maggied’s blag

Another term, another several months that I go without updating  my blog. Oops. Anyway, as of a few days ago I have completed my junior year at MIT. Junior year was probably the most challenging year for me at MIT academically so far, but in the end I came out on top and am happy with how I did. Everything seems to be on track for me right now and I am looking forward to what’s in store for the future.

After term ended I spent a few days in Boston hanging out with people before my train home Friday evening. Saturday morning my mom, dad, brother and I headed out for Lancaster, Pennsylvania to visit my aunt and her husband for the weekend. All of my cousins were elsewhere, so it was just us six. My uncle joined an oldies band a year and a half ago and they had a gig in Mount Joy, PA, so we all went over there to check it out. As it turns out, they were playing at the Mount Joy Popcorn Festival, which turned out to be loads of fun. Here’s me standing next to the sign. (To see all the photos in this entry and more, check out this set on Flickr).

When we first arrived, not only were we shocked that we were at a Popcorn Festival, we were also shocked by how awesome the park was. James and I took a joy ride on the swings for a while and he hung out in the tire swing for a bit.

After enjoying the park we explored the rest of the festival. When we first got there in the early afternoon it wasn’t very crowded, but it definitely picked up as the night went on. One noteworthy attraction was the popcorn kernel spitting contest. The record spit for the junior division (14-40 yrs) was over 27 feet!

There were several other contests as well. There was a coloring contest for the kids, a popcorn hat decorating contest, and a contest to guess the number of kernels in a jar. My dad, James and I did our best to estimate the number of kernels in the jar by estimating the number of kernels per cubic inch. We actually came very close (all three of our guesses were within 10%), with my dad off by only 400 kernels from the winning guess. There were about 27,000 kernels in the jar.

After wandering around for a bit we decided to grab some Italian ice because it was just so ridiculously hot out standing on the pavement.  While we were eating the ice the old school popcorn truck also showed up and we got some delicious popcorn here at the festival.

After my uncle’s band the Ravens finished their second set, organizers of the festival convinced them to play an encore show because they had done such a tremendous job. In order to convince my aunt to let him stay later, the band played Freebird. It was hilarious and awesome. I put a video of it (with commentary from the crowd!) up in my public here.

The next day we were all pretty tired and didn’t get out of the house until after 2pm. We decided to go shopping at the mall so I could get more clothes for my internship this summer (It’s with Boston Scientific in St. Paul, MN), and James got a few things too. I picked up a nice pair of casual sandals and a pair of dress shoes, along with some slacks to go with all the blouses I got a few weekends ago.

After shopping we headed over to the Tilted Kilt Pub (also in Mount Joy) to listen to a few guys play that James and my Dad know from New York. One of them is a really mean keytar player, and things were great until it rained and we headed home.

I had a great time. Hopefully I’ll be posting more over the summer!

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It’s finally here. And right when it needed to be. The end of term wound up being my most hosing time at MIT, through a combination of classes and extra-curricular activities. In retrospect, I’m starting to appreciate the idea that yes, even us MIT students can’t do everything they want, and we should try to keep ourselves sane first and foremost. Summer should help with that.

I’ll be working in the Media Lab with the Personal Robots Group. We will be working with the MDS (mobile dexterous social) robot and conducting a study at the Museum of Science. I’ll post back with more details of the study; you know you want to participate.

This past week after classes has been very relaxing; I spent a lot of time hanging out with friends that I hadn’t seen in a while, and getting psyched for Bonnaroo. It’s June 12th-15th, and should be totally awesome. I might have watched 4 Seasons of the Office in under a week. Maybe.

Other things to look forward to: There are other concerts over the summer, including Journey and Iron Maiden. I am also looking into getting a new, lighter bike, and getting my endurance back. My computer is in need of an upgrade; I’ve had it for almost 4 years now (16th b-day present). I turn 20 June 21st. An underwhelming birthday at best. I guess the next big birthday is my 21st, then my 25th, and if my mother is right, once I turn 29 I’ll stay that age forever. Now that’s weird to think about.

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…was fucking amazing. Getting into the Palladium turned out to be surprisingly difficult for me, though. First, they noticed a small pocket knife I always carry with me. I’ve brought it to the Palladium twice and on four air planes and no one has said anything about it until now. Even after I got rid of it, I came back and they started questioning my pill case and arguing with me over whether it was allowed in or not. What do I look like, someone who is going to shiv a guy at the concert? Seriously, they have better people to be concerned about than me.

Anyway, we arrived just on time for Children of Bodom. I recognized a bunch of their songs but not as many as I would have liked. The set was short because they weren’t the main attraction, but still really solid. Next up was In Flames. Dale and I pushed our way to the front between sets and were two bodies away from the railing for most of their set. They started with Cloud Connected, and the crowd was really, really into it. Other notables included Clayman, Come Clarity and The Mirror’s Truth. Overall, fucking great.

Oh yeah, and then there was Megadeth. Ironically enough, I don’t really know any of their stuff, so I didn’t enjoy the set as much as the other two. Then again, that may have also been because I was drenched in sweat. Sweet.

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I managed to survive my week of four tests. My impression of the exams was that they all went reasonably well, particularly given the amount of time I actually had to study for each individual exam.

After the week ended, I decided I was getting cranky with the status of my inbox and completely reworked everything using The Trusted Trio (don’t hate on Lifehacker, folks). With additional hosage comes poorer organization, so I also took time to step back and make Remember the Milk happy again. In the process of browsing software I found Joe’s Goals, which a neat online app that lets you keep track of if you’ve been good or bad.  It’s useful for keeping track of habits and running logs. I’m using it to keep track of when I get to sleep…Positive and negative reinforcement for the win.

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Four tests this week. Ugh. We start off with the easier tests first, which is nice. 9.00 on Tuesday, 6.041 on Wednesday, and 6.012 followed by 6.003 on Thursday. Fortunately, I don’t have many obligations this week other than an EPIC UA Senate meeting tomorrow night. Tests mean no p-sets, so hopefully I’ll have plenty of time to study for the exams.

After the week is over, I’m going home for Friday and Saturday night, and will come back Sunday evening. Capen will be driving me down to Stamford on Friday, which is much more awesome than paying to take a train and sit alone for 3 hours. I’ll take Amtrak back on Sunday afternoon/evening.

Here’s to not dieing.

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Note: this post is really long.

Time for a real update on what has been happening over the course of the past week or so. I was home from Thursday afternoon to Sunday night. Despite my great-grandpa’s passing, I still went out to enjoy the fireworks. It was drizzling a bit, but overall the fireworks were fun. We sat inside a causeway in one of the E buildings (I forget which exactly), and heard the concert over the radio. An older woman kept proudly telling us all that “she was from Hawaii, and she wanted to be sure to enjoy her fireworks,” which resulted in her excitement when I found a radio stream on my computer to play for her, and her agitation when a few people were loud playing cards. While the woman was pretty adorable, it got annoying after awhile. As we were waiting for the fireworks to begin, I started playing Chrono Trigger again. I suck at save states, so I wound up playing the fair over about 5 times, but that’s okay. Over the weekend, I played another few hours of the game, but haven’t played since then.

I went into lab briefly on Thursday morning, and took the regional Amtrak service back to Stamford, where my dad picked me up. Played Chrono Trigger and read The Subtle Knife at home the rest of the evening, because we had a long day on Friday. My dad and I woke up around 9am and got bagels. mmm New York bagels. We skipped lunch, picked my grandmother and grandfather up from the airport. My grandpa had an infection on his leg from surgery earlier in the month, but despite the hype he was able to walk fine with his cane. Other than his leg, he looked great.

The rest of the evening was pretty agonizing. Wakes in particular are really difficult because you are forced both to confront the fact that someone has died (it was an open casket) and engage in extremely irritating small talk with people you see maybe once every few years. All the kids get pissed off because their parents keep introducing them to people that they don’t remember, but have probably already met at some other family function. People ask, “How’s the job going?” or “MIT, huh, how do you like it up there?” and it just gets really frustrating. During a time such as this, I’d rather not be talking about myself. Personally, I like it much better to just sit down on the bench and reflect on the situation.

Another thing that I found frustrating about the whole experience is the fact that people are overeager about comforting you. It’s as if there needs to be a quick fix for something that clearly lacks one. There is absolutely nothing anyone else can say to you to instantly make everything feel okay again. Why bother trying? It’s great that one would like to show his compassion by giving the other person a hug or a rub on the back, but I dislike it when people try to console me by saying “He lived a great life, he’s in a better place now.” I’m not five; I know this fact. At the same time, I sincerely feel like the wake and funeral are a time not only to celebrate the life of an individual who has passed, but also give you that window of time during which it’s completely okay to mourn. You’ve already taken the time out of your work schedule to make it for the services, so why not use this time to really get out any of the emotion that you try to keep inside? That’s exactly what I want to do when I go to a wake. I want to feel that pain, and people trying to make me feel better by telling me “he’s in a better place now” seems to miss the point.

Anyway, Friday night I hung around with my cousins from Pennsylvania, and watched Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas after everyone had gone to bed, which was very enjoyable, although I think some of that was offset by how hyped up the movie had been. Saturday was the Funeral; I had not been to mass in several months, so it was kind of weird to be back. It was also difficult for me to deal with being at church at a time when I was feeling particularly bitter toward the church. I tried to put these things behind me for the service. My great-grandfather’s name had been put on his headstone years ago, which was kind of weird, and all that was not there was the date. After the funeral, we went out to lunch at my great-grandpa’s country club together as a big family before it was time to move on with our individual lives. Things seemed to look up from there; although this was one of the first days in quite some time that the sunshine didn’t manage to cheer me up, I began to feel a degree of closure about things.

I met up with my very close friend Paul on Saturday evening, after watching Harold and Kumar go to White Castle to cheer myself up. We chatted for a while and Paul got some dinner. I drank a large Powerade because Paul didn’t want his drink; DON’T EVER DO THIS. I’m serious; I peed 5 times in 4 hours because of it. We hung around for a bit, then met up with a few of my other friends at home, climbed and rested in a tree for a bit. We stopped by a deli sometime after midnight, and hung out at my friend Emma’s house for a bit. I was totally exhausted though, and retired at the early hour of 2:30am.

I slept late Sunday, which worried my parents but I was just tired. We left for Stamford around 4:30pm, and when we arrived, the train didn’t show up on the TV, so we freaked out. Eventually, it appeared, and said “ON TIME.” My parents get ready to leave to meet my grandma for dinner, but then hear that my train is now “90 MINUTES LATE.” Great. I buy a puzzle book for $3 and settle in. Mom and Dad leave after about 30 minutes, but I’m stuck at the station until 8:35, when the train should have come at 5:48. Also great. Eventually, I arrive in South Station at midnight, and everything is closed. Fortunately I had the foresight to ask Capen to pick me up, so we drove off, got lost in Boston, and then finally I made it back home at 12:40am, nestled into bed with my book, and went to bed.

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My great-grandfather passed away today at around 1pm. He was 98. Grandpa Ed had been slowly going down hill over the past few months, and we were not sure when his time would come. I spoke with my mom at 12:38pm, and they were just about to leave to go over and visit him (they had been visiting at least once a week since the summer began), and he passed away sometime before they arrived. I got the call from my dad at 1:38pm. I don’t know any of the arrangements yet, but I will be heading home for a few days soon.

Everyone used to always joke with grandpa Ed that he’d make it to 100 and more; even earlier in the year, he was at the gym, exercising on the treadmill! The last time I saw him, he had been in the hospital because fluid was filling up in his lungs. I only got to see him for about 5 minutes because he was tired, so I’m sad that that was the last time I got to see him. I spoke with him briefly on the phone the day after my birthday, but he couldn’t hear me on the phone. What probably bothers me the most is the fact that I never got to speak with him while he was on his death bed. My parents told me that even though his body deteriorated, he remained strong in his mind to the very end. He was frustrated that his body was giving out on him, when his mind was still completely there. Grandpa could tell you stories from the 1940s as if they’d happened yesterday. He knew a lot about the world, and loved to talk about it with his great-grandchildren, because he was determined that it would be us that would change the world for better or for worse.

He was one of my biggest supporters over the course of my life. Grandpa would always tell me that if I worked hard, I’d go places. He would always brag about his great-grandchildren to his card buddies. I was really proud to tell him that I was accepted to MIT, and every time I saw him he would ask me about my research. Even though he lived a long and fruitful life, I wish he could have been around a bit longer to see his younger great-grandchildren grow up. It brought him such joy to see how much each of us had grown (both physically and mentally) over the years.

Sigh. I think I myself will be fine. Although death is always unfortunate, I’ve been anticipating the call from my parents ever since I came back to MIT. Every time my parents phoned, I would get nervous, thinking that this might be it, but it never was until now. I’m much more concerned about his wife, my great-grandma Kay (he remarried, so she isn’t related to me by blood, technically), my Grandma (his only daughter) and my Mom (she was always his favorite grand-daughter). I’m going to be sure to spend plenty of time with them while I’m home to help them get through this.

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Well, I’m finally all done and settled in my new room. It will take a little while to get used to, but I’m rapidly getting used to the “team speak” and loud music that categorize living in Bemis. I set up my computer and my speakers, the only major thing I have left for my room is setting up the server Drew gave me.

Work is going well, although I’m rapidly running out of exciting things to do. Fortunately, only two more days and then I’ll be  able to get started on a real project this coming Monday. The grad student for work at the Media Lab finally wrote back to me, so I’ll be able to take care of that stuff on Friday probably.

As it turns out, I won’t actually be going home this weekend, unless something drastic happens in regard to my Grandfather’s health. My little brother is going to an Airsoft event in Massachusetts on Saturday, so my dad (and possibly other family members) will be driving up to the general area to hang out. We’ll probably try to go out to lunch and celebrate what we can for the few hours people will be around. It just isn’t worth going home on Friday, only to return on Saturday afternoon.

I should really try to be in lab by 10am today, so I will sleep Real Soon Now ™, but look forward to an exciting post about more than my life later today.

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I was walking through Stata today and there is now a sign next to the refreshments that indicates a badge is required to consume them. Sigh.

In other news, I have begun moving into my new room. I’m pretty happy with it so far. Although it is certainly smaller, I’ll be able to make the best of it with the new futon and all. I have more things than I anticipated, but still not very many things at all, so I’ll be fine if I just stuff random items in the closet. Many thanks to Drew, Capen, and Charles for helping me build the loft for my bed. Although it’s too late to take pictures of my old room, I might take pictures of the new one once everything is all set up.

I will most likely be going home this weekend, for many reasons. Tomorrow is my dad’s birthday, and father’s day is on Sunday. My birthday is the 21st, so my family was planning on celebrating the three occasions over the weekend like we usually do. Unfortunately, my great-grandfather’s condition has declined rapidly, so this is probably the most urgent reason for me to go home. I saw him for about 5 minutes a few weeks ago, but I hope that was not the last time I get to see him. Even in his old age, my great-grandfather has been sharp as a tack, and it’s a real shame that his body can simply not hold up anymore. He was in the hospital but is now at home under hospice care, as there is nothing more they can do for him. My mom says relatives are coming to visit tomorrow, but they might not be around when I come home for the weekend.

Things are extremely quiet in lab right now. As in, I’m the only one here. The lab assistant said I could leave whenever I got bored, so I think I’m going to head out soon to keep moving some of my stuff. Paymon isn’t in, although he might be here later in the afternoon, but I feel that my time isn’t really being used particularly productively today, so it might be best to just take off.

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Last day home was sad at first but ended on a great note. I wound up watching Running with Scissors after my post last night so I didn’t get to bed until late, and didn’t wake up until like 3pm. After that, I just hung around at home, played a little WoW, and then went out to Epstein’s (a Jewish deli). It was absolutely delicious; I love this place. The sad part was I went to visit my great-grandfather, who at the age of 98 is slowly deteriorating. He has lived a great, healthy life so far, so I don’t feel really bad about it, but at the same time it was a shock to see him so weak. He was tired so I only got to visit him for like 5 minutes. I really hope he survives a while longer, but that’s probably wishful thinking.

After I got back to the house, I was all pumped up to do something fun with my close friends the night before going home. Things weren’t working out, though, and I couldn’t get in contact with people. I was getting pretty pissed, but then things somehow worked themselves out. We went to Coldstone, hung out there for a while chatting, and then went back to Sarah J’s house. We chatted a lot with her mom, and then just hung out in the living room. It was pretty awesome because everyone was just really chill and talking about our experiences in college, and life in general. I really had a pretty sweet time connecting with an old friend. I thought we had drifted apart, but somehow we relate to each other just as much as we did “back in the day.” While I’ll be going back to MIT tomorrow, I hope to keep in touch more than I have in the past.

I’m glad to be going home on a high note. Hopefully some friends will come and visit me in Boston over the summer, but if not, I can always make a few trips home. I went to the Christmas tree shop with my mom, so I’ve got some new stuff for my room at school. As I see it, the fun is just beginning. Even though it feels like it’s been forever, it’s only the third of June.

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