Dave Dash

Dave changed Fort Max

1998-11-05T00:00:00+00:00

"Moving the journal over here was a great idea. I just hope the users don't mind that we reuse old graphics, woman."

I’ve started reading CNN, more often. I’m sure you will notice the side effects. And also relating to the page… I’ve placed the journal on the opening screen and I doubled the length of data that gets displayed. I updated the Calendar, the Friends page and fixes the random problems with how links open.

I heard the KQRS apology regarding the comments made regarding the Hmong. The result is that they have given in to Citizens Against Racism. There will be no more Talk with Tak, featuring Tak the person from Grand Forks with an accent that's surprisingly Oriental sounding. I guess not stating his race does not matter. I think KQ should make up a new character with an accent that can't quite be traced. :) I'm interested in what others think of Talk with Tak or what you think would define something as being racist.

Jesse the Body was on KQ. He also made the front page of the Daily Illini (not the feature article, but the front page nonetheless). Most of my news that I throw at you is usually computer stuff, so here's something from Maximum PC that mentions "the wrestler."

[McJorgenson](mailto:dalamar -at- ftmax . com) sent me this link.

Apple has a new deal where you can Rent-to-Own an iMac for $30 a month. Sure, it sounds like a good deal. Only a little bit more than unlimited Internet access... except you realize that this is for 67 months. After the first year or two you'll feel like your machine is really out-dated. Then you realize that you are paying $30 for the next 43 months for an outdated computer that, from many peoples view points, wasn't very good computer brand new.

Matt Sundberg graduated from High School today. Slacker.

Anybody who uses the mega-gigantic dryers in Allen Hall should not leave their laundry in their for more than 10-15 minutes. It's really annoying, because if you don't use those and have a decent ammount of laundry, you have to run your load a few times.

The 52 lbs. package has been spotted in Cach, IL at 9:47 PM today. It should be expected to arrive tomorrow or Monday. The last time I saw something at Cach, IL I got it the next day or the day after. That was of course in MN, but now that I live in IL, it should be here sooner. That's right, I live in IL. I am IL.

I wonder if I've regained control of my will power. Jack's Taco Bell poster finally fell. Jack missed two classes today because he went to sleep at six in the morning.

I took my second math test. It hurt.

I love this song. "Give it to me, baby!"

Remote Desktop

1998-09-03T00:00:00+00:00

I was just remembering the good ol’ days. Back when I’d hang out in the Tech center at high school. Sure it was also the worst year of school, but it had its high points. Like when we installed Remote Desktop which enabled us to control other computers. I remember we’d always make the web browser go to a porn site like www.sex.com or something when Ryan Hayle was near the machine. I need to get something like that on some of the computers around me.

Canoeing

1998-07-18T00:00:00+00:00

The group of kids we have for SEI II are great. They are all smart and in class they are well behaved. The girls get obnoxious during break time. Actually not all the girls. One girl is really cool and lots of people mistake her as a TA (unless they mistake Molly and I as students). She’s into nanotechnology, genetics, quantum physics. Very cool kid. We’ll certainly miss these kids. Marc’s kids aren’t that great.

Thursday we went to an orchestra concert at Orchestra Hall. We took my cousin with us too, it was pretty neat. The concert had two good pieces at the beginning. The rest I didn't like because it was all opera-like. Adam, Molly, my cousin and I later went shopping at Rainbow. Molly went home and Adam, my cousin and I had icecream sandwhiches (Kempswich).

I talked to my cousin for a while. I won't see her for at least three years since she'll be in Germany with her family. It's wierd. I think she's looking forward to it.

Friday (yesterday) at the Northrup Turnaround where we pick up our kids there were huge trucks and busses. It was of course Tori Amos and her stuff. We didn't see her, but we did see her stuff. Marc and I asked around the trucks whose stuff was whose and well we were pretty much right. I offered my kids $20 if they could bring Tori Amos to class. They failed, but I don't blame them.

Later that day Molly and I ate with Raj, Kelly and Adam. Then Molly and I went to DanAmy and we went to see the Wedding Singer. The second time around made me "get" everything. Everything made sense now that I remembered it was the eighties that the story takes place. Once again. I recommend this "Romantic Comedy." It is funnier than hell.

Today I woke up at 5, left home at about 6 and went canoeing after Paul Heinecke (and another boat went after Laureen Ojalvo) while they swam 5 miles in Lake Minnetonka. Paul didn't make it all the way. Laureen of course did, she got second place for her age group. I think she rules! Paul almost made it, but for a person who had very little sleep, did a lot of work the day before, and has not swum in supposedly 17 months... wow... that was awesome. I realize that I may enjoy canoeing when there is less weight and people on the boat. Less chance of things going bad I guess. It was nice after I finished canoeing. This was my second time going. I went before with school that was cool too. I think I should go again except with fewer people in the boat (four gets crowded).

Went to Tanya Zhu's house for her Graduation Party. Most of the people were tired from canoeing or swimming or Smashing Pumpkins the night before or a mix. Now I'm tired.

UIUC... more details.

1998-07-09T00:00:00+00:00

Whopping out my schedule…

Day 1: I ate breakfast. It was bad. I went to take tests. I did unusually well. I am normally nervous during tests and do very very average. Then we went to the Krannert Center for the opening ceremonies. Krannert Center is a Transformer. It turns into a giant monster and eats families. It follows the quota system. The rest of the day was mediocre. The campus issues at the Krannert Center was reminiscint of High School politically correct skits. We had ones on getting drunk, getting raped, getting assaulted and getting a lesbian roommate that is black. Afterwards the kids got to discuss this and make posters. Very High School like.<p>Day 2
This was the good day because it went fast. Breakfast was okay, they have waffle irons there. The Personal Safety issues sucked and I left when they started to talk about the World Wide Web (wasn’t safetry related… but…). I went to some success oriented things and then… hmm I went to a special interest session on Unit one/Allen Hall which is my dorm this fall. That was cool. Helped me as far as signing up for classes goes. Then I ate lunch and then got my ID card… (I look like a dork) and then signed up for classes. My schedule is:<pre> Comparative Literature of Non-Western Civilization Intro to CS Chemistry What is College Graph Theory hopefully more… </pre>

Umm then I went home.

Oh yeah, I've e-dopted Sunita as my e-sister. She's cool.

Anticipation

1998-06-13T00:00:00+00:00

God, my house is so chaotic and my Graduation Party hasn’t started. I finished my last final. I think I did pretty well. I came home to one dead phone line which I fixed. Turns out that RJ-11 jacks suck. Hmm.. now I wait in anticipation…

Graduation

1998-06-12T00:00:00+00:00

Well after waiting hours for the long Graduation commencement ceremonies to end the Senior Party fianlly began.

We got on a bus, and went to the Medina Entertainment Center. The food was mediocre, but they made up for that with good snacks. The music was a little loud at times too. There was a lot of things to do there, Bowling, caricatures, photo-buttons, winning huge prizes (which I could have gotten had Molly and I pooled our money together and gone into the prize room. But, we found out too late. (Some kid walked off with a Halogen Lamp!!!). We had lots of fun. Went to the hypnotist show (which I slept through). I guess it was really good. Then they had a drawing for a plane ticket, a couple TVs and some other items. Nobody I knew won anything.

Romeo+Juliet

1998-06-10T00:00:00+00:00

I’m recording Romeo + Juliet, the movie nobody likes. I saw the first 5-10 minutes of it and thought it was cool. I saw Tybalt and thought… That’s gotta be John Leguizamo. He is so damn funny.

Looks like I graduate tomorrow.

I’m cleaning my room, it’s fun. I take stuff that looks out of order and lay it on the floor. Then I put things on the floor where they belong.

(no title)

1998-06-06T00:00:00+00:00

You know what’s annoying? Domain names. Like things like this and this are being used for bad purposes. Read the second one, there isn’t anything too offensive on the opening page, it’s really funny though.

Graduation Party Weekend #1

1998-05-31T00:00:00+00:00

Yesterday: We went to Mychal Anderson’s Grad Party. That was fun. Later we went to Arthur’s Birthday Party. That was fun. Then the lights went out after a transformer was jolted by an almighty god. When I went home, our lights were out too… and as far as I can tell they are still out. I didn’t care too much, becuase it was sunny. Now it’s dark and I have retreated to the Borcherts (one of many homes that have electricity, but the only one that had a computer to spare… must work on assignment).

Went to Eve’s today for Eve Xin and Lisa Alholm’s Grad party. That was fun too. Well I don’t want to say anything more yet, because I should be busy.

Princess Bride

1998-05-24T00:00:00+00:00

Finally… I saw The Princess Bride. That is a very good movie. It would have been nice to see it on Prom Night, but today was as good a day as any. I bet there are several web sites dedicated to this movie.

Memorial Day weekend?

1998-05-24T00:00:00+00:00

Some people died for something. Which means this weekend we catch up on stuff we haven’t gotten around to doing.

I was accepted into Unit 1 today! Friday we went to see Godzilla (or Gozira). It was a very good movie if you expect an action movie. After that we went to Tanya’s and played Boggle. That night or maybe the next morning I stumbled upon a good game web site.<p>Saturday Adam came over. I got my hair cut and I thought I looked a lot like my brother (it’s all spiked), but no, today my brother cut his hair too and it’s really short. Adam and I started moving stuff around my room. If you’ve ever been in here, I changed the desks around again. It’s very spacious in here if you are working on office stuff.

We were midway moving stuff and Molly came over and we went to Hyland Park in Bloomington (based on my directions). We played Tag, it was fun. Yishan had some ailment that caused him to be lying on a picnic table while people poked him with ray guns.

After that Adam and I moved more stuff then went to Arby’s with Marc, Mike and Molly. After that Adam and I moved the rest of the stuff and everyone else played Dr. Mario. At midnight everyone left. Adam, Marc and I stayed up until 2 and then we slept woke up around 8. Adam and Marc picked up some pancake stuff and they made pancakes while I finished cleaning my room.

A lot of people went to Taylor Falls. I don’t have rock climbing gear and wouldn’t feel comfortable going rock climbing with all these people who are probably many times better than I.

I went to a Barbecue with my brother, sister-in-law, Mom2, Mandy and a few other people. The food was good.

Now I will learn how to do some stupid programming project.

AOL-ICQ

1998-05-21T00:00:00+00:00

Here is a funny response to my AOL-ICQ mass message:<pre> Are you serious? I already knew that they were being bought out, but is it really true that they’ll charge? </pre> I saw our school’s fourth annual Unplugged. There was a lot of good stuff and a lot of dull stuff. I’ll point out the good. There was a good song called “Tune” by the Cahsta Ricans. Which was this guy on the violin or some stupid string instrument. There was a silly 50s-ish song called “Wishin and Hopin” that was just silly and made females seem inferior. Zach Held did a song called Closer. I slept for a bit and woke up to Neil Young’s Old Man as done by Mr. Carlson on banjo and Susan Anderson on Guitar and some other guy on some other instrument. Very good stuff. Post Intermission: There was Spaghetti Eatin Disco Bears with Hydroponic Beats for the Soul. That was the coolest thing I heard all night. It was a lot of good percussion. Some people did a good version of Layla. There were a few other good ones. Peter Seals, Jacob Greene and Dan Thomas did an excelent version of Simple Mind’s Don’t you forget about me. That’s about it.

old friends

1998-05-20T00:00:00+00:00

It’s silly that I didn’t think of this before…

A person with whom I was friends a very long time ago (before preschool to first grade) has been “found.”

I tried recalling her last name one day and I found it and where she lived - Eden Prairie. This is where she moved after first grade. It occurred to me today, that Adam may know of her… and sure enough he did. Now I have to creatively find this person and not scare her. I’m not good at the second bit. Oh well just the fact that I know where this person exists makes me happy. Now I have to find a non-threatening way of meeting her…

It’s so sad that I am just finding out about all my friends from long ago.

courage

1998-05-18T00:00:00+00:00

I finally worked up the courage to write a letter to one of my friends from Bloomington. I thought it would be very sad to not attempt to make contact with at least one of them before I left for Champaign-Urbana. Hopefully I’ll get correspondence.

Graduation Ceremonies

1998-05-17T00:00:00+00:00

I remember people asking why we were not having the Hopkins High School graduations at Northrup Auditorium. They claimed that Northrup was under remodelling. Suzy said that they were painting the basement. Either way, it was irrelevant. The day we graduate, 11 June 1998, Is when Adam Engelhart and the rest of Eden Prairie High School have their graduation ceremonies at the Northrup. Just another reason why I hate our school.

UMTYMP Graduation

1998-05-16T00:00:00+00:00

Wednesday we had our UMTYMP graduation. Present were Molly, Tom Borchert, Adam Engelhart, Suzy Reichel, Laureen Ojalvo, Eve Xin, and others. Doug Shaw gave an astounding speech. Suzy also gave a speech which was good. Raj (my brother) and I did not like the food at all. Other people said the food was alright, but I think maybe my brother and I have higher standards for food.

Anyway, I got a lot of help for my fourth CSci assignment in Recitation. Recitation was boring so I emailed Katie (ed: Romportl - 5/24/06) for the last two minutes. There’s a link, you can email her too (ed: there is no link, it was removed in a belated attempt to thwart spam - 5/24/06). I’m going to start using her as my personal wailing wall. Except I won’t cry. I’ll just babble about how I don’t want to be in my classroom at the moment.

When I got home, Molly and I started working on invitations for our graduation. Hopefully we’ll send them out today or on Monday.

Yesterday, Molly and I went to Minnehaha Falls and rain fell on us (which she enjoys more than I) and then hail fell on us (which neither of us enjoy at all). We ran back to a mini-shelter and then to the car and headed to someplace safe, Arby’s. Molly has sided with me and really likes the Roast Chicken and Pesto Panini Grill sandwich. We then left for the play at Hopkins (Pirates of Penzance). I got to talk to the crew and even where a shirt of a crew-member (because mine was sopping wet). Molly returned to the light, and I found Mike Jorgenson and we sat down and then were joined by Adam and a surprise appearance by Jason Waye. The play was very good.

We (Molly and I) went home, were tired, started printing labels for the invites. Then we realized they didn’t print what we wanted (well I realized that, Molly was asleep on the couch). Molly left home, and I went to sleep.

Today I worked on my C++ project a little. It’s not too bad at all. Tomorrow my dad comes back from India during Simpsons/X-files… I hope his plane gets delayed so I don’t miss any of the show.

Day after Prom

1998-05-10T00:00:00+00:00

Prom… well despite it costing a couple hundred dollars, it was worth it. It’s just a nice occasion. Here’s how mine and Molly’s went.

At around 8-8:30 I woke up and took a shower and everything and Jesse had arrived. Jesse and I ate breakfast (Eggos) and then Katie arrived. Jesse and I didn't feel like waiting for Molly so we went to Gingiss to pick up our hideously expensive Tuxedos (which I can hopefully return tomorrow...) then we went to Glenrose Floral in Hopkins to pick up our hideously expensive floral "accoutrements."

We came back to my house and we started making Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie and Pesto Pasta stuff. Our word of the day became "scrod." Hopefully I can get some pictures from Scrod-Prom 98. My mom smelled something burning, opened the oven, and sure enough she had left some miscellaneus kitchen items inside one oven that Katie Pre-heated. Katie was filled with a little too much guilt, even after Molly and I convinced her that it was alright. My mom bought a lot of new kitchen toys that day though, it was very nice of her.

Katie and Jesse left for their respective places-to-be and Molly and I finished cleaning up the kitchen and dishes. Molly and I showered (seperate showers, because we can afford those types of luxuries) and got dressed. This wasn't easy. Molly had a hard time getting her corsage on properly, and I had a hell of a time putting my tuxedo together. We eventually figured it out (with help regarding the boutonniere from my mom). Then we departed for the Grand March at the Lindbergh Center at Hopkins High School.

Waiting in line wasn't too comfortable, but we finally went under the arch, had our picture taken and then we went to where LifeTouch was and had our professional Prom pictures taken. We went back to my house for our homemade dinner.

When Molly and I got back, Katie and Jesse soon followed, and then Molly's parent's and grandmother did too. Several pictures were taken of us outside the house. The dinner for the four of us was very nice. We ate in our formal dining room (which had been a longing of Katie's since the first time she came over to my house). We had the very fancy China and glasses and serving dishes. The whole time I couldn't stop but think of how much more efficient it would have been to eat at a restraunt. But, that wouldn't have been as nice. My mom was kind enough to get a few pictures of us around the dining table, before we ate.

After dinner we did all the dishes and did a decent job of cleaning up after our selves. We took a few pictures of doing dishes. (Who does dishes on Prom night?) Then we took pictures of ourselves at the stairs. It was about nine-thirty when we finally left for the Prom.

The actual prom wasn't that great, just a typical dance at the Marriot Hotel (opus 2). It was very nice seeing a wide spectrum of classmates. It was not just one or two cliques, but most of the Senior (and some of the Junior) class. It was amusing watching Caitlin "skank" to Reel Big Fish.

Molly and I went back to home to change into better shoes and then left for Becky's and that was mildly fun. I left there less tired because I slept through Princess Bride (which I have yet to see). I came back around five am today (when I started this message). I took off the tux and crashed on my couch. Woke up at 8:30 and then again at 11:30. I returned the tux and finished entering this message.

Jesse and I plan on writing a cheapskate's guide to prom (dandelions make nice corsages, etc.). We'll probably do another dinner thing with Katie and Jesse using the Upscale Macaroni and Cheese or Spicy Macaroni and Cheese recipes that I found on the net.