My aunt told me she had been to lots of shows of artists I would have paid obscene amounts of money to see. I asked her if she had ever seen Jimi Hendrix, to which she replied “I think I might have, I can’t remember…” If I had seen Jimi Hendrix I feel pretty confident I would have remembered it, but on the off chance that shows seen are the type of thing you forget as you get older, I decided to make this page. In the future I will add dates that I saw these performers, but for now I’m just going to put down everything I remember going to, in semi chronological order.

You can see the page here.

A while ago I built an aluminum kiln. Just yesterday I got the chance to fire it up again and melt some aluminum pans I had saved up. Here are the videos from that.

On Sunday I was unbelievably lucky enough to find a queen ant just wandering around my house.  I say lucky because queens are not possible to buy (or, at least, they can’t cross state lines).  So, if you don’t buy one then you have to catch them in one of two ways.  First, you could carefully dig up an established ant hill until you find the queen. Second, you can wait until it is spring time, when the queens are relocating. They relocate by flying in a swarm of drone ants to a new location… very difficult to catch.

Seizing the opportunity I now had, I immediately knew I must build an ant farm worthy of a queen.  So, that’s exactly what I did!  It’s 24 inches wide by 18 inches tall.  Made with plexiglass so it will be strong.  I’ve included pictures of the farm under construction and of the queen herself (next to her lightning hug dinner, which she didn’t care for).  I got wide lumber and my room mate Jay and I (but mostly Jay) used a table saw to cut grooves for the plexiglass to sit in.  Then, with the help of my other room mate, Justin, we hammered the whole thing together, taking extra care to be sure the grooves in the wall and the floor lined up.  Then we sealed the plexiglass in with gorilla glue.

Next, came pouring in the sand and getting the queen in her new home! She has a capfull of water to drink from, which Justin delicately placed in the farm with a coat hanger.  She is in the farm now, though she seems pretty dormant. We put another lightning bug and a moth in there for her to eat, but she seems very disinterested.  Lane put some sugar in the farm, which she is evidently taking to.  I really need to find some drones now.  Evidently she isn’t pregnant,because she still has her wings.  Unfortunately I’m not sure where to find drones, and especially not sure where to find ones she will mate successfuly with.

Check out the pictures! I will post updates!

My decision to go to graduate school stemmed from a desire to do research and change the world. Upon entering graduate school, however, I realized the difference between undergraduate and graduate school is just as much a leap as from high school to college. This being the case, “research and changing the world” seemed a goal farther out of reach than I expected. The biggest blockade to this goal is a trait about myself that has always been there, but I never knew: I am a bit of a perfectionist.

Sadly, to me, perfectionism is a trait that does not fly in graduate school. Perfectionism takes time, and as a grad student you have none. What must be done instead is output. Output as much as possible, as quick as possible. Do a lot of “pretty good” work rather than just a little “excellent” work.

Working until midnight every night was pretty common this semester. Though a friend of mine, Lane, often had time to go to the gym and take time for himself on Saturdays. His GPA was a little better than mine as an undergrad, and yet he had time off…what was he doing? Then I remembered: when we worked on group projects together it would drive me nuts that he would turn in work that was not done right, or only halfway done. He had no problems turning stuff in that was “sort of on target.”

What was going on here? He was doing things improperly, yet still receiving credit for them… If they are wrong shouldn’t it be negative credit? No. I didn’t realize up until the middle of the semester that that is not how things work. As a graduate student I was able to get a job grading papers for a Discrete Math class. Grading these papers it was clear some people didn’t know what they were talking about when answering a question, but would still put down something, anything at all. As a grader, I felt obligated to give a point or two (on 20 point questions) where an attempt was made. Sometimes they would even get something right and I’d end up giving them even more points.

However, whoever saw my Discrete Math test and found a question I didn’t know how to answer would’ve just seen a blank page. As a (yet unknown to myself) perfectionist, I would have put nothing instead of a “semi right” answer, or guess. The same would go for homework and projects as well. I would spend so much time getting something perfect, that I’d end up not doing a lot of the assignment.

After seeing these kids who would guess at questions gain a few points that would ultimately lead to a letter grade difference, I realized I had the wrong strategy. Taking notes on what Lane was doing, I began “de-perfectionizing” my work. My grades improved and the stress of getting all my assignments done relaxed a little.

Unfortunately, the relaxing of this stress led to another: worry about how my work would be received. When my work was, in my eyes, perfect I knew I would do well. However, I have no feeling for what grades I will get when I don’t view things as perfect. Therefore, there was a constant worry I was going to get horrendous grades. Luckily, this never happened though!

I’ve finally recognized that one of my favorite things is to see an idea from conception through to perfect completion. Whether its a sand castle, legos, a mathematical proof, clothes, furniture, or a program, I love doing things “just right.” In scenarios where output is key though, I’ve finally begun to develop an ability to flood with decent products. Thankfully Lane was there to learn from! While I’m not totally satisfied with my grades (I didn’t get a 4.0, which the perfectionist in me requires), they were better than they would’ve been had I not realized to relax, and just output as much as possible.

I do think perfectionism is a valuable trait to have though, at times. I will still continue to practice it in my free time, and in fact I am right now. I’m building a website which I hope to have an alpha version of ready for spring semester, which will also be the topic of an upcoming blog post.

The NC State Library lends really nice digital cameras, namely, the Olympus E620. Though there was a three month waiting list, I finally got one. I took a lot of photos and chose some of the best ones to post here. I also submitted them to Windhover, “NC State’s Literary and Visual Magazine.” We’ll see if they make it!