It's alright and it's nice not to be so alone.

Do you ever have one of those moments where reality, though just like it always was, is somehow different?

Imagine for a moment that virtually every important thing you own is stuffed in your car leaving only room for one in the cockpit. Suddenly you’re 800 miles from home and surrounded by “different” people. In theory they’ve always existed, but seeing as you haven’t been around them since you were a teenager, your brain has long since begun grouping them with Santa Clause rather than real people (not to say that Santa isn’t real, he’s just so elusive you think he doesn’t exist…occasionally). In addition to being in completely foreign territory, you’ve been stuff in your vehicle for the past 12 hours with all the music on your computer, some Spanish, and a voice CD. Now imagine that your brain tries to process this material simultaneously.

You get a restless, opera singing Mexican totally weirded out by the fact that his entire existence spans only six feet from his body as he tries to figure out how in the Hell everyone he knew has been replaced by pointy-eared little men.

Maybe I just had too much trail mix.

All that I can do is listen to you; all that you can be is out there

It’s Friday evening, and I’m mentally gearing up for my long trek to Seattle. Lo and behold, I learn that it is NEXT Saturday that my parents are driving back to TN. In addition, Sister 3 is staying for another week rather than returning to Provo once we had her moved in on the 29^th. Now, leaving the next day doesn’t seem quite so appealing. As I contemplate sticking around a little longer, there is a knock at the door…TA DAAAAH Sister 1 and Post-Doc boyfriend have shown up unexpectedly from San Diego. The whole family is officially together now. I called my boss, and he informed me that he hadn’t expected me at work until the 3^rd anyway. My contract said I would start on the first, but oh well.

PD is from Boston. I think he may be 29, but he is easily the smartest sub 30 year-old I have ever met. One thing PD did not have growing up however was a big yard/farm. Now that he lives in Pasadena, he has even fewer opportunities to do manual labor. So he comes out to our place in Logan and wants to do some yard work. Can do.

Now it’s Sunday; S1, PD, and myself will all be leaving first thing in the morning. Before he goes, we decided to show PD the glory that is a rototiller. We borrowed the neighbor’s nice Troy-Built with a 5hp Brigs and Stratton motor. One uses rototillers to break up ground. chop weeds, or grind up kittens if you don't use it correctily. Anyway, PD starts off fairly well, but one thing you have to know about ‘tillers is that they can get pretty jumpy. Sometimes, the blades will hit extra-dense dirt or a rock, and the machine will lurch forward. If you’re ready for it, you don’t lose control, but you DO have to hang on. My dad warned PD, but apparently, he didn’t warn him explicitly enough.

As PD reached the edge of the garden, the ‘tiller jumped forward out of his hands and crashed into the wooden fence promptly smashing the bottom edge of the motor housing and breaking 6 of the twenty iron fins on the fly wheel. My dad has mellowed out in over the years, so he kept his cool. Unfortunately, bestowed with the role of the alpha-male, he now has to fix the $1000 piece of equipment, tell PD he has to buy a new one, or return broken ‘tiller to neighbor. Not the best way to spend ones vacation. Luckily, my daddy has been fixing this kind of thing for 40 years; let us hope that the parts can be easily ordered.

And that’s it folks, that was my last story from Utah for a while. In T-minus 14 hours, I shall depart for unknown territory. Am I ready? You’d better damn well believe it.

Interesting details will follow as they appear.

A room an empty shelf. A book on mental health. I search for inner wealth.

Have you ever had your scalp lacerated by an innocent looking cabinet? Let the blood clotted in my hair serve as warning to all that a person should never trust an inanimate object to remain stationary. I swear the thing lowered itself a foot while I wasn’t looking.

Housing….well, I’ve finally found a place. $425 a month for a place that’s 8 miles from work.

Pas si pire. Right?

Right now, it’s thoughts on finals, torn muscles, Seattle, and NCG that spin through my head incessantly. Finals seem to be going fine. I’m not worried. Muscles are not doing well. I’m debating ignoring the fact that they don’t work correctly and going back to the old routine. I’m back to being excited about Seattle. I just need to stay organized until the.

NCG, well, I’m a microwave and she’s infrared. Sometimes we’re in phase sometimes we’re not. I don’t think either one of us knows why. The good news is that we are usually on the same page in our ambivalence and confusion. I’ve never been able to be so honest with someone; it’s nice. Ironically, the truth seems only to complicate matters. But complication yields growth, and growth IS always good.

Break down the barriers; ally the carriers. What is your motivation? Take a good look in the mirror.

Can I just say that I love my friends?

Despite getting up at 7:00am to go to a stake fireside, yesterday felt like the kind of Sunday a person could enjoy. I went to church in a family ward; the services ended at noon. Not only did I have most of the day left to enjoy, the service itself was significantly more sincere and less contrived than the typical BYU singles ward. Elder’s Quorum was full of men with normal jobs and families. The halls were filled with smiling children (granted, Easter has that effect on kids). I walked out of that building uplifted (an increasingly rare occurrence).

I spent most of the day talking to people that matter to me. Many of them to which I hadn’t said much in months. Not having time for this kind of interaction wears me down after a while. For this reason, I don’t think I would ever be happy as a pure research scientist. I do love science and engineering. I do love research. However, I love individuals more. Last night while talking to NCG, I realized that I’ve never been as content with my current group of friends as I am now. Every one of them makes me happy, seriously.

It’s funny. As the social side shifts to something favorable, I’m noticing my physical side is getting increasingly worse. My eyes are not doing well, I now have two injuries that should have healed, and I’m picking up a small cold. Still, a body is much easier to heal than a life. I’ll take this lot any day.

It's a dangerous stage but the show must go on

How do you know what you can be
if you can't see where you are going
What breaks the silence Misery
Can make you see where you belong
It's a dangerous stage but the show must go on

Why do you lie
Why do you lie
Would you betray your soul
Why do you lie
Why do you lie
Don't let your weakness show
You just might be the last to know

Freedom is such a loaded word
So full of hurt and such a plomb
Loneliness saunters in its breeze
Like a disease it drags along
The time of your life can't be had for a song
-Gregg Graffin

I must say that the wolrd can be a sad place. I don't believe it's fair that the brunt of a person's immaturity is felt inifinitey more by those who care about that person than the person him/herself.

What is anger? Injustice.

Just a day, just an ordinary day, just trying to get by

I went to the Soulforce rally yesterday. It was an interesting experience though it didn’t present anything new. Overall, I felt it was worth my time, but I also remembered a few things about myself that will probably never change.

I’m just not a bandwagon/rally guy. I get irritated when people draw applause from the crowd by using trite one liners. I don’t like the, “oh poor oppressed us…but we WILL NOT be ignored any longer we are PROUD to be us.” *Crowd cheers in most stereotypical way imaginable* I’m always bothered when a person has to belittle someone else’s ideals for the sake of promoting their own.

“I’VE been ex-communicated THREE times.” *Ha ha ha. “You go girl.”* I’m sorry. Those cheers from the crowd don’t sound like a cry for expression. They sound like those of a mindless mob. I came here to listen to sincere, intelligent comments pertaining to changing the status quo, not your propogandic bullshit.

“I met my boyfriend at BYU.” *Hooray. Take that stupid BYU*

“After being allowed on BYU’s campus under the agreement not to give speeches, pass out literature, or set up a booth. FIVE of us were ARRESTED for trying to give speeches!! We refuse to be ignored.” *cheers from the crowd* Yes, thank you Mr. Champion of free speech; I’m so glad to see you sticking it to the man. That and totally disrespecting an agreement with a university notorious for cutting you no slack at all.

“Queer is good. We are a great asset to the world. We are artists, performers, musicians…we are a sensitive people…we are in tune…” (I use quotations, but I will admit, I’m not getting what was said verbatim.) That’s what I’ve been missing all these years. I suck at painting because I have the wrong sexual orientation. I get it now. Silly me, I thought it was because I don’t have a painters coordination, and I never took time to develop those skills.

All of the above aside, the BYU alumni and student made valid points. I do wish others who have yet to think about these issues could have heard what was said. “God hates you because you’re gay,” is not something anyone should have to believe, ever. Homosexual=Terrorist=Nazi is another one. I don’t get how modern people can believe such things, but I guess I’m a little naïve. I do believe church leaders had it wrong back in the 80’s and before. Another lady commented on the mentioning of “gender confusion” in General Conference. “My son is NOT gender confused!!!” No kidding? I'm glad to hear he's so happy. It turns out that Elder Holland may not have been talking about your son. It turns out that church authorities are worried about more than just you.

Some say that gay marriage is no different from the blacks and the priesthood issue. I vehemently disagree, but maybe there were people like me who said the same thing back in the 1940’s. I guess the world is more complicated that I originally thought. I don’t know that we’ll ever see a full reconciliation within the church. I don’t know that we should or that we shouldn’t.

The meeting was also interspersed with people driving by, honking their horns for a minute straight, and small groups shouting things like, “YOU’re inTOLlerANT, YOU’re inTOLerANT…” Grow up people. What could you possibly accomplish beyond making me wish I was immature enough to get up and kick your ass.

Threw away your greatest hits, you left them here the day you split.

UTAH it is.

After another set on interviews, I have no reason not to go there. Now, the only real thing drawing me to UT is nostalgia. Granted, nostalgia is great, but it’s not something on which to base ones life decisions. (But maybe it should be. I haven’t made an irrational decision in almost 12 hours, seriously).

How should I word my rejection? I figure it would polite to tell my contact at UT personally. I do feel bad that I can't take him up on any of the UT offers. I could do it in letter or spoken form:
"Dear Professor Guy/Dude/Object/Paramecium,

1. I regret to inform you that I have accepted another offer that offers more opportunities and more money.
2. I have accepted another offer.
3. I decided to join the circus and realized I have no use for an advanced degree.
4. You suck, so no thanks.
5. I greatly appreciate your efforts to bring me to your school, but you forget that I’m a cheap, lazy bastard. Better luck next time.
6. I had a dream and this green mushroom threatened to eat me if I moved from Utah. I don't want to get eaten, so I must decline your offer.
7. I could never associate myself with the vile booze industry. Do you see my nose pointed towards the heavens? That means I'm way to pure for the likes of your silly oraganization; I don't care if the ethanol will be used as fuel. 'Avoid the appearance of evil' remember? I guess not. Seeing that you place yourself within 5 miles of an alcoholic beverage, I can only conclude that you are a diry whoremonger. FOR SHAME.

(That last one only applies to the Forest Products offer.)

So I’m going to solicit comments for a change. The four of you who read my posts, please vote/make other suggestions.

It's easy to confuse grand design with life's repercussions. Lament not your vanquished fantasy; it's only destiny.

When I started high school, I learned that balance was vital to survival. Yet no matter how hard I tried, I could not reach a stable equilibrium between my professional, academic, social, recreational, and romantic ambitions. Having three of the five was fairly common; four in five was rare. But the lost sheep always matters the most, right? Little has changed since then. At times I’ve felt that which was missing, the romantic aspect more often than not, would by itself bring more happiness than all the others.

Now, for the first time since my senior year in high school, I feel like my world is finally balanced. The professional and academic have made peace with each other and the world. My life still lacks a bit socially and recreationally, but I’m not too far from where I’d like to be. The romantic aspect resembles something stable and worthwhile. So am I perfectly content now? No, but “content” is the right word to use.

It’s beautiful to think, “Once I have A through E, I can be happy,” and I will admit that life is indeed better when you get close to having what you want. Still, making a good entree takes more than merely adding all the correct ingredients. My frame of reference is no longer an ideal; it’s reality. So though I’m saying a similar thing that I said a year ago, I feel like my words hold more weight. Strength in one area does not make up for a lack in another. Despite previous hopes, reality proves that there are neither shortcuts nor any components that can be completely disregarded in favor of something higher up on the priority list.

Rocky Top, you'll always be home sweet home to me. Good 'ole Rocky Top, Rocky Top Tennessee

In the remaining 38 minutes before my heat and mass transfer test, I figure it’s time for an update.

Engineers are nerds. We microwave our food in the hall while dozens of people walk around us. There are tons of opportunities to make new friends or simply smile at those who pass by. Instead, we stand in the middle of the hallway staring straight down at the floor but not because we’re shy. Shy people don’t analyze their footing because they need to understand their center of gravity. They don’t stand on the cracks and think about what caused them. They don’t wonder how the floor was constructed or its components fit together. Well, maybe they’re shy too, but they are way too preoccupied with cool things like floor tiles to ever notice.

BSG and RCW’s fiancée are at it again. Now it’s turned into, “well my boyfriend can beat up your boyfriend.” I’ll elaborate later if I have more time. Harsh words were exchanged two nights ago over BSG’s boyfriend getting a haircut and washing the result in the bathroom sink. Yes, some battles should be fought. Some people shouldn’t be afraid of confrontation when it leads to resolution. But most importantly, EVERYONE needs to grow up or go back to high school where they would better fit in.

The offers are finally here:
UT Forest Products $15000
UT Nuclear Particle Coating $18000
UU Carbon anything $21000
UT Teaching Assistantship PENDING

The one problem is I’m not a Utah resident. If I go to the U without said residency, I’m suddenly $10000 poorer.

Tennessee is a beautiful place right now, but Utah is much better for activity, no humidity, no mud, no ticks, and lots of mountains. I realized today that excepting two summers, I haven’t lived in Tennessee in almost seven years. I ask myself the question, "Self, where is home?" I respond, "Shut your hole!!! I don't pay you to think." Someday, he may insist on a real answer, but I figure I can procrastinate a little longer.

I've got to buy some shoes. These ones are getting lose; my feet are shrinking in the Sun, and it ain't fun.

My body is a funny thing. With the exception of the 8 final months of the mission and a week here and there, I’ve exercised at least three days a week since I was fourteen. Speaking of that time cumulatively, I’d say about 40% was spent running, 50% lifting weights, 10% doing random stuff like basketball, swimming, chasing lady-types, running from lady-types, etc. Looking back, I think I kept up this regiment partially at the expense of my grades. I did it to keep my sanity, and it got me through my major. I’m still trying to decide if it was worth it.

Anyway, this semester presented new challenges. My classes are of a different breed, and I’m not nearly as prepared as my new classmates. I have much less free time, and my physical routine has been the first to go. In the past, when I’ve missed a day out on the road or in the gym, physical energy quickly accumulates. If I don’t find a way to expend it, everything gets out of whack and I can’t do anything right in any area of my life. Due to school, work, and, ahem, other things, the past month and a half has dropped me down to barely twice a week. Last Thursday, for the first time in over ten years I found I didn’t WANT to go to the gym.

The sensation almost feels like fear. But wait, fear is what other people have. Still, if it IS fear, why am I feeling it? The thing that I like about racing or lifting is that no matter how good you get, it’s always hard, and, in my case, there is always infinite room for improvement. So why should the 5-lbs-weaker version of me hesitate? The difficulty is the same; the room for improvement is the same. The differences between the current version and the January version are unnoticed by everyone but me.

A few thoughts:
1. Going back to the gym forces me to acknowledge that January version could kick my ass. I’m afraid of him. The human side of me would rather be ignorantly neutral than understandably weak.
2. Going back emphasizes my digression which is in itself depressing.
3. My shoulder still will not permit military presses. I don’t like feeling restricted.
4. I’ve lost my drive to improve myself physically in favor of knowing my way around Navier-Stokes equations.
5. I’m in a funk. T’will pass with the season.

Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s a shift in ambition. I don’t know. The only certainty is that typing on this stupid machine is the last place I should be on a day like today.

And I'm flipping through the pages for a name to take my place.

Introversion. I’m sitting in my lab, headphones on and an old Fuel CD loud enough to drown out the undergrads seeking help from the TA. Nothing else in the world matters. I rather enjoy this feeling. One thing I’ve learned about myself is that when I get stressed, I don’t want much to do with anyone. A luxury of being single is that you can disappear for a week or month, and it’s no big deal. Sure, people notice, but they have their own agenda to worry about. You’re not that important, and consequently, disappearing creates little more than a few ripples in their lives. Someday, I won’t have the luxury of singality, and I might, God forbid, have a family. So what am I going to do then? I can’t exactly ignore their calls and do my own thing, can I? I suppose I may find a way to relax, but the confidence of knowing I can disappear for as long as I need will be gone.

Objectification. Whenever you snuff out a match flame, your senses continue to pick up on things. You feel that the heat is gone; you see that the light is out, and you smell the smoke that remains. Chances are I’ll be able to tell you a lot more in a year, but one thing I do know about smoke is that it’s full of chemicals oxidized and not. In many ways, smoke is just as chaotic and complex as the flame that produced it. As I always do when a flame goes out, I sit back and observe.

This time, I’ve noticed that over the past year, I've felt zero pull towards the attractive girls that meander around me (yes, even in the Clyde, there are plenty). Why not? I’m single, right? I’m male, am I not? In light of EG’s post about WAD. I have a few thoughts (and by "few," I mean about a million, but lucky for you, I'm only going to share one of them).

I’m full of insecurities like everyone else. “When people see me, the first thing they notice is that I’m not smart/tall/good looking enough. Such qualities MUST be what matter most.” Yes, I notice those same attributes in other people; I’m a scientist, how could I not observe and compare? Though, I’m confident that these qualities are of paramount importance when people look in at me, they play third fiddle when I look out at them. Double standards are a funny thing, so funny...

Still it's hard, Hard to see, Fragile lives, Shattered dreams.

I realize that only a few of you care, so I’m providing a picture for those who don’t.

"Spouted fluidized bed coaters are used for applying coatings to tri-isotropic (TRISO) nuclear fuel particles for the advanced high temperature gas reactor (HTGR) and other Generation IV nuclear power reactors. The purpose of this project is to scale up coaters to production size by collecting detailed experimental measurements from the currently used 50-mm spouted bed coaters, intermediate size spouted beds (84 and 150-mm), and selected candidates for production scale coaters. In order to supply the required fuel particles for commercial reactors, 150 to 300-mm diameter coaters need to be designed. However, scale-up of the fluidization processes with chemical reactions poses unsolved problems. These processes are highly nonlinear, sensitive to boundary conditions and disturbances, and exhibit transients and unstable hydrodynamics. Further, the larger coaters will inevitably require distributors that are more sophisticated than the typical conical bottom.

Research objectives are to:
1. Design and fabricate fluidized beds with changeable nozzles, distributors, and other components.
2. Develop LabVIEW software for operation, control, data collection/synchronization, data archiving, and feedback control.
3. Collect detailed experimental data, including local gas velocities and signal conditioned high-speed inlet pressure measurements (1000 samples/second).
4. Develop an experimental matrix of parameters, which may include: bed diameter, cone angle and throat diameter, selected distributors, bed load (amount of particles), type of gas, gas flow rate, as well as particle properties (surface characteristics, sphericity, size distribution, density, bulk density).
5. Conduct image analysis using synchronized video from two cameras for spout shape (height and diameter), Poincaré sections for particle circulation, resident times distributions, and wall boundary conditions.
6. Develop correlations for spouted bed characteristics, such as minimum spouting velocity, bed pressure drop, spout shape, and scale-up.
7. Develop new measurement techniques and implement maturing technology, such as the ability to measure local particle flux, local particle momentum distribution, use fiber-optic probes for circulation studies, and local void fraction measurement.
8. Support instrumentation and control of hot coaters and address data measurement in the harsh coating environment of high temperature (2000 K) and chemical vapor deposition (coats everything).
9. Apply chaos and nonlinear dynamics concepts for process monitoring and control (hydraulic state, distributor restrictions, wall agglomerates, free agglomerates, abnormal events)."

Chances thrown, Nothing's free, Longing for what used to be.

It turns out grad schools aren’t done with me quite yet. I just got an offer from Rochester. Good news? Meh. They are ranked a little better than Utah, but unfortunately they only offer Master’s students a half tuition scholarship. So we’re talking a $35,000+ a year difference from UT and Utah. Yeah, I think I’ll stick to my original plan.

The notes are old, They bend, they fold, and so do I

V is for a lot of things I guess.

I saw the matinee yesterday, and here are a few thoughts:

Overall, I liked the movie. It definitely had the George Orwellian feel, like Gattaca, Equilibrium, Fahrenheit 451, etc. One main difference, however, was the film's affinity for the word “terrorist.” On the MTV special, Hugo Weaving said he felt that the movie was a direct critique on the Bush administration while Natalie Portman said it was more of a general “get people to think” sort of movie.

I don't fully agree with either opinion. The movie didn't cause me to pose that many questions, certainly not any new ones. Protest through violence, justice through death, and the concept of redemption irrelevant. A sad world, but one worth discussing. The movie had a few unclear points. It could be a Matrix Reloaded thing ("it’s not confusing, you just missed a few things"), or it could be that the movie simply didn’t want to take the time to explain the less significant points.

As always, the previews are worthless. Among the three scenes with V slashing/stabbing bad guys, and only the final one is bloody. Maybe two or three “f” words and only a few other regular curse words. No sex and only a couple allusions. A few appropriately disturbing images of dead, naked bodies strongly resembling in those of Night and Fog. I was pleasantly surprised at the lack of unnecessary mature content.

**************SPOILERS*******************
Did V burn down the place or did he simply survive it. Why was he the “key?” The destruction of Parliament didn’t seem that important. Why did the government torture homosexuals instead of executing them on the spot? Why did #2 need V to kill #1(the chancellor).

You don't know how far you've gone, or recognize who you've become. When'd you grow to be so hard...sick of playing my part.

Utah.

Clean Coal – Tens of millions of government and private dollars going towards pollution controls on exhaust steams. The most immediate problem is mercury. How do you oxidize it to a halide salt be for the vaporized liquid leaves the smoke stack. Lots of exposure to reaction kinetics and experimentation. Coal gasification is the wave of the future, not combustion.

Combustion – Surrogate fuel design. Experimentation, characterization, and synthesis of artificial fuels with a small number of components in known concentrations that strongly resemble the real thing. Such fuels are easier to analyze and model. Researching them allows us to use the real fuels more efficiently.

Biomass combustion.

Wavelength specific laser grid development. By adjusting the wavelength of the lasers, detectors can be customize to look for various combustion by products and intermediaries yielding more accurate models and eventually better fuels. Great work to be done in the experimental area. Research and Development is fun, but I still have to eat once I graduate.

Carbon Dioxide Sequestration. We produce the stuff like crazy, so let’s put it back when we’re done. Meh. Interesting, but a little to narrow.

Oil Shale/Sand. How do we get it out of the rocks? How do we turn it into something useful. Possibly too much analysis. Possible too little English as a first language. Tons of job opportunities.

Two sisters at BYU, house in Logan, a few friends, Mecca of all things outdoorsy, charted territory, easy transition, NCG

Tennessee.

Nuclear - "One project is based on hydrodynamics of spouted beds that is important to particle coating. This work is for the Nuclear Engineering Research Initiative (NERI) for Universities, DOE, for nuclear fuel particle coating. Nuclear energy is now considered “green” technology, there is no melt down problem with Gen IV reactors and developments are being made to transmute and burn all of the fission products so there is no waste." Nuclear is cool. That's all there is to it. Fewer job opportunities however.

Biomass – see previous description. Progressive but possibly a lot of hoopla. Fewer jobs, lots of theory.

Parents, the farm, being out of Utah, my dog, home in the “home” sense of the word.

According to my horoscope, I'm supposed to avoid deceptively tempting offers and trust the advice of the "experts." So what does one do when it is the experts who are making the offers?

Lost the words, lost the nerve, lost the girl, left the line

Holy Weekend Batman! Let’s see…

In the company of RCW and fiancée, MN (Male Nurse who was my roommate last year) and wife, and NCG (Non-Committal Girl, my most recent flare), I finally got to try out a new deep dish pizza recipe. The dough required about 1:10 cornmeal:flour, so the dough did not gain its normal elasticity after kneading. Because I was short on time, I could only let it rise once which hindered the texture and flavor. We made the sauce from canned, whole tomatoes which tasted great but the extra juice soaked into the dough and made it a bit soggy. None the less, the pizza was good enough, especially for a first attempt.

Next time:
Knead More
Rise More
Boil Sauce More
Try Asiago cheese

Saturday: Dancesport. Yes, I didn’t chicken out, and yes, I botched it. Yes, I’d happily go back and try again next year were I to stay at BYU.

I competed at the "slightly more coordinated than a 6 foot seventh grader" level, Bronze Cha cha. The first round was alright. When they posted the qualifiers for the next heat, I was certain I wouldn’t be moving on. Hello!! My hips and knees are made to move in one direction only. Me changing directions to a beat or even changing directions at all is like me wearing a dress. Yes, I’ve done it, and yes, it is only funny for the awkward effect. Looking up at the numbers, I noticed ours was there. “Hmmm, I guess the ones that are underlined are the ones moving on. It looks like around one in 16 are moving on. Meh…”

The second heat begins, “Hey! We’re better than that couple, and that one…and that one…oh well.” Intercom: “Couple 500 please come to the back stage” “Okay, Jenni (our instructor) must just want to give us feed back (we forgot to talk to here when we finished).” We go back. “You guys made the second heat. Why weren’t you out there?” My face slowly begins to grasp the magnitude of my pessimistic stupidity. “Quick! Go down there, maybe we can still get you in.” Thirty seconds later, we’re dancing, and by “we’re dancing,” I mean I’m fumbling around because I had zero time to mentally prepare and oh yeah, it turns out that wasn’t that good to start with. I missed a step and lost the beat. We had to stop for a few seconds to get it back, but the moral victory was already lost. I feel bad for my partner, but I’m sure she’ll survive.

My sister and NCG both told me I needed to act more confident, and they have a point have a point. Still, I think I need to work on my posture more than anything. The good news is that I'm the person that is motivated by his inablities, not discouraged by them.

Throughout the whole weekend, I picked up on a few RCW v/s fiancée quarrels. Maybe getting engaged after a month of knowing each other isn't such a great idea afterall. Among them the tense moments:
“I don’t want an indoor dog.” “We’ll talk about it later.”
“I don’t want to discipline kids for silly reasons.(i.e. your dad is 'silly' for grounding you for not shaving” “We’ll talk about it later.”
And finally, “My ex-fiancée wants a second chance. I need to go see him to be sure I love you instead.” “…” Poor RCW, he’s already lost that battle once.

Round here, we're carving out our names. Round here, we all look the same.

So phase two of midterms has past. Synopsis: Mike is officially smarter than the average BYU chemical engineer. As I’ve mentioned before, my strengths are stamina, complexity, and thinking well. Though these qualities are helpful, tests require other skills, thinking quickly and answering easy questions that are so fundamental, you can’t reason through them, two capacities I have yet to properly develop.

My Kinetics test went well, 139/150 with a 126 class average More time would have got me another 5 points at least. On the Thermo test, 64/70 on the difficult computational problems 14//30 on the quick conceptual ones. 78/100 with a 76.6 class average. I had plenty time, but I simply misread one problem and misunderstood the other.

Another example of my follies. As many of you know, I hope to call myself a man someday. One thing men don’t do is give up. So here I am, it’s 11:30pm, and I’ve already lost an hour purely from trying to solve the final part of a hw assignment. It just doesn’t fit. I cannot figure out why I can’t get the right answer. I’ve tried everything, and I keep going. Now, it’s man vs machine, I will NOT concede defeat. 12:30 rolls around, and I start getting somewhere. Finally, arrive at the solution, but MathCad keeps giving me the raspberry. Still, I feel I have won the moral battle by 1:15 when I head home. It’s about 2:35 when I finally fall asleep. I’m up by 7:15 the next morning, and in my lab by 7:40. I work on the problem a little longer. Still no final answer.

Then I go to class. “Hey Bobby. Did you get 6-14b on the homework?” “6-14b? We didn’t have to do that one. It was 6-14d we had to do.” Yes ladies and gentle men, it took me 2 hours to figure out 6-14b because I wasn’t supposed to know how to do it.

And that is why no man will ever love me….oh wait….

under dirt filled rainy nights with my socks stuck in the mud? Please come dive in puddles with me.

Jobs:
Lecture Prep Supervisor
Growth Center Grunt (sounds gross huh?)
Marriot Center Toilet Cleaner
White’s Fresh Foods Bagger

Movies:
Gladiator
The Wedding Singer
Dumb and Dumber
Maverick

Places:
Levis and Montreal, QC
Fall Branch, TN
Provo, UT
That’s it folks

Food:
Deep dish Hawaiian and bacon pizza
Any cut of steak over 12oz.
Pineapple Curry
Sweet and Sour Pork

TV Shows/Movies I've never seen:
Singles Ward
Desperate Housewives
The OC
Gilmore Girls

Vacations:
Utah (the mountains)
Ontario
Orlando
England…oh wait, dangit.

Where I’d rather be:
I’m actually rather happy to be here at the moment.
It would be nice to go home for a few weeks however.

Tags:
Meh. friends are overrated.

I'm not surprised and really, why should I be? See nothing wrong See nothing wrong. So sick and tired of all these pictures of me.

If I had the option of seeing everyone fully for who they are, I'd have a tough time deciding if I'd take it or not. A while ago, Katya compared it to seeing marbles. Sometimes I think it would be nice to see a person and instantaneously see his passions, pains, joys, regrets, hopes, and all the other things that make him him. I think the world would treat itself better if we could all appreciate the humanity we see in each other.

At the same time, I’m not sure if I could handle it. The world can also be incomprehensibly ugly. There may yet be further depths of human cruelty to be discovered. Individuals have great capacity for sadness. Right now, I don’t think I’m strong enough to absorb all of the world’s sorrow. I think it would consume the bit of hope I still reserve for myself.

Never the less, part of me wants to know those things anyway. Part of me wants to save those people. Part of me wants to rid the world of the consuming filth that pollutes it. Part of me knows that even I can drown in an ocean.

Right now, I don’t know that I can balance my personal and social ambitions. I don’t know that I can’t either. It would be a mistake to inundate myself with the world’s problems, but I think it would be a tragedy to ignore them completely.

To the bastard talking down to me, Your whipping boy calamity, Cross your fingers, I’m going to knock it all down, Can I graduate?

Random thoughts and events from yesterday:

“A Biofuels Fellowship at the Forest Product Development Center with David Harper has been announced. David is a co-PI on the chemical modification of biomass research with me. He is a great colleague who I have been working with for 3 years. He is an expert on biomass materials, their structure and chemistry. A major part of the engineering work will be lab studies of bio-oils from pyrolysis in fluidized beds. We have agreed that a Chemical Engineer would be an ideal candidate. This would be funding beyond the funds for two students listed above. If you are interested attending graduate school at UTK and in the utilization of biomass, I want you to apply for this fellowship immediately. There is a desire to fill this position as soon as possible and our desire is for it to be a ChE.

The attachment, FPDC Biomass Fellowship 01_2006, contains the fellowship announcement asking you to contact David Harper. If a duel degree in ChE and Forestry looks like an exciting opportunity, Biomass is the future! David and I have looked at the course requirements for both degrees and we think it can be done by only taking 3 additional courses.”

I took a 3.5 hour thermo test yesterday. By hour 1.5, I had 5/6 problems completed. By hour 2.5, I had 5/6 problems completed. By hour 3.1, I had the sixth problem almost started. This entry in the chronicles of the testing center has a happy ending at least. I finished the problem, and I’m fairly certain I got it right. Still, I spent 2 hours of my life figuring out how to find the enthalpy difference (read “heat”) between a saturated organic liquid at 0.1MPa and its vapor at 600K and 1.2MPa. May I just say that though I’m out of my mind for spending so much time on one problem, academia will be pleased with my actions? Read: Academia is also out of its mind.