IM

For a while now I've had this tendency to feel self-conscious about instant messaging. Every time a friend's nearby with a laptop or computer screen on, I can't help but notice how many gchat (or aim back in the day, or webex in the case of work) conversations they usually have ongoing at one time. I mean, I've had moments where I've had several chats going on at once myself, but it's only once in a while. And it makes me wonder why I'm not talking to people as much as the person in front of me.

Some people have asked me in the past why I hardly talk to them [online], generally people who I talked to more often than most to begin with. I dunno. Is it a symptom of something?

Back in the day [read: middle school] when I started using MSN and later AIM, I always had this weird complex about never wanting to IM people because I didn't want to bother them or something like that. In retrospect it shouldn't have been that big a deal, especially considering the kind of things middle schoolers would've talked about anyway... but I don't know how well I got over that. I don't think of it as much, but I still feel irked whenever people don't really respond, even though I do that a lot myself now anyways. It also bothers me when attempts at conversations just end after a few lines. (I'm probably reading too much into it.)

I guess in general, I don't feel like initiating conversations most of the time unless I actually have something to say. Which sucks when I want to talk to someone but don't really have anything to say, so I either end up not initiating or just sitting there if the person happens to be there.

I apologize if you've had to experience the awkwardness of me just sitting there. According to a friend it's cause I like to soak in the presence of other people. "Like a sponge."

Those moments of frustration when you have people you want to see, but for whatever the reason (distance/time/conflicting schedules/inconvenience/lack of responsiveness when you try to initiate/you've grown distant from each other/you don't really know each other that well and they're not the type of person who would want to go out of their way to meet up with someone they don't really know/they don't necessarily want to see you and you don't even know why you want to see them in the first place) you can't. This doesn't bother me all the time, but there have been random moments in the past few months where one stray thought of this sort has come up at night, and I consequently find myself unable to sleep for a few hours. And of course I wake up the next morning wondering what the hell I was thinking.

And for those you do get to see, the feeling of "That's it?" that comes afterwards, because things aren't the same as they were before, and the subjects you wanted to talk about are still left unsaid, and you probably won't talk again for a long time anyway.

Sometimes I feel like I've traded the closeness I felt in college for an abundance of regular friendships and acquaintances with other people I hadn't expected to see. Which is to say that I'm thankful for what I have now, but the feeling of unrest from what's missing is still there. It's hard to find a replacement for late night conversations and man-councils nowadays.

Just finished the first two episodes of the second season of Breaking Bad (finally).

Holy ****.

Musings

- I have this tendency to internal monologue at random moments throughout the day. It tends to break off into incomplete thoughts because I have a rather short attention span, and sometimes includes a mix of either replays of particular conversations I've had in the past (more like sound bites; my memory isn't THAT good), or hypothetical conversations that may or may not happen in the future. And by hypothetical, I mean realistically and in-character hypothetical- Ryan L., on the other hand, tends to subvert this in front of me by coming up with stupidly ridiculous and exaggerated hypothetical conversations that aggravate me like no other.

- Having recently rediscovered Evernote (I couldn't figure out what to use it for the first time around), I feel suddenly compelled to make random notes for just about anything. Considering my tendency to make random textfile notes on whatever computer I'm using, I guess it's natural to move them to the cloud. Now I can access my to-do lists from anywhere! (shut up, Ryan.)

- Going on the organizational trend, I have this sort of somewhat logical system set up for online stuff. This blog for mostly text posts, tumblr for random pics/videos I find, google+ for random articles I find, facebook for social stuff (and stalking Nathan apparently, although it's mainly cause he posts so many articles.), and then google reader for articles/rss feeds/blogs which are then sorted into read it later which are then preserved in evernote if deemed worthy enough. And then reddit's always just there.

And as far as lists go- goodreads/myanimelist/icheckmovies/the backloggery/evernote for the rest. phew.

- I should stop obsessing so much over lists. I have this unhealthy habit in particular of making lists of things that I don't quite never get to, as I've discovered over the course of four years that a list I made back in high school is now 70-80% complete.

- I've never really liked instant messaging all that much (outside of for work purposes - otherwise I've grown close to hating it at times), but I tend to be online all the time anyway.

- One of the things I disliked the most about living with people was the prospect of being judged for my lifestyle choices/habits. Things that wouldn't bother me but would bother someone else with more sensitivity; being made light of the things I preoccupy myself with; dealing with the accusation of not eating (I ate a lot of meals when no one was watching >_>).

- That said, I think the main reason I prefer living with people is to make up for my general inclination towards being anti-social in most settings. For whatever the reason I seem to take a long time to actually befriend most people (in a way beyond acquaintances). It feels a lot more difficult when I see other people who, when placed in similar circumstances as me, grow close a lot faster. Honestly, if it weren't for the proximity that the dorms and apartment life brought, I'd probably be a total recluse right now.

In some respects I feel like one even now - in spite of going out a bit during the week, I feel a general lack in actual close relationships out of the ones I have so far here. But I'm still trying, sorta.

- I've grown pretty accustomed to living alone now, but I'm looking forward to having an apartment-mate again.

The last few months

My setup before I had a bed. It wasn't comfortable.

Three ways to use the yellow pages. Elan is demonstrating how to easily rip one apart. (He succeeded eventually.)

That one time at Justin and Bill's place when I was somehow coerced into helping them build a toilet. Justin named it after me. -____-

A to-do list I found in a throw-away pile in my apartment complex. This kid reminds me of myself.

(I also found a bunch of random volumes of Naruto, which I scavenged because I don't like see manga go to waste... even if it is Naruto.)

Lord of the Rings in Concert at Oracle Arena! They played the entire first movie with orchestra accompaniment. The entire Bridge of Khazad-dum sequence might've been my favorite part. I never really noticed the choir and vocal parts when I saw the movie originally; it made a really big difference having them singing right in front of you.

One of the managers in my group after a Halloween themed "how fast can you wrap your manager" contest.

First attempt at rendang!

The desktop I built. This thing kept me up till 4 in the morning. It scared me for a moment when I finally turned it on and it responded, only to shut down for 15 seconds... and then start up again. Apparently that is normal behavior for Gigabyte motherboards though.

"Oh fat people! Oh wait those are bears." - Jade
(Christmas in the Park San Jose)

Free Online Courses

So apparently Stanford decided to add a bunch of courses I would've wanted to take if I went there for grad school to their free online course offering for next year (Jan/Feb 2012).

Natural Language Processing @ nlp-class.org
Software Engineering for SAAS @ saas-class.org
Game Theory @ game-theory-class.org
Probabilistic Graphical Models @ pgm-class.org
Machine Learning @ jan2012.ml-class.org (Same class as current ml-class.org)
Computer Security @ security-class.org
Information Theory @ infotheory-class.org

plus Anatomy and then a few other courses I'm not as interested in. I definitely wouldn't be able to keep up with all of these though. I already gave up trying to keep up with two courses this quarter, although I'm sort of following along at my own sluggish pace anyway. Sigh.

I went ahead and signed up for all of them anyway just for the heck of it since I'd probably want to watch the lectures at least. With all of these courses being put up for free online now I'm starting to wonder if I really want to go to grad school anyway... although granted, as far as ml-class this fall started off, they're probably going to be a bit dumbed down compared to the actual on-campus class. We shall see.

Working Life

Life is good, but I feel restless. Living alone makes me more aware of how hard it is to connect with people sometimes, especially when it takes a lot more effort to do so as they're not in close proximity anymore. I still feel that disconnect even when I do see or talk to people - like something's missing.

In previous days I'd stay up till 4 or 5 trying to elaborate more, but it is now 12:50 and past my bedtime. Good night.