UPDATE!

NO ONE GIVES A SHIT! (No, really, I don't know if anyone even reads this anymore so it is a logical assumption.)

Anyway, on to business.

Currently playing: The Minstrel's Prayer by Cartel

Days until I move into my shiny new dorm room: 29

Days until I start fucking up things in my shiny new dorm room: 30

Days until FUUUUUUU- (read: first class I will ever have is Chem lecture at 7:30 am): 34

Art projects finished: 1

Art projects not finished: 12

iTunes library status since grey-screen of DOOM: 4, 203 songs, 22.14 gb

Indie-fied: Very much so.

On a scale of "Nah" to "OH MY GO-AUBSIYVAYAV", how much my room needs to be cleaned: "I think that pile of laundry is trying to communicate through pantomime. That or my dog is stuck under it."

Things purchased in the last week: 

-Time Capsule

-Post-it Notes

-Socks

-Earplugs

Things I have in my room that don't belong in my house: 12

Number of people that need to be given their shit back: 2

WoW Accomplishments:

80 Death Knight (Saintmurder)

80 Mage (Oddity)

79 Warrior (Stimpak)

73 Druid (Chemo)

68 Rogue (Radium)

36 Shaman (Ectoplasm)

29 Paladin (Acumen)

20 Hunter (Acehigh)

Man-Harem Additions:

Craig Parker (NOT in Haldir costume. He looks retarded. Zap the wig though, and nnngghh. Pretty.)

Sam Neill

Paul Bettany

Ethan Hawke

Alejandro Manzano (Lead singer of Boyce Avenue. Check 'em out on YouTube.)

Current music obsessions:

The Bravery

The Dead 60s

Eisley

Keane

Locksley

The Real Tuesday Weld

TV on the Radio

To-Do List:

Finish packing

Clean room

Finish Packing

Clean out mini-fridge

Finish packing

Baby-proof house

Finish packing

Wash car

Finish packing

Explore phenomena called "sunlight"

Finish packing

FINISH PACKING!

...

Oh, I need new jeans too.

Care level: I_I

("Ahem, Thisby."

"Aye, Cap'n. Quite."

"Thisby, it appears that the lass's care cup is still rather empty."

"Indeed, Cap'n. Most remarkable."

"...Well, do something about it, Thisby!"

"Erm, what do you propose, Cap'n?"

"Well, first things first, those pants are going to have to come off."

"C-Cap'n?")

"Trent?" "Yeah?" "I think I just came. I'm standing 15 feet away from Chris Martin."

So, Coldplay in concert...holy shit. Like, I knew they were good, but they were a million times better live then I ever expected. And it was more than just the fact that these are four very talented guys bouncing around on stage and having so much fun doing it, you're having fun just WATCHING them...it was the whole event. The lights, smoke, acoustics, balloons, GLOW IN THE DARK BUTTERFLIES. It was just...magical. I know that sounds corny, but for two and a half hours I wasn't in Irvine, California. I was in a completely different world. And the population was 20,000 screaming fans and 4 very talented musicians.

The Breakdown:

7:00 - The first opening band starts, a very odd swing/pop/country/blues compilation band hailing from the UK. The male singer was very good, but the female drummer kept throwing me off. She used her entire body whilst drumming. Very strange.

8:00 - Second opening band begins, even weirder than the first. Sort of a African choir meets Techno meets Blues. Very bizarre combination, but it kinda sorta (not-really) worked. Either way, opening bands are supposed to be mediocre anyway.

8:50 - Roadies begin setting up for Coldplay. I squee at the sight of Chris Martin's signature acoustic guitar.

9:10 - The show kicks off with a blast - lights, color, and sound - to the tune of Life in Technicolor. Chris Martin is bouncing around the stage like he's walked every inch of it since he was born. It's hard to describe how happy I was that they opened the show with my favorite song from Viva La Vida.

From there the set followed thusly:

Violet Hill (My second favorite song off the album, who'da thunkit?)

In My Place

Viva La Vida (I shouted myself hoarse on this one. You couldn't NOT sing along.)

Yellow (Here they had giant yellow balloons out in the crowd.)

Glass of Water

Cemeteries of London

42

Fix You (Imagine 20,000 people singing along with this. EVERYONE was on their feet.)

Strawberry Swing (One of the best performances of the night.)

God Put a Smile On Your Face (This is the song where they played on a stage in the middle of the crowd and I was 15 feet away from them. It was insane how close I was. I - just - it was amazing.)

Talk

Lost

Green Eyes (Again, they went and played in a different part of the crowd, but this is my favorite Coldplay song of all time. I was very surprised that they played it. In fact, I bet Trent before the concert that they WOULDN'T play it, heh.)

Billy Jean (Yes, they did an acoustic version of this song. Also, my favorite Michael Jackson song. Funny, innit?)

Death Will Never Conquer (Much to my surprise, the drummer really could sing.)

Politik

Lovers In Japan (Here they launched thousands of thin plastic butterflies that glowed in the dark into the crowed. NEON RAIN!)

Death and All of His Friends

Reprise of Viva La Vida

The Scientist

Life In Technicolor ii (A nice way to wrap up the show with this one.)

The show ended around 11:15, and I called Trent right after it was over to ask him what he thought. Most of the phone call was silence because we couldn't put how it felt to be there into words. I still can't. 

I honestly think the best part about the whole thing was that you could see how much fun the band members were having. I've seen many shows where the band looks like they can't wait to get offstage. Their whole performance says "Damn, I have to do this 100 more times." During this show, there wasn't even a hint of that. Either the members of Coldplay are very good actors, or they genuinely enjoyed what they were doing. It was impossible not to have fun.

Simply put, Coldplay in concert was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. I've stood inside St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome. I've seen the Panama Canal. I've stood at the highest point in the continental United States, and seeing them play live is right up there with all those.

...And the only thing that could top it would be seeing Bowie in concert.

Blink

So I finally did it. Fuck.

I started writing the epic story about time travel that I've had stuck in my head for three years now. It's been rattling around up there because I've always been too terrified to try and put it down, like trying to capture a waft of smoke - reach for it and it's gone.

The Players:

Evan Hoffling - Called 'Hoff' by most people but can't stand it.

Fadir Mittal - Evan's best friend who is convinced he can travel in time.

Juliet Fenwick - I don't know how she fits yet or what she does, but holy shit that's too cool a name to waste.

The Problem:

Okay, now me actually telling you how Fadir thinks he could travel in time would defeat the point of me even writing, yes? Just so you know, it has to do with strings and paradoxes and the constant movement of molecules. Oh, and blinking.

I'm certain this will turn out to be yet another one of my partially-finished, hair-brained schemes that never see fruition, but here I go anyway.

On The Proper Use of Leverage

"Give me but one firm spot of land on which to stand, and I will move the world." - Archimedes

So says the man that was the first to discover the properties of buoyancy, to give practical uses for mirrors and levers, to calculate the volume of a sphere. Archimedes was hailed as the one of the greatest polymaths ever to live by taking theory from the abstracted mind, and giving it a practical use. Archimedes stood on the library and museum at Alexandria, and from there he changed the world.

I have Lancaster. And I will have UC Davis. Certainly they are no match for the birth place of modern thought and reason, but maybe - just maybe - they're firm enough that I can change the world too. 

Archimedes changed the world with a lever and fulcrum, what will you change the world with?

(I blame illness on this post. I have been reading "The Rise and Fall of Alexandria" while I've been bedridden...blasted philosophers.)

The Nature of Wind

It isn't often that I read something and feel like the author is speaking personally to me. More often that not, books are an entertainment - a distraction. Complete immersion in a book is one of my favorite diversions since it's so simple for me to get lost in the lives and infinite intricacies of another person's life, but rarely do I ever feel any personal connection to the characters. Most of the time I feel like I'm treated at best as an observer (at worst an intruder) to the book.

But every once in a great while, I read something, and I can't help but feel that either I've known the author or they've known me, because they know exactly what I need to hear at that exact moment. It's an odd thing, that, and it makes you wonder if things like that are always there, but you just don't notice. Because you need someone to tell you those exact words, but when no one does, you go looking for them...and sometimes you do find them.

I didn't make valedictorian this year, nor did I make CSF. I will be one of the few IB seniors to not be a valedictorian or graduate in gold. I don't blame anyone but myself though. Every decision I've made for the past four years was mine and mine alone, and this is where they've left me. Am I angry? Yes. Will I stay angry? No, there isn't any point. So I'll have a different colored robe. So I won't sit next to my friends. There's no point in fighting something that I can't change, and I needed a piece of fiction to tell me the truth of that:

"That's the nature of wind. You can work with it or you can fight against it... but no matter how much you might not like it, you can't change it."

I have two choices: I can get angry about my own failures, or I can enjoy my last two weeks of high school. Staying angry might feel good now, but I will regret the time wasted later. I certainly won't like it, but I'll do what I can to work with it.

Like Clockwork

In gearing up for the release of the new Star trek movie, I've once again immersed myself in the escapist fantasy that is inherently the normal state of being for a Trekkie. Instead of caring about what clothes to wear or what new fad to buy, we ponder the universe and the future and everything in between.

This has led me to consider the one topic that has always fascinated me: alternate universes. The idea of an alternate universe is that for every major decision we make, there is an equal and opposite decision, and by making a choice we split our fate one way or another. This would imply that there are points in life that are distinctly more important than others, and the question is: If such moments do exist, how do we go about recognizing them? Or, are they recognizable at all?

The Star Trek episode City On The Edge Of Forever put forth a situation where a woman that was well liked, well respected, and totally innocent had to die in order for the universe to continue the way it was intended to. If the life of one person can so radically affect the future, then how are we to justify anything we do? A harsh word could accidently turn the tide of a kind person into a hateful bigot, a piece of trash casually tossed aside could prove to be the extinction of an entire species. 

Causation: this is the dilemma of all questions involving alternate universes. If each alternate universe is born of an important decision made by a single person, then the number of possible universes out there is, well...astronomical.

So, for example, this Fall I will be attending UC Davis, but (going back to last November), I may have decided not to join Mock Trial which caused problems with me getting CAS hours and I didn't get the leadership experience, so I didn't get into UC Davis. In another universe, I went to AVC for two years. Maybe I transferred out, maybe I met someone and decided to stay, maybe I died in a car accident on my way home. One decision, whether or not to join Mock Trial could have affected the future of my life to that extent. Of course we'll never know if Mock Trial was the ultimate reason why I got into UC Davis, but the possibility is still there, and for an alternate universe, possibility is all it needs.

I recognize joining Mock Trial as an important point in my life, possibly one that affected my future. McCoy in the Star Trek episode attempted to save Edith Keeler, but was stopped by Kirk and Spock. Because of her pacifist tendencies, Keeler would have delayed the US's entrance into WWII, to the point where Hitler nearly took over the world. Starfleet never existed in that timeline. For McCoy, trying to save Keeler wasn't a conscious choice. He never considered the repercussions of her living when it was clear she was meant to die. It was an action, not a decision. 

So that leaves the bigger question: Are we in charge of our own fate?

I would say no, based solely on the fact that even if we were able to accurately recognize every important moment of our lives, there is no way that is humanly possible to extrapolate all of the possible outcomes of a particular decision. Our lives are like clocks, with a infinite number of cogs and wheels and little machines that drive everything that we do, but if one falls out of place our lives are derailed instantly. However, by carefully weighing decisions instead of hasty choices, we can make them run like clockwork.

All right. Enough philosophical ranting. 

Emoetry

I'm sick of everyone else's emoetry, so I'm gonna show y'all how it's done, haiku style:

Normally life sucks.

But cryptic phrases say zilch.

So get over it.

Goddamn. If you're going to say something, then just say it already. Pfft.