I think there is a fundamental misunderstanding in our society about the meaning of the word hypocrite.
From its misuse in popular reference, I observe that many people think a hypocrite is someone who says one thing and does another. Certainly, that is a small part of the meaning of this word, but if that were all, there would be no point in having the word, because we already have a word for that: human.
Yes, every human whose father and mother were born on this planet has said things and then done different things. No human alive today has ever been completely consistent in words and actions. And you wouldn't want to meet someone who did, because there are often good reasons for changing our minds and not following through on something we said we should or would do.
No, there is something much more important in the meaning of the word hypocrite.
To understand this, we need to go back to the root of the word. The ways we use and misuse words changes over time, but however we twist the meanings, the words themselves will always convey to some their original meaning, and it is often useful to return a word to its proper meaning, because words have no purpose if they do not clearly and properly convey information.
Now, this word hypocrite comes from a Greek word that means actor. And therein lies its true meaning.
A hypocrite is not someone who says one thing and does another. A hypocrite is someone who does wrong and pretends to be doing right. It is easy to confuse the two, but there is a huge difference. Saying one thing and doing another may in many circumstances (either because the situation has changed or because it is realized that following through would be worse than not doing what was promised) be helpful to all, but pretending to be doing good while behaving wickedly is never helpful.
A hypocrite is a pretender, not someone who strives for a good goal and misses the mark. We are all human, and we all make mistakes. No one can consistently do good and never do anything wrong. The tendency, though, is to expect this of others and to pretend that we are always right. And by judging the foibles of others who are trying to do right, we ourselves become the true hypocrites, pretending and deceiving ourselves that we are better because we don't talk about the good we're trying to do.
The truly righteous people acknowledge that they are no better than anyone else, try to do right, and don't, when they do something wrong, pretend in self-righteousness that they are doing right.

I've been thinking about Web design a lot, lately. This is probably because I'm going into the field as a career. Anyway, I've run across some pages on the Web discussing the relative value of liquid and fixed-width layouts.
Most of them point out that a liquid layout will become unwieldy on a very wide screen, and that for this reason, designers should put limits on the width of the content.
While the logic that it is the Web designer's job to make sure the layout can't be so wide it is unwieldy or difficult to read the long lines thereof makes sense on the surface, it ignores some important things.
First, not everyone likes the centered-50% content column layout. Personally, I find it annoying, just as I find huge buttons on a browser's toolbar or many banners on a Web site I'm visiting annoying. And the reason is the same: They waste valuable screen real estate.
Second, users can resize their browser windows to have a comfortable column-width. While a kiosk browser may be limited to full-screen, a desktop browser doesn't have to be. I can set my browser window to 640px in width and browse sites that way all day long.
Third, users can also adjust their base text size or zoom factor to make a relative-width layout easy to read. But if the column is fixed-width, zooming or changing the text size may break the layout or the text wrap (i.e., make that fixed-width column stretch outside the viewing window).
Fourth, it is insulting to users to dictate what fluid content, like text, should look like. If your layout depends heavily on images, positioning them rigidly makes sense, but there's no reason in the world for a Web designer to dictate to a user how wide a column of text should be. Yes, I know thin columns are easier to read, but if I'm reading something lengthy, it is more important to me that I get as much text on the screen as possible to limit the number of times I'm required to move the page to access further content.
It is insulting in another way: It implies that the Web designer thinks the user is not smart enough to adjust the window to a comfortable view.

So, Web designers, if your aim is accessibility and readability, don't use fixed-width layouts. Liquid layouts are more accessible and more friendly to users. Don't put your users in an unnecessary box.

Barack Obama said recently, "Look, I got two daughters — 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first about values and morals, but if they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby. I don’t want them punished with an STD at age 16, so it doesn’t make sense to not give them information."

Others have covered the angle that he is essentially putting pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases in the same category. I won't go into that.

My problem is with the word he chose: ( punishment. )
Words are important. Choose them carefully. The words of a president are even more important, because leaders around the world make decisions based on what the leader of the U.S.A. says. Choose them carefully, too.

What is wrong with menu designers?
The first order a waiter or waitress takes is beverages, yet the beverage section is almost always at the end or center of the menu, where it is harder to find. Why isn't the beverage section up front, where you'll see it first?

I recently had the unfortunate necessity of replacing the RAM in my laptop, Koko, apparently because it was overheating. To prevent a repeat of this expense, I purchased a cooling pad (basically a box with two fans that sits under the laptop), which is too small for Koko's widescreen body to rest upon but which seems adequate for cooling if I perch Koko on its top just so.
While testing the RAM with memtest, I had to use my desktop system, Skimbleshanks, for research online and talking to the PcolaLUG. This was unsatisfactory, for various reasons. Mainly, since I use Koko for nearly everything and Skimbleshanks only for archiving my unison files, I had not customized it for my preferences or installed all of my most-used programs. Also, I had somehow messed up the configuration of something, and titlebars were not displaying correctly. Finally, though I could discern no difference in the configuration compared with Koko, Skimbleshanks was not viewing the Debian mirror as a trusted package source.
I use the past tense because I have begun a change in this situation.( Read more... )
Check out these links. They're two parts of a humorous piece on different distributions, comparing them to airlines. Enjoy:
http://linux.ucla.edu/pipermail/linux/2000-May/003064.html
http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=704486

For the benefit of those who've known me a while and heard me talk about my computers, Koko is the new name of Zidgel, Skimbleshanks is the new name of Midgel.

I finished another scarf. It is about 50" long.
Here are pictures:

The colors, again, are bad. I've shot it in film, so I'll try to post those when I develop my roll. Only 10 more exposures. The colors are in real life these: bright green, light gray, white, and a blue variegated pattern in the middle stretch and the centers of the green squares.
I boxed up this, the blue phone case, and the pillow, planning to sell them on eBay, but after looking at the prices things on there got and the number of unsold items to the number that sold, I decided to save my money and try to sell them some other way.
I did put up my digital voice recorder. I hope it sells. I need some money, and so far haven't sold any of my crochet work.
If you see me mention I've finished something you want, or if you want me to crochet something specifically for you, let me know. I'm trying to earn some money to further my education by paying for my expenses.
[Edit: replaced one shot with film photo]

I suppose I ought to update this with what's been happening to me, for the benefit of my friends and my poor memory.
The semester is all but over. I have to turn in one packet of assignments tomorrow, and I'm free. I'll need to go back on Friday to get my packet back from Thursday night's class.
I'm still way behind on sleep. I'm hoping I will grow a brain in the next week and start going to bed at decent hours.
We got new fire alarms put up in our house. We went to a free dinner and saw a presentation on fire safety, and really, everyone should look into what protection their homes have, because the standard smoke detector is not enough.
I've been thinking a lot about what I'm going to do when the spring semester is over. In the spring, I'm trying to get an internship lined up, but that may not work out. If it doesn't, I'll do another semester of practicum as a copy editor on the student paper.
Anyway, after spring, I've decided that what I'll do is try to get jobs working for churches or Christian organizations, possibly through my church conference, so I could get paid by them and work for the small churches without charging them... editing copy, building Web sites, teaching churches how to write press releases in a form papers are likely to print, etc.
I found a LUG in the area, and they have an IRC channel, so I've been getting on IRC some (freenode.net). This keeps me up a little later at night, but since most of the people are in the same time zone, not nearly as much as Undernet used to. And I'll be meeting many of them in person at the next LUG meeting. I'm looking forward to that. It'll be nice to sit down with some people who don't get glazed eyes when I start talking about Linux. Sure, the art director at the paper understood it, but it'll be nice to meet multiple people who not only understand Linux but advocate it.
I've been annoyed by things I've heard in the news lately. A lot of people are bashing President Bush about this NIE report and ignoring both the biases of the authors and the intelligence we're now hearing about that refutes its findings. I'm annoyed that I see so much action that is based not on the welfare of our nation but on how people can smear their political opponents, regardless of how much it hurts morale and mission effectiveness, even though the people in question were singing a different tune in the past. It makes me sick, and I'm not going to mention any party names.
On the crochet front, I've finished a major project. Yay! I'll post pictures eventually. I still have 25 exposures left on the roll.
I'm working on a few other things, still. I have a baby blanket I need to finish, a hat I'm working on that I should probably wait until I finish the blanket before I work much more.
I posted some ads for artists, but I haven't gotten any nibbles even. I need to sit down with the pad of paper and just practice drawing until I can do my own artwork, since it looks like I'm not going to have an artist any time soon.
I wish I could think of something else to write. I wish I knew what my friends want to hear more about. I wish I were caught up on sleep. I have a lot of topics I could write about, if I were better rested and more confident.

So ... I've been very busy. Life has been hectic. And I've been frustrated with not doing anything meaningful outside of my college courses.
I want to do things for God's glory. I want to feel that I'm spending my time wisely.
And having no money to do things like feed and clothe people, the things I do need to have virtually no cost.
Which means that I want to write. I feel I have stories to tell that others should read.
But I'm faced with a dilemma.
It's the false starts.
I need to write.
I can't.
Or rather, I can, but in order to write, I need to get started, and that's where I'm running up against a brick wall and failing to make progress. I need to restart my writing habit, like rebooting a computer that has locked up.
The last story in which I was able to write easily and well was the Great Movers. I can make some progress in that, I'm confident, but I can't finish it by myself. It was started as a collaboration, and it must continue as a collaboration. There are parts of it I lack the proper understanding to write. So, if I'm going to write in that, I want to find a co-author who can fill in the political scenes I am unable to write at this time.
The other option would be to start something new, or work in earnest on another of my many story ideas ... but I don't know what story is right to work on right now.
This is my current situation.
Please pray for me.

"In order to be grounded I've got to be crazy, and I must be crazy to keep flying missions. But, if I ask to be grounded that means I'm not crazy anymore, and I have to keep flying." --Capt. Yossarian, Catch-22

From time to time, people (usually married people) say to singles something along the lines that singles should be content and happy with being single, that singles should stop looking and just be productive. What the single should be productive at varies, whether it's mission work or a career or something else. And if the single tries to take this advice, people will say something like, "See? Aren't you happier now? You didn't need to be looking for your mate."
The proposition is a catch-22: If you want to get married, you must not be whole in yourself. If you're whole in yourself, you should have no desire to get married.
This presents singles with something of a problem. If they don't take the advice, they'll have to put up with insensitivity of those who, for the most part, are like the environmentalist who already has a house but tells others that they shouldn't cut trees to build homes for themselves. Easy for you to say I don't need a house; you already have yours.
And if they do follow the advice, their legitimate desires will be dismissed as being something easy to ignore, or worse, imagined in the first place.
Furthermore, if they give up on their search, singles face the prospect of missing their goal when it presents itself. For, being wholly consumed with whatever being productive is, they are less likely to have attention or time to give to prospective mates who might emerge.
I know that sometimes singles look with the wrong attitude, and that some of us need to make changes to the way we do things, but what I'm talking about here is this blind insistence people who are not looking have that singles should not be looking, which I think often comes down to an unwillingness on their parts to listen to what they consider to be the whining of the lonely.
Married people don't want to remember, I think, their singlehood. It is easier to simply pass it off with a platitude and urge the single person to find more productive use for his or her time.
Some will even go so far as to extol the virtues of being unattached. Why, you single people can go wherever you want, whenever you want, and you don't have to clear it with a spouse! Okay, assuming you have a good salary and can get away, fine... but there's another side to this coin. It may be nice to run wherever the wind pushes your sail, but when you are away from your harbor, there's nothing so lonesome as knowing that there is nobody at home to care what time you get in. The opposite of love is not hate; it's apathy... and if the manifestation of apathy in someone's life is that no one is at home to care whether one comes back to the hearth at dinner time or at midnight, is that not a feeling far from feeling loved?
So don't be glib about the freedom of being single. If someone wants to get married, don't ridicule his or her feelings. If you feel the need to do something, help the single prepare for marriage properly. But don't tell single people that they don't know how good they have it. The likelihood is that they do know the benefits, but they also have a wish that, even if it's not the best, merits honest and compassionate discussion.
I plan soon to write a little bit about the mistakes singles ministries make, and how those mistakes can be avoided.

I've been doing some research for class, and here are some of the gems I've encountered.
It's about time I saw someone else saying these things. Most of the points in Nintendo's Wii Is the Best Product Ever are things I've been saying ever since I heard about the features of the Wii, and PS3, and the Xbox360.
That article had links to some others which I couldn't resist reading.
Yeah, I think I was right to avoid MySpace all these years... and for many of the same reasons mentioned here: MySpace, Second Life, and Twitter Are Doomed. I did not, however, predict what is predicted in the article. I just complained about it and stayed away.
Even though I could not care less if you paid me not to care, this article, iPhone to Flop...Then Fly is a pretty good read, and I think he's mostly right in his analysis. I disagree about the keypad issue, though. That will hold them back. Anyway, I don't really care if iPhone does well or poorly, because I'm not into multi-function phones. I want my phone to be a telephone and nothing or very little else. Text messaging is sort of useful, now that we have predictive entry.
Another news item is this one about Blockbuster video choosing Blu-Ray for its high definition rentals. As A Slipped Disc? explains, the war is not over, and since HD-DVD is more closely aligned with the computer world (while Blu-Ray has a good corner of Hollywood), HD-DVD may be the winner in the end. That's where I'd put a wager, if I had to. Computing and recording are more important than Hollywood releases.
Finally, Google is doing things that annoy me. Their maps service is the one thing I do use on their site (except when individual sites use Google for the backend of their site search page, but that doesn't really count. Anyway, this article suggests that Google Is Watching Us! An interesting read.
Well, i should probably get back to my assignment. I have more research to do.

You asked: Is the morality of the Old Testament outdated?
No.

( Did you want more of an answer? (cut for excessive length) )

I was reading an article online today (http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=199201179), and I was reminded of a question I'd heard some time ago.
You see, one of the things some people say about Linux in the face of points about why it is more efficient, more secure, more powerful, and better behaved than MS-Windows(tm) is that it's not as easy to use.
I think a large part of that is a misunderstanding in how people approach Linux, but the question was this:
You're the coach of a baseball team. You have two players who run the 50-yard dash in the same amount of time. One player has good form, and the other has bad form. Which player do you put on your team?
You put on the player with bad form. Once you've taught him good form, he'll blow the other player away in running.
I think it's the same with Linux.
Right now, Linux has some issues with usability (largely because its software tends to be written by people who needed it, so it's designed to do tasks the way the authors wanted them done. Usability for others is an afterthought with many packages (those developed by individual programmers rather than software teams like Mozilla)) and with hardware support (which is usually an issue of hardware companies not giving out the information needed to interface with their devices, requiring a reverse-engineering effort for the Linux community to cobble together something that works with finicky hardware). And yet, it is approaching Windows in terms of usability and hardware support.
So, what Linux is would more accurately be described as a baseball player with a sprained ankle or broken leg. If the guy with a broken leg is running at nearly the same speed as a healthy player, imagine what could be accomplished once his leg heals.
Programmers who think Linux is not friendly enough should do some development with the interfaces to make the programs more friendly while retaining their power and good behavior (i.e., not changing settings once the user has set them). In this way, everyone would benefit. See, the people who wrote the software you think isn't friendly often didn't write it to be friendly to random users. They wrote it to do a job, do it well, and do it the way they expected it to be done. The UI was secondary for them. If the UI is important to you, you can program a friendly UI that works with (or becomes part of a replacement for) the program that does what it does in a workable way. Different people feel different parts of the software picture are more important.
Hardware support will continue to be a problem as long as companies develop hardware and drivers for Microsoft but don't develop drivers for Linux or release the interface specs needed to write a 100% compatible driver. This is the fault of the hardware manufacturers, and those who continue to treat Linux like an unwanted stepchild will soon find that other companies have started playing nice with the FOSS community, and that they don't sell as many devices as they used to. The movement is growing, and we have long memories.

I had not intended to write about this, but my sense of linguistic purity compels me to make note of a misused word.
Tragedy.
News reports have repeatedly included the word tragedy in describing something that is not.
A tragedy is a lamentable occurrence or disaster. Tragic events merit lamenting. Why do we lament? Because tragedies occur outside of conscious control.
In ancient drama, according to Wikipedia, a tragedy involved the downfall, characterized by seriousness and dignity, of a great person through either a character flaw in the great person or a conflict between the person and a higher power, such as fate or society or the law.
An earthquake in which many people die is a tragedy. An automobile accident in which numerous or special people die is a tragedy. Being lost at sea and drowning or starving is a tragedy. Missing a safety step in an experiment that causes an explosion is a tragedy. When a building collapses because it wasn't designed for the snowfall it receives, killing people, that is a tragedy. When a ship sinks because it was going too fast for the watch to see a hazard, and people die, that is a tragedy.
These things happen through some means (whatever your beliefs about why things happen) outside the conscious control of those who set them into motion.
Crimes, including murders, are not tragic. They can be heinous, horrific, vicious, or other adjectives, but one thing they never are is tragic.
When planes fly down and shoot and bomb people having worship services on a Sunday morning, it is not a tragedy but a crime. When someone sets off a bomb in a sports arena or a marketplace to kill people, it is not a tragedy but a crime. When someone flies a large plane into a building, killing many hundreds of people, it is not a tragedy but a crime. When someone picks up a gun and willfully murders people, it is not a tragedy but a crime.
The proper reaction to a crime is not lamentation, it is justice. Lamenting is appropriate for events beyond our control. Crimes demand justice. Deaths may be lamented as tragic. Crimes themselves are never tragic, because there is a choice of will to bring them about, so the event of a crime is not a tragedy.

My mom and I went tonight to see the Taming of the Shrew. It was pretty good. The director costumed the players in modern clothing, for the most part, and had the good sense to leave Shakespeare's lines in their original form. We laughed a lot, both at the Shakespearean jokes and at the modern sight gags. All in all, it was a fun time.
Some people hissed at Kate when she delivered her final soliloquy, which I felt was in very bad taste.

I've seen recently a few of the Disney dubs of the works of Hayao Miyazaki. They have been skillfully realized films, dubbed with great care to their accuracy and synchronization, that have been worth seeing a second and third time. If any of you are fans (or become fans) of Studio Ghibli's works, I'd enjoy discussing them with you.

Frustration has been present in many of my recent days. My desires ebb and flow, turning up now and then on different days most strongly, but all of them, both great and small, seem postponed with no estimated time of arrival. And most frustrating is that this is true of both my heart desires (finding my wife, having steady work to provide for her and buy a house, and getting married) and of the minor whims of the passing of the day (having money to buy this or that amusement), as well as the desires in between (having money to support worthwhile artists by buying their works). I feel pulled in a thousand different directions with no clear idea of how to accomplish any of my desires because of the choices I have made as far as getting my next degree. I feel both pulled to things beyond my reach and anchored to things beyond my control other than drastic choices not easily undone. And I am tired, weary from lack of discipline to sleep at reasonable hours and exercise as much as I should. And I've been having trouble getting myself motivated to do the things I need to do.

I am making good progress with the exercise, though. I have a treadmill now, and I can exercise while I do my class reading. Since March 9th, when I took the Everything Test and discovered that I weighed 198 pounds (and decided that was probably not healthy), I've made good progress. Without making many changes at all (mostly just curbing the between-meal snacking), I've lost about 6 pounds. I plan to simply stick to this method, no particular emphasis other than eating a regular breakfast and a light meal and a big meal, taking seconds only when I am actually still hungry, and trying to get a little bit of extra activity, and lose weight until my body reaches its optimal weight. I'm not setting an arbitrary goal, because I'm not dieting. But I might continue to keep track of where I am, thought I might not, because I can't think of any reason you all would care about such things. I mean, I care when my friends are trying to reach a goal because it's important to them, but wouldn't care if they didn't care.

Tomorrow is a new day. I no longer feel hideous, my lip having cleared up almost completely. I expect this episode is over.

The semester is reaching that point where the assignments begin to really come hot on the heels of each other. I want to get them done quickly, but they take particular steps to complete that cannot be done as quickly as I would like. I'm going to finish this degree, but I'm not sure whether I'm well-suited for reporting.

Pray for me, for guidance and discipline... and that I find my wife soon for her friendship with me to grow strong.

  It's stinking cold in my dorm room. The past several nights, I've felt worse and worse as the night goes on, and I think it's because of the cold. It's not that cold outside, but the A/C unit in our room blows cold air all night. Tonight, I put on my bathrobe, and I don't feel as bad as I've been feeling, but my hands still get cold, and I realized that my hands, at least, and the shivering, remind me a lot of my time in Poland in the winter. I know I should go to bed earlier, but I feel in the late evening that I'm just getting started on the important things I'll get done during the day.
  I mentioned already that my current website design is ending. I started work on my new design last night. This time, I remembered first thing to archive a copy of the old design. Then I set about designing the layout. It's four boxes under the site name graphic that lead to four areas: The Page - My writing, The Hand - About me and my thoughts, The Muse - Influences on my work, and Poland - My time in Poland. I'm concerned that the labels are a bit trite and corny, but I'll go with them for now, unless I hear from many people that the idea is bad.
  I hate uncertainty. I hate not knowing how something is or should be. I think that's why I feel the need to constantly check the waters, why the counsel of those around me holds so much importance for me. Sometimes, I think I'd rather things turn out quickly the way I don't want them to go than for uncertainty to drag on. Uncertainty is when I do lots of overthinking, I think...and that applies to so many things: worrying when someone doesn't come at the expected hour, the status of friendships, feeling ill and throwing up or not, test scores and semester grades, and romantic relationships, et cetera.
  I have not been comepletely forthright with some of you who've spoken to me recently, because I have been in a state of flux regarding something.
  After I got back to Jacksonville, I asked Ruth what I had asked her before we met: What do you think about our relationship, and where do you see it leading? At that time, we discussed some issues we had noticed during our visit. As well as the two of us match, as amazed as i am at how well we match, there are some significant differences between us in the way we approach things and our relative levels of independence. We decided to give some time to thinking and praying about these concerns to decide whether they were red flags or simply areas that we needed to work on reaching a compromise. For this reason, I felt that I ought not reveal this state of flux to other people.
  I am confident that God has someone better suited than me for Ruth, and that He has someone very well-suited for me. It is possible that God's will is, indeed, for Ruth and me to marry, and if so, I'm sure He will let us know. Otherwise, we will try to patiently await our respective spouses. I am thankful for the many nights of wonderful conversation we had. My semester was greatly brightened by our nightly chats. I think that the speed with which we got to know each other, the maturity with which we handled things, and the due caution with which we treated things (she more than I, hehe) made our recognition of the status of our relationship faster and lessened the pain of our decision to take a step back.
  I am sad that it did not go differently, and I have some pain, but I am glad to have things settled, and I am happy to know Ruth; I know she will be a magnificent wife for someone, whether that someone is me or not. God bless you, Ruth. May He make you and your husband exceedingly happy.
  An entry bears this similarity to a romantic relationship: they are both difficult to end gracefully.
  Speaking of tests and grades, please pray for me. The semester ends soon. I have three major assignments due this week. I wish this week were over and its pains forgotten. God bless you all! Good night.

When I came back to the dorm tonight, there was a nice misting rain. It was so pretty and so pleasant that I had to stop for a moment and enjoy the lake and the mist. The way the droplets stuck to my glasses as I continued walking to the dorm made the world shine in a pretty haze that made me feel good.

When I got back to the dorm and went to the lounge to fix some food, I discovered that somebody had removed the coaxial cable from the television there, so waiting for the food was very boring.

Television commercials annoy me.
The people at Helio(tm) need to get over themselves. If you provide voice communications, you're a phone company; it doesn't matter how many features you cram into it, it's still a phone. Talk about thinking too highly of yourself. And the commercials are stupid, anyway.
The Army commercials are annoying me, too. The wording they've been using is almost religious and certainly hubristic. they need to tone it down. Military service is an honor for any citizen and a neccessary fixture in the world. But no nation should glory in its military; the use of force is often necessary to protect a country, but it is not the be-all and end-all of strength. The glory of nations is their righteousness: "Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people." --Pro 14:34
[Edit: What I'm talking about is the "nothing stronger" language.]
I haven't seen anyone on LJTalk in a long time. It's cool; you should try it. :)

"Hey, have you heard about the new Calvinist razor? Once shaved, always shaved!" --unknown

I'm back to normal, lack of sleep aside. My sinuses are pretty clear, and I'm thinking a little bit clearer, though the sleep debt is impeding me there. I plan to take a nap this evening after dinner, so if I don't show up online, it's because I didn't wake up.
I bought a new toothbrush on Friday. When I was fighting that sinus infection, I bought a toothbrush that was medium instead of soft. That was horrible. Never buy a toothbrush when you can't think straight.
Although I said my lips had all cleared up, I still have a spot in the corner of my mouth that hasn't gone back to normal yet. :(

I had a strange dream this morning. I was in a prison, and I got up in the night to go to the bathroom, but it was in a different building. And when I got to that building, it turned into a raft with a sail that moved around the area where the building stood, and when I finally got off, it was after the morning roll call, so I was sent to punishment, which was supposed to be like time-out, but these two women were dealing cards and expecting me to play with them, even though I wasn't supposed to be interacting with anyone. Weird dream, and I don't expect any meaning, but it's nice to have a semi-clear dream, because I hadn't been dreaming for a while, and the last week or so, I had been dreaming only in strange abstract snatches.
I need to find a sleep mask. I think the level of light streaming into my dorm room is affecting the quality of my sleep. Of course, the fact that my AC is still blowing hot air sometimes is annoying me. 68 is a little chilly for me, but that's where I have to have the thermostat to keep it from blowing hot air.

Night before last, she said it. :)

My mother has been telling me that I need to go to a real restaurant once in a while to keep my diet balanced, so I went to Olive Garden for lunch.
I really dislike going to a restaurant alone. It's been a while since I did this, but it still stinks.

Speaking of restaurants, I dislike the new Arby's commercials. They portray Arby's customers as people who are stupid and irresponsible, more concerned with food than with fulfilling their commitments. What is wrong with these advertising agencies? Oh, and there's McDonald's and their totally unaware people. What these commercials say is that their customers are unaware of their lives. Another one I see often is Vonage, whose commercials make me want to stil sharp things into my ears, but beyond that, they're saying by the situations they portray, that they are the company for people who are stupid. What is wrong with these companies? I am a smart man, so I don't want to patronize companies that tell the world the message: You're stupid, so we're the company for you.
I love Arby's sandwiches, but I'm not sure I want to patronize them if they're going to tell people that their customers are stupid and irresponsible.
It's not just these companies I've mentioned. Most advertising firms seem to like putting people in their commercials into situations that make those people look stupid. I don't understand why. Surely, we encounter a lack of common sense frequently in everyday life, but when did companies discover the chutzvah to call their potential and current customers stupid to their faces?
I think companies should treat us with respect. We are, after all, their source of income.

Go Gators!

I was right about the intensity of this semester. Things are starting to get stressful, but part of it is my terrible time-management skills.
Of course, part of it is that I chose a very difficult and beginner-unfriendly topic for my first story. Or maybe it's just that my schedule is such that finding people in their offices is a challenge... but that goes back to my poor time management. Anyway, I'm not complaining about the assignment, just stating that it is presenting a challenge I'm not sure I was ready to face... But this challenge was intensified this week. I've come down with a sinus infection that has made thinking difficult and sapped my energy a bit.
I've still been going to my classes, because I didn't know of any other way to know what was going on (and I take pride in perfect attendance). Perfectionism and poor time management don't mix well. They lead to taking on too many things.
Several days ago, I ran into someone while playing my PS2 game, We <3 Katamari, and he indicated an interest in playing it. He had a copy of Katamari Damacy, which I wanted to play (I would have bought that one if the game store had had a copy), so we agreed to loan them to each other. Anyway, I tell you that to tell you this: At the beginning of one of the levels, the king (who gives you your assignments) begins with "Dzien dobry!" and goes on to say something about having been in Poland. I don't remember what he said, but I was amused to see the mention. On campus, we have an area where the walkways are lined with light poles that have flag banners attached to them indicating the origin of international students currently enrolled. One of them is Poland, so I know there's at least one Pole here. I wish there were some way for me to find out who they are, because I think we might have interesting conversations. But I know the university will give me no help in this. I was thinking about that a few minutes ago when I ate the last section of a bar of Goplana chocolate filled with strawberry filling (which is from Poland).
Anyway, I think I'm starting to really get over the sinus infection, which means I will only have the ADHD to fight in getting things done. I plan to go to the library tomorrow. I walked all over campus today trying to find the office of the Faculty Association, which was closed when I arrived (and probably had been for some time before I went looking). So, that was a bit frustrating.
I went to the free ASL class today. Since I seemed to be the most experienced person there, I ended up translating, which was quite slow sometimes, given my mental state from the sinus trouble. But I did well enough to surprise myself. I'm hoping someone will start attending who knows more than I do, because interpreting for a class is quite a responsibility, but if not, that's okay, because it is good practice for me in both receptive and send-ive (still not thinking straight) signing. And when my head is not fuzzy, I should have fewer moments of, "wow, those handshapes are interesting; oops, what did that sign mean?"
I went shopping tonight. I got some generic decongestant. I stood in the aisle for about three minutes trying to figure out why it's still called Sudafed when they no longer put pseudoephedrine in their pills (You know, pseudo phed...). I also looked around to see if I could find something that did, since the bold claim of not containing it sparked my curiosity. Has pseudoephedrine been removed from the market, or has it just fallen out of favor with consumers? I also looked at a few things that had "no sugar added" and decided that legislation should be passed requiring some sort of easily-recognized graphic be put on anything containing aspartame. A lot of people are allergic to it or concerned about it, so it ought to be easier than reading the fine print of the ingredients for consumers to see that something has aspartame in it. In a continuation of good help being hard to find, tonight's cashier did the familiar examination of the canvas bag without understanding I didn't want to purchase it (again). The bagger, thankfully, understood the purpose and told the cashier what I wanted done. I found the irony mildly tasty.
Well, I think I've rambled enough, and I should go get some more food. Is it feed a cold, starve a fever, or feed a fever, starve a cold? ;) I guess it's a moot point, since I don't think I have either.