The Creeps

I like to get lost in my thoughts. Some places are better for that than others, walking somewhere, in the shower, brushing my teeth and in lecture are my favorite places to get lost. Sometimes I reflect on the shit going on in my life and other times I am just completely silly, even in my own head. While I was brushing my teeth the other day I thought about what I would look like with no skin at all, or even clear skin. Then as I finished brushing and reached for the floss (yeah I floss after I brush, I know there are two schools of thought on when to floss, this is just how I do it) I looked at my teeth and started thinking about my skull and what it looks like. I started moving my mouth around and looked in to see what it might look like as just a skull. I was indeed freaked out by what my brain conjured up. I hope I never have to see what just my skull looks like, but who knows, maybe one day there will be a way to have clear skin and I can watch my diaphragm raise and lower with each breath. Part of me thinks it would be cool, the other part thinks it would be creepy. Yeah definitely creepy.

Preachy College Student

Yesterday the University celebrated Cal Day, which is not actually significant of any event in Cal's history, it is placed when there's about four weeks remaining in the semester. The day is geared mostly towards prospective students fumbling between Cal or any other school. Some seniors earned a full ride scholarship to a different school or they are trying to choose between Cal and the "school across the bay" (we win there, our clock tower is 22 feet taller--size does matter.) The University pulls out all the stops and shows how amazing the campus can be. Each department has a booth, every club is handing out some kind of propaganda, and the band is playing fight song after fight song. If you like crowds and enjoy overly spirited college students, this day is for you.

My family, namely, my mom and little sister, came to visit me for the first time since I started my college life. They met some of my coworkers and saw just how crazy Sproul Plaza is. We walked around getting free stuff from every booth. Mom, often out of guilt, would strike up conversations to make it appear she was actually interested in what they had to say. Needless to say she knows about as much as I do about Mediterranean anthropology. The people working the booths were either really dumb and believed in our interest or they were just really enthusiastic about their field. Probably both.

On another part of campus were about eight booths devoted to energy and resource sustainability. One of the booths offered a ribbon for making a sustainability pledge, for paper, energy, water and transportation. My sister made a paper pledge to use the backsides of used paper whenever possible and Mom made a water pledge to shut off the water when she brushes her teeth in the evening. I took the easy way out, I made a transportation pledge to use modes of transportation other than a car at least once a week. The last time I drove was spring break and the time before that was when I came home in the beginning of March. Like I said, the easy way out.

Even before the pledges, I have always felt guilty whenever I used or wasted resources. I always try to be environmentally friendly and conscious, but I often feel that the small number of people that are don't offset those that are not. I would like to hope that one day we can use purely solar or wind power and not have to worry about global warming or gas prices above $4 a gallon. There are four minutes left of (global) Earth Day 2007. What is your pledge going to be?

Things I Like

Life can be depressing and stressful, it doesn't help when these facets of life happen at the same time. With two weeks remaining in the academic semester and finals season approaching, I can feel the weight of college life settling firmly on my shoulders. It's times like these I like to point out the things in life that make me happy and, if I can, I would like to share them with you.

In no particular order:

1) Waking up with him next to me 2) New music 3) Sleeping straight through the night 4) Extra caramel/chocolate on top of whipped cream 5) Falling asleep to the sound of the rain against the window 6) Visitors from back home 7) New products from Apple 8) Laughing for 45 minutes because of something stupid my sister said 9) Finishing a test/paper early 10) Getting an A on said test/paper 11) Large paychecks 12) Sleeping in freshly washed linens 13) Bush's falling approval rating 14) Going to the top of the Campanile and seeing the Golden Gate Bridge 15) When my iPod plays songs that seem to capture my mood perfectly 16) Long car rides with a friend 17) even longer walks with a friend 18) Wearing scarves 19) Feeling good in my favorite pair of jeans 20) 8:00 class being cancelled 21) A clean shave 22) Receiving a letter or postcard from someone I haven't seen in awhile 23) Not knowing where my roommates are 24) A cup of tea before bed 25) Working up a sweat while playing tennis 26) Free food 27) Never wanting to put a book down 28) Making inside jokes 29) Dressing up 30) Having no new facial blemishes 31) Smily faces in my coffee 32) My team winning 33) Finding grammatical/spelling errors in the conservative magazine on campus 34) Getting the last maple nut scone 35) The big stores in San Francisco 36) Quoting "Scrubs" with Angie 37) Finding Nemo 38) Waking up to a 3AM phone call from a friend 39) Having more money in my bank account than I thought 40) The campanile at night 41) Sparklers on holidays 42) Not dozing off in class 43) Helping people with computer trouble 44) AAPL going up 45) MSFT going down 46) Buying people stuff with my meal points 47) Tax returns 48) Green initiatives 49) Drag shows 50) "Meeting" famous people 51) Kissing 52) Earning my way to the top 53) Early Summer 54) People seeking my help and being able to help them 55) Art 56) Silence 57) Wikipedia's random page button 58) Being genuinely interested in a lecture 59) Knowing what to say at the right time 60) You... yes, you!

Scorns of Time 2.0

If you've checked my blog within the past five days or so you would have realized Scorns of Time has a brand new look with "new features". A few things are responsible for the new look: (1) blogger recommending I switch to their new templates (2) I needed something else to help me procrastinate and (3) I thought the old satanic look didn't fit me too well. Even though there are a lot more "elements" now, the page looks cleaner and more aesthetic. I also hope the new look motivates me to update more frequently and perhaps draw more readers. Maybe all the black/red [edit: apparently the previous look was not black/red as I previously had thought, all I know is that it was dark and I wanted something a little lighter] scared potential readers away... I guess I will never know. Before I go into my normal "life contemplating" babel, let me walk you through the new "features" of my site.

The first thing you'll notice is the annoying "navbar" at the top is gone. I couldn't stand looking at it whenever I visited my page, it chopped off the title, a no-no. My brief profile also finds itself on the new page, incase you forget just who I am and possibly what I look like. Probably the newest and most exciting thing (to me at least) about the new page is my "song of the moment" where I feature a song that I am either listening to, currently have on repeat, or feel explains my life situation at the moment. The current "Bob Dylan" choice was chosen because well, the page has changed. I know, really original. If the song is featured it means I own a digital copy of it and if you are ever curious about it feel free to contact me and perhaps I can arrange for us to "experience" it together. In case you're wondering why it is not called "The Song of the Day", it is because that requires I come up with a new song and actually update my page daily which, as we know, I cannot accomplish. Recent posts are also archived in a nice hierarchal style that gives the appearance of neatness with little drop down triangles. In a white box I have my most frequently visited websites, the first group are blogs and the second group is just an alphabetical listing of websites I visit multiple times a day. At the very bottom of the page features a newsreel of news headlines for keywords of my choice. All praise web 2.0. Well, that's the rundown of my new layout. Any questions? comments? other? whatever.

I don't want to go to deep into my life situation right now, it's too hectic. I will however state that my roommate discovered he could talk to random people on the internet when he plays his stupid shoot 'em up game. As if his incessant clicking at 2:00am wasn't enough, I now have to hear him (loudly) praise anonymous people about how they successfully completed a mission while still maintaining enough geekiness to get them into the Star Trek convention for free, by the way, that convention would probably the only time he left the room and socialized with people face-to-face. I should stop, I am sure his friends are wonderful cyborgs... I mean people.

Best Friends, New Places, Great Times

One week back from spring break and I am already feeling the stress from the closing of the semester. This upcoming week I have three presentations, a small research assignment, an 18 page paper to start, and a write-up to complete... all before Wednesday. I have a feeling my sleep pattern will suffer the next few days. As a matter of fact this week's crazy schedule started just a few hours ago with the great homo history hunt in San Francisco for my alternative sexuality class where me and three other classmates romped around the city looking for landmarks in queer culture. Needless to say, I am exhausted.

Fortunately, I got a small break from reality when the two best people I know decided to take a few days out of their spring break to visit Jena and me. Kasey and Katie arrived in Berkeley early Thursday afternoon and we spent the time laughing and loving the fact that we were all together again. Even though it was only a week since I saw them last, it feels like it was a week too long. We consumed Peet's coffee, walked around Berkeley, spent hours talking with Peet's Coffee in hand, froze in San Francisco, and watched emotionally scarring "films". Did I mention, we consumed Peet's coffee?

Even though we were out of our natural environment (the AV) nothing about us together felt unnatural. The dynamic transferred seamlessly past the 400 miles and I had a wonderful vacation from the stressful reality I currently live. The saddest part of the vacation was before falling asleep when I realized they would be leaving and I would be without them in close proximity. It may be counter-intuitive, but even though I don't see them often, I feel like it's normal to be with them. Before I get all teary-eyed just writing this I will post some pictures of the trip and let me say thanks. I have an amazing summer ahead of me.


Kasey and Me outside the Ferry Building



Katie and Jena on BART



Kasey and Me on BART




I wish I had a group shot.

stress induced coma

It's been about two an a half weeks since my last blog. It's not that I have nothing to write about, I feel I have nothing important to say. After all I have maybe four loyal readers I don't want to disappoint by writing about something trivial (I guess it's ok to break the fourth wall in blogs).

For me, spring break started about a week ago when I came home late Thursday evening. This was the most I ever felt a break a was necessary. It wasn't the college spring break MTV conditions you to believe spring break it like, however. I spent a wonderful weekend in San Diego, got a little sick Monday, went to Long Beach to visit my best friends Tuesday and Wednesday and since I have been back I have been trying to enjoy my last few days before having to head back up to Berkeley where the month of April literally has me in a death grip. I have five presentations in three different classes, two papers, two field trips (one of which is overnight that I am in no way, shape or form looking forward to) and a midterm. Unfortunately these things couldn't have been scheduled prior to spring break, but whatever.

At the end of any trip home I get the same feeling. It's like nervous mixed with sad and a liberal pinch of excitement. I feel like maybe I didn't get out of spring break what I had hoped. Or maybe I just feel overwhelmed because I know I have a handful of crap to do before I can start summer. Getting an email from one of my instructors reminding me of a small assignment due next Tuesday certainly doesn't help. Or I just don't want to pack all the stuff I brought here because I am just that lazy. I am excited to go back to Berkeley though. To have my routine back. It's weird how something so new can now feel so comfortable that you're halfway calling it "home". I think a lot of my feelings stem from the fact I look too far forward. I know I will go seven weeks without seeing certain people so when I do see them I feel like it has to be something ridiculously special. Even though the thing that makes these people so special is that I enjoy doing nothing for the activity of choice.

I have less than seven weeks until my last final. It's been eleven since the middle of January when I started what I then called "the slowest semester ever". I hope that April allows me to get everything done with minimal stress levels (haha, yeah, right) but fast enough so all that crap just gets over with. It will probably be how it always is, one day at a time then I'll look at a calendar and say to myself "oh, it's the 30th already?"

sunglasses and flipflops

It's that time of year again. The days are getting longer, the nights are getting warmer, and people are trading scarves for sunscreen. The azure sky is complimented by the white flowers sprinkled on the lawn. Frisbees are threatening to smack us in the face and the squirrels are creeping around looking for the nuts they buried months before. Books and papers are being ignored for an afternoon basking in the sun and class time is being taken up for midterm reviews...

Wait a minute, midterms ‽ And all this time I thought summer was just around the corner. The past two weeks have been characterized by perfect bay area weather. I chose to wear shorts yesterday, not just because all my pants were dirty, but because the weather told me to. A few warm days and the populous here acts as if summer in a week away. I too fell into this mind trap. I felt as though there wasn't a care in the world and that soon I will be able to spend my days in sunglasses and shorts sipping lemonade on the porch perusing whatever smut I felt like. Then reality hits when I step back inside and look at the Monet calendar by my desk. It's the middle of March, memories of last winter break are closer than summer.

I am lucky to be less than two weeks away from spring break, but the general apathetic attitude of my fellow university students wants it to be summer already. I finished my first round of midterms last week and only have a short paper due before spring break. As I said in the previous blog I am just going through the motions until spring break happens to find its way here. It doesn't help that daylight savings time makes it feel like I should be calling my friends as soon as it gets dark so we can go out to Barnes & Noble and drink frappuccinos until the sun rises. The world tells me summer is here, but my mind reminds me it's a week until just the first day of spring. I don't want to go to classes at all, I just want to turn in my papers and go out and do youthful irresponsible things. Incase anyone is wondering, I have 66 more days until my summer officially begins. Damn it.

Radical Apathy

Today in class I experienced what is best described as "vegging out". It was the last class of the day at 12:30 and I already had two prior, but at this point I was done with listening and trying to comprehend the soil depth and moisture content of the Californian mixed Evergreen forests. I plopped my butt in the classroom seat and waited for the ninety minutes to pass. I started daydreaming and thinking about life. I thought about how I got to where I was, from high school back to kindergarten. I played a game with myself trying to come up with a memory for every class I have ever been in. I succeeded in remembering the time I first played Oregon Trail or when I earned the coveted title "Berry Important Person" in kindergarten. I thought about the past and the distant past and I even thought about how I would never get these ninety minutes back.

This is the first time this semester where I felt apathy towards a subject or lecture. I couldn't even trick myself into being interested in the subject. I tried with the pictures of baby trees even mumbling under my breath "how cute". It's not just that it was boring, but I felt like I was just done with it. This is the same class I had a midterm last Thursday that I probably performed quite poorly. Eventually the hour and a half passed and I started walking to work when I actually saved a small dog from being ran over by what I assumed to be a crazy nobel prize winner (as they are the only ones with parking spots on campus.

The past seven and a half weeks have gone by slowly, but looking back it actually has been a lot faster than I expected. Everything has settled in and everyday goes by as expected. Nothing too exciting, but quite predictable. It's all mundane, the bright side is I am currently fifteen days away from spring break and I think I can hold out from going completely crazy until then.

101 Things

In response to Angie's "100 Things" I posted "101 Things" because I like showing her up.

1) My best friend walks on four legs. 2) I wish I could memorize things easily. 3) My high school home life was considerably different than before. 4) I like getting awakened by a phone call from a friend in the middle of the night. 5) I hate the sun. 6) I only have enough testosterone to grow hair below my waist. 7) I still feel like it's too much. 8) I shower longer than any boy should. 9) The first book I ever wanted was a thesaurus. 10) I don't understand religious fanaticism. 11) I believe killing someone is wrong. 12) I have Apple's "Think different" manifesto memorized. 13) I like stability. 14) But day to day stuff bores me quickly. 15) I am afraid of looking in a mirror. 16) Sometimes I think my life is just a dream and I will wake up 2 years old in a crib. 17) Sometimes that sounds nice. 18) I'm generally a realist 19) Laughter is my defense mechanism. 20) I can't laugh alone. 21) I spend three years of high school to get approval from one girl. 22) One day it just stopped. 23) I feel best about myself after a shower in my underwear. 24) I am an internet addict. 25) I'm not seeking to have that fixed. 26) I hold others on a pedestal because sometimes I think so low about myself. 27) Nothing makes me want to do something more than when I am told not to do it. 28) The first thing I said when my sister was born was "put her back". 29) I'm glad they didn't. 30) My eating habits suck. 31) Same to my exercising habits. 32) I want the power of the written word. 33) I believe in the pursuit of happiness. 34) I trust in the good of human nature. 35) I'd rather be comfortable and happy then rich and lonely. 36) I still have nightmares about high school. 37) Plants fascinate me. 38) I laugh at stupid stuff. 39) I feel like I don't have a creative bone in my body. 40) I listen to unrequited love songs. 41) Apple is my vice. 42) I had a 66% chance for an STD. 43) It was a UTI. 44) I've never even had sex. 45) I am capable of being a doctor. 46) The work overwhelms me. 47) I can walk with my iPod for miles. 48) As a vegetarian the food I miss most would be my mother's brisket. 49) I like the smell of fabric softener. 50) My sister used to dress me up in her clothes. 51) I didn't mind; I got to play with her. 52) I think my hair is one of my best physical attributes. 53) I don't know what I can offer the world. 54) I have a drinking problem, I have to have over 64 ounces of water a day. 55) Tea is comforting. 56) I have high standards for workmanship. 57) Aesthetics are important to me. 58) If I had one wish it would be the ability to fly. 59) Overcast days make me happy. 60) I went through a 2 year Gilligan's Island phase. 61) I am scared of drugs. 62) I enjoy being in solitude. 63) My deadly sin is envy. 64) I love going places with my friends. 65) I also love just sitting and talking with them. 66) Without peanut butter and the salad bar I wouldn't eat much at my dining commons. 67) I like flying. 68) I hate airport security. 69) More people call me their friend than I call them mine. 70) If you are my friend I will fight hard to keep you. 71) MTV never interested me. 72) I feel like I can define childhood and adulthood. 73) Still don't know where that puts me. 74) I like the holidays. 75) I can't go a week without cleaning my sheets. 76). I love feeling loved. 77) I consider a B+ good. 78) In high school that would have devastated me . 79) My sister makes me laugh harder than anyone else. 79) I'm an environmentalist. 80) Solar power is so obvious that my hometown wont even consider it. 81) I hate feeling like the world is going on without me. 82) I like falling asleep to the sounds of the rain. 83) I am proud to be a Mac user. 84) I read 'Foxtrot' religiously. 85)I am sure education can fix the problems of the world. 86) I am very emotionally sensitive. 87) I find almost everything symbolic. 88) That turns into a problem. 89) Thinking of a day without a shower scares me. 90) I hate the way I look naked. 91) In middle school I wore a white polo shirt everyday--by choice. 92) I think the bible is just stories. 93) I like to tackle conflicts head on. 94) In 19 years I still haven't learned how to study. 95) I still feel like I need my mommy. 96) I believe in karma 97) Karma sucks. 98) I turn red really easily. 99) I am a good listener. 100) I want to invent something. 101) Education, justice, and family are my greatest values.

from the soap box

I'm starting to doubt human nature. My entire life I assumed people were born good and that they want to do good for other people. My life, despite all of my complaining, is quite good. I have a family that supports me and money in a bank account. I have a roof over my head and I know I will eat everyday (of course ruling out Yom Kippur). What just irks me is the urban homeless population. I am not bothered so much by homeless people in general, I am bothered by the lack of interest in the seemingly obvious problem facing society. In the most advanced cities in the world we cannot solve a problem that seems solvable. The problem is we all live in our own small selfish bubbles. I will be first to admit I am guilty of it, but I think as a society we must break through our bubbles and help fellow members of the human race.

I am supposed to be attending a University with some of the most brilliant minds in the country. The people who of UC Berkeley invented the atom bomb, helped to start what is now the internet, and created the anti-proton (whatever the hell that is). What I am trying to get at is these same people can't seem to come up with a way to help their fellow residents. We all seem to live in this "UC bubble", once we're on campus we care about our grades and our research and once we're off campus we care about what happens in this week's episode of Grey's Anatomy.

It's depressing to see people without homes on the streets of a city known by its progressive values, yet it has one of the highest rates of homelessness within the city limits. I don't have a solution for the problem, but I want to help find one. I want people to know they can get a meal and medical care without having to ask strangers for spare change while smiling through the gaps in their teeth. I still believe in the power of the goodness of human nature. People are and can be good. We just need to stop being silent and open our eyes to problems bigger than wardrobe malfunctions and celebrities' shaved heads.

My Philosophy

The most important thing in the world is a person's happiness, whether it be your own or someone else's. I believe that everyone has the right to be completely happy with every aspect of their life and if they can find it they should strive hard to keep it. I deserve to be happy with my environment, my school, my choice of friends, and my relationships.

There isn't anything in the universe that knows me better than me and I know what makes me happy. How do I know what I know? I wont go into epistemology right now (that was last semester) but I will say that through experience I know what's best for my 19 year old life. I could be considered naïve, but isn't that what life is all about? Taking risks because you believe something to be right and then learning that it wasn't necessarily the best thing for you. I know that's kind of what I am going through right now.

Let's look at where I am right now: UC Berkeley. Great school, intelligent people, wonderful geography, and on the cutting edge of academia. It has a great name. Who doesn't know the prestige of the University? But where does that leave me? The past four years of my life were all about working towards this goal, not Berkeley, but prestige. The recognition by my peers of my hard work was something I thought I wanted, something I thought would make me happy. Complete rubbish. Since August I have been weighing my thoughts on Berkeley, whether it was the right decision for me. I still haven't come to a conclusion yet, but it doesn't look too good in for the University. As great as it is here, I don't think it is for me. The people, the professors, and the environment.

I still don't know what will make me completely happy right now, that's something for me to find out in time. What's great is now I know what seemingly does not make me happy. I don't have a plan for next semester yet, so far I have no idea if they even include Berkeley. I love learning and I will always remain a student. I know I could always withdraw from the University for as long as I need to and, if necessary, enroll in courses at AVC and decide what to do from there, whether it's going back to Cal or transferring to a university that might make me happier. I do know this, I will finish my semester here in Berkeley and along the way I will open doors and research all of the different opportunities I have. Maybe I'll switch into a University I like for next fall.

Who cares if people say I couldn't handle Berkeley? I obviously showed that I had the potential to handle anything academic Berkeley threw at me. Like I said before, I need to do what makes me happy and I need to find out exactly what that is. It needs to be understood that if I decide to do this I would want it to be completely for myself. I dont want to do it for my family or my friends, but for myself. I need to find myself and see what could possibly help to make me happier. There is still a very high chance I will be in Berkeley again in the Fall and I will be joking about these emotions I am feeling right now. Whatever happened I'll keep you updated. Let me ask you this though, why spend four years of your life being anything short of happy when you have the power to change it? Exactly. Fuck what everyone else thinks, just be happy.

My Major

If you asked me in high school what my major in college would be, I would have answered "math" without much thinking. If you asked me my major just out of high school I would have said "business" with little effort. If you asked me once I moved in to my dorm I would have said "philosophy", but with hesitation. Depending on how well I know you I now answer with some ridiculous concentration (interpretive dance) or a "hell if I know" (for you reading this, the latter).

I feel almost completely overwhelmed and stressed with picking a major. I know I have time to think about it, but everyone already seems to know what they want and they have at least something to pursue. My roommate is a bioengineering major, besides meaning that he is about twenty billion times smarter than me, it also means he knows what requirements and breadth classes to take in order to graduate with that degree in hand. For me I am taking a hodgepodge of classes that I hope will someday get me a degree in something. I keep telling myself I am doing what I am supposed to do, get breadth out of the way and try to find something to fall in love with. It's not quite working. It's not that I don't like my classes, it's the opposite, I see myself enjoying all of the subjects I have taken so far.

I miss how in high school the schedule was hand picked for you and you knew exactly what classes and subjects you had to take to graduate. The problem here is that there are four sets of requirements before we can graduate. There are University of California requirements. UC Berkeley requirements, school requirements, and major requirements. I feel I am behind in everything because I haven't picked a major and I feel that when I do pick a major I will be behind all of the other people in that major because they probably knew freshman year. I figure I could always try to make it lucky and keep going like this and see if the classes I am taking fall into a major. Right now it just so happens I am closest to being an art history major. Go figure.

Berkeleyian Disappointments

The urban dictionary defines Berkeley as a city that makes "Amsterdam look conservative". Berkeley was home to the free speech movement and was the first city to convert its entire diesel fleet to bio-diesel fuel and to prohibit the sale of ozone depleting styrofoam in fast food containers. Progressive and liberal go with Berkeley the same way 'evil' meshes so well with Wal*Mart. Lately, however, I have been disappointed with my fellow citizens.

Every time I take a shower the previous user of the shower has left the water running. They haven't left it running full blast mind you, but it's a steady trickle. The dripping is loud and it's blatantly wasteful. I am also sure I am the first one to use it in the morning which translates to the water being on all night. While this is not only bad for the environment, I am almost sure that it does help whatever fungus may be growing in a college freshman dorm bathroom.

It's not only my fellow floor mates that are wasteful, it's my damn roommates as well. Why must one of my roommates insist upon leaving the lights on when he leaves. Not just the main light, but his desk light as well. And no, it's not because someone else is in the room and he doesn't want to be rude. I have walked in from my day at school and work to find both of the lights on and my roommate absent.

The other roommate is no better, I don't know how many times I have walked into the room and his godforsaken speakers are blasting his hyphy music. But where is the roommate responsible for this? Oh he left about thirty minutes ago to get drunk and stumble in at 2:00 am yelling things that have nothing to do with anything.

Mind you this is the same city that has hippies up in oak trees for the past few weeks trying to save them from being torn down. I think if they saw what my fellow floor mates were doing they would be sitting in our shower stalls protesting the water the pressure or something.

After all of this disappointment in my fellow "Berkeleyans", I am never disappointed by their sense of humor. In high school people would write on the desks about how one person might be a bitch or how they have the biggest copulatory organ at the school. Yesterday I discovered some desk graffiti that made me giggle a little. One student carved into the desk "Who let the dogs out?". Directly underneath, written by another student: "Pavlov?".

A Year in Review

Last year I posted a year in review on my MySpace blog. It was a nice way to recap the year and set some goals for the year ahead.

Last year's hopes and wishes: from a 2005 perspective In 2006, I will turn 18 and graduate high school. I hope to be accepted to either Stanford or UC Berkeley. I hope to strengthen bonds with my friends as well as generate new ones with new people, and even help reattach those broken threads. I hope to reach all of my goals and I will work hard to reach them.

Let us review my year month by month, similar to last year's blog.

January: I started the year off with some of my closest friends, watching movies and hanging out. At midnight I laid outside on a trampoline in the bitter cold discussing aspects of life with Kasey. In a weird way, my best memory of 2006 was also my first. It was finally 2006, the year I have been waiting for since middle school when I discovered I was part of the "Class of 2006". It was also the month of my 18th birthday, turning 18 was not anything like Hollywood leads us to think. Angie went off to college in Colorado which began the longest time I have been away from my sister.

February: Once again Valentine's day was nothing too exciting, but I did get to host the robotics media event. I became friends with the Wallaces at their Valentine's Day party in early February.

March: Traveled to Annapolis and Las Vegas with the robotics team and did very well with our robot. I became further and further behind in school due to the progressive symptoms of the highly contagious disease of senioritus. Finally spring break came and I got to take a brief vacation away from the ridiculous demands of high school. College acceptance letters started pouring in with acceptances from Long Beach, Irvine, Santa Cruz, San Diego and on the last day of March, Berkeley.

April: April Fool's Day was a big day, the robotics team won the second most prestigious award they could and I found out I got rejected from "the school across the bay". I had within that weekend pretty much sealed my fate for my next our years without even thinking too much about it. Within 48 hours of knowing I was accepted, I decided to attend Berkeley to do god knows what.

May: For the past four years of my life, May was almost monopolized by AP testing. This would be my last round of those dreaded tests. High school dwindled to only weeks where the good-byes inevitably began.

June: Happy graduation Benji! 13 years, from kindergarten to senior year in high school, it all came down to that very warm afternoon in early June. I got handed a diploma case as well as a mild sunburn from the hot June weather. The rest of my life had begun and I didn't know what to do and where to start, I just knew I had to enjoy the best summer of my life.

July: The 230th anniversary of our "great" nation. I spent it watching TV in a house that was far too warm for humans to tolerate. I went over to Kasey's house in the late evening and lit sparklers to feel patriotic. We sat on the grass remembering the memories from New Years. I attended my student orientation and went on vacation. My student orientation was two days long, but I only really needed to be there for about an hour of it. My vacation across the left coast of the United States with my family was great. I returned home and caught up with my friends before the last month at home began.

August: Angie went back to Colorado. At that point I have seen her everyday since May and kind of got used to seeing her again. The local high schools started again, this time without me. It was a weird feeling knowing that life at Lancaster High went on without me, but I knew I didn't really want to go back. I was still burnt out from the past four years. In my last month I said goodbye to the people I have gotten to know over the course of a lifetime. I shook many hands and hugged many bodies. My mom and little sister dropped me off in Berkeley with the essentials of my life that accumulated over the past 18 years in a few boxes that managed to fit in a midsize sedan. I spent a week waiting for classes to start and just getting used to my new environment. I also got hired at my current job at The Scholar's Workstation.

September: The Wallaces, Rene, Tyler, and Alan came up from Lancaster to visit me on Labor Day weekend. We toured San Francisco and spent just one more weekend together. School came into full swing with my first true college paper. I came home to Lancaster for a long weekend at the end of the month to help my mom move out of the house into a new one. My room was how I left it, even the smell and look were the same. When we moved it was like I was going away again and I had to pack up even more memories into boxes that I knew may never be unpacked.

October: Just a month filled with repetition. More assignments and a midterm. Time just kept flying by and before I knew it, it was Halloween.

November: Before I knew it, there were six weeks left in the semester. More papers and a midterm and then I realized it was Thanksgiving and I got to go home again. This was when I finally realized I was going to see people I haven't seen since August, unfortunately Angie was not one of them. I did however get to reunite with Kasey and just talk about life, like we used to and we realized even though our lives were now 500 miles apart, they were still very similar and our friendship just as strong. It felt a little bit like it was summer again and that I didn't have a care in the world. Then reality hit and I knew I had to go back for my last three weeks of my first semester at the university.

December: It started with me just wanting finals to be over and wanting to take a break from dorm life and the stress of college. I came back just in time to celebrate the first night of Chanukah with my family. I still had to wait a week before my friends came back to hang out again. Angie was supposed to come back two days earlier than she did, but she was trapped in a blizzard in Denver for two says and our reunion was delayed. The last day of 2006 was spent with the same person as the first, very appropriate if I say so.

Review: Most definitely one of the most eventful years of my life. 18, graduation, college, life, and love. It was hard, it was surprising and it wasn't at all what I expected. On a five point scale, I give it a solid four.

How did I do?Well, I was vague to say the least. I did keep in touch with old friends and now that I am here in college (UC Berkeley) I of course made new friends. I did not get accepted to that school across the bay, but it was all for the better, who wants to spend five times as much money for an education just as adequate? Exactly.

Hopes and wishes for 2007: Well, we're one month into it, so I guess I have to shorten it a little. I hope to keep my relationships strong and let them grow. I look forward to seeing what they blossom into. I hope to live somewhere next semester that isn't the dorms. I want to maintain a good GPA and finally pick a major to work towards. Maybe I'll start a business or something and get rich and drop out of college like a few famous people I know. Or maybe I'll become a model and make money off of my *cough* perfect *cough* body.

Getting My Routine

I've been through two weeks of classes and I am still shifting my schedule. I guess technically this was the first full week of classes as last Monday was a holiday and this is the first week we actually attended discussion groups. I feel like it's taken two weeks to get classes started because we're just now going to discussion because each discussion also has a syllabus to accompany the syllabus in the lecture. The section syllabi suck though because they often include more work than what the professor asks of us. In lecture it's pretty much midterm, paper and final with reading to do in between. In some discussions though we have homework assignments and I mean assignments like back in high school. I'm talking worksheets that take 10 minutes to complete, but it's the most inconvenient 10 minutes of your weekend. Last semester I was spoiled by the dry classes which only had a few papers and exams. The only supplemental thing was reading and the occasional (monthly) homework assignment, I guess that's the price you pay for having interesting classes.

Other than that, I guess my semester is chugging right along. My roommate is out until 5:00 in the morning every night and missing his morning lectures which is kind of humorous to me and the other roommate is back to his gaming from afternoon to the wee hours of the morning. I wonder if it would be safe to say I was the most responsible one in my room? I mean my side is the cleanest and I actually make an effort to have a somewhat normal schedule.

The dorms are quite annoying though. If you recall from last semester I had a blog entitled "No More Summer Camp", what I realized now is that all year it's like freaking camp. The biggest reminder is the hall association which meets weekly to plan social events for the people in the dorms. While I guess I enjoy a sense of community, it is actually kind of annoying feeling like a child with events planned for us and a lot of them have little educational tie-ins like why not to drink alcohol. Maybe I just want to be left alone to do my own thing now that I have been here for half a year, I just want to live this and move out as soon as possible, I hate the dorms.

In the meantime I encourage all of my readers to get a dose of my sister's new blog, she can actually write.

Procrastination is like...

One day into my new semester and I learn something that took me three months last semester to learn. I am of course talking about new procrastination methods. Last semester, during a writing workshop my English instructor tells us he visits cuteoverload.com which distracts him for hours. Of course, instead of working on the paper he assigned, I visit the website and spend hours looking at the cute kittens, puppies, ducks, and whatever other animal makes your heart melt. I did manage to finish the assignment though and I pulled off an A in the class.

Day one of the Spring semester: my LGBT professor starts lecturing on what the class is about (in case you don't know it's the history of alternative sexual identities in the United States) he pulls out a quote from isitnormal.com and discusses how the website works. People submit stories and readers rate it on how normal it is, ranging from staring at other boys in the locker room to the frequency of going to the bathroom in a given period. Of course the next time I can access the Internet I pull open the website and spend a good deal of the early evening reading a variety of stories and rating their normality. Thank God for the Internet, She most definitely blessed us with that.

Other than that, my classes this semester look promising. They seem to be a lot more satisfying than the somewhat dry schedule of last semester. I am taking LGBT 20AC, English 95, Environmental Science and Policy Management 191 (upper division) and Nutritional Science and Toxicology 10. I dropped linear algebra so I could take environmental science, I didn't need the math for GE or for my major (which I am pretty sure will not be math related).

One week down, sixteen to go.

Back in Berkeley

Four months after the most difficult semester of my life I was allowed one month of an almost stress-free break. This was the best break in recent history. I also rediscovered some of the best people I have the honor of knowing.

My sister, Angie, after battling a killer blizzard in Denver managed to make it home for two weeks. I haven't seen her since the beginning of August and we had a much needed brother-sister reunion. It felt as though we hadn't been apart and everything kind of went back to how it was, it was awesome.

Some of my best laughing times were with Janet & Will. We discussed the experiences of the first semester of college and the possibility of where Janet may attend law school (Boalt maybe?). I enjoyed the little time I spent with them, but every moment was enjoyable.

One of the most pleasant surprises was seeing Katie. In high school I didn't have the pleasure of hanging out with Katie outside of school as much as I would have liked to. I ask myself now, "why the heck didn't I hang out with her more?" I still owe her an ice cream cone however, when I see her again, I will pay her back.

I spent all but a few days with Kasey and have gotten closer to him than I could have ever imagined. We did everything from shopping in Valencia to taking a stroll in the park. My favorite memories of the break were spent with him. New Year movie night, countless Starbucks visits and staying up late just to talk. I know my break was meaningful because of you. I owe you more than you will know. You have given me so much happiness these past few weeks. I really hope he can make it up to Berkeley to visit in February.

No Snow, Still a Good Winter

Sunday. I go back up to Berkeley in less than a week to start my new semester. This has been one of the most relaxing breaks I can remember. I feel well rested and I am ready to start the new challenges that lie ahead. School challenges and the challenges of being away from the people I have come even closer to these past few weeks. It feels similar to leaving after high school again, the only difference is I am leaving after a month, not 18 years. I feel prepared and I know what to expect the next few months. It isn't all new like it was before, last time I was nervous and excited, now I am just excited. I built a life for me up in Berkeley, surrounded by good, intelligent people.I look forward to resuming everything up there.

However there is a part of me that wants to stay. I like what I have here, I am happy, a happy that I have never felt ever before. I am going to miss you, but you should already know this. Still have five more days, let's make them the best of the break.

19 years old in ten days.

Good-bye 2006. Hello New Promises

I have recently been informed that I have "frequent" readers. Frequent being the operative word as I do not post all that frequently. I realize it's not very fair to those of you that do read my posts. I should be more respectful to my readers. The truth is, there is a lot going on in my life, this is not an excuse, this is a statement. Plenty of stuff I could and would love to share with the rest of the world, not because I am the most interesting person, but because in my mind it's worth sharing. I let you into my life and have not done my best to keep you here, thank you to those of you that stuck around, you're great.

Since my last post we have entered a new year, 2007. It was time to say good-bye to 2006, it was and still will be my year. High school graduation, starting my new life in a new city to further my education and discovering new things about myself. 2007 will be a good year too, I entered it in a most memorable way, celebrating the change of the calendar with Kasey. I try not to make New Year's resolutions, but if I had one for 2007 it would be to embrace every day as a new adventure and a goal to accomplish. Today's goal: post a blog.

Also this is a new year for the blog, I would like to take this time to announce I got a brand new camera as a holiday present to myself. I will post more pictures to help you see what I see everyday.


The Family Photo/01.05.07

Happy Winter Break

With a semester under my belt I feel a bit more relaxed about everything. I have successfully secured at least a 3.0 GPA in my first semester at Berkeley. What am I going to do now? I guess now that I am home I am going to relax and visit with old friends. The thing is, I feel a little overwhelmed with all of the people I can see. I haven't seen my sister since August so I want to spend time with her, but I have people I want to see outside my family. The thing is, there are a lot of people that want to see me, but only about a handful I actually want to see. I guess what I want is to just hang out with the right people and not waste time with the people who cause me stress, I just want to see the people who make me happy. Thank you to those who do. Hopefully I will be seeing a lot of you this break as we go on great adventures.