| (no subject) |
[Jul. 21st, 2009|07:00 pm] |
Still alive, somehow. Moved to place in Berkeley, no internet access. Comcast can kiss my fat ass. Will get this all sorted out and return emails, etc. I am not ignoring anybody!
PS place is great |
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| new address |
[Jun. 19th, 2009|11:44 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  tired | ] |
If you haven't gotten an email from me with my new address and you want it, let me know! I'm physically moving all of my stuff up to Berkeley this week, but I'm not actually moving in until the 30th.
Everybody in the Bay Area, I'm looking forward to seeing you all on a regular basis. Everybody in LA, I'm going to miss seeing you on a regular basis.
This move is a new record for me: 34 boxes of books. I need to stop buying those things. |
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| Iran elections and twitter |
[Jun. 16th, 2009|10:42 am] |
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For everybody on twitter who's following the Iranian elections, read this! It's a quick guide to the shenanigans that the Iranian government is trying to pull using Twitter and the internet. |
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| Randomness... |
[Jun. 4th, 2009|10:25 pm] |
There are so many different things that I have floating around in my head and which I'm tempted to ramble on about. I got a hair cut last week, and I'm still getting used to it. Here's a picture. I like this one because you can actually see how messed up my nose is from the last time I broke it. For some reason most pictures don't show that very clearly. I don't know why.
George Tiller was murdered 5 days ago. He was one of only three doctors in America who provided late term abortions. Many people have started referring to these as "partial-birth abortions", which is a term made up by politicians to sound as terrible as possible. There is no such medical procedure as a "partial-birth abortion".
This sad event made me think about two things: one, that the vast, vast majority of people don't have any idea what would make a late term abortion necessary, and two, that the "pro-life" movement is a disaster. (There's also a little bit of stuff about how Bill O'Reilly is morally partially responsible for this murder as well.)
Late term abortions are not done willy nilly, or because a woman just didn't bother getting around to having an abortion, or because she changed her mind after 8 months of being pregnant. The fact of the matter is that late term abortions are done when a fetus is either severely impared and most likely won't survive, the health or life of the mother is in danger, or the fetus is already dead. Most anti-abortion people don't want the general public to know this because the general public would be horrified if they learned that the more conservative anti-abortion laws force women to keep carrying dead fetuses for weeks while the chance of an infection that can severely injure or even kill the mother increases with every hour. Instead, they have to describe a doctor taking a "baby" (a dead fetus) and chopping it up into little bits.
Some women chose to have a baby that has severe defects. These women are usually lauded by the "pro-life" movement and held up as examples while women who chose to have a late term abortion are vilified. The worse argument I've ever seen against this scenario is the "why didn't she have an abortion earlier" argument. Many severe birth defects aren't visible in an ultra sound until the second or third trimester. (Why is it that so many anti-choice arguments are made by people who don't know basic biology?) Many women cannot handle being the parent of a child with these types of problems. And by "cannot handle", I don't mean "doesn't want to do the work involved". I mean they literally cannot be a parent to a child like that for various reasons. Many anti-choice activists don't want to deal with this reality and instead fob off the problem with the casual claim of "just put the child up for adoption!". I don't need to discuss the odds of adoption for a severely impaired child.
This brings me to the second thing that I have been thinking about: the "pro-life" movement. I always use the quotation marks because I don't believe that anything about this movement has to do with life. It only has to do with control, control of women's bodies and lives.
The "pro-life" movement isn't. I can't take this position seriously at all, especially since so many "pro-life" people support the death penalty and wars. These groups don't help children, parents, or families in any way. They don't help disadvantaged families and children, and they certainly don't support the programs which are designed to help the most vulnerable, especially the adoption programs in this country. They just spend their time screaming at women and trying to shame them, inserting themselves between patients and doctors, using legislation to invade medicine, and supporting misogyny.
If you are "pro-life", then you it's time for you to put your money where your mouth is. This is it, your chance to show that you are actually against killing. Your groups are turning into religious, domestic terrorists (and have been since the 90's). It's time for you to stop murdering people to show that abortion is "murder".
"Where are the moderate Christians? I haven't heard any kind of outrage or upset over the use of Christianity to promote harassing and murdering abortion doctors." We spent nearly ten years listening to ignorant, hypocritical, self-centered Christian Americans ranting incoherently and spewing hatred towards Muslim people, demanding to know where the moderate Muslims were and why they weren't condemning the more extreme members of their religion. Now it's time for these people to show the kind of behavior they claimed should be expected.
The vast majority of the people I know who make a big deal out of their Christianity and who say that it's a cornerstone of their lives, etc., don't act in a Christian manner. They certainly aren't praying quietly in their closet/inner room/private place/whatever (and I'm not getting into Bible translation issues here). People who take the time to make signs and picket abortion clinics but who don't support welfare or birth control because those sluts should be shamed are perfect examples of many Christians I've met: massive, complete, utter failures of human beings.
This website is the first result if you google christian t-shirts. What does this site sell? T-shirts that are anti-Semetic (1, 2), smugness and obnoxiousness (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7), attempts to recast abortion as racial or hate crimes issues (1, 2 this one is particularly bad, 3) including t-shirts with lies on them (1 see here, 2 no studies or references to back this up and I couldn't find anything online either), rejection of taking care of the planet which they believe that God created but support for an increase in population (1, 2), anti-science even though they use science to promote their message and make money (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), rejection of any Christian group which has different ideas from them and an obsession with Satan (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6), ignorance about what the Torah says while using it to promote their platform (1, 2), confusion about how the American legal system works (1, 2, 3 this one also directly contradicts the Torah), assumptions about other's decisions and disturbing use of fetuses as marketing ploys (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), strange political arguments (1), the assumption that having an abortion necessitates forgiveness (1), advocation of adoption without addressing any of the problems with the system including the emotional effects on the mothers i.e. that abortion emotionally damages a woman but adoption doesn't (1, 2, 3), insults to rape victims (1), the standard imagery of 9/11 (1), and a seriously disturbing support of violence (1, 2, 3, 4, 5).
I found one t-shirt on that entire site that actually espoused Jesus's message of love, peace, respect, and faith (here).
This website was the first result on google. This kind of bullshit is everything that is wrong with Christianity and it's the most popular realization of it in this country.
I'd love to say something sarcastic like "It's time for Christians to grow up!" or "Jesus may love you, but everybody else thinks you're an asshole!" but that won't solve the problem.
The "pro-life" movement in this country is founded on two ideas: control of women's bodies and lives, and the self-centered, self-righteousness of the religious majority. Until the "pro-life" supporters can actively take up their chosen name and become truly pro-life instead of anti-choice and shed their nearly sociopathic dogmas, I will continue to oppose them in any way I can.
Oh, and if you think that men should have a choice about abortions, then you'd better be screaming at them and calling them sluts and whores as well. |
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| (no subject) |
[May. 17th, 2009|08:49 pm] |
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Earthquake: felt like a 5.0 to a 5.5. Also felt like the epicenter was near here. Everything's okay. Yay California. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 8th, 2009|09:56 pm] |
You know what's annoying about earthquakes? When they start going so you jump out of bed and pull on some clothes and get ready to go outside and then the earthquake stops. But now you've had an adrenaline rush and your concentration* is broken.
That's just plain inconsiderate, earthquake. You'd better shape up or I won't even bother responding next time.
* After typing this, I see that there may be some clarification needed. I was in bed, wearing pajamas, and trying to debug some Matlab code. |
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| warning: statistics ahead |
[Nov. 24th, 2008|11:10 am] |
There is a website called fivethirtyeight.com, which is run by a statistician who used meta-analyses to make predictions about the presidential election. Now I love this site because the stats is well done, the explanation of the analyses are easy to follow, and they also do explanations of why other pollsters get things wrong. If you like stats at all, 538 will consume you.
Like all other statisticians, the guy who runs this site can't resist playing around with the data. This entry on the Coleman vs. Franken recount in Minnesota is a perfect example*. There is very little actual, real data coming out of this fight, so while it's interesting to see what you can do with what scraps of information you've got, you can't take the results very seriously.
I was really surprised to see this entry on 538 because it's presented like this is a confident analysis of the situation and, especially for a site which prides itself on being as accurate as possible, there shouldn't be any confidence in the results. It's just weird - I wouldn't have any problem with this entry if it had been made perfectly clear that this is just a quick exploratory analysis to see what happens, and not an all-out attempt to predict the outcome.
tl;dr: Even the most trustworthy and dependable statisticians can screw something up/be unclear/overreach. Never trust a statistical analysis unless the author can justify it.
* ( Be warned: here is a whole bunch of statistics about the original analysis and why I don't like it ) |
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| OMFG, WTF??!!! |
[Nov. 17th, 2008|09:56 am] |
So it turns out that the premiere for that cracktastic vampire movie Twilight is now at the Village Theatre in Westwood. This is approximately 0.0001 miles from my office. The entire neighborhood is a freaking disaster. There are lines of teenaged girls that are literally (yes, literally, I'm not making this up) more than four blocks long as of 9:30 this morning. Argh...leaving is going to be a nightmare.
All of this for a movie about teenaged vampires. My life sucks. |
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| (no subject) |
[Nov. 4th, 2008|10:10 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  anxious | ] |
I'm so worried about Prop. 8 (gay marriage ban). It's currently leading and I can't go to bed for worrying about it. Only 25% of the precincts have reported, but it's just terrible.
The worst thing about this whole mess is that the funding for Yes on 8 came from Utah. Get the fuck out of Californian politics, Utah! We should invade them next. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 9th, 2008|10:12 pm] |
Dear people who I may happen to be related to (although I'm not sure about this) and who keep sending me political email forwards,
Please stop. The name Hussein means handsome in Arabic. It does not make a baby into a terrorist. This is the equivalent of claiming that anybody named Chuck is a sociopathic, mass-murdering cult leader because Manson's first name was Charles. It is stupid. Stop.
And since you are related to me in some way, you are aware of the fact that I lived in a neighborhood of Chicago on the South Side named Hyde Park for five years. What would make you think that sending me an email about the eliteist, anti-American morons who let a domestic terrorist live in their neighborhood is a good idea? Did your brain even manage to remember that you're talking about me and my sister when you say that "those people" should be arrested for helping terrorists? No, of course not. You're too busy frothing at the mouth about William Ayers and his evil, evil ways to bother thinking about the fact that Walter Annenberg didn't have any problem giving the guy a 50 million grant.
Not that you give a shit, because Annenberg was a Republican and a friend of Ronald Reagan and that's good enough for you. You also don't care that his wife, who is the president of that same board that you like to scream your head off about, supports John McCain. Nope, that's not a close enough tie for anybody else but Barack Obama and all of us who lived in Hyde Park to be America hating, Muslim loving terrorists. Even though McCain's got supporters who hired Ayers and gave him millions of dollars, we're the only ones you think did something wrong by being associated with Ayers.
Because you are so blinded by the "my team never does anything wrong! the opposing team deserves to be crushed!" mentality you apply to politics, you can't grasp the fact that you're insulting both myself and a pretty large number of innocent Americans (John McCain included in this, you fucking dumbass). Golly gee gosh, what were we thinking, living in a neighborhood with a guy we don't know? Send us off to Guantanamo post haste.
Oh, and that last little bit in the email that's been clearly been tacked on in the last few days, the thing about how this isn't anything like the Keating 5 scandal because McCain was found innocent? So was Ayers. If it's sauce for the goose, it's sauce for the gander. (How's that for folksy, down-home Americana phrasing? And I can pronounce the g's at the end of gerunds.)
In conclusion, you're being stupid and insulting. The next time we meet, I may resort to making you read an 8th grade social studies textbook.
No love,
Me
P.S. Until the election is over, I'm going to send you spam for every one of these stupid forwards you send me. You're on a shitty Windows machine, and there's a likely chance you'll get a virus. Whoops.
If I'm still annoyed tomorrow morning, this email will be sent to the necessary parties. They know who they are. |
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| (no subject) |
[Aug. 29th, 2008|01:32 pm] |
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Cessation of possibilities... Damn, now I'm depressed and whiny. |
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| (no subject) |
[Aug. 28th, 2008|01:50 pm] |
Reason eleventy-billion-and-one why I love my advisor
Setting: This morning, my office
-------------------------
My advisor: How are you?
Me: ... Hung over.
My advisor: Yeah, you look like it. Just do that stuff we talked about yesterday, and then go home and drink lots of water.
Me: Okay.
My advisor: And learn how to drink.
Me: What? Did you say something?
My advisor: Nothing. I'm going home now. Bye! |
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| Go me... |
[Aug. 19th, 2008|11:48 pm] |
Yesterday I once again displayed my stunningly awesome powers of observation: getting ready to go to LAX to pick up ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) thewhitephoenix, I decided to check the details of his flight one last time. And then I was confused because it said "Thursday" and yesterday was Monday. That's because thewhitephoenix is coming to visit in September. D'oh!
And here's the picture of my new hair color that I promised to put up:
My advisor walked right past me in the hallway a couple of days ago because she didn't recognise me (or so she said...). I don't think it looks that different. lily_durona pointed out that it looks pretty natural because I dyed my eyebrows dark to match. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 29th, 2008|11:58 am] |
Earthquake: felt like it was between 5.3 and 5.5.
California, I love you. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 23rd, 2008|12:10 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  relieved | ] |
Just got back from seeing the cardiologist - I am in love. Seriously, completely in love. Luuuuuurve, even. In 30 minutes, he solved all four of my weird medical mysteries. He's brilliant.
( Medical stuff )
In summary, I'm moving to Seattle. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 17th, 2008|04:36 pm] |
A couple of students in my department thought that the creepy stalker guy came to our lounge, so I've sent them his picture and now I'm waiting for them to get back to me. It's much more nerve-wracking than I thought it would be. Argh. I've been sick all day - the stress of last week finally caught up to me. Today is the due date for sending a progress report to my advisor, but it's going to be a couple of days late. I need to stop taking every second day off, but it seems like every time I turn around something dramatic is going on. I need a real vacation.
Blah blah blah....I've been so whiny lately. Everything is driving me crazy, even the little things that normally wouldn't. Although today there was tuna fish at the salad bar. Finally. I managed to eat almost two tablespoons of it before getting sick, which is a new record (good, not bad).
And now back to regularly scheduled procrastination. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 12th, 2008|10:42 pm] |
Holy crap...I don't even know what to say. This week, aside from the weird health issues, has been terrible because of my roommate's stalker. He started sending her messages on match.com in February and has been stalking her online since then. This week, he started showing up in person. He leaves really creepy messages like "I've found you" and "I'm waiting for you".
phd_girl and I went out to breakfast and shopping and had a great time. When I got home, I found out that the stalker followed my roommate around the grocery store and kept trying to talk to her even when she was running away from him. The store security stopped him and called the cops. I don't know what he said to them, but one of the officers called him "that Danish freak" and "fucking crazy".
My roommate has already started the paperwork for a restraining order, but it's not valid until a sheriff serves him in person. Her mother and I are going to go where ever she goes so that she isn't alone until this gets taken care of.
I don't know if there's even a lolcat for this type of situation. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 8th, 2008|02:18 pm] |
That last post, the one where I said I wasn't going to write about complaints and just generally bitch and moan? Yeah, ignore it.
I'm "sick" again, in the way that I'm healthy but something's gone wrong. If that makes any sense. Yesterday morning I had another one of my weird dizziness/blindness attacks while biking to campus. After lying down for a couple of minutes (specifically, 3 minutes 55 seconds, the exact length of Gold Dust Woman by Fleetwood Mac - yes, okay, I was wearing my ipod while biking, but the volume was turned down low so I could hear the traffic noises - this is such a run-on clause), I was starting to feel better when a woman pulled over and drove me and my bike up to campus. Right now the doctor I saw is calling it 'anti-motion sickness' since it only happens 10 seconds after a sudden stop at the end of some kind of exertion, e.g. running or biking.
So now I've gotten one of these things six times in four years - two times biking, four times running. It only seems to happen in middle of something that I've done multiple times before, stopping suddenly at a red light after the crest of a hill, in the summer. That's pretty specific. It's being caused by a sudden drop in blood pressure, but there's no explanation for why it's only happening at certain times, or what's causing it in the first place. (I also think that they're also only happening when I'm exhausted and dehydrated, but I can't remember what I was feeling like during any of them except for this last one.)
The EKG yesterday showed no abnormalities. In a couple of weeks, I'm going in for a heart ultrasound and an echocardiogram.
Until about half an hour ago, I would have said that they will both turn out normal. This is because my tests always turn out normal. But this morning I did a bunch of starvation blood tests (where you can't eat or drink for 8 hours beforehand), which I was convinced would be normal, but they weren't. WTF? They're always normal. It seems unbelievable to me, but my LDL levels are way too high. How that's possible when everything else (including HDL) is fine, I just don't know.
My current eating/exercising plan is getting changed. I lost about 5 pounds last month (which got me back to my pre-advancing weight) but then I got lazy and stopped going to the gym as much. Last week I decided to cut out dairy for a month (but then forgot about that and had a chai latte at lunch with mrs_coorslight - go me), so I'll do that, and go back to the gym.
My diet needs to be changed, since that's the non-medical thing that could be affecting my LDL levels. Unfortunately all of the recommendations I've been given say to cut out red meat and eat more veggies and fish. My current diet is vegetarian, with veggies and fish for lunch. This leaves my sweet tooth as the problem.
Now I am going to try to stop eating sugary things, like pastries and chocolate. Ha, this is going to be hilarious. God only knows what's going to happen.
Long story short: weird health issue means changing what I eat, yet again. Odds of success are fairly slim. This has put me in a really pissy mood.
I have a meeting today from 3-4:30, but I'm going to leave early to 3:30 just because I feel like it. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jun. 27th, 2008|01:56 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | argh, it's Friday | ] |
I could do my usual post full of complaints that only mean something to me, but I'm not going to. This is because I have just noticed the number of weddings going on.
1) Happy solstice! It got freaking hot in LA just in time (117 at my roommate's mother's house) but now is back to June gloom, thank god.
2) Congratulations to mr_void and xioley, who got married last week and are now honeymooning amidst the glories of nature (but of course somewhere with an internet connection).
3) Congratulations to furison and aureus, who have either gotten married or are about to get married (I'm just a lit bit confused about this part). Getting married in San Francisco means that you will always be happy with each other and never fight, because that's just how cool SF is. What? I may be a tad bit biased about this, but I'm not wrong. My parents got married in LA instead of SF, and look what happened to them: two marriages to each other, one divorce from each other, and multiple separations. The fact that they're both batshit bonkers has nothing to do with this at all, nope. Or with the fact that the divorce had nothing to do with the separations and instead was supposed to be a protest against the patriarchy inherent in our legal system but turned out to be a major hassle with the paperwork so they got married again.
Right, my point was that getting married to somebody you want to be married to is a joyous event that should be celebrated, even if it is all about me. |
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