studystudystudy

Well, I have blogged about this topic before and it looks like I am about to do it again. But this, it is actually sort of serious. Procrastination- it has gotten pretty bad. My procrastination is seeming to be sort of a serious manner for me. I have 2 more AP tests coming up and this was my weekend to study for them. What did I do this weekend to pass my time? You have two options, I either, A: Studied. or B: Played video games. If you guessed A, you are incorrect, sorry! Well, to be honest, I tried to study, and I just got bored.

The fact that studying, for me, can become such a drudgery and become so boring I think is actually a pretty major problem. I mean, I would get out the easiest form of studying psychology terms, flashcards. Yet, after a few I would wonder what I could be doing on the video games right now. The logical fallacies fly through my head, such as "I could totally be accomplishing things right now on the video games." When in real life, I am only logging onto these to avoid the dreaded flipping of flash cards.

So this is sort of my self-help post. I think I could study better if I turned off the computer, and after this blog I am going to! I could also study better if I could focus more, so maybe caffeine would solve the problem of tiredness. Maybe sitting in a new spot, such as on the couch and rather then at the computer, because we learned in psych that sitting in your usual procrastination and laziness spot does not help! I think I am going to shower first, I am not sure, but I feel it might help. Definitely, no television (I already tried, don't judge me!) Honestly, the one thing this will boil down to is self-determination. I think I will think of someone who I know is extremely self-determined and I am jealous of, and it might help motivate me to try to be the same.

Thank god writing this post took me just a little bit of time to get away from studying!


studyinnorway.no

Potatoes

So last night i was playing an online game. It was a game that potatoes fly across the screen and you need to count them. It starts to get intense when potatoes start flying really fast across the screen, and also carrots and cabbages fly across the screen and you can't count them. The part that motivated me to play this fucking stupid game for fucking 2 hours was that I was part of a 'competition' type sort of thing. I needed to get a score of 155 potatoes in order to beat this 'high score'. So after an extreme potato counting session for almost 2 hours, I decided I was only to do only one more round. I actually even put the mouse on the top corner X in order to stop my minor addiction to projectile potatoes. The final round: it was the final showdown. This was it, it was for all the marbles. I actually started off really well, and then I scored a 176!!! A 176! I BEAT IT! I was euphoric! I fist pumped the air and clicked send score. And it replyed with "ERROR: Your score was not processed, close the browser and try again."..........................wtf are you kidding me? The shit broke down on me. I stood up, kicked absolutely nothing but the air and started talking to myself, "I don't care what that game says! I am a winner!" and other vulgar phrases like, "That game ain't got shit on me!" Never before have such profanity came out because of aerial potatoes.

So that entire night I was just grinning out of a defense mechanism because I had so epicly won, yet so epicly failed due to not my part. It made me wonder, this was such an achievement for me, yet I had nothing to show for it. Almost any time I have achieved something, I have had something to show for it. I guess that is why they give out trophies at the end of soccer games, so that the little kiddies can put it up on their mantle. Yet, I got nothing. But, I was pleasently surprized at my reaction. I actually sort of enjoyed just knowing that I did something that no one will ever know I did (unless you read this blog post.) This was an even less physical rewarding experience then volunteering. Volunteering you know that you are helping someone, and sometimes that someone will thank you. No, this was just a personal goal that I achieved with flying colors, yet it again was something that does not even exist.

The only thing I am leaving with out of this experience is that I am a winner. And yes, being a winner feels good. There was no losers here, but I was a winner. And yes, a virtual game does not have 'shit' on me either. Hell yeah.


cobornsdelivers.files.wordpress.com

Inanimate Objects Making Money

So recently I have been playing the trading card game, Magic The Gathering (I know it is super nerdy, don't judge me!) And in order to complete my total badass deck of cards, I need to get 4 of a specific card to put in... however... inorder to buy this card I would need to spend 20 dollars on it... 20 dollars on each. individual. card. I'm not stupid and I am NOT about to do this, but it makes me wonder because I know someone who is not as economically savvy as I might spend that much on these tiny pieces of paper. That is all they are... tiny pieces of paper. How can these tiny pieces of paper with a picture and writing on them be worth 80 dollars? Some even go up to 50 dollars individually. It is stupid how they are so expensive.

This sort of reminds me of an online video game I used to play. On this game, the founders created a system of 'donations.' If you 'donated' to the game, you would in return gain a virtual item. (I think they only called it donations due to avoid taxes, but that is irrelevant!) So unlike buying the card, when you spent this money online, you would gain absolutely nothing in real life. Zero. The company was making absolutely 100% profit... off of nothing. And some people would spend a lot of money from these virtual 'donations.'

So I ask, is it really worth it to buy nothing in a physical form? I used to be a little bit more naive, and tell myself that this donation is the price of 'fun.' A price on fun sounds a little rediculous, I mean the game was free in the first place, yet in order to keep it free people need to 'donate'. I don't think some things like these games should be free, I feel that people should pay to operate them, because the company is paying to keep the server up in the first place. I do believe fun has a cost, and I don't believe that some people can pay their way to fun. I think the people who get the benefits from the bonus inanimate items should be the people who people vote are the most caring! Rather then the rich moguls gaining perks, the good people would! A just world phenomenon! Maybe I am still naive.


rockcheetah.com

grades

We got our midterms today. My grades were pretty good I guess. I mean, I actually started to work hard in classes and I actually began to get good grades. Getting them wern't not too hard to do either, it just required labor. That is what the key to success in GPA is, laborious work. The corrolation, I feel, is there and astounding. It also, amazingly as it sounds, feels pretty good to get good grades. Never in high school did I actually try at getting high grades as I have this term and last, and I regret not trying this hard in the past. I mean, I got a C in AP World history, and now I am cranking out A's in AP classes.

I think that also this new extreme nationalism for good grades has been acquired from my past bad grades. When I visited the University of Texas for a college tour, I began to realize, "Oh Crap, my gpa where it is now will not get me into this college." And thinking this really sucked. I mean, i want the option to go to any college I want, and hearing the admissions officer talk I realized just how important class rank is. It was rediculous, because it almost sounded like that was the only thing that they took into consideration! So I cracked down on grades. I started, believe it or not, studying. It is not hard to get a 3.0 without ever looking at a textbook, but getting a 4.0 is a lot harder.

So I think I am going to continue to try to get these good grades. Next year won't be so easy, because I am going to be in a few MORE AP classes. Right now I have found a delicate balance between AP classes and regular classes... but next year it will be all focus on grades. This is sort of going to suck, I just hope that I can get a good GPA the first term, and then senioritis grades the last terms!


butterflypages.files.wordpress.com

so you think you can dance? no, i don't

today I decided to go out on a whim and try out for show choir. this is something big for me because i have been the chairman of anti-showchoir for probably the past 10 years. It was a really spontaneous decision of mine to even try out. today was only the dancing part, but maaaan i was terrible. I realized that when you have never danced before, you actually lack a sense of rhythm. I think the reason I don't have rhythm is a lack of some bone in my foot or something. well, the main problem was my memorization. when you do the dance for the coach guys or whatever, apparently you have to remember the dance, and i forgot to remember the dance. So I got all mixed up multiple times. I think it is even harder to get back on track when you mess up. You see, the reason why I did so awful is because in the 'training' i was playing off the person infront of me, and then they threw a fucking curveball and made us stand in a line, which blew my mind. So after today when I think of my future, I think of possible lawyer, doctor, politician, and maybe even a teacher. But any dreams I have of being a professional dancer are dashed. I was hoping a major in political science with a minor in salsa dancing could get me to presidential status, but now I will only be the president who can't salsa dance.

going into this, I was thinking, "Huh, boy, you haven't ever really danced before in your life have you?" and the amount of experience I acquired in my lifetime showed, which was short of nothing. But hey, I couldn't care less that I can't dance a conga line, I tried! And damnit, what more can a boy with two left feet do! so I am proud of myself for stepping out of my comfort zone, yeah! i could care less that I am making a defense mechanism!

So I look at this and think that I can overcome any challenge! except the vocal audition part is tomorrow...... fuck



extremely related

My Youth

One of my friends has a brother with a tattoo. It wasn't very professionally done and it was his favorite band's symbol to the left of one of his pecs on his chest. I have always had my parent's opinion when it comes to tattoos, that they are stupid and not worth having something on your body always. Yet he told me his reasoning behind getting his tattoo, "It was a symbol of my youth, it makes me think of all the good times I had whenever I look at it." This got me thinking about my youth.

Recently when I was driving I was just thinking of what I thought of my youth. I loved it to be completely honest. I loved all the moments, even the stupid ones that I am supposed to look back on with shame. The times that my decisions were 'less then thinking of the future' and 'less then... legal' I don't regret. I am glad I didn't get busted for these to be honest, so I look back with zero percent regret and 100% nostalgia.

I want to look back on my times and remember them being the greatest times of my life. I want every moment in my past to be fantastic and also, I want to look back when in the future at the present and think the same thoughts I am thinking of now when looking back into the past (wtf kind of sentence was that?)

So about tattoos, It doesn't sound so bad. For the first time in my life 5 minutes ago I actually considered getting one. What would I get? I don't know really, I don't think I would want a band symbol, but maybe something related to what the majority of my youth was devoted to, maybe something like video games. What would I get? A master sword and hyrulian shield maybe? Possibly mario, not sure, but if it was video games it would have to be nintendo. But also maybe something related to computer, but that might just be too nerdy.

I might not need a tattoo to look back into my youth with joyful nostalgia, but it sure would be fun to do!




probably not to this extent
wiinoob.com

more Karma

So I feel sort of bad, I was pretty mean to this guy. You see, in the musical, as rambled on before, I was in charge of moving the stinking stairs. Another 'stage tech' person was this other kid who seems a little different. He was in charge of moving the cube, alone with 3 other kids. He just really pissed everyone off in so many ways. I could blog 1200 words in a week easily just talking about him pissing me off, but thats not really what this post is about. It is about what I felt towards him, it was sort of weird. He would piss me off so so so bad and then I would be mean to him. He wasn't the one to stick up for himself very much. Afterward, I would feel terrible. It was almost like I was bipolar between pity and hatred.

In the middle of a scene, he walked off because he needed a drink. he just went off. We were so mad at him, I don't know how to handle this, as he seemed to be like a two year old. And when he got back, he said that he was not ignorant. I don't get how someone can be not ignorant yet so oblivious at the same time. I even stared him down one time. Yet after these moments, I still continued to feel bad for bullying this kid. I happened to know he liked to play rock paper scissors, so I played that with him. I immediately switched to the pitiful mood.

I wonder what this guy thinks of me. I wonder if he thinks that I am a bully, because I sure do think I was one. Yet I tried to make amends and be nice and give him a birthday present (which was a free burrito card from my wallet to pancheros). I would personally hate someone who was a jerk to me and then tried to be nice to make up for the mean times they acted like a jerk to me. I just don't know how to get things like not getting him to walk around behind the stage where the audience can see him without getting frustrated and angry at him.. don't get me wrong, after we got mad he didn't do it again, but that doesn't mean it felt good to do.

I think this one goes to karma to decide. How my karma ended up here? I am not sure, I think it is somewhere from neutral to bad. I am going to say sorry, but would it really mean anything? Just because it is over that means it won't happen again, but if the musical wasn't over I would still most likely get just as pissed at him. I still feel bad.



ncfy.com