Taryn's bday

Yesterday, we celebrated one of our most honored Republic member's bday. Yes, she has turned 43 (I think) with the amazing super power to turn 12 when she becomes giddy on Petrone.

A bunch of us whisked her away to the mountain of most magic and rode rollercoasters all day long. I have to say: I'M GETTING TOO OLD FOR THIS! Maybe it's not my age - maybe the rides are getting rickitier, maybe the G-forces acting on my spine and neck are just stronger, or maybe the damn harnesses don't feel as secure as a good ol climbing harness. Whatever the case, I'm sore, exhausted and my neck hurts as if I was rear ended 20 times by a student driver. Yes, it was quite fun.

Not having been out there since 1997 (I think), the whole gammut of new coasters was fun to experience. My favorite by far was "X". It's a weird coaster where you're basically hanging off of a single axle, and start off going backwards. But somewhere along the line, the forces that act on your seat flip you around facing forwards... then downwards, then upwards. I think I had the best seat on the train - the very front. A few of those drops you're facing directly downwards with nothing in front of you - that was awesome. I hadn't laughed that much on a roller coaster since 1997.

We all headed to my parent's restaurant afterwards. Ordered lots of food for people - I think they enjoyed it. Can't even remember everything that I ordered - I think there was tuna tempura wrapped in shiso leaves, monk fish liver pate, kobe beef steak, crab meat chile relleno, sushi, and other stuff. Was a little worried for Taryn - wasn't sure if all the solid non-blended food would be digestable for her stomache.

All in all, had a good fun full day doing something different from climbing.... oh my god, what did I just say?!

I LIVE!(?)

I've been trying to recover from a shoulder injury for the last 2 months. What I originally thought was a rotator cuff injury seems to be more of a shoulder inpingement (a diagnosis from a top notch medical student). As a result, I've climbed very little since November - a top rope here or there, a boulder problem with easy moves occasionally, etc etc. Nothing really at my top level.

This week I went to my original climbing stomping ground - the Outback Climbing Center at UCSD. It is the womb of my climbing self - that is where I discovered my love for climbing. That's where I found new friends, a new outlook on life and new strengths - literally. Tonight, that is where I went to experience my rebirth as a phoenix.

I started off easy with a bunch of 5.6 climbs and steadily worked my way up. I took long breaks between problems, drank plenty of fluids and stretched my shoulder VERY well. At the first sign of pain, I would back off - that was my plan. By the end of tonight, I was cranking on other people's projects. My shoulder feels a little stiff at the moment so I took some NSAIDs (ibuprofen) to keep any potential swelling down. Can't say I'm 100%, but it feels damn good to know that I'm starting to recover.

Now onto some sillier stuff:

Has anyone wondered if the reason why Vader was making that raspy breathing noise is because his breath filter was clogged and needed to be changed? I do.

They say you learn something new everyday:

Your toxic post-"completely drunk off my ass so badly that I decided to make out with the toilet" breath has some levels of formaldehyde (sp?) in it. Apparently, while you're suffering from the worst hang over in your life, you're also spewing the same chemical that they preserve cadavers in. This from a medical doctor (not the student - an actual doctor).

Yummy.

Will to live... leaving...

This blog is dying - not me.

Not that I want it to die. Everyday I keep thinking to myself "wow. that's an interesting thought. I should make a note about it in my blog".

But that never happens. You see folks, I used to blog a lot during my work hours at my former employment. There were hours of time where I had NOTHING to do. I even took care of the back burner stuff that is always at the bottom of everyone's to do list. So I blogged.

At the new job, I have lots to learn. On top of that, I'm at a computer station surrounded by other computer stations - kind of like computer terminal rooms in college. And just like college, there are no partitions or cubicle walls or office walls. So it's a little awkward when the entire lab can see that you're not working.

Not that people care necessarily. I've walked by others' computer stations and they're checking email, looking at myspace.com and other personal sites. But I still think it's not something one can do when they're still new there.

So as a result, I apologize to all my readers (yes - all 4 of you) that I haven't been updating as often as I should be.

Toxic cloud of ... stuff...

I'm amused. Part of my lab is a wet lab where there are deadly combinations of chemicals for some of the experiments. Under normal safe operating procedures, the chemicals are handled underneath laboratory ventilation hoods, and behind safety glass.

However, I've come to notice that the building that houses my lab seems to go under the occasional blackouts. This means the ventilation hoods stop working. This means that each time there is a power failure, everyone in the lab (and the building as well) needs to evacuate to prevent death and destruction.

I'm not sure if it's the two computing GRIDS we have up, or the near 100 Terabytes (that's 100,000 Gigabytes) of hard drives, or the multiple servers, switches, routers and computers we have up and running that sucks the juice out of the building. In any case, I find it amusing. Today's blackout encompassed the entire medical part of campus - one eatery, one admin building, 4 research buildings, and a lecture hall were all out of commission.

Still the prettiest one

Quick post:

new job started last Monday.

Kick Ass.

I mean - it's kicking my ass.

Is good.

Ass sore.

Need to learn how image reconstruction from electron microscopy works. By end of week. I think I understand how electron tomography using gold fiducial markers spread on two sides of a 10 nm slide works. Go me.

Co-workers unfriendly. Yup - definitely at UCSD. It's ok - still the prettiest one around.

Remembering how Unix works. Linux interesting. Moving on to Windows and Mac soon. I think Matlab hates me. It's ok - Sam will kill it if it tries anything.

(for those of you confused about the references: http://www.ealasaid.com/misc/vsd/)

Isildur's nut key

Ever since I bought my nut key, waaaay back when, it's been trying to kill me. I remember three specific instances where I was imperiled due to my nut key -

1) 2001: I butt scooted my way down a short slabby boulder so I can hop across a 2 foot wide, 15' deep chasm to the base of a climb where my stuff and my friends were waiting. As I committed myself to the hop, the nut key caught the loop of fabric on the back of my shoe and I lurched forward in an unexpected way. Fortunately, the cord attaching the nut key to my harness broke and I managed to land on my two feet across the chasm instead of fall face first down it.

2) 2002: on the descent route of Tahquitz, the nut key caught some shoulder high bushes as I was about to hop across some boulders. I caught my balance before I landed and managed to avoid a tumble down a 100' slope.

3) 2004: while chimneying my way up, my nut key caught my shoe while I was in a cramped heel-in-my-butt position inside of a crack. fortunately, I managed to dislodge the nut key before I gave in to muscle fatigue.

It's not like you can get rid of a nut key. You need one for trad climbing to get the oh-so-expensive stuck cam or nut out of the crack.

But this weekend, I momentarily lost my footing while walking in a narrow corridor of rocks and boulders, and somehow managed to get my nut key between my hip and the boulder I stumbled onto. Consequently, the resulting force put weird stress on the damnable thing and it broke clean in two.

It looked like Isildur's sword after facing Sauron! Take that foul demon! You may have won some battles, but I have won the war!

I think I'll have Taryn frame it. :)

Buzzers:1, Ob: 0

I don't remember when I started, but for a long time now, I've cut my own hair. I think it's a combination of myself picking up another hobby and being a cheap bastard. So I've bought buzzers to cut my hair.

Generally, I don't really care how I look. I'll pick up the #4 or #5 setting and cut my hair around evenly. It's only at the nape of the neck and around the ears that I spend a little extra time and effort clearing away the thick mat of hair to have some semblance of style.

Unfortunately, tonight I was a bit tired and in a hurry to finish cutting my hair. As a result, there's a half inch or so of hair around the top portions of my ears that was cut away with on a #0. It really looks like a mini explosion took place, leaving my ear completely unscathed and the hair sheared away.

Oh well - good thing everyone at my new job is anti social. I'd be suprised if anyone even looked at me and noticed.

My Theology

Sometimes, I really think there is a God and that this being is most likely a "He". Furthermore, I think that "He" created this world and us in his likeness.

But here's the catch - I think that God is actually a computer programming student trying to run a simulation of a physical universe. His physical universe. Why do I think it's a "He"? Simple - go to any computer science class at a local university... odds are that the vast majority are geeky males that like to procrastinate and play video games like World of Warcraft or Halo on their Xbox system.

And I think our current monotheistic God is a grad student, while the pagan polytheistic gods were all undergrads. Really now - I think the Grad student (God) setup the simulation and handed over the project to a team of undergrads for a term. But they started introducing errors into the code and weren't maintaining it properly, so the grad student failed them all, took over the project again and planned to fix things that they screwed up on (i.e. sacrificing of virgins... what a waste).

Which brings me to my final point. I think God was actively programming and interferring with our lives back around and before Christ's time (incidentally, I think Christ was his avatar - in more ways than one). But I think he is currently procrastinating and is playing some online RPG with other Gods of other simulated universes. I mean, otherwise he'd have a direct hand in current events like he did back in the book of Genesis, since he's supposed to be benevolent and stuff.

Stupid God. He really should have installed a screen saver for this universe. But not the one with the flying toasters. That'd just be weird to wake up and the universe was replaced with a dark, dark void filled only with winged toasters.

Winter Break

I truly felt like I had a winter break this past year. It was invigorating, relaxing and carefree - much like winter breaks I experienced as a student at UCSD. *sigh* Now that I'm back at work, I can use another 2 weeks. Cest la vie.

My break in brief:

Went to LA during Christmas weekend. Ate, shopped with 'rents, ate some more, drove around with them, ate. Somewhere there was an opening of gifts - I received (from my family) a knife from my brother and a 6 liter cooler/heater unit that plugs into my car. Upside: can keep things cold i.e. beer. Downside: will drain car battery after 3 hours of use when the engine is off.

Came back to San Diego and spent the week playing games, cleaning the house (Japanese O-soji style), hanging out with Steph and some cooking. Sweetness.

Bouldered at Stoney Point briefly before going to 'rents restaurant and house for New Years. Helped (occasionally) with odd jobs for the restaurant and for the New Year's Day party at my parents' house.

Served 30 or so people at my parent's house for the party. Lots of food - Zucchini flower tempura, frog legs, chicken, sea weed, marinated shiitake, etc etc. And great sake too!

Was bestowed the honor of learning that long time friends Matt and Helen were engaged before even Helen's mom knew. I think we were something like #2 and #3 respectively.

Also - the rain in LA was cool. My parents live in the Hollywood Hills so the rain clouds passed through like fog (due to the 1300' elevation as opposed to being at sea level) and kept a surreal view from my parents' living room for the weekend.

And eucalyptus logs are a bitch to burn - don't burn easy and don't stay lit for very long.

That is all for today!