karniv0re's Journal: The Streaming Data of My Consciousness

First of all, why is the "Write in Journal" button at the goddamn nether reaches of Slashdot? Are you trying to get me to not write my thoughts here? Too fucking bad. I've been doing it for over a decade, so deal with it.

This post will be largely drunken and angry and in a stream of consciousness style because I am drinking, angry, and don't care. I mean, most of my posts are stream-o-consciousness posts, but I am not always drunk. I'm actually not drunk... yet. I'm working on it. Drinking a LeatherheadRed which is quite delicious, and I took a shot of Evan Williams right when I got home because, well, that's where I'm at.

The Lady asked for more money to buy school books today. I don't think it would bother me as much if she just said, "heyyyy, I might need $500 for books. Can you swing that?" Rather than, "So I might need money for books." Me: "How much." Her: "I just hate how they do this. I hate not contributing. blah blah blah." None of that helps. In fact, it just makes me angrier. Just tell me what you need so I can figure it out. Right now, I'm still living on 401(k) loan money. The stupidest loan I've taken out, but what choice did I have. It is keeping me off of credit cards, but is in effect, decreasing my retirement significantly, and tying me to the company that I would like to have the option to leave.

This goddamn company, man. Stock is dropping. They're predicting another shitty year in 2016. For FUCKS SAKE. THIS IS NOT THE TIME. Everything else seems like it's falling apart. And what bothers me probably most right now is that I'm having trouble on my last homework in Probability Models. We're doing Renewal Theory, and shit got hard. All out of nowhere, everything was like, "Hey! We heard you've been doing well! We're here to fuck that up for you!" I have to turn it in tomorrow. I could turn it in and take a hit on it, which would keep me at a low A, high B, but for one thing, I want the A. And another, at least one of the problems on this homework is on our final, which is worth a shitton, so I HAVE to understand it regardless. So that, on top of realizing I spent over $600 on chameleons that we had to take to the Humane Society because the cats kept fucking with them.

Just came back from a break. I checked Facebook. That was a mistake. Read some bullshit about Nassim Taleb hating on GMOs. Goddamnit, nobody is good. Everyone has a part of them I will hate. Maybe that's just life. I'm sure there's things you'd hate about me (least of all my writing). I guess that just gives me more of a stance to take while reading Antifragile. The book overall is quite good and inspiring, but some of it must be taken with a grain of salt, or from a certain context. Like when he says that nothing good comes from universities, but rather from tinkering and hobbyists. Well, that's true for the big things (think the automobile, Microsoft, Facebook, etc), it's not true in general. But that's not what Taleb deals in. He deals in Black Swans - unforeseen groundbreaking events - good and bad, in which case, scientists being wrong about GMOs (lots and lots of scientists... lots) would be a Black Swan. Still, he puts the burden of proof on the scientists to prove that he is wrong. And that is not good skepticism or science. If you're bringing the skepticism, you better have science on your side. Unfortunately for Taleb, it is not. Can't get behind him on that one. Also, he resorts to name calling. That's pretty sad for a well-respected best selling author and academic. :/

Well anyway. My sister is badgering me to do her statistics homework. I partially want to to see if I can do it without remembering much from Prob & Stats I, but I also know I have a lot of shit to do and she's not learning anything if I do it for her. So I told her I'd give her an hour for questions. I have my own final to do! I'm genuinely stressed about this now. I want to do well. I want an A. For the first time in my academic career, an A matters to me. Demonstrable understanding of a topic matters to me. I want to be able to say, Yes, I took Probability Models. I can show you how to do Renewal Theory.

Alright, I'm gonna watch some 'flix and hit the sack. Peace. Hope you enjoyed the stream.