scribbles

Day 20 of July, Party Planning

Boys and girls, this coming August, on the 17th, there shall be stupendous partying pandemonium! I'm going to Japan, and it's my farewell party! Come and see me! Drink! Play! Be merry!

Everyone's invited! As an added incentive, it'll be at my house. Come--see the workings of Ivan's living space.

An event so big that it warrants its own website. Read all the details at the site dedicated to it all: MARCO/IGHO.

Please RSVP on that site by Wednesday, August 13th! Thanks!

Beer counter: 19

Day 18 of July

The days are just sliding by me now. I feel like I haven't done anything productive these past few weeks. Well, today, I got down to some dirty work.

Excuse me for the following geek-talk.

I'm pretty much the system administrator for the network run at home. In preparation for my Japanning action this September, I need to make the network self-sufficient. In the past, there've been occasional downtimes of our 56k (gasp!) connection to the Internet, causing mass mayhem and dismay amongst the other users sharing the line (that's 4 computers sharing a single 56k, double-gasp!).

I believe that I've secured the problem with disconnects with the help of a single line in my crontab to ensure that the connection is up every five minutes.

Then there's the problem of being able to boot without running fsck every time. I've already got a UPS, but I still need to make sure the system can boot without needing someone to twiddle with the system at the console. I've been moving the data partitions to ext3 (just in case I'll need to read them in Windows in the future) and everything else to ReiserFS.

Today, my primary hard disk started going haywire--a bunch of those nasty I/O errors, and in my /var directory too! I quickly copied over to the drive I was planning to install XP on, using ReiserFS on the new partitions. I'm excited: I've read good stuff about ReiserFS, and I'm expecting that it won't let me down.

Balanced Trees freakin' rock!

That's the stuff I love in Computer Science. It's not really the programming (although I do get a kick out of coding); it's more the realization that abstract ideas can become reality in a practical (and elegant!) fashion.

Beer counter: 17 (no more deficit!)

Discovered!

So, it seems like I've been found out. That is, Norry has found out that I've been reading her blog. There's a funny paragraph she's added on the side of her site:

Blog of a Japanese girl whose English is not-quite perfect. Titel of this blog came from her last name in a Chinese charactor. She initially blogged for her non-Japanese friends to know about Tokyo tidbits and her thoughts of life, but now she is addicited to keeping it updated for not only them but also someone she doesn't know.

The first sentence comes almost directly from a previous scribble of mine. I feel so honored to be her inspiration for writing.

Hello, Norry! :)

Day 12 of July, karutararu ekusuchenju

Ah, another morning after the Kinyou-kai.

I finally got a packet from Kyoto Gai-dai with a pretty certificate and letter of acceptance and all. At last, I feel like I'm really going. And now I can finally apply to get a VISA!

I found out an interesting tidbit about the Japanese language tonight (err, last night?). Apparently, the use of analogies and making up of new words isn't as common in Japanese as it is in English. I'd always assumed that all languages had folks spitting out new words left and right. For instance, some of my friends make good use of words such as "wakka" and "foopla." Well, that's just a few silly examples of semi-expletives some of my friends and I use. I have a whole slew of fun making up semi-real words that people still understand.

Also, phrases like "she's such a cow" don't come up too often in Japanese without someone having to make an explicit explanation. Come now, it must be obvious that we're saying she's a bit porky! :)

I think I've found the American equivalent of natto. Grits! Really, the stuff is nasty, and yet if you add a whole bunch of crap on top of it, it ends up having some semblance of flavor. As for natto, I've been trying to get to like it, really, but it just ain't happenin'.

Luckily, the folks in Kansai (the region I'll be staying in) aren't really attracted to natto. Ah, people with good taste. :)

Beer counter: 9 (2 below par)

Day 9 of July

Ah, drunk once again and updating my blog.

I woke up at 2:00pm yesterday (the 8th) just in time to twiddle with my computer a little bit, check my e-mail, take a shower, and head out the door to be late to meet my language partner.

I know all of you, my adoring fans, want to hear more about my adventures; so, when Eric Burns from the Center for Asian Language & Cultural Exchange asked if I wouldn't mind him writing something about me and my langauge partner, I didn't hesitate to give him my approval. I guess that soon there'll be something about Yumiko and I on the site.

Also, folks seem to be enjoying the pictures I took from AX. I've received several e-mails from folks reporting their absolute ecstacy of seeing the pictures. Hey, I do what I can!

A rather hot topic amongst the Cal SPC folks has been news of Jeremy getting his job at
ESC. Jeremy's been worried that he's not gonna have enough time to goof off like a real college student with all this working he's doing. Just make sure you have some time on the weekends for the great playground of life. One of the stipulations I told IMP when they hired me was that I never want to work weekends. They've respected that, and I can always expect to have Friday through Sunday off.

Drink more beer!!!

Beer counter: 6 (one yesterday and two tonight, only 3 below par now)

AX2003 Details

Ah, I just woke up (2:30pm), and I'm listening to Billy Joel's Piano Man. La-da-da-da-dee-da.

I wanted to give a few more details about what happened for my AX trip. Now, I was originally planning on going down south with Luis from SFSU. However, that bastard bailed on me and ended up going to Mexico or something instead. So, I was planning on heading down by myself. That is, until Christian let me know that one of his online buddies had a spot with his group. Thus, I got together with them and headed down south with them.

The con this year was good, but not great. I guess I just haven't been watching too much anime lately, so I've been out of the loop in terms of what's new and hip.

I got the pictures from the trip up now.

Day 7 of July, Back From AX

So, I'm back! And I'm exhausted!

What did I buy? I got myself an AX2003 T-shirt (I get one every year) and a Totoro wallscroll. I had a Lain one hanging on my wall, but I decided that it was too depressing for the summer. So now I've got a cute and cheery scroll on my wall.

I got a bunch of autographs, including one from yoshitoshi ABe, the creator of Serial Experiments Lain and NieA_7 (and some newer works that I haven't seen yet).

I also took a good number of pictures with attractive female cosplayers.

More info when I update again when I wake up.

Beer counter: 3 (but still missing 4)

Day 6 of July, at AX2003

I'm currently in Anaheim, attending this year's Anime Expo. Tomorrow's the last day, so I should be getting some pretty pictures up sometime soon. It's been a tiring few days, and I haven't had too much sleep.

The weather's been rather muggy, and it doesn't help with the LA pollution floating around!

Welp, that's it for now, folks. I'm behind on my beers since I just haven't had time to drink (much less sleep!). I'll make sure to make it up once I get back in town.

Beer counter: 2 (doh, 4 beers behind!)

Day 1 of July

The countdown to the 22nd begins! As we speak, I am already inebriated from drinking 3/4 of a can of beer on an empty stomach. I plan on drinking a can of beer (or equivalent) every day this month until the 22nd.

Tomorrow night (ergg, that's tonight), I'm meeting with seven people I've never met before to go to this year's Anime Expo in Anaheim. I wasn't going to go this year (I'm not so otaku-ish anymore), but I was tricked by Luis into going, and he ended up bailing on me! It's alright, though. I get to meet some new folks and watch some new anime. If I get a chance to waddle my way to a computer, I'll update accordingly (I'm trying to get an update each day with each beer). We'll see!

Now, time to finish the beer and head to bed. Zzz!

Beer counter: 1

Russian River, Camped

This past weekend, Joyce and I joined Jon, Krystal, Audrey, and Hiroshi to go camping in the Russian River Valley. We arrived on Friday evening and setup camp at a strange little campground next to the main road. It wasn't exactly roughin' it.

Anyhow, the weather was atrociously hot when we first arrived. Bay Area weather was unbearable for the un-A/C'ed last week. Temperatures were hitting the 100's, and all I could do last Thursday was say 'hot' and 'atsui' (or, as I like to say: 'hotsui'). When we woke up Saturday morning, the tent was like an oven! I had to get out even though I was still tired--so I ended up sitting in the shade staring at inanimate objects.

We later went swimming in the river, watching several folks flip over in their canoes and lying around in the sun. We also took a walk through Armstrong Woods, strolling amongst some incredible redwoods. Other than that, we spent the rest of the time eating, making fires, and getting drunk.

The weather cooled off, and we were able to find a shadier spot to tent up at. Now, I'm back, exhausted from a weekend of doing too much of nothing.