April 19, 2000 - 00:22 am
I was on my way back from class this morning when, as usual, I see the same, very very attractive brunette walking towards Turlington. I see her almost every day, and every day she gets my attention. Granted, I never actually met her and was only basing my attraction to her on physical appearance, but the attraction was real, nonetheless. She just had an aura of "datability" about her. Anyway, today was no exception. However, today she had a cloud of smoke around her head, and as I looked closer, I saw her pull her hand away from her mouth in that typical smoker's fashion--the one where they have their palm to their chin, have the cigarette in between their index finger and their middle finger, their thumb turned inward and their last two fingers resting on their chin,and then non-chalantly pull the cigarette away from their face in that oh-so-cool way (that last part is heavy on the sarcasm). Well, it was right then and there that I completely lost every bit of attraction for her. It's amazing..... how one aspect of a person's life can so completely turn one off of said person.

Smoking is a dirty, filthy, dangerous habit, as most of my relatives would now tell you, the ones that can still speak, that is. My uncle recently had his voice box removed because he smoked practically all his life. And because the chemo made his immune system weak, his surgical wound wouldn't heal properly, and had to have skin grafts (twice) from various parts of his body to help heal the wound. He is just now getting better, and the doctors say that he can have one of those electronic voice boxes put in soon. Another relative, my great aunt, is practically on her deathbed suffering from emphysema. We saw her over christmas break, realizing that that would probably be the last time we would see her alive. She could barely breath, and her speaking ability was worse than the wheelchair-bound kid from Malcolm in the Middle. Labored breath, one or two words, labored breath, cough, labored breath, one or two words, cough. And they weren't your normal, I've-got-something-in-my-throat coughs. These were true, hacking-up-an-organ coughs. If you ever need a reason not to smoke, my family is all you need to quit smoking. Oh, and we also had a friend of the family die of lung cancer about 4 or 5 years ago. Let me tell you, that is NOT a pretty sight. Please people, don't smoke--It's really disgusting, and it's not worth it.

Well, I hadn't intended on preaching in this update, but that's the way it came out.

Tomorrow, after classes, I'm going home. In a totally non-Easter-related event, my home congregation is going to the annual Lads to Leaders/Leaderettes Convention in Atlanta at the Marriott Marquis. I'll be functioning as a chaperone and as a judge in various competitions there. It's held on Easter weekend only because most everyone in the nation gets Friday off for Good Friday. Details about what goes on is on their website, if you're interested. This is a great organization, and I participated from 4th grade all the way to High School. I've placed fourth in the Speech competition (basically a shortened, watered-down sermon), made it to the finals in Song Leading (I think, I'm not sure anymore.... it was so long ago), and been on the champion Puppet Team on 3 different occasions. Oh, and I also competed in Speech and Debate one year, but it was way too much work, and I didn't do it again. Although, I have to admit, it's probably the most useful thing that goes on there. There's one topic for the convention, and you have to be prepared to argue pro or con. The year I participated, the topic was "Baptism by Emersion: Necessary or Unnecessary for Salvation?" The 'official' church of Christ stance is that it is necessary for salvation, in case you were wondering. (The website linked to is not the most aesthetically pleasing, but its content is good and gives a good overview of my beliefs--I think I'll be adding a permanent link to it soon). Anyway, the bus leaves for Atlanta Thursday afternoon, but I figured I'd go home tomorrow so as to go to church there and get any last minute details. I won't be back until Sunday late.

April 18, 2000 - 00:19 am
I wish I had something interesting to write about nowadays. Absolutely nothing interesting is going on.... other than classes....and they're not interesting at all. Well, I suppose one interesting thing happened in pchem. We derived the ideal gas law. That's right, the infamous PV=nRT equation that you use in 10th grade chemistry. Turns out it's actually a logical derivation (go figure!!!) based on the total energy of the atoms and molecules themselves. This includes their rotational energy, vibrational energy, translational energy, and the electronic energy. While I'm on the subject of PChem, I'm reminded of Boltzmann (you know, the guy who came up with all sorts of physical theories in chemistry, and the infamous Boltzman constant, k--which, btw, when multiplied by Avogadro's number gives you R, the Rydberg constant). My Fluids professor told us how he did all this work with Entropy, and came up with a whole bunch of theories about it. Well, apparently he was so disturbed by the concept of entropy and the disorder in the universe that he killed himself. But that's just hearsay. We don't know for sure whether he really killed himself because he completely understood entropy and couldn't handle it mentally. Maybe I'll look him up online.... Doh.... nowhere has an extensive biography (even Biography.com.) He's listed, but it doesn't say anything about his death. Anyway, I just thought it was cool that we finally derived a simple equation that we had taken for granted all these years.

April 16, 2000 - 01:20 am
www.dailyeatings.com

All I have to say about that update (via Sarah) is "Amen."

April 09, 2006 - 16:27 pm
Cold weather is good. I love cold weather. Especially when there aren't any clouds and it's windy. Excellent weather. I'm so glad we got one last cold front before the hot weather hits us. In the meantime, I'm forced to do lots of homework and to study for an exam in fluids tomorrow. Yick. So much for enjoying the nice weather.... I guess I'll just leave the window open. Oh well....