I give up on Christmas wishes…

It is so easy to get or give something material. My four year old nephew showed me today just how robotized gift giving really can be. I can not fault Matthew for that, thats how every four year old thinks, but what about those of us who really are capable of higher level thought and even mature emotional thought? Is the measure of importance now how many gifts you give or get or the total cost (the first part makes me chuckle thinking about the first Harry Potter book). I’ve heard so many people complain about Christmas music and how they’d like to slaughter the musicians thats sing it… you can end your tirade with an anecdote like “and a bah humbug to all!” but that really doesn’t make it funny or even acceptable. Christmas has become a depressing holiday filled with greed and perversion… its lost its majesty for me. I’ll grant you this is the first Christmas in years that I’ve spent entirely alone, but none the less it is still a saddening holiday.

Christmas was never about receiving for me (after the age of like 12). It was the family and friends (and others) sharing a time of peace. Tomorrow we’re supposed to celebrate the birth of the only man to walk this Earth pure of heart and free from sin and countless people are going to do that by looking at the person who gave them a gift and thanklessly ask for more… through words or mood or look makes no difference, so many people have lost sight of what tomorrow is about.

What saddens me the most is that when tomorrow is over only one person will have given me something that matters. Everyone else will have either written me off by “paying their dues” or simply not caring. Even worse, the only wish I have to make I don’t know if I want to… not that it would matter because it wouldn’t come true.

My rants for the holiday, may you not share in my dismay. God bless and protect you all and may He touch your hearts and give you a very merry Christmas. “Merry Christmas to all, and to all… a good night.”

Some days…

“What a piece of work is a man! How
noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how
express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension
how like a god!”

Had that been sarcasm I might have agreed with Hamlet…

I accomplished the 2nd of those 3 things that have been weighing on me… again with expected results. I’ve come this far… should I give up on the third?

When life gives you lemons… make more lemons…

Think of a person to ask a question. Now, think of a question to ask that person… did you know the answer to the question? Isn’t it interesting who we trust to give us answers and who we test to see if they really know what they think they do or if they’ll tell you the truth… Which am I doing to you?

Not that I’m in a particularly sinistermood tonight, but lets talk about paranoia. Paranoia is defined as “A psychotic disorder characterized by delusions of persecution with or without grandeur, often strenuously defended with apparent logic and reason.” or ” Extreme, irrational distrust of others.” [As an aside, I like the first definition better, apart form “persecution”.] There is an interesting dichotomy here… The first implies that paranoia is somehow rationalized while the second clearly says it is unreasonable. So, lets make a new definition… “A psychotic disorder characterized by delusions of torment or torture usually accompanied by an extreme distrust of others that is often strenuously defended with flawed logic and reason.” Yep, that sounds about right… sound familiar anyone?

The beauty of being me…

I spent 18 hours yesterday with my AI group programming an AI agent to play checkers… not only that… but learn how to play better. The scary thing… we succeeded. I’m not a checkers master, but I see strategy in it and think a few moves ahead and after we got some of our search algorithms worked out and a few checks added into our utility class the damn thing was actually able to beat me when I wasn’t really playing as well as I could… I’m hoping thats just because I was in a computer lab until 4am… I haven’t tried to embarass myself playing it yet today.

Other than the fact I’m significatly behind on my grading, I seem to have come out of my hole of cow dung smelling like roses. Other things are still bothering me, but at least school doesn’t seem to be weighing so heavy. Still not sleeping well… my cut off seems to be around 3am instead of 5am now though.

I have a final in a little more than an hour that I’ve not really been able to prepare for. I’ve done what I can, lets hope I’m as much as a knowledge sponge as I’m accused of being.