As I'm trying to finish up one of my programming projects, I was scanning through some of the code I had written and found something that was rather... interesting.

Normally, I consider myself a good programmer, but sometimes I have to take shortcuts and cut corners.

Here is a snippet from one of my recent projects in my CS 375 Compilers class:

/* Increment the index and return the next entry 
   we can use as a label. New entry should be 
   validated as well and safe for whomever wants 
   to peek at it. */

int GetNextLabel ()
{
    return 3;
}

The amount of code like this seems to be proportional to the margin of time between the due date and the time I actually finish the assignment.

Hmm...

There's a famous quote that says,

"Necessity is the mother of invention."

This of course referring to the fact that in times of great need, the demand for innovation and scientific development swells to try and compensate for whatever society is needing.

A lesser-know variant is "Boredom is the father of innovation". For some reason, given 2 or more bored people in an enclosed space, it is almost guaranteed that somebody will come up with a stupid game. Examples:

Water Jousting

While bouncing around a foam ball one day, my roommate and I had the brilliant idea of creating the exhilarating game of water jousting. To play, fill a cup about half-way full with water, and place it on the very edge of the counter (a bar-like counter), and take turns trying to knock the cup over by bouncing the ball off the floor.

The fun part? The person not trying to knock over the cup stands directly behind it, ensuring that if the other player successfully hits the cup, the loser gets soaked. The best part? Its also the loser that has to clean up the floor afterwards.

Shuffle Phone

This game came about on a slow night during tutoring. At work, all the tutors sit around a huge conference table until a student comes in that needs help. When not many students showed up, some of the guys had the bright idea to play "shuffle phone". Exactly like shuffleboard, except you use your phone instead of a puck, and there's just a target circle drawn in pencil in the middle of the table. The winner walks away with pride, honor, and a phone thats scratched as hell.

That was one of the few times in my life that I wish I had a shitbox of a phone so I could have participated...

Plate Frisbee

As another game born from late night boredom with a roommate, this example is illustrative of how even while doing work, you can still have fun. While emptying the dishwasher, we were tag-teaming the plates... but instead of just placing them back in the cabinet (boring), I found it significantly more entertaining to try an under-the-leg frisbee toss to put them up.

It's a lot harder than it sounds (think about the angles), and it soon became competitive. Especially with the glass dishes*.

Omega

The classic boredom game, I actually got this from an episode of Malcolm In The Middle (though I've heard the game dates back even before the show, and is known as "The Circle Game").

The aggressor makes the "OK" sign with his index and thumb touching, with the rest of the fingers extended. If he holds that hand below his waist and somebody else looks (the victim), then the aggressor gets to punch the victim without fear of retaliation.

I've been playing this game with my equally-immature friends of mine since the 8th grade, and the game has since exploded into something much more serious. With rules and regulations, as well as advanced moves such as the Around the World, the Gravy Train, the Solid Snake, and the Willy Wonka... the game only gets deeper and deeper.

I'm sure there have been plenty more, and there's no doubt in my mind that there will be plenty more to come.

I can't wait.

Do you ever catch yourself making a terribly awkward face? For example... maybe it's that funny movie you've seen 30 times with your friends, and the lead character just made (yet another) humorous reference to breasts... so you laugh. "LoL!"

Approximately 1.3 seconds later the joyous smile has faded from your face... but with your eyes glued to the set unaware of everything but the flashing phosphorus in front of you, there remains a shitty "mouth halfway open semi smile" awkward face. Who gives a damn right? Well then you catch a slight movement out of the corner of your eye. Your animal instincts kick in! You look over to see what it was... but it was just your friend moving in his seat.

Too bad y'all made eye contact and he got a full-on view of your shitty awkward ass face. Whoops!

It happens. A corollary to this phenomenon is the "look over to the car next to you at a stop light" accidental eye contact. Do you look away quickly hoping they didn't notice you? Do you wave? Give them the finger?

Of course a cute girl definitely deserves a wink or at least a smile... and a douche bag looking back at you deserves a mug... but what about less obvious cases? Contextual sensitive and situational evaluation is necessary.

So stop yourself from time to time... and look at your face. Does it convey the feelings of your soul? Or is it just shitty looking? Think about it.

-B. S. Valosek, awkward face avoider

Today I took my final for my US government class at Eastfield College. It was cake.... but we'll see when my grades come in. It was a different experience, going to Eastfield vs. UT, but I lucked out and got a pretty cool professor that was really opinionated, somewhat cynical... and just weird enough to make class interesting.

For those you of you unaware, I feel compelled to tell the sad tale of how I ended up going to Eastfield (~23 miles roundtrip) instead of Richland (~16 miles roundtrip).

It was my first day at Richland... I had printed out a map of the campus and my schedule off the internet.... and I was ready to go. I got there early too.... so I wouldn't have to worry about finding my class. My classroom was N212... So I found the N building.... but apparently room 212 doesn't exist! WTF mate? So I asked around and somebody told me there's a government class in 210, "It was probably just a misprint", somebody suggested.

So I sat in the class and when the teacher came and announced that this was a government 1 class (I was supposed to be in government 2), I realized I had screwed up.

So during break I went to the registrar and told them about my situation, and a large woman asked what room number my class was supposedly in. After I told her... she gave me a funny look and said, "Nope... there's no room with that number here. What's your professor's name?"

After I told her I got another really weird look. She typed it into the computer and squinted at the screen to make sure she was reading it correctly. Then she told me, "Hun, that professor teaches at Eastfield. You're at the wrong college..." Shit!

I must have accidently registered at Eastfield somehow... even though my second summer semester was all set for Richland. Go figure!

But now I'm done and will be attending Richland, and saving an ass-load on gas money too. Lesson learned.

I guess I should be more aware of the subtle clues I seemed to get. For example... next to my class room number there was "EFC" printed. What does that mean??? I had no idea until I realized it stood, of course, for "Eastfield College." Whoops!

-Brandon Valosek, clueless student

In regards to days I'd have to say that this one was pretty interesting.

I saw one of the most bad-ass things I've ever seen in a pond: a little turtle riding on top of a bigger turtle. I wanted to grab the little one and take him with me to my class... but I didn't want to traumatize the 3 year old kid looking on... although it would've been awesome to have some company in a room full of stale EE kids. Not to mention that fact that he most likely would be more intelligent than some of the guys in there... which brings me to the next topic of interest in my day.

Some people are just complete dumb asses. I'm afraid they have no hope... especially this guy I had the pleasure of sitting next to. He was attempting to do one of the labs in my EE class wherein you have to design a circuit on the computer and implement it in real life (see Nerdgasm).

First of all, he was a whiny little bitch. Calling the proctors over for every little step because his insignificant little mind couldn't even grasp the simplest of instructions (which could've easily been understood by a 5 year old), and complaining that his lab "just wasn't working." Not understanding the concept that computers do just what you tell them to do... he assumed that OF COURSE he was doing everything right and that "something was wrong with the program." Finally getting things straightened out (after 10 minutes of help by the TA) and getting his program onto the board, he couldn't get it to work!

He tried everything... re-downloading the program... checking the connections... flashing the ROM... nothing! Man his board must be bad! What terrible luck! No matter what buttons he pressed or switches he flipped, nothing would happen.

I guess he didn't notice that the board was clearly divided into two halves, and that one was labeled "FOR STUDENT USE" and one was labeled "FOR PROCTOR USE" in huge bold, black lettering.

And I guess he didn't notice he was mashing away on the unprogrammed "FOR PROCTOR USE" side.

But I definitely managed to zap a pic of his dumb ass before I left. He never did figure out that he was on the wrong side, and finally just gave up, slammed his books down, and threw his arms up in desperation (and realization that he really is a complete idiot), and walked out.

He walked back in about 5 minutes later to get his backpack he had forgotten.

After getting my lab done and checked it was time for me to head back home... in the pouring rain.

So as I said earlier, today was a day of days. If I can make it past this week of tests and survive finals... then I'm hoping to have a great summer... A summer of summers if you will.

Until next time!