Delusion-Elle

Before I pass out for the night (and maybe get in another 100 words for my paper), I'll do a quick review of the last two days...

Tuesday was my Guitar Hero party. It was also the day that my high school friends met my CPSC friends. Le gasp. Luckily things went well and I couldn't be happier with how things turned out, really. I think because the group was split pretty evenly in half (in regards to the "type" of friend), there was little to no exclusion, and things went pretty much the way I wanted them to, right down to the time the last of my friends left.
And apparently my friend went to the wrong house. He didn't even tell me about it, but he did tell my mom. Seriously. He told my mom. As my mom relayed it to me today:
"I didn't know what to say to him. Like, was I supposed to say: 'Oh wow, for such a smart kid, you sure are stupid'?"
Th-thanks, mom. @_____@ Thanks for not saying that. Whew.

Today I celebrated my friends' birthdays by playing some laser tag (at Planet Lazer, where Bieber punched a kid in the face, and then proceeded to buy new equipment for the place) and then going out for hotpot. Laser tag is really quite fun. I even managed to get a somewhat decent score. Honest to God, this was the... third time in my whole entire life that I've had hotpot. So yeah, I admit that I was a little slow to start because I was trying to very slyly watch how other people ate so I wouldn't have to ask embarrassing questions. There were also some absolutely fantastic birthday cakes from Thomas Haas.

Alright, time to get that word count up a bit before passing out for the night.

No, not the movie!
This is my 300th blog entry!

I was snooping around snopes.com (yes, that was intentional), and found this entry on that whole "change your Facebook profile picture to a cartoon" campaign. While on the friend's account I have access to a month or so ago, I recall someone asking in their status how this would do anything, and a horde of people commented on that status, chastising said someone for doubting the awareness raised by the campaign. I have to say that I remained skeptical throughout the whole thing. When a rumour started that this campaign was false and instead was encouraging pedophiles, I just shook my head. After having read the entry on snopes.com regarding this movement, I have to agree with Barbara Mikkelson's thoughts on "slacktivism". If people really gave a damn about trying to stop child abuse, they would do something more than just change a silly picture. True, the initial campaign started with a good premise of bringing the issue of child abuse to light, but the number of people who went beyond the simple act of changing their profile pictures is probably close to none. Sure, people probably actually thought the words "oh child abuse, what horrible horrible stuffs" upon hearing of the campaign, but is that really raising awareness? If that's awareness, then it was fleeting. If people really truly think that simply changing their profile picture is going to make a difference, then we are in a sad state.
I dunno, it's a tricky business trying to read past the basic premises of these sorts of things. Child abuse should be ended, there's no doubt about it. It's just that when people think that they are high and mighty for changing their profile pictures and are making a big difference, that's a bit much for me to believe. I just wanted to get this off my chest, I guess.

Today I slept in some, but I had to retrieve my Math 200 textbook from a friend at 2PM so I was up in time to do that. Unfortunately after walking around in the cold, I came back home with a woozy head and mild headache. Thankfully going to see my grade 8 & 9 French teacher definitely cleared my head. It's always nice talking to her and catching up since there's really a weird relationship between my family and hers. Or rather, her husband's, but hers too, now. Anyhow, I gave her a box of truffles for Christmas as well as my e-mail address since she wants to keep in touch with me more. She also ranted about the whole teenage obsession with alcohol, though her kids don't drink despite being allowed to at home. No wonder I think of her as my crazy white mom. In fact, my mom calls her my Dutch mom. Regardless, I love that woman! So nice and welcoming!

On the topic of things my (real) mom says and high school teachers, I mentioned to her that I ran into my Geo teacher today as well. Surprisingly he remembered my name. Cue conversation:
Mom: Wow, he remembered your name? That's pretty good since you only had him for one year.
Me: Yeah, but I did well in his class.
Mom: I guess you were one of his... GeoPets!
Me: ...
Mom: GET IT? LIKE NEOPETS!
Me: I know. *facewall*
That is my life every day, folks.

Anyway, I will make myself scarce tomorrow so I can study music theory like the nerd that I am, and after my exam on Saturday morning, I will be free!

Here's a .gif I found on the Uncyclopedia article about Canada. If this is srsly what Canada's all about, then Canada is undoubtedly awesome:

Ah, my mother knows me too well. Before she left for her friend's Christmas party tonight, she told me to go "do whatever [I] want" and "pretend to study Math" by the time she's home. o___o Damn. She's good.

Today was my MUSC 120 exam. The format was exactly as my prof had told us it'd be: 15 general multiple choice questions, 15 multiple choice questions about identifying pieces, and an essay. The two essay topics I had to choose from were also ones he had mentioned in class so I was actually well-prepared for the one I ended up going with (as I didn't prepare for the other topic since I figured that he wouldn't seriously offer a topic that he'd already given as an example). It was a 2-hour long exam, which was just a little too short for me. Apparently my essay-writing skills are horribly rusty, but I still managed to finish in the nick of time.

... I don't want to study Math! Albeit, it's a different kind of math this time around, but stillllllll. I'm in the mood for something slightly more creative. And I think I should practice writing just to try and get ideas out. My writing skillz have degraded a lot, it seems.

My exam ended at 5:30PM and I managed to get home in time to catch the end of the Habs game (for real, they lost to the Leafs?!) and see good ol' Nazzy's jersey being retired. I think all in all, it went well! I think the only thing I would've changed was how annoying the crowd was, not even letting the man speak. But I digress; I'm probably just a bit cranky after churning out a 6-page essay in 1.5 hours. And it was nice seeing those old players again (I can't believe I forgot Morrison in my last entry, him being part of the West Coast Express line and all -- I blame those unnaturally thin eyebrows of his), though, whaaaaaaaaaa? Dan Cloutier? Really, dude? Really? Mr. "I couldn't stop a beach ball if it was coming at me at a speed of 30cm/hour".
Anyway, to all the people who don't think that Naslund's number should be retired, I think Iain Macyntire got it right: "more than numbers, Naslund contributed stability and credibility — even hope — to a franchise that was nearly run into the ground in the late 1990s."
I'm generally a fairly neutral hockey fan -- I don't root specifically for a team. Frankly, I don't have the time to keep up with watching all the games and catching all the scores. But I remember back when the Canucks were sporting the orca, I had hoped that this city would finally get a Stanley Cup, and I think it's quite sad that Naslund never got to win one, despite all of his other achievements. The fact that he considers Vancouver "home" just proves how much he gave to the city. And hearing mention of "Nazzy's Suite 19" definitely took me back some years. The phone bit Mike Gillis said was rather humourous, too.

Other randomness that I feel like reporting is that I dreamt that Otep had a new EP out (a total lie; damn you, subconscious), and then this song a few nights later:



And some information for all the geeks I gamed with in high school and university:
So MapleStory's been totally changed with the new patch. Here's a list of what was updated, including the insane changes in levels of a lot of monsters. Also:

Everyone gets a free total SP reset.

Today's blog entry will be a very random one as I added stuff to be added throughout the day while I was trying to study (and failing at it). I think I only started studying really at 7PM. D:

Today I found out that Carey Price has been trying to score a goal! I knew it! All those times where he shot the puck down the rink when it was an empty net. Dayum. Though, my suspicions should have been confirmed when my dad started shouting "SHOOT THE PUCK! GET A GOAL, DAMMIT!". And I thought that maybe my dad was joking. I always find it super amusing when goalies manage to score goals. :)

I had almost completely forgotten about this until just a few hours ago I wandered downstairs where my dad was watching hockey highlights and they were showing some old footage of Naslund, but tomorrow they're raising his jersey to the rafters! And hopefully I'll be home from my exam in time to see it on TV. Nazzy's been a trending topic on Twitter (in Canada) since yesterday. To be totally honest, since they retired Linden's 16, I was starting to wonder when 19 would go up and join it. :) Man, I remember those days when it was Linden, Naslund, and Bertuzzi. Damn, seems like so long ago. I'm getting old.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. My music history course next term covers 1600-1800?! Awesome. That means we cover the Common Practice era: the Baroque (and the Rococo, I suppose) and Classical periods. Too bad we don't reach the Romantic period, but oh well. Things went downhill after the Romantic period, as far as I'm concerned, anyway.

So today my dad fed my cat some canned tuna (for human consumption) because apparently my cat turns his (albeit smushed in) nose up at regular canned cat food. After doling out a portion to my cat, my dad gave the rest to me to eat in a sandwich. This is my conversation with my mom when she got home from work:
Me: Did dad tell you that he fed Smoosh tuna?
Mom: Yup.
Me: Did you know that he then offered the rest of what was in the can to me for lunch? I mean, yeah, it's not like I ate exactly what the cat ate, but still it seemed kind of... I dunno.
Mom: Oh, so you got the king's leftovers?
Me: What?
Mom: Well, if you had eaten some first and THEN Smoosh had some, you know, you'd have been the king's food taster!
Me: ...
Mom: See, your dad loves you allllllllllmost as much as he loves the cat. Almost. That's why you got his leftovers!

...What the hell, mom?

13.5 hours until my exam!

I'm distracted from studying so I figured that I'd may as well blog.

Studying progress: I've gone through CPSC notes once and the Math 200 textbook once. Working on CPSC practice problems now. Going to try and read the CPSC textbook tonight just before bed. Yes, all of it. Mostly on track, just a bit behind, I think?

I am starting to just be confused by that MacLean's "Too Asian" article now. I don't want to go back and read the now edited version of it, and frankly, I think that the message they were trying to get across just kind of gets lost in everything else. Even the controversy gets a little lost. I just found this article on how our province's capital is condemning MacLean's. To be honest, I'm not sure what that means. Are they banning the magazine now? No, it doesn't look like it. And even if they did... that'd be censorship, quite the opposite of the "freedom of speech" aspect of Canada. Anywho, to me, this little "resolution" just seems out of place and random. And to be totally frank, Victoria was a very "white" city the last time I visited it. I'm surprised to see them all up in arms about this kind of thing.

More musings under the cut which probably make me seem very ignorant or something.