Lunar Luminate

In my attempts to see this more as simply a blog and less of a LET’S DISCUSS SOMETHING WITH INTELLECT AND STUFF

I update an hour before the Valley Transporter shall pick me up to take me to Hartford.

My flight is at 1:30 PM.

I touch down in San Francisco at 6:34 PM (yay time changes!).

It’s been fun, but I must go.
And I hope to see you folks again, five months from today.

I’ll update from Hartford or Cincinnati airports if I can.

Take care!

—

12:57 AM

O hello tharr. Boarding soon.

If Cincinnati offers free wifi then I’ll be back again.

To nap and play Ace Attorney on the plane!

-Eban

OH WAIT BEFORE I GO

New machine thing at the airport to detect for “explosive” powders and stuff on you?

You step in this giant thing with the general electric logo on it, and then a woman’s voice is like ABOUT TO PUMP AIR.

And then you get shot with these quick gusts from like all these random angles, and I started cracking up while in the thing after getting pelted with air pops

And then if you’re clear it’s like CLEAR and it has a little green light and these clear doors in front of you open up automatically. It’s really cool but I wonder where the detectors are for it to find trace amounts from what amounts to dust off your person.

IF I CAN FIND A PICTURE OF IT I WILL POST IT I should have taken one MAYBE AT SAN FRANCISCO IF THEY HAVE ONE THERE

Bye

SO with the rush that comes at the end of all things, I realize how much I still have to sort my Amherst life before I leave for five months to have mind opening adventures in Spain and greater Europe.

But as always, if things can go wrong, they most certainly will, as demosntrated by the sudden implosion of things!

LET’S BEGIN WITH A RETROSPECTIVE, SHALL WE?

1) Some very good friends who I care deeply about are leaving or have left before me. THIS MAKES ME SAD D: While it is selfish to be the last one to depart, I always find it easier to be the one staying and wishing well than the one leaving and saying goodbye.

2) My research project combusted and fizzled really quickly. Nothing that I can’t start up again, but I have to wait until I return on January 16th before I can see this project through to its completion. I still have to blog about this, and since I’ll be indesigning while I’m at home, I may as well have a post later with diagrams that explains my project and acts as a sort of dilution of what I am doing.
2b) Williamson is gone this week so all I’ve done in lab is organize my notes and start something which failed way fast and I was like OKAY not trying again so as to not waste my own time. Thus, begins our perpetual correspondence as I make my poster at home.

3) Storage still sucks X_x Campus Police unknowingly let me put in my giant fridge-box (you know, the one that comes with your fridge, and mine being 4.4 cubic liters, this box has no bottom making it an awesome bucket of storage good-ness 8D) into Cohan storage which would soon be discarded. THUS, my boxes for my mirror and my fan and my fridge and I have no idea what else in there got tossed. However, seven phone calls later, I will be recompensed with packing boxes tomorrow. YAY I’ll have until 2 PM to pack tomorrow so that’s a time cruncher. Yar.

4. The EMT written exam today was taken and failed by a single point. I even tallied the number of ambiguous questions I guessed on and totalled them to 33, and considering that you can get 30 wrong and pass, I assumed it was a safe bet after going back and second guessing myself as I reviewed.
I WAS WRONG. D:
I even woke up at 5 AM to study extra for it, thanks to Jessica Cook’s help. AND YET
ARGH.

5.  As I leave the school there will be far too many changes in the dynamic here. Lab techs that are highly valued, friends, etc. that are all going to be gone to some extent, either perpetually or just become super rare. To not share those last moments with them properly is upsetting :<

6. And new friends I have made here who I am going to be missing for a semester or more, thanks to poor synching of going-abroad times and such, I WILL BE SAD ABOUT THAT TOO.

All in all, it’s a melancholic end to the summer. Frustrating too.

However, as I once read,

“The world keeps turning, so roll with it.”

Not much I can do now then, is there?

Let’s see this through to the end.

See you in January?

Hi.

Just quicky post because I feel like this will probably motivate me to post again at some point soon-ish.

BUT

Summer goes well, research is as research does, I don’t see enough of certain people, and somehow I get mad cleaning frenzies in the middle of the night when I should be asleep.

I’ll post something more substantive later. But until then, I must say, there is something very pleasant and appealing when it comes to vocal synthesizers and such technology. Perhaps the topic of my next post?

I should also detail my research, except I’d rather do that when I start getting data, because the past weeks have ALL been set up and manipulation in hopes of getting things to function and work. Hrm.

Alright, take care people 8D

OH, quick question though, and feel free to leave a comment on the matter.

Top Favorite Restaurants in the Amherst-Northampton area? Split it up by cuisine or by location, I don’t care, I just wanna hear people’s opinions.

I myself think that Zen is the best asian restaurant in Noho (After visiting Osaka on Friday) and thus in the area. THIS SHALL ALSO BE EXPLAINED MORE PERHAPS LATER.

Goodnight!

Hi everyone! Back now.

So this past weekend was spent in Anaheim, CA, venturing along the Magic Kingdom and having a thrilling and amazing time at Disneyland and California Adventure!

Pictures are on facebook, but This and This link to the public albums for those interested. The second is more images of the awesome lights and effects show they have before and after the firewors called Fantasmic. IT’S AWESOME.
And as for rides, we were super efficient with fast passes, and hit all the major rides AT LEAST twice. Notable Exceptions:
Big Thunder Mountain Railroad: Six Times (lovingly misnamed multiple times, the best being Big Thunder Mountain Railroad Roaring Tiger. By Francesca)
Space Mountain: Four Times (MUST SIT IN FRONT. Also Violin-orchestral intense music on the ride makes it INTENSE)
Screamin’ California: Three Times (Another roller coaster WITH MUSIC!)
Splash Mountain: Three Times (Always in the back; less wet that way :3)

Our legs were worn and weary by the end, but it was very fun, and very much worth it.
Oh! And notable quotes:

Some guy we walked by: Where’s my wife and stuff..?

Prachi (To Francesca): Aww, you took that man’s flower!

Heehee~

In other news:

HAY SO ANYONE REMEMBER CHARLIE THE UNICORN HUH
WELL I’VE JUST BEEN INFORMED THAT IT HAS A SEQUEL THAT’S MORE CRACK-TASTIC THAN BEFORE!
So far I’ve avoided getting addicted to it but upon remembering it tonight after two weeks, I’ve seen it twice more. THIS DOES NOT BODE WELL.

Finally, the past two days have been fairly game-filled to try to get as much as I can aside before going back to Amherst, and where RPGs are an unwise choice of games to try to finish quickly. BUT IN MY SUPER SATURATION, I GOT TIRED AND DECIDED TO COOK!
Inspired by Zarla’s own adventure in making Shepherd’s Pie, I set out to make the dish I prepared by the dozens for my Spanish House Tertulia project Dubbed the Pupusa, it’s a stuffed tortilla, typically stuffed with cheese but you can also use certain vegetables, pork-things, and refried beans inside. It’s like the Mexican Quesadilla. no firefox spellcheck i did not mean cadillac GET OFF MY BACK

I hope eventually to improve my cooking abilities to a level of general competency, and thus be able to cook in a variety methods and styles and still come out delicious. Thus, here, you’ll still see some amateurish things happening. But remember kids, SAFETY FIRST!

THE INGREDIENTS TO BEGIN WITH! Maseca, which is Corn Masa (flour-stuffs), a bowl of mixing, and a measuring cup! Of course I grab this tea cup thing instead

Mmm, Corn flour-stuffs

So you take a cup of the flour and dump it into the bowl.

Plop.

Then you pour in equal parts water. This makes the basic tortilla dough, and a good opportunity to get your hands dirty

However before this happened I got myself a Fanta. Those who know me will recall how quickly and often I get thirsty.


Hmm, that absorbed all the water kinda fast. LET’S PUT MORE IN


What you shouldn’t be this mushy NO TOO MUCH WATER

I went outside and dumped some of the dough-water out. Still, the entire thing was way too creamy. The solution to this? MORE FLOUR


Doughball doesn’t cracked when squished? Success!

Awesome.

ALMOST FORGOT you should add some salt too. You DO notice the difference. Anyways after mixing the salt in it got set aside.

And thus, the filling! Some sort of cheese with zest, mozzarella for fun, and salt, but really any mix of melty-cheeses will do.
SO many people get unsettled by the thought of adding salt to the cheese

Monterey Jack added!

Cheddar Added! (God you can only tell because the bowl seems to mysteriously have more cheese)

SALT, ADDED! Then you mix that together to get a fairly homogenous mix. There’s no way to tell with pure white cheese I SHOULD HAVE JUST BOUGHT THE DAMN MEXICAN MIX WHILE I WAS AT THE STORE
But now, the official pupusa making begins!

First, grab a bunch of dough and make it into a ball

Poke a large hole into it with your thumb or your fingers.

Fill said hole with cheesey goodness.

Pinch closed like a dumpling then flatten with your hands until you make a vague tortilla shape. SUCCESS!

Okay two down

Why is there so much dough and cheese left this is taking forever

You know the dough is stuffed with cheese why not mix the cheese in IT’LL COME OUT THE SAME (thanks to Mukta for the discovery)

Hmm.. can’t tell if the dough is cheesey enough. The solution?

ADD MORE CHEESE

Alright that looks and feels better TIME TO MAKE SOME TORTILLAS
Tada! Two normal ones and six lazy ones. Alright, time to fry em up!

Fortunately there was this pan on the stove already. I’m completely sure it’s usable and bears no other trace of food-essence.
Now for a spatula

What that’s not where the spatulas are WHERE HAVE THEY GONE

Still no luck. Though I found the olive oil THIS WILL BE A KEY ITEM

So close, but not quite

There we go!

Dude check out that melted handle SO NOT USING THIS

Eh this’ll work I’m not picky

ALRIGHT! COOKING STATION SET UP! COOKING-A-GO-GO

Let’s set the flame to low-ish for this

Add some oil to the pan (that was actually more than enough to spread around the entire pan, even if it doesn’t look like it), and let’s start with the cheese-permeated ones:


Awesome! Let’s get fryin!

Kay you know what this is taking forever MORE FIRE

Sliiiiide around the pan
With the higher flame though the oil started to crackle and sputter a bit, leading to some minor burning. Why I ignored my spatula so soon, I don’t know.

Hmm, ready to flip? You can tell because they stop sticking to the pan so much and they get this nice golden-brownish color to them typically

I think they’re ready!

Mmm those look delicious

Into the bowl you go!

Leanin’ Tower of Cheeeeeese-a. And tortilla dough.

MORE OLIVE OIL!



You can see that as these fried up, I got kind of hungry and began eating them. IT’S LIKE A CHEESEY TORTILLA COOKIE not at all how a pupusa should turn out BUT STILL DELICIOUS!

Four remain. ONTO THE ACTUAL PUPUSAS!


When they’re ready to flip, a pupusa will take on a color more akin to this. And they’ll stick less to the pan, too.

Of course, eventually the cheese inside will expand and seep out, hitting the pan and becoming deliciously fried as well..

I think they’re ready!

AND WALA! A delightful snack for any occasion.
And to make it a meal, more elaborate stuffings and the addition of cortido (which is this cabbage-carrot-vinegar-etc mix which is actually quite good) is necessary.

Next time I do this, it’ll be from Amherst, and it will be the Salvadoran Dish that so many loved on the campus:
QUEZADILLA!
(Notice the spelling difference from the Mexican queSadilla. A single letter changes the entire dish into… a cheesy cake!)

One more day in the bay! And then a day of travel (stupid time change), and I’ll be around again. See you soon


WARNING: This music requires very particular silliness to enjoy. IF YOUR EARS ARE PRONE TO BLEEDING, TURN BACK NOW. Or, read on to know what to expect ;D

So just last night, I hit the 2000 song mark on my iTunes, totalling about 8.42 GB of music that would take 5.2 days to go through and listen to completely and individually.

However, having bought my iPod at the end of the first generation of nanos, my little silver-backed black player only has enough room for (less than) 4 GB of songs. So for over a year and a half now I’ve had to distill my music tastes, making sure that space was not wasted for songs I would never listen to if they appeared on shuffle. A continuous process that involves just listening to what I’ve collected and slowly filtering out what I’m tired of or things I stopped enjoying (i.e. most hip hop and r&b, bits and pieces of Spanish pop like Paulina Rubio, etc.).

However, there’s a fair amount that stays consistent throughout the years. Even with the evolving tastes that delve into indie-pop and more modern trends, there are a few things that never get removed no matter how bad they get.

I’ve realized I’m a big fan of fast-beat energetic music. Techno, euro-pop, and the ever-dying genre of bubblegum pop with their silly, stupid lyrics and their cracktastically happy tunes have always been at the top of my playlist as things to listen to when going from place to place in my life, whether it’s from class to class or from town to town here.

I know, it brings up a big question into my personal tastes. But like one of my oldest friends Zarla says in a recent livejournal post of hers:

“I can’t believe I didn’t have the Ding Ding Dong (Tra La La) song until now. I love the hook for it. I AM COMPLETELY CAPABLE OF IGNORING INCREDIBLY STUPID, TRITE, RIDICULOUS LYRICS IN FAVOR OF A CATCHY MELODYOKAY. You cannot be a fan of techno/dance/europop/trance without this ability.”
I met a girl she said her name was Sue, oh woah woah oh la la la~ “

Yea, every one of those blue words provides a different song. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND “ridiculous” “lyrics” and “catchy”

But, well, this is of course an incomplete little sampling of hyper happy hardcore music. Allow me to try to shed some light on bits and pieces of the genre, and forgive me if your eardrums explode a little in the process.

Credits go to Zarla and Jessica Cook for being some of the biggest contributors to this music collection.

The music is something you’ve undoubtedly heard, whether on the radio or at your old middle/high school dances. (Actually, Radio Disney was and remains a BIG venue for this sort of music)
It includes such groups as Aqua and A*Teens, amongst MANY, many others.

However, let’s start with some classics.

Dr. Jones - Aqua A fun and energetic tune that is the perfect introduction to the trite and silly lyrics of the genre. I especially like how before the chorus there’s the exchange between the male and female vocalists No I’m not posting Barbie Girl EVERYONE’S HEARD BARBIE GIRL

Floor Filler - A*Teens is their attempt at being kind of dancey-technoie, with a bit of a slower beat that’s consistently maintained in the song. A*Teens is more famous for their covers of ABBA songs, which didn’t really need to be covered in the first place.

Boom Boom Boom Boom - Venga Boys How can anyone NOT remember this song?

From here though, my next encounters with the music appeared in the form of Dance Dance Revolution. Hearing about the game online and finally running into one in the arcade of a hotel in Reno (p.s. I feel Reno >> Vegas), I excitedly tried my hand at light mode. I was TERRIBLE, but the music filled me with such energy that I spent money and went through token after token until I had mastered the same three songs.
Konami looks to the genre of europop and such in search of songs with clearly definable rhythms that they can make step charts to. From there, it wasn’t hard to follow the artist name and find the original songs, which were actually twice as long as the tracks one would step to at the arcade.

Mr. Wonderful - Smile.Dk The Swedish bubblegum pop group that’s best known for Butterfly released lots of songs with an incredibly catchy beat (and they marketed their albums in Denmark hence “.Dk”). Lyrics actually can get much worse than this, and this was one of their earlier works. STILL IT SOUNDS AWESOME

Dragonfly - Smile.Dk though shows just how repetitive some of their music can get, as this sounds REALLY similar to Butterfly, and then don’t let me get started with Golden Sky. All very catchy tunes, but also all very similar. It was like making the same realization with Motion City Soundtrack all over again D:

Cartoon Heroes (Speedy Mix) - Barbie Young is one of those covers of a fairly slower Aqua song. My favorite song on DDR Extreme, it’s energetic and peppy and full of life

Pink Dinosaur - Papaya demonstrates why I use the name hyper happy hardcore to describe this music. So fun to just blare this from speakers and bounce around to 8D YOU’RE A SWEET LITTLE DINOSAUR~

Hero (Happy Grandale Mix) - Papaya shows though how, for the sake of DDR, some songs may get sped up in order to make them more “danceable.” It’s interesting to compare to the original Hero, which I think sounds just as good. But on a sugar rush, one clearly has much more of an effect.

Bumblebee - Bambee is a more recent discovery that follows the same, delicious formula. I WAS OBSESSED WITH THIS SONG FOR, LIKE, A MONTH. I kid you not.

Cowgirl - Bambee is a song I got from Zar, and whenever she links to it she’s like “You know, THIS SONG, IT REALLY SPEAKS TO ME” and you know, I can totally see why :3

Do You Think I’m Pretty - Creamy is another song by an oft-used artist for DDR, however I don’t think this appeared on any of the games. This song inspired me to ask myself and many others if they think I’m pretty (just like a super model )

The Beat - Sparky is my favorite song from the DDR for Wii. It’s a cute song that’s as trite as ever and just as energetic. With love and dancing as the theme, it does seem a little *too* well placed in a DDR game. HMMM.

From here though, when you realize that the music is an actual legitimate genre, you can go through and find many more artists and songs that put you right in a happy mood upon hearing. Thus, such things as

Say Cheese - Fast Food Rockers appear to deliver the message to always smile and always be happy! And on a gloomy day such songs can really work mysterious wonders.

Ramp! (The Logical Song) - Scooter is actually a cover, and the original I finally heard while TAing for accelerated geometry last summer as one of the kids played it from his new iPhone. Temporal bias may make me like this one better :O

Less than Three - Becky is kind of emblematic of our internet culture, as for those who haven’t noticed, the title nomenclature translates to <3. With such lyrics as OH EM GEE, LOVE COMPUTER FANTASY and EL OH EL OH EL, you know it’s gold. Oh, and it has an official music video, which just makes the whole thing, well… interesting.

Mamboleo (English Version) - Elissa is a fantastic ditty which Zar used in an AMV on Newgrounds dedicated to Phoenix Wright. She got sick of the song but since the AMV came out, iTunes claims I’ve played this song 308 times. There’s also a Spanish version by Loona, which does not sound half as creative but brings back fond memories of childhood Spanish singers like Xuxa. XUXA WHERE HAVE YOU GONE?

Your Ass in the Air - DJ Cammy is a techno (well, technically House) song that Jamie Mattison sent me recently. It samples some very interesting choices and then launches into the simplest and yet catchiest thing ever :O And at 6 in the morning, this song coming up on shuffle then being put into an infinite loop inspired me to become HARDCORE upon my Love essay and finish it really rather quickly. THIS SONG, IT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE.

Well, I’ve made enough people cover their ears in alarm for one blog post. It does take a very particular kind of person to properly enjoy this kind of music, I admit, but it is always good to be aware of what’s out there so you can definitively define what you like and what you don’t like.
And I realize this might call upon the friends concerned for my mental status and standards of taste, but I assure you, this is still only a small microcosm of my general desires when it comes to music. But whenever I feel glum or mellow, these things will always perk me up and make me active again.

Anyways, none of you will hear from me until at least Monday. I am going to Disneyland this weekend due to the desires of one of my closest friends from back home, Francesca Mazzola. I’ll be sure to take plenty of pictures

Take care, and have a great summer!

I’ll be in Cohan 215 from 5 PM, June 2nd through… August 8th but the room is assigned to me until the 22nd, it seems.

A corner room on that first entry floor of Cohan is exactly what I wanted. And, if I remember correctly, the view also is exactly what I wanted to see when I looked out the window.

Anyone else from Hughes or CCE or Thesis know where they’ll be yet?

Anyways, I’m working on a more substantive post right now but keep getting sidetracked by things. Maybe tonight it’ll be ready 8U

Take care!

-Esteban

———

Touch fuzzy, get dizzy.

——

Story time to make this more than an image post!

A while ago I mentioned something about an old camp story involving something vaguely connected to the nausea I felt when waking up dehydrated earlier this week.
Well, see, the first time it affected me so drastically was during a 6th grade retreat at something called Camp Caritas? It was weird but whatever. It lasted a week, and on Wednesday I woke up about an hour and a half before we had to be ready, climbed down from my bunk, started walking from the cabin to the bathroom but my legs trembled rather immensely. Feeling unsafe and unwell, I returned to my sleeping bag and fell asleep again.

The counselor-dude-guy of my cabin prodded me to wake up, as did the other students in the cabin. However, upon pulling on my sleeping bag and dragging me back (causing me to skitter towards my pillow), they realized that my pillow was covered in sweat and that I really wasn’t feeling well. Nothing major happened though, one of the directors came to check on me, they filled my canteen with water, and when I was well enough to head to the mess hall I went. However, I was unable to participate automatically in the morning events that we were assigned to, despite feeling LOADS better after getting some water in me.

BUT, that meant that I got to hang out with the primary director of the camp, a really nice Asian lady whose name I no longer remember, but when I’d been to the camp a few years prior, I became fantastically homesick and she helped me out a fair amount.
Her job that day was to meet up and follow two of the other camp groups to evaluate the leaders and see how their lessons were going.

Now, remember my claim to animal-fandom? Yea, well the first thing the leader from that first group did was take us into the woods and ask us a question: “So mammals actually give live birth to babies. But there are two mammals that can lay eggs. Does anyone know what they are?”
And amongst those of us who raised our hands, mine shot up into the air. I got called on, and as a sixth grader, gave this verbose response:
“The two mammals that can lay eggs are the platypus and the echidna, or spiny anteater. Both are natives to Australia and are classified as monotremes, which basically means egg-laying mammals.”
And yea, I got random looks and mutterings from the other kids around me. BUT THE FUNNY PART ISN’T THAT
Leader-dude: Uhh.. yea, what else?
Me: ? (Wasn’t that i–)
Other kid: Birds!
Leader-dude: That’s right, the only mammals that can lay eggs are the platypus, and birds
Me: ………

Oh, how special some of us tend to be..

To be updated with substance and a delightful anecdote when I get to the Bradley airport.

Bye, friends
——–
Home now. Free internet in Philly was not really free so I just opened word to type my intended blog post. I NOW PRESENT TO YOU WHAT I HAD ALWAYS INTENDED!
~~~

By the time this gets posted, I’ll be snug and content in my room back at home.
HOWEVER, I promised an update from an airport, didn’t I?
So I am sitting here in the Philadelphia International Airport, where they offer free wireless to “college students” and yet have run out of vouchers for free internet-ness and don’t think they’ll get them in until next week.
Big load of help that does me.
But I digress. Today, I was going to document a rather stressful and frustrating event that happened nearly one year ago (Right now it’s like two days off :P)
So Finals last semester, somehow my psychology 11 final got pushed to being scheduled for the morning of that last Friday of finals. I end up booking a flight out of Hartford for around 6:30 AM on the next Saturday.
Here’s what goes down.
I’m fantastically unprepared for this final based entirely on memorization, so I awaken at 5 in the morning (after sleeping at 1) on Friday to cram whatever I can into my feeble mind. I gloss over, I repeat, I mnemonically memorize whatever material I could inhale during those four hours before the exam.

The exam comes and goes, and I make it back to my room with that delightful feeling of completion that comes with the end of things.

However, as a naïve freshman, I underestimate the load of packing.

I begin at two in the afternoon, my shuttle leaving at 4:15 AM. I begin the packing process and unfold boxes, sort my belongings, start lists which I don’t bother finishing, all while jumping around North saying hello and goodbye to people as the hours wear on.

By 10 PM, I realize I’m going to probably be pulling an all-nighter in order to finish my boxes. I WAS RIGHT! I finished finally at three in the morning, to the semi-dismay of my roommate. (Except after watching what I went through, he decided he should perhaps start as well)

So, I don’t bother sleeping. I sit at the desk beneath my bunked bed, clicking away at my laptop, sipping a soda until I have to pack that too and head for the shuttle. Kendra Allen helps me out with my luggage.

And so the shuttle leaves Converse and I conk out. I wake up only upon arriving at the airport, as the car swings into terminal set A.

I pull out my belongings, an overweight green duffle, a heavy black solid suitcase, a carry-on, and my backpack. Unable to pull three things at once, and being yelled at by a security officer, I drag the carry-on and the suitcase 10 feet before retreating for the green duffle, pulling that 20 feet, then the other two 20 feet, systematically moving them slowly to the check in gate.

The entire process was delightful

Still, after the hassle of getting checked in and things, where apparently I used my father’s credit card and I sign in order to pay for the fee of overweight baggage (By the way, that policy changed, it’s friggen expensive now >( ), I head through the security check point and to my gate. I am with people who I know, their flights boarding and leaving at the least, 20 minutes before mine.

We keep one another awake.

Then they leave.

Then I fall asleep.

Surrounded by people everywhere in the seats around me, I wake up bleary-eyed looking to my gate to see if there’s any hustle or bustle, the middle-aged couple ahead of me call my attention and say “Hey they were looking for a kid at that gate over there, maybe it was you?”

Deliriously, I go “ok thanks” and walk over.

I ask the stewardess if the flight has boarded
She goes “Are you Esteban Parker?”
‘Yea’
“Hey, Tammy, this is Esteban Parker”
‘Oh, this is the kid?’
“Yea. Fred, this is Esteban Parker”
and this goes on until I get introduced to practically all the stewards working at the gates. Finally she tells me, I missed my flight. They called my name seven times, they knew I was asleep, they ask why anyone didn’t wake me up (even those around me THANK YOU PEOPLE FOR WAITING UNTIL I WOKE UP ON MY OWN you could have poked me) and in my dismay and sleep-deprived panicked state I become bleary eyed and start bawling. However, the stewardess’s cruelty ends there, as she immediately begins booking me on the next available flight that’ll get me to the west coast, keeping me in the terminal for another three hours.

And after a few more introductions, she tells me to go back to sleep, because now that the workers know my face, they’ll make sure I’m awake for the flight this time.

That was traumatic.

But for that, I now make sure to sleep even just a little before the shuttle, and to bring more effective distraction than Pokémon Diamond and my iPod. Hartford’s free wireless, though horrendously slow, usually does the trick.
And for that to have happened on my way home for the summer was sheer dumb misfortune. Still, everything came out well in the end, and my layover was shortened so I made it home only an hour later than I was supposed to. Of course, I appeared at the airport located 30 minutes south instead of 20 minutes north of my home. Good ol’ Bay Area.

Oh, and my checked bags? They left without me. My parents were kind enough to perpetuate the spoiling of their only child and pick them up from the north before coming for me in the south.

Alright. My next flight boards soon. Then, I’ll sleep some more, I’ll pull out one of my favorite game series of all time to peruse while I’m awake, and I’ll finally be back to the warm California weather for two weeks.
ALTHOUGH YOU KNOW, I DON’T REALLY WANT TO BE. Crazy as it sounds, I wanna be back at Amherst right away, doing Hughes or anything, really.

Oh, and my last post garnered a fairly critical response from one Michael Britt, who went “wtf” and spelled my name Estaban in a text message to me after reading about my jubilee at the bird outside my window.
HERE’S SOME MORE EXPOSITION ON THE MATTER WHILE I WAIT FOR MY PLANE TO BEGIN ITS BOARDING PROCEDURES.
I lived in Newport 210 for the past year, which gave me a fantastic view into the wooded area located behind President Tony Marx’s house, also between the Cadigan Religious Center and Newport. Same block that Professor Miller lives on too, but stories for another time.

Anyways, the clearing that is surrounded by shrubs and tall trees (are some of them poplars? I was never a good tree identifier) makes for a delightful area for our local natural denizens to frolic in. As last summer ended, I saw many bunnies and squirrels and chipmunks tromp on through that area, along with many birds perch on the trees outside my window. THE
BEST THOUGH WAS THE HAWK

Yea, the Hawk that we see flying around the campus sometimes? It perched right outside on the tree by my window for a good hour or so. I didn’t get any pictures as I didn’t have my camera then, and due to the slowly falling foliage, I thought at first it was an owl. When I made out its features though, I was enthralled.

See, because in my pursuit of being a biology major, I started as the animal nut back at the age of six or seven, and learned so much arbitrary trivia on creatures that could have filled many a Wikipedia page with delightful data.

And throughout all this, birds were my absolute favorite class of animals. They were always so awesome and I loved how some of the tiny ones looked so cute (HUMMINGBIRDS EEEE) and how eagles looked so majestic and so I thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed being witness to them at any time.

It helped that my first video game was Sonic the Hedgehog, so I became a fan of speed, and thus the fastest animal in the world belongs to the birds: The Peregrine Falcon, reaching diving speeds of up to 250 miles per hour. (Variations from 245-255 depending on what you read)

(I also liked Cheetah’s too, for that reason)

Anyways, so when a bright red Cardinal sits in the green tree outside my window while I’m furiously banging at a keyboard trying to finish a History paper, I go googley-eyed and gawk at the poor bird while spazzing like an epileptic.

Jamie Mattison was witness to all this, as she sat on my bed trying to start her Neuro open book final.

Thus, unable to share my sudden glee with just one person, I threw up an AmhPub post.

This is because I’m of the mind that the AmhPub is far, FAR too seriously taken, right now. Sure, the thoughts of others might be good to provoke discussion, but a blog was never meant to be a public forum. It’s a public journal, and another mechanism by which we learn about one another and keep in touch with friends.

But, that’s a topic for another post.

I would have taken a picture of the cute tiny thing, but when I got my camera out, it flew to a slightly higher branch, and kept going higher until I had to arch my neck painfully while laying my head on my desk just to see it.
It was still really cute though. And it sang its bird song for about 20 minutes from the high branch before leaving.
That also reminds me, a few weeks ago when I made the sunrise post, that was in part because the morning songbirds and pigeons and things kept attacking and attaching themselves to my open window. IT WAS CUTE how they would use their talons and feet to grab a hold.

But the window opens up slanted, so one of them fell off. I did not hear a thud, though, and the sight of a bird slipping
down was still too cute to provoke concern from me, in the end.

Alright. I’m done gushing about birds. And my section is coming up.

See you all later!

(P.S.: Unfounded Revenge/Smashing Song of Praise from Mother 3/SSBB mix is still awesome)

(That gives me an idea too; one of my upcoming posts shall be a SONG POST! Anyone have a problem with sendspace?)

THERE’S A CARDINAL OUTSIDE MY WINDOW

AWWWWWWW

I’m so unprepared for what’s ahead

And I couldn’t be happier.

———-
Post Orgo Edit:

Hahahaha now for Servos Due in 9 hours approximately.

Study abroad meeting in 20 minutes. Bio Barbeque (and dinner) at 5. EL OH EL oh god I’ve cracked

—–

9:36 PM, May 12: Exhausted. Sleep. Early rise. X_x *ded*

——

9:05 AM, May 13: Woke up an hour and a half ago feeling nauseated. Much better now, think I woke up dehydrated. WHEN I HAVE NO INTERESTING THOUGHTS BUT WISH TO CATALOGUE MY LIFE, IT’S MORE FUN TO JUST EDIT THE POST 8U
Actually that can segway into one of my interesting camp experiences that demonstrated the retardation of some camp counselors in the world (plus my love for animals, that’s rescinded a bit now but was very apparent about eight years ago :P)
But I’ll leave that as the topic of a new post when I’m actually free. Servos was really nice and gave me an extension until Wednesday when I told him I just needed one until today. I just need to make sure I still finish it quickly so that I don’t get stuck pulling an all-nighter packing on Wednesday.

Oh, genetic analysis. How I love thee~

—
Post Final, 8:20 PM:
Huh. Kay, that was fun 8U
Anyways, Essay now? Due in, well, 27.5 hours. Fine, I’ll get to work.
I need time for the goodbyes and well-wishes with people anyway.

—

May 14, 10:03 AM
Still don’t wanna wooooork @.@
So far from the end, yet so close.
Damn it damn it damn it! Alright, that’s it. This will be done.