Another day another test. Tomorrow we have our conference exam and I barely studied for it. Just been busy really but I feel somewhat confident for some reason. Still I really want to be done with this test because on Friday I have the one and only real exam for that same class. Yes, the first and last exam. I hate classes that only have one exam. Oh well, after this week I’ll be done with this. And after this there will be another one. It doesn’t even phase me anymore. Soon, in a couple of months there will be no exams at all and I will be at home, in Dallas, having fun with the family and my other family. Enjoying every bit of it till I have to come back to a horrible 2nd year in dental school.

Life is beautiful these days, the weather is good and I’m really enjoying it. Right now I’m just getting ready for tomorrow’s exam and relaxing at the same time. I’ve been playing Darwinia all day and at first the game started off a bit boring. Then after a little bit you get into it and it’s great. I definitely need a new computer now though. This game is killing mine.

I got second place in the talent show about 10 days ago. That was a great moment I must admit. It was great doing the show, pictures are up on gotnose and they look good. Yesterday I was two seconds away from buying a Nikon D50. Then I thought about it again and decided I’ll hold off on buying the camera. I’m going to wait a bit longer, possibly till after I buy my computer. Rumors are that Apple will be releasing computers sometime this month. More importantly they are rumored to be the computers that I’m waiting on. We will see. Wish me luck tomorrow!

Good Morning America. And it is a beautiful day here in the city. With a high of 68 today I have to admit that I am looking forward to New York. Not that I normally am not, but today is going to definitely be nice. I’m only going to attend one class today and I’m already missing the first half of it. Not good but oh well, these lectures are about as worthless as a penny is to a millionaire. Then again, the millionaire might’ve gotten rich by collecting pennies, who knows? I have been passing and even kicking ass on my past few exams and that just makes my day all that much better. Last night I went out to a comedy club and had a great time. It was funny but more importantly it was something different to do.

Now I have a bowl of Cream of Wheat right in front of me. I have decided to actually try to eat breakfast these days. Of course, since this is the first time I ever make this stuff, it is interesting to note that without sugar this tastes absolutely horrible. There is no way I am going to finish this bowl. What is of more interest that even a small bit of sugar will make this otherwise horrible meal absolutely delicious. A hint of cinnamon in it just to give it a small kick and I’m good to go. Next time though, make it with milk rather than water.

Good day to you and good to everyone around you. I am redesigning the site right now for a more uniform look and one section rather than the current two (portfolio and personal). It will take a while but when I’m done I hope that you will enjoy it more.

Wow, I’ve been so busy with exams that I have totally forgot about updating the journal. Anyway, today seems to be the oddest weather day I’ve seen in my life. i think in the course of a day I’ve gone through all four seasons starting with a really warm temperature in the morning, dropping down to 36 and snowing, then going on to rain and now the day is working itself up to the 50’s. How interesting is that? All in the span of 8 hours.

Now I have an exam coming up tomorrow that just isn’t really worth studying for and an Organ Systems exam coming up Monday of next week that I have been studying for. It is really amazing, in the next month or so I will take four more exams for this class alone. Did they just decide to have the longest class ever created? Boring. Other than that things have been going relatively well with one major exception.

Naomi, my guitar, has cracks in the finish. Yes yes, I know, it’s my fault. I have not been keeping it humid and in New York, the winter gets VERY dry. Because of this the neck of the guitar shrunk and the finish cracked. I’m in the process or re-humidifying the guitar and I have high hopes for the neck. The cracked finish however is a different story, this one does not look like it’s going to fix itself. I might have to go into surgery on it using amalgamator (not a dental term in this case) and some new lacquer, glass, tape, sand paper and buffer. Yes it’s a process but this is also a very special guitar. Aside from the guitar, I have also received a new mic that I bought recently from Guitar Center for a very good price. I’m glad to say that the mic sounds beautiful and the results are very clean. I cannot say enough as to how good this mic performs. After all, if it wasn’t this good, I would not have been wanting it for the past several years.

Now if only I can get the guitar fixed, then my life would be back in order. I bought an extra humidifier for it that should arrive at the end of this week. That along with a hygrometer to keep in the case so I can test water level and make sure it’s on par. It is really interesting what the guitar does when it’s dry, as if it’s a living organism. It shrinks and shows you first signs of thirst by having a rough rippled like finish. Then the wood warps and become concave to where it is no longer perfectly flat. During all of this, the smell of fine cedar and rosewood simply disappears and the neck shrinks exposing the ends of the frets, making for a painful playing experience. My highest recommendations to any quality guitar owner is to buy a guitar humidifier immediately and a hygrometer. They will save you hundreds and maybe even thousands of dollars in the future. As of now, the smell of my guitar is coming back and the body is straightening up quite a bit, but will it go back to original condition? I hope so, but unlikely.

Here’s to Naomi

Home Sweet Home. That’s the saying at least. I’m back from my trip to Florida and I have to say, I had a great time. It was so nice to get on the beach and just relax for a bit. We went out to a few bars and clubs while we were there too, which I could do without, but the rest of the time I just had fun. Gotnose is updated with pictures and will probably be soon updated with even more pictures. I’m waiting on friends to email them to me.

The vacation couldn’t have gone any better. All I really needed was my guitar and it probably would’ve been perfect.

A simple post for a simple week.

Ah what a great feeling. It is the end of a really busy week. We had two conferences, two exams and a practical and I can’t be happier that it is done and over with. Next week? Miami, Florida. I can’t wait. I’m going to stay over at my cousin’s place and I’m going to be everything opposite of New York. Basically I’m going to be a bum, a beach bum. In the day I will tan and burn and at night I will burn logs and just hang out. The only thing I will be missing will be my guitar. That is an easy solution though, I wouldn’t mind buying one for less than 100.00 dollars and just using it for the week and keeping it at my cousin’s place.

There really hasn’t been much going on outside of studying. Just basically keeping busy with things to be honest. Trying to get more organized and waiting for the answer keys to my Neuroanatomy/Organ Systems exam to be released. The overly paranoid instructors have decided to have our system release the keys at exactly 11:10 am. What’s up with that? It doesn’t really matter I guess, 13 more minutes. I did so bad on this test that I am just hoping to pass at this point. In fact, if I make a 60 I will be, not exactly satisfied, but in good standing I believe. The test was a lot trickier than any of the past year exams. I will most likely check my grade before even finishing this post. In fact, I just checked my Health Promotion grade, made an A in the class, so that is good news.

Well, there you go, I just finished checking Neuroanatomy, didn’t pass, but I did make a 64, so I guess that leaves me some room for the next four exams to bring my grades back up. Oh well, at least this week is done with now and I don’t have to worry about anything for next week. Over all, it is a lukewarm day for me.

It is Saturday ongoing to Sunday, 12:17 AM on February 12, 2006. Yesterday was a great time, today wasn't so much. The weather is just not doing well for hanging out. It is cold, snowing and very windy. With an exam looming on the horizon for Monday morning, the mood gets worse and worse. Who would've ever thought that people care so much about an exam. I didn't even care when I took the DAT, and that exam pretty much determined my life ahead. Oh well. It has been very interesting times for me lately. Nothing that I want to talk about really but I've been enjoying my time in the city. School gets more and more boring but afterwards things are good. My kitchen is completely empty, I really need to go grocery shopping, but I just don't feel like it in this weather. I'm going to go tomorrow though, I have to. Actually I don't think I will. Maybe on Monday instead, after my exam. That will be good shopping for sure. I haven't had my Mac & Cheese fix in such a long time. I love that stuff, especially when you add an extra slice of cheese in there. So good.

I'm thinking of completely dropping Gotnose and instead getting a .Mac account for my journal and for my pictures. I haven't really decided but Apple now has created yet another addition to their iLife suite called iWeb. Anyway, it really takes the brain work out of creating a journal and really would make my life much easier as far as keeping it up to date. The only thing is that I might lose my archives and I really don't want that. I don't know, I have to think about things I guess. It is a big decision for me after all. I have had this journal for several years now and I love updating it. I guess for now I'll keep it.

Anyway, life is grand, enjoy it before you die. Or, if you're my brother, life's a bitch and then you die (inside joke). I think I'm going to go to bed now.

I am inspired… to not study. I am inspired to just enjoy my days here, succeed and even outperform the average at my school without putting any effort. And why not? I’ve done it my whole undergrad and these people really are all the same. I just couldn’t understand it myself. The need for that certain feeling, the rush, the morphine trip… the stress. It seems to be what feeds most of the people I deal with on a regular basis. What feeds me is more ambiguous it seems. I never cared about grades too much. In fact, I just found out, about 2 minutes ago, that I have an exam next week in Basic Tissues. One of my biggest classes this semester. I should study, but I’m going to play guitar instead. Whatever it is that drives me to study just isn’t there right now. I seem to be dependent on inspiration more than logic. I should be studying, I should be working as hard as I could to make sure that I do well… I know that. I’m not ignorant to the logical side of my mind. I just don’t feel like it. Maybe when I fail I might start taking things a little more serious. That day will come I’m sure, could be this semester, could be in a week or it could be next year. Who knows.

In case you haven’t noticed. I’m in an odd mood. I’m not angry, I’m not happy, I’m not sad. I’m bored and right now I just feel like I am here. No one needs me and I don’t really need anyone. Sleep is starting to sound like fun to me. I have other plans though. I’m going to play guitar and this time with a metronome and practice counting while I’m playing. Yeah, I’ve been playing for 7 years so far and even though my rhythm is doing well, it is not perfect. By perfect I mean recording studio perfect, where I can play something and have it hit beat with absolute preciseness. Meaning within nano-seconds of the beat. If I can get this, it would make my recording life MUCH easier. I would be able to create loops and simply mix and really start enjoying the process.

Life is beautiful. I can’t explain it. Like I said earlier, I am in a weird mood. I feel like creating something great, something that no one can take away from me. I just don’t know what yet. On another note, have you ever noticed that the “i” comes after “e” in weird? Isn’t it odd that the word “weird” itself is spelled weirdly?

It is that time again. I am in the mood to put a random post on here. Why? I don’t know, probably because I’m really tired and I need to get to bed.

I was over at my cousin’s place and we watched a movie called Dark City. It is old and rather obscure, not many people remember it but it was a good movie never the less. It did get me thinking though. About individuality. What makes us have separate personalities? Is it a genetic medium or classical conditioning? Maybe it’s a combination of both. Could it be that our personalities are basically a series of responses, repeated responses to stimuli? Responses that are controlled genetically and through classical conditioning? That has to be it. Repeated events in our lives shape how we think and how we respond. They also shape what we expect and how we perceive other people’s expectations. Everything in life is a random event. Even things people do intentionally, if you look at them from a worldwide perspective, every single action is a random event. The real beauty though is that every single action has a reaction of some kind. So I do something and something else happens. I type, you read. It’s like a dance. That is how I would describe individuality. A dance.

What else to discuss? I’m trying to take on NYC. Trying to go out and enjoy myself and find my niche in this place. It really is an interesting place to live. It seems that at night the city lights up the most. At night this city is beautiful. At night, most of the stuff that I like doing doesn’t exist. It is a tough balance really. The hardest thing is finding the right people. Still I’m trying to enjoy myself as much as possible and have been generally having a good time here. Speaking of time and its amazing ability to lurk behind you, ticking, ticking, ticking, waiting for you to wake up from your trance and leave your ohms behind you, mine has stopped. I have an early and late day tomorrow. It will be filled with many nods of my head, attempting and trying even maybe perusing the idea of staying awake in class.

On another note, I have been in the market for a new laptop and my favourite company has just released a new Intel based laptop. The Macbook is what they called it. While it is damn impressive and ridiculously fast, I will wait for a 12” version to come out before I purchase it. 15” is too big to carry around everywhere. This is a new era for Apple, the tech field and my stocks.

Goodnight

It is dark. Not even 5 PM and it is dark. I guess there are some things to get used around here. For one it gets dark much earlier than it did back home. Not really a problem, my view is much nicer when it is dark. All I see are lights across the sky. Kind of beautiful actually. Anyway, two more weeks of school and exams and I can relax for about a week. I am so excited to go home see my family and all my friends. I am done with my Cell Organelles exam today. I am glad, next I have two Anatomy Exams, one Dental Anatomy and my last exam is Genetics.

Life has been pretty good lately. Nothing overly exciting but just general hanging out and not doing much of anything really. I plan on going shopping tonight and buying myself a new a drill. Yes, I’m excited about a drill. I also finally got my second loan and now I can pay my rent and so that’s a load of stress that I do not have to worry about. Lately I’ve been kind of up and down. Some nights I feel down some I don’t. I think school might be getting to me. Anyway, I seem to be doing better in classes. Higher scores than when I started this semester. I’m at least passing now.

What an interesting turn of events for me. When I first moved here I was excited about having my own apartment and being on my own for a while. It has been about 3 months and I am already tired of it. I still want my own place, but I also want all my family to be around me. There is no way I would be able to move away from them and from my friends back home. No matter how well things get here, there really is no place like home.

Thursday... meh. Friday... meh. Saturday... meh. Everday... meh. 5 more weeks of this and home sweet home. I can’t wait really. Today I didn’t study a word, the exact opposite of what I wanted to do. I am just no longer motivated. Biochemistry is officially the most boring subject in the world. I can’t believe I am saying this but it is worse than Epidemiology. I know I know, it’s a bit crazy but it’s the truth. I had no problem studying for Epi but Biochemistry just bores me to death. Pathway after pathway after pathway. Who cares about this stuff? I blame the boards for this, I have never met a dentist that even remotely remembers biochemistry. Oh well, past the boards and I am not going to have any classes like this.

Life is good. I can’t say much right now because not much has been going on really. Most of my days consist of attempts to study for the next exam. Most of the time I am just not interested and I end up distracting myself. What can I say, I just can’t seem to get myself to study constantly. The plan tomorrow is to study. The plan for the next week is to study. The plan is to... play guitar and record music as much as possible while studying for 2 minute intervals in between.

All I have is exams. One after the next and the next after this one. Just keeps on going in circles and circles is what it feels like. Oh well, at least it's going by quickly. There are so many things that have been going on right now that my head is just spinning. What a ride. My schedule has become pretty set though. Kind of boring actually. I go to school, I come home, study, go to the gym, shower and pass out. The one thing that I enjoy is working out really. I can't complain though. It's not like I was expecting this to be easy. Only two years and after that things will be a bit smoother I think. I'll have more time to mingle and go out. More time to hit on girls, more time to do anything I want really. I hope at least. Either way, by the end of the fourth year I will be done. If I don't specialize that is.

I don't think I'm going to specialize. I am just tired of this consistent studying. I never was an academic person. I can handle it, but it was never interesting to me. Why didn't I go into art or music? Even computers. Any of these fields would have been a joke for me, that's probably why. I love dentistry, but then again I love a lot of things. I just knew I would find this really hard and really frustrating. Everything else I'll have a lifetime to learn. Science is the one general subject that I know I would not sit down and teach myself. Hence why I got in it. I don't know if this is confusing or not, but basically since it is something that I couldn't teach myself I decided to go to school for it. All the other fields I can learn on my own and I would learn on my own. Meh... I've been studying for a very long time now. It is 10 PM and I have been non-stop school work since 9:00 AM.

I have an exam in two days. I need to study.

It has been nothing but a crazy day over here. If you think about it, half of the semester is already done and I feel like I just started. Things go by so quickly although I know that this year everyone just wants to be done. Heck, the first two years every student I have talked to just wants to be done with school and done with having to take so many tests, one after the other. Life is so quick though and you can’t just take a step back to relax. Even this weekend when I went to Dallas the biggest thing that was on my mind is studying. I woke up thinking about studying and went to sleep thinking about studying. Oh well. It was a good weekend overall, but a bit sad really.

I went to bed at around 3 AM yesterday. Today I couldn’t wake up and missed my first two lectures, then after that I ran to school to catch my GDS lab. We had a quiz that I just couldn’t miss. I didn’t get much studying done and honestly never looked at the material. Somehow I managed a 100% on it. I am really happy with that, I am also done with my wax-ups through the rest of the month pretty much. I am happy with that as well. I just finished my canine wax up which we should’ve started sometime at the end of October. I love this class. Anything hands on I just know I will love. After GDS I had to go to Anatomy lab. The lab itself was good, I recognized most of the structures but the quiz I didn’t do too well on. I think I made maybe a 40 or a 60 on it. Not happy with that at all. I just can’t seem to get myself to understand anatomy. It is anatomy after all, and so you can’t understand much. Most of it is memorization and that is just not my thing. Never was, and apparently, never will be, no matter how much I study.

Right now it’s time to break my fast. I love food.

Ah, the first of October... exactly 3:30 AM. I am tired as hell and have had a very long night. Kind of sad kind of fun. Kind of not really. The day started out great. I woke up in a great mood, late to class already. I went and attended lecture. Made fun of Leslie, Sage and Vani. Good times. Had lab with Amit and our “special friend” Rigales (not sure of the spelling). Well towards the end of the night things started getting worse. I had a long talk with my girlfriend and just telling her how things are just so sad for me over here. Yeah I love hanging out with my friends and I really enjoy all their company, but I sometimes feel guilty that I’m out having fun and she’s not with me. So what do you do when you feel like this? Long distance sucks. I never wanted it. There were a lot of things in this relationship that I never wanted but stuck through. This right now is just really bothering me.

I know she’s not happy with me right now. I know she misses me and I miss her like crazy but I am also a little realistic. How am I supposed to concentrate on dental school and my life here if I’m still stuck back home. That will never happen.

Life is a series of events. One leads to the next and people move on. One of the biggest problems I see is that people think about the future too much. That really was never my style. So far I still can’t grasp the idea of always worrying about what will happen in the future. Instead of living in a world of risks, opportunities and ideas, we live in a system where the only real thing that matters is consequence. Consequences of what you’ll do and how they will affect your future. I can understand that in health, but not everything in life. Sometimes it is best to go and enjoy what is in front of you, right now, where you’re sitting, where you’re breathing at this exact moment in time.

It is 3:38 AM . I am tired and delirious probably. That is not going to stop me from enjoying some humus. Forget about how I feel tomorrow, I still want that humus.

The “instant gratification syndrome” that this city exhibits is amazing. No one is out to help anyone else. Each person on their own for their own. Well life is such I guess, especially if you live here. How fast can life move, that is impossible to say actually. Everything we experience is really a series of events. For some time flew by and for others it can’t go fast enough. It is truly impossible. Technically you can count the minutes of an event, seconds, even to the millisecond. In reality, perception is time. It is not a series of events and it is not two hours, twenty eight minutes and three seconds. It is a flow of the mind really and it can only be measured by a person’s perception. This is why things go backwards and forwards. People forget things that happened and remember specific events. If we truly thought “in time” we would remember every single event, all leading to the exact day and second that we occupy at the moment. You reading this. So here’s my question, why is everyone trying to get out of school in four years? Why are we taking only 3 months to study the whole human body, a result of millions of years of evolution? I have never felt as if there is not enough time in the day. Here’s to a new chapter in my life, my professional education and my personal re-incarnation.

For me time can’t pass fast enough right now. I am curious as to what the future holds and honestly I am in a state that I have never experiences. I care about school. I care about passing and I care about finally graduating and making my way back home to my family and my extended-family. Friends is a word of the past now, we are all family.

I have 44 quizzes, two practicals and two exams in one class. It is going to be interesting times for me, I actually have been studying. Weird. Just like my post.

A little late... I know but at least I am posting. Life has been nothing but crazy here. Just getting situated in and getting my furniture in and settled in the apartment. What a mess, what a situation and what scenarios I had to go through. Nothing is made easy in New York. Just to get my furniture up I had to ask favours from people I don’t know at all. It is really crazy. First I had to set up appointments with the apartment management office to get the furniture delivered. The problem is that I don’t know when the furniture will be delivered because IKEA and Eurway don’t give you set dates. So you have to schedule with them, once that’s set you call the management office to get the appointment. Well then they tell you that you can’t just set any appointment you want so it’s a no go. To change the appointment with IKEA it is an extra 100 dollars every time. Where do I come up with that kind of money? Right now I am more broke than I have ever been. Not only that, the school loans are definitely not enough to live on. They are giving us a loan based on rental rates from the 1990’s. 1375.00 dollars for an apartment? Where? Even their own subsidized apartments are 1700.00 dollars a month. What were they thinking with this? I guess it is time to go apply for extra loans.

Enough ranting about New York and the move now. I am tired. I need food and there is a slice of pizza in the refrigerator waiting on some CPR from me. I have seen a lot since I have been here. One event that caught my mind was the sight of a guy running around, screaming “f*** Bush.” He got on his knees in the middle of a group of almost 200 dental students and asked for a cigarette. No one paid him any attention, myself included. Then he screamed “why not, do you all support him? is it because I’m Arabic? Is it because I am Palistinian?” It really took a lot to my heart to see him like this. I just wanted to sit him down and buy him a meal. Ask, discuss, interview... whatever you may call it. What does it take to get a person to that point? To go insane? Obviously it has to do with politics, but what it is it? What happened? If I see him again, and if I have money, I will take him to lunch, buy him clothing and if I can, I will attempt to help him get back on his feet. Life is too short to ignore the problems around us and to not help out other human beings in general.

I am frustrated. I finally found some furniture I want and some things that I like and every 10 minutes I hear someone telling me to return them. They don't like them. Go away! It is my apartment and my furniture. So what do I do? I ignore I guess. That is the easiest way to get around things.

"The Wife" is right next to me, reading as I type. She makes me laugh sometimes and so angry other times. Oh well, I guess it's all part of being in a relationship. Either way I still can't wait till she moves up to New York with me, then that'd be great. We went and looked at furniture the past two days. She has horrible taste. She picks the weirdest things in the world. Mirrors that are absolutely useless and lights that provide no real lighting. Even when it's dark I think a candle would do better. Ah good times, this is why guys should never allow women to decorate. They get things that are absolutely not practical but look pretty. Guys on the other hand are the opposite, things can be ugly as long as they work. That's the real point anyway, to have things that work.

Soon I will be back in New York and paying so much money to go to school and to eat. The cost differences between here and there are amazing. Most people would flip out and some, the few that lived in New York, are not at all surprised. Oh well, time for me to go and do more shopping now. Find something that the family won't complain about. And the wife would like.

Satan’s Den. New York. I have never in my entire life seen so many drunks, homeless and the high class in one area. This really is a great place to visit. Would I consider this place to be the best to live in? Not so much. Most people say it is the place that helped them find themselves, I think it is the place that they lost themselves. It is amazing how each person, unique, decided and comfortable is now the same collective person here. Over and over again you meet the same person, all who discovered who they are. Maybe I only scratched the surface but it seems funny to me that every single person I have spoken with plans on moving back home immediately after school is done.

This past weekend was a lot of fun. I met a lot of people and enjoyed a lot of company. Now it is time to go back. Independence is beautiful. Having your own place and not having to worry about being anywhere or at any place. Things will change soon. School is going to start and that’s all I will be able to think about. It is amazing how fast life can change. One day I am at home with everyone, the next I am in a new world.

It is another new day today. The type of day that you know will really do nothing for you. How can you get anything done when you just don’t have the money? It is amazing how schools can charge extreme amounts for tuition and also give you as little money as possible to live. What do you do? The same thing I do I guess. Keep looking. New York is no fun when it comes to looking for a place to live. The market is over saturated with customers and almost every building requires a realtor. The realtor takes a little bit more than a month’s rent. Lately, the minimum I have found in any apartment is 1950.00 dollars a month. Now lets think about that for a second. When you first start rent you have to put in the first month plus a deposit equivalent to each month’s payment. So that’s 1950.00 times two and then add to it the realtor’s fee, approximately 2050.00. That is a total of $5950.00. This is startup cost and does not include utilities, internet, food, living in general. Who has that type of money?

It is depressing here. It wouldn’t be so bad if I can just get up and go to Serene’s place. Life is too fast, too complicated and too selfish here. To each his own is a way of life here, not just a saying. I need my own place, I think that’s what makes this so hard. Once I have that then it is easy from then on. Just go, buy a bed, a desk, plates, silverware, setup electricity and internet access and get a gym membership. Not really that much if you think about it. The trick is finding a place to live first.

Well it is Saturday night and I am in my scrub pants. No... not work. They are comfortable. I am very tired, today has been a long day. Good and bad.

Work seemed like it is taking forever. Forever in the sense that forever will never end. I know... that's what the word is supposed to mean. Reality proves otherwise though, everything these days takes forever. A minute stoplight is an unbearable burden. A computer that is two seconds slower is outdated and a child who is 14 is living the terrible nightmare of not being 21. Time is too slow. I think our minds are just too fast. Everything has to be done and it has to be done instantly. Otherwise, catastrophe. It is the end of the world. Every task wasn't accomplished. The prime objective for today has not been reached. Life as we know it will cease. Now what's going to happen to that task. Gasp, it will be done... tomorrow. It is amazing how people rush to get things done all the time. I personally prefer a different method. Relax and do what you want. Slowly, calmly and joyfully.

Today I had a great time hanging out with Miranda. We did just that, relaxed. Nothing was rushed, no schedule, no time. Haven't looked at the clock once in fact. It was a beautiful thing and something that I'd like to do more often. I'm not completely impervious to the rush however. I want my baby back and I want her back now. I guess the only way to handle it though is to take it day by day. Soon I will be in Denver and then New York. I will be in the rush fever. Running from one place to the next to try to get settled in before school starts. Trying to get settled in time to come back to Dallas for one last visit before school starts. In time to come and see her one more time before the big move.

I can't wait... I can't wait to be done with the first year. I can't wait till she is up in New York with me and I can't wait till I wake up one morning and find her next to me. That will put a smile on my face.

What a life? How would anyone know with it being cut short so quickly. She is only in her fifties and now she is gone. You know the day people find out the cure to death is the day that I think all war and hatred will stop. After all, why hate someone if you will both live forever. All you will do is fight forever. Then again I guess you can look at it the other way, why hate someone if life is so short?

I guess it is all part of nature anyway. Everything dies. It was cancer. She was an amazing woman. We can’t fight nature, it helped create us. All these new revelations in science and health to postpone what happens in nature. I guess the reality of it is that we are fighting and straying away from the one thing that truly has nurtured us. We are in a sense, becoming our own entity. Humans no longer abide by the rules of nature. Every disease has a way of being postponed further and further. Every treacherous road has way of being paved in brick and mortar. Still though, it seems no matter what we do, and no matter how much we think we will rise above nature, we lose. It is a reality and our fickle minds just cannot seem to accept it. Mine included.

I was shocked at the news. Last I remember, she was quite alive. Running from one end of our small refuge to the other without a second thought. What a grim day.

The doctor said he’d give him a few days to live
I’d give him more... if I could - Jack Johnson

So would I. In loving memory of Violy. You will be missed.

Am I really that sinister or is it normal? Maybe I am just selfish. These thoughts that keep running through my head. Good and bad. Mostly good, but what’s up with the bad ones? She’s only been gone two days and I already miss her like crazy. I keep thinking about all the fun that we always have. Every once in a while though, I’ll start thinking thoughts of her meeting someone else. Or doing something that would totally destroy us. But then I think, no way. She’s my baby, my girl, my a lot. And I mean a lot to her as well and she wouldn’t do that. Then I feel better. I guess I’m not that sinister, but definitely selfish. I want her back. I don’t know how nor do I care, I just want her back here with me. Right now. I would like to wake up and all this be a dream and her be right next to me in the morning. That would be ideal. It is only for two months though, eight weeks, 9 weekends. If she’s reading this I hope she is having fun.

love: noun: an intense feeling of deep affection - oxford

What does oxford know about love? They’ve never seen us. I could be in the worst mood and depressed but then she will laugh. I mean truly laugh, like I have never seen before and my world would all of sudden be better. I think it’s more than an intense feeling. I think it’s a dependance, an expectation, a way of life. Simply, a feeling that is truly unique to every couple. The only feeling that is truly unique. Hate and jealousy are all the same. In the end people do the exact same thing when they feel hatred or jealous. Love though, makes you do crazy things. Things like leaving the person you are with just because you know they’d be happier otherwise. What is that? It is torturous. Two more months I keep telling myself, four two week periods or to make it even somehow seem a little better in my head, two four week periods and she’ll be back. I am not depressed nor am I crazy. I just miss my baby.

On another note the past few days have been a great time. I’ve been programming a lot. Or at least learning. I’ve gotten pretty far with what I want although some concepts I just can’t get my thoughts around them yet. Soon enough though, with enough practice I will be able to accomplish my goal.

For the few of you who were worried about me. I really am not depressed, I just feel like writing. These how my thoughts have been my whole life. Just take it with a grain of salt. Believe it or not, I am a lot deeper than I might put out to be. By the way, did you know that beach sand is actually fish crap? A specific kind of fish (that I can’t remember their name right now) that eats rocks. It deposits the non-edible food (rocks) as sand and the sand gets eventually washed up to the shore. So, next time you’re on the beach, have fun getting buried all the way to your neck.

I am revolted; by several factors, attitudes and actions. Yesterday I had an FBI agent come in searching for an old customer of ours at work. Why you might ask? As things may turn out, this clean cut all American, married man is running from the law for molesting a five year old boy. The thought of raping an adult woman brings me to a place in my mind where killing someone simply isn’t that wrong anymore. How do you think I feel when a person does this to a five year old child? An adult can comprehend the situation better and deal with it better, but an innocent child, at five years old, instead of playing with fluorescent green balls and getting a lot of joy simply by running from one side of the room to another will never be able to understand why this would happen to him. I propose a new law, castrate all rapists. A five year old child? What can possess a person to destroy a kid’s life? Deteriorate his self esteem and force him a childhood unlike any other. A childhood that he would have been better off without otherwise.

On another note, I ask the question, what is a favor? When you ask someone for a favor, what do you expect? eMail me on this one and I will quote the answers that I receive next time I post.

Other than that, I have been very busy with school stuff for New York. As you might already know, I have received my rejection letter from Baylor, which is not a good thing of course but, I still am going to dental school in New York and that is good. Actually I really am looking forward to the move, in fact, I am very excited about it. New city, new apartment, new everything really. What’s gonna make it hard is the money. I just applied for my first student loan, $74,600. That is crazy, at least it includes living expenses though, I hope at least. I really hope I get the money earlier because I would like to use it to pay for the apartment rather than pulling out of my 401K and using that which I think I will be doing anyway. I got my shots today, that means I am one step closer to getting everything ready for dental school. I have to go two more times, because Hep-B requires three shots. At first I was afraid of getting my shots, after all, I haven't been to a doctor in 13 or 14 years, I really don't remember what shots even felt like. Once I got it done though it was a breeze. No worries there.

Peace

I had an epiphany; life is becoming real. It has been a long weekend for me and I am looking forward to just relaxing next weekend. I have noticed many things in many people and for the first time I think I am starting to hate caring. Maybe things should go back to the way they were, when I just didn’t care about anyone or anything for that matter. I had my music and my art to keep me company. Now I haven’t written a song in weeks it seems like and I haven’t painted in months. Maybe a requiem for my dead art should be taking place. Something to bring back what I have never not loved and what has never betrayed me. Soon I will be on my way to a totally different world and just as things were getting good here. New furniture, new apartment, new city, new life; all good things, things that people enjoy. New friends... not something that I am excited about. I would trade in all the new things and keep with the old. Life is complicated as it is, no reason to just keep adding new things. It is not my approach to life.

Breaking relations and creating new ties, this is life. This is how the world operates and it is the sad truth of growing. When you are young it takes seconds to make life long friends. When you are older it takes the length of your life to make a second friend. I am not going to see my girlfriend like I have been, like I am now accustomed to and I am tired of making friends. This is a tie that I do not want broken and would like to think that I am still young, hence made a life long friend in seconds.

I am... in a weird mood. I feel like talking about something and nothing at the same time. Why is it sometimes that people feel the incessant need to justify wrong doings in their life? There are just some things that I just don’t understand sometimes and some people that I do not get. My brother says “life is a bitch and then you die.” I prefer to think life is what you make it. Never settle for less than you deserve and work hard for what you want and maybe, just maybe, look at the other side of things. Maybe then life will be great, maybe then life will be like how I see it, just awesome. Take things with a grain of salt and relax sometimes. Stop worrying about things a bit too much and try something new, like enjoy yourself by yourself without feeling sorry for yourself. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes I feel down too and sometimes I feel up and sometimes I just don’t feel at all. I don’t fight it, I accept it, there’s nothing wrong with feeling up or down.

Why is it sometimes that I always feel like I have to defend my place in people’s hearts? Especially my girlfriend? She gets hit on so much I feel like I have to compete or something to keep her with me, but it’s not like she’s a prize. She’s my girlfriend and she loves me. I am not so much questioning her, or people hitting on her for that matter. They would be crazy to not hit on her to begin with. She is smart, funny and absolutely stunning but that’s beyond the point. I think I am questioning society all together. Why is it that I know so many people who have been cheated on and so many people who have cheated? It makes me trust the world a lot less. Why do I worry so much about it? Media influence? No way, that’s not me, it has a lot to do with personal experience but it also has even more to do with experiences of friends and such. Everything that happens makes you think and the more you think the less you follow your heart. I hate thinking. Why is it that a single sip of wine could break me? Has my dislike for alcohol grown to a point where it is taking over me? I don’t know? Now I am thinking about it and in my mind trying to make it feel... alright. Well, this is one point I will stop thinking about as of now. My heart has always told me I hate alcohol and drinking, the party scene, the cool crowd and the mentality that if you’re not drinking and dressing like me you are not cool.

Maybe I am the black sheep in a herd of 300 million white ones but why is it that anything that compromises good morals and values I find completely horrendous? Not bad or distasteful... but horrendous. I am afraid of lack of morals. Is it the way I was brought up? My brothers are a lot more open minded than I am. Generally I don’t care what people do as long as it doesn’t affect others. But for people who I love and care about, it doesn’t matter, all I can do sometimes is worry. Even if they have no intention of doing anything I always place them in scenes in my mind where they are acting just plain stupid. Stupid by my definition of course. I guess maybe it has to do with me having hope that I am not the only person in the world who values honesty in a way like I have never seen anyone value it. I always feel like I am the only person who sees things the way I do. Sometimes extreme I admit, but that is the way I am. My imagination runs crazy and I just can’t stop it. It would be against my nature to even try to stop it. I just wish sometimes that there would be a person who understands exactly the way I feel, not because I explained it but because they feel exactly the same way I do. Not about everything, but about the things that I would consider important... things that they too would consider important.

I warned you that I was in an odd state.

April Fools!

But seriously folks, these past couple of weeks have really been amazing. It was my girlfriend's birthday and man it couldn't have gone any better. She loved her present, it was an engraved iPod mini. We went to the movies and stuff and it just was a good time in general. Other than that I have just been going to work and stuff. I have been much happier lately. Just generally happier and I can pretty much account all of it to my baby. I have lately been looking a lot at a Yamaha S08 keyboard. This thing is just awesome. It comes with an excellent sound bank, specifically the piano and the upright bass. Those are really the only two that I use MIDI with. Oh and drums too, but I am only concerned about those two because they use up a lot of computer power. My laptop is great, but not that great. I wish I had a PowerMac G5 to run all this stuff on. It is a much better system for audio stuff.

I have also been looking at a Toyota MR2 Spyder and an Infiniti G35. I cannot decide between either one of them really. The Infinity is much more luxurious but the MR2 is a much nicer ride. The MR2 is also a lot cheaper than the Infiniti but what it has against it is that it is slow, very slow and also there is absolutely no trunk space. Oh well, I will be happy with either decision. Either way I will not be getting a car till I find out what is going on with the Baylor program. I really hope I get accepted into this program. Not because NYU is bad, because it is a great school actually, but because I want to stay here in Dallas. It is much cheaper here for one, about 230 thousand dollars cheaper plus I get to stay with my family and friends. Baylor is, in my opinion, the best dental school in the US and personally I don't want to settle for less. Anyone who is reading this right now, please take a moment to pray for me. I find out what's going on with me on April 27th. Hopefully sooner.

What else, oh yeah, Jana came and visited me today. I haven't seen her in a very long time. It was so good to see her and catch up on old times. I was really hoping that she would get stay a bit longer so that she can meet all my friends and my grilfriend and stuff. Oh well.

Well I think I have said enough today.

Ah, work work work! Well here I am just working for free as I have been lately. So what's new, well I have gotten a letter from Baylor insuring that if I complete a year of school with them and with UNT I will be guaranteed a spot in. It is a very good deal actually and I might actually go for it. I spoke with NYU and they said they can defer my enrollment for another year. So things are looking good.

Outside of that, everything is going great with my baby. Her birthday is coming up soon and I am really excited about it. So what else is new? Nothing really, just been going to work then hanging out. Going to work, hanging and so forth. I might be getting a new car soon, I am very excited about that.

Ah what a great month it has been. I have been so happy lately, just nothing really puts me down. Outside of a single rough day I think everyday has just been better than the one before it. Of course, I'm sure many are wondering why and many already know, but I do owe the way I feel lately to one very special girl. I can't really write her name here because of reasons that I just don't feel like explaning right now. So... what's new?

Nothing really, I have been working at my dad's place and my credit card balance just keeps on going up and up. I really need to get a paying job sometime soon. I am so excited, this month is my cousin's birthday and my baby's birthday. Two of my favourite people. Mazen already knows what he's getting, baby on the other hand doesn't, she has no idea what I'm doing for her but I'm excited about it. I took a quiz recently... well it was a psychology project my girl had to do, but basically it was about pictures that we had taken, she printed them out and asked me questions about them. What was she wearing? What did the clock say? that type of stuff. I got all of them except for one right. Man that was great.

What else what else? Hmm, well nothing really, just been going out with her and really having a great time.

Happy birthday Sharon and Parastoo.

Happy Valentines day everyone! Mine would be fun except that I am stuck at work all day and I don't think I'm going to get a chance to see my girl. It's OK though, I'll get to see her tomorrow and all will be well with the world again. Work today is driving me insane, as soon as I get a chance to sit back down another customer walks in. So... you'd think with this many customers walking in all day that I would have more than two packages right? RIGHT? I guess not today, it's the type of busy that I dislike.

The past two weeks have just been awesome. Really I've enjoyed every day immensly. Everything really has just been great and I've been having so much fun. Nothing new outside of having my graduation party and making a hell of a lot of money that day. Something like 1700 dollars, thanks everyone for the great gifts I really liked all of them. Some news about Naomi (my guitar). Yesterday I was getting very irritated because whenever I would hit the open A string, the microphone would buzz. I ended up taking it to Guitar Center to get it checked and see if they can fix it. Turns out my headphones were the problem and nothing really was going on with the guitar at all. I was so happy, that guitar cost me 1500.00 dollars on its own, not to mention the case and the tuner and everything else I got with it. I was very angry when I thought it was buzzing, something that expensive should not be at all buzzing.

That's all really. Not a very interesting post even though the past two weeks have been great. To my baby, vous êtes très mignonne.

UPDATE: Despite having a horrible day at work, this was the best valentines day I have ever had. merci tellement mon chéri.

Second post of the year. This day can either be really good, really bad or just normal. The really good part of the day is coming up and that's having lunch with a girl who I really like. Good times for sure. Now as far as why the day can be really good or really bad, well today I might get a letter from Baylor. If I get a letter it can go two ways, I could have gotten accepted to Baylor College of Dentistry or it can be a rejection letter. If it's an acceptance letter then that would just be awesome, everything basically would have worked out perfectly, if not, well then it just isn't a good day and I will be heading to New York, not that I mind of course.

So, what's changed since last time I posted. Nothing much really, my graduation party was just awesome and everyone had a great time. As usual my dad threw the best party most people have seen. I made a lot of money and I am about to go to the bank to deposit it and send it to my credit card company. This is very good news, I really like paying things off and I am very close to getting all my debt paid off. I still need to fill out my FAFSA work though, so I can go in more debt with dental school, somewhere in the range of 350 thousand dollars. Ah good times! My brother Firas moved out recently, he bought himself a house and I am very proud of him. He is doing very well for himself and I couldn't be happier for him. I feel like I am just listing what has happened recently and I probably am, then again I just woke up 10 minutes ago so I'm not all here.

It is freezing and it is supposed to get even colder, maybe snow so I'm going to get going and make my deposit to the bank. Bye!

Ah, the new year, it is quite wonderful isn't it? Happy New Year to everyone who keeps up with this silly journal of mine, I hope you are enjoying it. I certainly do writing it. Well, it's been about a month since I last posted and a great month at that but before I get into that, I bet you're wondering what happened to the rest of the journal. Well, as with every year, it has been sent to the archives, click on archive above and then you can pick by year. Personally I am very surprised and happy that I have kept this journal for more than a year. Still, it is a goal that I have and I definitely will continue on posting here.

Now, back to it being a great month. Well, I have just been going out, having fun, but more importantly I have returned Tess and exchanged her with a new guitar, this one I call Naomi. She is just gorgeous. Perfectly built, with a very nice warm sound. She is very loud and unlike Tess, she sounds good when recording. The biggest problem I've had with Tess (Cordoba CWE-S) was the pickup. It was a B-Band pickup and it was horrible. First of all, there's no real microphone in it, meaning that all the noise the hand made just did not make a single sound. For any classical guitarist out there, you know how fake it sounds when you don't have finger noise. Also, it was horrible at picking up dynamics of the guitar, if I played loud or softly, it barely could tell the difference. I certainly was not a fan of that lack of sensitivity. Mostly, what I hated about the guitar was that when plugged into an amp it didn't sound half bad, but when plugged into recording equipment, the noise is louder than anything else and it is very prevelant. I have many people who can attest to the difference. Naomi (Jose Ramirez 2CWE) is probably the best guitar I have ever played. It sounds better than other guitars that are twice it's price. It also features a Fishman Pro-Blend pickup, probably the best pickup in my opinion. When plugged into either amp or recording equipment, it just sounds awesome. No noise at all, simply nice warm tone. If I want it to sound a bit like an electric I can turn the pickup to use the transducer against the strings, if I want it to sound more natural like a classic guitar, I just turn it to use the condenser microphone that's built in it. So it has two points of pickup and you can blend as much of each as you want. So for example, 80% mic, 20% pickup. That sort of deal. With a good cable, Monster in my case, you can achieve really clean results. The sample you might've just heard was done with no effects or editing at all, with the exception of adding reverb to each track. Pretty damn amazing if you ask me. Outside of the pickup, the guitar itself has been built without a single disregard for detail. It is just beautiful. Best craftsmanship I have seen yet. Everything on it is just right. Now here comes the bad part, when changing one of the strings I had popped it and it went into the finish, and so now I have a quarter inch scratch on there. I am not a fan of the scratch at all and it has been bothering the hell out of me. Oh well, win some lose some I guess.

Moving on, life really has just been good, I've been very relaxed. I have been relaxed since the day I found out I got accepted to dental school really. Now I just have to find a place to live and I have to do my loans, outside of that I'm really free as a bird.

Well, this will be the last time I post this year. I wasn't planning on posting again so early but I do have some news to report. I bought a new guitar for myself, I named her Tess. The guitar was a purchase of celebration, I got it because I found out over the phone several days ago that I have been accepted to NYU School of Dentistry. I am very excited, the school was my second choice school mainly because of cost and the fact that my family is in Texas. Still, it is an excellent school, the facilities are up to date and some are brand new. The SIM lab is very impressive and I can't wait to start doing work in it. All in all this has been a really good week for me. Graduation and Dental School. It can't get any better than this.

Yesterday was graduation. It was great too, I had a really good time. My friends and I hung out all day and all night. Right now I am over at Ruba's place after a very long night. I think I'm just going to spend the night here and leave it at that. I'm tired and don't feel like driving home much. I have gone and interviewed at NYU School of Dentistry. I loved the school, even though I'm certain the interview went horrible. NY was a lot of fun. I stayed in Manhattan with my cousin Bahaa. I didn't expect NY to be what it was I guess. I went about 10 years ago over there for a few days and I guess I just remembered what I didn't like about it. When I went back this time it was different. It's probably because I got to know some people there and hung out with them. Home is where you make it after all and without friends, it can't be home. I think I can get used to New York, what I especially liked about it was walking everywhere. Even though the weather was horrible, it was very refreshing to be able to walk everywhere. The city had bad traffic at 11:00 P.M. when I arrived from Dallas. That was amazing to me, I couldn't believe it. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world, the city was really alive. I'm sure after a while though I will begin hating NY traffice but since I'm walking, then there really won't be any issues.

As an update to my dental school status by the way, I did not get accepted into any of the schools here in Texas. I am second listed at the moment and still hoping to get into Baylor because it is right here in Dallas. Not even 20 minutes from my house without traffic. It would be many magnitudes cheaper for me to go to Baylor than any other school. On average, I'm looking to get out of Baylor being only $120,000 in debt as compared to NYU where I will be leaving with something in the range of $350,000. It is not even a question of how I would like the schools, both are very impressive and I can easily see my self attending and enjoying both. When it comes down to my future though, it is easy to see that it would be a lot more beneficial for me to go to Baylor, just on saving money.

One thing I forgot to mention, I graduated Cum Laude from UTD, meaning honors. Something I am very proud of.

Now back to other things, I really don't have much more to add. It is two in the morning right now and my thoughts are all over the place. Oh wait, one more thing, I've written maybe four different songs in one week. I don't know why but they just kept on coming. Okay, enough for now! Really my thoughts are all over the place.

The past two weeks have been much better than the month preceding. Read the last post. Anyway, I've been in a great mood lately, my love life has taken many turns and I'm getting tired of it, but I met a person who I think might put an end to all that for a while. I've been single for so long, all for one person, and that just didn't work out at all. Well, now I'm done being single and I am taking matters into my own hands.

I've written some new music, I am really excited about it. When am I not though? Anyway, soon I will finish recording it and I will add it to my site in the music section. I'm almost done with this coming semester. It looks like December is going to be a very busy month for me. On the first of December I will be finding out if I get accepted into dental school or not. Hopefully I made it in. Then on the fifth of December I will be going to New York because on the 6th I have an interview with NYU. I will be back on the 7th. On the 8th I will be having lunch with Dr Rippel and all the other TA's. He takes his TA's out to lunch every semester and it's just awesome of him. Once that's done, I have my graduation on the 11th, I will be graduating with honors, which is nice. I'm really excited about that actually, and in fact, I am even going to go to the ceremony. I skipped high school graduation, it didn't really feel like an accomplishment. After that is Christmas break, so I will be able to relax for a while and then New Years, which means I get to start a new Journal page and this one goes to the archives. I can't believe it's already been a year, this year just flew by.

I've had several people ask me before, why do I have an online journal? To put it simply, it's been my goal through life to document my thoughts and my feelings so that my kids or anyone who's interested for that matter can somehow understand my life story. Of course, this journal is not all I have, but if you combine my music, my paintings, my journal among other things I think it is possible to figure out how I was feeling at a certain period in time. Every detail won't be clear, but just so that people can get a general feeling of me.

Simple enough!

It's been a hell few weeks for me with a bunch of rediculous drama going on that I am not in the mood to deal with. I really won't talk about it now because it is water under the bridge but needless to say, I'm just not in a good mood lately.

On the other hand, Logic Express came in, the improvements in it are great and I for one am very glad of the changes. My brother also bought a PowerMac G5 and Logic Pro. Both of which are just completely amazing in their own field. Logic Pro has got to be the most complete and best music software I have used to date. I am waiting on a couple more updates though before I get my copy of it. I can only imagine what Apple will do to Logic Pro in the next couple of releases. Hopefully they will do to it what they did with Final Cut Pro, if they can even come close to reaching the calibur of Final Cut Pro then they will simply blow everyone's mind away.

On the fifth of December I will be flying up to New York for a dental school interview. By then I should know whether I have been accepted into the dental schools here in Texas or not. Hopefully I have, they are much cheaper over here and some of the best schools in the United States. Right now this is all I will add to my journal.

Goodbye.

Not that I have the money, but I don't mind going into dept a little for good software. Specifically I am talking about Logic Express 7. Apple just released this, it is what I use for all my music and I have been waiting for an update from Apple ever since they acquired eMagic, the oroginal developers of this program. Logic is just impressive in its abilities. It is extremely well featured, the only issues are that it required a USB dongle to be plugged into the computer in order to use the software and the interface is just horrible on it. With this new update, Logic Express does not require a USB dongle anymore, LogicPro still does, don't know why. Also, Apple has updated the interface for Logic, although it is not a complete overhaul, the updates done on it are worth the upgrade price. Now there are only a few things left to fix. For one, I would like to see a non destructive time stretch interface, much like audio warp in Cubase SX3. More updates to the interface include giving it a facelift and being able to control where loops stop with having to copy an instance of the loop and capping the end of it. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, if you used Logic you would know.

I'm at work right now waiting on customers. I get really bored up here and so I always bring my laptop with me to work on some projects. I have a board meeting to attend at school today and then I'm pretty much off for the rest of the week. It is mid terms this week and since I have to be at work today, Dr Rippel said that I can't administer the practical to the students in my section tomorrow morning. Basically he wants someone who can make it to all three sections and I don't blame him. It is the only way to have fair grading across the board. I am excited that I get the day off tomorrow and saturday. I don't know what I'm gonna do, but I'll definitely sleep.

Bye

Ah the good times, well yesterday I had my second dental school interview with Baylor. I really liked it there, the SIM lab is very impressive. Nothing much has really gone on for me. I wrote a new song, but it's definitely not one for the masses, oh well, I like it a lot myself. Outside of that, nothing new, all I can think about is getting accepted into dental school. Right now I am at work and I am bored. I just finished preparing for biochem lab for tomorrow and that really is all I have to do. I guess I'll just have to find something to do for the next five hours.

Life is still good

Yesterday I had my first interview with San Antonio Dental School. It was very impressive, I like the program and I like that instead of buying books, everything is done on computer. All the books are on one DVD. It is expensive, but never the less, it's a lot easier than buying a ton of books. I think the interview went alright, I couldn't gauge my first interviewer very well. Anyway, now I am back home from San Antonio and today I have the day off.

I stayed over at Angela's place and that was interesting. I think she felt a little awkward that I was there which is understandable. For those of you who don't know our story, Angela and I were an item for almost four years. It was very good to see her though, it has been such a long time, almost four years since we last spoke.

Other than that not much has been going on, all that are really on mind are the dental school interviews right now. I am at least one step away from being accepted.

As dad would say, "life is good." I have just been having a great semester so far. I have two dental school interviews and hopefully I will get several more. I am really excited about them actually, more importantly I am really excited about dental school. Hopefully I will be accepted this year, I am ready to start. I have been ready for a long time now. Anyway, I have been hanging out with all my friends as usual and I'm only taking six hours this semester, so it's a very easy semester for me, but don't worry, I make up for it. I have to watch my dad's business because he's trying to switch to real estate instead.

Outside of that nothing much has happened, honestly all I can think about are the interviews right now, so I can either end here or write a few pages about them. I think I'll end here.

Bye bye.

Wow does time fly. I feel like it was just yesterday when I last posted on here. To give an update, I have just finished my applications for out of state dental schools. I'm really excited, I have applied to areas where I have family and friends. I really would like to go to Maryland because it's an hour or two from everyone. I figure that way I can visit people whenever I feel the need.

Outside of dental school, I did manage to make all A's in the summer, which is nice. I am very happy with the way that went. Obviously. That's really about it for me and school right now. My brother and my friends Paras and Farbad are all taking the MCAT this saturday. Good luck to them all, I hope they do very well on it.

There are many things going on in my life right now that I will not post about, and I have many paintings stuck in my head that I need to begin churning out. I've also been working on some new music, I'm excited about that as well. I'm using an electric guitar now that Paris had let me borrow. It's a different texture all together for me and I'm really enjoying experimenting with it. Still though, nothing touches acoustic classical guitars. I'm still wanting to buy a drum set, piano, violing and a new guitar for myself. I'd like to get a classical acoustic/electric so that I can record music without worrying about outside noise. That's a technicality though, I found two that I liked, both above 1500.00 dollars.

Enough for now.

Well, school is almost out. So far I have three A's and one more class to go, I'm pretty sure that I'll make in A in this class too. I hope at least. I am real excited to be almost done with everything. One more semester and then I graduate. I have to run by the HPAC office to sign a form so that all my stuff is sent to the dental schools, that way my application process can finally start.

Outside of that I haven't really done much. Just hanging out with my friends and all that good stuff. Tonight we're meeting at Fuddruckers (I don't know if that's spelled right) and then we'll go out and do something afterwards. It'll all be fun. Friday I'll be going to the DMA because they are open late and they are having a jazz band playing. That's going to be a lot of fun. Also this Sunday my brother is going to Shakespeare in the Park and I might go with him. Just gotta find a date first.

More than anything, I am excited about my mom and my little brother coming home this weekend. I can't wait till they get back, I miss both of them so much. The house is real quiet without the both of them.

That's really about it.

Good times good times good times. That's All.

Just kidding. I have been crazy busy the past few weeks, my family being out of town and all. I've still been having a great time though, last week was a party over at Savera's place, that was a ton of fun and the homies and I have been hanging like the usual. I have one more week of school left, I'm really excited about that. I am looking forward to being done with classes, of course I will be starting classes yet again a week later. Still, next semester I think will be a lot of fun actually. The classes that I am going to be taking are ones that I will enjoy. Since all I have left to graduate now are electives I just got to pick my classes and I picked something completely out of my field. I figure since I plan on attending dental school I might as well take something else that I have an interest in becasue I don't know if I'll ever get the chance later on.

My dad came back to town yesterday. I'm so glad he did, I missed him a lot and I miss my mom and my little brother as well. I can't wait till they get back into town. Outside of that I don't think much has been happening really. I mean, it's all about school lately. I still have to write a five page paper, no problem, and I have to prepare for my presentation, I also have to finish a chapter's worth of homework in my creating music class and finish a portrait in my painting class. Outside of that I don't have that much to do, just make sure everything is going well with my applications for dental school as well as register for physics class and pay tuition. Ah, how the good times come rolling.

Have a great July!

Happy Holidays everyone. I haven't really done much since I last posted, it's only been 10 days. Anyway, I have just been catching up on all my school work, papers, student ambassador and school events that are going on. I had my HPAC interview last week and was not very happy with it but hopefully the real dental school interviews will go much better.

There isn't going to be much happening tonight. Just a few friends and I are going to watch the fireworks and then go back to Grego's place and just hang out for a little bit. Nothing overly exciting. What is exciting though is that I am going to be buying a drum set. Yep yep, I can't wait. I'm about to jump in the shower right now and then go to Guitar Center and see what type of deal I can get. I can't wait to get one, I've been wanting to play drums for so long. They are advantageous in two ways, one I get to improve my rhythm and second, they will help as far as my coordination goes so that my dexterity for dentistry is improved even further.

I'm still continuing on working on my album, although I haven't recorded anything new in a while, I have just been way too busy. Either way, I just found out that there are scholarships and such that I can get that will allow me to go to a recording studio for free and record a song or maybe even a full album. That would be great to do, a definite eye opening experience.

On another note, last week I went out with some of the first year dental students at Baylor College of Dentistry, where my cousin goes. We got to know each other very well and now I am more excited than ever to begin dental school. I know how much work is involved in it and that I will be very busy but somehow, I am looking forward to that. I guess my dad's saying is true, the older you get the more you want to learn.

Hope everyone has a great 4th, I know I will be enjoying it.ß

D-Day. Basically, I bombed the DAT today again. My average did not change a point, I am still at 18. The thing is, I've gone up at least a point in every section but my average still did not go up. Now I'm wondering if I'll even get an interview at all. Do what you have to do I guess, I will be taking the DAT one more time. Outside of that, I really don't have much to add. I haven't done much more than study, so really, I'm done here.

OK, so I'm tired right now and I'm about to go to bed. Basically I've been studying for the DAT, I just finished my dental school applicaiton, I've been going to work at my Dad's place and I have been very busy with school. Outside of that, nothing much has changed.

Good news and bad news. Bad news is that I have to retake the DAT and score at least two points higher in order to get a decent chance at dental school. The good news, I got all A's this semester, basically I am now standing at a 3.55 GPA the way UTD calculates it. Not that I really care about that, what I do care about, however, is how dental schools calculate grades. According to the way dental school do it, I am now at a 3.55 science GPA, 3.8 non-science and 3.62 overall. Not bad at all, too bad these grades completely drop once you throw in my CCCC grades (first two years of college). I wish I can take back time and redo both of those years with my current study habbits. I would easily have a much higher GPA. EASILY.

Outside of that nothing much has been going on. The pool is almost entirely clean. I'm so glad, I can't wait for it to be done. You can now see the bottom of the pool, something that hasn't been possible for at least a year. Now that we have a new filter though it's getting much better. I've been working on it everyday to get it in tip top shape and it's paying off. Two more days and the pool will be swimmable in. BBQ anyone?

I've written four new songs in the past month. I'm on a roll I guess. I'm still learning more and more everyday about Logic and how to use it. It really is quite powerful, but the interface on it is really hard to learn. I hope now that Apple owns the company that they have a RADICAL change in the interface aspect of it and some under the hood (not much) tweaks here and there. If it had something like SoundTrack's interface it would be excellent. Much easier to use but still has all the power. It's easily feasible. OK, enough of my ranting about this.

Have a good summer!

I am done with exams! It has been a great semester and I have learned a lot, but towards the end, I began getting sick of it all. Now I am finally done, I'm taking summer classes and then fall classes and that's it, then I graduate. I will be applying to dental school this month and I will be retaking the DAT next month or the month after. If everything goes well, I will hopefully be posting on here my acceptance to dental school.

Outside of that, nothing much has changed. We got a new pool filter so hopefully the pool will be much cleaner soon. I give it a week and I think that it will be swimmable. This is very good news, I've been wanting to swim for so long.

That's all folks!

Lately there hasn't been much that changed. I have been so busy with school that I haven't had time for anything else. I finially finished my senior thesis, and got an A on it, so I am very happy about that. All I have left is a presentation for tomorrow and then I'm pretty much done with this class. No more quizzes, notes or anything, just attendance. Outside of that, I have an exam in Immunobiology and that's pretty much it. The rest is just the usual, practice for Piano and Guitar class, as well as weekly homework and quizzes for Basis of Evolution. This semester is pretty much done now. I'm real excited about that. Also, in about a month I'm going to apply to dental school and we'll see what happens after that. I have to go to school and talk to the health professions advisor, see what needs to be done.

Other than that, I am sunburnt because of Oozeball (mud volleyball). It is an event that we hold at school. I had a real good time there, but the funny thing is that mud splattered on my face and basically, those areas did not get sun burnt at all. Now I have a red face, with white dots everywhere. It's very funny looking.

We also got a new pool filter here at home, hopefully this one will work and I can finally get the pool clean. The one that we had is about 30 years old and it's time that it gets replaced. This new filter will arrive the 29th of April and I for one am really excited about having it installed.

My birhtday is coming up soon, the 22nd actually, and I'll be turning 22. Serene's birhtday is coming up too, on the 19th, so... happy birthday Serene.

Well, that's really about it.

Good times, good times. OK, so here's the deal, I'm really making some inroads on recording all of my music. I'm getting better at the software that I'm using and I'm loving it. This is one of the most significant projects that I've done in my entire life. The whole project is mine, the music, lyrics, every thing. No way around it. These past two weeks have been crazy for me actually. I took my second exam on Friday for the Immunobiology class. Hopefully I did OK on it. I also had an event for Altrusa that I went and helped with. The event was a lot of fun actually, time flew really quickly and outside of the people who acted like slave owners, everyone was nice and in a good mood.

Yesterday I spent the whole day trying to fix my uncle's PC. The thing is brand new and cost a ton of money and it's already gone bad. Something's wrong with the hardware, he's going to have to send it in to get it fixed. Towards the end of the night, my uncle decided we should go and pick up a laptop for him, but that never happened. It's a long story.

Other than that, I have just been real busy with school and will continue to do so for the next two weeks at least. I have to finish my 15 page paper that's due for Seminal Papers and I also have two quizzes that are coming up. I am really worried about these quizzes actually. In fact, I'm worried about Immuniobioligy this semester and Seminal Papers. The other classes I think I will do fine it. Guitar is a blast and I'm getting better at music reading. Piano is a blast as well, and I'm getting better at reading music for that as well. I wish I had a keyboard at home to practice on. A real keyboard not like the one that I have now which, is 14 years old and only has 3.5 octaves. I would like to get an 88 piano weighted key keyboard. Then I can really get some real practice going on.

That's all foks!

Spring Break is here! Guess what else is here? Yes, a slew of bacteria in my body making me sick. So basically, I'm not feeling very well. At least I have gotten some progress done with my papers. I have a total of 4 papers due at the end of the semester. Last weekend I wrote two of those and I am now working on my long paper. The last paper is for Piano class, it's a simple one page paper that won't take any time at all to accomplish. Outside of that nothing much has changed. I'm just getting ready to go on a trip with the Student Ambassador group at UTD. We're going to be presenting to people how to mingle at parties. Sounds like it is going to be fun.

I have since last time recorded several songs, most just a quick recording so that if I ever forget them I can have something to remind me of how they go. I have also re-recorded Sweetest Rose and it sounds much better now. I had set up a poll, some people don't like it, some do... no problem. It's not really everyone's style of music. I can certainly understand why some people don't like it. Anyway, so far there are only three votes, 2 like it and 1 doesn't. No one loves it and no one hates it.

Outside of that, not much has really happened. Just school school school.

Well, I missed making my second post for February, but it's OK, things happen. Honestly, not much exciting news is going to come from this post. The only new things that happened is that I got Logic Express, which is a pro level music development software. On this I recorded the first song that I've ever written on Piano. It definitely sounds better but there are still some tweaks that I plan on doing to it. No extra instruments or anything, just get rid of one of two effects that I have on my voice. I like it to sound as true as possible, and the way the song is right now, it sounds a little different.

Outside of that, I have returned the OmniStudio USB recording interface for the original FW410 that I had bought before. It works much better than the OmniStudio. The reason I returned it originally is because it wasn't working with GarageBand. Now, however, since I am not using GarageBand anymore, I'll just stick with FW410.

Yesterday I went to Greg's place and came up with tunes for a new song on the guitar. It sounds very much like a 50's or 60's song. Super oldie, but it can be fun, and it will be fun. Either way, I enjoy it.

Right now I'm working on my 15 page advanced writing paper that is due at the end of the semester. I figure I'll get it done before spring break, that way I can get started on studying for the DAT during spring break and concentrate on that. Last time I took it I did OK on it, but I would much rather do better. If I can get two points more on it, then I'll be set with the DAT. After that it's applying and interviewing. Hopefully I will be accepted.

Many different things have happened since I last posted, but I'm not going to talk about much. I have a quiz tomorrow in Seminal Papers and an exam Friday in Immunobiology so I will be spending most of my time studying, hence the reason I'm not going to post much tonight. To the good stuff, I bought a new computer two days ago, I got a PowerMac G5 and the machine is just awesome. It is easily the fastest computer I have EVER had the pleasure of using. With the speed comes some down falls however. It has a hefty price tag of 3300.00 dollars. A little much for my blood actually so I will be returning it. The good thing that came out of all of this is that I did get a chance to work some of my music without the computer freaking out on me like my laptop did. It is too bad I have to return this, I really love this machine. I don't care if you're a PC user or a Mac head like me, you have to appreciate how well designed and how fast this machine is. It just blows the competition, bar none. The song I just finished recording is called "Pale." It is the second song that I've written on the piano and it is one of my favourites.

Outside of that, I'm doing a little spring cleaning I guess, I'm selling all of my photography equipment as well as some software that I've had for a while. It just is sitting here collecting dust, even my digital camera is of little use now. I just don't have time to pursue music, oil painting, photography, school and work right now. Since I do less photography than anything else, I've decided to give it up for right now. I will get back to it, but not now, besides, I really don't think I have a need for 4 cameras anyway. That's a little much for a hobbyist.

I figure that I will get a pretty good amount of money for all this equipment in which case I will buy new software which will hopefully work better than GarageBand on my laptop. If that works, then I don't have to opt out for a new machine. I think it's kind of crazy that a computer that was top of the line less than 6 months ago is now outdated. I love my laptop, no reason to replace it... not unless Apple comes out with G5 laptops, then we have a totally different story... ;)

Man, this is a nerdy post, all about computers and software and some schooling. Oh well, it's the stuff that's on my mind right now.

Peace

And you thought I was going to post again this month. Well, you were mistaken. Good times and bad times since I last posted. Nothing great has happened, except that I all of a sudden know how to play some Piano. I'm not great at it by any means, but definitely a lot better than I anticipated. So as usual, I got over excited and went out and bought myself a keyboard. It doesn't make sounds on its own, you have to hook it up to something else, I have it hooked to my computer. It's a MIDI controller. It's interesting that I've been learning so much about audio recording and such. So far I have everything I need to record music, except for software. I bought some software, Apple's GarageBand. It is a first release and it acts like it. Very slow and has some rather irritating bugs. After a few more releases I'm sure it will get real good. I just don't plan on waiting that long anymore. I'm going to buy Logic Express and hopefully that'll do well. It's a lot more feature rich than GarageBand anyway, so I'm really getting a much better software package. The only thing I worry about with is whether there's a good piano sound or not. It comes with several software instruments but I don't know if it has a regular grand piano.

So lets see, what else is new? I guess nothing really, just been hanging out and working on school and stuff. I feel like I might finally be learning how to read music. I'm glad I'm taking these classes, but sometimes the differences between Piano class and Guitar class can throw you off, the two of them confuse me somtimes, but it's something that I have to learn to work through, especially considering that I plan on learning at least 12 instruments by then end of my life.

That's all folks!

Happy New Year to everyone! Well, there goes another year. Time seems to fly now, faster than ever. Of course, I am busier than ever as well. Today I finished my History II Wintermester class, hopefully I did well on it I am glad to be done with it as well, not because the class wasn't interesting, but because of some of the students in the class. That's another story though.

The good stuff, I bought some recording equipment finally. I got headphones, a mic/midi interface for the computer and a microphone as well. Right now I'm waiting on software, it should get here next Friday. Once I have the software, I'll be set to record, everything is top quality except for the mic. That will be my limitation as far as sound quality goes, and it is going to be a huge limitation untill I get a new one.

If you notice, the year 2003 is gone, but don't worry, it's still on the site, just click on the Archives section above and you should find it. I always wonder how long I am I going to be able to keep this journal up. It's not daily, and it's very loose in structure, but it is my life. Ah well, no need to worry about that now I guess.

Back to the music. Monday I start Piano classes at UTD, as well as the rest of my classes but I'm more interested in the Piano part right now. My brother left his keyboard in my room the other day, and for the first time I sat down and played it. Within 10 minutes I figured out how to play ColdPlay's "The Scientist." I was so excited, still am actually. I'm considering getting a MIDI keyboard for myself, one that doesn't make sound unless it's played through some other instrument. Now you might think that this move might be stupid, but I think it would be a pretty good one, what that means is that I'm not limited by the sounds strictly on my keyboard, as long as they make new sounds, I can just play those, so I can play a ton of instruments on one keyboard. Don't worry if you don't understant what I'm getting at, it might just be easier to show you.

I am going to re-record all the music in my music section as well as add some band covers that I like to do. It will take me a while to get everything sounding well, so don't expect anything soon. Oh and I will be redesigning this site so that it would work with older browsers better. I don't think it will look any different to any browser that's up to date though.

Have an awesome year!

Yes! Finals are done. It turned out to be a pretty good semester after all. I made three A's and one B (Mol Cell). To be honest, I was surprised that I did this well this semster because it just didn't feel like it. Not that I mind or anything. So far I've had one week of break, which I worked away at my dad's business. It's Christmas and his busiest season, so he needed the help. This is the first time I work at his place where I'm doing computer work. I was working with packages and shipping and all the good stuff of the business. He decided he's going to make me a notary public. Which I think is kind of cool actually.

Outside of work, I start school tomorrow. So much for a break, school is already starting for me again. Oh well, not like the break has been that great anyway. All the friends have been canceling to do things, plus the homies don't go to the same school that I do, so they had finals all of last week. Oh well, I guess I'll hang after and before class. Since there was nothing to do during the break, what I ended up doing was updating my music page, this time with my own music and completely changed the layout. I never liked the way I had it before, it always struck me as ugly and confusing. I recorded my music on my laptop using a program not designed to do music at all. It was also all done in one take and through the built in microphone on the laptop. So if you think the quality sounds bad, well... now you know why. Anyway, that's all for now. Told you it was a boring break!

So normally I start off by saying that not much has happened. For some reason though, I think a lot has happened since I last posted. At least it feels like it. I am now approaching finals, and they're coming quickly. I have Mol Cell on Monday, Microbial Physiology on Tuesday, Biochemistry and Government on Thursday. I honestly can't wait for the semester to be done with. It is just so much work and I'm really tired of it. Next semester will be busy as well, but it will be better because I'm taking classes that interest me a lot more than Microbial ever did. I went and spoke with my advisor and determined a road map for graduation. I'm looking to graduate Fall 2004. Finally. The next step, and the step I'm really looking forward to is dental school. Everything that I've worked for, I've done so I can go to dental school. I will apply next year and will hopefully receive an acceptance letter in the mail. Once that's done, I can relax. It's going to be tough and a lot of work, but for once I may feel like I'm actually working towards something, and that my future is finally within my grasp, rather than getting my Bachelors in Biology and not knowing whether I will be accepted into dental school at all or not.

Enough ranting about school, now to the important things. Lets see, where to start first. OK, my friend Nasreen was getting sick and she tested out positive for tuberculosis (TB). What this means is that she's going to have to be on medication for the next nine months at least, which is no fun. It really isn't that bad though, it's only one time a day, and once you get in the habit your really won't even notice that you're doing it. I guess it'll be like brushing your teeth. Since she was sick, and could infect people, that means that all her friends have to be tested. So if you haven't guessed, that means me as well. Anyway, the testing really wasn't that bad, I went with Savera and Paristou, and they made fun of me like usual, but it was all good times. We all came out negative, of course we couldn't tell Nasreen that quite yet. We told her Paris came out positive, but she didn't believe us. Oh well, Curtis (Platypus) believed me when I told him I was positive. I thought it was funny. Anyway, so since Nasreen was infectious, she was quarantined at her home, no one could visit her or anything. That must have really been boring. Anyway, today was the day that she was no longer contagious, so she actually got to go out. Congratulations Nasreen.

As far as this last weekend went, well, I went and got tested with the girls and then after that we went to visit Nasreen. Now we didn't go in the house, we just sat outside in the lawn and talked to her through the window. That was funny. Anyway, after that we went to Best Buy and then Guitar Center, my second home. After that, I went to eat with my cosine at Chilis and then went back to her place and just hung out for a while. Saturday, we had a few people over at her place and hung out for the night. By the end of the night though I was feeling pretty bad. My chest was killing me. Anyway, the next day I woke up and I was so sick. I was delirious, dizzy all day and could barely stand. I was coughing so hard and just couldn't really control anything. I had attained the flu, and I got it from my dear mom. I have never felt so sick in my life, it really was worse than anything I remember ever feeling. Good times. I slept maybe 20 hours that day. I was planning to spend all of Sunday studying for exams, and so far, I've barely studied a word, and today is Tuesday. I can't help it, the past two days I just couldn't concentrate on anything, not even music. I didn't play much guitar, I didn't think about any paintings I'd like to paint... nothing. It's a horrible feeling. No inspiration.

Come Monday I feel a little better, no great improvement though. Well, I had to go to the TB clinic so they can check my results because I either had the flue, or possibly TB. Anyway, me and Paris decided to go so I met her at her work after class and then we head on out there, we walk in, and two minutes later, we walked out. I could've just as easily called the clinic and told them what the thing looks like. Oh well, at least they were cool people, unlike most clinics I deal with where they're just too full of themselves to be more human. I don't think most doctors realize the importance of that in their field.

OK, I think I've written enough. I probably could have shortened all of this, but like I said, it really did feel like a lot has happened in the past few weeks. Enjoy!

Well, I just finished my third batch of exams this semester. I did OK on a couple, but I have two more that I still don't know how I've done. It's getting very close to the end of the semester, and I for one am glad. This semester wasn't as much fun as my other semesters have been, mainly because it really had me stressed out. Oh well, not a big deal, I figure this is good practice for dental school, where I will be very busy and very stressed.

Yesterday we hung out over at Grego's place. It was a blast, a few people were there and we had the music, hookah, pool table, black jack table and bunch of folk. Left there kind of late actually, then Mazen, Santosh and I went to IHOP and had a little something to eat. Everyone was in a good mood and everything was funny, there were new and old people, it was great.

On another note, Ramadan started about a couple of weeks ago, so I've been fasting all day. That means no food or water at all. As you can imagine, usually by the end of the day I'm extremely tired. Plus, I have already started losing weight, which isn't good considering I'm already very skinny.

Not much more to talk about really. Enjoy!

OK, so 10 more days and it would be a month since I last posted. I figure this would be a good time to post. Nothing much has changed really, I have four exams coming up, again, this semester's biggest lab report and a five page paper due. Honestly, the only thing I'm really thinking about now is my microbial physiology exam. I have a feeling that I will do well in Mol Cell, I also have finished the lab report early, so that I don't have to worry about it, which I'm not anymore.

Halloween is coming, I have no idea what I'm going to do for Halloween, but honestly, I really don't care right now. I'll probably just go and hang out at some one's house or something if I do anything at all. It might be a better idea for me to just stay home and study for my exams, but I doubt that's going to happen.

I've made some updates to the site, a new link at the bottom takes you to some of my poetry. I also changed one of the sites in my portfolio to OS X World, which is a much more active site.

As far as what I've done since I last posted, well, it really is nothing more than just studying and hanging out with friends and such. Not a big deal and not much to talk about so I'm going to skip the details. The only thing that I'm excited about right now is the Baylor Summer Enrichment Program. Basically it's a program that is supposed to give you insight and hands on experience with dentistry, which I'm very excited about, plus, it also increases my chances of being accepted to dental school.

I learned to play a few more songs on the guitar lately as well, all by ear. It's really odd, I'm finally starting to pick up music by ear and I'm real happy about that. It used to be where someone would have to teach it to me. Anyway, I learned Green Eyes and The Scientist by Coldplay and I also learned to play Unchained Melody (the song from the movie Ghost). I also picked up four Radiohead songs. The way I see it, the more the merrier when it comes to learning music. Later!

So not a whole lot has changed since I last posted. I have four exams coming up in the next week, two for Biochem Lab, one for Microbial Physiology and one for Molecular and Cell Biology. Sounds like a fun right? With all that, I've been so busy with school that I haven't had time to do anything. I'm designing two websites for school, one website for my brother's fantasy football league that he's doing with his friends, and a flyer for school. I also had to go shoot pictures for my uncle's house. I shot over 200 shots that day, I'm happy that I'm not developing them. On top of that, I spent all Saturday helping my cosine Mazen move, that took about nine hours. We hired help and they were horrible, so we got rid of them early and finished the job ourselves. Add all that up, plus things I have to do for school and you have yourself a real busy week. No problem though, I think I'll do much better on this test than I will on my last one, which I made a C on.

So this weekend, after Saturday's move I came home and met up with Nasreen and Paristou, then we went to Savera's place. That was fun, but I was so beat that I just kinda sat there like a lazy ass (Nasreen). Then Sunday I studied the whole day and then went over to Serene's place and hung out that night. That's really about it. Outside of that, it's been all about school which has kept me very busy.

Oh, and hopefully there'll be an update to the pictures page soon, I'm going to try to get pictures of all the homies so I can put them up on here.

This shout out goes to my friend Jerry because he's having a rough week. Peace out homie.

This is the first week since school started that I don't have anything but Biochem due. I have no exams, quizzes, homework, or any of the such. It's good too, I can catch up on a lot of things. I just finished washing my car and cleaning the inside. It's still dirty as hell though, as if it hasn't been washed at all. Oh well...

The weather is awesome today, so I have the top down, I think I'll be going to Serene's place tonight to hang out. That'll be fun. OK, so now the updates I guess...

Well, yesterday was my last day at work. Right now I am jobless, which is nice, I don't have to be anywhere other than school. It's real weird though. I'm going to sell my play stock acocunt and pay off my credit card so that I don't have to worry about it. I should also have enough to get another drum set, but this time I'm going to leave it at Grego's place.

Last weekend was Curtis' birthday. I took him to The Melting Pot, there were about 10 of us I think, and we had a blast. Then we went to Grego's place, played pool and just hung out for the rest of the night. That was awesome. It was also Paristou's birthday, so Sunday I went out to eat with her, Savera and Nasreen, that was a good time as well.

I learned some new music as well, I learned three Radiohead songs and yesterday I learned to play Stair Way to Heaven. I don't know how I learned it either, I came back home from Greg's place and I was feeling a little down, so I just grabbed the guitar and started messing around. Anyway, I just started figuring the song out and I've only heard it maybe 10 times in my life. I was kinda happy that I picked it up though, it means that I'm progressing a little as a guitar player.

That's all I can think of right now.

Today marks an important day in my life. I gave my two week resignation to my work. I no longer have any time to work, with school and everything involved. I've been there for almost four years, so this is a large step for me. This will be the first time since I turned 15 that I don't have a job. I don't plan on getting one either, unless it's at a dental office. Outside of that, I'm not interested.

So it's been a while since I last posted, well, lets start since the last time I posted. August 30th doesn't really ring a bell but I believe it was memorial day weekend or labor day or something like that. Anyway, I went and hung out over at Nasreen's place with Curtis, Savera and Paris. Anyway, it was a lot of fun, we saw The Secret Lives of Dentists. A really good movie. Since then I bought a few DVD's myself, I bought Rushmore, Phenomenon, and Requiem of a Dream. I haven't seen Requiem yet, but I plan on it.

Ok, the weekend after that we had a little get together over at Serene's new place, that was fun as well. Played guitar, smoked the hookah, you know, the good stuff... There really hasn't been much outside of that. Yesterday I went over to Greg's place and then we went to eat at Bennigan's. Also, a few days ago I went to Guitar Center with Nasreen and I played a drum set they had there, that was so awesome. I have to get one again.

I have an exam on Tuesday, and today's Saturday and I haven't studied a word for it yet. I'm just not in the mood. It's really probably one of the most boring classes I've ever taken in my life. Not interesting at all. It's all just biochemical pathways and such, completely puts me to sleep. Oh well, I just have to do well this semester, because after this, things should be much easier for me. Most of my classes will be electives, and I plan on taking Guitar class. I can't wait for that. Peace out.

Well, it had to happen. I just got in my first car accident. Actually, it isn't my first, but it's the first one where I'm at fault. I backed into a car while pulling out of the parking lot of a Chilli's. Anyway, no one was hurt, but now my bumper on my car is nicely bent. I'm just wondering how much it is going to cost me to get this car fixed. The whole thing needs a new paint job. I'm going to call my insurance lady and ask her and see where I can go from there.

Outside of that, I had my Student Ambassador Retreat last week. It was a lot of fun. I had a blast, everone was nice and in a good mood, which is always a plus. I'm looking forward to working the rest of the year with this team, I think it's going to be good times.

I updated my Music page to have a different look on it, plus I added Coldplay to my list of artists, they really should have been on there a long time ago. Oh well, not a big deal. I have a meeting tonight at school for Legacy Lane, which is a school related issue. I won't bog you with details. Outside of that, I have no plans at all. It's kinda nice actually. Anyway, that's all folks.

Not much to report today. I have updated my protfolio portion of the site to also include the paintings that I have done. These include some airbrush work and some oil paintings. I have also updated the personal portion of my site to have an archive of dates that I posted. This way, it does not take an hour to load this page and you can search for dates much easier. The link has been placed above instead of "Links." The links page was not being updated, therefore no use in having it. I have also removed the "About Me" page and changed it with the "Music" link from the bottom. This way all links on the page are at the top and you don't have to scroll down to see them.

On another note, today I went to Dr. Grave's office to do observations and such, it was a lot of fun. I saw two or three procedures and then stayed up front for the rest of the time. Everyone there is real nice, which is a good thing to have for the office. Wonderful.

So it's only been four days since I last posted, so this is going to be a short post. I'm only adding to this because I made a new painting today. I haven't painted in years, only pencil drawings and digital stuff, but with a real paintbrush and real paint, nothing. It's been so long since I last painted that I had to re-buy a bunch of supplies. Cost me about 100.00 dollars for a canvas, paint, two new brushes, and some other things. Anyway, it's an abstract/minimalistic painting. I really like it a lot, for two reasons. One, I just really felt like painting the last week and so finally did it. Two, it's an oil painting. For those of you who don't know, I don't usually paint in oil, or using traditional brushes for that matter. I'm usually using acrylic and I paint with an airbrush. For some reason though, I wanted to do something with a heavy texture, oil only seemed natural for that. The canvas that I bought has a 1.5" thickness. It's the type that you don't frame. Anyway, I've always wanted to paint on one of these but I could never afford one before. By the time I got a good job I had already backed away from using paints, so I had no use for canvas anymore. Anyway, I liked painting this canvas so much that I'm going to stick with it, so anytime I paint anything, it's going to be on canvas like this.

Nothing new much. Just the same old really, work and school. I'm doing great in my Photoshop class, which is excellent. I only have three more lectures left of that class. Can't wait to be done with it. As cool as it is, I'm ready to have a real break from school, with no classes at all. Till now my summer vacation has been all classes. Not really my idea of a summer vacation. Anyway, enough about school. I've been feeling a little down lately because I'm just starting to realize that it really is over between me and Jana. Hey, live and learn I guess. Anyway, we're still friends and she's doing great. She's really liking Chicago now. Finally met some people that she gets along very well with. As for me, I've been hanging out with my cosines a lot. It's good stuff, they keep me busy and keep my mind off things.

I've written a new song, or actually two new songs, they're pretty good. So far everyone's liked them, which is good, but I haven't played them for either Curtis or Greg, which I need to do. I've also been in the mood to paint something lately, so I'm going to go buy a canvas and get on top of that. I haven't painted, or felt inspired to paint, in years. It feels good to want to put something on canvas.

I went shopping with Serene last week. It was awesome, bought a bunch of new shirts that I really needed. A few weeks ago I grabbed a trash bag and threw away all the clothes that I don't wear anymore, or that are torn or something's wrong with them. Anyway, by the time I was done, I was left with two pairs of jeans, one pair of khakis and two shirts. Great. I figure it is time to go shopping. I'm going to buy some more stuff as well, I need more pants definitely. That's all folks!

Been a while since I last posted. Many things happened. Most exciting was I went to Chicago and visited Jana. It was awesome. I had a lot of fun there. The first day, I've been on many different forms of transportation. So, I came off the airplane, then got into Jana's car then onto the train then to busses, after that we walked all over the place, got into a cab, back on the train and then into her car and finally home. I was very tired by the end of the night. The next day we went out, had fun, went and ate at the Melting Pot, which was great. We discussed a few things that concerned our relationship, and everything turned out great. Was definitely a fun trip, and I can't wait to go there again.

Since then I've also started my history class, and finished it. I made an A on it, I also made an A on my Government class that I've takend. Glad to get those out of the way, I still have Government II and History II to take. Right now I started my graphic design class, it's going to be so easy. We're learning Photoshop, and I'm pretty good at it. That should be a fun class, the computers there are awesome PowerMac G4's with 17" Cinema displays, which I'd love to get my hands on. Speaking of computers, I also ordered a new laptop for myself. A PowerBook G4, 12". It's an awesome laptop. I'm going to give my brother my beloved PowerMac G4 and use the laptop as my only computer. This is going to give me a much larger desk space, plus it's portable so I can use it with clients and such. I'll have his 17" monitor to hook up to it when I'm at home. I also bought an iSight with it so I can video chat with friends over the net. It works very well, although since the software is in beta stages it still has some bugs in it.

That should bring you up to speed, other than that, there really isn't much to talk about. I haven't been doing anything out of the ordinary really, work, school and music.

Crazy times we live in. Haven't been up to much lately, just getting things straight and all. As usual good things and bad things. Well, I’ve taken the DAT. I did terrible on it, and what was odd, is the sections which I’ve done awesome in on the Kaplan practice exams, I’ve done the worst in on the real DAT. Anyway, I will be taking it again, I’m not satisfied with this grade, I don’t think any dental school will be either. The Spring semester is done with, I’ve made two A’s and two B’s. I was really disappointed. I was hoping to at least make an A in Genetics, not just because I was doing good, but because I really loved that class. It was awesome, very interesting. On more bad news, I am going to drop doing research in Sickle Cell, the reason being, I just plainly don’t have time. Dr. Goodman had warned me that I will need a lot of time and the fact is, with summer school, work and my next semester, there’s no way.

Now to the good news, I shaved my head finally. It got pretty long nearing the DAT, I didn’t bother doing anything because that test was the most important thing to me. Since then, I’ve started my Government class, which so far, I have a 99.5 average in it. How awesome is that. My instructor is great, she makes government very interesting, as it should be, something dynamic that changes all the time. Other government classes I’ve taken make it sound like everything’s set in stone and nothing every changes, how can that be interesting?

I’ve also written two or three more songs, and I like them, more than any other songs I’ve written. Not only that, they seem to carry a much bigger audience than my other songs, simply because, they’re catchy. I don’t know if I’ll do more like them though, not my style of music, but it’s interesting still to see how people react to different styles of music. With my style, I have a very limited audience, but they would be a very faithful audience, something that counts for a lot with me, and more important than any number can be.

I’m going to Chicago in June, I can’t wait. I’m going to visit Jana, we’re going to have tons of fun. There are three art museums, which I would like to go to all three, but I don’t think we’ll be able to do that. We’re going to go to the Melting Pot restaurant, our favorite place, or mine at least. Then, we’re going to go shopping down town, that will be a lot of fun. I can’t wait to do that, it will be a relaxing time from school and work, I’ll just hang out, no driving, no web design, no programming, no anything, just hanging out with a person that I love to hang out with.

Well, the past couple of weeks have been awesome. Just always something to do I guess. Anyway, this is looking like a very good semester for me, again, if I do well on these, then it's going to be a 4.0 semester, which I need. So a lot has happened, I am now officially a UT Dalas Student Ambassador. I was so excited when I found out I made it. The interview went pretty good, I had fun doing it. Student Ambassadors are in close relation with the Alumni Association as well, which I will hopefully be redesigning the site for. Right now their site is terrible in my opinion. I think Pat from the Alumni Association agrees as well. Hopefully tomorrow I'll find out what she thinks of the design I'm proposing.

On another note, I am now 21 and feel no different. I didn't drink, despite attempts by friends to try to get me to drink, although to my pleasant surprise, they really didn't try to push me too hard to drink. In fact, the waitress where we went to eat was trying harder than they did, shows how well they knew me. That's good freindship when they can respect my values as such and not try to pressure me. I had a good birthday, it came right before finals week, so I didn't do much. Never do though. Anyway, got some cool gifts. Jana sent me jeans that fit perfectly and a gift card to the Apple store for 150.00. Wow, I was astonished at that. Anyway, I'll be flying there sometime in June, I think the 12th was the date that we set for me to go there, so I need to make sure I get them off from work. On May 11th I plan on taking the DAT. The real thing. I can't wait to be done with that. It's so much pressure with this being the biggest exam of my life. Anyway, I have my Biochem exam and my Biostats exam on Tuesday. Then on Wednesday I have no exams, but we're working on our Bio Lab final presentation. Anyway, on Friday I have my Genetics exam, then I have to present our Bio Lab presentation, after that, I'm all done except for the DAT. This will give me a good week to study for it. I should be able to do well on it. I really need to study only two sections, sciences and mathematics. The others I'll do well on, I'm not really worried about them. Anyway, should be fun. After that, I have Maymester, and then Summer school, plus research in sickle cell anemia. I'll be busy, but much less stressed considering that I'll be done with the DAT.

It's looking like it's going to be a very busy month from now on. First of all, I would like to say that I'm very happy I made an A on my Genetics exam, it was very hard and I didn't think I'd make an A on it. Now, back to the real to stuff. Well, there are two more weeks of school left, not much I guess, but basically I'm going to have a three exams and a ten page paper due by the end of the semester. I'll also start studying harder than anything for the DAT, I plan on taking it May 11th, right after that, Maymester starts at CCCC. The next day after that's done, I'm going to be lfying down to Chicago to visit Jana for a week, then I come back June 1st, where I satrt Summer School. Oh man, I'm going to be busy and I'm worried the most about my DAT. Things are looking very good for me this semester, I think it might be a 4.0 semester, as long as I keep working things like I have been. It's just kinda crazy how everything mounts up to the last minute, all my exams are withing two days, and then I have the paper, which must be accompanied by a presentation to be made. Then after that's done, I have a week to take the DAT. Oh man, I'm so scared about it, it really isn't that hard, it's just so much stuff to remember. Hopefully I'll do well, I've improved on all my grades since I started the Kaplan class, but no where near where I would like to be. I guess I need more practice. I'll get there though, I'm shooting for a 28, we'll see how that works out.

My birthday is next week, on the 22nd, I'll be turning 21. My friends are going to try to get me drunk. Little do they know that they have a real challenge on their hands, since I don't drink and all. It's going to be funny though. They keep on asking me what I want for my birthday, and I don't really want anything, I just want to get into dental school. That's all I'm looking for right now, and that's my biggest goal and that's what's most important to me.

Much has changed since I last posted. The Coldplay concert was awesome. It was the best concert I've ever been to. Of course, I really haven't been to too many concerts, still though, it was the best. Since then, many things have happened to me, some good some bad. I made an 80 on my second Biochem exam, I was very dissappointed since I was expecting a 92 on it. I also made a 72 on my Genetics exam, which was 10 points above average. I was very pleased with that grade. I started a DAT prep course, I took the diagnostic and I made a 14.5 on it, which is terrible. I'll bring it up however. I'm shooting to make a 24 on the real test. By the end of the this prep course, I'll hopefully remember the basic concepts, I haven't done these things in such a long time that I honestly just forgot many of the concepts and memorizations that I had to do.

Jana moved to Chicago about two weeks ago. She's liking it up there. I wasn't really happy about that since that means I can't see her anymore. We talk every day at least once, but it's weird because we're now broken up. For the best I guess, at least we broke up without hating each other. Hopefully, I'm going to go to Chicago and visit her in May, by then I'll be done with the DAT and my finals for classes. I'm taking the DAT April 28th and school finishes May 5th. A lot of stress is going to fall off once I'm done with this semester. It's one of my hardest semester, plus add the DAT to that, and you got yourself a can full of stress. Anyway, back to Jana, I sold my laptop to her. She's liking it. I'm also very close to paying off the credit card, which means I can start saving up towards another laptop.

I've written my resignation letter for work. I haven't turned it in yet, I'm going to wait till I secure another job before hand. I'm looking real hard for a job at at dental office, since that's what I've wanted to do most of my life, I figure this is a step in the right direction. Hopefully I'll find one soon, I'm just tired of dealing with banking. I need something to give me more experience that what I already have with dentistry.

I have two tests coming up next week, Genetics and Biochem. Both of which are going to be hard and need a lot of studying, so needless to say, I'm not going to be doing much this weekend.

Alright, so today I'll update. Nothing really too exciting, except that I went and saw Duncan Sheik play at the Gypsy Tea Room last Friday. Tonight I'll be going to see Coldplay in concert, which should be pretty good. I don't really care about tonight that much, but I'm going because Curtis loves Coldplay. Anyway, Duncan rocked in his concert. He sounded extremely good, just like he does in the studio. That its really hard to do. Most artists couldn't sound the same live if their own lives depended on it. That's all I'm going to say about that, I'll keep the rest to myself.

I also went a talked to Dr. Goodman this afternoon, I think I might be working on some research for him, which will be great, plus it will help my with Biochem and Genetics. I've also written a new piece of software called Loan Table. It amortizes loans and also calculates extra principal payments made to the loan. It's pretty good actually, in fact, on VersionTracker, three people have rated me and I've received 5 out of 5 stars on the program. Plus I've had over 3000 downloads. Pretty good for someone who's never advertised and who's only released one piece of software before. Right now I'm working on a way to improve it a little more and then I'll start working on an FTP program. I hate the interface of all the other programs, so hopefully this will work better than them. I just have to get it to connect and all. We'll see how that goes, since I'm having some difficulty with one concept, a very important one, saving. Enjoy.