Final Day of Instruction

I just finished my last class of the semester. I'm officially done with school. The only thing left is Finals' Week.

It's been busy the last week. Capstone courses all had their own projects and papers due, on top of work and several games of Homeworld 2(still super awesome despite its age, incredibly so).

Tomorrow, I'm going to watch Gladiator 2, or as they call it, Robin Hood.

I'll post again tomorrow or Saturday. Too tired for anything serious.

And I hope to the God(s) out there that they don't ban open carry in Kalifornia. Conceal carry is already hard enough to get(and freaking impossible if you're in LA).

Actually, it's pretty discriminatory. I wonder if we can make a case of it?

Guilty Concience

So I got home from school a few hours ago, to find my mother in a mood.

An Incident during her lunch has resulted me pulling Triela out of the safe and bringing her to Condition 3, leaning her next to the bed. She shall remain so for the next two weeks, even after I change and/or re-key all the external locks in the house.

Dammit.

As I approach The End...

Finals are coming, as is Summer. Haven't yet decided what to do, though I will definitely return to Taiwan. Beyond that, maybe a trip to Alaska, or Holland, or both, depending on how various friend's schedules work out.

For now, my immediate obstacle is labeled "Finals Week." And forget not that various final papers and projects that go with it.

This really is just a short post to remind me to keep this blog alive, but I find it necessary nonetheless.

In other news:

It's odd that I find very little in the mainstream media about the 2010 May Day violence. Especially since I saw some of it for myself. But here's a link for the uninformed. Be sure to watch the video. Before you dismiss it as ludicrous and pure Anti-Illegal Immigrant propaganda, I've actually seen one of those Pro-Revolucion fliers.

And to bring up an interesting thought: When there is a group of illegal aliens in one country supporting overthrow of that country's government through revolution, violent or otherwise, isn't that technically a war? I mean, invading soldiers are technically illegal aliens, are they not?

And before you call me some kind of bigot/racist:

A: I am a hyphenated American.
B: I work with illegal Mexicans all the damn time, but they pay taxes. (Seriously, they do. They also make an attempt to learn English.)
C: I understand the need for cheap labor, but I refuse to take the crime that goes with it. Immigration reform is needed, but general amnesty for a single color I cannot abide, especially since I know so many who have been waiting patiently through the legal process, yet will not benefit before those who hopped a fence.

Oh, and Iron Man 2 is being released this Friday. I'm going to watch it with some friends at 0001hrs. Joy.

Life and Adventure

Adventure.

I use this word a lot, as many people can attest. But I'm not sure they know what I mean when I use it. So I'm going to define it for ya'll.

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Adventure is experiencing life. It's excitement, discovery, and learning.

Adventure is something beyond the routine. Something to break up the monotony of life. It might not be fun. In fact, it could suck. It could end badly. You might die from it. Then again, it could be fun. It could be the time of your life. You could discover things you never knew about, and understand things you knew so little of.

Adventure could be as simple as a walk around the neighborhood, or as complex as a trip overseas. It could be as contrived as a drive to Target, or as exciting as skydiving.

Adventure is living life to the fullest. If someone offers you an opportunity to so something new, you take it. If you find yourself with the chance to do something different, you jump right on it. And you don't even need to go very far to do it.

Hell, you could have an adventure without leaving the house! (though that kind of adventure is best kept private.)

However, adventure is about more than just experiencing life. It's hardship, struggle, and pain.

Adventure is what makes you a man(or woman). It's the fight to move past entitlement, and into self-reliance. It's moving past the sheep-ple mentality, raising your head, and taking a long, objective look around you.

It's realizing that you have only one life. Understanding that you have but one chance to do it right.

And doing it right.

Girl stuck in splits

This is why you don't do the splits without someone at home.



And because I broke my last remaining tension wrench yesterday, I couldn't even pick the door. Luckily, the balcony door latch gave in after a couple upward shoves.

Ninja Edit: The video has been removed after girl threatened to sue. So if you really want to see it, you're going to have to come over.

So that's what I did today.

In other news:

I need more lock picks. And a plug spinner.

Kick-Ass

It seems like my prediction was right, as per Photo Summary 002. More essays in the works. This one took from 1700hrs to 2300hrs.

But enough about that.

Saturday was an exciting day.

In the morning I went with SuburbanDweller to pick up his birthday present from, a new(well, not new, considering the thing is over 50 years old) SKS. It's a Norinco with all matching parts.

In the afternoon, we went to explore a new trail I ran across while driving to a construction site.

At night, I went to watch Kick-Ass. Kick ass. Really. For a superhero(well, not super) movie with such silly costumes, it was awesome.

This morning I installed a garage door, though not by myself. It doesn't seem to be all that hard, but still took about 4 hours. I'm sure there's still much more I don't understand, but time will fix that problem.

In other news:

The new KFC Double Down is awesome. It wasn't near as greasy/oily as I thought it would be, though it was much more expensive than I had expected.

No serious news I care about enough to write about.

New Business

Life will be getting busier, it seems. Scattered between the usual confidence-crushing lectures and rants on my uselessness, Father has revealed that we will be starting a new business venture. In order to reduce the time I spend on frivolous activities(these include guns, exercise, backpacking, and, ironically, school), I have been asked(read: You're going to do this, and you're going to like it. Or you won't, but you're going to do it anyway.) to take part in our family's partnership with a new friend, a garage door installation and repair technician.

And if you haven't guessed it, this means that I will be spending the majority of what free time I still have(had) accompanying my new friend on his job, learning the trade.

I'll keep ya'll posted on this.

In other news

I've picked up a new Ruger Mk. III Hunter in stainless steel.
She looks kinda like this:

I've named her Jean

Jean has the most ridiculously complicated reassembly process I've ever had the misfortune to encounter. But after almost 2 hours of fiddling, I figured it out.

Also, this week, the soundtrack for the PlayStationNetwork game FLOWER was released on PSN. If you have a PS3, and you don't have FLOWER...GO DOWNLOAD IT RIGHT NOW! Here's a trailer, just to further convince you.

Itch

So I've got this itch.

No it's not a bug bite or anything. I've had it before; it's reoccurring.

And NO, it's not herpes or something equally disturbing.

It's an itch to get out of the freaking city and back into the wood. It's an itch that can only scratched with the tree bark(tree still attached) of an old oak, or by the sound of the river rushing by at night.

And you know I got it when I start staring at bushcraft gear for hours on the net.

I really want a small(2-3 inch blade length) scandi grind knife piggybacked to a larger(5-7 inch blade length) scandi grind chopper, complete with firesteel loop and sharpening stone pouch. All leather sheath.

A WoodBear or a Bark River set would be nice.

The sheath will need to be a custom job, unfortunately. And since the IRS literally left me with $3USD in my account, I won't have the moolah to place any kind of order in for several weeks, if not months.

As I have seen someone say/write:

Le Sigh.

In other news:

This is what happens when you run about doing unnecessary things. The US may not have had the best policy before, but it was a clear one. Nuclear, Biological, or Chemical, it didn't matter which one was used, the US considered them all equal as Weapons of Mass Destruction, and would retaliate in kind with WMDs. Being who we are, that meant Nuclear, since our stocks of Biological or Chemical weapons are not large nor readily deploy-able.

Classic example of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Oh, and the Greece Bailout may actually happen.

And this is why I neither have a credit card, nor play Farmville.

Last Spring Break of My Life

WARNING: SELF-PITY POST, but read the news below.


Thus it ends. I shall never have another Spring Break again.

I find it disappointing that I essentially worked through every Spring Break I've had in college. This previous week was no different. The only day(night) of leisure I had was a few rounds of beer pong with a few of my equally girl-less friends in a garage, whining about how girl-less we were. And that will be the best spring break memory I'll ever have.

I have not visited either of two Meccas of Spring Break (Cancun and Las Vegas), nor have I spent my recess anywhere else for the sake of leisure. I fear that this will become the pattern of my life, never going out and letting loose, even if given the opportunity. I fear that my mindset will prevent me from enjoying this life to its fullest, always calculating, always thinking, always measuring my options.

Even during sex, I'm planning out my day tomorrow. How sad is that?

In other news:

Can't this guy do anything right?! Saying that we won't use nukes in retaliation for chem or bio-warfare is like saying, well..."Why don't you guys attack us with chem or bio weapons? We won't shoot back, Scout's honor!" The US doesn't have the stockpiles of chem and bio weapons to retaliate against a large scale attack from said weapons. What we do have is nukes, and now we can't use them?!

Hell, what if some city/town gets attacked through bio-weps, and everyone's dead, but we need to sterilize the place. The only thing to do it with is a nuke(at least to do it thoroughly), but hey, no we can't use those. We're going to need the guys in moonsuits and flamethrowers to walk on in and burn everything, and hope we kill all the germs.

Oh, and you know that the US has gone to the pits when the Russians lecture us about capitalism, and we can't refute it.

April Fools'

I've never much liked this day. It confuses the crap out of me. IMs from confused people lead to further confusion. So many plausible things supposedly happen, then are refuted.

Stop this nonsense!

In other news:

Spring Break has become a 50hr+ work week. Joy.

Will probably be going to Steamers tomorrow with SuburbanDweller.