6/5/2002:

I'm not even exaggerating about the state of our answering machine. I never get phone calls on the apartment line. I think it's because I do much more communicating via email or cell phone. We had a backlog of 25 messages on the machine and 24 of them were for Sil. But no, I'm not bitter. Well, about the phone.

Yeah, I'm taking up the mouse again to deliver a strip to you loyal readers. Sorry for the wait. Like I said, it was a really busy weekend. I was working on something or another from Saturday until the quite wee hours of Wed morning. Since then, things have backed off a little, but I still have two projects to finish before I'm a Northwestern graduate. That, and a couple hours of listening to Kofi Annan at the ceremony.

So, you might ask, what is up, Kip? And that would be a good question. Spirits are up, because I had a really nice date Wednesday night. Some spirits are down, because I couldn't sublet the place I'm living in next year for the summer. So, I have to move twice. I hate moving so much. I want to freeze dry everything so I can just move everything in a box or two, but I don't think my electronics would appreciate (or really be affected) by such a process. At least I found a sublet for cheap, so the spirits are confused as to which direction they should be heading. I think the date pushes them upwards no matter what. And no, no more date details.

Monday was my last improv performance as a current Titanic Player and not an alum or whatever we decide to call ourselves post graduation. It was the last time I'll perform with a few people, and while it wasn't a totally tearful affair, I'm not sure if it was the note I wanted to go out on. It's over and done with now. Mark and I were talking on the way to the wrap party about how different our lives would have been if we hadn't done this scene together during callbacks, freshman year. I was sucking it up at the callbacks, but the scene with Mark evidently clinched us both for the team. In a nice bit of cyclical college life, at the party the team I coached begged for audition anecdotes, like how I picked them and if they were all first choices, etc etc. I guess I'd feel more terminal if I weren't going to be coaching my team next year. They gave me a card. Aren't they sweet?

Tuesday morning was spent finishing up a paper for design class. We sketched out a system that would replace Congress with an intelligent collaborative filter, a la Tivo or Amazon. Instead of voting for people, you would vote for issues. There's a lot more to it than that (6 pages worth), but it also takes into account unspoken user input. For example, if people spend more time at museums, it will assume that museum attendance is valued and increase the national budget for museums. Tuesday night was spent in the office finishing up my multimedia project. I was going to work in the lab, but I realized that in the office I could eat and take off my shoes and yell and not disturb anyone else. You can see the fruits of my multimedia labor here. It's very light on content, but has Flash and Director stuff, so it's all good.

I got myself a PS2 game as a reward for being 1/2 done with my classes (and making it hard for me to finish the other half). It's called Way of the Samurai and it's a ronin simulator. You walk around this town and interact with people, stopping from time to time to slice up people standing in your way, or people oppressing the weak, or the weak (if you want to oppress them). The storyline has several branches and so I've done a lot of varied things. The combat is a lot like Bushido Blade, except without stance changes. However, there is the push/pull feature, which rocks. You can push or pull people off balance when the swords clash. It reminds me of my dad teaching me basic kung fu exercises and pushing and pulling my arms all over the place. I'm pretty sure I could wax him at this game, though.

Alright, back to being a samurai!

kip