Hello, World.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Outdoors Computing
I've realized there are two things that make me happier than anything else: outdoors and computers. I think from now on this blog will be mostly stories relating to those two things. Luckily, that just makes my blog title a double entendre and thus I'm officially funny on the internet.
My latest computing exploit has been reading through Artifical Intelligence: A Modern Approach 2E (AIMA). I'm on Ch. 3, which is all about search trees and different algorithms to search through them. They presented a few interesting problems which I plan on coding up and solving in the next couple of days; I'll be sure to host my code here as well as on some public code repositories (yay open source learning code!). The problems are:
In addition to the book; I've been following CarlH to touch up on some programming basics; the course is below me because it starts from the very basics, but its fun to read and interesting to see how he presents the ideas to beginners. I think its the best coding tutorial I've ever seen.
Now for outdoors! I went abseiling this weekend. Did a multipitch abseil in the Blue Mountains (picture below; the entire area I was in is vertical cliffs leading to a tree filled valley, beautiful)., just outside of Katoomba. For those Americans (like me), abseiling is the non USA way of saying rappelling. I learned how to self belay using a prosik on an abseil and also how to safely attach two ropes for longer abseils. Turns out all you have to do is join them with a double over hand knot. The abseil took a good deal of time, in large part because I was setting up/helping set up the ropes for each pitch...takes a bit of practice before you get quick.
(Pictures Courtesy of: http://home.chello.no/~dudley/images/8puzzle.jpg, www.8puzzle.com/8_puzzle_algorithm.html , http://www.australiantraveller.com/images/imported/Escarpment,-Blue-Mountains.jpg, respectively)
¶ 8:38 PM 0 Comments
My latest computing exploit has been reading through Artifical Intelligence: A Modern Approach 2E (AIMA). I'm on Ch. 3, which is all about search trees and different algorithms to search through them. They presented a few interesting problems which I plan on coding up and solving in the next couple of days; I'll be sure to host my code here as well as on some public code repositories (yay open source learning code!). The problems are:
- 8 Queens Problem: Try to put 8 queens on a chess board such that they can't attack each other.
In addition to the book; I've been following CarlH to touch up on some programming basics; the course is below me because it starts from the very basics, but its fun to read and interesting to see how he presents the ideas to beginners. I think its the best coding tutorial I've ever seen.Now for outdoors! I went abseiling this weekend. Did a multipitch abseil in the Blue Mountains (picture below; the entire area I was in is vertical cliffs leading to a tree filled valley, beautiful)., just outside of Katoomba. For those Americans (like me), abseiling is the non USA way of saying rappelling. I learned how to self belay using a prosik on an abseil and also how to safely attach two ropes for longer abseils. Turns out all you have to do is join them with a double over hand knot. The abseil took a good deal of time, in large part because I was setting up/helping set up the ropes for each pitch...takes a bit of practice before you get quick.
(Pictures Courtesy of: http://home.chello.no/~dudley/images/8puzzle.jpg, www.8puzzle.com/
Monday, September 28, 2009
So...uhh...this blog thing didn't really work out
So I see this blog didn't work out so well...oops. Posting about life is boring for everyone (me included). I'm going to get rid of the goal of posting things no one wants to read and start posting what I feel like posting. This could be nerd, this could be boring life, this could be anything...For now this is...
Things that have happened since I've been here....
Things that have happened since I've been here....
- I'm even nerdier...spent some time with HTML and javascript, reckon I can make a web page now?
- Got a twitter...Beutel was right, those things are cool. Follow me
- Love my classes, except for philosophy (no surprise there).
- Bungee jumped (sweet, would do again, need to get over fear of jumping off of things), scuba dived (scary! more later), sky dive (feels like you're floating), mountain biking (definitely want to do this more, Tully...you gotta hook me up), caving (more later)
- Goals: climb!, get in shape :(, set up an rss feed, revamp home page, stop procrastinating and study for test
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Moral Rapelling?
General Feelings:
Climbing Trip:
Rapelling
Have you ever walked off the side of a cliff? Literally, just walked off. I mean, sure, I was on a rope. Sure, I was on two ropes even. But the fact is, neither of them were taut while standing straight up. In fact, neither were taught until I was a foot down the rocks and standing parallel to the ground. A shorter safety would have been nice here. The idea of having that 4 feet of no rope terrified me. It took me about 15 minutes to actually start my rapel off. I managed to cut my 4 feet down to a couple of inches by stepping down and using an arm to lower myself down - no free fall, but no supporting rope either.
Why'd I do it? Why didn't I just walk down? Aside from TS's encouragement, the reason is for the experience. I like doing things. I like having experiences. I slept in a hammock above a black widow's web...well where was until I knocked it down while setting my hammock up. It was an experience. Ok, that was just a stupid move, but it was late and I didn't feel like moving. I rapelled down a rock face for the experience. I conquered my fears of it. Or better yet, I began to conquer my fears. To add to the fear, I rappelled down on anchors that TS and I set up together (mainly TS). That's an experience I've only dreamed of having. I did a Tarzan swing on the rope later that day just because I was scared to do it. It was an experience. It wasn't particularly dangerous, but it felt good knowing I can do it and knowing I have done it.
Sometimes I wonder if I like doing these things so I can claim I've done them, or if I like doing them for the sake of doing them. I sure hope its the latter. Is this blog my sick, self absorbed public journal? Possibly. I prefer to think of it as my way of communicating with the world, keeping my memories, and at times (now) learning about myself a bit. Admittedly, knowing its public makes it easier to write some things. The audience is a motivation of sorts. I think my reason for liking experiences is because experiences are memories. Time spent making memories is time worth having.
On the note of memories - I want to be more proactive. I want to do more. I feel as if in the past few months I've gotten better at this. I've coded for fun, I've climbed, I have an internship and a research set up. I've organized travel plans. I want to get good at being proactive. TS kind of inspires me on this one, he has such an exciting life because he doesn't waste a minute of it. I want to always be making memories.
Conversation with AB
Does absolute morality exist? Absolute Morality only exists if there's some universal standard of what is evil. The very fact that there's no common agreement implies no absolute morality. Event horrors (Holocaust) had/have supporters -->no absolute morality. Morality is defined by logic, empathy, and sympathy.
If you can empathize with another being, you naturally shouldn't want to do wrong to it. IE if you can empathize with Fred, you can logically prove its immoral to mistreat Fred. But not everyone empathizes equally. In fact, empathy is deeply personal. What's a person? My empathy is defined by what? By my free will? lol. Must be by my past interactions...what does this imply? Certain situations cause lack of empathy to develop? Granted, this assumes there's no "soul" and that humans realy are living chaos theory (still not certain how I feel about that). ¶ 10:41 PM 0 Comments
- Optimistic about school. Speaking with TS this weekend made me realize something - I can get A's in school. He said one thing in particular that made me feel really good and just reminded me that I can do well in school, "You were always good at tests". I haven't felt like that since high school. In fact, its been the opposite since then. No need for that to be the case though. Time for me to start getting A's again.
- Excited for Australia.
- failed at H Bridge circuit design (barely tried, better with IC any ways)
- soldered up H Bridge IC (key is to hold the heat still and move the solder)
- created worling circuit!; circuit broke 10 minutes later...
- verdex pro connects with Tweener, but not with new cable
Climbing Trip:
- went to Pilot mountain with TS and VT
- learned how to set anchors for top roping
- bought shoes after doing a 100 footer barefoot (ouch!)
- I cut really easily and was asked by multiple people if I was ok/what happened - maybe I'll wear pants next time? Also, I looked really filthy/manly/war veteran like (awesome!).
- Make a computer flash card program with a GUI
- Finished the bowling program.
- Chapel Hill is awesome, but need to be 21.
- Math 103 is very interesting. I'm really glad I got to relearn it.
- Party with TS and AB was good; had fun meeting people. Looking forward to getting good at clubbing/barring in AU. Not sure why but its a skill I really want to have. (I want to be the best meeter of people in alllll the land!)
- I want to run a half marathon at some point in my life.
Rapelling
Have you ever walked off the side of a cliff? Literally, just walked off. I mean, sure, I was on a rope. Sure, I was on two ropes even. But the fact is, neither of them were taut while standing straight up. In fact, neither were taught until I was a foot down the rocks and standing parallel to the ground. A shorter safety would have been nice here. The idea of having that 4 feet of no rope terrified me. It took me about 15 minutes to actually start my rapel off. I managed to cut my 4 feet down to a couple of inches by stepping down and using an arm to lower myself down - no free fall, but no supporting rope either.
Why'd I do it? Why didn't I just walk down? Aside from TS's encouragement, the reason is for the experience. I like doing things. I like having experiences. I slept in a hammock above a black widow's web...well where was until I knocked it down while setting my hammock up. It was an experience. Ok, that was just a stupid move, but it was late and I didn't feel like moving. I rapelled down a rock face for the experience. I conquered my fears of it. Or better yet, I began to conquer my fears. To add to the fear, I rappelled down on anchors that TS and I set up together (mainly TS). That's an experience I've only dreamed of having. I did a Tarzan swing on the rope later that day just because I was scared to do it. It was an experience. It wasn't particularly dangerous, but it felt good knowing I can do it and knowing I have done it.
Sometimes I wonder if I like doing these things so I can claim I've done them, or if I like doing them for the sake of doing them. I sure hope its the latter. Is this blog my sick, self absorbed public journal? Possibly. I prefer to think of it as my way of communicating with the world, keeping my memories, and at times (now) learning about myself a bit. Admittedly, knowing its public makes it easier to write some things. The audience is a motivation of sorts. I think my reason for liking experiences is because experiences are memories. Time spent making memories is time worth having.
On the note of memories - I want to be more proactive. I want to do more. I feel as if in the past few months I've gotten better at this. I've coded for fun, I've climbed, I have an internship and a research set up. I've organized travel plans. I want to get good at being proactive. TS kind of inspires me on this one, he has such an exciting life because he doesn't waste a minute of it. I want to always be making memories.
Conversation with AB
Does absolute morality exist? Absolute Morality only exists if there's some universal standard of what is evil. The very fact that there's no common agreement implies no absolute morality. Event horrors (Holocaust) had/have supporters -->no absolute morality. Morality is defined by logic, empathy, and sympathy.
If you can empathize with another being, you naturally shouldn't want to do wrong to it. IE if you can empathize with Fred, you can logically prove its immoral to mistreat Fred. But not everyone empathizes equally. In fact, empathy is deeply personal. What's a person? My empathy is defined by what? By my free will? lol. Must be by my past interactions...what does this imply? Certain situations cause lack of empathy to develop? Granted, this assumes there's no "soul" and that humans realy are living chaos theory (still not certain how I feel about that). ¶ 10:41 PM 0 Comments
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Climbing, Meetings, and Robots
It was incredible! I only got to do three runs, but I had an incredible time. I really hope I find a climbing club or something of the sorts in Australia. My first two runs I did pretty well on - all fun and games, no fear. My last one, which was aptly named "The Unnamed", was a different story.
The goal was to climb the 100 feet up and stay at the top to avoid needing to hike back to the parking lot. A long story short, I did it. But it was quite the struggle. This has happened only once before, but apparently sometimes while I climb I get really irrationally scared. This was one of those times. It didn't help my mental game that our rope had an easy 3-5 feet of stretch in it and that it was my belayer's first time (although he did perfectly). I remember climbing and asking every 30 seconds, "You got me?" Iwanted to be on belay as tight as possible, which is the opposite of what I normally want. I don't know why I get scared sometimes, but it sure doesn't make the climbing any easier. (Side note: terrible use of but by me just now, I didn't contrast anything there.) Since it was such a long climb I took a few breaks on good ledges/at the belay's expense. Unfortunately when you're scared a break is the equiavlent of hugging a big rock. About 15 feet from the top, I cut my knee and left a blood trail going up - it was pretty cool to look at while I rapelled down. Felt like I had left my mark on the rock. Also, I'm pretty sure that blood trail helped the next climber find how to get up.
After the climb, ZC, AB, and I all went to Waffle House where we had the most intelligent conversation Wa Ho has ever seen. Between the car ride and that dinner AB managed to blow my mind by convincing me that free will doesn't exist, or better yet, that free will is a ridiculous concept.
What is free will? I tried answering by saying its the ability to make your own decisions; if my life were a series of if trees, each branch taken at any point would be decided completely by me. I always have the ability to choose which branch. AB argued that each branch could be decided in one of two ways (his wordings been changed to make it make sense...): 1) Uniform Distribution (or perhaps some other form of distribution 2) Chaos/Determinism.
In order for there to be a free will, there would need to be some form of "will". What's a will? Does it make decisions? Does it do so based on past experiences? Hmmm, this sounds like chaos. Maybe its just a uniform distribution, like a computer's random number generator...doesn't make much sense to me/not a convincing argument.
The last option is maybe it's neither; maybe its true randomness. Only response to that: Shit. That would imply that all of our actions are random! IE cause and effect no longer existed. Nothing we did had any direction/repercussions/effects on our future actions! This is even less convincing than a distribution.
In other news, I'm questioning my belief in Deism after this one...maybe I only hold onto it because I refuse to believe that enough/complex if trees can model human life (aka human life is chaos).
In other, other news, chaos theory is awesome and I've always referenced it in these conversations in the past but didn't know its name until this blog post.
Adios, World.
DJ ¶ 7:46 AM 0 Comments
- General Feelings: Great week, got lots done
- Busier = better
- RoboCup Progress: going great!
- Found a 14.8 V to 5 V regulator with 5 A of output (for cheap! but lots of external circuitry)
- Set up equations to define Kicker Circuit.
- Became a respectable member on the GumStix forum.
- Learned lots about how to use GumStix - mainly we just need more cables.
- Drove a motor with a square wave (aka PWM)! Now need to use an H Bridge and do it...
- Other: Not much programming (no time)
- Started tutoring Multivariable Calculus - good fun to learn again. I made the mistake of not preparing for one of my sessions and failed at Double Integrals. I've since reviewed them - they're easy. Also a good source of extra cash and motivation to wake up early.
- Hoping TS manages to visit me with a crew next week!
- I love outdoor climbing!
- Nailed my discussion with Professor KC - looks like I'll have a decent Biofluidic chip lab to come back to in January.
It was incredible! I only got to do three runs, but I had an incredible time. I really hope I find a climbing club or something of the sorts in Australia. My first two runs I did pretty well on - all fun and games, no fear. My last one, which was aptly named "The Unnamed", was a different story.
The goal was to climb the 100 feet up and stay at the top to avoid needing to hike back to the parking lot. A long story short, I did it. But it was quite the struggle. This has happened only once before, but apparently sometimes while I climb I get really irrationally scared. This was one of those times. It didn't help my mental game that our rope had an easy 3-5 feet of stretch in it and that it was my belayer's first time (although he did perfectly). I remember climbing and asking every 30 seconds, "You got me?" Iwanted to be on belay as tight as possible, which is the opposite of what I normally want. I don't know why I get scared sometimes, but it sure doesn't make the climbing any easier. (Side note: terrible use of but by me just now, I didn't contrast anything there.) Since it was such a long climb I took a few breaks on good ledges/at the belay's expense. Unfortunately when you're scared a break is the equiavlent of hugging a big rock. About 15 feet from the top, I cut my knee and left a blood trail going up - it was pretty cool to look at while I rapelled down. Felt like I had left my mark on the rock. Also, I'm pretty sure that blood trail helped the next climber find how to get up.
After the climb, ZC, AB, and I all went to Waffle House where we had the most intelligent conversation Wa Ho has ever seen. Between the car ride and that dinner AB managed to blow my mind by convincing me that free will doesn't exist, or better yet, that free will is a ridiculous concept.
What is free will? I tried answering by saying its the ability to make your own decisions; if my life were a series of if trees, each branch taken at any point would be decided completely by me. I always have the ability to choose which branch. AB argued that each branch could be decided in one of two ways (his wordings been changed to make it make sense...): 1) Uniform Distribution (or perhaps some other form of distribution 2) Chaos/Determinism.
In order for there to be a free will, there would need to be some form of "will". What's a will? Does it make decisions? Does it do so based on past experiences? Hmmm, this sounds like chaos. Maybe its just a uniform distribution, like a computer's random number generator...doesn't make much sense to me/not a convincing argument.
The last option is maybe it's neither; maybe its true randomness. Only response to that: Shit. That would imply that all of our actions are random! IE cause and effect no longer existed. Nothing we did had any direction/repercussions/effects on our future actions! This is even less convincing than a distribution.
In other news, I'm questioning my belief in Deism after this one...maybe I only hold onto it because I refuse to believe that enough/complex if trees can model human life (aka human life is chaos).
In other, other news, chaos theory is awesome and I've always referenced it in these conversations in the past but didn't know its name until this blog post.
Adios, World.
DJ ¶ 7:46 AM 0 Comments
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Duke Summer Days: Part 4
Ok, so second post of the day - this one will outline the 4th week of my Duke Summer experience. I started a new post because after advice from M.S. and reading a few other blogs I want a new format...more outline, with real text only for stuff people will want to read. The outline will likely be just for my memories.
The idea is...DJ Sharkey's How To's. In life there are so many things that are so simple to do, but hard to get a foot in the door for. For example, traveling - the first time is a scary experience. Web programming-how do I learn the difference between PHP and HTML in human terms? Camping - what do I need? I don't necessarily expect my website to be widely used, at first I just want it to be posting on my own, but maybe eventually I can have it be a wiki format (hmm starting to sound oddly like wikihow...but I'm sure I can differentiate somehow, if only by providing useful information). Scratch that last line, I just read wikihow and it looks really similar to what I was talking about. Hmmm, maybe a site I'll use more often? None the less, I want to make this site. By the way, my love of documentation kind of inspired this one...kind of a documentation on my life. ¶ 4:59 PM 0 Comments
- General Feelings: been very tired/haven't wanted to work out too much/kind of bored...think I'm getting over it though...just making me even more excited for Australia though!
- Need to be more proactive...why haven't I gone camping yet?!? Why haven't I rented a bike from the outpost?
- RoboCup Progress: Used machine shop! Awesome! Know how to use a lathe and a milling machine!
- Learned a lot about voltage/power/voltage regulators. Might even do something cool soon!
- RoboCup taught me some things about myself: 1) I love documentation...on everthing.
- Other: -Fell in love with the show weeds (watched like 2.5 seasons in 3 days, including staying up until 4:30 AM with A.P. watching and being late to work the next day due to watching). Climbing at Pilot Mountain tomorrow with Z.C. Want to go camping really badly.
- Began working on coding (something similar to this http://tralvex.com/pub/bowling/BSC.htm). Want to be able to do it in Java, C, C++, and something I can put on the web (a combo of html + php + javascript+ajax...gotta learn them all better to know what to do) A.B. is helping me learn the languages. The program was Dad's idea.
- Climbed at wall today = so much fun!
- Need to learn HTML/CSS...typing in this smart text box or whatever it's called doesn't work, I can't even indent my outline.
- After reading J.S.'s blog - I want to go to Kenya so bad!
The idea is...DJ Sharkey's How To's. In life there are so many things that are so simple to do, but hard to get a foot in the door for. For example, traveling - the first time is a scary experience. Web programming-how do I learn the difference between PHP and HTML in human terms? Camping - what do I need? I don't necessarily expect my website to be widely used, at first I just want it to be posting on my own, but maybe eventually I can have it be a wiki format (hmm starting to sound oddly like wikihow...but I'm sure I can differentiate somehow, if only by providing useful information). Scratch that last line, I just read wikihow and it looks really similar to what I was talking about. Hmmm, maybe a site I'll use more often? None the less, I want to make this site. By the way, my love of documentation kind of inspired this one...kind of a documentation on my life. ¶ 4:59 PM 0 Comments
Duke Summer Days: Part 3
So I accidentally took a week off from blogging...oops. No need to fear though friends, I will fill you in on all of the wonderful details of my life right here.
Home - this is a prime example of why I should blog more often...next to no memory of what happened at home. Friday night, I got in and went out to TF's house to watch the game; standard night, nothing to exciting. Saturday afternoon and night? I've got no idea. Sunday night - JD's place with the crew and then off to Ybor for some clubbing. At the club, JLand I were a team...we did terribly. I remember I tried dancing with this one girl and she said no. Nothing special there - the special part was I saw her waiting for a cab later that night and I really wanted to go up to her and ask (in a totally not creepy, I'm over it, purely informative kind of way) "why didn't you dance with me? what could I have done differently so you would've? Unfortunately (or Perhaps luckily) JL wouldn't do it with me. I still think its something I want to do some day.
Memories coming in now - I went to ML's Bar Mitzvah Luncheon, where I hung out with DN, LJF, and JL. Good seeing people again, especially DN because it had been a long time since I had seen him. Went swimming with the kid (Jalyn) on Sunday afternoon. Monday was a family bbq, which I unfortunately slept through a decent portion of. Very disappointed about that. Monday night I went and visited Grandpa. Grandpa is insane! He entertained me with stories about his life for over an hour - he's done some crazy things in his life. Sunday night I went to Splitsville with Josh and his brother's bar mitzvah party - I spent most of the time bowling in weird ways
Wednesday JR flew in; we had a great time. Gardens lunch - lasagna cooking (delicous, fed me for like a week), cookie baking, Barnes and Noble reading, delicous BoneFish eating (although I wouldn't reccomend coconut crusted shrimp + bacon wrapped scallops ... need something that isn't sweet in there).
That weekend I drove JR down to Camp (I love that place), hung out for a few hours. It was awesome having a Tripod Reunion with RZ and ID. We giggled like a bunch of little girls, and I'm pretty positive that Isaac had a pair of my underwear from when I was 16. After Chatuga I went to CL's's place, had a good time, met his family and friends, beat him in ping pong (only once...he killed me every other time). Ate dim sum + chicken feet at some real dim sum place in Alpharetta area. I learned threethings: 1) Real Dim Sum places have food on carts and you point at what you want. 2) Dim Sum is all about Shrimp 3) chicken feet look like baby hands (horrifying revelation before I ate the chicken foot didn't let it stop me).
DJ, Out.
Bye World. ¶ 10:55 AM 0 Comments
Home - this is a prime example of why I should blog more often...next to no memory of what happened at home. Friday night, I got in and went out to TF's house to watch the game; standard night, nothing to exciting. Saturday afternoon and night? I've got no idea. Sunday night - JD's place with the crew and then off to Ybor for some clubbing. At the club, JLand I were a team...we did terribly. I remember I tried dancing with this one girl and she said no. Nothing special there - the special part was I saw her waiting for a cab later that night and I really wanted to go up to her and ask (in a totally not creepy, I'm over it, purely informative kind of way) "why didn't you dance with me? what could I have done differently so you would've? Unfortunately (or Perhaps luckily) JL wouldn't do it with me. I still think its something I want to do some day.
Memories coming in now - I went to ML's Bar Mitzvah Luncheon, where I hung out with DN, LJF, and JL. Good seeing people again, especially DN because it had been a long time since I had seen him. Went swimming with the kid (Jalyn) on Sunday afternoon. Monday was a family bbq, which I unfortunately slept through a decent portion of. Very disappointed about that. Monday night I went and visited Grandpa. Grandpa is insane! He entertained me with stories about his life for over an hour - he's done some crazy things in his life. Sunday night I went to Splitsville with Josh and his brother's bar mitzvah party - I spent most of the time bowling in weird ways
Wednesday JR flew in; we had a great time. Gardens lunch - lasagna cooking (delicous, fed me for like a week), cookie baking, Barnes and Noble reading, delicous BoneFish eating (although I wouldn't reccomend coconut crusted shrimp + bacon wrapped scallops ... need something that isn't sweet in there).
That weekend I drove JR down to Camp (I love that place), hung out for a few hours. It was awesome having a Tripod Reunion with RZ and ID. We giggled like a bunch of little girls, and I'm pretty positive that Isaac had a pair of my underwear from when I was 16. After Chatuga I went to CL's's place, had a good time, met his family and friends, beat him in ping pong (only once...he killed me every other time). Ate dim sum + chicken feet at some real dim sum place in Alpharetta area. I learned threethings: 1) Real Dim Sum places have food on carts and you point at what you want. 2) Dim Sum is all about Shrimp 3) chicken feet look like baby hands (horrifying revelation before I ate the chicken foot didn't let it stop me).
DJ, Out.
Bye World. ¶ 10:55 AM 0 Comments
Friday, May 22, 2009
Duke Summer Days: Part 2
So, about another week has gone by at Duke...man, it would be easy to stop the blog here; really very little has happened.
Finally took care of a few study abroad papers today - turns out I'm qualified for a lot of the CS classes I was interested in taking and I placed an approval request for an AI class (cool!).
RoboCup is slow moving - still no motors, no luck on figuring out how to choose our motors. We've decided to possibly just buy some DC brushed motors (on the reccommendation of Greg Fricke - a grad student who helped us out) since they'll be cheaper and easier to use, but now we're having trouble finding those :( . I've been in contact with a couple of sales people asking for prices and "free samples" (no luck so far). The guy from Maxon actually seemed pretty helpful though, so we'll see if that pans out.
Also, we started researching solenoids/how to use solenoids to kick a soccer ball. Building this robot makes me realize how little practical electronics I know...so I signed up for a forum and have began posting about my problems in hopes of learning some.
My biofluidic research is going decently - I'm almost finished with the paper; which I am not confident in saying is about quick ways to ensure biofluidic chips are working propers. The next section is on "future research" and I'm supposed to pick out an area there that interests me, so we'll see how that goes. I'm excited and I hope something cool comes out of it.
Beyond that - the gardens are still beautiful, but unfortunately the weather hasn't been (although it is picking up!). I want to rent a bike next week and just bike around Durham at random when I have free time (possibly eat at "Wangs and Thangs". I ate at Chubby's for the first time, biggest burrito ever - but I dont reccommend shrimp in it (kind of want a t-shirt..."I love chubbys"). Donnie Darko deserves all the hype it gets - wish I had been in more of a movie mood when I saw it and that I had spent more time trying to figure it out before switching to wikipedia. I LOVE CROSSFIT! So bummed I can't do the workout today...(wow, I don't think I've ever said that about working out before).
I added this new gadget to my facebook - a map of all the places I've been in the world; I've gotten 6% so far. Tobias has 8% - darn you Tobias. I'm excited to add so many countries so soon, but for some reason not as stoked about Australia as I have been. I'm kind of scared it will be like America. On the other hand, I'm looking forward to the enormous cultural gap in SE Asia.
In an effort to add more countries to my map; here's my life plan: graduate, teach somewhere crazy, work somewhere crazy (joke job...maybe summer camp?), do something like Peace Corp. Then grad school I suppose?
Oh yeah, I'm going home today; I'm actually in an airport right now.
Peace out, World.
-DJ ¶ 10:22 PM 0 Comments
Finally took care of a few study abroad papers today - turns out I'm qualified for a lot of the CS classes I was interested in taking and I placed an approval request for an AI class (cool!).
RoboCup is slow moving - still no motors, no luck on figuring out how to choose our motors. We've decided to possibly just buy some DC brushed motors (on the reccommendation of Greg Fricke - a grad student who helped us out) since they'll be cheaper and easier to use, but now we're having trouble finding those :( . I've been in contact with a couple of sales people asking for prices and "free samples" (no luck so far). The guy from Maxon actually seemed pretty helpful though, so we'll see if that pans out.
Also, we started researching solenoids/how to use solenoids to kick a soccer ball. Building this robot makes me realize how little practical electronics I know...so I signed up for a forum and have began posting about my problems in hopes of learning some.
My biofluidic research is going decently - I'm almost finished with the paper; which I am not confident in saying is about quick ways to ensure biofluidic chips are working propers. The next section is on "future research" and I'm supposed to pick out an area there that interests me, so we'll see how that goes. I'm excited and I hope something cool comes out of it.
Beyond that - the gardens are still beautiful, but unfortunately the weather hasn't been (although it is picking up!). I want to rent a bike next week and just bike around Durham at random when I have free time (possibly eat at "Wangs and Thangs". I ate at Chubby's for the first time, biggest burrito ever - but I dont reccommend shrimp in it (kind of want a t-shirt..."I love chubbys"). Donnie Darko deserves all the hype it gets - wish I had been in more of a movie mood when I saw it and that I had spent more time trying to figure it out before switching to wikipedia. I LOVE CROSSFIT! So bummed I can't do the workout today...(wow, I don't think I've ever said that about working out before).
I added this new gadget to my facebook - a map of all the places I've been in the world; I've gotten 6% so far. Tobias has 8% - darn you Tobias. I'm excited to add so many countries so soon, but for some reason not as stoked about Australia as I have been. I'm kind of scared it will be like America. On the other hand, I'm looking forward to the enormous cultural gap in SE Asia.
In an effort to add more countries to my map; here's my life plan: graduate, teach somewhere crazy, work somewhere crazy (joke job...maybe summer camp?), do something like Peace Corp. Then grad school I suppose?
Oh yeah, I'm going home today; I'm actually in an airport right now.
Peace out, World.
-DJ ¶ 10:22 PM 0 Comments
