Brian's World

Interactivity

Tonight has been a highly predictable tonight.  Things went exactly how I knew they would, which is to say there were zero surprises or turns.

A quick recap of events:  This afternoon I had to activate video playback on the Alumni House Concerto screen so they could watch the Legends of ’85.  The computer powering the screen isn’t super powerful  so it stuttered a bit when playing it back, the frame rate might have been in the single digits.  Unfortunately, there wasn’t much I could do that wouldn’t threaten the stability of the system so I had to leave these moderately bad looking video (by my standards) playing.  After setting that up, I returned to the Union and everyone left to attend the “Big Red Freakout” hockey game (spoiler alert: RPI lost miserably).  I did not leave. Later,  I battled the vehicular hockey traffic up near the Field House to grab some dinner and supplies from my room, then I returned to the Union.

I spent most of my time struggling on a form to support a has_many join in rails for Concerto 2.  Feeling down, I went to Father’s to buy an ice cream cookie, one of the few “treats” I’ll personally indulge in.  After purchasing the cookie/ice-cream combination, I discovered it expired by opening it up and finding the cookie mostly absorbed into the ice cream.  I confirmed an expiration date of Nov 21, 2009 by examining the back of the wrapper.  The hockey game ended at some point and a modest crowd (i.e 2-3 people) trickled back to the Union.  Most people were attending post-game events and therefore did not return to their place of origin.  A little before 11:00pm I returned to my dorm.  That is where I write to you from.

It is no secret, I’m not a big fan of hockey.  I’m not opposed to the concept of hockey/athletics in general, but I feel no personal draw to attend games.  That said, you’d be mistaken to say that I won’t go to a hockey game.  I won’t go to a hockey game alone or for the hockey, but their are plenty of other reasons that would get me to attend.  For example, I have attended sporting events and musical concerts because there was a social reason for going.  Someone else may have invited me as their personal guest (opposed to inviting a dozen people to go as a group), or someone may want the opportunity to just chat or spend time with me (like my dad taking me or my brother to a basketball game).  The venue doesn’t matter much to me, but the interaction that happens when I’m their does.

In my current social situation, there is a low probability I would have interacted well with any group I could attend such events with at RPI.  I am securely positioned as an outlier, where most others view me as mildly useful for a very specific (and unfortunately shrinking) set of tasks… nothing more.  Commonly I am invited out of  professional courtesy, whereas I am not annoying enough to warrant being blacklisted from event, and it never hurts to invite someone with a terribly low attendance record who you see on a regular basis.

I am unsure how to accurately capture my feelings, because I typically use “left out” to describe scenarios where I am being intentionally excluded from something, which I am not.  I don’t identify loneliness with my current state because I know I could always initiate communication with a friend should I think it would help.  How exactly to capture the feeling of an outlier?  Maybe if I knew more big words I would have a better set to choose from here.  Spare may be a word to describe some emotions, where it is perceived that anything I could offer a gathering can already be provided by others.  In previous years I might have said secluded because I wasn’t as publicly visible as I’ve been this year, but I’ve found that an increased physical presence makes minimal difference.

Maybe it makes sense to explore the logic behind invitations and gathers.  Let go down the list quickly:  As an organizer, it it always logical to invite yourself.  Your significant other will also want to attend, or else they will feel left out, so you should invite him/her as well.  Next, I guess it makes sense to invite some close friends who you know will come.  Independently, they each should be able to interact well with each other so they aren’t relying on you to serve as the  only common ground they have.  Next, you might want to invite someone who can act as the “life of the party” for whatever event you’re hosting, should things go downhill this person could be someone well qualified to supply “event materials,” be it physical goods, services, discussion material, etc.  I think you finally invite everyone else, recognizing that an event’s enjoyment may be measured in sheer attendance and the more you invite the higher attendance might be.  Since these people are, in some regards, extras (i.e you might not invite all of them if you had limited space/resources), you don’t spend time evaluating their social needs or fit with the group… just shotgun it.

Maybe I am just really bad at picking up on sincerity or something; but I would almost always cast myself in the group of extras invited to events… be it a meeting, sporting event, party, food trip, you name it.  I guess most people must be OK with this, they go and do their own thing, interacting in whatever social circles they find themselves in.  Me?  I’m a little more structured than that.  Going with the sole intent of “showing up” to “see how things go” doesn’t work for me.  I don’t do anything to “see how it goes” except for things that I can undo with no damage (like computer programming).  Before I’m willing to take a risk and “see how it goes” I need to evaluate all the possible outcomes and, to proceed, identify some slight probability of success.

That was all very abstract, let me “break it down” for you.  To date, I have asked a total of one person to enter a relationship with me, you can probably guess who.  To do this, I spent approximately a very very long time determining there was some probability of short-term success and an acceptable low probability for little long-term damage.  This is because I opt to not be like a significant group of males and enter a relationship with just about anyone for the sake of seeing how it goes and gaining some experience.  (Though I will say, the knowledge gained from past relationships does leave something to be desired at times.)  Life is not my training dground, I don’t have the time to spend practicing these sorts of things.

Consider yourself lucky.

Goodnight moon.

Better

I force myself to write this morning not because I’m super excited to tell a story, but because documentation is key.  My memory frequently lapses, and these days may be critical in a future time.   Here’s to a future self.

I try not to blow my bugle too often, reserving its use for times when alertness and responsiveness are important.  It disappoints me to receive such a dismal response to a trumpeting.  Rarely are my requests unfounded, and never are they unjustified; my simple pleas fall far too frequently on deaf ears.  I wonder if the bugle itself is flawed,  maybe it’s important is being drowned out by the call of others, or its tune indistinguishable from the rest.  I’m hesitant to invest the time in learning a new tune, worried the time spent won’t rally any more support.

I almost made the mistake of discussing whether the game can actually change, nearly citing the game as static constant only flexible in the ways we perceive it.  I am glad I avoided entertaining such a discussion, instead I’m left to think about how the game can be effectively moved in our direction.  Traditionally, I’ve played my hand for the betterment of others, trying to reap any reward purely as side effect of those actions.  I recognize this method may not be the most effective at providing any personal gain, but my training has guided me to enjoy any slight gains on this front.  I do wonder what more I could be doing to adjust the variables to better align with the goals, or (the alternative) adjust the perceptions of key parties to better reflect the desired scenarios.   What I do know for sure is that plan A hasn’t been very successful, and the results plan B have yielded haven’t shown much promise.

Congestion

I didn’t write for all of January.  That is very disappointing to me.  I had plenty of things to talk about and  a good number of drafts at the ready.  It noticed that most of my drafts shared my negative views about different groups, social behaviors, people, etc. and I really wanted to be positive for a change.  Therefore all those drafts have been deleted.  I’m confident I can recall all the juicy stuff anyways should the need arise.

To start of my 2010 blogging year on a positive note: I will let you all know that I have applied to at least one job, and have partially applied to at least one graduate school.  I have received no positive responses on the job or graduate school front, but I will hope for the best and continue planning for the worst.  I have the hardest time with my Cover Letters to places I apply; its not very easy for me to express in words why I want to work somewhere… especially when I don’t have a strong idea what kind of development projects are going on or anything like that.   I had also hoped to say that I have completed the application to at least one graduate school, and if I had posted this blog yesterday I would have said that.  However today I learned that they can’t waive the GRE anymore, the admissions office won’t let them, so I’ve got to go and take that sometime soon.

That’s enough positive stuff for now.  I wouldn’t want to overwhelm you.

Over winter break I had the opportunity to go down to Florida with my family + Katie.  My parents are considering retiring down there for some duration of the year, probably the part of the year that involves shoveling, and this trip provided them ample time to explore lots of retirement communities.  Its strange to think of my parents hanging out in a retirement community participating in strange retirement community activities.   Maybe they’ll make friends with someone who knows how to work the TV remote…  (My parents have trouble associating the mute button with the unmute action to re-enable the sound.  It runs in my mom’s side of the family I think.)

While down in Florida, we went to Disney World and did lots of fun stuff.  Besides waiting in lines, we went on a few rides, ate roughly the same thing every day, and saw our fair share of confused international visitors.  We also went to the Cirque du Soleil for Katie’s birthday (my mom determined she liked the circus, and therefore Katie would enjoy it too).  Since you’re taking the time to read this, I’ll let you in on a little secret:  I don’t like the circus.  Don’t confuse that statement with “I’m afraid of the circus” or “the circus makes me nervous,” because neither of those are true.  I don’t like the concept behind the circus, for the same reason I don’t like the concept behind most professional sports.  As I see it, most of the acts at the circus involve people with a highly specialized physical skill set showing off things they can do that you cannot.  Even if you could probably do some of the acts, like fly around on a sheet, you’ll never be able to try because you are not in the circus… and only they have the flying sheet machine.  Soccer, on the other hand, is a sport that just about everyone can try, which makes it slightly more enjoyable in my mind.  If I see #{famous soccer player} doing a cool move, I can try to do that.  If I see a circus member doing something cool I’m left to think about how I will never have the chance to try something like that.  I’m not saying the circus is a bad experience or something I hate to go see, I just don’t find it as enjoyable as… say tossing a frisbee around or playing a video game (expect for when you play those obnoxious people who punch you in the face when you spawn).

Let me think, what else is worth mentioning.  Oh yes, it was frigid when we were down there.  Not like 40’s or 50’s, but like 20’s and 30’s. All the local residents were very confused what was going on, I almost wanted to declare “welcome to weather.”  It was moderately humorous to see  all the places that didn’t have heat and therefore were closed/not doing business.  I think even some of the schools cancelled because of the lack of heating capabilities.  Maybe they can borrow some heat from the Sage or Ricketts Building here at RPI.

This weekend is Valentines Day.  It should be no secret to you that I don’t like Valentines Day.  Don’t get me wrong, the theory behind the day is great, a special day each year that isn’t an anniversary whereby you celebrate your relationship with someone.  The implementation is terrible, primarily because everyone does it on the exact same day.  To me, the 14th of February is of little significance (I associate it with Lincoln and Washington’s Birthdays), I would much rather celebrate my relationship in March, maybe April… or June.. I’m usually pretty free in those months.  As a male partner in a relationship with a female (I have not run the analysis for homosexual couples) there are certain expectations for Valentines Day.  For example, I am expected to partake in a romantic meal with my partner.  In this case, romantic may be defined by money spent, exclusivity, uniqueness, thoughtfulness, or any combination of the aforementioned.  At some point during the day, I am also to present my partner with a series of offerings (aka gifts).  For those of you who don’t know Katie, she celebrates an anniversary in November, Christmas in December, and birthday in January.  By the time February rolls around I am running out of good gifting ideas.  My mom suggested popcorn; that is definitely a good idea mom.  I actually don’t mind giving gifts, but I have trouble when I have to do it month after month after month after month.  I’d rather be like hey, that looks cool on Woot/Slickdeals/Amazon/etc, I’m going to buy it for Katie.  Sure, she may not be expecting it and therefore be unprepared to reciprocate the offer, but I don’t expect anything in return.  What I also dislike about Valentines Day is that many people have such elevated expectations for it.  Even people who aren’t Katie or I are like “what special plans do you have for Valentines Day?”   The holiday might be more successful if I was just like Surprise! Its April nth, today we’re celebrating Valentines day!  Of course that wouldn’t work because the Hallmark Store wouldn’t have any good cards.  Unless I made my own…

I haven’t finished running the numbers here but I think that in most relationships, females have it much easier buying gifts for a male partner.  I know of a few males that are picky or extremely particular, but most I’ve reviewed would be highly satisfied with a random good of negligible monetary value.  I hypothesize you could give a male a box of cleaned trash from a junk yard and he would enjoy it.  Females on the other hand, commonly prefer items they can wear (like clothing or jewelry), eat (like chocolate covered strawberries), or… actually thats it for the “general” ideas… other gifts would be more specific to the person like a video camera, microwave, popcorn, etc.

I am now working on another blog.  It might be decent.

But for now,

Goodnight moon.