HBA

Dear Kenneth,
Unfortunately, there was an error in our decision delivery process, andadmission letters were accidentally sent to students who we cannot offeradmission to at this time. We sincerely apologize for this error, and we aresorry that we cannot currently offer you admission to HBA. However, we haveplaced you on our waiting list, and you will be given priority if a spacebecomes available.
Again, our sincerest apologies for any inconvenience this has caused.

This becomes increasingly annoying every time I read it.

Shopping Week Blog

This is going up here so that I can delete the file.
Let it be noted that a lot of this stuff will not make sense to anyone other than myself.
Let it also be noted that I have censored myself by omitting extremely incriminating stuff. ;)

Monday, January 23, 2012

Econ 1010b--Macroeconomics

10:00am: Damn, Ec1010b lecture really got me interested in Econ again. Prof Foote was really interesting and inviting, super super funny.

Gov 40--International Conflict and Cooperation

10:06am: Looks like there are already people sucking up to Prof Rosen.

10:07am: Oh look, Matt Watson is here. As is Doris and Oh, John Grammer—never mind, not him. Ohai Julian.

10:07am: Oh, the suck-ups were actually just section leaders. Oops. #tooquicktojudge

10:08am: Class still hasn’t started… Oh well. :P Still giving out handouts… Oh lol, it’s just a syllabus.

10:10am: OHAI DIANA!

10:12am: A lot more sparse than Ec1010b

10:27am: Interesting insight about being able to look at current events based on historical parallels [Current “jihad” vs. Past European “crusade”]

10:32am: Also Japan-US in WWII vs. Iran-US&allies, with Econ Sanctions à War

10:37am: Maybe I’ll be more interested in a different IR class, or a PoliTheory class. Let’s see how Gov 1061 goes tomorrow.

10:51am: Ended 9 minutes early. Gives me good time to a) go to Sever and b) study for Chinese

Soc ???--something about heirachial organizations

11:10am: lol. People making fun of his accent already. Although, granted, it is difficult to understand him at times.

11:12am: Interesting, another Chinese TF

11:14am: lol, surprisingly high number of guest speakers—seven confirmed, hopefully nine?

11:17am: Ohai Jay. :P

11:18am: Lol. Holworthy freshman spouting out impressive things, just repeating the stuff the senior said, basically.

11:20am: Such a long course introduction.

11:58am: Indeed, the entire class, basically, was just course intro. Attempt to introduce material at the end involved readings that no one had done yet. Lol. Very awkward class, very awkward instructor, people left saying that they were “not feeling it” and those who do stay are probably hoping that the guest lectures and case studies will make up for it [as one girl mentioned]

Ec10 2nd Semester - Macroeconomics

12:07am: Mankiw. First comic: “This is my first recession. How worried should I be? / You’ll be fine as long as you don’t have any hopes and dreams. / But I still have them. / It’s time to yank off that band-aid.” WTF.

Psych ??? - The Psychology of Human Sexuality

1:08pm: Let’s hope this class is offered next year since it hasn’t been for 5 years, lol.

1:11pm: I am SOOOOOOOOO IMMATURE.

1:14pm: “Human beings are always…’up’ for it.”

1:20pm: Highlights—Silvio Berlusconi, Herman Cain, Good ol’ Newt, and hypocritical old closeted Republican men

1:22pm: Too much talk of the female anatomy

1:26pm: “biopsychosocial perspective” <3

1:27pm: “fisting” “titillating”

1:31pm: Interesting distinction between transvestite and transsexual; the former is more of a fetish, the latter psychological/gender identity.

1:44pm: “Based on this research, exposure to semen lowers rates of clinical depression.”

1:49pm: Noice. He’s writing a textbook. AND he writes a SEX COLUMN?! scienceofrelationships.com: “Lusting, Loving, Leaving”

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Gov 1061--The History of Modern Political Philosophy

11:23am: Ohai Krister.

11:40am: obai Krister.

12:05pm: Ohai again, Krister.

Eng??? - Crime and Horror in Victorian Literature

12:07pm: Lol, cheesy music.

12:10pm: How does he use “Exciting” and “Disturbing” in the same sentence?

Ec????--Behavioral Economics

1:08pm: Lol. Kids not looking at the location change [although to be honest, it wasn’t very clear on the course website.]

1:12pm: Yay. Harvard students solving problems on their own. The horde is trickling in.

SLS 20--Psychological Science

2:35pm: Lol—Amboy Duke’s “Journey to the Center of The Mind” not working on Pinker’s laptop. Sadfaice.

2:39pm: His voice is higher than I would have expected. But his sense of humor is nice

2:44pm: Steven Pinker talking to his complaining [battery-dead] Roomba

3:13pm: Steven Pinker just mentioned Viagra and penis enlargement in conjunction with captcha tests

3:37pm: Noticing a lot of overlap with his book

3:48pm: I like how he says “rather” as [ɹɒðə]

AAAAAAAAAAAAND that's a wrap.

Winter Crush

Didn't exactly work out the way I expected.
Indeed, to be completely honest, didn't really work out at all.

We had started messaging each other at the end of last semester, right before finals. The nice (if you could call it that) coincidence was that we had exams the same days--indeed, we shared one exam. But even post-exam period, when we had gone home for the holidays, the messages continued to flow. Most of the time, I wasn't the one initiating them. Regardless, I looked forward to them every night. It was funny--I'd get the messages around 11pm or 12am, when it was already 1-2am on the East Coast. But we would always be chatting for an hour, maybe half, maybe more.

The messages dried up after New Years. I reasoned that it was difficult to enjoy a trip to South Africa and Germany and still find time to text someone back in the States, nine time zones away. Even when messages weren't forthcoming after the trip, I just assumed it was because it was almost time to get back to campus, and everyone was just busy packing.

So it was a little unfortunate when we couldn't exchange over ten words to each other when we finally met up on campus. If we can even call it that. The first two times we met eyes, a total of zero words were spoken. The third time? "Hey." "Oh! Hi!" And then we parted ways.

A few nights later, around 3am when words just start spilling directly from my brain into the world, I sent a message: "Would you like to go for coffee on Friday?" I even gave times when I was available, times on other days if Friday didn't exactly work out. Twenty four hours later, there was still no word. It wasn't until the day after that, when we were chatting about the mundane topic of classes (a conversation that I had started up, albeit on Facebook--as usual), I snuck in a strategic, "So is Friday a no-go?" The answer was as expected.

For a while, I hoped that we may take the same class. We were shopping the same government class, and we met up at a meeting for the Harvard Political Review. Both of us are planning to write articles for the publication, and from the way things look now it seems pretty plausible that we'll be seeing each other at least once a week, in the meeting room. Part of me still wants to break the barrier, to strike up conversation, and perhaps to re-extend that coffee offer. But part of me--a part that's been nagging all along, a part that has compared our intellects and found mine to be far inferior, a part that constantly scolded the overjoyed side of me throughout those few weeks of "attraction"--that part knows that it'll probably come to nothing.

And that's where we stand right now.
And though it had never really had the time to grow into anything in the first place, there's still a sinking feeling when I realize that the "seed" hidden "far beneath the bitter snows" is perpetually frozen, never to make it to the Spring.
#BetteMidler #ohgod #sosappy #thisisneithertwitternortumblrwhyhashtags


Speaking of tumblr... Some recent posts in which I wallow in self-pity:
http://kenmeows.tumblr.com/post/16807201285/simplementconfondu-accurate-if-i-were


http://kenmeows.tumblr.com/post/16852920227



Aaaaaaaand we're done.