Important Dates and Sawing off Limbs

Though there are many joys in life, one of the biggest has to be when you're working on your math homework and you're getting them all correct. I classify big joys as those that make you feel better than your average state, however, they don't happen all the time -- in fact, sometimes these "big joys" can happen very rarely. Me succeeding at my math homework seems to be a very rare joy indeed. I indeed have math-savy people to thank for helping me with my homework lately: Kenny DiFiore and Rachel Kindergan. I am finally feeling like I know what I'm doing. The wonderful thing about this math class is that it'll be my last math class -- ever. That's it. College algebra and then I'm done. I'm going out of the number world with a bang, so to speak. I got an 80 on my first test and a 100 on my second test (the average of those two scores is a "90" -- see, I told you I was getting good). My next math test is this coming Wednesday, and I'm a little nervous because the material is getting harder.

For anyone who needs a hand with some math homework, a great site to check out is Free Math Help. You have to register for their message boards, but it's free -- and they offer help for any level of math. I just registered tonight and browsed over a few things. From what I can tell, it's extremely helpful.

Tyler came down on Friday night and attempted to trade some songs over iTunes from my computer to his iPod. At the rate of one song per three seconds, it would have taken him a very long time to extract my 16 gigabyte archive of music. The reason it was so slow was because he forgot his iPod docking station -- which makes the transferring process oodles faster than what it was transferring at through a USB cord.

He and I went to see the movie Saw that night. Now, I don't know about the majority of the people who watched it, but I know that I liked it. Take a look at what critic(s) are saying about the movie:

A smart and intense thriller that will make you glad you SAW it.

- Jesse Chapman, judyhoof tribune

The suspense is truly CUTTING EDGE.

- Jesse Chapman, judyhoof tribune

I'll tell you right now that it's now really as scary as the trailers make it out to seem, but that doesn't, by any means, mean that it's a bad movie. It's actually good enough where I'd consider seeing it again at the theaters. Speaking of movies that are coming out in theaters, here's the list of movies that I want to see in the future:

• The Final Cut - Out
• Birth - Out
• Kinsey - November 11, 2004
• Ocean's Twelve - December 10, 2004
• Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events - December 17, 2004
• Andrew Lloyd Weber's The Phantom of the Opera - December 22, 2004
• Meet the Fockers - December 22, 2004
• White Noise - January 7, 2004
• Boogeyman - February 4, 2005
• The Ring 2 - March 18, 2005
• Hide and Seek - April 8, 2005
• Jurassic Park IV - Summer 2005
• Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith - May 25, 2005
• Batman Begins - June 17th, 2005
• Bewitched - August 8, 2005
• Charlie & the Chocolate Factory - August 15, 2005
• Indiana Jones 4 - August 1, 2005
• Superman Returns - Summer 2006
• X-Men 3 - May 5th, 2006
• Spider-Man 3 - May 4th, 2007
  

This is what I think of Halloween this year.

I'm sure there are others, but those are the only ones I can remember seeing previews to and wanting to see. You can find out information on any of those movies at http://www.upcomingmovies.com. Remember, release dates are subject to, and often do, change.

Speaking of important dates and sawing off limbs, Happy Halloween everyone. I hope that everyone had a very safe trick or treat, but not both. Me, on the other hand, pretended Halloween didn't exist. It's just easier that way. I had some Hershey Kisses. My close friends would tell you that I don't like candy or chocolate or even cake -- and they wouldn't by lying. I've never cared for sweets of any kind (but that doesn't I don't occasionally munch). So, as you can probably guess, Halloween has never been a holiday for me to eat -- but it certainly has been an interesting holiday for dressing up.

Two years ago, I went with a group of my friends as Christmas Carolers. Some of the people we visited were very rude. Some interesting quotes included:

• "You've got the wrong holiday."
• "Can I just give you the candy?"
• "HEY, YOU GUYS ARE FABULOUS! COME ON IN AND SING FOR MY PARTNER!"

The following year we went as a group of dead people with a choreographed dance to Michael Jackson's Thriller. It was completely awesome. Some interesting events included:

• An old lady throwing the candy on her doorstep and closing the door.
• Another old lady clapping and giving us candy, then going back into her house for more, and then following us down the road shouting that she had more candy.

My favorite part of Halloween is breaking things in the yards of people who don't give me candy. I'm serious. Every time I got something bad or nothing at all, a lawn ornament would end up on their roof or some porch lights would mysteriously disappear. I think that's what I miss most.

This year, I pretended like Halloween was cancelled. Maybe next year.

Besides, there are better holidays, like "International Visit Rachel Day." Speaking of which, that day is coming up soon! I'll be visiting Rachel on November 10 and staying through November 14 at her Virginia apartment. It'll be quite an exciting time up North. From what I understand, I may need to obtain some warmer clothes (i.e., African Snowsuits). I'm ready to embark on this exciting adventure.

When Rachel came down last about two weeks ago, I got a parking ticket for parking at a meter and letting it expire. I knew it was my fault, so I acted maturely.

SupriseVisit799 and Me_Me_Me walk out to the car.
Me_Me_Me: Well, looks like I got a parking ticket.
SupriseVisit799: Uh oh.
Me_Me_Me: Hummm....
Me_Me_Me is thinking.
SupriseVisit799: What are you thinking over there?
Me_Me_Me: What if I just pretended not to have ever received my ticket?
SupriseVisit799: What do you mean?
Me_Me_Me: You know, like I told them that I never got a ticket, right? All they do is put it under your windshield wipers! Someone could easily come along and snatch it up, or the wind could blow it off. There are a lot of possibilities. The way they give these tickets out creates a huge margin for error, you know. I think I'll do that. I'll just ignore it and never mention it to anyone, and if they contact me, I'll lie and say I never got it.
SupriseVisit799: Why don't you just pay it?
Me_Me_Me is thinking.
Me_Me_Me: Eh, that's a good point.

So, of course she had a good point, and I paid the ticket. The Monday after Rachel left, I went up to Parking Services and gave them the ticket envelope with the money inside, and they thanked me for paying so quickly. Well, that was that.

So, I decided to go back to my dorm and check online to see the new Polaris system. The Polaris system is the University's gateway for all the students to find out their schedules, grades, and other important information. They recently did an update to the entire system, and I figured I'd check it out early as to avoid any confusion when I registered for my classes in the spring.

Immediately when I logged on to the site, I was notified that I had a "hold" on my account. Basically, a hold is something that doesn't allow you to do anything until it's taken care of. Typical holds are problems with financial aid, overdue library books, and...



Parking citations? Well, I suppose that the University's system doesn't update as fast as I'd like it to, right? Just in case, I went back the next day to check out what was going on. Apparently, I had a different parking "citation" that was overdue from October 13th. I told her that I never received a ticket, and that I was concerned as to why it just showed up out of nowhere. She said that they had all the information written down, so there was really no way of a mistake. I again stressed the fact that I did NOT receive a ticket, and I was very upset about that -- plus the fact that there was a fee for not paying within seven days. I told her that it was entirely possible that someone else removed the ticket from my car and because of that I was responsible for the late fees. "Yes sir, that's correct," she said. "We do it that way because some people just lie and say they don't receive tickets."

How about that for irony?

I still protested, but she said that I will have to pay the fee. To be honest, I really didn't get a second ticket (which would have been the first one). However, I decided in the end to just simply pay it. The next day, I made my way to Parking Services and noticed an interesting development in the parking meter areas: all the meters were gone.

Sometimes I hate irony.

As many of you know, I plan to open my own web-site in the coming months. The only problem that I'm going to have with opening my own site is coming up with some time to design the site. I have a hard enough time simply updating my journal as it is! What I'll probably end up doing is simply doing all my homework on a lonely Friday night and spend Saturday and Sunday coming up with an easy design for the time being. The judyhoof.com design, as simple as it looks, was an effort that spanned about a week. I'll probably end up changing the design of my new site a few times in the opening months. So, in short, I have no idea when I'll be able to open my new site. When judyhoof.com closes down, there may not be any journal updates for awhile.

The plans for the site is based on a poll that was conducted at judyhoof.com a few weeks ago. The majority of the people said they liked my journal and lab3 the best -- so these two elements will become the central focus (most likely with lab3 being renamed). Most of the other elements of judyhoof.com will also transfer over, but I'm not sure which things I'll keep and which ones I'll delete. Most likely, the downloads section will transfer completely, however, the older gallery items will probably not. The address for the site has been registered, and a coming soon page is online. If you'd like to take a sneak peak at the site now, please venture to http://www.collegeisamovie.com/.