I am having a ton of trouble trying to write the NSERC application. It's so difficult to talk about myself and write down plans for my future in abstract words that will probably mean nothing in a couple of days...sigh...

Logging events of yesterday: Morning -- went to the Career Fair at RIM Park with Mary and Keane. To my disappointment, it's indoors, so I don't get to see much of the park. Not that I was looking for a job, no, I was only looking for Peter. That's the first time that I saw Peter with a HydroOne shirt on. Took Keane/Seven around the booths in search for possible jobs. Result: Keane decided to go for grad school. Hey, good choice! That's the same choice I made...

Afternoon -- visited Bobby to clear out some things. As I've mentioned above, I won't be staying the night in Toronto tonight...sigh...maybe next time. Briefly visited my office, which was during Alex's office hour. And hey, I get to help a little with a question that so confused me last semester! Went home to wait for Thian-Peng and played table tennis. I showed how badly my eye-hand coordination is, and I think now he believes it...hehe.

Night -- decided to do grocery shopping anyway. This time, at 10PM. Pouring rain. That was fun! Wet fun...

For some odd reason, I find this picture of Waterloo Park very beautiful... I mean, the scenery is ordinary, but somehow things pre-arranged in the orderly fashion looks good...

Lord, help me. I am overwhelmed. You are my only hope.

Looks like my plan to stay at Eugene's on Thursday night is off.

That was the slowest game of table tennis I've ever witnessed...and I was in it!

A quick shout-out to Jason to say hey, thanks for letting me invade your office for two hours last night! I had a great time watching you play around with that laptop. I think this would belong to having "guilty pleasure," as in the back of my head, I kept thinking: I need to go to work, supervisor meeting tomorrow! Thanks for a wonderful (yet internally painful) time!

Oh, and my car hit a milestone today: at around 8:20PM, it reached 1000km! Congratulations, car! So that's 1000km in 28 days. Let's see when the next thousand will hit...

So, the Bible study was over. I always feel bad just after I lead any Bible study. This time, I feel like I was going too theological, don't really know how to elaborate on things, and I have no idea how to ask good discusssion questions. Anyway, with God's help, I will improve next time.

2.5 hours away from the Bible study, and I'm actually done with the preparation. Just a stripped down version, though... Pray more...

Today, I will attempt the impossible: prepare an important Bible study in 6 hours.

By noon, this overwhelming sense just blew me away. Couldn't handle it. Everything just seems to come together all at once... Pray...

Here's something mildly weird for me: on the weather for Waterloo right now, if you look closely, the icon for "light rain" or "showers" is this, while the icon for "rain, heavy at times" is this. A difference of..........one rain drop! Ok, so it's not so amusing at all...

Last night, I had a dream where I basically told my deepest secret in front of a moderately large group of people. And I asked for prayers. It was really painful, but the relief was great. Too bad it was only a dream... Although I have to wonder whether or not this will happen in real life...

Hey, The Amazing Race won an Emmy! That's...well...Amazing! Congratulations!

Reminder: NSERC application!

Finally able to go to Laurel Creek yesterday. It's a nice quiet place. Too bad we didn't have time to explore this place. Here is a nice group picture that includes everybody there except 6 people (5 needed to go in an emergency, and 1 was taking the picture). So as you can see, there were 24 people there. Surprisingly large group, I'd say.

So I bought another weight, and started doing these exercises. I have not exercised for a while, so now my leg muscles are in pain... But it is quite funny, though.

Peter was here, but I've only talked to him briefly. The dinner was nice, though. Andrew was here, but I've only talked to him very very very briefly.

I think next Thursday's plan to Toronto will materialize. Although I really need to get those tickets...

Very cold this morning (well, compared to recent days anyway). It was only 4 degrees. Nice!

Since my memory has failed a bit more often recently, here's a list of things that I should remind myself about:

Tuesday morning -- Supervisor meeting.
Tuesday afternoon -- Genesis Bible study.
Wednesday morning -- Go to Rim Park for career fair.
Wednesday afternoon -- Thian-Peng is coming for Ping Pong.
Wednesday evening -- Buy groceries.
Thursday morning -- Office hour.
Thursday afternoon -- Graph theory seminar.
Thursday evening -- Hopefully go to Toronto for TSO concert.

Wow, Jupiter now has 61 natural satellites? That's too many!

So what happened when a hurricane is here? Waterloo becomes Vancouver. That's all.

Well, that was a very...uh...interesting (?) office hour. First of all, an emergency from MuTao delayed my entrance until almost the start of 11. One person already waiting, so I tried to answer his question. Then a second person came in, and we tried together. Then a third person come in, then a fourth, a fifth, a sixth, and a seventh. At that time, at the urge of the first two students, I started explaining questions on the board. Then an eighth person showed up, then a ninth, and finally a tenth. That's ten people and one TA jammed into this tiny office. This is a first for me, so that was a very...well...interesting experience, I'd say. Personally I prefer explaining the questions one person at a time, as different people have different levels of understanding. However, there was no way that I could have done that, so I just started talking and writing and hope that they have some response. Usually there are only two that responded (the two that have more of an idea of what's going on, I suppose), and the others just gave me a blank stare, occasional nod, and constant writing. Oh well, that's too bad. I was going to offer them to email me to maybe set up extra time, but I'm sure I would get swamped, so I didn't do that. In theory, an 11AM office hour plus 5 days away from due date equals very few people visiting. However, this time around, the assignment is just way too tough... Here's hoping for a better time next week.

So, what did I learn about Alex today? Certainly extremely talented, just based on his previous job experiences. Very business-oriented. He's the first person ever to say the classic phrase "can't tell you, or I'll have to kill you" line to me (re: Caymen Islands). A sports guy, mostly a soccer player. His extensive travel experiences made me really jealous (oops, that's one of seven deadly sins...avoid that!). But seriously, how can a guy work for Bombardier, Amazon, and Morgan Stanley, travel through 40 states, Cuba, Caymen Islands, and most of Europe, took road trips that include (several?) four-day trips to Florida, an eleven-day trip through as south as Louisiana and Texas, and a 4-day 5-park round trip from Seattle to as far as the four corners? Wow...that's all I can say... To say that I am amazed by him is a serious understatement.

Brought MuTao everywhere yesterday. It was quite painful to watch him go through such troubling times. At least he might have a new home now, and that should be good.

Yay! Hurricane! Friday! Well...post-tropical hurricane anyway. Love those "active" weather...

I think I'll do a "40-day plan in 45 days" starting Wednesday. I'll plan for the plan tomorrow...

Hmm...apparently I'm not alone here...(go two posts down)

Just came here to say that hey, The Amazing Race will come back again!!! That's excellent!

Too much to say, too little time to gather my thoughts together...

What happened two days ago: missed half a Tutte for a haircut; long waits at the post-mid-autumn holiday dinner; the experience in recording songs into the computer was really really funny -- not because of how we recorded them, just how the girls sang.

Yesterday was quite an experience. Bobby hosts the welcoming event at the youth group, and I am supposed to do some of the preparation. We spent the entire day on this, and we seem to hit a wall everywhere we turn. The day started out with no internet. Without internet and Bobby without a phone, it was quite impossible to contact him... Fortunately, he called, so that was ok. We used Ingrid's digicam to take photos of "attractions" in Waterloo, which we planned to use on our guide to Waterloo. Unfortunately, Ingrid didn't bring the cable connecting the digicam with the computer. And it's no ordinary cable. We borrowed the cable from three other people, and none can be used. Also, in the middle of preparation, all of a sudden, the keyboard on Bobby's laptop computer stoppped working. That's really bad since at that time, all the data for our "guide" is on his computer. This was ultimately resolved when, after a long search, Bobby found an "actual" keyboard to make it work. It still felt kind of awkward to use an external keyboard + touchpad combination, but that's ok. One final complication was when I was trying to pick up Roger. Well, actually, picking up Roger was no problem, however, missing a turn after picking up Roger cost some time. And I was late already, so I was driving like crazy (well, still slower than most people...). Finally had to pick up the map to confirm where we want to go. Ended up about 5-10 minutes late, but that's ok, since almost everyone arrived at that time anyway. One bright side of the day: the game that I needed to program took surprisingly little time (only about 2 hours), and it was so funny that I laughed so hard while testing it!

As for the event itself, well, none of the things we had done on the day were used. We basically underestimated the amount of sharing a group of about 20 people can produce. It was a very exhausting day. I'm sure the Lord is trying to teach me something here, but I haven't found out what it is yet. On the other hand, I got to meet Tony and Samuel, who are both great people. Tony's always smiling and laughing. That's grrrrrrrrrreat! (Sorry, Tony!)

Wow, this is the longest post I've ever made. Sorry if you actually read through the whole thing...but then again, thanks a lot if you did. Please post comments as I have no idea who actually reads this stuff (hopefully at most one or two other people).

Oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MESISTER!!! Sorry I had to call so late...

Note to self: contact Justin.

These days, I sleep too much..........

So, what did I learn during today's C&O pizza party? Well, the pizza sucks. Had a long talk with Aidan, which was excellent. Funny how he followed up my "I almost failed P.E. in high school" statement with a "I almost failed French because of too much P.E." statement. I didn't meet anyone new, which sort of defeats the purpose of the party to begin with. Didn't even talk to most of the people I know...

So, what did I learn during today's Minota house meeting? Well, everyone sucks at geography. When it comes to answering the question "am I from China?", apparently my answer is no. Keith (317) studied at Simon Fraser. Usman (316) studies bioinformetics. Simon (112) is still here. Atefeh (116) is here as well. There is one other C&O student here. We need a C&O movie.

Pray for MuTao and his family.

Finally, the mystery shrouded around the new officemate has been lifted! That's nice...
Sleeping a lot? Also nice...
Having a great time at the TAs meeting with B and A? Surprisingly nice...
Old habits remaining? Horrible...

Oh, and I should mention my cooking experiment yesterday. It was a gooey jumbo of rice, corn, green onion, too much ham, egg, soy sauce, salt, and some browny salt-like thing. Probably put one too much of the last three items there...but it was surprisingly tasty. I will probably be eating for about five straight meals, and start another cooking experiment...

I think I should start seriously preparing for the Genesis Bible study thing...it's a huge a difficult task, I'd imagine.

So, my all-nighter took me until 3:30 AM before going to bed. Having tea made it hard to sleep, though. Thoughts kept racing through my mind in my sleep... Let's see if this cram work will do any good in one and a half hours...

Just to remind myself on something to do: make a family calendar for 2004. If that's successful, then do other themed calendars in the future. That should be fun...and more reason for procrastination!

(Wow, 3 posts in 1 day...I must be going crazy.)

So I met one new graduate student today. That's nice. I won't name name, in fear of falling into the kind of post that I posted two posts ago...

Today is "work until I have something significant to make my supervisor happy" day. Tomorrow is "I promise I will do something significant for next week, but for now I will relax a little bit until next Monday" day. This Friday would be "I wish I had done something significant already" day. Man, this is getting really depressing...

Wow, that's a lot of people that I talked to at church today. Some of the usual ones: Francis, Paul, Ingrid, Bobby, Thian-Peng, Sinnie, Aaron. Some of the unusual ones: Andrew (hey, he's back!), May (hey, she's back!), Jim (ECE Masters), Gin, Nancy, Jessie. Finally the car is put to service, yay!

Now that I had a look at my previous posts, I feel like I am posting as a little kid...awww. I can even hear that little girl's voice in my head, reading off the list of names...sigh.

Despite my best intentions, I still couldn't shake it off...sigh.

Just added an ugly commenting ability to this blog thing. Just to see who is actually reading this...please do leave a comment so that I don't feel so lonely in here...

Well, maybe having internet access at home isn't such a good idea. Just wasted so much time on it...

I think I'm in a scary situation where some (bad) things that I've always wanted to do before but couldn't? I could now...

Hey, I got my internet back! Why does blogger look different on my PC than the school UNIX system?

Oh my dear Time
How do I waste thee?
Let me count the ways.
One-one thousand, two-one thousand,
three-one thousand, four-one thousand..........

That was a really nice BBQ yesterday! Let's see, I met Morgan (306), Amico, Leah, and Lilia. Had some form of light conversation with Andrei, Jeff, Berry, Hideo, and Alex. It was great to finally be in a social event, which I'm terrible at participating.

Tried to do the required things for internet connection to go back on. Hopefully I do get it back today.

Fire alarm drill this morning. Talked with Fung (217). Not a bad drill afterall...

So, I bought two things that I wasn't supposed to buy...bad move.

Still no internet at home...not that it matters as I was able to read quite a lot while being netless. I also played a lot of those little games...

One nice thing about the car: grocery shopping doesn't take too much energy, and I actually had the courage to cook a fancy dinner! Nice... More shopping today, I think.

Cluelessness. Not good.

The most amazing thing about Niagara Falls: The water is running even when I'm not looking at it!

I really really need to reduce my incredible skills in procrastination...

I'm supposed to write something about my new car, but I really don't know what to say...It has a CD player...that's nice.