HCI TA Rant

Upon turning in my HCI final to the TA today at the very last minute, I overhead him saying "I'm sure the students who turned in their finals earlier are smarter than the ones I just collected finals from."

What??! Admittingly, students who are better prepared for their final might be able to cruise through and finish early, but that doesn't mean they're "smarter". Although the definition of "smart" is very multi-faceted, this was undeniably upsetting to hear, especially from the mouth of someone who will be grading my exam. Ridiculous.

Good Morning w/ Angry Lillian

Happy morning everyone! Being cheerful as always, I'm going to start off my day by ditching my 8am class that I painfully woke up and am actually on campus for. Justifications I'm giving myself to make myself feel better: lots of shit to get done that I failed to get done over the weekend, had to drop the kids off which made me 15 minutes late, and I can just read the lecture power point notes. Now I'm at Starbucks enjoying this nice cold lemonade 1/2 black 1/2 green tea that I was introduced to yesterday at yet another Starbucks (y u everywhere) on this lovely gloomy and rainy day. 

In order vent off some morning anger I had after encountering two of my biggest pet peeves upon sitting down for barely 5 minutes, I'm going to write about it:

Dear girl sitting in front of me,

Your back is to me and I can see everything you are doing on your laptop. Not only have you been endless scrolling down your tumblr homepage and not studying (which I am very much guilty of 90% of the time I'm in coffeeshops.. the not studying, not the tumblring), but you are also listening to your f*cking electronic music OUT LOUD with NO EARPHONES. Seriously? There are people studying & doing work all around you (she's sitting smack dab in the middle of the mass of tables) and even though you very respectfully turned down your music at a low volume, my shitty ears can still hear you, which probably means that the grad student studying 2 tables away from me can definitely hear you. Thank goodness I have my iPod with me today, otherwise I'd have to go through the unpleasant experience of deciding whether or not to get up out of my chair to ask you to turn it off.

Dear girl sitting two tables to the left of the girl sitting in front of me,
I know you love your iPhone 4s and the person you're facetiming with on it (again, with NO EARPHONES), but you have got to STOP. Yes, you're very cute with your korean accent and all, but I've heard enough "an nyoung"s to last me a lifetime. What are you doing, talking to 10 different people? 


Okay enough people watching/hating for today.


Have a great day!
- Lils


Update: 
Fuck, I just said "bless you" to the first girl when she sneezed. So much for me trying to be a bitch.

Clubbing vs. Indiana Jones

This last Thursday, I went to a Lunar New Year clubbing event* and I couldn't help but compare clubbing to what Indiana Jones had to go through in his movies. The thought hit me as I attempted to maneuver through the fire-hazardous over-packed venue of a gazillion Asians (not exaggerating), 3 white men (none of whom even came close to Harrison Ford), and 1 suited up Indian (who told me he thought UCI girls were the most beautiful.. yea ok nice try). For those of you who don't know who Indiana Jones is, you've been missing out on this piece of hunk:

For those of you who haven't gone clubbing before, let me break down the experience for you:


Having to squeeze past couples having the sexytime right then and there:
Having to wait for the opportune moment when the guy/girl swings a certain way, opening a passageway for me to jump through, reminded me of all the times Indy has to jump through and avoid shit (I'm not even going to try to pinpoint the thousand times he has to do it in his movies). Although it's not as bad as running away from a giant boulder, it's still pretty annoying especially if your jump was ill-timed and you get stuck in a 2 second threesome and then having to apologize to the guy for your unintentional cock-blocking..

Being asked (aka bothered) to do da dancing:
It's one of the most annoying things to me when I'm just having fun with my girls, and then suddenly, a hot (the temperature definition) and sweaty body pressed against my back and  a pair of man-hands on my hips appears. And when the arrogant "I'm doing you a favor by letting you dance with me" gorilla of a douchebag came along, I felt like Willie when she gets captured by the bad guys in the "Temple of Doom". Even though my situation didn't involved my heart almost getting ripped out by some crazy priest with red hair, it's still irritating. I know, it's not fair for me to complain about this when I'm at a straight club and guyz jez lookin' fo sum a$$ ok?!, but no me gustas regardless.


Getting pushed and suffocated by the never-ending lines of girls linked together holding hands:
Okay, I'm not sure if this was a specific scene in Indiana Jones, but this reminded me of all the giant snakes, thick vines, and other lengthy ropey impeding objects that appeared in the movies. You'd think the line of bodies would end, but nope! out pops another girl and then another one and then another one.. I admit, I'm guilty of this as well, but at least I apologize to everyone I accidentally push or step on during my journey across the dance floor.


Getting splashed in the face by the sweat of the person next to you (or you can lie to yourself and think that it came from the AC system above):
Although I'm not sure how Indiana Jones has to do with it besides the fact that he gets pretty damn sweaty in his movies, it's all too disgustingly true..


Being offered drinks by complete strangers:
It always baffles me when girls just blindly accept drinks from randos; I mean come on, we're at a club, people, so don't get pissed shit goes down. Just like we all learned back in middle school, "If it's wet and it's not yours, don't touch it." (Indy reference: when he used his ninja instincts to pick out the Holy Grail in the "Last Crusade")


After typing this post, I now have a very strong desire to stick to gay clubbing from now on and to re-watch Indiana Jones beast m0de for 6 hours straight. For those who have yet to pop their clubbing cherries (got that from Ashlie Chean lol), I hope you gained some knowledge from this, and if you feel some pre-clubbing training is necessary, you're welcome to join me in my Indy marathon :)


Until next time,
Lils


*I find it amazing how promoters are able to take century-old traditional festivities and compact it into some spiel about "Girls dress sexy in red, and Guys prepare your dragons" or something like that. (that was my first and last attempt at marketing, I promise)

My Tribute To KOST 103.5

My radio default dialbuttonthings are set to these stations (in order) KOST 103.5, KROQ 104.3, KYSR 98.7, HERP 97.1, and DERP 102.7. 830am this morning on my way to school, I turned on my radio today to listen to the resonating and soothing voices of Mark and Kristen, respectively, on 103.5, and to my greatest dismay.. I hear this instead:

I don’t give a fuck when I’m in the club sippin’ above really drunk and I see a fat booty. Gotta have it, Imma grab it, it’s a habit, automatic, like Uzi. Who’s he with the sick flow, make a chick go crazy and flash them ta-tas. Redfoo, the dude, a true party rockaaahhh. - "Sorry for Party Rocking" by LMFAO

LMFAO.. grammar r non-existe.. words are what i don't even.. non-sequitors.. and what/who the hell is a Redfoo. 


Although I get chastised for listening to mom music all the time, it is even sadder to me when little kids go into Lollicup and they're able to sing along to Afrojack and even worse, when my 8th grader family friend doesn't even recognize the tune to "Stayin' Alive".. I mean, come on.


In any case, I am eternally grateful for radio channels like KOST 103.5 for providing Southern California ranging from timeless artists such as Frank Sinatra, Air Supply, BeeJees, Chicago, and Blondie to the modern (and not so timeless) artists. Thank you for keeping them timeless throughout the years and throughout the ever evolving (unfortunately, not for the better) styles of music. 


Until next time,
Disgruntled radio listener

Nosmo King & Friends

So apparently, all UC campuses will be banning smoking from their campuses over the next two years. [Read article here]

Even though I don’t smoke, can’t stand the smell, etc etc., I find this policy to be pretty ridiculous and unnecessary. The primary impetus is to “reduce people’s exposure to secondhand smoke [and for it to be] an overall reduction in smoking among those who work or study on the campuses”. BS, it’s not like the innocent doe-eyed freshmen are clueless and unexposed to smoking prior to entering college. They’re going to do what they want and choose what they choose regardless of this policy. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not an advocate for smoking or any other activity that could seriously harm one’s health (I don’t even drink soda for goodness sakes); however, I do find this policy to be pretty useless and can foresee a lot more on-campus debates/protests that to me, is not only disruptive to the flow of a school campus, but also an unnecessary battle.

I can say that I’ve stayed relatively strong in the face of peer pressure, even when my closest friends mysteriously started getting more hyperactive at birthday parties (drinking alcohol WHAT, smoking weed WHAT). I admit, I didn’t handle it well at all. In fact, I played the part of the responsible church-going (the good ones, not the fake ones who say they love their religion, and proceed to get high and do sexy times over the weekend) mama bear and scolded them and yes, judged them. However, as those activities became the norm as high school came to an end and we all entered college, people began to actuallyfeel sorry for me that I don’t drink or partake in any of the cool kid activities. Okay, I don’t want to be the dbag who brags about how I am capable of having fun, clubbing, etc. without drinking, because I am almost 99% sure that everybody can have fun to some extent while being completely sober. However, once that person opens their mouth and asks me “but awwww, why not??” I’m sorry but no, I don’t need your sympathy because I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything in life by not ohhh, taking that sip, or yea, taking that drag (did I even use that in the correct context..). Or comes the “I don’t bereev you.” What does that even mean, that I look like someone who would smoke/drink? That I look like I party? Or that I seem like someone who would lie about that to save face? What, how, implications of these assumptions, I don’t understand. And them comes the “OH i know, you’re not 21 right?” No.

I do what I choose to do because I know what makes me happy and I know what I need. My decision to drink before/after I’m 21 will only waver if I ever feel the urge to drink (or in the more likely case, for professional reasons), and not because of mere legality issues (however, never underestimate Irvine PD, cuz they bada$s). It was immature of me to judge my friends in the past because in the end, they were doing what I was doing: choosing for themselves. That is why I think this policy will only be useful in that it will rid the campuses of second-hand smoking (a huge plus in my book, but not too significant of a problem on UCI’s campus), but unfortunately won’t play a factor in a student’s choice to or not to smoke.

Until next time,
Lils