Days left: 36

"Nothing is certain but death and taxes"

It is an exceedingly pleasant and sunny spring day outside, but April has definitely demonstrated the truth of those words.

36 days left.

I wonder if I could have done my senior thesis differently. And I think not. I tried my best, I know I did. But perhaps it was the effort that was wrong. I think eventually I will learn. I am trying.

Days left: 52

Slowly the countdown continues. I want to make a list of things I would like to do before graduation. I am going to miss Yale.

A few words of wisdom from a wise man. No matter what your politics, you can respect these fundamental truths. Originally these were numbered, but it tends to have the effect of ordering or ranking by importance, even if it's an organizational thing and not intended to do so. So I have removed the numbers.

"The Wisdom of the Heart"
from the 14th Dalai Lama
Nobel Peace Prize Laureate (1989)

Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.

Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.

Sleep is the best meditation.

Spend some time alone every day.

We can never obtain peace in the outer world until we make peace with ourselves.

Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.

We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection.

Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.

If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them.

The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis.

Days left: 63

Now that we've hit the 60s mark, meaning there are just about two months between now and graduation, it's starting to feel real. Two months can pass exceptionally quickly, especially if one is consumed by senior projects and other things.

In any case, I'm glad that I finished the first stage of testing for my senior project. If I didn't stay over campus and run people, I would be even more behind than I am.

So to analyze what my progress was like over break:

1. Submit applications to jobs and internships
2. Have an outline of senior paper by the end of break

2a. preliminary literature review

2b. run 15 subjects
3. Finish a rough draft of my directed research paper
4. Feel prepared for my programming midterm
5. Make serious headway on programming pset 6
6. Work out every day as if it were a class (reward is watching the last episode of Coffee Prince!)
7. Feel like I've made it to beginner status on the guitar
8. Read article, Frederick
9. Read chapters 71-80 of SOTS
10. Write up bibliography of 5-6 books or sources/text for SOTS paper
11. Read Furth, Blood, Body, and Gender

Interestingly, the things that I didn't get to were the things that are more long-term projects. Perhaps this has to do with the stressfulness of long-term, large projects? I realize that for such large projects, they seem like they loom over you especially if you think of them as One Large Monstrosity. It's beginning, taking the first step, that's daunting. Maybe it will be helpful if I break them down into piece-wise steps. I think it would feel much better.

Days left: 66

Writing from Bethesda, MD, about 10 mi outside of D.C. Thankfully the weather was quite nice today and should be tomorrow as well. And the surrounding downtown area is really nice--a shopping center nearby and lots of businesses and restaurants. Should be a pretty convenient place to live, and you can do so without a car which is great.

Days left: 76

So how did I do today in terms of things I wanted to get done?

Days left: 80

Today is the start of Spring Break. After wishing-washing for nearly four months or so, I have finally decided that it would be in my best interest to use the event sounds project I was put on by Brent. Sadly, there's nothing time-perception related about it, but perhaps that's fine, given the short time frame I have left. If I just work on it and write it up, I can't see how I won't pass and do fine on my senior project. But it's sad because I wanted to do a really good job...must work hard, clearly.

Goals for spring break:
1. Submit 10 applications a week for jobs or applications
2. Have a preliminary draft of my senior project by the end of break
3. Feel prepared for my programming midterm
4. Feel like I've made it to beginner status on the guitar

It's sunny outside and glorious, but I've been feeling tired. Clearly I've been watching too much Coffee Prince and need to not go to bed at 6am.

But it's so hard to say no to such adorableness!

Days left: 82

I'm looking forward to Spring Break: peace and some relaxation. Although, I really shouldn't be complaining since I very intentionally created a relaxing, low-key last semester for myself course-wise. Either way, the quiet and a chance to do what I want whenever I want is appealing. (One thing: must remember to take a loaf of bread from the dining hall one of these days, and get some peanut butter from Durfees).

Just recovered for an awful awful flu this weekend. It hit me hard starting Saturday night, and by Sunday I was useless. By Monday, I was so incredibly woozy (still am today, in fact), but I forced myself to go to Programming at 11:35, which is ironic because all those days that I wasn't sick I sicked several classes in a row, and now that I am sick and have a very valid reason not to go, I go. Well, I never said I was a rational person, right?

Kitten with (empty) tissue box bc of snuffles

By that night, I was really regretting my decision, and my fever of over 100 degrees was simply not reducing. All I could think about was how in Laura Ingall Wilder's books, Little House on the Prairie, her older sister, Mary I think her name is, loses her sight because of a really high fever. And then that got me thinking about how for that to happen, the fever must have denatured the proteins in the eyes, or maybe the synaptic connections, and all that got me really depressed, because the Tylenol sure wasn't working and my fever was still really high, and even in this day and age, if your fever doesn't go down, flu can still due you in.

Apparently, all semblance of rationality and all kinds of melodrama emerges when your head is overheated past the boiling point of water.

Luckily, by Tuesday morning, thanks to my immune system and the generous company of P. on the preceding few days, I was feeling much better and not like I was going to melt in my own skin into a heap of denatured proteins. Unfortunately, my pset for programming was due at 9:55pm (random time, seriously) and I had been too sick the last few days to have been working on it or even think about going to any of the office hours. Somehow I cranked through it, and churned out a passable version, though not without the details smoothed out as I usually did, only to get an email from Professor Yang after the 9:55 deadline saying that they were extending the deadline. Wish they had let us know sooner, but I guess this way I was incentivized to be further along than I otherwise would have been?

In any case, still have a bit of a fever, but incredibly glad to be feeling better, and looking forward to the break. Would really love to go somewhere, but where?

EDIT: Also, not just me, but apparently a large number of the Seat Yourself cast came down with flu, thanks to Max. WHAT!

Days left: 90

Extraordinarily exhausted today. Not enough water? Not enough food? Not enough sleep? No idea why.

Days left: 90

Conclusion: planning for trips with more than 2 people is complex.

I mean, I knew this before we started, but the full extent...whew, experiencing it is just different from predicting.

In any case, am supremely pleased with myself. Although the rehearsals for Please Seat Yourself take an incredible amount of time, say 5+ hrs (intense!!), I am thoroughly enjoying my new experience! I've never been in a play before and it's fun! It's a well written and very interesting play to boot, so I think I quite lucked out. I like the director and the producer, and I know the people running it (K. and A.) so that helps. Plus I've met people I didn't know before, and probably wouldn't have met if not for this play.

Although rehearsals are long and tiring and take up lots of time, it's fun. And you know what they say about suffering and friendship. Plus spending so much time cooped up in the same room with each other. It's a pity that tech is only a week long. I shall be sad when we are finished. So in the meantime, I will try to enjoy the process as much as I can.

Days left: 91

Three months left until graduation!

This means time to write/examine my graduation bucket list in earnest.

Not sure what should go on it yet, hm...

Days left: 92

If you google image "Saturday" this is one of the first results. Pretty! It's how I feel most Saturday afternoons...

Another Feb Club! My third. Sig Ep was clean and roomy inside last night, and could fit quite a number of people. It'd make a pretty nice place, actually--wouldn't mind living there for real. They have a patio area, when you go in the room feels large since the entrance actually leads into stairs going down into an open lower level. And there's a balcony where you can be a creeper and watch people on the level underneath you.

It wasn't too crowded when I went last night. Saw a few of the regulars, like E. and also J., who's a cog sci senior and hence is in senior seminar now and was in junior seminar last year with me. He came up and remarked on how he was surprised to see me out, did I go out often, because I'd seemed like the academic type?

Hm, I'm really amused that anyone would assume that about me. Then they really don't know any better, haha! I guess when you assume you make an ass out of me and you?

M. led us to the Rugby House after, where we saw G. and her friend...um...whose name escapes me right now, but anyway, they seem like good friends since I see one and then the other at all (of the few) parties. When we walked in, there were a couple of guys with red cups in their hands. One of them asked, Are you all twenty-one? I think I might have rolled my eyes and said something to the effect of, What do you think? He, or maybe one of the other guys said, Funny how everyone's suddenly twenty-one.

Everything was happening upstairs, so we walked up a flight of rickety old stairs (I SWEAR the wood of one of the floor boards buckled under me, and I'm not that heavy I hope) and into this little room with kitchen things that was quite crowded. There really weren't all that many people, so it was small and packed which personally is worse than large and packed (I'm more claustrophobic when it comes rooms and walls than people it seems). The room connected to it had the lights off, and (good!) music playing (actually, Sig Ep had really good dance music too, which was a happy surprise). D. and I stayed there for a few minutes and then left, because we wanted to try our luck at T for the first time, which we laughingly and hurriedly braved the howling north winds to get to.

Days left: 93

It really is the case that the sweetest moments in life come from the simplest things.

Like a warm day in February that feels so tantalizingly, deliciously like spring, makes me feel nothing but love in my heart. Yes, cheesy I know.

Lingering and laughing over dinner with good friends makes meals taste better.

I have duty tonight which means I have to stay around in Silliman from 10pm to 3am. But I think I rather like it, with the window is open, the air smelling faintly of the dampness of growing things, and blasting Only Girl in the World and Mine with the bass on high.

Maybe it also has to do with the fact that I turned in a few applications today? Either way...now that I think about it, when I was focusing on my criteria, I almost failed. Versus this week, when I focused on being happy and only doing things that give me happiness, my quality of life increased a lot. I think I did tons better on my different criteria. Curiously, all that's really different is how the question is asked: does this help one of my goals versus will I feel happy doing this? Perhaps the lesson here is that instead of trying to reach goals that we think will help us be happy, we should just ask ourselves before we do something whether it will bring us happiness. Sometimes, this can be along the lines of, will doing this problem set or not doing this problem set make me feel happy or unhappy? Haha, and almost always, I'm finding that the answer is yes, it will make me happy to get this pset under my belt, and yes I will be very unhappy rushing it at the very end.

Days left: 95

Another Feb Club under my belt. Repeat soon!

And most effective motivation to get to the gym: feeling energetic and great and positive afterward. The feeling itself makes me want to go again!

Days left: 96

I started looking through package deals to Puerto Rico, and there were quite a few good ones to be had, which was really exciting!

Also, I need to get my inactive self to the gym...but so difficult when feeling lazy right now...

Days left: 96

Very first Feb Club tonight, at 356 (or was it 365?) Lynwood. And you know what? It was GLORIOUS. Haven't had so much fun or enjoyed myself so much in a while. Clearly I need to live a little. I am SO THERE for the next few. YES.

Days left: 97

We're well past the 100 days mark. This is when it really starts to get scary. Oh dear...

The bright side is now I really want to start planning spring break in earnest. Before, the ideas we threw around were just that: ideas. Now, it'll involve looking into hotels and flights and reality will start to set in.

Yesterday was Valentines. Came back to my room right at the end of the day to find flowers at my doorstep: a bouquet of white tulips with petals laced in purple and soft green leaves. Absolutely lovely! Spring is my favorite season, and nothing represents that better than tulips, with their fresh green, and especially in light, pastel colors like white and purple.

I found them a comfortable spot on my coffee table, and tomorrow when there's morning light that's the most flattering, I'll take a picture and share it.

Happy Valentines Day.

Days left: 103

Today I feel better. I've come to terms that this is the state of the world. I'm pleased with my productivity today, despite my busy schedule on Wednesdays. It help me to realize how happy it makes me to be productive. I looked over Linda's update as I promised, picked up my package (a textbook) from the Master's Office, got the sound files from Brent so I can run tests on the code tomorrow, updated the YRURP website, and remembered to bring the Mongolian bowls to Angela in programming. I'm proud.

I think Lin Dai-yu's study in Story of the Stone must look something like this

I also find myself enjoying Behavioral Perspectives more and more. I was talking to Ak today before class started, and I said something to the point of, I feel comfortable at SOM. And I realized that this is true. At Yale College, I feel cloistered, like I can't say what I want. But SOM, I have the same feeling as high school and before, a freedom to ask questions, to not be judged by what I say. I can't be sure why I feel this difference, but I feel comfortable and at home at Yale business school in a way I don't elsewhere on campus. And the students in my SOM class are so much interesting than the average Yale college; you can tell that they're from all over the world. They have such diverse experiences. It's much more exciting and interesting. I only wish I'd discovered taking classes at SOM earlier.

So you might have noticed that the number has suddenly jumped up. In past posts on my blog I've been counting up the number of days into the term, but the counter I have on my desktop is counting down the number of days left from now until the end of the semester. Instead of counting it out myself, it's much easier to just look at the number on the counter. Plus since people are risk-adverse, the idea that I have only 103 days left, is a much stronger number emotionally than oh we're 30 days into the semester.

030

Some days I just get so frustrated with things.

025

Happy New Year!

新年快乐!

023

In honor of New Year's and the upcoming Year of the Rabbit, a collection of bunnies!

023

So my logic today begins like this: it's not as if I can predict what will make me happy in the future very accurately.

This is especially true given my occasionally capricious nature. It's not that I enjoy shifting from one thing to the next, but it's something that happens naturally for me. I go through many ideas and life-views, and since I want reaffirming data for each, new pieces of information (anecdotes from friends, or stories about the success of this or that person) that can tip the balance in favor of one view or the other are like to do just that.

I'm not excusing myself from the fact that I do this; it's definitely my own doing that makes me flit like I do and my lack of steadiness in pursuing expertise in a few special areas.

Maybe now that I see how this unhappy it makes me, I'll take steps to minimize the disappointment I feel in my own accomplishments.

The other reason I'm so indecisive is this pressure to pick just one thing, or a few things, that I feel from my above conclusions. I know I'm not satisfied with my capriciousness, and I try to force myself into selecting something to remedy that. The problem is then the pressure I feel to choose makes me constantly question whether what I've chosen is really "right." But the thing is that the question of "rightness" isn't (haha) the right question. It's not as if I have this one time to choose and that's it, no more choices in the future. I can do what I've found to be the right path at the time, and not be affected by hindsight bias.

022

Just when I thought I was getting a handle on things this semester, I realize I something really important slip by.

I was planning on applying to the 2-year Bioethics Fellowship with NIH, which would have been an absolutely fantastic opportunity. I even went as far as to ask Dr. Latham for a recommendation last term, almost 2 months before the application was due. So I had plenty of time to work on it. But somehow, in the middle of holidays, the start of the new year, shopping for classes in the new semester, and other things, I let it slip by. Today, I finally realized it, and when I looked up the due date again, I realized, with incredible disappointment, that the deadline had already passed: January 15th. That's more than half a month ago!!

This is beyond procrastination.

I don't think this has happened to me before, especially given how interested I was and how much I was looking forward to applying.

You can imagine my disappointment. With myself, with the situation. Either way, at this point, there's no chance of asking for an extension or trying to apply late, given the amount of time that's passed.

This episode means that
1) I will be extremely invested in making sure something similar doesn't happen again
2) I will be very motivated to apply to other opportunities I'm very interested in

017

SNOW! Again?


Connecticut seems to be getting more than its fair share of snow storms this winter. Or is this pretty much consistent with averages?


Bedtime last night at 1am -- could have done better but it was hard to sleep with the groaning and clanking of buses as they passed underneath my window. Resolved for some yoga and pilates in the evening to help with sleeping better.


Also, I resolve to take more pictures this semester. Of Yale, friends, get-togethers, and things that happen.

016

In and ready for bed by 12:30 tonight! Well played, Amy, well played. Right on target!


Edit: actually, ended up being more like 2:00am. Yikes.

014

I'm planning on testing out a new schedule next week. Our brains are habitual creatures -- structure is good for it, like a scaffold.

Time -- so important. (Maybe that's why I study time perception?) I want to have enough time to do all my work, have a kick-a** senior project, to get a job that I'd be really excited to work on, and hang out with friends, work on a writing project, and have a fun-filled semester to boot. WHEW!

...it does sound kind of impossible doesn't it?

012

At the end of each week, I'll going to analyze how I'm doing at meeting each of my goals.

So how am I doing so far?

010

{source}

Schedule set!

After deliberating forever (deleting it from my schedule, adding it, deleting it, and then finally adding it again), I finally decided to drop Modern Unconscious. Lecture was okay, the studies were interesting, but I don't know if I really want to take it and be there in the classroom. Frankly, the course felt like it took forever. As a student of time perception, I knew what that meant.

It's good to feel like after 7 semesters at Yale, I finally can make good choices for classes, based on what I want to do, not what I think I should or ought to do.

So here it is:
CGSC 472 Directed Research Cognitive Science
CGSC 491 Senior Colloquium and Project
CHNS 225 The Dream of the Red Chamber
CPSC 112 Introduction to Programming
MGT 562 Behavioral Perspectives on Management

Excited!

Day 008

It's amazing to think about it, but it's my final semester at college. When I was a freshman more than three years ago, who thought that this day would actually come?

Even if we are stubborn, time will always drag us forward.

The facts:

Start: Jan 10 - Spring classes begin
End: May 23 - Commencement

Total number of days = 134 days