04/29/2005: "Another day passes by"

It seems most of the school's computers were off today for some reason. I was going to post from two different classes, but it seems that I couldn't get online during the day, so.. no luck. Not that it's really all that amazing to write from school, but it's interesting to do if possible.

Not much to say about school today. Have one more paper and two tests coming up, but after that the semester's over. Also have the Japanese oral exam coming up soon (possibly more on that later). Otherwise, it's all getting pretty boring, to be honest. Two of my classes are mostly spent doing homework for my other classes, since I've already passed one (don't have to take the final) and I just need to write a paper for the other. Sometimes I just sketch out website designs, some project or another, or simply draw pictures. Yes, college work at its finest.

So, what about the rest of life? Not too eventful, I must say. Just the usual stuff.. well, if you ignore the fact that I'm leaving for Japan in 18+/- days. To be honest, I haven't really done anything for it so far. I think I'll start buying all the little things (all the personal items people need to keep themselves alive and such) next week and probably start packing around the same time. I guess it might be a bit early to start packing but as someone wisely pointed out to me, this is a long trip, so it might take some time to figure the best way to pack. There are a bunch of last-minute things I need to do before I leave but I can't really start doing it until about the week I leave, so.. right now it's just alot of waiting.

Randomly, in case anyone's curious where I'll be, when I'll be at a certain place, etc, I'll be leaving maps and that kind of information.. soon-ish. Or at least I intend to. I need to make up some stuff soon to send off to people, so I'll see if I wind up posting it here. Mind you, travel plans and maps aren't that interesting, so.. it's not much to miss out on.

With any luck, I'll be getting down to the small details on my Japanese oral exam over this weekend and finally stary practicing for it. It'll end up for about 40% of the grade for my final (the other 60% is a written test), so it really would pay to study for it and work on it. If at all possible, I want to leave it as free-form as possible, which is why it's best to go for a really easy-going scenario that involves alot of discussion. It won't be easy no matter which way you do it, but it'll be a whole lot easier if you can throw in different questions and forms as the conversation progresses. Or, it could just be that I think too much. This does happen sometimes, so.. who knows.

Probably won't do anything eventful today. Maybe run to the bank.. don't have anything else planned. I might start work on the other game I wanted to work on (apparently I have two I might be working on at the same time.. ack! Hopefully I can get them done before I leave). I did some sprite ripping today, so that should mostly be done. I also did some of the course layout, so.. with any luck, I should have alot of the resources ready. I think this game should be simpler to make than the last one (not so complex), so.. we'll see.

Well, I'm going to be up a bit longer and then I'll go sleep for as long as I can possibly sleep before the sunlight finally yanks me from bed (probably around 6 hours or so).

As for everything else in life.. right now I'm just degrading to smiling and nodding and pretending everything is "perfectly fine". Oddly enough, I notice that as stress increases, I concentrate more on other people's problems. I guess maybe it's easier to get lost in trying to make things better for people around you than to aknowledge your own situation. Or maybe it's way too late at night and I'm thinking too much. I tend to do that late at night.. not always a good thing.

Well, I should be off. I'll write again sometime soon, when I can.

Oh, and if anyone's curious, the outline for my Japanese thing is available by clicking "More" at the bottom of this post.

========Japanese Outline========

Hobo-chan and Coffee-sama meet up and greet eachother. They exchange greetings and ask if the other is doing well. Coffee's day has gone well, and Hobo has just woken up. They decide that they should do something, but don't know what. Several suggestions are thrown out until they decide to go eat. Discussion continues as they decide where a good place to eat would be. Eventually, they decide upon Chinese food.

Hobo and Coffee arrive at the restaurant and seat themselves. They talk for a bit more about random things before the waiter arrives to take their order. Hobo-chan would like monkey eyes, but they are all out! They discuss food choices ("What do you want to eat?", "What will you drink?") before finally settling on what they would both like. Through this, they both continue to ask about the prices for each various dish as they decide on what they can afford. They give their order to the waiter and go back to light banter as they wait for their food.

Finally, the food arrives and they eat through it. More serious discussion ensues as they talk about their family, ages, birthdays, favorite things, and other such issues. They talk about their past and describe what they were like as children, how they family was, where they lived, and assorted other points. Possibly for absolutely no reason, someone dies. The living party mourns momentarily before paying the bill and leaving.
Jason