Jason

Jason

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(no subject)	[Feb. 3rd, 2008\|10:16 pm]
Right now I have essays that I need to write essays about, so, of course, I'm going through all of my bookmarks that have accumulated over the years. I started in "Other" which holds things like funny websites, video game walkthroughs, and links related to music, website development, and anime. The video game walkthroughs were a history of games that I've played: Junior - Mega Man X3 Junior - Mega Man X2 Junior - Mega Man X Junior - Lufia II* (A game I played with Lee in elementary school) Junior - Illusion of Gaia* Sophomore - Chrono Trigger* Sophomore - Alien vs. Predator* Sophomore - Secret of Evermore* Sophomore - Earthbound* (Another game I played with Lee) Freshman - Yoshi's Island* Freshman - Final Fantasy II* Freshman - Front Mission Freshman - Secret of Mana* Freshman - Final Fantasy III* The ones with asterisks have childhood memories associated with them, and playing them again has attached new memories and associations to those games. It's hard to believe that it's been so long since playing those two Final Fantasy games. Though I remember intending on playing Final Fantasy 5 afterwards, but I guess my video game attention went somewhere else. But that's the general tone of going through these bookmarks, finding links about old hobbies and people, and remembering those experiences and where I thought I would be in 2008. Lego mecha, drawing/digital art/animation, plastic models, anime, and website development are no longer a part of my life, but let me tell you what I've been up to since my last update. Summer semester at Eastern: I needed to take a second physics course before I could start architecture at U of M, and the only time to do that was during the Summer semester. My first physics class during the Winter semester had a great professor, and a great group of students, and while it was a stressful class, it was definitely one of my favorites. A few students from the last class were there, but for the most part it was a new group of people. The class itself was a confusing mess, but through study groups and lab sections, it was generally good from a social standpoint. Even though it was the Summer, my dorm room was cool and very comfortable. I had a single, in a dorm tower (actually, the same building where that murder had occurred a few months before), about 15 minutes from the physics building, with the student center and library in between. There were no meal plans during the summer semester, so I had oatmeal or cereal for breakfast, turkey sandwiches for lunch, and alfredo+noodles+chicken Beefaroni or ramen for dinner. Since I had the room to myself, I played the guitar more. Unfortunately, the roleplaying club had disbanded after continued bullying from the university (when it comes down to it, that's what it was), and since it was the summer, the students from the Fall and Winter semesters weren't there anyway. My old roommate was still working at Taco Bell though. U of M: Well, I'll start off with housing. One of my roommates checked into rehab for his cocaine addiction (which it turned out he was doing at my desk, along with smoking drinking and video games). Another roommate was an obnoxious fratboy/political science major from a very affluent NYC suburb (which means he got drunk and high from wine and expensive drugs while wearing a suit at pseudo-political parties). Both of these roommates had a ton of alcohol, and a variety of drugs in their desks/all over. The other roommate was just fine. The commute to the architecture building was 20-40 minutes, by way of two buses. The closest cafeteria was a 10 minute walk. Needless to say, I didn't like my situation. Luckily I spent most of my time in the architecture building anyway, and this semester I was able to transfer into a new dorm, which is a short walk to the architecture building and the cafeteria. The room is comfortable and my new roommate has been good so far. Architecture school itself has been going great. Everyone (~100 students for '09) is in the same program and takes pretty much the same classes at the same times. No matter the time of day, there are a lot of people in the studio working on projects who are willing to procrastinate with you, and overall it's just a really positive environment. Everyone works hard and accomplishes a lot. Spring Break Internship: The school of architecture does this thing where they place you at a firm for an unpaid, one week internship over Spring Break, and I've signed up for it. Out of a it-doesn't-hurt-to-ask attitude, I requested two great firms in Detroit (SmithGroup, and Albert Kahn & Associates), and there is a good chance that I will be placed at one of those firms. If that goes well, it could lead to a paid internship for the Summer, and a start to my career. If not, it still looks good on my resume. We'll be receiving our placements for that within about a week, so I'm hoping it will work out well. So that's what I've been up to. :)
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Another Update	[May. 14th, 2007\|05:30 pm]
Well, another semester, another update! :) So I've been back home for a little while now. It's nice to be back. To make a long story short, I've been accepted into U of M's school of architecture, and I'll be starting there in the fall. During the summer semester, I'll be taking the second physics class, which I need to start the program. I'll be taking physics during the summer at Eastern.
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New Semester!	[Jan. 10th, 2007\|10:46 pm]
Well, I took the placement test, but got a 71. There's a 30 day wait period for retaking it, but I got permission to take it ahead of time, so I did, and I got a 97 which placed me into the highest bracket (93+), so I got into MATH 120, which is Calculus. That also let me take PHY 221 (Mechanics, Light, and Sound), but the lecture was full, but I got an override. The lab that goes with it only had one extra space, and I was lucky to get it in time. I talked to the people in the Video Game club, who I talk to when I occasionally run into them. They said that the leader guy who wasn't leading is no longer the leader, since he's stopped taking classes and being involved with the university, or something like that. A different guy, who really seemed like he has his act together pretty good is the new leader, so I'll be checking that out on Friday to see if I want to get back into that. Professors: MATH-120: Nice, seems to know what he's doing, and enthusiastic. He has the body language and accent of the asian guy character from MadTV. CADM-101: Nice, but stares off and thinks about what he's going to say a lot. Talks kinda dull. He remembered my name on the second day, along with other people's, which I think is pretty good. ART-124: Seems cool, but it seems like he's going to want a lot out of us. Ratemyprofessor says he's a jerk sometimes, and so far I can see where someone could think that. So far it doesn't seem like it's really a problem. PHY-221: I like him a lot. The class has been a lot of fun and really interesting. It's too early to say, but I think he might end up being my favorite professor of all time. PHY-221 Lab: I haven't had this class yet, but ratemyprofessor makes me think I won't really like him much. We'll see though, he might turn out to be good to have. Christmas Eve, Christmas (done in the evening), and New Years were fun. January 4th, my and Mary (my brother's girlfriend), went to the Guardian Building to get a tour of it, and to go to the roof, and that was a lot of fun. I took pictures with my new camera (!), but the default setting has the timestamp on, so that ruined most of them. The auto-light stuff (or whaveter it's called) was on a bad setting for the rooftop taking pictures of white buildings on a bright day, but also a bad setting for taking pictures in a dim lobby. So the photos didn't turn out that good. Afterwards we had StoneCold Icecream, and mine melted fast, like last time, but a lot worse (I don't think I mentioned it last time, but with Emily eating icecream in greektown, my icecream melted). We tried to get into an uppper floor of the David Stott, but the desk guy wouldn't let us. Later that evening, me and my siblings, and Mary went to see Spamalot at the Fisher Theater, and that was a lot of fun too. Happy 2007 everyone! :) -Jason
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Update!

[Dec. 18th, 2006|05:18 pm]

[	Current Location	\|	My computer, silly!	]
[	mood	\|	distressed	]

ok, I'd better update this.

First off, from my first entry, I never got around to making any non-Sim City art, other than what was required for my drawing class, and what I doodled in my notebooks during class. :)

My new screen name is Jasoncw87. I only use animaster887 when I'm checking my e-mail, and when that happens I usually don't want to talk (because I'm busy doing e-mail stuff).

Since I last updated I've played and beaten EarthBound. I've played it two or three times before. One of those times was with Lee a long time ago. But none of those times I was able to beat the game. I always got stuck in Magicant because I had the Gutsy Bat equiped to Ness, so he was always missing, so I couldn't beat his nightmare. But anyway, this time I knew better, and I beat the game. It's an outstanding game, and might even be my favorite.

School-wise, half of my classes have bad professors. Math especially. At ratemyprofessors.com he's like a 1.2 or something like that. I'm also getting a low grade in that class. I think I'll pass, but I don't know if I'll get the grade I need to take the higher level of math.

Which leads into my main problem right now. I need to take Calculus and Physics in the Winter semester, and in order to take those I need MATH 105 (the one I'm doing bad in right now), and MATH 107 (which I need to test out of). But actually, MATH 105 doesn't really matter, because if I test out of 107, then that means I've also tested out of 105. I have that tommorrow at 11:00 AM. I stopped by the Math Tutoring Center and pretty much got all of the important math things I've ever learned recapped in 20 minutes. I need to get 16 out of 20 questions right, and I have a study sheet that has about 40 potential questions, and out of those, as long as all of the hard ones don't show up at once, I think I'll be ok.

But if I don't pass that placement test, then all of my acedemics are delayed, and I'll have to wait an entire year before I can apply to Michigan's college of architecture. And during that year, I'll only be able to take a few classes (otherwise I'd go over their credit cap (I need to have less than 70 but more than 60), and most of them won't even count towards my architecture stuff.

Anyway, long story short, I need to do good on that placement test or the rest of my life will be messed up. :)

I don't really like Eastern as whole very much. I don't reccomend coming here unless you really want to. For one, everything is inconvienient, so nothing works out how you want it. Half of the buildings and people are nice, while half of the buildings and people are ghetto. I ended up in one of the ghetto buildings, which was designed really poorly. The front desk, mailboxes, and lounge are situated in the middle of nowhere in the building (they're not situated near where people walk or anything like that), so there's a big reduction of community and all of that kind of stuff, that could be easily created by good design, like the other dorms at Eastern, and the one I was in at Grand Valley. It seems like a lot of the students don't really care about school. Also, all of the people I talk to in my classes are ALL commuters, and the other friends I've made (through Sim City!! :D ) live nearby, but still far enough away that it takes planning to hang out. Hopefully next semester I'll meet some people who live on campus.

ArchMage (the gaming club) is a lot of fun, and I'm in a really fun Star Wars campaign. It's just the right mix between action, roleplaying, and sillyness. Unfortunately, since Thanksgiving, scheduling conflicts have prevented us (or me) from playing. There was also a video game making club, which had really bad leaders. It was very clear that the club wasn't going anywhere at all, so I stopped going to the meetings.

Sim City is going good. I won "Trixies" which are awards through the one fansite, Simtropolis.com. People vote on different categories and I won two, "Best Landmarks" (For my Detroit landmarks), and "Best Tutorial Writer" (for tutoring a ton of people who want to learn how to make buildings).

Went to see the latest James Bond movie a few weeks ago, and I liked it a lot. Way at the begining of the semester I saw the DaVinchi Code, and that was good.

Also went downtown with Emily, and I liked that a lot.

Instead of normal class, there's a party for art class during the final time. I'm spending some E-Dollars (meal plan money) to buy a bunch of snacks to share.

I've recently had a few "break throughs" (when something clicks and I can suddenly play better, like wandering around in a dungeon for a while and then you suddenly level up and everything becomes easy) in my guitar playing. Due to this, I've decided to start learning songs (up untill now I've generally just doodled around, playing my own things). I'm starting off with these two Jesus and Mary Chain songs, and so far it's going ok. I just started a few days ago and right now there are only a few chord changes that I can't do smooth enough.

I don't think I ever went through my professors. I guess I'll do that now:

Math - Horrible teacher
Writing - ok teacher, but has over the top views, and he's generally a weirdo. I don't know what's going on in his mind.
Art - Really nice and friendly. He got to know who I was, and he really cared about everyone's art.
History - I liked his class, and him in general, but he was really sarcastic, and a lot of the time he was kinda rude. I had him for a low level history class, but according to people on ratemyprofessors.com, he's really bad for upper level classes. He put on this history game thing, where I was one of many senators, and we decided whether or not to convict or aqquit President Johnson's impeachment, and I enjoyed that. It also pretty much ensured that I got a fantastic grade in the class.
Construction Management - Nice guy, and extremely well spoken.

I enjoyed Construction, History, and art, and really disliked Math and Reading.

But that's all the past. At this very second, I'm worried about my math placement test, and what to do if I don't get high enough of a score on it. But also, if I don't pass it, that will suck. But if I do pass, then I'll feel really dumb for going through all of Math 105 when I could have just spent an evening studying, and I could have just tested out of it at the begining of the semester. I'll just have to pick the lesser of the two evils. ;)

Well, that was a bigger update than I thought it would be. I'll try to write again, at least at the end of next semester. :)

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A Personality Quiz! Joy!	[Sep. 13th, 2006\|10:46 pm]
I think it's accurate enough. Most of the ocupations listed sound like things I would be ok with too. Personality Type Report Your Personality Preferences INTROVERT While you may not be anti-social, you do need (and deserve) your private time and space to retreat from the world. Unlike extroverts, you need to develop a concept of the world or some aspect of it before experiencing it. Too much socializing may sap your energies. Your energies are derived from exploring the inner world of ideas, impressions and pure thought. INTUITIVE While you do process information through your senses you add a twist to your processing by relying on intuition and serendipity. You look for undercurrents of meaning and abstractions in what you experience physically. You do not just see things just as they are, but as what they could be. While you may rely on common sense at times, you trust inspiration far more. PERCEIVING You like to have as much information as possible before making a decision. Putting off a final decision until the last moment does not make you uncomfortable. Indeed once a decision is made, a course plotted, you may feel a bit uneasy, because you feel bound to a certain course of action. You would much prefer to wait and see what happens. You enjoy the opportunity to improvise. Commitments are not etched in stone to you, and are changeable. FEELING You make decisions subjectively based upon your values and what is important to you. How people will be affected by your decisions is important to you. You are likely to make decisions based upon what you feel is acceptable and agreeable rather than what is logical. Your truths are founded in your values and those of the society you live in. It is important to remember that we are discussing how you evaluate data and make decisions, and that you rely on your feelings to do so in no way implies you are overly emotional. Your Personality Type Introvert/Intuitive/Feeling/Perceiving You are devoted and compassionate. You have a well-developed distaste for rules, orders and schedules. You are a natural born learner and can get so absorbed in your projects that you forget those around you. You are passionate about your beliefs and love ideals. You have very high standards for yourself. You are very creative, sensitive, reserved, and introspective. You respect the values of others and expect them to respect yours. In relationships you are loyal and totally committed. You prefer a few deep relationships over a horde of acquaintances. Because you are somewhat reserved, you do best in one on one and small group situations. When you feel comfortable, you can be very entertaining and capricious. You are nurturing and supportive by nature. You greatest social challenge is to balance your need to withdraw into your inner-world with your need to keep a strong connection with those you care for. . Famous People of Your Type: Homer, Virgil, Mary, mother of Jesus, St. John, St. Luke, William Shakespeare, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, A. A. Milne, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Helen Keller, Carl Rogers, Fred Rogers, Dick Clark, Donna Reed, Jacqueline Kennedy Onasis, Neil Diamond, Tom Brokaw, James Herriot, Annie Dillard, James Taylor, Julia Roberts, Scott Bakula, John F. Kennedy, Jr. Occupations Suited to Your Type Include: Actor, architect, artist, composer, editor, translator, journalist, librarian, musician, occupational therapist, psychotherapist, educator, researcher, scientist, and writer. http://www.typequiz.com/passess.htm
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New Livejournal	[Sep. 11th, 2006\|11:47 pm]
I didn't like my old name, so I got a new one. This is mostly so that I can comment on other people's journals. Plus, if I used the old one, then someone would get the wrong impression about me from my old journal. Although I guess I haven't changed much since then. I also have a new aim screen name, it's Jasoncw87. ~liek ad me lolz~ I've been meaning to do more normal (non-Sim City, lol) art, so maybe this will be an art blog or something. I don't know. I'm taking a drawing class, and I've recently gotten 3ds max (a 3-d program), so I think I'll start doing more art stuff. Haven't done much in the last two years or so.
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