I’m Craving School

My boundaries may just be blurring in dangerous ways.

I think I’ve been spending way too long on Reddit. Part of me regrets signing up, because you can subscribe to communities, and they pop up on your Reddit homepage. When you’ve been accustomed in life to having to go out of your way to even get ice cream, Reddit shoving its content into your face tirelessly is a something you’ll readily take. Jokes on me though, I spend way too much time these days.

Reddit may not be the villain here, but it is on the verge of turning me into my own worst nightmare: a mindless content consuming drone. Nightmare? Scratch that. It’s the end of me, my biggest fear.

So I’ve been scrolling through an amount of posts that would put my… ex-math textbook to shame. It was thick. It also put a serious smile on my face to call it my ex-textbook. I’m almost longing for a new one now, three months is the sort of vacation no one should be allowed to have.

If I digress for a minute, just imagine the sort of profits the entertainment industry would make if people had three month long holidays. After a point, people would begin to pay the trashiest posters on Reddit, Instagram, whatever else they use, just to fulfil their daily cravings.
Although, it’s not exactly as if sitting at your desk at work or at school during a quiet moment, you don’t feel the urge to check Buzzfeed. I guess as long as the world has people bored and numbed, the creative industry will soar. The irony is that the creative industry is practically of the Ones Who Broke Away.
But I have resolved to get back onto YouTube. I’ve stayed away from live music recordings for way too long, I can’t lose touch with that!

Anyway, I’ve been mindlessly scrolling for the moment. I guess I didn’t realise how instinctual it had become. This morning, I was reading the newspaper and was on the comics page (no, the actual comics page). I read through a comic I liked, and just for a second, my index finger tensed as if preparing to lift itself up and hit the Upvote button.

Oh shit. The cynical observer in the Man vs Robot war is falling prey to the enemy. This is probably more of the reason I haven’t blogged for so long. I have got to get my brain running again. I’m going to dig out those old physics notebooks.
Jokes on me again, though. The physics notebooks have been out all week, I have sort of been aware of my Reddit (semi?) addiction for a while now. It’s pretty much numbed my mind, killed my wit and is retarding my writing style too. That’s actually why I’ve been afraid to write anything significant for a while. I know I’m going to look back on this and cringe hard.

I never thought you’d hear me say it. I’m craving school right now. I need the school environment to get me interested in learning again. I need a change, I guess.

If I read this post title in isolation, I’d check me into a mental institution, but I guess Stockholm Syndrome’s hit me. After reading this, I’m just fucking ready to check into university, help me.

But the guitar sort of helps. I’m doing almost nothing creative these days, save maybe a three-chord arpeggio riff, nothing major. My other blog’s nearly dead and I haven’t written any poetry in a long while. Even though I nearly die almost every time I walk back home from design class, there’s tons of fodder, but I need to become more receptive to it again. Maybe then I’ll tell you about how awkward it can be to be a science student among art majors. Huh? What is this ‘friend’ you speak of? Is it a new algorithm? A mathematical mnemonic? New drug in the pharmaceutical lab? …Oh, wait.
It’s a long story I will attempt sometime soon when I’m not cringing as I write. I’m really just thinking out loud right now.

The guitar still helps though I’m restricted to only playing it, because like every other muscle in my body, my vocal chords are stiff and I cannot sing to save my life. I’m trying, but sheesh, I’d really rather not do it with anyone around. Things are literally going like this.

Me: (attempts to mumble)
Mum: (mildly concerned looking out of the window) “Is a kid crying in the next building?”
Me: (tries to cover up mouth movements by pretending there’s something stuck in my teeth)
Me: (tries to hit the lower notes)
Mum: (looking out the window) “Bikes can be so noisy.”
Me: (tries to falsetto but vocal chords are in the middle of a union strike over unemployment)
Mum: “alkjmp Darn that construction!”
What?!

So yeah, not my best period. I was trying to play along with my iPod today, and it probably wasn’t a great idea. I’m playing along with the track and Elliott Smith begins to sing, and I forget to play, because it has been a really long time since I’ve heard a real singing voice and one that’s not begging for death. Elliott Smith also just happens to be amazing.

At least so far, my fingers have only been stiff some five times.

Who knows, maybe the truth really is Stockholm syndrome. I kinda miss trashing school.

Jaded

Do I want a change of scenery?
It’s the fifteenth time this wall has passed by me
Or fifteen more, easily

Mission’s lost signals to ground control
And now my mind’s truly alone
Is anyone home?

And I look to the skies for a sign of the end
But the laws of space and time have bent
I declare I cannot be ment

I’ve walked this fine line fifty times
And repeated these fifteen lines
Leave me alone and I’ll be a walking landline

I am a looping, skipping tape
How much more can you take
With the ever-rising stakes?

Snap me out of this apathy
It’s got a stranglehold on me
My motivation steamed and is nowhere to be seen,

Just lie a little…
Just try a little…
Die a little…
Lye a little…
Cry a little…
Was always sci-fi to me,
And now it’s all I see in me.

Musings of an Exam Giver

It’s self explanatory. It’s addictive.

WARNING: Major geekish/chemistry/physics avalanche to hit in five, four, three, two…

Crap.

Well, here goes.

 

See me right of the sunset
On your color TV screen
Powdered, yellow as I can get
If you know what I mean
Nitro-groups to the left of me
And nitro-groups to the right
Ain’t got no looks
But warn the kooks
Don’t you start no fire

I’m DNP, not dynamite
DNP- your chemistry ain’t right!
DNP ain’t shit that flows
DNP – watch me explode!

 

Leaving group to the rest of the compound:
Babe, baby, baby, I’m gonna leave you
I said baby, you know I’m gonna leave you
I’ll leave you when the ‘lectric charge,
Leave you when the ‘lectric charge comes a-rolling
Leave you when electrons come along.

 

The aldehyde musician
Went in for a trade
With a tip of a hat
Over counter he bade
Good day mister, I’m no trouble to men
Just a humming traveler, I’ve come alone
I’ve no gun, but I’ve a microphone
But I’d trade my Carbon for a Hydrogen,
For then, I’d finally have found my ke(y)-tone.

 

When you ask the chemist for recommendations and they pass something over the counter with an evil grin and say, “Try Nitrotoluene” and you smile for a minute before realising that they meant trinitrotoluene, or TNT.
[probably the reason why you can’t get TNT at a chemists’.]

 

Cuz they always said the sky’s the limit.

 

In the time of chimpanzees I was a monkey
Butane in my veins
And every other chemical compound in my head
And in spare sockets in my eyes.
       – Studying chemistry.

 

“Where it’s at
I got two study tables and a pile of books

 

All my life
I’ve been searching for something
Something never comes
Never leads to nothing
Nothing satisfies but I’m getting close

– And then one day, Heisenberg gave up and left it all to uncertainty.

 

Concentration of the reactants is inversely proportional to time. Sketch the graph… Concentration decreases over time.
Hold it, that’s my graph!

 

A + B + C = pi.
Sigh. I miss the times when crust + filling + bake + icing = pie.

 

Who knows what conversations go on between radicals when they undergo decomposition?
“Welcome to my breakdown.
I hope I didn’t scare you.
That’s just the way we are when we come down.”

 

Bohemian Lament

Is this a real pile? Is it just fall-acy?
Caught in a landslide
Of books sliding down on me
Open your eyes
Look up to the ceilings and see
I’m just a poor boy
Pile of books taller than me,
Knowledge easy come, easy go
Little high, little low
Any way the wind blows,
The answers seem to blow with them
Away from me

Mama just killed a man
Just the turn of a page,
Now he’s confused and filled with rage

Mama, the lesson’d just begun
But now I’ve gone and thrown it all away

Mamaaa ooooooooooo
Didn’t mean to make you cry
But I won’t be done with this by tomorrow
Grind on, grind on
As if nothing really matters.

Too quick
It’s time has come
Sends shivers down my spine
Eyes shutting all the time

Goodbye everybody
I’ve got to go
Gotta leave the world behind and face the books

Mama, oooooo
I don’t wanna die
And sometimes wish I’d studied a bit before

I see a little silhouette of a book
Scandium, scandium, can you be less scandalous
Thunderbolts and lightning are just electrons flying at you
Galileo, Galileo, Galileo, Galileo Galileo didn’t see this coming,
No-o-o-o-o.

I’m an unpaired electron, no body loves me
Unpaired and Lost from his metal was he
Spare him his life of unfulfilled valency
Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?
Bismillah! No, we will not let you go
Let him go!
Bismillah! We will not let you go
(Let him go!) Bismillah! We will not let you go
(Let me go.) Will not let you go
(Let me go.) Will not let you go. (Let me go.) Ah
No, no, no, no, no, no, no
(Oh mamma mia, mamma mia) Mamma mia, let me go
Bismuth has an orbital put aside for me
For me
For mee!

So you think the plain ground state was made for I?
So you think I’ll just keep spinning here till I die?
Oh, gaining, velocity baby,
Just gotta get out, just gotta get right out of here

(Put down the book, and)
Nothing really matters
All the prep there can be
Nothing makes the difference
For me.

 

 

Revere a million prayers
And draw me correctly into your pulpiness (ruled exam paper)
But there’s nothing there
Light only shines for those who’ve studied
Unleash a million pen marks
And blank out then erase them babe
Do you have no mind
It’s like it died
Long ago (Sometime last night)

Sleep feels warm to the touch
It can bring me back to life
But chemistry blazes me alive
Now I’m dead inside.

You’re free to give brains a fry
Whilst I am crushed and pulverised
Because you need control
Now I’m the one who’s letting go
You like to give an inch
Whilst I must convert to centimeters
But now I’ve nothing left
You have no cares and I’m sleep bereft

Your skins feels warm to caress
There may be magic in your pages
On the outside, you’re ablaze and alive
But you’re deadly inside

Fill me now, with expertise
I need you to sit in my brain
Open up to me, stop hiding from me
It’s hurting, babe
Only you can help me pass
Don’t leave me out in the cold
Don’t leave me out to die
I gave you everything,
I can’t give you anymore
Now I’ve become sleep deprived.

 

When the super-important, favourite-child, Earth-shattering discovery of a ‘100% appearing’ question does NOT feature in your paper and you were COUNTING ON it – Butthurt.

 

Believe you me I have a pocket dynamite. It’s not an insulated wire cutting gone wrong.

 

Exams in 5 days.

 

 

I’ve just found the meaning of life.
(On the Internet, no less.)

 

Loki got it easy. He became the god of mischief. Mischief. How easy is that. Try being the god of chemistry. Won’t last a day.
Pull this pin, let this world explode.

 

Light falling on a perfect black body:
“Hello darkness my old friend
I’m back in black!!”

 

It was a sad moment.
Someone said to me, 3DS, as in the Nintendo 3DS.
I had a mini brain crash and was left wondering HOW on earth do you mix a 3d and a 3s orbital like that.
And then another meteor crashed: that of memory.
Hello from your past? Remember Nintendos? You fucking own one.

Oh, crap.

 

The name’s Bond.
Pi bond. Code =.

 

Chemistry is all about observation and educated guesses.

 

The answer my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

How easy would exams have been then!

 

If your mum is practicing to enter a Make the Weirdest Face contest, go ask her for some dihydrogen monoxide.

 

Frenkel defect.
Frenkel’s life: When you work so hard to discover a void, and get a defect named after you.

(At the end of it all)
Frenkel: Frenkly my dear, I don’t give a damn anymore.

 

Effects of chemistry:

Every step that I write is another mistake I’ve made
Every second I waste is more than I can take

I’ve become so dumb
I can’t draw you there
Become so tired, so much less aware
I’m becoming listless
All I want to do
Is catch more of sleep
And care less about you

 

Chemistry textbook: Aniline smells a bit fishy.
– Look at the crow calling the Raven black!

 

At 2 am
And all the coffee junkies
Open their pen-scratched palms
And ask angels made of ticking clocks and garbage scream out,
What will save us
And then the sky opens up
Everybody wants to change the world
Everybody wants to change the world
All I, want to do is try
Wanna try, wanna try, wanna try
Wanna try, wanna try now
To change the test date

EXCEPT IT DOESNT RAIN ENOUGH NOOOO

City rains: The rain, my friend, is blowing in the wind,
The rain is blowing in the wind

I still don’t think it’ll ever be enough! They’d make us wade through the knee deep water and write the paper if they had to!

Sometimes I wonder if My Chemical Romance got their name after spending long harrowing hours with their chemistry textbooks.

 

“Aromatic amines are less basic than aliphatic amines.”

Of course are, have you tried sitting all day drawing hexagons over and over?

 

Rho rho rho your charge
Gently down the currents
Merrily merrily merrily merrily
Life’s an iostream.

 

C/C++: making hashtags cool before they were even called hashtags. #pound #include

 

Note: Despite all I’ve written about electrons, after a day without electricity (well, mostly) I’ve rediscovered my respect for the tiny unseen particles that control so much of our lives.

 

 

That’s about all of the rubbish I managed to squeeze in with 3 weeks or so of pure exam giving.

Whether or not it amounts to much in my papers is yet to be seen. But I hope you enjoyed this post!

Bohemian Lament

In my defence, I get bored.

 

Is this a real pile? Is it just fall-acy?
Caught in a landslide
Of books sliding down on me
Open your eyes
Look up to the ceilings and see
I’m just a poor student
Pile of books taller than me,
Knowledge easy come, easy go
Little high, little low
Any way the wind blows,
The answers seem to blow with them
Away from me

Mama just killed a man
Just the turn of a page,
Now he’s confused and filled with rage

Mama, the lesson’d just begun
But now I’ve gone and thrown it all away

Mamaaa ooooooooooo
Didn’t mean to make you cry
But I won’t be done with this by tomorrow
Grind on, grind on
As if nothing really matters.

Too quick
Its time has come
Sends shivers down my spine
Eyes shutting all the time

Goodbye everybody
I’ve got to go
Gotta leave the world behind and face the books

Mama, oooooo
I don’t wanna die
And sometimes wish I’d studied a bit before

I see a little silhouette of a book
Scandium, scandium, can you be less scandalous
Thunderbolts and lightning are just electrons flying at you
Galileo, Galileo, Galileo, Galileo Galileo didn’t see this coming,
No-o-o-o-o.

I’m an unpaired electron, nobody loves me
Unpaired and Lost from his metal was he
Spare him his life of unfulfilled valency
Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?
Bismillah! No, we will not let you go
Let him go!
Bismillah! We will not let you go
(Let him go!) Bismillah! We will not let you go
(Let me go.) Will not let you go
(Let me go.) Will not let you go. (Let me go.) Ah
No, no, no, no, no, no, no
(Oh mamma mia, mamma mia) Mamma mia, let me go
Bismuth has an orbital put aside for me
For me
For mee!

So you think the plain ground state was made for I?
So you think I’ll just keep spinning here till I die?
Oh, gaining, velocity baby,
Just gotta get out, just gotta get right out of here

(Put down the book, and)
Nothing really matters
All the prep there can be
Nothing makes the difference
For me.

Slash and Patch

Oh, the irony of the wonderful place I live in.

So much that’s right is really wrong, and so much more that shouldn’t be wrong, is.

Just something weird I’ve noticed.

When it comes to sex, we are mum. (Not in my school, though.)
No one talks about it.
It’s the giggly-hushy thing. No one knows any better, though.

In sixth grade, we had to fill in some form, and our class teacher was giving us the instructions.

“Write your full name, in capitals, where it says ‘Name’, and only write ‘M’ or ‘F’ where they’ve asked you to write your sex, you don’t need to write the whole thing.”

Oooooooooooo, goes the class. I turned. What happened? Ooooo, did you hear her? Snicker snicker snicker. She said the word.
Class teacher frowns.

In seventh grade, we were studying reproduction in plants. Winks all around.
I believe our science teacher took it really well; she said to us, “Wait till next year, you have human reproduction in store!”

Eighth grade. Biology. Second term.
The chapter everyone had been, uh, waiting for.
Suppressed smiles, lit up eyes, looks thrown around, snickers and meaningful glances.
I remember some of my friends saying before we began the chapter, you rankers should watch it this time. We’re gonna ace this test. Full marks.
(It was at least mildly amusing when I somehow did score a full on that bio test, and waved my paper, complete with badly proportioned, crooked diagrams, under their nose.)
This was the build up to the chapter, anyway.

Our biology teacher had it lucky: she was the teacher of the two official, branded worst classes of eighth grade.
You guessed it, one was mine, and we were only second worst.

She had a tough time with The worst. She decided she didn’t want to go through the snickering again.

So we got a pre- Human reproduction lecture from a very peeved biology teacher.

You are eighth graders, you are big children, and hopefully a lot better than <whichever one it was, The Worst Class>. I hope I can expect you not to act like small kids, if I hear a single laugh, whisper, or a giggle, your class has had it from me.

Hardly fair, this was the first time we were to have any chapter remotely about us. Whatever that meant.

 

(Extra info for those who’d like to know how the class went: there were muffled grins. It was building, really.
Somehow, the class ended with our frustrated teacher telling us something about HIV and prostitutes. Weird.
The next day on, it was like a normal lecture. Just a lesson again.

One of my buddies was telling me about her experience with the initiation of The Chapter (or, as it used to be referred to around that time, that chapter *wiggle eyebrows*). She said, again, the urge to giggle or smile was building up strong, and at one point, someone in her class cracked a really lame and pointless joke.
The class roared with laughter.)
(Buddy and I were in different schools, back then.)

I suppose you can call it weird behaviour on our part, but I do think we got a really negative response from our teachers too.
Imagine how normal the first class would’ve been if the teachers had first talked us through our side of things. (Later, they seemed to escape into the technical biological aspects of things.) If they had just told us that it’s a very normal thing, and eventually it will happen with everyone, or almost everyone, at least. If they hadn’t made it seem like being remotely interested in how your own body works, and apart from the digestive, circulatory and respiratory systems too, somehow made you a bad kid. In sixth grade, something had blown up, and a teacher of ours had spent fifty minutes talking to us about how there’s nothing special or different about having a best friend from the opposite gender (which I agree with) and that ‘love’ was only for the silver screen. She said love only happens in movies.
That was something, though, that even as a sixth grader I doubted.
(She was even one of those teachers everyone wanted to please, because being good in her class was worth points to your class ‘team’, and the ‘team’ with the most points got a surprise at the end of a term.
Yep, it’s come from not wanting to think a bad thought against your favourite teacher to writing about these very things that are embarrassing in hindsight. There’s been some stuff on this very post that I’ve found my fingers drifting over the backspace for: no, this is too embarrassing, I can hardly believe now that we went through this as a class! But then I think to myself, if it was, it was. I can’t delude myself to believe it wasn’t. I don’t think I questioned most of the things going in and out of my life till rock music found me, and pretty late too. (More on that another day.) But I suppose there is still something good to consider: that today, I am awake. I’m putting out what I think and feel. I am not going mad, because I can talk here. In a way, my puking zone, but there’s always food for thought.
Embarrassing as it may seem, it’s perhaps helped me turn out the way I have today. I’ll never know.)

We’ve come from there to the boys in my class pushing to wear skirts in October when it will get very hot. (Nope, no comments. They say, we’ll borrow skirts from the girls.)

[UPDATE FROM A MONTH LATER: THEY DID IT. I’M SO PROUD.]
(Details another day, perhaps.)

We’ve come to a point where we almost had a class discussion on masturbation. (I said almost. Not yet, though.)

We talk openly about sexuality, about the idea of love, and feeling and identity. And there’s a comfort in looking to the people around you and knowing that you can talk about anything that comes mind, no one’s going to harshly judge.
(And if they do, like I always tell my shyer surveyees, you can totally judge back. There’s no hard feelings.)
My friends and I recently had a big talk about crossdressing and not dressing, and prom clothing.
(About turning up at a prom in boxers, and about coming in the opposite gender’s dress code. And asexuality (mine, to be specific.))

It makes me wonder why it’s such a problem to talk about things, that ultimately matter.

(Yes, I suppose your last-year-of-school-prom-cum-first-prom-ever-if-happens dressing ideas can matter? I don’t know. I’d go if I can rig the DJ’s system. Or blast out AC/DC myself there. My guitar and I, here we come!)

 

On a different note, I passed by a newspaper stall that had twenty copies of a local paper with the headline, Living the Shitty Life.
I can guess they probably meant it literally, but wasn’t shit a swear? I remember it being censored in the music video of Longview by Green Day (a song which is pretty much a good listen if you’ve been interested in the last bit I’ve written. It’s a very open, honest piece where singer-guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong talks about getting so bored that masturbation becomes boring; the song was a breakthrough then, because no one would talk about such stuff in the ’90’s. Similar to what I’d talked about, listeners of that time found it liberating. It’s also got a pretty good bassline.)
The irony (and this is something a lot of my friends have pointed out to me before, and I will hand the observation down to y’all) is that shit, censored all over, is pretty much the first swearword a kid here learns, and they don’t even know it, it’s so normal. Most kids will tell you that the first rude word they used was stupid, or idiot, or in some cases, even shut up.
(You must remember that I see kid cases every week, I play basketball.)
Yet SO much other stuff, including stuff that happens within your body and your head, has been silenced all this while.

We developed as human beings, the smarter species, the thinking feeling beings, the difference between us and them being “humanity, “compassion” and “civility”.
But so-called civility has taken such control, we’ve reduced us to parodies of ourselves. Emotions aren’t weaknesses, thoughts are not a waste of time (I have a maths test tomorrow), being different is not being defective, and being the same as another person is not lame (neo-aggressive unique individual thought that shames you for thinking like another person) (not pro-plagiarism). When all this is the only stuff left to distinguish us from the robots that we always vilify, (besides the organic nature of our skins versus their lasting stainless steel surfaces, and the fact that the average human is slowly falling behind the robot) why would we try our hardest to discard those elements?
When we have only one life to do everything possible, it wouldn’t make sense trying to hide behind a blueprint forever. At least for the moment, humans are born, not cultivated, created, or designed.
Thoughts are the things that shape what we become, and hiding them means not only suppressing something that could potentially change your world, but maybe someone else’s too, which I find to be the most beautiful thing about an artist. The ability to express a thought, and to have it reach someone else, far away, with whom it may resonate, or on whom it may leave an impact. The ability to spread an influence.

The way to live, at least if you feel you have something to say to the world, is practically to live by the lyrics of the most meaningful song in my life, Butterflies and Hurricanes.

It says:
Change everything you are
And everything you were
Your number has been called
Fights and battles have begun
Revenge will surely come
Your hard times are ahead
Best, you’ve got to be the best
You’ve got to change the world
And use this chance to be heard
Your time is now

Change everything you are
And everything you were
Your number has been called
Fights and battles have begun
Revenge will surely come
Your hard times are ahead
Best, you’ve got to be the best
You’ve got to change the world
And use this chance to be heard
Your time is now

Don’t let your self down
And don’t let yourself go
Your last chance has arrived
Best, you’ve got to be the best
You’ve got to change the world
And use this chance to be heard
Your time is now

And a beautiful piano solo.

 

The clock is laughing in my face.

– Brain Stew, Green Day.

Wish me luck for that maths test.

A Cringeworthy Story

We had a bit of an exciting event today.

One class was putting on a show, and their performance included a guitars and piano, a cover of a song in between.

Good guys, they chose to look behind rather than ahead of them.

(My good luck, they weren’t playing any, say, Ed Sheeran stuff or anything, in the name of a guitar song!)

They were covering Bohemian Rhapsody. (Not all of it, of course.)

Now believe me when I say I feel lucky. A lot of people know Queen, and know this song pretty well, a nice change from my situation a couple of year ago.

So they begin singing along with the singer.

Behind me, in the audience, a bunch of hipster 11th graders sat.

Midway through the second verse, a girl behind me realises that, oh, if people are singing along, this must be a popular song. She nudges her friend.

“Which song?” she asks.

“This is… Uh… Umm….”
I’m already shouting out in my head, Bohemian Rhapsody, and somewhere looks like a good place to begin!
(The cringe begins here, too.)

“Uh, this song is…
<recollection> ah, yes, Bohemian Rhapsody,” says her friend.

But she’s not done yet.
“by…”, she continues.

“Umm…. Ah, Panic At The Disco.”

This is it, this is the whole point of this post, this  is a real Cringe, with a capital C.

But hey, I’m not that condescending, besides, I’m in verbal paralysis, I don’t think of telling them that they’re missing the better picture: it’s Queen’s song, not Panic at the Disco’s, that’s a cover! And the song goes on.

 

 

A verse later, the discussion furthers.

“This is the song from Suicide Squad, isn’t it?” the inquirer inquires.

“Yeah dude, and he’s playing it spot on.” Interlocutor replies.

I’m actually kind of excited, because if they haven’t heard the Queen version yet, they have something to look forward to in life.

Me, I can look forward to hearing the song again. And hoping they realise how wrong that was!

 

It’s incredible how people can screw up with such confidence.
(I should know, I’ve done the same, but in bio practicals.)

I’ll leave you with something to wonder in amazement at:

Who needs speed breakers when your roads can do the job?
#TheRainsAreHere

Journaling My Journal (The End of it)

Following up from my physics journal completion tryst from over the last two days.

 

Well, life lessons are everywhere. And today, I suppose I learn that the resilient do win!

 

So today was school. I didn’t bunk, there wasn’t the slightest rainshower, we had our classroom changed (and hence no rat in the picture) and we didn’t get a PT period.

Basically, all my checkpoints failed.

But I won.

I completed one experiment during some free time I had in the morning in school, and I said to my friend, we’ll take it as it comes.

And it came in the form of victory, and it was sweet.

Our physics Teach’ came in today, and asked for the journals straight up. My major concern at this point was that I hadn’t drawn any diagrams in my journal. (I was hoping here that I would get away with two teeny experiments less.)

Teach’ then said it was alright not to have drawn the diagrams or observation tables at the moment, that could be done later. (We wouldn’t have the time later in the year to write the whole big mess, the tiny details could be added in later. That was the purpose of having given us this task in the vacations in the first place. But well, chances like that are sort of wasted on us!)

I did turn in my journal, and though I almost got in trouble because I have a sort of small handwriting, and because of that, it seemed to Teach’ like I had written a hundred and fifty pages worth of experiments rather than two hundred, (and I choked back shock and a yawn here) things turned out fine, and I got the coveted tick against my name.

That’s it. Just a tick.

Everything I have done, over three blog posts, no less (:P), just for a tick.

But it felt good; I felt accomplished.

I don’t think I’ve ever fist pumped for having finished school work before, but I did today. I looked at my bored buddy beside me, I said, hell yes! She glanced up and said, yes, alright, sure. Congratulations.

It was a victory, in a way, and I can really sleep tonight.

In the end though, Teach’ did relent and prolong his deadline to Monday. Who can resist that weekend bonanza. Go right ahead, kill Saturday already!

A friend of mine came up and told me that he would begin his journal today.

Suit him, and good luck to him.

As for me, I have a beautiful, unsoiled weekend ahead, with a juicy double header Women’s cricket World Cup matches on Sunday.

So all’s well that ends well.

This is awesome. 🙂

Journaling My Journal (Again.)

Working on my journal again, a follow up from this.

Here we go again, how much can I finish today? All of it, I hope!

 

Lithium carbonate salts are used as antidepressants.
That’s probably why the Nirvana song Lithium is named so.

 

Reverse biased diodes:
a) something that’s existence I will need to know about, and very well too.
b) A description that works bloody well for me.

By the way, it’s a diode with a lower potential at one end. Sounds like someone?

 

Zero error: Something that doesn’t exist for me.

 

Hmm… Going by my physics journal’s guidelines, every phenomenon has a characteristic curve… Wait, what am I thinking!?

 

If you happen to have a biology journal to complete/are a biology student/are interested in biology (in more than a primitive-sex instinct kind of way) find out what an aneurysm is.

I’ll just tell you it’s a great Nirvana song.

 

Last week, while surveying, I met a friend. She had a bandage on her thumb. I asked her, what happened?
She said that she’d completed her biology journal last week.

 

What would happen if a guy named Rio got stunned/paralysed?
He’d become rheostat.

And I thought I’d hit rock bottom yesterday.

 

Oh, when you have the Potential to do it, but your Current situation sucks ’cause the Resistance is too much.
Practicals can can be a lot like Literature: it takes many readings.

Speaking of which, Reading festival is from 25th August this year, and I’m super stoked: Muse will be headlining on Sunday!

Glastonbury was last week, and Foo Fighters rocked Saturday night.

I wonder, if I were to try the Glastonbury traffic, would I complete my journal on the way? (It can take up to 16 HOURS. The traffic gets terrible.) (Super hypothetical situation. I haven’t been to Glastonbury yet. Sigh.)

 

Smriti Mandhana scored a century today, and India beat West Indies. More than beat. I’ll do a separate, proper post on that, sorry I haven’t been putting up too much of the Women’s Cricket World Cup lately. The Tournament’s been really exciting so far, and hopefully, there’ll be less washouts than the Champions Trophy.

 

The day I’ll really appreciate physics is when we can make it rain where it needs to happen (here. HERE! SURFS UP!!) and stop it from raining down on our parades (and matches.)

 

Physics: Plot a graph.
Architecture: Graph (sketch) a plot.

Life is complicated.

 

You know the statue The Thinker?
It’s been sitting in one position for how many centuries.
I’m rivalling it. Soon.

 

From all the precautions we have been given for our practical experiments, it really seems like someone out there cares for us.
That’s why they wrote us 9 precautions, each three lines long. Because no one ever gave them a copy of
Precautions to Take While Experimenting with Adolescent Human Anatomy
(The Complete Hand Care book)
– Foreword by Donald Trump.

 

My wish for the day:

All the downpours came today
And it looks as though they’re here to stay

Oh you Pretty Things (raindrops)
Don’t you know (your absence) is driving me insane

But it looks like the original will stay, no sign of rain.

All the nightmares came today
And it looks as though they’re here to stay.

 

I think journal writing is getting to us all:
My class was so close to having an official class discussion on weed today.

Also. Any physical test to determine whether a reaction has evolved acetic acid involves doing a nose test to check if it smells like vinegar.

So we are legally given marks to sniff acid!?

 

Here’s a trick question for you: what’s the difference between accuracy and precision?
What’s that you say, they’re the same thing?

Haha, joke’s on you, no they’re not. Welcome to the world of physics.

 

Lorem Ipsum dolor sit amet, quot possit his ne.
Yes, I actually did that.

 

6 experiments to go!

 

A friend told me that electrons might have a “consciousness”. There’s speculation.

If they did, I wonder, if each electron in my body volunteered to smear a dot of ink across this paper in front of me, how quick would I be done?

(Yes, we are science students. Please believe me.)

 

Dad says to mum, delete her data. Am I being invalidated?

 

Things I’ve learnt from my mother:
Don’t disturb her when she sleeps. You physically cannot.

The other day, I was ill and puking my guts out. My mother volunteered to sleep next to me, so that if something happens at night, she’d be right there.

Later that night:
I’m in the bathroom puking again. I have the soothing sound of my mother’s snoring for moral support.

Lesson: she will sleep through my marriage if it’s in a different time zone.

(PS: That ain’t happening. Ever.)

 

 

There is such a thing as Reverse Breakdown voltage. I suddenly relate to physics. Or not.

Everything is probability, after all. 😉

 

I showed that bit to my mum. Now I get to hear the history of my life again. I am getting detailed descriptions of every one of the ten thousand-and-one pukes I puked as a baby. (And boy, did I puke till I was two.)
This isn’t about the physics anymore.

 

My little sister has been given a pamphlet in which to write down her favourite cartoon character. I’ve been nominated.

 

If I cross a bridge that’s 100 centimetres long, would I have successfully used a metre bridge?

 

Me to my battery:
We Gotta Hold on to what we’ve got…
It does make a difference if you don’t make it!

11% left. Charger.

 

Cool thing called Zener Effect. It happens when the reverse bias value becomes much larger than the forward potential, the electric field pulls electrons directly out of their bonds to join and increase the current. Sounds like forced army recruitment.

I wonder then, if electrons do have a consciousness, is this unjust?

 

If there was no gravity, the trust fall test would fail.
– said the Optimist.

Ouch, said the Pessimist, rubbing his broken arm.
Only 5 to go!

 

I’m sorry Teach’, but when I’m doing transformers here, I’m thinking of Bumblebee.
The dilemma of a follower of British English: when shortening stuff, would you rather colour retain it’s ‘u’, or you retain some time?

Pride’s the factor. Screw the colour coded resistors, it’s the spelling that matters. (And I try to assert that I’m a science student. Hah.)

If you told me a robber was in town, I’d probably first say, “Where’s my journal?”. Four and a half to go!

Just four to go!
I wonder if the reason why it’s absolutely necessary for us to cover our journals with orange paper is because some officials feel uncomfortable staring at naked notebooks?

 

It’s 12:30 am. I look like the Nevermind smiley.

Goodness, how did kids in the 1700’s survive without all this physics?

No wonder there are so many wartime poems. And wars. Physics leaves no time for that shit. Overthinking needs time. That’s where extra deep/nonsensical war poems come from?

 

My grandparents will laugh at me- my legs hurt from all that sitting.
To say nothing of my wrist.

 

Writing bulb experiments brings back sad anecdotes: for a period of time in sixth grade, despite knowing the spelling of bulb, it always came out ‘bubl’ when I wrote it, because I wrote with cursive. It drove me mad, my friend would laugh hysterically.

I gave up cursive, now, partly. I’ve taken up cursing. Believe me, I’m learning. 😛 Or not. Probability.

 

“Matter can neither be created nor be destroyed”, said Lavoisier, I think. Yet all that is born must die.

Valhar Morghulis.

What if the multiple universes present are connected like a parallel circuit, with some weird glue “current” flowing through them all, binding them together?

 

Ah, the experiment procedure says “Step 1: Procure needed materials.”

SOMEONE APPRECIATES THEIR ORGANISATION.

 

If you really want a high, try staying up real late. You’ll get all light headed and feel like you’re floating real high around.

 

I’m not giving up, only just pausing our blockbuster for today. The Box Office has had enough for a day. The climax comes tomorrow in physics class.

Unless:
1. School’s rained out.
2. Class smells after PT and no one can enter.
3. The rat does it’s job. (I need to elaborate on this, but there’s a rat in our class. Occasionally. But I can see it freaking our teachers out.)
4. Fortune decides to favour the poor, underslept unfortunate.

If not, watch out for the smoke alarms!

3 experiments to go.

Pō pai! (Good night!)

 

---

 

I finally decided to man up and face things head on. Here’s the next day.

Journaling my Journal

Trying to work on finishing my lab manual.

How blockbuster.
I have until sundown to finish writing all my physics practical experiments. Great job, Teach’.
That was delivered to cinematic perfection.

I had all holidays to do it, but I didn’t. I told myself, once my tests are done, I will write the damned thing, it’s all in a day’s work.
And then I let it go.

Till today. Teach’ drops it in so casually, you couldn’t have imagined it causing any damage till the damage was done.
Plenty whaaaaaaat?????’s follow.

I’m writing a physics journal write now. Oh, sorry, I meant right now.
But I’m also journaling my writing of my journal. ‘Cuz I’m bored.

Disclaimer: I don’t suppose this is going to be all grammatically correct, since it’s just a draft of thought. My main aim is to finish the journal, this is ‘cuz I’m bored. And why not, it may even be a guideline to someone else who’s on the last minute thing. (Don’t leave it to then!)

Well, here I am then, physics journal. But I’m doing maths. I’ve planned it out.
20 minutes an experiment. 15 experiments. 5 hours? I should be done by 12! Joy, I may get a few hours of sleep!

Fact: My last journal writing period was exactly like this one.
One day to go, a whole journal to complete.
It took till 1 then, but the good part was that I finished listening to (and pretty much learned by heart) the whole Sounds of Silence album.

I have too much journal work left to include a link. But Google exists and thrives for a reason. Give a listen sometime.

Update on my journal: I’m thinking of throwing in some Lorem Ipsum in the procedure and listening to Nirvana.

Journal writing can be a very creative process.
You need to think of the shortest word to replace a sentence and still need it to look convincingly long. I don’t even have a very big handwriting.

Did you know you can covert a galvanometer into a voltmeter? All you need is a little patience, very high resistance converted in series luck.

14 experiments to go!

Mean heart
Cold heart
Cold heart
Cold heart

These are not only Tourette’s lyrics.

Hello darkness my old Friend
I’ve come to talk with you again
Because I plan to see you and then shut my eyes again
And resume my sleeping

What an idea would bunking be tomorrow?
I’ve 14 experiments and, like 7 hours before the day changes.

Did anyone watch England’s incredible 377-7 against Pakistan in the Women’s World Cup yesterday?? Shame it was rained out, as today’s game (SA vs NZ) looks to be heading to, but Pak had their task cut out. Ayesha Zafar batting pretty well, though.

I feel like Usain Bolt.

“You take a 98% concentration fuming nitric acid and add the acid to three times the amount of sulphuric acid. Do this in an ice bath. Then add glycerin with an eyedropper, drop by drop. You have nitroglycerin.”
Nitroglycerin is a dynamite.

Fight Club is the one time you’ll love chemistry. Unless you love it already.
The part I love, is that I actually understand what he’s saying out there.
Now back to the physics.

I just cut down a three line point to half a line. Then I realised that doesn’t work. Then I had l lengthen it. Manipulate your manipulation. We lead sad lives.

A friend once said they felt wrong being ungrammatical in notes. I think we’ve passed that stage a while ago. I’ve lost all my articles. And most words under three letters. Unless they’re absolutely necessary.

Rain, rain, please leave England
I believe you’re better appreciated here than in no man’s land
Please flood the school entrance till no one can enter
If you’d like to keep going, the more the better
We’ll decide how much to grade my journal based on synchronised swimming with excuses.
(I’ve picked up quite a few on the last survey.)

Hamlet’s eternal dilemma: to take a bathroom break, or not to take a bathroom break.
I’d thought a phone break was out of question, to be honest.

I’m thinking of the song Friday I’m In Love. Would it have hurt to have been a Friday?

Enough with me being a Negative Creep. I’ll be more positive now. Not for the wrong reasons. But I may just finish.

Last year’s physics journal anecdotes:
A friend finished his journal with quite a flourish last year: his procedures included half the class’ names and movie dialogues.

Another pal began writing her journal with music on. Her aim turned out to be a lyric. The page found it’s way to the dustbin. She later tells me, I mostly listen to instrumental stuff while studying.

We’re losing handwriting. And time.

How many pens will I finish in one sitting?

Only twelve to go!!

Spherical Mirror Parallax removal: The one time looking in a mirror is not vanity.

Past journal anecdotes: (not mine this time)
Our physics teacher had once told us that an examiner had been unhappy with a graph in a mirror experiment that labelled ‘u’ (object distance) and ‘v’ (image distance) because she felt it could get mistaken for ‘u’ – initial velocity and ‘v’ – final velocity. Speeds in a mirror! We’ve seen it all.

I actually don’t know who I’m trying to entertain throughout my journal writing.
My chances of finally making it in time? Not.

It started raining suddenly and hard this evening. A cat got surprised and yowled in agony. And again. And again. For ten whole minutes!

I was happy in the haze of a drunken hour
And heaven knows I’m miserable now

– Sounds like me all of last week. And the holidays.
(The song is by the Smiths.)

Yesterday
All my troubles seemed so far away
Now it looks as though they’re here to stay
Oh I believe in yesterday
(and tomorrow, forevermore, procrastination)

Suddenly
I’m not half the man I used to be
There’s a shadow hanging over me
(under my eyes)
Oh yesterday today came suddenly

I He said something wrong now I long for yesterday
(and all my nonexistent summer break)

Soon to come: An Ode to Coffee.
We’re not yet at that stage, it’s like, 8 o’ clock. Still running.
Have I mentioned I feel like Usain Bolt?

My little sister these days knows more practical science than me.
We’ve reached a point where Facebook videos have better science ideas than a 12th grade physics/chemistry textbook.
Who knew the worth of a hot glue gun.
(Soldering guns can be used to fix pickups. Guitarist, alert!)

11 to go!

This countdown seems worth it. Almost. If only it could move as quick as the doomsday clock.

If only this work were cheese
Everyone would be at ease

Cheese and fine wine are a few things that only get better with procrastination, unlike my situation.

Wait, introspection when I’m only 5 down? What am I doing!

I’m looking hopefully to the sky for a number of reasons:

a) When the zetas fill the skies
It’s just our leaders in disguise
b) Rain. Rain? Rain! RAIN!?
c) Looking for the odd-lightning bolt to strike and turn me into the Flash. I need the speed.

At 9:30, as I sit and write a lens experiment, my instincts open up. My situation is clear before me.
Everything comes into ‘focus’. 😉
(Naw, have I fallen this low?)

My book cautions that in an optical bench experiment, “tips of the needles should be as high as the lens.”
I don’t know what to interpret anymore.

I just misread sexiest as sexist. Am I getting defensive, or is the work getting me?
(Don’t worry, it wasn’t in the physics book.)

10 to go.

Declare this an emergency
Come on and spread a sense of urgency
And pull us through
And pull us through
And this is the end
This is the end
Of the world

(There will always be a Muse influence on me. Sue me.)

Teacher, leave us kids alone!
All in all, it’s just another brick in the wall
All in all, it’s just another prick in the wall.

Sigh. 9 to go.

9 still to go, but I’ll keep updating here!

Someone get me a fast forward button for the night.

I’ve realised my maths assumption at the start of this Herculean task was probably as screwed up as I’m going to be by tomorrow morning.

Journal/Practicals anecdote: We were doing an experiment with a travelling microscope.

A pal of mine, great guy asks our teacher, “Ma’am, if I take a microscope with me for a weekend drive, does it become a travelling microscope?”

Practicals fact: My chemistry lab partner and I have set off the smoke alarms in the chemistry lab twice in two weeks already.

Test tubes can get awful c-c-cold
(Talkin’ ’bout my generation)
Why not break some before you get old
(Talkin’ ’bout my generation)

Been there, done that.

I got no motivation
Where is my motivation
No time for the motivation
Smoking my inspiration

(Lyrics to Longview by Green Day.
I can see those alarms going off a third time.)

Has someone taken your faith?
Its real, the pain you feel
You trust, you must
Confess
Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?

Yes, I must confess, I didn’t imagine it was this much. I told a friend in the evening, that with 12 experiments to go, I’ll probably complete by midnight!

She laughed nervously and said, honey, I don’t mean to burst your bubble, but that ain’t happening. Not today.

Shit, I suppose.

Oh no love! You’re not alone
No matter what or who you’ve been
No matter when or where you’ve seen
All the knives seem to lacerate your brain
I’ve had my share, I’ll help you with the pain
You’re not alone!

Oh, dear, I actually want someone to tell me this right now!

We’re now in the next day. Crap. Aborting mission? Almost at that! Maybe a few more…

She says we’ve gotta hold on to what we’ve got.
It doesn’t make a difference if we make it or not.
We’ve got each other and that’s a lot.
For love we’ll give it a shot.
Whoaaaa, we’re half way there
Whoaaaaao, Livin’ on a Prayer
Take my hand and we’ll make it I swear
Whoaaaa, Livin’ on a Prayer

It actually doesn’t make a difference anymore… It’s sleep or coffee, every cell for itself!

So… I end the day with 7 experiments to go… Not too bad progress! I’ll have to fend for myself tomorrow, but I gotta admit, it’s been an interesting journal writing session.

Thanks for keeping me company all these hours! (Sort of.)

Sparks will fly and smoke alarms will ring tomorrow.

Good night!

---

Update!

This is after school, the next day.

For anyone who’d want to know about the smoke alarms, or how the day after went, I’ll let you in on this.

You know, life has funny ways of going about itself.

I decided not to bunk, despite the fact that I slept at 12:30 and got up at 7.

50% of my class bunked. Was that encouraging? We actually had 50% of the class present, that was a surprisingly big number of people attending! 😛

So our present population also had a big number of people who hadn’t completed their journals, and we figured,

If we die, we’ll die together,

And then the first period for the day begins.

It’s English. Our teacher’s busy next week. She wants some extra teaching time.

Guess what? She’s decided to borrow time off physics. Not ten minutes or so. The whole period.

I’ve lucked out! All that was running through my head was this: ‘Well, what do you know! I guess sometimes Fortune does favour the brave!’

So in the end, I have a great experience behind me, and all’s well that ends well!

Just 7 experiments to go!

---

So how did today go?

I’ve decided that both I and other readers would be pretty fed up with scrolling down endlessly through till we both have finger sores (wait a minute. I’ve written a journal for, what, a net worth of ten hours, are we talking about my finger sores?), so Day 2 of my conquest is a separate post.

Follow the madness here!

(And thanks for keeping me company through those lonesome early hours of the day!)

Warped

No matter how old you are, you’ve gotta admit that Phineas and Ferb rocks, and greeting people with a “Hey <person>, whatcha doin’?” was probably standard. So forgive me if I inadvertently (on purpose) end up ruining your childhood… I love Phineas and Ferb too. Here’s me messing around with the theme song.

I wish there were a 104 days of summer vacation
But school comes along just to end it
So the annual problem for our generation is finding a good way to spend it.
Like maybe:
Not doing homework or doing a project
Or climbing through a pile of textbooks
Learning of something that doesn’t exist
Or reviewing notes for an hour!
Surfing the Internet
For creating answers
Or locating Guam or Israel (“it’s over here!”)
‘Dentifying a dodo bird
Learning stuff you’ve never heard of
And driving yourself insane!
As you can see there’s a whole lot of stuff you know we’re not to do till fall
So stick around and do not fret about, and do nothing at all!
So stick around and chill about a while; you’re gonna kill us all.
(“Ma’am, these guys think they’re gonna get away without doing their homework!”)

Do tell me, whether you liked it or want to kill me now.