You weirdos wishing Biebs a happy birthday

We all know you girls (and hell, maybe some guys) just want to get in bed with him. I mean that’s why you’re waiting for him to be legal you creeps.

OK, maybe not, but still you’re weird.

Just in case you thought you might have an infinitesimal chance with him, here’s him smooching up Selena Gomez. Sorry.

What did I learn today and yesterday?

So here’s a bunch of stuff I learned:

• My “readers” obviously care more about Justin Bieber cutting his hair than what’s going on in Student Government. Fair enough.
• Falafel ain’t bad, especially with Tzatziki sauce (thanks Jillian!). Kind of could make me go vegetarian to be quite honest with you. But do we really have a place here in Gainesville devoted to falafel? Interesting.
• Voter turnout was slightly higher on the first day compared to last year, but not considerably enough to warrant concern that there’s a possible shift in power.
• Progress is potentially more out in force compared to yesterday, but it’s still kind of paltry to be honest.
• The “bring out the dog” thing is so 2010, people.
• APPLE’S COMING OUT WITH THE iPAD 2 NEXT WEDNESDAY OMG OMG OMG.
• Apple’s also coming out with a MacBook Pro refresh. For those of you who just got MacBook Pros in the past month, I feel sorry for you.
• The Asians are definitely out in force to get their guy Anthony Reynolds into office. You can’t really go around campus without seeing an Asian person wearing a Unite shirt.
• President Obama has ordered the Justice Department to not defend the Defense of Marriage Act, basically potentially opening the door to gay marriages in the future. (sorta kinda, don’t quote me on that please).

::yawn:: I’m tired, nap time.

Salads are to BBQ, as crack addicts are to urns?

My genetics test went as horribly as it could. Turns out the stuff I thought I knew I really didn’t know and the stuff I worked hard to know I actually knew. le sigh. On the flip side, I think I did OK on my physics quiz for, well, not looking at anything.

Anyway, yesterday was mostly pointless…although I did learn that Marilyn really did exemplify the definition of “sugar-high” last night. I mean she went from being slightly insane to incredibly crazy after a (admittedly larger than usual) Steak n’ Shake shake (double fudge, Mar? I forget). But then all of a sudden she crashed and just stopped talking and was completely committed to her phone playing some game. Weirdo.

Lots of interesting stories in the past few days, so heeereee we go.

• One of my favorite places in town is Gator Dawgs. I probably have mentioned it before…although I don’t think I’ve actually done a review on it. (I did a very mini-review on it actually). I know I said I didn’t think it merited a review because it was good but not great…but two things. One, I gave it an A-. And two, it’s not really about the hot dog but what goes on the hot dog that makes it great. I used to love really big, beefy hot dogs because I liked eating them plain (barely any ketchup or mustard). But anyway, they were about to close down…until the Alligator reported on their eventual closing and people started pouring in, voicing their support and overflowing their tip jar. Now they have a second wind…thank God for journalism saving the day.
• Speaking of food, the absolutely brilliant owners who created Designer Greens (can’t you tell I like D Greens?) are now going back to their roots and opening up a BBQ place nearby Swamp; apparently it’s called Hay’s or something of that sort, but if their salads and sandwiches are any indication, their BBQ should be amazing. In addition, one of the Sonics that closed down will be reopening soon…I personally don’t like Sonic, but it’s a better place to go to when you’re taking a bunch of drunk people home rather than Taco Bell. Or maybe not.
• How can you be idiotic enough to think that cocaine was stored in an urn? Actually, thinking about it, it’s not necessarily a bad place to hide cocaine. But these guys thought there was cocaine in there….instead, they snorted human and animal ashes. The second issue is: what the heck are animal and human ashes doing mixed together????
• Has this state Senator, Mr. Greg Evers, forgotten about Virginia Tech, the recent tragedy at FSU, the Arizona shootings, the University of Alabama – Huntsville incident, etc??? This guy thinks that we should allow anyone to carry firearms on any university campus as long as they have a permit. Apparently, he may have taken Humans vs. Zombies for real….
• UF is now going to be offering a doctoral program in Public Health. I’ve always found public health to be an interesting and engaging subject, and something that merits our full attention especially in this heavily globalized age.
• If you have a GPS and you live in the Southeast, be prepared for frustration. Apparently the Department of Defense is doing some tests that will disrupt GPS service for the next month. Sketchy, right?
• Weirdos in Britain threw a live chicken at KFC employees. Protest? Prank? Stupidity? We don’t know.
• So I know of a girl who has this really cute but really fat cat (the two or three people who have me on Google Reader should know exactly who I’m talking about). Fat cats are cuuute…I mean, really, I read Garfield every day. I don’t know how I feel about other animals being fat…but I guess they’re cool too.
• I don’t have a smartphone still…but I can update my Facebook status via text message. I don’t do it from the bathroom…but apparently a lot of Facebook users do….

MLK Day

To be completely honest, I never did think much of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. When I was in grade school, we only looked forward to the day because it was treated like any other federal holiday amongst us: time off from school. Even up until this year, it was more or less regarded as a time to just kick back and relax. But seeing all the specials that ESPN had on the 25th anniversary of the start of honoring MLK day, I realized that this year I couldn’t let myself just push off this day any longer. I took more time to reflect and think, to look at the specials and see how so many peoples’ lives were affected by the voice and action of one man. It is incredible to think of the value and the enormity of influence that this man possessed, especially in the vast realm of history. Many people credit Abraham Lincoln for freeing the slaves, and he deserves that title for sure. But he naively thought that the abolition of slavery would mean nearly instantaneous equality when, in reality, it would need nearly 100 more years until true equality came to fruition. Dr. King was able to, somewhat magically, able to conjure up the last hurrah in making sure that everyone, no matter their color, had equal rights in this country. While it’d be way too farfetched to say that without him the United States would still be segregated today, it’s not farfetched to say that it would have taken much longer than the 1960s to achieve the near-equality we have today. I didn’t realize it until just yesterday, but even though I am not African-American, I’m sure that I would not have been given the same rights as everyone else had Dr. King not been able to give his “I Have a Dream” speech. To say that I owe Dr. King a great amount of gratitude would be an understatement.

While this country has done so much to get to where it is at today, there is still much work to be done. Congress has barely been able to slowly chip away at inequalities seen in our military, such as the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. There is also now a movement to allow women to serve in combat roles in the military, although that might take longer than expected. LGBT affairs are starting to be incorporated into daily life and de-stigmatization is happening, albeit at a somewhat slow pace. It is our duty to make sure that history does not repeat itself, and it probably won’t repeat itself fully in the sense that we’ll never see the awful lynchings and killings that occurred in the 50s and the 60s during the Civil Rights Movement. But any unfairness to any person is too much unfairness indeed. As the Constitution says, “all men are created equal”. When the hell are we ever going to fulfill that statement in its entirety?

It’s Another Apple Christmas – this time fo realz

…..ugh…..SERIOUSLY? A Woot-off? ON THE DAY OF A MAC EVENT?! Geez, companies are really doing their part to “stimulate the economy”/bankrupt us.

Speaking of bankruptcy though here’s a shoutout to two people who I know won’t be bankrupt in the future, although I must say you’re making me nervous and anxious all of a sudden for the next year. A BIG congrats to Chelsea Marcus and Sean Brennan for getting into UF’s College of Medicine! Even though you’ve made me jittery as hell, you both obviously deserved it . Much congrats and best of luck!

Now to the really, REALLY good news though:

• Apple released, after almost two years since their last iteration, the new MacBook Airs. One word, no, two describes them: freakin sexy. LOOK AT THEM AND YOU’LL SEE WHAT I MEAN. 11.6 and 13.3″ versions, lowest priced model is $999 with 2GB RAM, 1.4GHz Core 2 Duo, nVidia 320m graphics, multitouch trackpad etc. It’s a tad expensive, but it’s definitely much better value than Sony Vaio’s P ever was (that underpowered piece of crap with a weak Intel Atom processor that was STILL $800). Nothing of majorness is missing from these guys except a backlit keyboard, but I’ll live with that. It is interesting to note, however, that Apple kind of “compromised” on the netbook wars by trying to go as low a Core 2 Duo processor as possible AND only putting 2GB RAM standard on ALL MODELS. (I would’ve understood 2GB on the 11.6 and 4GB on the 13.3″…but not this scheme that they’ve done). Battery life is claimed to be vastly improved, but we’ll see how that works. If battery life is stellar on this thing, expect it on my doorstep by next year. (also interesting to note that 13″ model has an SD slot, 11.6″ doesn’t. 13″ model much more suited for expansion of flash memory if necessary). (also, one of the criticisms of flash memory has been its long term longevity, aka: can SSD drives stay alive more than conventional ones do? This’ll be interesting to see).
• Apple also came out with iLife ’11 (interestingly no iWork ’11, yet). iPhoto is improved greatly with more of an iPad theme but also much better Facebook integration and better print/card options. iMovie basically is a kiddy Final Cut Pro, which it kind of always was, but it’s more feature-packed than before. GarageBand looks really cool and could aim to help someone like me to learn guitar better.
• Apple also previewed bits and pieces of Mac OS X Lion, due in Summer 2011. Basically, it’s not iOS, but it definitely has some more elements of iOS. Launchpad looks unnecessary and almost like an add-on layer rather than something that’s integrated. I fear for people like myself who are folder users how Launchpad could “ruin” file organization in the next few years. But at the same time, Mission Control (the way to control all your full-screen and windowed apps) looks phenomenal, even if it is just a gussied up Expose. The Mac App Store will be interesting…but at the same time I feel like Steve Jobs has put himself into a bind with this regard. Think about what he said on Monday in the earnings conference call, how iOS is closed but better. Mac OS X is now trying to head to a closed ecosystem…but it will still always be “open” because one can always side-load apps via CD/disk image/whatever. Hypocrisy anyone? I don’t mind that there’s a Mac App Store…as long as we can still install applications the way we want to, things like menu bar extras, TweetDeck, etc.
• Speaking of big kittehs, as seen in the Alligator, a Nevada feline is the longest cat in the world. big kitteh.
• Christine O’Donnell forgot that the Separation of Church and State existed in the Constitution. This coming from the lady who sponsored witchcraft some years ago. This coming from the lady who said “she would uphold the values of the Constitution”. She doesn’t even know the frickin first amendment! A 5th grader knows the first amendment for crying out loud. I can understand her not remembering the 14th or 16th amendments (I sure don’t remember them), but even then she’s going to be a politician and doesn’t even know the Amendments?! She said bluntly in response to her gaffe “I’m sorry I don’t carry a pocket-sized constitution around with me”. To those voters in Delaware planning to vote for her: ARE YOU FREAKING RETARDED?

I get -ish done.

662 days since Addazio was promoted to Offensive Coordinator and, consequently, increased our chances of losing against FSU this November.

Sort of. (referring to the title)

I’ve actually done some work on these outlines I’m preparing for microbio, so I’m going to take a brief break and blog. Naturally.

Of course I’m coughing like an obnoxious person up here at the 3rd floor of Club West. But maybe they should remember to turn up the heat just a little bit up here in the night time when the weather is a little colder (that’s a phrase I never thought I’d say). Seems like everyone and their mom AND dad is up here at West though, must be a busy test week coming up (you’d think all the professors around here would want to get exams over with before FL/GA, because we’re just so damn good…)

Speaking of the Gatas’ performance, Pat Dooley has some insight into the theories pervading why, to put it bluntly, we suck this year. Now, granted, I’m all for the “in all kinds of weather we’ll all stick together”, but we need to know why we’re doing so bad so that, at the very least next year, we can be great again.

In the meantime though, maybe we need to find a way to grin and bear it, and what better way to do that than alcohol, no? Apparently some researchers in the U.S. have found a gene that may explain why some people get tipsy earlier than others...and I thought it was all based on a height:weight ratio or whatever. So, great, I have two genes that go against me possibly in this area.

Anyway, the only exciting thing coming up for me is the “Back to the Mac” event tomorrow, thank God. Of course, watch it disappoint me…and then me eventually proceed to get aforementioned disappointing product some months later.

I’ll be mass-tweeting tomorrow updates from the event, so brace yourselves.

Does anyone remember…

…when we used to make outlines for History of the Americas with Scofield and/or Eissler and our IB history tests?

Imagine doing that for your science classes.

It’s pure torture I tell you.

Other notes of interest:

• I really should get together with my FABers more often; just saw my friend Emily because she’s leaving for London on Saturday and I realized that I did a bad job of keeping up and saying hello to some people worth saying such stuff to. (PS: I realized I still have pictures I never posted…I’ll get on that…next week).
• Chipotle is my love and noone can take it away from me.
• I bought a new shirt today from Woot (had a coupon and there was a sale as well, definitely coupon FTW). It’ll enrage my vegetarian friends, but then again my Mac Daddy shirt didn’t enrage PC fans did it?
• I’m really not in the mood for studying and staying up late. But such is life.

Oh dear blog, how I’ve missed thee.

I wish I could say that I’ve been enjoying life carefree and that’s why I’ve been avoiding blogging lately, but that’s the exact opposite case of what I’m facing. Here’s what I’ve been up to lately:

• Research has started back up again, but I’m really excited this time around because I actually get to play with some data. What I’m about to say is really nerdy but I like trying to discover trends and analyzing/finding patterns in data and giving interpretations about what various statistical packages/tests may tell. That is a really long-winded sentence, but you know what I mean.
• I’ll also be starting up a new volunteer job that’s somewhat hybridized with my research; it’s more or less a science outreach program where we go into some elementary schools and help some of the kids learn basic FCAT science concepts. Later on, after FCAT, it’ll be more anti-obesity based.
• I’m not going to lie, grading essays is hard. There’s, admittedly, a personality conflict that rages inside of me because a part of me wants to criticize these essays to oblivion but at the same time a part of me wants to give them the most benefit of the doubt.
• Procaryotic Cell Structure and Function is going to be the absolute death of me.
• I’m not doing anything for my 21st I’ve decided; there’s simply too much I have to study for. I’m sure that might change when I come back to Gainesville Saturday night.

Anyway, I have a special (not really) present for you all: The first chapter to that new book I had hoped to finish before school began but, of course, never even really got started. If you want to find anyway to procrastinate further, this might be the answer for you. But it probably won’t be.

And so the September of 21 officially begins

Today also, obviously, marks the 9th anniversary of the September 11th attacks. We remember the innocent lives who perished that day as well as the firefighters and policemen of NYFD and NYPD who bravely risked their lives to save many, many lives on that Tuesday. Also, in light of the nonsense about the Quran burning, we remember that as Americans we are tolerant of all colors, beliefs and religions. 9/11 hurt everyone, not just in the United States but around the world.

Today marks something really interesting: the first in the string of September birthdays. Every year we’d all be like “oh wow that’s impressive, that’s a lot of birthdays in one month”. But this year marks something completely different: this year marks the year of the 21.

Some of us have waited weeks for these days, others of us have waited since we turned the last milestone age: 18. Regardless, 21 represents the start of the final frontier. It doesn’t represent the end of exuberance and youthfulness by any means, but it does represent the beginning of the end for that. I mean pretty soon we’ll all be going off to either graduate school or the workforce but regardless we’ll be doing big things, all of us.

Everyone of course knows the other actual tangible perk to the 21: full legality (well, minus rental cars in some states…pooey). But with more legality comes more responsibility. And while yes the age of 21 feels like we’ve just entered a brand new theme park with no lines at all the rides whatsoever, it also comes with the need to be more responsible about ourselves.

All that I’m really saying, I guess, is that I hope everyone has a kickass time with whatever they’re doing this month and the rest of this year, because it’s going to be one hell of a crazy ride. But just as important be healthy, be safe and be aware. Noone wants a fun night to go sour all of a sudden, and we all want the fun to last as long as possible, right?

So Happy 21st Birthday to all my September friends: Tousley, Mark, Melissa, Rachel, Kishan, Jillian, Anisha, the Arroyo twins and Nico. Thanks for blessing us with your presence and, of course, for all of your birthdays being clustered in such a favorable way hahaha. But seriously, let’s do this rightttttt. woooooooot.

OMG IT’S (ALMOST) GAMEDAY

I mean where else do 80,000+ people come together to root for the Gators? (and yes I’m including the away crowd because even they get so bored being beaten up they start rooting for us). Where else does the whole Gator Nation put aside whatever frickin differences of opinion they may have on stuff come together for one day to have great food and drinks and watch great football?

On a slightly different, more tech note, two things happened:

• The PowerShot S95 got reviewed today, and it ALMOST has my name on it. If it weren’t so expensive right now, and if it could allow me to optically zoom during video recording, I’d be sold. But I’m a little torn between the S95 and something like the Panasonic DSC-ZM7. I’d like to see what kind of battery life both cameras have though (as well how durable it is)
• Also, HP came out with a new update to a computer that I recently gave to my dad, the dm3 series. They now all have Core 2010 processors and also they have an “innovative” cooling system (these computers ran WAY too hot before). For more info, just go on ahead to the HP Academy website where, if you’re a UF (or any university student) you can get a pretty sweet discount.

Anyway, HAPPY GAMEDAY EVERYONE! and more importantly GOOOOOOOO GATAAAA.