I’ll never understand Midwestern weather.

February 24, 2003

You know what? I don’t understand this damn state. It was 50 degrees on Thursday and Friday, now it’s 14 degrees and snowing out. What, did Mother Nature just taunt us with some nice days and then stick it to us just to be mean? I like cold weather, don’t get me wrong. When I first decided I wanted to go to Beloit, my Mom asked me if I like cold weather. Honestly, I do. I like bundling up and drinking hot chocolate or coffee. I like eating chili with a blanket over me while I watch a movie. Well, I haven’t done much of the latter one, but it seems like it would be fun, y’know? Anyhow, cold weather just makes me feel…I dunno…ALIVE. Nothing like that brisk feeling outside, and then coming in and having to warm up your ears and wipe your nose.

Now, that being said, I like warm weather as much as the next person, too. Note that I say warm, not hot. I consider hot to be anything above 80 degrees, which means it gets hot around here in the summers. 50 degrees is a little too cold to be sitting outside, but on Thursday and Friday I went out without a coat. Today I was back to wearing gloves and my coat zipped all the way all. Funny how the weather works.

I had a pretty busy weekend. Friday night I sat around with a bunch of friends and we talk and sampled various mixed drinks Dan and I were concocting. A bunch of sophomores down the hall were celebrating someone’s 20th birthday, so they were playing loud music and screaming and yelling, and those of us crowded together in my room found it amusing that we were sitting, listening to some music, sipping our drinks, and calmly talking about everything from nostalgic songs to our imminent war with Iraq. Guess we’re just a bit older. Saturday night I went out to dinner with a few people after I ripped off Dan’s van, though we just went to Applebee’s here in town. Two of the people I went with had to be back by 6:30 to work the play, so that ruled out Rockford. Last weekend three of the four of us who went had gone to the all-you-can-eat Chinese food place a few doors down, so that ruled that out, too, though that was my secret desired place to go. I really do love Chinese food, though I’m sure if I went to China I’d be in for a rude awakening as to the types of food available there vs. what I like. Anyhow, after that I watched a movie with a friend and then Dan and his girlfriend Kristine came over and we all watched another one. Pretty lazy night.

Yesterday was the killer, though. I spent most of the day working on homework, actually. I headed to the library at about 11 or 12 and went to work on my special project that I’m doing this term. I know I’ve mentioned it before, but in a nutshell, it’s about European immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th centuries (I think approximately 1890-1910 will do) and how the discrimination against them inadvertantly led to American nationalism among American nationals. “America for Americans”, that sort of thing. I checked out eleven books, and I have to turn in my tentative bibliography to Ann today. It’s going to be a primary source paper, but most of what I have are secondary sources right now. One book, however, is the experiences of a writer who went and lived in the immigrant slums with his wife, then travelled to Italy and came back through Ellis Island as an “immigrant” and went back there. Investigative reporting of a hundred years ago…I love it. Should be an interesting read. The latter half of the day was spent working on an assignment for my Quant class. It was a bit more complicated than I expected it to be through a combination of unclear directions and me not knowing all the material through little fault of my own. I started work on it at about 5, and I worked on it off and on until around 11:30. The core of the assignment was the explain the concept of regression analysis in statistics (I can almost HEAR my Dad saying how easy it is and then going on to explain it to me off the top of his head), but the trick is that we have to do it in the context of the software we’re using. I dn’t believe that we were supposed to list all the equations, just explain the concepts and the numbers that the software kicks out. I guess I’ll find out. I hope I’ll find out. The midterm is on Wednesday.

The simulation in my African Politics class went well. We simulated the peace talks between Ethiopia and Eritrea towards the end of their border war between 1998 and 2000, with people in the class taking on the roles of the Eritrean delegation, the Ethiopian delegation, and the mediators. I was on the Ethiopian delegation, and so for much of the talks like every other set of peace talks, we mostly squabbled about the issue of responsibility, even though it had no real bearing on the talks. It’s funny, you read about peace talks between states and you marvel at how little they get acomplished and how you could do such a better job and get things done if you were in their place, but when you actually get in their place, the same things happen–even for inexperienced “diplomats”. We finally came to a cease fire and withdrawl agreement, though we didn’t resolve any of the core issues that drove the conflict in the first place. Oh well. We only had two days, though, and it took both days to even come to the terms of the withdrawl. Ethiopia was in a position of power at the point in time we were simulating, so we were trying not to give away our only bargaining chips and our upper hand, as it was. My paper that I turned in with the simulation came out better than I expected. I had started work on it the previous week and began the actual writing the weekend before it was due, which was a good step for me. The night before it was due, I had only two pages to write, which made my job tremendously easier. Now I just have to get started on my 20-25 page paper (1st draft!) that’s due the week after Spring Break….

…which is next week. No, next week is Spring Break, not the week after Spring Break. I can’t believe that the term is already halfway over. I have so much to do in the meantime, I guess the rest of the term is just going to fly. I think my primary goal next week is going to be writing, with a secondary goal of job hunting. Yes, I do believe it’s that time. Wish me luck.

Which brings me to my final point of the day. In May after graduation, my father and I are going to be driving from Beloit back to Portland. This will allow me to save some money on shipping costs by piling stuff into his car while simultaneously giving us a chance to do some touring of the country and see places I’ve never been. There’s been talk of Mt. Rushmore, Devil’s Tower, and Yellowstone, though I’m not sure what else he has in store for me. I bring this up now because I’ve started thinking of ways that I can keep in touch while I do this. I have my laptop, obviously, as well as my digital camera, and so I can take pictures and then transfer them to my laptop, which can then get them onto the Internet. I couldn’t possibly get all the pictures I plan on taking onto my website while travelling, but maybe just a taste. I’d have to arrange some sort of Internet access, too. My two choices so far are to return to NetZero, which is a free Internet provider though I’m limited to 10 hours a month, or to pay for one month’s access from another nationwide ISP (or use a “free first month” one and cancel) that would give me more than 10 hours. Then I run into the problem of hosting. Currently, I host my website on one of my own computers, which would be difficult since it will be in the car with me as I travel. That won’t work, so I have some thinking to do. We’ll see how that works out.

Now I’m going to pick up my room, since I didn’t do much of that yesterday as I worked most of the day. Then I’m going to read today’s news and see what’s new in the world and the world of technology. Have a good day everyone, and I’ll likely post another update later in the week.

Feelin’ groovy. No work due tomorrow.