The Daily Adventures of Mercat

Environmental ethics has brought up some interesting things to talk about, but it is much less applicable than I thought it was going to be. Well, that sounds wrong. It is completely applicable to every aspect of life, which is why I like philosophy; but it is not at all like my Engineering Ethics class, where we are asked to look at ethical dilemmas faced by professional engineers.

But I digress; today I came upon a thought that can better articulate something I've been feeling lately, that nameless thing.

Regardless, I really don't want to talk about that right now. Last week was a long and exhausting week and this week is not much better. I had a nice panicked moment when I thought I had part of my final project due for economics, but it was the grad part of the class that did. *breathe*

Oh, it's supposed to snow heavily tomorrow. Hurrah! Maybe Girl Scouts will be canceled and I can regain some sanity time.

I've had some pretty bold-imageried dreams lately... I don't know if that's because of all the crap I've been eating and drinking, or the fact I'm not sleeping well, or what.

Everyone seems kind of on-edge, too... Not sure why, but it's rather worrisome.

Anyway, I have like seven emails to myself of links I've accumulated that I need to disperse. So, without further ado:

Cool military deceptions. I've always been intrigued by deception... The number of detective and spy books I read when I was in gradeschool was rather ridiculous, I'm sure.

Any UKers out there? I'm like 90% sure no, but just in case I am passing that on. It doesn't sound good.

The floating islands of Titicaca. So effin' sweet. I'm such an engineering dork.

I'm confused about what's going on here...? But both the Disney-capitalist and agnostic parts of me rather love it. Capitalism is crazy sometimes...

The Eight Weirdest Ways We'll Generate Energy in the Future. As an engineer who's been hearing about green design for a while now, most of those are not that "weird". Personally, the weirdest one is... tornadoes? I think I need a diagram to grasp the idea of this one.

Seven Phenomenal Wonders of the Natural World. I think I've linked this before, but I don't remember the sailing stones, and that's pretty amazing shit right there.

There are a lot of days I wish I could just be an explorer-naturalist. How badass of a job would that be?

Oh dude, and Neil Gaiman got a Newberry award! Congrats to him! Very deserved.

Hahaaaaaa fuck. So my MW am class changed classrooms, and NO ONE TOLD ME. So I showed up early (about five minutes, which is normal for me) and no one was there. I waited. No one continued to show up. Great. I walked out in the hall and made sure I was in the right classroom... Yes. Waited a few more minutes, texted Geoff (who's in most of my classes this semester), and walked home. The only reason I'm upset is that we were supposed to have a quiz today, AND the professor actually takes attendance, and I don't want me not getting an email to count against me twice in my grades. Fucking hell.

Other than that hour of stress, I'm in pretty much the same mood I was last night. Bah.

Okay, why on earth does this keep happening to me? When I sit long blocks to study I keep just having these gigantic flashes of... I dunno... life issues, or something. I mean, just thoughts on my own life. A totally different perspective on what's going on here. The weird part is that whatever I'm studying has nothing to do with the thoughts that show up. I think...? I dunno.

...Perspective doesn't look like a word.

Fuck drama, and fuck this emotional bullshit, and fuck wastewater.

I have been working on this fucking assignment for two and a half god damned hours and have ONE problem finished. OUT OF FOUR.




I fucking hate Dr. Taylor. No examples in the book, no examples in class. She is the

worst

teacher

i have

ever

had.

You know what I realized the solution to my problem is? A classic musical.

HOW DO I NOT OWN OKLAHOMA OR THE SOUND OF MUSIC. Not even Little Shop on DVD, daaaaaamn. Just that old VCR recording that I think Papa might have taped (because the intro and the credits are cut off).

I have... ~zero~... musicals here with me. Dammit. How did I get this far with zero musicals? Semi-musicals don't count. Enchanted's out. Oh wait, I have Hairspray, but that is far from a classic. ARGH. I NEED THAT RETRO-NESS.

Yeah... so.

PD officially dead in the water. Not cancelled, just dead in the water.

I hope another network picks it up. Preferrable to comics. If not, I hope they get a really good artist that gives it the same feel as the show (I don't know how they'd really pull that off...), and good writers, because so much of that show is the writers, and bad character writing is the reason I don't read the Indiana Jones comics or books.

And a movie, I could live with a movie, too. Anything to give the story its ending, really...


BUT DAMNIT THIS IS THE BEST SHOW ON TELEVISION. >:C Those actors are some of my freakin favorites, and, just, I don't know. Everything about that show is fantastic.















*sigh*

I don't know if I mentioned it, but I really don't have time this week to update or anything. Um, I kind of have to make an exception. In comparison to everyone else's problems this week (of which I've heard many, and I'm talking friends around campus because haha like I've had time to read blogs) today qualifies as the worst day ever. And somehow I'm chugging through because I know if I don't, it will only get worse, and there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Um, but. It kind of gets worse. See, I am doing Hopewalk. That has consumed my life because yes Sarah is awesome and everything but she hasn't been real on top of stuff on her end so far, but at the same time she's getting stuck with all the work this weekend so I don't really feel like there's much room for me to complain.

So anyway. I had three tests last week and I have one on Thursday still and plus my regular homework load, plus an extra lab (I have to redo the first for some points I lost a lot of doing things wrong), plus the lab took me an impossibly long time to do the calculations which were wrong but hold on this is part of the story.

So I didn't even get to the lab until 11 last night. I worked on it until 12:30 when my brain stops comprehending numbers and I decide I'll get up at 5; that gives me an hour to finish that lab and an hour for the second and 15 minutes to do today's prelab. Well I spent the whole time working on the first lab which was still incomplete, and definitely spent a good chunk of time stressed and crying, but luckily Dr. Crosson understood about the run and I got an extension until tomorrow (my deadline, not hers).

Meanwhile I have a list of Hopewalk things 50 miles long. Switch cars with mom, copy forms, tables, pick up supplies from Kay (in Troy), make banners, email everyone about everything. I switched cars, then I had to meet with Dr. Crosson about what I was doing wrong, and then I had to come back and make a banner and do my art homework. So six o'clock rolls around, I have to go visit Kay to get the tables and water jugs, mom calls. My cousins' (I have only two first cousins, my dad's brothers twins) grandpa fell out of a tree and injured his head and is in urgent care.

Wow, yeah? Not good. He's so healthy and walks every day and head injuries are not good. But we can't tell Max in Colorado because he has a final tomorrow (his school does like month-long super-intense classes and rotates), and can't tell Kyle because he's in Argentina.

So I am stressing about getting the stuff back to campus in time to change into dressy clothes and make it to KU in time for Greek 101, which actually turnedout to be an awesome speaker but still sucked up two of my hours I could have been making the banners I didn't get to or the lab/homework I'm behind on.

Uh, so, I get back home afterwards and I'm trying to figure out all the Hopewalk stuff everyone has to do. Go through emails, my checklist, what do I need what are we doing where is everything. Check my phone to call Sarah. Three messages.

Mr. McGarvey died.

Um... yeah, wow. He was just so... full of energy all the time. And I think part of it is not that I knew him particularly well (I mean, I didn't) or that his accident is rather tragic or that I've spent so much time this past year trying to determine what I believe, and reconfirming at the very least I still have a lot of issue with the reality of "heaven" (as an idea I like it, though). That's not my problem. I don't know what the problem is, I just cannot accept death well, of anything. Maybe because I never had anyone close to me die until I was eleven or so and Fuzzy died. I mean Nana and Tippy didn't die until four years ago; that's a long time to go without someone close to you dying. (I mean, people in my family did, but locally the family is very small.) And I just... I dunno. Maybe because I'm so emotional. But it's just all a feeling of denial or something for me. They can't be dead, why don't I remember more about them, what about this and that everything, and so often I will have a dream or a thought or a memory of them where they are so alive and I am just so haunted by it, I can't get over it. I still bawl about Nana, and Fuzzy and Tippy and forgodssakes even Papa sometimes though I never met him. And Jacob, damn. He died too young.

I dunno, it's an area where I feel completely lost, and all I can do is miss them, a lot.

Hopefully, Max can come back and Kyle can too, and the funeral will be next week. I definitely need this PoD weekend now (yet another thing on my stress-source-until-Friday list; I need to pack and do laundry and go shopping), definitely definitely definitely.

Yet somehow I just push it all aside because I don't want to use that excuse; I need to stay on top of things and clear things out of my to-do list. I don't know. I can't guess if I'll be upset tomorrow, I'm probably too busy with my to-do's rught now. I'm just waiting until someone makes a comment during band... I think that's the time I'll really just sort of collapse.


This day has been ridiculous. I can't say worst day ever because somehow I am coping with it all. But it feels ludicrous. I already got an extension because of how busy I am, and if I absolutely needed to I could actually go in tomorrow and say "I had a death in the family, I need a further extension" and it's the truth. And somehow... that ridiculousness... feels the weirdest to me.


I was really hoping this entry was going to be about the speaker from tonight, which, by the way, it's still tonight of the 23rd for me because I haven't gone to bed yet. Dear lord, I nearly nodded off in art today, who knows how awful it will be tomorrow. I haven't gotten a good night's sleep in a month and a half, and I doubt a good one is forthcoming.

OH GOD THE WEATHER IS AMAZING

I was in a Halloween mood for the past few weeks and now I'm in a CHRISTMAS MOOD just WTF and YAY and OMG STRESS and I have a billion things to blog but I'm soooo busy this week with PoD and Hopewalk and homework and uuuuugh.

BUT. Friday night I'm reserving blog time for myself. And I'm going to watch Shawn of the Dead. This of course all after I go grocery shopping and go home to get clothes for the WTF Are You Wearing Party for SATURDAY omg yay. Can you say tacky Christmas tights + striped socks + swimsuit + nerd scarf + shiny gauntlets + bowler? Oh I think you can. I just need to decide which shoes would be appropriate ;D

IN THE MEANTIME! I am leaving you with this. And now I will commit ritual seppuku with Wastewater homework.



Also, The Beeftrain Incident also made a full-on Mr./Dr. Jones parody (FINALLY, after that short version on College Humor was up forever, but was only like two verses, though I liked the fact it was from Shorty's POV), which makes me excited because I actually have six songs on my non-Williams Indy CD. Actually, non-movie CD, because I don't have stuff like "Wake Up Little Susie" or "Hound Dog" or "Shake, Rattle and Roll" on there either. But I need to.

Also I swear there's other songs that reference Indy that I don't have... and I can't for the life of me recall who the artist was that did Jazz Raiders. Feh...

BUT OMG THE WEATHER, IT'S AMAZING. I loved living in Hawaii but I always completely forget how the fall makes me feel. I can't explain it, it's like I feel like a totally different person, really.

Oh, is anyone else watching Fringe? I don't need to get addicted to another show but it's so awesome and the Dr's combination for his garage lock was 3-1-4-1-5-9 and I LOVE YOU NERD WRITERS, YOU ARE SO AWESOME, SERIOUSLY. :D

EPIC DAY TODAY.

So everyone's sitting at home doing homework and stuff, waiting for chapter to roll around. The wind was ridiculous and definitely keeping us entertained. I had to go get the pool off the fence for Baujan Field, and Brittany noticed all our neighbors across the street pointing and realized we had siding coming off. From Adela's room you could see St. Joe's losing shingles off the roof. At one point the gusts were so strong I thought they were going to blow the window-mounted AC right into the house. D:

So security is coming around telling everyone to stay inside (of course EVERYONE across the street from us is outside on their porches for hours; wtf?!), and sending out warnings through the system (so the house got five calls, one for each of us) and chapter gets cancelled. So we all go back to watching TV and gettin' shit done, and of course we're all busy and sort of worried about our workload etc. etc. Well, then the internet goes down and everyone goes fuck, well, what am I supposed to do now? So we all kind of do chores until the internet comes back.

BUT, the power goes out across campus. For us it flicks back on in I'd say less than half a second, and we continue to do homework and stuff. Word slowly travels across the ghetto and the rest of campus that the north side of Stonemill (us) is the only part of the Ghetto (and actually the Dark Side, too, but I don't know about the houses by Frericks) with power. The dorms don't have power, and the upper floors (like five and above in Marycrest) don't have water, either, because of pressure.

Eventually a whole bunch of girls (some Phi Rho, some pledging, some just engineers) come over to take showers and do homework, and as it's nearing ten or so Brittany comes downstairs super-excited and puts a Britney Spears song on the CD player, puts the speaker up to the window and BLASTS it. She decided she was going to wreak revenge upon our neighbors across the street for all their Thursday/Friday/Saturday late-night music, and eventually we find some good music and I burn a mix CD and stuff.

So then Candice gets word that the PMA house (in the middle of the Ghetto, mind you, sans power) is having a greenlight. (They have an old stoplight upstairs; when it's green, it's party time.) So of course we have to go over there, and the guys are there , and as we leave our house we notice the UD Police pull up right behind us. Well, we get over to the PMA house and they're actually partying and drinking and stuff. There are a few glowbracelets and the greenlight is actually the team lights from a green-team Nerf gun, and they are powering their music off the battery for the pep band bass guitar. So of course it is awesome and at this point everyone is getting sort of slap-happy and more people are getting word and actually coming to the greenlight. Candice and I figure since we have homework and worry that Brittany might have freaked out from the police that we should go back to our house. (After all, we were having a party, too!)

So as we get back to Stonemill we can tell we're no longer blasting music, but the house down the street has Christmas lights up. One porch and one tree with colored lights, and then the tree also has a blinking giant white star. We realize Danny and Mike and some of the other guys from that house are the ones who put some of it up, so we go down there and talk to them for a bit and then steal some of their lights for our house. Well, we get back to our house and Brittany and Christine were already having thoughts of Christmas lights and pull out the house's lights. Which is an entire shopping bag full of stuff. So we put the music back on and shove an extension cord through the window AC's opening and proceed to spend the next hour or so hanging up lights, taking photos, waving to passing cars, and talking to people on the street. A few guys (5th year MBAs, don't know their names) from our side of Stonemill come down to see what's going on after we're taking out bizillionth photo with my tripod. They had heard that since we are on the grid with the campus, which is all on a generator (or, I'm guessing, several) that all these houses with the lights were trying to suck power to get classes cancelled. I can't speak for the other houses but we tell them that we're just trying to give the Ghetto some light and make people smile. And seriously, by this time, the lights are ridiculous. We have colored lights up one pole and around the top; white lights on the bushes in front; colored light tubes down the railing and around the front of the bushes; and pulsing white and blue icicles hanging from the other handrails. At this point we had a few people drive by and call us assholes :C I think because they were jealous we had power. But some people are staying the night (of course after we'd spent half a retaliation-induced-dance party and Christmas-lights time doing homework) sleeping on our couches and stuff, and some guys were supposed to come sleep over on the couches in the basement (they haven't showed up yet), but who knows. Tomorrow is another day, we'll see how that goes, too.

Oh, and the cops didn't even come up to the house and yell at us, Brittany turned the music down as soon as they pulled up apparently. =P

And after all the fun, I walk inside to see Brittany had taken a whiteboard marker and written on the wall tiles in the kitchen "Diane's Schedule" with a hole and arrows (because getting my schedule up is low on my priorities list right now) and I fix it to read "Diane's Schedule: Hopewalk and/or PoD" and Brittany and I decide (well, first of all, that we need to wash the tiles because when I got a wet paper towel to wipe away her schedule hole, there was a distinct white area and dirt line) that we are going to memorialize Phi Rho House Fun on the walls with the whiteboard markers. So she writes up "cops called" and "no power" and "christmas lights" with "9/14" on there and I add "AAHHH SPRINKLES" from Candice and this year is going to be awesome.




I'm kind of sad, though, the winds knocked over an old tree at home. =C It seems like all the older trees are having to go for one reason or another... Falling down, having to get cut down so they don't fall on the house, having to get cut down so they don't uproot the foundation, rotting, getting struck by lightning... =/ Or in this case blown WAAAAY over. It's just weird because when you come home after the old trees come down, it feels like there is a big hole in the sky. And of course, you can't just quickly grow a tree to fill it in... Yeah, this kind of thing breaks my heart, same kind of thing as having to move...

Damn, I have been busy lately. Recruitment chair + Hopewalk chair + overly busy POD year + total bitch prof for wastewater = Diane not getting any sleep, yeah?

I have an entire page in my art history notebook full of things I've meant to talk about, just thoughts that strike me about life or me or things in general. I think this happens more in art classes because we're analyzing the art in relation to how people look at life.

And I keep wondering stuff about why I particularly enjoy surrealism and fantasy art as opposed to other movements (perhaps disregarding art nouveau and art deco as those are styles rather than movements?), especially with respect to Yukio Ozaki (my ceramics prof from last semester)'s comments about not crafting, but making art. I don't know, I sort of have a problem with that.

I feel like despite the fact that yesterday was possibly the worst day ever and it fried my brain so much (probably from crying out of frustration? I definitely was >this close< to snapping all day long, so I definitely cried enough), I am still having a good year. Wednesday was an AMAZING day because the weather was cool and GORGEOUS, and we had a little Chaminade meetup which was all nice and emotional and warm fuzzies and that sort of deal. But the weather the most reminded me that for some reason, even as beautiful as Hawaii was, there's something about the fall that I can't grasp or describe that is absolutely perfect. I just get this feeling of perfection when the weather gets that way... It's beautiful. And then yesterday was a total bomb (minus the LHC not blowing shit up, lol) but today I was happy again. I don't know why, because I didn't get to sleep in or anything. But then going home for dinner listening to the radio I just realized that music, especially radio music for some reason, never fails to make me happy. It brings me back to some sort of happy time, I'm not really sure what; I'm consciously reminded of different high school events but it's not that, it's more of a subconscious happiness with a little of that reminiscence thrown in. So, I don't know. Hopefully tomorrow is a good day, too.


By the way, September 11th totally snuck up on me, as did Talk Like a Pirate Day. So I watched a History Channel special which made me cry, which I'm glad it did because it kind of helps me realize how big that was, which I don't think I understood at the time. I mean, being an emotional person, I was upset and it was obviously devastating, but I didn't understand the impact. I forgot my cousin's aunt worked at the Pentagon, and I didn't really comprehend, I don't think, that this was the first attack ever on American soil. (Blah blah blah Pearl Harbor HAWAII WAS NOT A STATE THEN) BUT. Yeah. Despite the fact that everyone hates that it gets used politically as an excuse for everything, I'm glad people still take the time to teach everyone and remind everyone what it means.

And now, I think I'm going to go listen to For the Fallen, and wish I had our original recording of because I think there was more passion in it, but I need to post a recording of it or something, because it's an amazing song written by a local composer about 9/11. Anyway, yeah.

And life goes on.