Monthly Archive for December, 2003

I feel terrible.

I just found out that the CMU HCI Institute requires Ph.D. applications to submit GRE subject test scores. I didn’t take the GRE subject tests. To say this jeopardizes my application is an understatement. It turns a long shot into a faint glimmer of a long shot.

Why didn’t I take the subject GRE? Well, I paid for it. I scheduled it, I threw over $100 into the toilet, I intended to take it, but then I never prepared for it. I was working on other applications which didn’t require it. I told myself I should just take it, even if I didn’t get a chance to prepare. Then I told myself to make sure I at least double-check that it isn’t absolutely necessary anywhere I am applying. Then I just ignored it and then my chance was gone. I never prepared. I never checked. I never took the test.

I am feeling worse and worse about my options. I found out Colorado doesn’t offer funding for masters students. So my back-up plan of getting a masters at Colorado and then reapplying to some of these programs is lost. UConn doesn’t offer a masters. I am unsure how I feel about getting a Ph.D. in psychology from UConn. I feel impotent here.

The application process is tearing me down. I feel compelled to devote all my energy to it, but working on applications forces me to confront everything that I haven’t done over the past four years. And I am compelled to change that, but can’t as long as my applications are hanging over my head. So I have to wallow in the consuming sensation of disaccomplishment, if there is such a word.

All this seems to mean is that I have to push on with the applications. I have five left. I should be able to use some of my other personal statements for UCSD and Rice. Those shouldn’t take more than a half-day each. But I am terrified of the CMU application and the Maryland application. Utterly terrified. And when I am this scared, I tend to delay. The exact opposite of what I must do.

I found an amazing bit of teen internet-speak today:

hey!!! i am so bored!!! 2 day woz crap!!! i slept up bekas lst nite an we were up all nite talking and watching films : ) this morning i wnt 2 town wiv beka an her sis an then i seen the 2 bitches 4rm hell – rachael an spana!! : ( i think the bst thing 4rm 2day is tha i argued wiv them coz they were saying stuff like oh i aint going near beka or emily coz they r bi!! well i dnt really think tha any1 is going 2 go near them!!! lol!! is any1 going 2 koola 2moro? i dnt know if i am now : ( i dnt know wot 2 do!!! nufing else 2 say so i’ll leave u all 2 it!! c ya soon bye

I wasn’t sure if it really was terrible english or just abbreviated and poorly punctuated to the point of incomprehensiblity, so I went ahead and translated it:

Hey! I am so bored. Today was crap. I slept at Beka’s last night and we were up all night talking and watching films. This morning I went to town with Beka and her sister, and then I saw the two bitches from hell: Rachael and Spana. I think the best thing from today is that I argued with them, because they were saying stuff like “Oh, I’m not going near Beka or Emily because they are bisexual.” Well, I don’t really think that anyone is going to go near them. Is anyone going to Koola tomorrow? I don’t know if I am now. I don’t know what to do. Nothing else to say, so I’ll leave you all to it. See you soon. Bye.

The translation is actually fairly comprehensible, so I guess the nation’s youth isn’t illiterate. The references are somewhat ambiguous, but that is probably because of their assumed audience. Mine are no doubt just as bad. Amazing how language changes though.

It makes me a little sad when someone moves and a quirk dies. For example, take the Yankees fan in Storrs. In Storrs, almost equidistant from New York and Boston, there are Yankees fans and there are Red Sox fans. There is no consensus, no dominant force, no acquiescence, just ongoing battle and beating of chests–infinite fealty to the Duke of the Big Apple or the Lord of Beantown.

But when one of us moves to New York or to Boston, all of the sudden there is no stand to take. They put their Yankees hats on every day, and drive to work amidst a sea of blue bumper stickers. It’s no longer a unique property, but an expression of normalcy. Except it’s not normal for them. They didn’t grow up in a place where supporting their team was the norm, but for all intents and purposes they appear that way. Their quirk has died.

Today, I mourn the death of all such intricasies personality, sports-affiliated or otherwise. May you live on in the hearts of your owners, who will remember you always.

I have been reading quite a survey of the nativist perspective on language and arguments against it, including whorfian and connectionist perspectives. More links than I could ever hope to follow.

Well, my Cornell and Carnegie Mellon Psychology applications are signed, sealed and delivered. I feel good about them, and good about the personal statements that they contain. But right now I am working on my MIT application. I hate my MIT application.

My MIT application wants me to know not only my grade in every course I took, but what category it falls under, what semester it was taken in, how many weeks I was in it, how many hours per week it took, broken down between lecture and lab, and last but not least, the textbook use, title and author. The fucking textbook.

Now I don’t know about you, but I don’t keep around my old Chemistry textbooks, or syllabi for that matter. And my professors sure as hell don’t keep that information on their web sites. They probably don’t even know they have web sites. So this demand my MIT application is making is utterly, fantastically retarded.

You’d think they’d know better up there.