This has been bothering me for a week now.

Whenever I meet someone new nowadays, I try to hide the fact that I don\’t drink. When offered a glass of alcohol, I smile and say \”oh not today.\” But that is almost an impulse for them to try to persuade me to take it. Then I\’ll come up with another mild excuse – \”I have to drive\” or \”I feel like having a glass of water instead.\” But in the end, I\’ll be force to say that I don\’t drink.

I just don\’t want to be pigeon-holed…or placed in a stereotype. I don\’t want to be someone who people perceive as naive, ignorant or pure. It was my own choice. Not because of religion or because of other people. I don\’t want my choice to speak more than what I say.

But that\’s the way people treat people who are vegetarian (or is it completely different?). An immediate impression of purity or it reveals their opinions about animal treatment.

People are so much more complicated than the first impression.

One interesting thing in contrast to Berkeley. Here at CMU, regardless of whether you\’re an undergrad or grad, you always call your professors by their first names.

My dad bragged that when he was a TA, his students would call him Mr. Ng. Thankfully, such formalities don\’t translate across decades. Nowadays, we want to be closer to those who teach us, especially because now we\’re supposed to view them as human beings.

Next item on agenda: new digicam.

These are the moments I wish such things came with homing beacon. Or at least, some kind of way to establish its location. Naturally, we find our missing cellphones by calling it. And some of us can even sound the alarm of our car when we\’re searching for it in the parking lot. Yet what about all those other things? A missing laptop is hard to locate because it just doesn\’t send out a signal that is unique. Sure, there\’s the MAC address but it would be so difficult to just find that one computer when it is logged on again.

My home 2020 group has just been cursed with bad luck. Yeonjoo lost her laptop. Chris lost his backpack. And me…my digicam. :(

I can\’t think, I can\’t eat! ARGGGGHHH!!!

I lost my digital camera. Or better put, I misplaced it. But I have had this \”death\” wish for awhile. After I got my Canonpowershot s30 in November 2002, I almost regretted it. It was larger than most cameras of that quality. And it was just so heavy. Not to mention, one month later another model took its place in the market. But compared to other people\’s digicams (the s230s), it had better quality at night and took the best scenic photos. Not to mention, it was overladen with features with my wannabe photographer side of me.

I did drop it a few times in Portland when I was hiking up to the waterfalls. So there\’s one dent in one corner (this is a surprise to me because it\’s now almost 3 years old). Otherwise, perfect condition.

And now it\’s gone! :( Yesterday I had taken it out of my backpack to take pictures of cubes. Fortunately, I have already transferred all the pictures that I really want from the camera. So most pictures on the card are not lost. But where is it?! I took it out to transfer pictures in the Wean clusters, then I brought the bag along with me to my home 2020 class. I remember one of my group members pointing at it on the table because it wasn\’t in my backpack saying, \”You better watch that…\” Her laptop had been stolen a month before and I thought she was being paranoid because I certainly wasn\’t going to leave my stuff lying around. Then after that, I went down to the second floor of Wean to reward myself from the vending machine. Then I went to the first floor of Wean to that secret spot I discovered on my first day. There I absorbed myself in an .avi I had on my computer. So did I leave my camera bag there? All I remember was having my reward slide under my backpack and me trying to reach for it. Then after that I walked to a conference room in NSH, 30 minutes early to plug my computer in since it was losing power. After the meeting, I was the last one to go and locked up the room…and left for home.

Ok, where in those 3 different locations could I have left my camera? GRRR…

I walk to school nowadays, because not only have I become to appreciate \”good\” weather, I also dislike being stuffed in a bus full of grumpy people.

As I was walking though, I noticed all these random rows of tulips, roses, daffodils, and other flowers planted in front yards. Did they just appear that randomly? I don\’t recall seeing any sort of color a few weeks ago. On campus, it is clear that there overturned dirt near the Fence was obviously a result of gardening. But the surprise of color is something. A sort of yearning to share a rebirth. A pleasant surprise on my less-traveled path.

How often do we find serendipity in our lives? Despite the fact that I tend to schedule my whole day in the morning, I always leave room for the spontaneous change of events. A few weeks ago, someone asked me casually if I wanted to visit Seattle. Even though it never happened, at first, I balked…it seemed too spontaneous, ditching everything I had \”planned\”. But suddenly the thought of going somewhere without knowing what I would do there became appealing.

So when will the moment arrive when I would be willing to get in a car and start driving…with no final destination?

Adobe + Macromedia = together forever?

How did this come as a surprise? What will happen to my photoshop, my illustrator, my flash and my dreamweaver?

I have always viewed Macromedia as on the bleeding edge, the teenage one, the rebellious one winning ladies over with its sleek style. Yet just not popular enough. But Adobe is the more stable one, the one that always delivered what we needed with documents speaking equally to both sides of the table, the reliant one who I could rely on to erase people\’s faces. Too popular, but classic. So what will happen now?

To me, it seems like almost a perfect man!

Last semester, I thought group work was the best thing in the world. So I signed myself up for three group-based classes. Now, it feels…so…hard. Working in a group means responsibility. It means that if you don\’t do your work, it\’s not that the grade will drop, but also you have the social relations with your group members. It also means that you have to work with other people\’s working styles. Not necessarily a bad thing, but adapting to others takes awhile. And this is most likely reflective of the real world.

I am so ready to see and meet new people. Maybe it\’s the fact that not only do I work with the same people, but I also hang out and live with them. Walking into CHI and meeting new people was such a great breath of fresh air. I liked talking to people without me knowing their work styles, the type of parties they threw. And I liked not knowing when I might see someone again, rather than being stuck in the loop that I\’ll see someone again in an upcoming meeting, an upcoming class, a lunch break. Although I love all my HCI classmates, I am so unaccustomed to being in the same group of people for all parts of my life.

Today I walked through Giant Eagle shopping for my red potatoes…when BSB started playing. An old song from their Millennium album. It brought back the flood of emotions during my turbulent phase. My slight rebellious wistful phase of naivete and hope. How I miss thee.

The Spring Carnival for cmu has arrived. It\’s a student-run event where there are the typical rides…then there are the student booths. Usually it\’s the frats and other social organizations that create these elaborate booths that are about the size of the room, decorated with paint, paper mache…pictures to come!

For one of my classes, we were to build a booth–a home of the future. Unfortunately as part of that class, I also had to do the security watch. So last night, I was out at the parking lot from 3-5 am doing security just making sure nobody unauthorized walked into the fair and stole equipment…

I ended up spending the majority of those 2 hours huddled in fetal position on the sidewalk, rocking back and forth. It was cold!

But today, I saw the Shins in concert. Such an awesome show. Of course like most people, I had discovered them when I saw Garden State. Their music is so mellow, but at one point during the concert, they had an identity crisis and basically did a partial song in the heavy metal genre. Then they started a cover of Led Zepplin\’s Stairway to Heaven… Oh, the concert was so good…standing in the midst of a happy crowd nodding to the music, being completely lost in it, the couples swinging together, some really young people crowd-surfing, smoke flying from cigarettes, and the music…

I do too many 180s.

I reached Norfolk today and had such a busy day doing CIs, prototype walkthroughs. But I got to visit a Navy base (escorted with a few gentlemen of course) with my team and we observed users. Afterwards, they drove us around the base to see the view of the and airplane carriers and the destroyers.

But the best part of this trip is the hotel. Superficiality aside, our room is nice!!! Equipped with wireless internet, an arm chair, a tv (that we didn\’t use), two phones (one cordless), a safe, coffee maker and refrigerator. And a \”board room\” downstairs (which we used as our meeting room, complimentary breakfast, swimming pool and a non-working spa. Also cookies for snacks. Ok, so this is probably typical of most hotels but I haven\’t done a nice one for awhile…

—

So someone told me once when she saw me upset, \”Do whatever you do that makes you feel better.\”

And at that moment, it was strange to realize what I usually did. When upset, I naturally just gravitate toward the anonymous world of the Internet. At the moment, I realized that I went online…wrote out what I thought and felt to ease my own stress and pain. Then after that I would cruise through my usual listings of blogs and journals…trying to relive my friends\’ experiences. Then I would often read the journals of people I didn\’t respect (*cough*) and yes, I felt better from their pain. :) Even if we don\’t want to admit it, we can believe at least that\’s not me!