Parkour is a physical art or sport the goal of which is to move as quickly and efficiently as possibly, overcoming obstacles in the way. It is often seen in the media as some pretty fancy urban acrobatics. It makes for great youtube videos which is how I was first interested in it. My recently renewed interest in running and general desire to get more in shape made me think it would be something fun to learn.

After reading more about it today, I thought that the philosophy is perfect for me. Anyone who has seen me running around everywhere should understand. And seriously, why go around when you can go over? I don't know if what it takes, the agility and strength, or the ability to develop it through hard work and practice, but I'm excited to try, more than I have been about any other excercise routine that was solely for the purpose of getting in shape. So I've found some locals who I think can help me.

I've had some frequently recurring dreams for a while now where I can fly. It's not like Superman or anything, mostly just 2-3 feet off the ground and only with intense concentration and training. I don't even remember the dreams in morning as dreams, but often I have memories of being able to do it that I know aren't real. It sort of feels like what it was like to hover in the vertical wind tunnel, which may have something to with the phantom memories. I imagine that the freedom of movement that is said to come with parkour to be the next best thing.

Today Jeremy, Matt, and I decided to work out and experiment with a new way to get to work. First thing in the morning we met up and ran GATech's π mile (3.14 miles). Then instead of our normal drive, we took our bikes on MARTA, Atlanta's train system, and then from the northmost station, North Springs, road our bikes 10.5 miles to office. Needless to say, we also reverse the ride on the way home. There were some tough hills, particullary on the way there, but overall it was a good ride. It wasn't much worth the time it took, but it was fun once. Now my legs are so tired I may never want to walk again.
( See the Route )

I ran again on Monday so it looks like I might be sticking with it. I don't know about tomorrow, it's pretty late now. On Monday, though, I did even even better than Friday.

I'm learning to juggle. I probably mentioned that, but it is starting to go really well. First of all, I am practicing, I haven't given up yet. That in itself is a big achievement for me. I was kind of stuck until Matt Kusic gave me a tip yesterday. Now I am really starting to do something that could actually be considered juggling. It's not quite continuous, but it feels that way, if only for a second.

Also, I had fun exploiting my artistic side again. For Visual Story, we had to write up a director's paperwork for a scene out of the movie, Psycho, including drawing storyboards. Drawing 36 scenes, even if I could pause the video to draw it, was a lot of fun. I won't say mine look good, but the fact that you can tell what they are is a real accomplishment for me. Particularly the part where I had to repeat these 2 frame each 9 times (it cut back and forth very quickly) I got to practice learning to draw something, figuring out the essence of it, and drawing many times quickly.

Finally, tomorrow there are on campus tryouts for Jeopardy. I love that show and would love to be on it. I couldn't be on any other quiz show because I'm trained to answer in the form of a question. I hope I'll be able to make it to the tryouts, even if I don't make it on the show or anything.

All in all, I really feel that I'm getting the value out of college in a way I may never have before. Really broadening my horizons, the way college is meant to. Taking advantage of all these options to do something different. It feels good.

( Preamble )It snowed a lot Wednesday night and we had about 6 inches on the ground. Last night, at 12:30 my friend Jessica and I went out onto the cut and built a fence out of snow. If you are familiar with CMU then you know what the cut is and the fence that is at one end of it. Our snow fence was a smaller model of that one. We built it at the other end of the cut, near the street. We painted both sides. For the people coming to campus the front said "1 MORE DAY", because today was the last day of classes, and for the people leaving the back said "ENJOY BREAK". It took us about 4 hours to do, but it was well worth the effort. I said I would be happy if it stayed intact until 3pm, and it lasted til at least some time after 4:30. At some point some assholes came and knocked it down. That sucks. I did get pictures.

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For anyone who read the journal entry from the other day, I'm sorry for the negative attitude and bad English. Everyone has their down days. I try not to write on those days, but it slipped out. But who reads this crap anyway? Speaking of crap, you have to see Strong Bad's email, one of the features of HomestarRunner.com. It is really funny.

Meanwhile, the number of people going skating is ballooning out of control. Ok, it isn't that bad, but I didn't realized I had so many friends.... who like ice skating.... and are free Tuesday night.

Unbeknownst to our hero, in another part of town, My website has been updated again. You could call this revision 2 of the new design, but then again, who's counting? What's new? Well, I'ved decided that journals and pictures are content I can actually update where as the rest I can't. Plus, why do I need to write pages about stuff that I do if I can just write about it in the journal when it happens? Therefore, the pages become less important. Also, there were too many frames and annoying dynamic database type features, so I got rid of them all. Simple simple simple. The best changes went into bbGallery, the picture browser I wrote. Most of the changes were on the administrator side. I can easily generate and regenerate thumbnails and rotate and delete pictures from the web. Customizing the settings is all standard now. There are a few user changes you may see. Thumbnails really fit into their size now. It won't ever autogenerate thumbnails, instead it will just let you know when there isn't one available. Finally, you can see more details about the picture that the camera recorded.

Ok, that's enough for now. Sleepy time. Keep on scrollin' on....

So, I have tried, today, to be a better student. I realized that despite the fact that I don't think it is important to me, it must be. When I see people who do better than me, or I see how poorly I actually do, I wish I were better. I feel below good students and that isn't what I want. So I tried to do work. To get things done so that I would know what it feels like to have fun with everything done. It didn't work. I realized, "What's the point?" Things were going well, but then I had a sudden realization, and knew that even without work, I wouldn't be happy. I won't ever be happy. It's a tough thing to realize, because I like to be optimistic and think things will *eventutally* work out... but they won't.

Since things were going well, might was well mention them. Halloween party was cool. The party itself didn't go so great, but my costume was cool. Check out pictures. Although, on the note of halloween, there was another party I was supposed to go to and didn't. I really should have but I just can't handle stuff like that, it makes me sad. Also, AEPi had a mixer where we did karaoke. It was actually surprisingly fun. I guess the fact that I like to sing helps but I was surprised that I wasn't really embarassed at all not only to sing in front of 30 or so people, but to sing Whitney Houston.

The ice rink is supposed to open on Monday. That is something I'm looking forward to. I have been waiting to go ice skating for a while now. I already have plans to go with a whole bunch of people. It should be /interesting/. That is what I was looking forward to, but in light of other things, it just can't really make up. I have to try to put on a positive face, and make it seem to others like my life is worth living. Right. Signing out.

The first week of school has come and passed. So far my classes haven't really given me any hard work to do. I have to start the shell for my OS for ... OS. It actually bothers me that everyone has to write Yalnix -- I think you should get to name your own OS. I'm not in 18-240 yet, which I really need to figure out this morning because I need to be in the class and not screw over my lab partner and the first lab would be on tuesday for me. Definately one of the funnier class related moments this week was when I was trying to get to 85-100 and the stairs in Doherty were clogged with people trying to get into 2210 and I said loudly, "Intro to Intelligence? How about starting with 'Don't block the halls!'" Ha Ha. Anyways... BVW has been a lot more work so far than I expected, but this first week is the hard one and I enjoy helping people. Randy still spells my name wrong. If he plans to fix my grammar I'll teach him to spell my name.

Outside class things are going well. I ran 2wice this week. Rush has been going well, and our events have been fun. Monday we went to Gullifties for dessert. Tuesday we went to the Pirates/Braves game. It was a good game. The Braves were up but in the bottom of the 9th there looked like a chance that the Pirates could pull it off (Go Buccs!) but it didn't happen. I missed laser tag, and ultimate frisbee yesterday was a lot of exercise.

It's tough to keep the personal stuff out of this journal when it is the only one I have and there are things I have to say.

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