Overcoming a cold

I had a cold this week, it wasn't fun, but now I'm almost completely over it. Here is a day-by-day account of my cold.

• Friday - I noticed a sore/scratchy throat when I first woke up but it wasn't very noticeable the rest of the day.
• Saturday - I knew I had a cold at this point because my throat hurt more, though I didn't yet have any other symptoms, except a slightly runny nose.
• Sunday - I felt worse, felt tired, had a slightly runny nose and continued sore throat.
• Monday - My throat hurt even worse and my nose was much runnier.
• Tueday - My throat started getting better, but my nose was runnier and my eyes were watery. I got fed up with the symptoms so I took some NyQuil.
• Wednesday - I didn't feel much better, but I was taking NyQuil (even during the day), which alleviated some of my symptoms, made me tired, helped me take a 1.5 hour nap, and made me feel weird. I felt like I was on drugs, which I guess is true.
• Thursday - My nose stopped being runny and started being stuffy. Even though I didnt take any more NyQuil, I felt kind of out of it. Then I took a nap and felt much better.
• Friday - Almost back to normal but still a stuffy nose.

I think I'm going to take the train home

I live in a dorm in Dallas during the week and on the weekends I go to Fort Worth to stay with my family and see my girlfriend. Usually I drive home on Friday afternoon and drive back on Sunday afternoon. Since my finals next week aren't until Thursday, I'll probably do some studying in Fort Worth and return to school on Monday or Tuesdsay.

I'm thinking of taking the train home this weekend, since it would save me at least $7 in gas and be better for the environment. The train doesn't run on Sunday and that's why I don't usually take it. I'll be bringing some things home though, so it might be a hassle to drag them on the train. Still, I'm sort of inclined to take the train, even though I would be without a car for a while.

lunch with dad

My dad was in Dallas today and so he stopped by and we had lunch at Zuzu's on Hillcrest. The food wasn't that good, but it's always nice to be taken out to lunch.

suggestions for something to do in Dallas?

I go to school in Dallas, but don't spend a lot of time in the rest of the city. I have finals next week, but only on Thursday and Friday, so I'm thinking about doing something fun on part of one of my days off. I've thought about going downtown and walking around and taking pictures, but I don't think I'd do that without a specific objective in mind. Seeing a film at the Angelika would also be a decent idea. I could go to a park or White Rock Lake or something like that or I could just try out a different restuarant or something like that. I don't know what else I could do, preferrably something cheap/free and not too time consuming, and I might not do anything, but I'm open to suggestions.

Should I go see Paul McCartney with my girlfriend?

My girlfriend is a big Beatles fan. When Ringo Starr came into town, I went with her to see him perform. Paul McCartney came into town a couple years ago and she went with a friend to see him. Paul McCartney is coming into town again, and she kind of wants to see him. But is she going to see him every time he comes into town from now on? I don't want to go. If she hadn't seen him before, then I would be more inclined to go with her, but since she has already seen him, and considering I don't care much for Paul McCartney and tickets are will cost $70-100 each, I don't think I should have to go. Please advise.

"Abu Ghraib was only the tip of the iceberg"

This isn't at all surprising:

Muslims in U.S. custody have been tortured and mistreated at dozens of detention facilities around the world, according to a Human Rights Watch report issued a year after notorious Abu Ghraib prison abuse photos were made public.

...

Government data show 108 people have died in U.S. custody in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, including deaths attributed to natural causes. Twenty-seven deaths have been investigated as criminal homicides involving possible abuse.

The report cited those figures and detailed other allegations of abuse including beatings, sleep deprivation and exposure to extreme cold in Afghanistan, and subjecting detainees in Iraq to sleep deprivation as well as placing them in stressful positions.

On Sunday, Human Rights Watch issued a report calling for a criminal investigation of senior U.S. intelligence and military officials who may have condoned or ignored the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere. The organization took no stance on the culpability of the officials but said an investigation was warranted.

An investigation certainly is warranted, but I doubt there will be one. If you would like further investigation into these abuses, please send this form letter by Human Rights Watch to the President.

I heard Barbara Walters speak

Tuesday night I had the opportunity to hear Barbara Walters speak as part of the Tate Lecture Series at SMU. She talked about some of the interviews she's done and what some people have said about leadership and other things. Before interviewing President Bush, his new dog peed on the rug. Norman Schwarzkopf said that he was scared of a man who couldn't cry. Colin Powell didn't know what he wanted to do with his life until he joined the ROTC and decided to pursue that. She also told stories about Katharine Hepburn, Margaret Thatcher and Christopher Reeve. By interviewing so many successful people, she has learned a lot about how people become successful, and she offered some advice. She said that we should find a passion, something that we enjoy and makes us want to get up in the morning. She said to have a person in your life who loves you and supports you. She said that we should have strength of purpose and mind. She said that circumstances in life may not be perfect but that we should deal with the hand we're dealt, and that we should grow and fluorish.

New poll: What kinds of posts do you like?

I post about a variety of topics, so I'm interested in finding out what topics appeal to my readers the most. I included all of the topics that I could think of, but if there's another subject of my posts that you like, please mention it in the comments.

What kinds of posts do you like the most? (you can pick more than one)

posts about me, events in my life, and things I've done
posts about things in my future, like things I'm trying to decide
posts about news/current events/politics
posts with my opinions/commentary about various things
posts with pictures
other

Current Results

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Previous Poll Results (#48)

I previously asked about my posting frequency. One person said I wasn't posting enough, two people said I was posting too much, and two people said I should never post again. Here are the results.

Done with classes

I am now done with my classes, but I still have final exams. I have some time off between now and then, so I hope to be able to sufficiently prepare for exams without having to work too hard.

no meals remaining

Today I used my last meal available for the cafeteria. I had an allotted amount of meals and I've used them all, so for the remaining few days of school, I'll need to eat elsewhere. I'm glad, because the few times that I've gone to the cafeteria the past few days, I've been reminded of why I don't like to eat there all the time. Unfortunately, I'll be eating there all the time next semester.

World's Smallest Political Quiz

This quiz has existed on the internet for several years and I've taken it several times and it's been interesting to see my ideology evolve. Anyway, I just took it and I invite you all to take it and share your results. Here are my results, I'm on the border between centrist and libertarian.

Your PERSONAL issues Score is 60%.
Your ECONOMIC issues Score is 70%.

I am now the Environmental Society president

I joined the Environmental Society this Spring and noticed their page hadn't been updated in a while, so I volunteered to be the webmaster. I will be the webmaster, but I haven't been able to update the site because the current president has been slow in getting back to me.

The Environmental Society is pretty small, while there are quite a few people on the mailing list, the attendence to our irregularly scheduled meetings was never more than 10, and occasionally fewer than 5. The environmental society doesn't do much. We have a can recycling competition in the Spring, and we're supposed to do something for Earth Day, but I'm not sure if we did. A few months ago I decided that I could do a better job and I wanted to be president.

Today, there was a meeting about next year's officer positions and I was the only person to show up. I talked to the current president a little bit and indicated that I wanted to be president. So, now I'm the president for next year. People who know me might be surprised to hear that I decided to do something without asking a bunch of other people for their opinions first, but I just wanted to do this.

I'm sure I'll have a lot of questions about the job, since I've only been in the Environmental Society for a few months, but fortunately the current president will be available to help at the beginning of next year. I'm not too worried about how I'll do as president because this year we haven't been very active, so I don't have to worry about keeping a high standard.

This will be the first time that I've been a president of anything, so it will hopefully be a challenging and rewarding opportunity to be a bigger part of campus, increase environmental awareness, and further my personal growth.

As president, my first priority next semester will be to recruit new members. Our group suffers from low participation, and I believe that if more people participate, the group will have be able to come up with better ideas and become more active. Secondly, I would like for the society to work more in tandem with the Senate Environmental Committee (which is another environmental group on campus that does a lot more than us) so that we can coordinate our efforts to get more done. I also hope to make the group more active, easier to participate in, better-run, and a more influential and important part of the campus.

My lack of a passion

If I had a passion for something I'm convinced that I could do it quite well. I tried playing the piano when I was a kid, and I did reasonably well at it, but I quit because I didn't enjoy it that much. Right now I don't really have much of a passion for anything, though I have an obsessive tendency that encourages me to do well at whatever I'm passionate about.

Passion (or coercion), I suppose, is why anybody becomes very good at anything. Olympic athletes have a passion for their sport that compels them to spend so much time and effort practicing and preparing. CEOs must have a passion for what they are doing or for their business for them to give so much of their time to their company. I don't think I could ever go that far, though, or at least right now I don't ever want to. I would like to devote my time to something, but I don't want to give up my life for sport or business.

I just haven't really found a long-term passion. I've had small passions before, but they always end after while. Do I have the focus and the determination to keep a passion?

I have pursuits, sure, and I guess most people only have pursuits. I'm not sure I know anyone personally who I can say has a real passion for something. Perhaps only normal people have pursuits, whereas the people who become the best at what they do have passions, like successful scientists, professional athletes, and published writers.

Photography is a recent pursuit of mine, but it doesn't do anyone but me much good unless I have a passion for it, in which case I'd try to take the absolute best photographs that I can take and want to do it more seriously than I currently do with my simple point-and-shoot camera.

I don't know what I could be passionate about. I think I could conceivably become passionate about a lot of things, such as writing, business, and who knows what else, but only certain situations would attract my passion.

I just wish I were passionate about something, right now I feel like I'm being underused and I want to discover a passion so that I can more fully use my abilities.

The drawbacks of listening to my own music

I listen to music on my computer somewhat frequently, I like to listen to a playlist of either some or all of my songs. But you know what I hate about it? There's not someone interrupting every few songs. I just love hearing someone interrupt my music not only to tell me what I was listening to, but also to tell me about a contest I could win if I keep listening. You know, I wish I could be advised of contests all day, I just love hearing about contests, even more than I like listening to music. And I really miss hearing other people make song requests, because few things in life are better than not only hearing what someone else wants to hear, but also hearing them say that they want to hear it. But the biggest drawback of listening to my own music is that I don't get to hear about exciting products that might be of benefit to me. Sometimes I want to download spyware just so that I can listen to music and receive corporate advertisement.

I'm just being sarcastic, I was just pointing out that the radio and its DJs suck.

Amount of music on computer

I have 8.86 GB of music on my computer, which includes 2107 files and more than six days worth of music. I didn't realize I had so much music, that's a lot of music. I'd still like more.

Went to a soccer game

I'd never even seen a soccer game in its entirety before I went this Saturday to see FC Dallas take on Real Salt Lake City. FC Dallas won 3-0. People who don't watch soccer assume soccer isn't very entertaining because there are few scores, but I was pretty satisfied with the level of entertainment. It's a decent value for a sporting event, too, in fact, I don't know of anywhere else in the Metroplex where you can go to see the home team win for $10 per ticket. Maybe I'll go again sometime.

Cowboys Blog

I've become a fan of this blog about the Dallas Cowboys. It seems to be updated regularly and have good information and analysis.

Checking out at Best Buy

A while ago, Best Buy started asking you a bunch of questions when you buy things there. I've been annoyed by the more complicated checkout procedure, and James Lileks has too:

At the checkout counter the clerk asked for my phone number. “Why?” I said. I hate this new wrinkle. I just hate it. I hate the fact that I can’t buy a frickin’ candy bar without a procedure that rivals a mortgage application. I’m always interested in the rationale they give.

“We need the phone number before we can let the merchandise leave the store,” the clerk said. Practiced response, right out of the employee handbook. Fine. Let me say no, and let the burly boys tackle me as I try to leave with my paid merchandise. Sir! I need an area code sir! Then she said “This DVD player has a two or a four year extended warranty. Which one would you like today?”

This isn’t upselling; this is deceit. “Which one” doesn’t include the option of “neither,” of course. And then she offered me a free 8-week subscription to a magazine, so they could have my address as well as my phone number. Jaysus! Let me buy the fargin’ thing and let me go! You want a stool sample too? Here!

I have no idea if Best Buy knows, or cares, but every annoying check-out interchange reminds me anew: buy online. If I hadn’t needed the DVD player that night to review some family movies I’d just cut (want to get them done now, since I’m wiping the drive to install Tiger nice and fresh next Friday) I would have ordered online. Not because I think my privacy is held in greater honor – they have my address, too – but because it’s just less of a pain in the arse. As it stands, you end your Best Buy transaction by saying NO, NO, and NO. They might consider ways to let people leave with the word “yes” fresh on their lips.

Cowboys Draft Review

I'm pretty satisfied with the Cowboys draft, they strengthened some weak positions and drafted some good players. I'm surprised that they didn't make any trades, I expected them to trade away at least one of their first round picks, especially considering that Jerry Jones likes to trade down. Does the fact that the Cowboys didn't trade down indicate that Bill Parcells has more control over the draft this year?

You can view the Cowboys picks and some analysis provided by NFL.com here. I'll briefly summarize what I think, pick by pick:

1. 11th pick off the draft: Demarcus Ware can play DE as well as linebacker, and seems like a good pick.
2. The Cowboys wanted to trade up from #20 so that they could draft Marcus Spears, but they were unable to trade up but were able to get Marcus Spears anyway.
3. I was surprised that the Cowboys' spent their 2nd round pick on Kevin Burnett, an outside linebacker. The Cowboys already drafted Ware to presumably play OLB, so it will be interesting to see what they do. Right now they have 4 linebackers that could start: drafees Ware and Burnett, Dat Nguyen, and Al Singleton. And while it's been suggested that the Cowboys will switch to the 3-4 defensive alignment (3 defensive linemen, 4 linebackers), but they have too many defensive linemen: draftee Marcus Spears, Greg Ellis, new signee Jason Ferguson, and La'Roi Glover. They're pretty stacked at those two positions right now and I think they have needs elsewhere, so perhaps they'll try to trade someone rather than leave someone on the bench. Or, if it's not too much trouble, perhaps they could alternate between the 4-3 and the 3-4. Still, it seems like they could have picked a better position here than linebacker.
4. The Cowboys didn't have a third round pick because they used it to acquire Drew Henson so that he could keep the bench warm since Bill Parcells sure doesn't want to play him. In the 4th round, the Cowboys drafted Marion Barber at running back. The Cowboys needed a backup running back, and while I think they could've waited until the 5th round to draft one, this seems like a solid pick.
5. Then the Cowboys drafted another DE, Chris Canty. While picks taken this late in the draft aren't even guaranteed to make the team, it would've been nice to have tried to fill a position in need, like offensive tackle or free safety.
6. Here the Cowboys drafted the free safety they needed, Justin Beriault.
7. Here the Cowboys drafted the offensive tackle they needed, Rob Petitti.
8. The Cowboys continue their infatuation with defensive ends by drafting Jay Ratliff.

So, overall I'm pleased with the draft. I wish the Cowboys had done a better job of filling positions and not drafting so many DEs, but I'm optimistic that some of these players will help the Cowboys win more games next year.

My room smells like mildew

Previous post here.

I return to my room at 21:00 today, Sunday. As soon as I enter, my roommate asks me if I smell mildew. I do. Then my roommate starts trying to figure out where the smell is coming from and notes that he started noticing the smell Friday. A friend from down the hall suggests that it could be my roommate's boots. My roommate starts smelling his boots, saying that he doesn't think it's the boots, then smells the bottom of the boots and claims that the smell is coming from there. As he goes to wash off the boots, I mention that I also noticed a smell Friday and that's why I set out my air freshener. He says, "Oh, you noticed a smell on Friday, too?"

I made some conclusions about the smell Friday, and while those conclusions weren't made based on solid evidence and could actually be incorrect, it seems to me that my roomate is simply not owning up to what he did.

In my last post people were very quick to harshly criticise him, but I'm not going to condemn him for it. None of us knows the whole story, so none of us is qualified to judge. We can judge and condemn his actions, but we should not judge him as a person. Sure, what I'm assuming he did was wrong, but that doesn't mean he's a bad person. If we judge everyone by their biggest faults then everyone would be a bad person.