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Thoughts
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September 23,
2004 |
Forgot yesterday to mention Carlos Santana. He is also someone I enjoy a lot.
Of course the war in Iraq and the role of our military forces is a major news topic these days. Doesn't really matter what I think, but I feel like expressing myself in regards to this matter.
Before talking about Iraq specifically, I would like to start off by talking about the armed forces. If you are an American, there is almost no way you can be upset with our troops (not talking about abnormalities such as the abuse of foreigners or things like that). The troops are risking their lives for the protection of our nation. Whether or not what they are doing is right is not their concern. If you do not agree with their fights or where they are fighting, do not be upset with them. It is the role of the President and Congress to make the decisions. It is the role of the President and Congress to decide what is right and what is wrong. The military is simply a group of volunteers that wish to do what is in the best interest of the nation. Support of them is mandatory. Support of the President and Congress is optional.
When the President announced the war in Iraq, I supported him. The President was so steadfast in the claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction that I couldn't help but believe him. Though no facts were presented to the public, confidentiality I thought played a role in this. However, so far no weapons of mass destruction have been found. I wish the President had not started this war now, but I will not be supporting John Kerry. We have gone too far to suddenly pull out. Unlike Vietnam, these guys we are fighting are really pissed (really really pissed) at us and have already shown us what they are willing to do to hurt us. We must suppress the insurgency before pulling out this time.
At the beginning of the war, some people claimed it was simply a war over oil. Well, we've overthrown Saddam, we have taken Iraq, and do we have low oil prices? The people who claimed this was a war over oil are stupid. Plain and simple. However, there is something that bothers me a little - Dick Cheney's ties to Haliburton. It is possible he is seeing some extra green behind the scenes. I would rather have a vice-president without these ties, but at least he's better than Mr. Robot Al Gore or the Zombie John Kerry.
I would like to finish this up by talking about those who believe the military is killing their children. Simply put, the military is not killing your children. Military service is voluntary. Last I checked, voluntary wasn't the same as mandatory. It's not like they're being drafted against their will. They want to serve the nation. They understand the risks (assuming they know what a gun is). Shut up. Please. Now.
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September 22,
2004 |
Wow, it's been a long time. A very long time. Well, here it goes.
As a lot of people know, my taste in music is very limited. I am not shy about making known how I feel about certain songs. However, I do not explain why I dislike those songs. After so many times of simply saying "that song sucks," I have decided it would be best if I explained how I feel about music and why I dislike so much music.
Before I start explaining, let me just state that this explanation does not apply to hip-hop, rap, dance, or any type of electronica stuff. This explanation only applies to music such as rock, classical, and most current types.
The main reason my choice in music is so limited has to do with instruments versus vocals. In my opinion, modern music focuses way too much on vocals. As far as I'm concerned, evoking emotions through the use of instruments is much more difficult than doing the same through the use of voice. I guess it is similar to the argument people make against cursing. Though cursing is easy, all lazy people can do it. Expressing oneself without cursing is much more difficult, but is more rewarding (or so people say). Likewise (the way I see it), anyone can sing. But not just anyone can make you feel music like someone like Jimi Hendrix or Jimmy Page can make you feel. Classic rock (pre-70's), classical, and jazz are mainly what I enjoy for this reason. These types of music focus on instrumentals rather than vocals.
Now, I do not like Eric Clapton, but not because he doesn't focus on instrumentals. I dislike this guy's music simply because it is blues music. I don't really care for blues music or the majority of sad music for that matter. I'd rather be happy.
I feel like this explanation is adequate in expressing my taste in music, but to summarize I'll make a few things clear. I don't like punk or any of its forms. Used to enjoy it, but now I can't stand it. To me the majority of it is people whining and people playing white noise (white noise being of course the static one hears when a television loses signal). I don't like 80's music (for the most part) anymore either. Too much focus on singing and not enough focus on instrumentals. For the most part (aside from some things such as the Kill Bill soundtracks), I don't like anything past the time of Jimi and Led. My brother can probably point out some stuff I enjoy, but that is what I remember for the time being. Again, this does not account for hip-hop, dance, etc.
Finally, I would like to express what I feel towards groups such as the Beatles and Buddy Holly. As far as I'm concerned, these guys aren't classic rock. Chuck Berry is classic rock. Jimi Hendrix is classic rock. Led Zeppelin is classic rock. Classic rock to me is strong instrumentals and minor vocals. The Beatles and Buddy Holly are too much vocals for me.
I know I've left some things out, and if I remember what I have forgotten, I'll add it in later, but for now I hope this sheds some light on my weird sense of music.
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October 9,
2002 |
The NHL season begins today. Just like every other year since I became interested in the sport, I am going for the San Jose Sharks. Last year they surprised everybody, including me, and finished tied for second place in the Western Conference, the more difficult Conference. This year should be just as good, and the Sharks have been picked as a major Stanley Cup contender.
Virtua Fighter 4 is the best fighting game ever. Its graphics are outstanding (arcade looks better than the PS2 version though), and the gameplay is so much more deep than any other fighter out there. I used to be a Tekken fan, a serious Tekken fan, but after playing Sega's game, I can not go back to the subpar rehash known as Tekken. Sorry Namco, but you just do not revolutionize your games.
One of the old Computer Science assignments was to code a program that would decide if a number was prime. This was easily done when the module operator was learned. I will post this code on a Programming page, which I will make in a couple of days or something.
In order for me to teach myself programming, I have to have tasks, exercises, and challenges to complete. I have been satisfying this need by doing the Computer Science class's assignments. Today I happened to notice something on the GameFAQS message board: a homework assignment that someone needed help with. While I did not and will not post a reply, I did happen to code the assignment. The guy had to create a program in C++ that would accept input from the user and in turn give them a seat assignment on a plane. There were ten seats to be assigned on the plane. The first five were First Class; the last five were Economy. Of course, a seat could not be assigned twice. This problem was easily solved through arrays, and, like the Computer Science problem, I will be posting the source on my Programming page, once I get it up.
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October 4,
2002 |
It is 4:10 now. I am working on a banner for my site. The one I just made has my name, Roy, with some jagged lines. As it is really simple right now, I'm going to be working on making it better. I like the basic concept of it; jumpy, like me. Created it with the GIMP, an absolutely free program that can be used to do some nice work. Not quite as powerful as Paint Shop or Photoshop, but it is FREE. And it's only a 6 mb download. Get GIMP. Going to be adding color, so I will update the picture every once in a while.
It is about 3:30 Friday afternoon. I am bored, and just like every other time, I am not going to the Conroe High School football game. Why should I? There is no answer to this question. What has the school done for me? Nothing. What has made me feel pride for the school? Nothing. If I really cared about our football team, then I would try my hardest and play for them an in effort to help out. However, I do not care. The school has done nothing for me and I feel embarrassed to be a Conroe Tiger. So instead of going out and sitting for some hours watching the team play bad, I am staying home and probably going to program.
Last night I did not go to sleep until some time around 11:30 although I went to bed at 10:30. The majority of the time I layed awake, thinking about English. This is what I thought about:
Why do I need English? As far as I can tell and know, Computer Science, which is what I will be majoring in (99% certainty about that), requires very little English. Aside from simple progress reports and similar items, I do not see very much written language being transferred. I plan on writing code, not writing the dialog for user interfaces. Why am I forced into learning about adjective clauses, adverb clauses, and everything else I care nothing about? These things are not going to be very important in progress reports. I do not think supervisors worry too much about whether or not your sentences have literary merit. Sure, you have to know how to make sense when you write, but I do believe that this technique was learned in elementary.
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October 2,
2002 |
This is my first update in a very long time. I am just getting the basic outline for my thoughts down so I can expand upon them at a later date.
To me, C++ is wonderful. The syntax is extremely easy to understand, the language is easy to learn, and it is just a really organized language. Heh, I would much rather code in C/C++ than the simplistic TI-BASIC for calculator programming. Luckily this wish comes true thanks to a nice program that compiles C code for the TI-89 and TI-92 Plus (not sure about the regular TI-92). Do not remember the link right now, so I will post that later.
The majority of the counselors I have had during my years in school, all of the ones in Texas (the ones in New Mexico were good), have been complete idiots.
I apologize if I am boasting, but at Peet Junior High the counselors made the mistake of putting me in Pre-Algebra in 7th grade. This has since come back to anger and frustrate me as I easily breeze through my math classes without even trying. The counselors at Peet had no real reason to put me in the class that they did; assuming that because I was not from Conroe I would be uneducated, the junior high counselors wrongly placed me. Unfortunately, I did not resist this decision, and I did not take Geometry and Algebra II both in my freshman year in an effort to challenge myself. This was my mistake.
Similar to the counselors at Peet, my counselor at Conroe High School, Mrs. Lane, knows nothing. It is difficult to organize all of my thoughts regarding this lady, so I may get sidetracked as I start explaining. The first example that comes to mind is something I said last year when we received course selection books. Upset with the lack of courses I find important, I asked her if there was any way to suggest new courses. Surprised that someone thought Conroe lacked variety, she said courses had to have strong support, and if they did not have support or interest, then they could not exist. Well, the classes I was thinking of have much support. For instance, Computer Science. Sure, the Academy has a CS course, but CHS needs a class that is open to all students. Also, Japanese. I wanted to laugh at her when she did not think this would have enough support from the student body. No offense to German, but I belive Japanese would have more support and generate more interest than Deutsch. Heh, just look at all the anime fans and videogame fans out there. Those people alone warrant the need for the language. Surprise in my wanting of new classes lowered my confidence in her. Adding to this is the fact that she believed I was confused in my math classes this year. At the beginning of the year I was taking PreCal and College Algebra at the same time. My teachers were worried that I may be like previous students and end up confused, which I do not think I would have, so they asked Mrs. Lane to change my schedule. At the same time my mom was in the process of trying to get my schedule to include Computer Science, and when she finally got hold of the counselor, the counselor told my mom that I was having difficulties in the math courses. Confusing and screwing up something like this lowers my bar of expectation for that women. However, there is one more thing that I must address regarding her. Much to my dismay, I did not end up in Computer Science. This results from her claiming it was impossible for me to fit the course into my schedule. Accepting this with much skepticism, I did not argue. However, after a brief flow of thought last night, I wish I had of put more time in figuring out a new schedule for you see, last night I realized how I could have taken Computer Science.
1.Physics
2.Computer Science
3.US History AP
4.PreCal
5.English III AP
6.German III
7.College Algebra
Finding out this schedule that could have been mine has eliminated all respect that may have been left for this counselor.
These are not my only thoughts. Lately I have been writing down some of my ideas in a small notebook. Some of these thoughts I don't really feel comfortable with putting on the site right now, but check back later and maybe some new stuff will be up. Oh yeah, one last thing, I would like to know the programming assignments for the Computer Science course. Sure, I am not taking it, but I would still like to expand my knowledge and practice what I know. About a week or two ago you received a sheet with three assignments on it; I believe I remembered the first one, accept input from a user and display the closest Fibonacci number to it without going over, well, if that is it, then I have done it. Took about thirty minutes to do (just had to think of a way to refresh the variables), and the source is listed below if you want it. The code I made is a kind of debug type thing, I was not getting the Fibonacci numbers right at first, so I added a short thing of code to display the numbers as they go through the loop. Later.
#include <iostream.h>
#include <math.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
int number;
cout << "Enter a number:";
cin >> number;
number = abs(number);
int fibonacci=1;
int fibonacciprev=0;
while(fibonacci <= number)
{
int fibonaccinext;
fibonaccinext= fibonacci + fibonacciprev;
fibonacciprev= fibonacci;
cout << fibonacci << endl;
cout << fibonacciprev << endl;
fibonacci=fibonaccinext;
}
cout << "\n" << number << endl;
cout << "\n" << fibonacciprev << endl;
return 0;
}
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