Update: And yet here are some more cases! Perhaps I’ll just make this a running list. Anyway, in the latest news: 180,000 people had their personal data stolen from Polo Ralph Lauren and GM Mastercards.

Also added info on data theft from DSW Shoe Warehouse in March that I didn’t originally notice. 100,000 people affected in that incident.

People Affected So Far In 2005: 1,297,000 (more…)

I really should update the design of my website to less dreary colors. It’s kind of depressing… almost as if this page is in constant mourning or something. I’ll file that plan away when I have some more free time.

Anyway, as is becoming a Tuesday tradition, I missed my Petrology class again! Oh yes. What was the excuse this time? More faulty alarm clocks? Earthquakes? Fires? Famine? Power outages or a herd of angry buffalo? Nope. I woke up at 7 AM, thought to myself, “Hmm, I think I’m going to take the day off!” Yawned and went back to sleep. Wonderful! Probably not the smartest idea in the world however. Ugh. (more…)

Well my “academic weather forecast” for the next week or so calls for calm weather. All my pertinent assignments are turned in, presentations given and field trips carried out. I have a small quiz tomorrow evening in volcanology, but I’m not too worried about that (though I should be, the last test was a bear! Still managed to pull off a “B” though).

So to celebrate, I missed my petrology class today. Oh yes! What actually happened is that my alarm clock is a rancid piece of trash. For some odd reason, the snooze button doesn’t work anymore. However, I’m not going to let a wimpy little thing like the snooze button stop me from snoozing for another 15 minutes! So I’ve taken to just manually resetting the alarm clock forward 15 minutes and going back to sleep. That is dedication for you.

However, today I evidentially set my CLOCK forward 15 minutes and not my alarm clock. Unaware I did that, I went back to sleep (where I had some horrible dream about my teeth falling out). When I finally woke up, I thought “that was a REFRESHING 15 minutes of sleep! Wait… something must be wrong.” I look at the clock to see that it is now 10:05! (In actuality, it’s 9:50). Regardless, my class started at 8AM. So much for going to that.

Field Trip
This past weekend, our Quaternary Geology class had a field trip to Pyramid Lake, located in western Nevada. It probably ranks as one of the best geology trips that I have ever been on. A large class (especially for an upper division class in our program: 21 people), but everyone was just completely awesome.

In terms of stuff to see and work to do, it wasn’t bad at all. And all of it was definitely interesting, as we looked at deposits relating to an ancient lake called Lake Lahontan. Check out the photo gallery from the trip.

Also, I filmed an interesting video of us throwing a lighter into the fire. Oh yes. Probably not the smartest thing to do at 1 in the morning. Regardless, check out some looney college students. The video is a 7mb AVI file. Blowing Up Lighters

Until next time.

Spring Break is almost officially over. It’s definitely been nice to basically laze around for the past few days and be completely unproductive. That said, I still have two papers to work on that are due Wednesday, neither of which I have really started yet. Looks like that is what I’ll be dedicating today and tomorrow for!

Anyway, I flew home to my parent’s house for a few days in Southern California on Saturday and had the distinct pleasure of missing my plane! Totally my fault, since I misjudged the amount of time it’d take to BART across the bay. The person behind the counter told me I’d be put on a standby waiting list, but that all the flights for the rest of the evening were sold out! Luckily, the next plane had space (perhaps those people ran late as well?) and I was able to fly home an hour later.

I got to hang out with the gang every night I was down, so that was awesome to see them again. Of course this is the only time I’ll be able to go home this whole semester, so it’s kind of depressing that I didn’t get to spend more time there. It was definitely an awesome time of year. The orange groves are blossoming (at least what’s left of them before they’re torn down to make way for houses), tons of monarch butterflies are doing their migration as well, which was awesome to see. Just a bunch of awesome sights and smells.

I flew back up here on Tuesday and have been fairly lazy since then. We decided to hold a birthday-for-roommate/end-of-spring-break party at the place last night which was a wild success. David and Michelle came, as well as some of our friends from Southern California who were visiting. I’ll have to post some pictures later.

This past week hasn’t completely been a loss though! I applied for this internship yesterday, however it’s going to be quite competitive since there is only one spot open.

Anyway, time to start writing papers!

One more midterm to go! Got to school at 9am this morning… just got home! Oh yes. 15 hours today. Ugh. Might as well go to bed… last exam in roughly 7 and a half hours.

(Also, since a few people were curious… here is the banned page, as was described in an earlier post.)

So I’m leaving school today and walking up the platform to catch a train home. A little old lady is in front of me running up the platform. I notice that her backpack is open, so I jog up and catch her to inform her about this. As she pulls it off her back to close it, she drops a sweater and folder. Then she exclaims “OH MAN!!! I HAVE TO GET TO WORK!!!!” all while she’s trying to close her backpack (and having a bit of trouble). And then she starts wailing! “OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! OHHHH NO. OHHHHHHHHH!” Then she picks up her stuff, gets on the train and continues to wail. And wail. And wail for the entire ride home!

Oh man! I’m sorry to have brought bad news to her life. 🙁 Good grief, just by the mere act of me talking to people, I can make them cry. That makes me feel great. 😛

I encounter the craziest people on these trains. Last year, another little old lady sat next to me on the ride to school and proceeded to tell me her life story… despite me having headphones on! And then she mentioned her boyfriend Jason. Then she would ask me “Oh! Did I tell you about my boyfriend Jason?? He is great!” Then a few moments later, “You know my boyfriend Jason? He’s great!” And then she proceeded to ask me again if she told me about her boyfriend!

So cook some popcorn and pull up a chair, and I’ll tell you about how I discovered a roommate’s obsession with downloading PORN!

Beware, this post contains massive quantities of computer sleuthing/nerdiness and might be boring to your average reader… (more…)

A project that I’ve been wanting to get off the ground for quite awhile is coming to fruition! A site strictly dedicated to geology news! Check it out. 🙂

I’ve written about this before, but it’s really sad that two people who were awesome friends at one point in history probably won’t ever speak to each other again. It’s even worse when the friendship ended for rather dubiously weak reasons.

Anyway, for some odd reason, I had an urge to try to start our friendship over again. Perhaps it’s because she’s been on my mind lately. Or how random things associated with her seem to keep coincidentially popping up. Or her best friend sending me an email that said she “missed having me around.”

After exchanging a few emails dealing with random science stuff, I asked her if she’d like to get together for lunch one day, just to talk, when I’m home for spring break. The response I received flat out rejected that idea, or even the idea of friendship. So much for trying to be mature and extend an olive branch. That makes one feel like crap. The tone of this email (as well as the initial email that set things in motion a year ago, or rather, killed them) and its negative message make it seem as if I did something to wrong her. Why is there so much animosity there? For no apparent reason too.

Regardless, the email this evening stated that “I am being direct and honest when I say that I have moved on in life.” Moved on from what exactly? Not to mention a recent email reply that said, “I’ve been thinking about you lately.” It just seems rather curious to claim to have moved on and want nothing to do with someone when still interested about the events going on in their life (i.e., consistently checking their webpage roughly once a week… according to site access logs). Because “moving on” somehow involves knowing what’s going on in my life. Whatever.

So however petty it may seem, I’ve decided to ban that IP address from this website. I think it’s better for both of us. Though I have no illusions that the ban is fairly easy to circumvent if one is dedicated enough, but it is peace of mind for me. And it helps her to actually move on. Of course it probably makes me look like a petty asshole, but I no longer care what her opinion of me is anymore. What’s the point?

After thinking about it for quite awhile tonight, I feel better though. I basically got the (final) answer I needed, and I guess I can move on myself, rather than still clinging to some false hope of trying to be on friendly terms again. It also solidifies my feelings and opinion of her, in an unfortunately negative way. Perhaps that makes it easier to forget someone. Perhaps that explains the animosity of her previous letters.

It looks like I did well in the student research competition. I just found out today that I won in my category (Mathematical and Physical Sciences) and will be going to the statewide competition in Sacramento at the end of April! Yeah!!