Do

"What makes you do the things you do? Why do you do what you do?"

Mom: I want to make the most of my time here.
Biology professor: Sex.
Lydia: So that one day I can do what I want to do.
Leon: Because I want to, damn it. This shouldn't even be a question.
Me: I don't know. I just want to be happy.

I should try asking more people this question.

TFZ

My computer science homework for this week: TFZ.

Dying

Sidestepping the political issues, I'll just assume that life begins upon birth. That means for whatever time you spent inside your mother (hopefully the whole nine months, unless you were Athena, in which case no one knows how the hell you came to be in the first place. Oh, what's that? You popped out of your daddy's head fully armed? I see...), you were presumably "dead."

So in a way, death is nothing new to us. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.

Now supposedly, there are people who claim to have had dreams about being born, even as they got older (I personally haven't). Plato argues that this makes perfect sense from a biological perspective; though we may not "remember" being born, it is quite plausible that we have not "forgotten" it either -- sort of like a fossil record of where we've been.

In our case, however, the endpoint of the fossil record happens to be the same as the beginning.

Which leads to a bizarre idea: the way in which we entered the world and wrinkled the dimensions of space and time from  nonexistence is, in a sense, the reverse of dying (maybe we were all given a Max Revive while loafing around inside our mothers or something. Who knows).

Granted, I didn't ask to be born. That much is true -- none of us did. But seeing as we, along with every other living thing on this planet, have already come back from the dead once, there's really no reason not to make the most of it.

It's good to be alive.

I think that will be my philosophy for 2013.

Application

I think I found a new hobby.

Application for _____

• Tell us about yourself. What makes you unique? What do you think are your strengths and weaknesses?

I am unique in that I don't consider myself unique. My strengths are my arms and calves, while my weaknesses are my abs and hamstrings. Occasionally, I also wish I was taller and had fewer pimples, but I think those are fairly minor flaws.

• Why do you want to explore finance in this economic climate? What does ____ offer to you personally?

I want to make money and connections. Additionally, ___ offers me a nice bullet point on my resume, which is currently empty.

 

Resume

Ryan Chow - Class of 2016

San Jose, CA

Academic

• I managed to turn in my study card 3 minutes and 14 seconds before the deadline. I then went to Finale to buy myself a cranberry pie. It tasted pretty good, but not as good as the ones my mom made back home.
• I have only missed one class so far.
• I hope you're still reading this.
• I shopped Math 55 just like the 200 other tourists who showed up on the first day.

Social/Extracurricular/Other

• I summoned the courage to sit down next to a girl I didn't know in Annenberg during Opening Days. She got up to leave a few seconds afterwards though.
• I hold Thayer's record for most midnight trips to the restroom in a single night.
• I made the 100th purchase on the basement vending machine and got a free pack of Pop Tarts.
• I didn't choose the thug life; the thug life chose me.

Rage

Of all the random evolution stories from my Pokemon days, the only one that's stuck with me is that of Gyarados.

Here you go from the most useless Pokemon (it's a goddamn red fish flopping on the ground) in the game, and then BAM! at level 20, you've got this blue serpent of awesomeness.

So why is Gyarados so angry? I mean, for a Pokemon who just went through 20 levels of living hell, you would think that Gyarados would be pretty happy with the results.


--------------------------------------------------
In a sense, we're all like Gyarados over there. We constantly craft our decisions and sacrifice our immediate wants in order to build up to some goal or achievement, but once we get there, things aren't as amazing as we had imagined. We knew it all along, but being the wishful thinkers we are, we still wanted to make sure that the pot of gold doesn't actually exist. And it never will.

So we get frustrated. And we get tired. And we start raging.

And then we start turning blue, growing whiskers and crazy spikes on our heads, and spewing out awesome yellow hyper beams.

Most Improved

I happened to meet the parents of one of my close middle school friends the other day. I was in a good mood, so I waved, and they cautiously said hi.

"Oh, I guess you don't remember me anymore. I'm Ryan, I was friends with Michael."

And just like anybody who hasn't seen me since 8th grade, the first comment I got was about the voice. Fine.

Then they started launching into this commentary of how I've become more good-looking and how I look intelligent now.

Well, thanks. Glad to know that you thought I was a hideous, pimply blob with the intelligence of a cantaloupe back then.



You can take a compliment about how you've changed either one of three ways.
1) Fuck you.
2) At least I've improved, unlike you.
3) Be a normal, polite person and graciously accept the compliment.

You can guess which option I took.

That's right - the first one.

Aren't I clever

column - insecurites and industries

Every year, hundreds of volcanic eruptions occur. Broiling, red hot magma spurts out of the
mountains. People scream. Lives and livelihoods are destroyed. The helpless humans try their best to mitigate the damage – buckets of water, fire retardants, and lucky charms – but to no avail. The towering messengers of smoldering destruction never stop terrorizing the populace.

I am, of course, referring to pimples.

Being the little baby I am, I easily get nightmares from good horror movies, bad horror movies, and bad parodies of bad horror movies. But waking up in the morning to a smoldering mountain of red on my nose is on an entirely different level of terror.

I hear that normal people have nightmares of being naked, which supposedly suggests subconscious insecurity or something to that effect. I laugh at their trite nudist fantasies. Because at least in that situation, no one ever seems to actually notice that, well, you're butt naked.

Now a pimple, on the other hand -- every time you dare show your volcanic face in public, the blind population increases.

So naturally, wherever there’s an insecurity, there’s an industry. With companies like Neutrogena touting a magical "pore-cleansing" formula and Cetaphil with its "now 3x more powerful!" daily cleanser, pimple-stricken teenagers now have the appropriate arsenal to defend against the red alien invaders.

Unfortunately, I am not one of those teenagers. Starting from seventh grade, I have unwillingly nurtured my very own Ring of Fire right on my forehead. Yet five years of oily catastrophe and six different acne creams later, I've long since accepted my fate as a giant walking Petri dish for acne bacteria to party in. Sure, it may not be very attractive to have volcanoes and craters all over my face, but it's not like I'm some shirtless model gracing shopping bags around the world. There's nothing to lose!

Of course, it would be nice if all those creepy little bacteria would leave me and my exquisitely textured face alone. But even then, I've pretty much learned to accept my pimples for the poor (albeit hideous) creatures that they are. After all, it’s not fair to just exterminate things if they’re ugly, right?

Uh...right?

...Guys?

Just Curious...

I wasn’t exactly happy that day. No, I was feeling downright awful, staring at the drenched sidewalk while I trudged home, wet and exhausted. Until I looked up.

You flew by me on your bike, so full of energy and life. For the first time that day, I felt true joy. The rejuvenating sight of your long golden hair fluttering away in the rain...what beautiful hair you had. I followed you for hours on end, until you finally reached your house. You finally took off your helmet, completely exposing your wonderful hair. You turned around to lock your bike, and we briefly made eye contact. I was feeling pretty bad that day. Until I looked up. Then I felt even worse.

How was I supposed to know you were a man?