My history professor has a sick sense of humor. He handed back our exams Friday. I thought I did pretty well, as did several others. We get our papers only to see 67 (or 49 or other low number). WTF? After reading through the exam and looking at how much each question was worth and how many points were received did we realize that there were only 67 points possible. 100% on the first exam! Overpreparing has it merits….

First philosophy exam was later that same afternoon. There were six philosophers split into three groups (variants). Each person got one of the three variants to write about. We had to describe their moral philosophies, compare them to a person of our choice, and give our own personal opinion. I drew Immanuel Kant and David Hume and ended up with a 10+ (/10 pts possible). My semester is off to a pretty good start.

Afterwards we went to the Coffee Garden. Daniel played chess while I played around online. He went outside for a bit and saw that there were Sundance movies screening at the movie theater next door. He came back in and asked me if I wanted to get in the waiting list line. So we did, and found out that the movie was the most talked about one of the festival, Hounddog. We got to the front of the line and waited anxiously to find out if there were any seats left. It turned out that there were two more. The couple behind us had tickets to a later screening of a different film (as in guaranteed seats..$30-35 each) and offered to give them to us if we’d let them ahead of us. We declined and went in. Unfortunately the two seats weren’t together.

The movie was awesome. I found it to be a really honest portrayal of rape and the effects it can have on a person. Loss of innocence and such. I cried during several parts. So did most of the people around me. Contrary to popular belief, it is NOT child pornography. I’ve found that most of the people who are against it and saying negative things haven’t even seen it. Utah’s attorney general saw it for himself and said that it breaks no laws. I also think that Dakota Fanning has a really nice voice for someone who had never sang before filming the movie. Not really technically perfect, but beautiful in the emotion it conveyed, if that makes sense. If you get the chance to see it, I highly recommend it. The screening I saw was the last time it was being played at the festival and the last ever until it gets bought.
Afterwards, we got to meet the director and talk to her. It was really awesome. I got her autograph too.

Daniel and I went to the anti-war event at the library Saturday that was held to coincide with the protest in D.C. Speaking of the D.C. protest, SLC’s awesome mayor, Rocky Anderson, was a speaker at it. First was a panel comprised of several war veterans (both Iraq and Vietnam), authors, professors, and other activists. I have video of several of the speeches on my camera. I’ll upload them later.

After the panel, I Know I’m Not Alone, a documentary by a musician who went into Iraq and Israel was screened. I highly recommend this one as well. It shows that the Iraqis and Palestinians are human as well. They are just like us in so many ways. Several people came to the conclusion, and I agree, that when we make war on Iraq, we are making war on ourselves.

The Roasting Company is closing and my computer’s battery is dying so I must end for the present….

…I guess I should figure out what I want to be. My long-term dream is to do something with Psychology, but that requires a master’s and is at least 4-5 years away. I think being a history professor would be pretty cool as well, but there’s the problem of my fear of public speaking and the fact that it also requires a master’s in history which would be 3-5+ years away.

This post inspired another possibility I had temporarily dismissed after having problems finding information about job opportunities. What is it? The natural career choice for a self-professed bibliophile of course: working at the library/a bookstore. I should check into this further. I find this possibility quite intriguing. It would also be quite convenient: the closest branch (which is the main branch, aka architectural wonder of Salt Lake City…Google it…) and two local bookstores (Sam Weller’s and Ken Sanders Rare Books) are just a short Trax (train) ride away. If I wanted to do the big retail store thing, Barnes and Noble has a location in Sugarhouse (short bus ride).

It sounds very do-able. The possibility is quite exciting.

I also got my hair cut today for the first time in a very long time. Its about shoulder-length and in layers. It feels much lighter and should be much easier to deal with. My only complaint is that the bangs are a little shorter than I’d prefer them to be, but it won’t take long for them to grow out to where I want them. At least they aren’t nearly covering my eyes anymore. I was starting to look like Cousin It with darker hair when they weren’t pushed to the side. -.- I might take a picture or two to post later.

Edit: I finally typed (and uploaded) the so-called “Lost Review” of Sillyish.org. It can be found here. Must study for Philosophy exam now….

Also, original or extra crispy?

I’m feeling just a little lot brain dead at the moment. My first history exam was today and I stayed up a lot later than I should have overpreparing for it. I suppose it was worth it because I’m pretty sure I aced it. I’m running on about four and a half hours of sleep right now. Having yoga first thing this morning didn’t help matters much. It was too relaxing!

Four hours after the end of my last class and I’m still on campus, bumming around online on the school’s Internet Explorer only computers. I was on one equipped with IE7 earlier today and was not impressed. Its tabbed browsing is pretty sucky.

The Philosophy class I’m taking this semester, Personal Ethics, seems like it’ll be pretty interesting. At the beginning of the semester the professor gave a list of ten issues (including abortion, animal rights, and war) and told each of us to pick the seven we were most interested in. Everyone who picked a certain issue, regardless of their position on it was put on a team together and accordingly each person is on seven teams. Each person on the team will research a different aspect of the issue and will present their report to the class. We’ll do the same thing for every issue we’ll be covering this semester. So essentially the students will be teaching the class instead of the professor. The first topic is abortion. I get to talk about extremists on both ends of the spectrum. I think I’ll enjoy it more than just searching for statistics and such. My only problem is having to present to the class. It’s a small group, but smaller groups=larger chances of getting really nervous and messing up.

Issues with the hostee are still not resolved. I have not received any response. This is quite annoying. I feel bad about completely deleting her though so I’ve been delaying it. ….I’m too nice sometimes.

To those impatient ones looking for pages that don’t yet exist, what you seek is coming soon. I just hope that it is up to standards.

Or so one random person said at the library last week. Feel free to debate the accuracy or inaccuracy of that statement amongst yourselves and perhaps comment about it if you feel so inclined, but that’s not what this post is about.

It snowed today! Not an unusual occurrence since this has happened several times this winter. It is awesome, however, because it cleared the air. I live in Salt Lake City, which sits on an ancient lake bed almost completely surrounded by mountains. A geographical bowl of sorts. During the winter, if there are no snowstorms for awhile, the pollution builds up and forms a layer over the valley causing a temperature inversion. This means that it’s much colder below the layer than in the mountains above it. This also causes the quality of the air to drop to a point where it can (and had, until today) become nearly unbearable. Once a storm comes in, the layer dissipates and the air clears for a few days.

I did several updates around the site, most notably in the Library section. It’s slightly more organized and I added two of my three fan fictions. The third along with some of my other writing (including some that are quite weird, even for me), will be coming soon.

Also, I found the notebook containing the Sillyish review I did several months ago. It was the first and last handwritten review I’ve ever done. It seems kind of a waste as far as a helpful critique goes since the layout of the site has changed several times and most of the content reviewed is no longer online. But it seems much more of a waste to leave it to rot in the “Chronicles of the Random and Pixelated #2″ (there is no #1) as I have named that particular marble book, so I’ll type it up (possibly in it’s original, unedited form) and add it under the title “The Lost Review” within the next few days.

I received an email today concerning one of my hostees. Some rather serious allegations were leveled. As in violations of both my rules for hosting and my host’s terms of service. I sent an email to the hostee. Now it’s time to just wait and see what happens. Hopefully it resolves itself fairly quickly without virtual bloodshed. If nothing happens by tomorow afternoon (as of this Saturday edit, I haven’t received a response), I plan to drop the hostee.

I think I’ve been a bit too trusting and not as cautious as I should be when it comes to selecting hostees. I received an email not long after accepting one of my hostees. It contained a warning about said hostee’s supposedly stalkerish tendencies among other things. I wasn’t sure what to do, if anything. So I did the passive thing, which was nothing.

I regret that now, but I’m not sure what I could’ve done differently…..