tomorrow

an exciting day coming back from extended. Never have I been so happy as I am now.

new aspiration

I am looking to save up for this specific macro lens that I've been reading up on.

60mm f/2.8D AF Micro-Nikkor

Yep....Ha Thien will be saving money for a while....since college is about to start sucking me dry and I would hate to ask my parents to buy me something again. I hate spending their money for some reason....sounds counterintuitive, doesn't it? Anyway, I hope to have it by Christmas....let's see what people give me for my birthday, first....I hope it's not clothes.

Friendship

If you don't try your best to maintain it, then it's not of priority. If new opportunities and people arise and you can walk away easily, then if obviously didn't mean anything to you. If it doesn't stay as it was, then you've let it go. These things are simple, no? If people were once good friends, if you ever felt relieved to be around them, less bored when hanging out with them, happy to share something with them, then you are an ass for letting that go.

It's also a two-way street...if friendship is not returned, it's just one person taking advantage of another.

That's how I feel about it.

God vs. Science

Pick either one, but don't be stupid.

Example of Stupidity

The way I see it...you can do anything you want, just don't be stupid. I think that either way you look at it--devout believer or not--do you really want to put your fate or the fate of someone you love into a force? I mean....do I sit there every day and say...ohh...maybe gravity will feel gracious today...I will maybe grow some more. Even though that might've been a ridiculous example, I think you all know what I mean. To leave something as important as a life into the hands of pure human faith...

Dream

So I had a dream last night that I was taken, along with a bunch of people, to a military base of some sort, and I was borrowing someone's camera because I didn't think my giant camera would be allowed for some reason. So then after I got out of the plane that took us there, I took out my D80 and just started snapping pictures....and for some reason, I saw a cemetery and was taking a picture of it, making sure to catch the blue sky reflecting in the pond that was in the cemetery....It was weird. Then we went into this storage room with a bunch of ripsticks and weapons...and my camera keeps taking a longer and longer time to take a picture of anything, and it keeps coming out dark, so then I looked at it and.....it was out of battery!

That was one of the weirdest dreams I've ever had.

"There is a secret that we keep"

Secret

It moves slowly at first...but I promise you it'll be good. Well...I can't say you'll think that...but I can promise you I thought it was really nice. Please watch it? Well, I can only do so much advertising.

I watched the ending to this several times...it make me smile every time. Perhaps this isn't the most imaginative thing, but it's nice.

We keep secrets sometimes...sometimes they're things we can't tell others--sometimes they're people.

Sometimes it's both. Shhh.....;D

heh

my new amusement at the moment:

Design Within Reach

my crazy roommate

"stacy" (2:08:26 AM): You are asleep right now and I am awake
"stacy" (2:08:30 AM): I am awake and pissed
"stacy" (2:08:33 AM): i am jealous
"stacy" (2:08:39 AM): perhaps I should wake you
"stacy" (2:08:44 AM): you just rolled over
"stacy" (2:08:48 AM): and moaned
"stacy" (2:09:00 AM): perhaps that is a sign i should wake you

I...."moaned"? hmmm....I want to know what I was dreaming about...unless she means "moan" in that innocent way.

i'm bored

I’m kinda stuck in this mathcad thing that I have to do for calc. I don’t really want to do anything because for the whole day I’ve been feeling like I want to sleep. I haven’t been sleeping very well at night for the past two days or so because for some reason, I’ve been thinking about things a lot. Idk….during the day, I’m actually very fine, perhaps due to brain inactivity from lack of sleep. Other than that, there’s not much to tell, really. I also have—again—come to the conclusion that my mind conflicts way too much when I’m trying to decide something, especially when I have to decide whether or not to say something. It’s not the kind of thinking pattern that you want to get into, really….but I have it whether or not I want it. Right now, I want to do and say some things and see someone…but I can’t. I’ve never felt that restricted before, I don’t think.

I hunt chickens; men hunt me. All chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat...

Onto "rites"

"You must be very patient," replied the fox. First you will sit down
at a little distance from me-like that-in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day..."

The next day the little prince came back.

"It would have been better to come back at the same hour," said the fox. "If for example, you came at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o'clock, I shall be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart is ready to greet you..."

""I am responsible for my rose,"
the little prince repeated,
so that he would be sure to remember."

ohne dich

Ich verbrenne für dich

...

Ich falle für dich

...

Ich ertrinke in dir
Spür deinen Pulsschlag tief in mir

...

Ich bete zu Gott dass es nie endet
Dass dein Feuer mich ewig blendet
Ich vermiss dich zähle jede Sekunde

an abstract dissection

I'm not sure what I want to type, but I want to type something.

I have not been in the greatest of moods lately, and the only thing that's picking up the mood every once in a while is the residual happiness from the last extended weekend. I think I'll revisit something that I think I posted about a while ago.

I am going to revisit the wikipedia article about love.

Recent studies in neuroscience have indicated that as people fall in love, the brain consistently releases a certain set of chemicals, including pheromones, dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin, which act similar to amphetamines, stimulating the brain's pleasure center and leading to side-effects such as an increased heart rate, loss of appetite and sleep, and an intense feeling of excitement. Research has indicated that this stage generally lasts from one and a half to three years.

This intrigues me....and sometimes scares me to a certain extent, because 1) that's not a very long time (1.5-3 years) and 2) I think that there's something scary about the what I would call "good side effects" of this love being controlled by our own brains. It's not the idealized image of someone being able to cause something to us. It's just that our brain and body chemistry reacts to certain people more than others, to the extent of releasing the "happiness" chemicals. I don't like the thought that what I feel is just chemicals going through my body. Then again, what did I expect? I like permanence, but I don't think it's possible to have that.

I think this next paragraph is supposed to assuage my worries?

Since the lust and attraction stages are both considered temporary, a third stage is needed to account for long-term relationships. Attachment is the bonding which promotes relationships that last for many years, and even decades. Attachment is generally based on commitments such as marriage and children, or on mutual friendship based on things like shared interests. It has been linked to higher levels of the chemicals oxytocin and vasopressin than short-term relationships have.

I'm glad that in the later, long-term stages, there are higher levels of these chemicals in our brain. I wonder....perhaps some time in the future--when people get crazy and paranoid enough, and society has come to near-ruin from relationship disloyalty and failed marriages--people will have some sort of test to determine how much of each necessary chemical is in the brain to determine true love before marriage. *shudders* However, in retrospect, if love is supposed to give you all those good feelings, then what do would they call the gap in-between? I don't mean a literal gap, I meant all the worries and such, like what I had in an earlier post. There were many, many worries. Also, in retrospect, I don't think these feelings are irreversible.

Then, psychologically, there is the Triangular theory of love that is--like wikipedia warned us at the top of the article--not to be confused with "love triangles". XDDDD I find that absolutely hilarious! Anyway, there are three levels that determine the level of this love that people have for one another. Each type is described below, and I think that it's very interesting to describe these in such ways. Supposedly "consummate love" is the "perfect couple" but heh....the great thing about this theory is that the psychologist that developed this theory stressed that it might be harder to maintain than it was to reach it. I think I have a quote that is one on my list of very few reasons why I still choose to express things

"Without expression," he warns, "even the greatest of loves can die"

It has the potential to turn into "companionate love" where the passion/desire is gone. Heh, I think Stacy and I talked about these one time. She says it makes her sad to see those because you can tell that they were once probably really "in love" and then when they got to be as old as they are....it just died.

Alternatively, if you go back to the love article, there is something else that amuses me.

Peck maintains that love is a combination of the "concern for the spiritual growth of another", and simple narcissism. In combination, love is an activity, not simply a feeling.

I'm glad that it's narcissism as well...and I'm glad that my arrogant ego can finally realize that now. I think it is true, though...that people tend to be attracted to people who are similar to them. I read the rest of the article, and I don't think there is anything else I want to talk about...but then....idk....this is hazy. For some reason, it is comforting yet not so at the same time.

I want an answer. I would like for everything to be clearly defined. However, I don't think that's possible sometimes.

50 years of greatness

50th anniversary of the LEGO brick

Happy Birthday!

.....

I don't like people who lie.....when their lies definitely has the potential to hurt others.