trippy

Weren't we all...

I believe I have a new life motto (xkcd.com):

Oink, Oink

So we didn't like Need for Speed, and Nathalie got it changed out for Elebits. Now, Elebits is a great game. It involves trying to capture little creatures by making as big a mess as possible. At the moment, we're working on being able to throw houses around.

I ran into Drew yesterday at Barnes & Noble, and we talked for a little bit before having to go once again on our separate ways. You know, he's going to Russia (tomorrow, I believe), and I suggest that you all do the same. Going out of the country is a nice experience. Anyway, he reminded me that I never updated you all on the happenings of my niece. My parents (her grandparents) now have custody of her. They have finally been able to get her the medical insurance that she has been lacking, and for this they couldn't be happier. This comes at the price, however, of my brother for some reason deciding that he no longer has a family nor a daughter. I (and no one else, either) have not heard from him in about half a year, and I don't expect to anytime soon. And his "wife" has also decided she doesn't have a daughter: instead, she has a child in her life that she opts to see about once a month for a few hours (she's *really* busy with work [and alcohol and other, more important people], though!!).

Ah, but I don't really care. My niece finally has a place to call home with a loving family and the things she needs to be 'appy and 'ealthy.

</diatribe>

In a couple of days, I am going to N'awlens for a big math conference (*the* math conference). I'm sure I'll try to post from there (because I have a laptop now!) about the goings-on of the world of mathematicians... We proved the Poincaré Conjecture, you know. Fine, I know you don't care, but perhaps I can find a book there which will pique your interests.

Christmas and the other holidays

So as we all know, yesterday was Christmas. I post now because I got a new laptop, and I clearly want to spend every moment with it. Nathalie got everybody (my parents, her parents, her brothers, and she) together to all pitch in on paying for the 13-inch black MacBook. I wanted a laptop really all last semester because every bit of my homework was done on the computer. I would also be at school about 12 hours a day, every bit of which I couldn't really get much work done by virtue of the fact that I had no computer. I already love it, so we'll see how much I use it at school.

On the topic of school, last semester I was taking a very busy 18 hours, and I still managed to keep a 4.0, so I can at least post that I am a little proud of myself. More tangibly, over the semester I became much more proficient in (these two things are unrelated) LaTeX and ASP.NET. The ASP.NET comes from the busiest course I have ever taken: in software engineering, we were split into groups of four which had to create a website which could be used by a brokerage firm to add new customers and let customers trade their stocks, manage their money, etc. I had never touched web development nor databases before this course, but t'was all fun to learn.

Hmm… ¿Qué más? I'm going shopping now to spend all my giftcards. Ah, one more thing: I bought myself a Wii. This is important, because I don't often buy myself things, especially things over $100. However, it is a lot of fun, and I think it was worth it. Any suggestions on games? I of course have Zelda, and Nathalie bought Need for Speed, but I'm thinking that I'll want something else soon. Though once school and work start up again, I'm sure I'll be too busy to play too much.

New Beginnings

As of noon on Thursday, August 24, 2006, Nathalie and I are engaged.

Corny though it may be, I wish to let you know that I asked her in Austin at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. We were on our way down to San Antonio to visit caves and Sea World and a zoo: a last vacation before school started again.

Of course!

In this time of Constitutional Amendments made by people who don't quite understand our rights, I propose another.

Proposed Constitutional Amendment
We shall define sex solely as the act of a male's penis entering into a woman's vagina, when both said man and woman are consenting adults. Henceforth, the analogous acts between two (or more) consenting male adults or two (or more) consenting female adults shall be known as civil intimacy. Furthermore, those engaging in civil intimacy will have the same sexual rights and responsibilities as those engaging in sex.