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Hint: If a professor calls his 97-question multiple-choice test "multiple guess"...you know he's a good one to keep around.
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Hint: If a professor calls his 97-question multiple-choice test "multiple guess"...you know he's a good one to keep around.
"A note: Optical mice don't need mouse pads. The computer lab mouse pads are simply in the way, making the mice move more slowly. Though I see where you might be concerned that the finish on the desks will be worn away, I doubt that it will be worn off by a mere bit of mouse-moving. Further, the mouse pads that are currently available are dirty, with grime often embedded in them, hence users are forced to try to avoid touching them if possible.
On another topic, I and many others would appreciate it if you'd configure your lab web browsing software, namely Internet Explorer and Netscape, not to save AutoComplete data—the settings on most of the lab computers default to saving this data, which can include personal information like passwords, PINs, and usernames. This is a real danger to people's privacy, especially considering that anyone can install programs on these machines to log keystrokes or reap a harvest of AutoComplete data. Sure, the programs will later be found and deleted, but the distinct possibility still exists that unwitting students will end up having their personal data stolen.
Every time I use a Web browser on one of these computers, I make sure that AutoComplete is turned off and that the history and cookies caches are cleared. That may seem absurd, but I don't like the idea that my personal information could be accessible to others on these machines. You might say, "Well, if you don't trust the technology, don't use the machines." Yet when one is on campus, 15 to 30 mins away from a dorm or apartment, these machines are the only available option. You could also say, "Why don't you just get a laptop?" Not everyone, however, is able to afford the luxury of portable computing power. This lab should be a convenience to students, but instead it becomes a liability and a hassle when the security-conscious have to spend extra time to ensure that their personal information is secure."
I realize that it's an incomplete argument, and probably makes me sound like one of those cloistered computer geeks who won't touch doorknobs without Kleenex wrapped around their hands, yet something needed to be said about both of those issues. I think simply changing the default settings on IE to not save AutoComplete data would go a long way towards keeping passwords, PINs, etc. secure.
After that, I was disappointed because I couldn't hang out with this guy again, as he had flying class. I was walking near the building on campus where the military stuff was and I saw someone I thought was him fly overhead, turn, hover a second with the cockpit facing me, then fly on in to land behind or on top of the building somewhere. I decided for some reason to go into the building, and as I entered I saw this class of cadets or students training in this cool combat simulation, in this dark room with a couple of laser guns. I suppose it was really just like laser tag, except that apparently they were really blasting students to the moon so they could do this combat simulation under real conditions there. It still took place in this black set of tunnels and rooms, just on the actual moon.
I got the impression that it was a first exercise of sorts for this class, so I decided to ask one of the T-shirted instructors whether I could procure a laser gun or two, i.e. the "proper equipment", as I put it when speaking to them, saying that I'd just arrived late and hadn't gotten my equipment for the game yet. I suppose it was like Battle School in the Ender's series, albeit with people of college age. They looked at me skeptically, then just shook their heads and started getting me stuff. They piled things into my arms—a small white blanket, a bright green pillow, a coil of black cable or wire, a bunch of black plastic items—and I protested that I didn't really need all this stuff, I just needed a laser gun so I could catch up and go with the last group out to train in the moon lab. One of the other instructors who was piling stuff into my arms replied, "Yeah, well, we want to just get it all out of the way now, you shouldn't really even get all this until the ceremony, but..." and trailed off, implying either that since I wasn't part of the class, I shouldn't be getting it anyway, and they knew it, or that they'd simply been giving everyone stuff before the ceremony anyway, or that I'd missed the ceremony and would have to be in one of my own later.
I took all that and set most of it aside, asking one of the instructors still standing around to help me out, show me the ropes, so to speak, as far as working the laser guns was concerned. The instructor seemed friendly enough, though somewhat puzzled by why I hadn't learned this yet—I think he figured I was just behind in the class. So he turned on the machine that provided power for the guns through a little attached cable. (In the space combat situation, that power was provided by clip-on boxes that people slipped into their pockets backwards like cellphones, with the clip sticking out over the top of the pocket.) I messed with the laser wand that was attached to the machine, trying to figure out what the various buttons marked, in grey on black, "M," "U," and various other letter and number combinations actually did. I managed to create a constellation of dots like light shined through a colander, only in red, and eventually produced a fine-tuned dot of red. I thought it was counterproductive, looking at some of the things other students were using, to have a red dot that blinked really fast on one's own face as one looked through the sight, seeing as that would make me quite visible to others... I glanced at the computer monitor next to the area's console, which had a lot of blue, green, and white on it and something about the Girl Scouts. I get it, I thought, it was some joint project between the military and the Girl Scouts.
After that I kind of gave up, figuring I'd just make it up as I went along in combat, just pushing random buttons on my gun like I do in video games I haven't read the instructions for...I glanced at the other kind of laser, hooked to an identical machine (these machines were about the size of old-time arcade game consoles, rather tall, black, and hulking—they provided a lot more power, continuous power, to the lasers compared to the little clip-on power packs we'd use in combat practice) next to the first one, that shined with a white little beam, which ostensibly was a good bit more cutting and powerful. When I'd walked into the place at first and seen all these students swarming around doing various training things, I'd watched some guy hit another guy with one of those in an ankle, and he crumpled to the ground, with others looking on approvingly. I didn't touch that, though, figuring I'd have enough trouble just getting through that combat situation, if they even let me do the combat situation, without having had the training the rest of them obviously did. I felt out of the loop, though I knew most of these people went here, to WU, so I figured I knew at least some of them, and they didn't seem unfriendly. I figured I couldn't be that behind, since it wasn't much past the beginning of the semester.
Then, though, as I looked through my laundry basket of supplies, I couldn't even find my gun; apparently they'd grabbed one off of a surplus shelf and it didn't look like the other people's sleek laser wand guns, it was actually shaped like a gun, I found when I eventually dug it out, and had odd little labels on the side. I was sitting there, despairing, when my roommate and a friend of hers came up and looked at me sitting there between surplus materials shelves on the ground, desperately digging through the pile of black plastic crap the instructors had shoved at me, and just started heaping scorn on my head, saying I wasn't doing what I was supposed to be doing, I wasn't good enough to be there, where did I get off trying to get into the program without even having had the training, they'd trained for however long to get there, and did I even care about that? At that point I was crying, frustrated, and just yelled at them, saying, No, I wasn't sure I wanted to keep doing it, I wasn't trying to do anything wrong, it just looked like a lot of fun and I wanted to try it, since she and others I knew were involved with it, and that I knew I was behind, but that it'd be hella nice if they'd just forgive me that and let me actually get on with what I was trying to do. I couldn't help it that they'd given me this huge basket full of identical-looking things...
That was right about when the phone rang in real life. No one picked it up after two rings, so I grabbed it, only to have whoever it was hang up. Then I settled back into bed to try and imprint this dream on my mind, going back over what'd happened, and the phone rang again...
That song's tone is so jubilant—I must be feeling at least a little on top of things if I've gotten it in my head. The song lyrics I put in posts are either ones that come into my head independently of conscious thought or that I think are particularly illustrative of my mood and/or some thought I'm attempting to explain. Hence there is a reason for all the lyrics—in unconscious times like these, sometimes those lyrics and thoughts that come to mind unbidden are my only link to my self. It's becoming obvious, though, that my taste in music pretty much stopped evolving beyond when I first started listening to radio in the mid-'90s—I can include slightly "harder" sounds among my preferences now, but for the most part, I'm already becoming anachronistic...
It occurred to me last night as I was patching together a paper that catchy phrasing and sentence structures are coming easily to me again. Apparently all the English-oriented things I'm doing are actually having an effect, and I'm actually improving in a subtle but steady fashion. Metaphors and analogies are coming to mind easily, too—yesterday, unbidden, the image of Arnold Schwarzenegger as a big, bounding golden retriever came to me, reflecting that large, panting mouth, his nose and cheekbones, and all that hair.
I envision this blog, you know, much as I envision my computer's hard drive: I see it all as a sea, a fish tank, a big liquid box full of things floating in suspension, words, essays, phone numbers, applications, and programs that do various things all suspended in this crystalline liquid. In the case of my computer, I almost envision the liquid as existing somewhere directly beyond the surface of the "desktop," back in the monitor itself, though I know that's impossible in the case of my PC. Perhaps Apple had a similar intuition when it housed all the components of its first computers (and, more recently, iMacs) within the same chassis.
I miss things. I retain a childish wish that everything would just work itself out—despite what y'all may think, nothing, as of yet, is set in stone.
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Edit: The main op replied soon thereafter, and changed the limit. Rock on.
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Tell me—does this look like a blog created by an INTJ? (Despite the fact that my question uses a familiar construction that generally seems to call for the response, "No," I'm really just looking for you to say, "Yes, you're really one of your type. You are a true mastermind genius. Good job.")