Hawks

Because reasons, multi-part post of all the things with questions. 1. I have RAM trouble, am lazy so clicky (to /r/buildapc thread). 2. How's a good way to tell your parents/other important people in your life you're basically not straight? (and/or a good time, place, etc) Lots of introspection lately and before and I've come to that conclusion, although also being 20 and not ever having had a romantic relationship is not helpful in that regard. Also am aware that asexuality is a thing. Also I really like labels so that's probably where part of this is coming from as I am lacking a label for myself in this regard and am less than thrilled about it. 3. Painting hoodies two days before you leave to go back to school is fun! Kind of. Been working on a simple cosplay of Wyldstyle from The Lego Movie, painting a hoodie to match hers and made a ridiculous hat.

Any particular reason the real-life advice thread is dead? Kind of want to post something there but it might also fit in the relationship thread but also I'm lazy. Was working on a tunic and then left it for a bit, computer is trying to update itself and generally being annoying.

Ran out of hydrogen peroxide while trying to etch a couple of small PCBs. Went with H2O2, vinegar, and salt mix because I had all the stuff and it's not anywhere near as potentially dangerous as most other things. It does work, just very slowly. Probably going to go ahead and sponge it on when I get more H2O2 as that's slightly more effective.

Just cheese quesadillas or with chicken and/or steak?

Shredded chicken burrito all day er'ry day (or the chicken DLT, also excellent). Going to vote today mostly to fill out the absentee form for the fall. There is actually one valid thing on the ballot though. Otherwise, waiting on mail to come so we can make a better aux cable for our 2005 Forester (really intelligent hack involving the external sub plug on the back of the radio). Might start on my new sewing project, although most of the house is a mess so I don't know where I might put it.

Is there some way we could make a Steam group? I'm lazy and not that good at Steam anyway (only just now made my profile pretty) but it seems like it could be fun/useful/etc. and we have one on most other types of things (dA, last.fm).

Actually kind of a two-fer. 1. Looking for decent speaker system (preferably with a sub) that will last me 3-5 years using pretty much just for casual music/gaming on my laptop. The stock speakers are garbage and I can't always use headphones. I just have on board sound with RealTek and/or AMD (idk, sound cards aren't my thing). Looking to spend <$50 USD, thinking about either these or these on Newegg. Thing number 2: I play bass for fun and occasionally in my college pep band. I'd like a decent portable thing that I can be heard with that is battery powered and not too heavy. I'm willing to do a little electrical work to make that work but am nowhere near a hobby electrician or anything like that. I've got the stuff to build a Ruby pre-amp with a more bass-y feel but no speakers or anything to hook that to. So any ideas or thoughts about this? The general use of this amp is for practice with headphones as it runs on a 9V but it can drive a cab too... I know they make the HoneyTone amp for guitars but also that it is really bad with bass levels. So I guess a super bassy speaker (on the smaller side, and battery power-able) if anyone has suggestions or things I can hack together?

Here (where Technological is in the name), overall it's a 3:1 male:female ratio but certain departments are more or less balanced than others - biomedical engineering is about 1:1 if not more female-heavy, and nearly every pre-med type major we offer is female dominated (medical lab science, biochemistry, etc). Most of our small liberal arts stuff is again slightly weighted toward females (mostly scientific and technical communication, but we do offer history, anthropology, and English degrees for some reason). The still worst department is computer science/computer engineering where you're hard-pressed to find a girl. I've not yet been the only female in a class, although the majority of the classes I've taken thus far are either prereqs (math, physics, chemistry) and thus big classes, or major-specific (biomed, so pretty well balanced). I am taking a 3D printing class this fall, it'll be interesting to see how that class is made up (iirc only 15 people in it anyway). Looking for budget computer speaker+sub suggestions, going to put something in T&C but any ideas? Looking for <$50 USD, also have a side project going on maybe with them...

My second grade teacher and my fifth grade math teacher. Both were really good, definitely need more of them. Some reason everything outside smells like wood burning. But good, just wood, not other weird crap that makes it unpleasant.

Same, in the diabetes department. Think we had that discussion at some point. Helped that I've always had pretty good control and healed fast. I kind of want to do a TIF census now, of normal things like what you're studying/your occupation, and weirder/more random stuff like diabetes. Also I keep listening to Weird Al's new album which is a good choice, looking up the cheapest option to buy a yellow traffic cone. I think I just have to get an orange one and spray paint...

Kinda like a callus, it's a little bit tougher than the rest of the skin on the top of my toes. Doesn't hurt to step on it or whatever anymore than it would with a toenail. My podiatrist said the only useful thing you can do with toenails now is climb trees barefoot; they're not really necessary. Also, going to a school with generally a 3:1 guy:girl ratio, it'll still happen.

Sucks, dude. I have no toenails on either big toe now because of that, I highly recommend it if it keeps happening to you. One they just went in and took the root out, after the initial attempt on the other toe took three or four tries with increasingly strong acid (strong enough that it had to get mixed at the hospital and kept in a glass bottle) that I said screw it, just cut it out. Fun fact to share though.

Also, it's 1am here so...

Told myself I will buy a Molly Schaus (one of our goalies) jersey if we win gold (US women's ice hockey) this year. Also looking to see just the general interactions and stuff that happens due to Putin's anti-gay laws. Also hoping somebody gets revenge on Crosby for last time.

Learn tuba, baritone ukelele. Get in better shape Social life? Thinking of rushing a fraternity with some pretty cool people in it, dunno if I'll have time though.

Steam sale, got SpaceChem, Counter-Strike Source and Garry's Mod, haven't actually played any of them yet. Amazon sale, got Fable Lost Chapters and Assassin's Creed II. Downloading Fable right now because I honestly forgot I bought it... L4D2 for free and Fallout for free a while back as well.

Surf teh Internetz and learn super random stuff. Look up cool Instructables I can do. Watch random YouTube videos. Listen to awesome music. Occasionally draw. Read books. Play saxophone/bass. Make stuff. I sew on a semi-regular basis and make assorted useful things. It's a useful skill and easy to learn to sew by hand or with a machine. Also when very bored for extended periods of time I delve back into my campaign world and work on that or roll up a random character in D&D and then draw them. Or hang out in Reddit's /r/characterdrawing and choose ones of my fancy. Reddit pretty much destroys all boredom I have now.

So I decided I might post a picture up here finally. This is a couple years old now but I haven't changed much. In front of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington DC. [hide=me][/hide] May as well index it, please.

Haven't accomplished the things I've meant to accomplish whilst home for a week... Hopefully will do at least one thing as soon as I'm done dinking around on the Internet. Depends on if we'll get over to my grandparents' today, my mom has some sudden back spasms thing going on and all the pain meds in the house aren't helping, so they took her to the doctor this morning. Waiting to hear anything. We have no idea why it happened, she didn't do anything out of the ordinary the past couple of days and it just started in the middle of the night the 27th. Yesterday was actually better because roads were bad, so grandparents and aunt didn't get over here for Thanksgiving so we just sat around and ate it and then went out to get my mom a heating pad because we had no idea where ours was (I think we threw it out as it wasn't functioning). Hopefully doctor figures out why or at least gives her something that fixes it. (tbh she took some vicodin left over from my wisdom teeth extraction last night and it didn't really help either). Any reasons you can think of for sudden onset super painful back spasms in the gluteus medius and/or latissimus dorsi region? Basically the sides, right above and around the hipbone. I got nothing.

It's almost 11 and I'm not accomplishing anything, and I have an anatomy exam tomorrow morning. Listening to debatable 70's music on Pandora because apparently that's the only thing it can find similar to Tower of Power. Going home tomorrow afternoon though!

I took a half-semester linear algebra course and finished it last week... Unlike most things, I could have completely explained cofactor expansions to you. Now for differential equations. And my package that was supposed to be here Monday (USPS tracking site actually says that) is currently in Des Moines Iowa. It came out of a suburb of Cincinnati, spent 2 days at that post office, went to Cinci, spent a day there, and is now in Iowa. WTAF, USPS. And it was first class, not like some random free slow boat to China crap.

Saq - sounds like you need one of these, so you can take it off and put socks on etc: http://static.dme-direct.com/media/catalog/product/cache/3/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/b/l/black-foam-knee-immobilizer.jpg But the patella going out all the time seriously sucks. I've been kind of lucky and haven't injured any of my ligaments (afaik), just have garbage cartilage in the joint and weak muscles attached to the various tendons that keep all that stuff together. Should probably go back to physical therapy for it, although I think the doc would just say it's your own fault... Bad, but I think an endoscopy might do me some good. Also avoiding writing a German essay at the moment. Supposed to review Rumpelstilzchen and Siegfrieds Tod.

Disappointed there were no pictures of potatoes. I like the purple-starry one the best.

Dayum son. Obviously not peak usage at the moment. I got a free tshirt today. And our hockey starts tomorrow. We're going to beat up some random Canadian college. And for the first time the pep band will play O Canada in addition to The Star Spangled Banner. Presumably we will also play Blame Canada at some point. BUT HOCKEY IS BACK! All of my teams are playing now. Wings won yesterday, Griffins better win tonight, we better win tomorrow, and best of all, I get back on the ice in less than two weeks!