Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Jeremy's LiveJournal:

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Saturday, October 10th, 2009
1:52 pm	Up and down, but a bit skinnier I've been feeling alternately happy and sad, mildy excited and then subdued. I'm still really unmotivated when it comes to my research. I'm forced to do work on TAing and I'm able to keep up in the class that I'm taking, but nothing has happened on my research project. Maybe I can get to some of that this weekend... In other news, I lost some weight a month ago, and somehow I've been able to keep some of it off. For the last ten years my weight has hovered between 165 and 180 lbs, but now is the first time I can remember where it's dropped below that range (to 160). According to the internet BMI calculator, I was overweight before, and now I am just barely in the range of normal. The reason I lost weight wasn't because of a high-power exercise routine or no-carb diet. It's actually a little sad: I was under an enormous amount of stress and anxiety, so I stopped eating. Although unintuitive, two of my main responses to stress are diametrically opposed---stopping eating, or eating lots of food. But now I'm feeling less anxious, and I'm eating relatively normally. I mean, some days I'll eat tons of veggies and healthy shit, but other days I make very poor nutritional decisions. (For instance, yesterday my diet consisted mostly of donuts, a giant carnitas burrito, and beer.) I think it all evens out, though. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 10th, 2009
6:55 pm	Summer is almost over I had a meeting with my advisor a couple days ago, and I have another meeting with my independent study advisor next week. This means that the summer is coming to an end, and I have to start doing real work soon. This is kind of scary. I feel compelled to look back on my summer, and question whether it did any good. I definitely had a lot of fun. I saw a lot of friends, I explored some cities, I drank a lot, I relaxed... So, in terms of avoiding work, I succeeded pretty well. I don't know if this break will make me better able to tackle my studies, however... Emotionally, I think I'm in a lot better place now than at the beginning of the summer. I feel a bit more stable---my feelings of sadness and despair are less frequent, and when I feel them they aren't overwhelming. I'm scared of the coming school year, but I'm also looking forward to it. I've been doing a ton of relaxing, perhaps too much relaxing, and it will be good to feel useful to other people. I'm also looking forward to some type of routine, where I can manage teaching and classes and research and a personal life all at the same time. I guess I'll be watching TV and playing Wii less, and I will also have to keep my angsting down to a minimum. But, if I'm strong enough, I should be able to do well in school and get things back on track. That's the hope anyway... (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, September 7th, 2009
10:47 am	Reminiscing Isaac came to the Bay Area this weekend, so we were able to go out and have fun! On Saturday, I hung out with Sushu and Jono, and we ate tasty Indian food. Then we met up with Isaac and his brother Eben, and we did karaoke! It was good, and I sang some fun songs, and Isaac and Eben sing all pretty. The next day, Jono made an astonishingly awesome five-course Japanese meal (saba shioyaki, gobo+carrots, miso soup with clams and daikon, goma ae, and gyudon). So good! And we got to hang out, talking about feelings and singing folk songs with Isaac on guitar. And there was some Wii and cards and Sushu and Jono worked on their comics. Because Isaac was there, we started reminiscing about the summer of 2004, when me and him became a lot closer. He was more or less spending all his time at our place, which made the summer really great actually. He also reminded me of some details of my 20th birthday party that I had forgotten, but looking back on livejournal archives, I knew at the time... It's strange, the role that livejournal plays for me. I mean, it helps me get out some of my feelings, but it also lets me figure out when things happened, or exactly what happened on certain important dates. Facebook lets me talk about what has happened in my life, but I don't think it stores all that shit. I mean, I can't go back five years later to see exactly what happened that night, but I can with livejournal... (Comment on this)
Friday, September 4th, 2009
7:47 pm	Summer routine I've been back in Santa Cruz for nine days. Most of that time has been spent doing the following activities: drinking, talking with friends, cooking, eating, sleeping, watching TV, reading, surfing the intarwebs. This is like my default life, if work or other stuff doesn't get in the way. And it's not a terribly bad life, to be honest. I love hanging out with friends, and I'm content to consume media that makes me laugh and/or think. I've been a little sad lately, not insane sad but it's there. And I've been having weird dreams. This weekend I'll be hanging out with Isaac, which promises to be fun! I like it when we have mini-UCJAS reunions! (Comment on this)
Saturday, August 29th, 2009
11:07 pm	Boston + New York/New Jersey = Awesome Had a fabulous time out East. Many thanks to boixboi for a place to crash in Boston, and for the entertainment and good times we shared. Walked around a ton, saw lots of museums and parks, met up with friends and family, ate really delicious food, and drank a lot of booze. All told, I couldn't have asked for a better trip. I made an album of my travels to Boston and NY/NJ. If you are interested, you can probably click through them in a couple minutes. I have (somewhat) witty commentary on some of the photos. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 18th, 2009
2:02 pm	Last week LA, this week SF Another great weekend in the series of visiting California cities to meet up with UChicago friends and others! I drove up to San Francisco early Friday morning. I went to my friend Holman's house (UofC alum), and got to see his neighborhood and meet his grandmother (who only spoke Cantonese). Then we took the bus all over the western half of the city, with Holman pointing out interesting landmarks or places he hung out as a kid. Then we went to Japantown! They were having this big festival thing to celebrate the opening of this weird mall/cinema/art gallery building. So we got some lunch, and looked at all the festival stalls, and people watched. There were tons of girls dressed up in Gothic Lolita (gosurori) clothing. Like, hundreds of them, and they all looked amazing. And there were lots of Japanophiles and gamernerds/webgeeks and actual Japanese people. The real point of this endeavor was to go see Japanese girl pop/punk music. We got to see three different bands (Red Bacteria Vacuum, Noodles, and Tsushimamire). That last band I had seen at ACEN three or four years ago, and they were fabulous then, and fabulous now. It was such a great experience, hearing them again and feeling that music! They are cute and funny and good musicians and their songs are interesting and creative and cool and they have so much fun on stage and OMG so much love! I met up with a few other peeps, Jono and Aza, and we looked at the new building and hung out in Japantown. Then Jono had to go home, so me, Aza, and Holman had chocolate beverages and Vietnamese food and talked about linguistics, American dialects, the future, life, and other shit. Then Holman had to go home, so us two remainders had awesome Scotch and looked out at the city from Aza's swanky SoMa loft. Then we went out to a wine bar, and I got to meet a couple of Aza's friends. The next day, Aza had to go paragliding, so I struck out on my own into the great big city. I walked in a long five-mile loop around the east side of town, through Chinatown to Coit Tower and down through the financial district. I really enjoyed looking at all the buildings and parks and pretty views. I also liked just being there, being in the city, inhabiting the space. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, August 14th, 2009
11:05 pm	My county is on fire So, there's a wildfire in Santa Cruz county. It's not super close to Santa Cruz (the town), and it is not headed in our direction, so I don't think anybody's worried about the more heavily populated areas. But still, fire! All today, it smelled like campfire. Everywhere. And the light was so weird... kinda like there was a lampshade over the sun. And I actually got a little ash on me when I was eating lunch outside. I also saw helicopters flying around with the buckets attached. It's quite surreal for a boy who's never been near big wildfires. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, August 10th, 2009
9:15 am	LA was friggin' awesome! This weekend I went on an amazing quick roadtrip to LA. It has raised my spirits and embiggened my heart. First, my weekend in food: Thai green curry, In-N-Out Burger, awesome miso ramen, ten different dishes of Ethiopian, and late night dim sum. Next, my weekend in friends: I had a slumber party with Sushu and Jono, and then we woke up early and headed out for LA. Jono read to us from The Diamond Age, so time went by so quickly. We got to Pren & Cage's house in the afternoon, and gawked at its swankiness and laughed at Pren's stories of Macedonian bureaucracy and angry Greek nationalism. Then I met up with a UCSC friend and we went to Little Tokyo (the one downtown, apparently LA has multiple ones...) and looked at character goods and Japanese magazines and ate the aforementioned ramen. The next morning, I met up with another UChicagoan, Jena, who I hadn't seen in four years! We got to catch up on those years. We eventually found our way to the La Brea tar pits and met up with Jono and Sushu, and smelled tar gas and looked at the giant pools of tar and got all educated. (Note: no dinosaurs are in the tar pits because the dinosaurs were long extinct by the time the tar pits were created.) More food was consumed, and then me and my traveling companions said good buy to LA, 24 hours after our arrival. LA said good bye back by giving us traffic. It was a whirlwind of friends and laughter and food and sites and stories and UChicago natsukashii and OMG so good! (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, July 23rd, 2009
5:52 pm	Where are all the people? Things have been kinda boring/lonely in my first week back from MI. But I guess that's kind of understandable. My MI trip was a success, meaning I spent tons of time with friends and family. Now, in CA, it's the real world, and people aren't going to drop everything to hang out with me, because there's no time constraints on me being here. It's just... life. I spent some time with Cat. She left for Indiana on Monday, so I got to see her a few times before then. She had a beach party in Santa Cruz, where we walked the boardwalk and waded in the water. She, the crazy devil, went in to the ocean all the way, head to toe. And Cat finally ordered those deep-fried Oreos that she had been obsessing over :-) I've been running a lot of errands lately. Went to the foot doctor. Went to the psychoanalyst. Went to the dentist. Did laundry, shopped for groceries, etc. Trying to get a bit more exercise than normal: lots of walking every day, a few crunches and pushups here and there. I've also done fun stuff! I hung out in Berkeley. I saw the new Harry Potter movie (verdict: meh). I hung out with my neighbors/linguists Dave and Sally. I've also hung out with my friend Nico a couple times. I've become slightly obsessed with Taylor Swift and cooking greens. Current Music: Love Story (Comment on this)
Friday, July 17th, 2009
9:12 am	Another summer trip to MI I went to Michigan earlier in the month. It was awesome. ( Now I will tell you about my travels. ) ( We went to Detroit, and visited the Motown Museum. ) (10 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, June 29th, 2009
6:39 am	Sushu and Jono are married! The last 48 hours have been a whirlwind of food, hanging out, laughing, singing, driving, being lost, and exploring! Saturday was the 13-hour Sushu+Jono extravaganza. We started at a picnic in this enormous park in Cupertino. The food was quite tasty, and the company was excellent. I mingled just a bit, but I was mostly excited to see my UChicago friends and bask in their presence. I also ran some errands for the bride and groom, which made me feel relatively useful. As my contribution, I made a fruit salad in a watermelon bowl---it seemed to go over pretty well. A bunch of my friends did performances as part of the celebration, and I thought they were an excellent addition to an already great picnic. After that, we all headed to a Chinese restaurant in Palo Alto, where our party took up the entire place. I was kinda full by this time, but the food was so good, and there were so many different flavors to try, that I was happy to nibble on all the stuff. I think the menu had 20 different items that we all got to eat! There was also the traditional wedding fare, like toasts and cake-cutting. Oh man, the toasts that people gave were so sweet, and some of them made me laugh and cry within 10 seconds of each other. We passed around photos of Jono, most of them depicting him doing some crazy stunt or wearing a crazy costume. And Sushu's mom shared with us a letter that 15-year-old Sushu wrote to herself from the perspective of 25-year-old Sushu. It was eerily accurate, and we all laughed so much! Then, Karaoke! In the giant room at Gamba Karaoke in Cupertino. We sang songs in Japanese and Chinese and English. In fact, the song that bonded most of the room together was Zankoku na Tenshi no Teeze, a fan favorite (from Evangelion). Jono did this sexy rendition of Sweet Transvestite, Sushu had a duet of a Tibetan plains song that was quite intense. We even broke out some Biz Markie. Went home. Slept and showered. Then I made my way back over the hill to join Isaac and Alexis in San Francisco. This weekend was Pride, and I kinda made the mistake of driving right into the thick of it. Fuck. Next time I go to SF during Pride weekend, I'm taking the BART. Anyway, after being stuck in traffic for half an hour, I found a moderately expensive parking spot, and hooked up with my friends. We walked a bit, and then me and Isaac got to walk some more. So many interesting-looking people to watch. Some beautiful, some weird looking, some more naked than others. But it all seemed relatively normal---it felt like an enormous gay pride event should feel like. And I got Isaac-time! What happens next? More food, of course. Delicious Malaysian food with Aza's family and more UChicago people! So good! (Comment on this)
Friday, June 26th, 2009
9:05 pm	I didn't recognize you without all that hair Sushu and Jono's wedding was so sweet. I can't wait to congratulate them in person! Life has been great lately. I've still been slacking. Watching lots of TV on the awesome Tivo, playing video games, sleeping. But I've also been doing productive stuff. Shopping, laundry, doctor, therapist, programming. I programed my first real video game. It involves a crappy MS Paint chicken/turkey thing with a top hat and three legs. You play as the chicken, and you chase around a Sacajawea dollar coin. Every second, the coin moves to a new location on the grid, and you have to hit it, or else it counts as a "miss". Screenshot. I am super proud of this, that I was able to actually make a whole video game. It also gave me this intense feeling of joy and accomplishment when I squashed the last error and it finally worked correctly. I was ecstatic. I have really missed that feeling of pride/accomplishment/intense joy. It had been way too long since I've felt that emotion. I've also been able to spend some time with Sushu, Jono, and Cat, and also some of my linguist friends. I've seen two great old movies at the local cinema, On the Waterfront and A Clockwork Orange. Both very emotional, powerful pieces. Oh, and the Boardwalk a couple blocks away now has super-cheap Monday and Tuesday night rides. I can ride the old roller coaster, the Giant Dipper, for 75 cents a ride then! I rode it twice this week, and I also rode a newer roller coaster and a ride that shoots you up in the air real fast. Amusement parks are so cool! I'm excited to go back home and visit my friends. I have such a blast hanging out with my high school friends---there's this interesting mix of old and new, fond memories and jokes made up on the spot, that makes it an extremely happy experience to see them again. On a less happy note, my family is having a lot of troubles at the moment, with my uncle's daughter possibly getting a divorce, and his ex-wife in bad shape in the hospital. I wish I could be there to comfort them and help them. I guess I'll get my wish in a week. (Comment on this)
Wednesday, June 17th, 2009
9:01 pm	Haircut adventure! I got a haircut today! I now have much shorter hair. It's still not short-short (even I have my limits), but it's short-ish. It was actually a whole adventure. I went in in the morning, and I talked to the stylist, telling her my ideas. And she played with my hair for a minute, went in the back for a couple more, and came out telling me she wasn't quite comfortable doing it, and that I might want to reschedule with a more senior stylist. Aw man, this was some serious shit. So I reschedule for later in the day, and hook up with my friend Scott earlier than expected. We had amazing lunch at Charlie Hong Kong, a local restaurant that bills itself as "Organic Asian Street Food", and it made good on its promise. After lunch, we played some Wii, and then it was round 2 at the salon. I met my senior stylist, Taryn, and she was super nice, and very confident. When I told her what I was thinking about, she was excited and very sure that she could do it. Thank god. It was an excellent haircut experience, too. Amazing shampoo and head massage, a whole intricate haircut thing, and then a second hair rinse. The thing that amazed me was that Taryn was really smart. Like, she had access to this whole world of knowledge that I know so little about. And she was explaining the theory behind why she was doing things one way or another, and it reminded me that even though I'm an academic, I am only an expert in my field. I am still a fledgling when it comes to other fields. Yay haircut! Picture Afterwords, me and Scott played some more Wii, and he fucking kicked my ass at every game we fucking played. Except for Bubble Bobble. I won at that. (Comment on this)
12:14 am	Summer! Summer break has begun! I am free from my linguistics responsibility. I don't have papers to write, I don't have research to do, nothing to read, nothing. I am taking a break, and it feels damn good. So, what should I do during this break... I'm going to Michigan from July 5th to 15th, so that much is decided. Sushu and Jono's wedding is coming up. And I've been hanging out with various linguists, and hope to continue this trend as the summer progresses. I plan on reading novels. Currently I'm reading God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater by Kurt Vonnegut. I also plan on teaching myself how to program video games. I've started in on the tutorial for Pygame, and it looks difficult but doable. I just have to push myself and keep at it even if it's hard. I really hope I can become excited and passionate about writing a video game. I used to feel passion for projects, and I want that feeling back. I might try to get some type of job or volunteer position. I think it would necessarily wait until after I get back from MI. Volunteering is probably more realistic, as jobs are not easy to come by here in Santa Cruz. Finally, I have to spend the summer thinking about my long term goals. Continue in the PhD program? Leave with my masters? What will happen after grad school? Tough questions... My apartment and roommate are both still working out great. Gabe, my roommate, had a big birthday party here last week, and I got to meet his folks and a ton of his friends. They're good people, and I had fun with them, and I got to drink really old wine. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009
1:20 pm	MOVE-ZORZ My life has been taken up with moving. For the past two weeks, it's been most of what I've been thinking about and doing. I think I'm (almost) at the end. Last night I cleaned up the old apartment in Family Student Housing. I had a very serious checklist provided to me by FSH, and I did everything on this list. I initially thought it would take me about 6 hours, but it actually took me over 11 hours. I cleaned from 4pm to 4:30am, with a break for dinner. It wasn't horrible, and I think I did a really good job, but it was really long and tiring. At 4:30 in the morning, I popped the keys in the mail slot, and now I am officially and completely moved out of FSH. On another subject, I have subjects for my experiment! So far I have run three subjects, and I'm doing a couple more right now. Everybody seems to enjoy taking the test (even though it's half an hour long), and they've all been really nice. I think it helps that I am the bringer of extra credit for Phonology 1. In the next couple days I will analyze my preliminary results (and learn R in the process). Hopefully that will give me awesome charts and statistics to put in my paper, proving my points clearly and irrefutably. Or, further research might be necessary. Further research is almost always necessary. (Comment on this)
Sunday, May 31st, 2009
4:33 pm	Moved in (mostly) I'm writing this post from my new apartment. I'm very happy with the place so far. The room is large and airy, my roommate is super nice, and the location is awesome. Two blocks from the beach boardwalk, three blocks from downtown, can't really be beat. Some of my friends helped me move yesterday, which was really great of them. The weather was nice for moving (a little cloudy), and the U-Haul truck worked out for the most part. The only snafu we met was the couch---we dragged it up two flights of stairs, and then found out that it couldn't fit into my room. Then we brought it back down. But other than that, no real problems. After moving I bought them Thai food, and it was yummy. I still have to move my kitchen stuff out here, and then clean my old place. Once I do that, I will be more or less fully moved. My mood has remained high the last couple weeks. I've been happy, but I don't really know why I'm happy. My work has been kinda sidetracked by moving, but I've run my experiment on one subject, and I have four (four!) subjects lined up to take the experiment on Tuesday. I still have lots of crap to write, but it seems almost doable at this point. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, May 15th, 2009
3:25 pm	I won't be homeless! I got the room I wanted! I will be living close to downtown, in a nice big room. I like my future roommate, and the neighborhood is nice. That is all. (Comment on this)
Wednesday, May 13th, 2009
12:43 am	Home Apartment search continues. I saw a really nice place on Monday, and I'll know by the end of the week if I get it or not. I guess that means I still have to look in the mean time. So far, I've gotten to the "check out the apartment" stage for three places. The first was with a girl who preferred to live with another girl, so I don't think I'll get that. The third was an itty bitty room, with such a narrow staircase that none of my furniture would make it up. The one in the middle was the really nice place that I hope I get---the room is huge, it's very close to downtown, my potential roommate is friendly, and it has a giant HDTV with Tivo. Things are...bearable. I'm still not doing well, but some amount of school work is being done, I'm proactive when it comes to finding a place, and I'm more or less optimistic. My mood is unpredictable and it goes up and down pretty dramatically. (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 7th, 2009
2:25 pm	Still looking So, I decided to try to find a room for rent. I was thinking about getting a studio, but then I changed my mind. I think I would like to live with people, possibly to keep me from going crazy in the summer. But that means emailing tons of people, calling them up, etc. It's annoying. And they usually don't answer back. And once I find a place, that just means I'll have more packing and cleaning and moving to do later this month. Even so, I remain somewhat optimistic that I'll find a decent place. Things have been pretty blah lately. I try to do work, but usually end up goofing off. I am getting some amount of work done, though. I'm looking forward to the summer, where I will (hopefully) have no research-related responsibilities. At least then, I won't feel bad for not doing research. (Comment on this)
Monday, April 27th, 2009
12:42 am	No answers, but doing better I haven't figured out anything new with respect to career or education goals, but I've been thinking about it and talking to people. I know that I'm staying in my program for a bit, so I don't need immediate answers. Things are getting a little better for me, though. I'm starting to feel happy more frequently. I haven't been over-eating as much, and I've been much more social lately. It's not like I'm the best I've ever been, but at least it looks like I can get past this hurdle. In the spirit of being social, I had a very eventful weekend. Friday I did SingStar with friends from my department. Saturday I had a jambalaya crepe at a restaurant with some ling buddies and an incoming first year who just moved out here. Today I went over the Hill to visit a farm that a friend of mine works at. We pet the baby goats, and we saw the chickens and the pigs, and we smelled all the awesome plants in the garden, and we ate edible flowers, and it was basically a very nice time. Then we got vegan Chinese food at a Supreme Master oriented restaurant. I guess I have come across one answer: it is not possible for me to move in with my linguistics buddies in their giant house. This house was where the party was Friday night, and I sneezed so much everyone had to ask if I was OK. I must have sneezed over 200 times. I can't live there because I am allergic to the cats. So, it looks like I'm going to go hunting for a studio apartment. It's a bummer, but I have to be able to breathe in my own domicile. (Comment on this)