Life update

I don't blog about my life much, but I'm now all moved in to a new apartment with brand new roommates, so I figure it's worth talking about what's up.

Being a fifth year senior is definitely weird already and classes haven't even started yet. Seeing friends looking for work or getting married or settling down in new places is hard. More than that, though, it really feels like this isn't Calvin as I know it, though. There are so many changes on campus - new and departed faculty, building projects - to accompany my missing friends that it's almost like the school is taunting me for staying beyond my welcome. I know I made this choice almost a year and a half ago and that this surrealness of my current position isn't any sort of punishment for failing to grow up or achieve to some desired level...but it's hard all the same.

The new living arrangements will be good, but very different from what I've experienced before. I'm used to living with fairly meek individuals, people who give me room to expand my role and my personality and act out a bit in order to liven things up. The social dynamics of my three roommates, though, are established well enough that, instead of expanding to fill in gaps, I'm fighting to figure out how I fit in. So far, I feel like I'm the guy who cooks and plays videogames. Not terribly glamorous. More than that, this is much more of a typical guy apartment. A bit more crudeness, a bit more testosterone than I'm used to living in. It's an environment I can survive in just fine, but I'm definitely going to need more escape from the heightened level of subliminal conflict and competition. Also, they actually watch sports here, which will be fun from time to time, but it's definitely going to be odd seeing the TV in heavy use for something other than games or binging on TV on DVD.

One nice thing about this being a more typical guy apartment, though, is that I'll also have more chances to expand my cooking. Cooking for one is a pain in the butt, but cooking for four doesn't feel nearly so bad. The guys fastidiously track receipts and what was bought any time anybody goes to the store and will be paying for their share instead of me always treating when I make larger meals (which I didn't mind at all when I only did it once in awhile). In the last week, I've already tried my hand at a few new things without even using any recipes (chicken soup, salsa) that have turned out pretty well. I'm looking forward to doing some more, and especially cooking with wine/alcohol. (beer brats at home! =D)

As far as classes go, things shouldn't be too bad. I've got Physics, which should be a breeze considering I've basically done the work before and I'm living with 2 engineers. I'll probably need to break down and buy a new calculator, though. My 8-year-old TI-86 now has as many dead lines of pixels as it has working ones. That's an unexpected expense that I keep on forgetting to incorporate in my budget planning. Lit and Theology shouldn't be too bad. My (comparatively) slow reading speed will probably make the work a bit of a pain time-wise, but I still write well enough and I like the fields. I'm also taking Intro to Logic, a 100-level Philosophy course, to keep myself full time. Considering all of my experience with deductive logic, the first part of the course, at least, shouldn't pose any difficulties. I can't imagine the inductive logic being much harder (especially since, again, it's an intro level Philosophy course).

In the mean time, I've also got to start getting down to business with grad school research and applications. My intentions to continue work on my senior project in hopes of presenting on it somewhere kind of fell apart over the summer as communication with my advisor dropped off, so I won't be looking quite as impressive as I'd hoped. The list right now isn't terrible long:
Carnegie Mellon (the ideal school, probably won't get in)
University of Michigan
Virginia Tech
University of Colorado at Boulder (where I'm not as likely to go, but I'm hoping they'll pay for me to come visit so I can see some friends for free)

I figure I've got a decent shot at the last three, but I want to expand my options a bit, anyway. Also, I'm looking chiefly at the HCI/Cognitive Science programs at all of these schools, and I'd like to find schools doing cool stuff with programming languages research. In any case, I need to get started researching the profs at these schools and getting my materials together. Having Tuesdays and Thursdays completely free should help a lot, assuming I can actually keep myself on task.

Fortunately, the novelty of my new X-Box 360 is starting to wear off. I've completed Mass Effect and Shadow Complex (two of the best games I've played in recent years), and I'm not looking at buying anything else that will be a major time sink for a good while. The only other games I have are a few multi-player ones I can play with my roommates or online with friends back home. If any of you play Castle Crashers, BlazBlue, or Team Fortress 2, let me know.

That's about it, I guess. I'll probably have some more "profound" thoughts to share in the not too distant future. At the very least there will be a summer movie round up.