tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-298726602024-03-07T20:03:18.082-08:00This statement is false.The musings of a certain individual.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.comBlogger137125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-78211834441078721092008-01-01T22:46:00.000-08:002008-01-01T22:52:37.426-08:002008!Happy New Year everyone!<br /><br />Well, it looks like I've really been neglecting this blog of mine - no posts for a couple of months now. I guess there's a couple reasons: for starters, school, and all my other commitments. Even during winter break, I have a ton of stuff to do: scholarships for the most part, and I haven't had much free time.<br /><br />Also, I got one of them Facebook doohickeys that them kids use nowadays (view it in all of its web 2.0-y glory at http://hs.facebook.com/profile.php?id=570501827 - feel free to add me as a friend if you so desire but type in "dasooopnazi.blogspot.com" in the message field so I know you're not jsut some random Facebook stalker), and since Facebook is more oriented toward my boring day-to-day life, I don't really need the blog for it anymore, not that I used it for that much anyway. From now on, I'll for the most part be posting on this blog about my random projects and creations, not so much about my personal life, which is what my Facebook is for. It's good to be organized.<br /><br />But none of these is the main reason why I haven't been posting. Frankly, I completely forgot about this blog I've got here. Sorry guys, and my 2 or 3 readers can expect some more posts in the near future.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-88671767915823070252007-10-21T17:31:00.000-07:002007-10-21T17:36:28.488-07:00Oak Park Seemingly Incurs the Wrath of a Higher PowerStrong winds knocked out our DSL last night; I'm typing this through great struggle on a dial-up connection. And I was planning on typing a long post today, about the past month. Seriously! I was! Well, it'll have to wait for another day ...<br /><br />Oh, and Oak Park is flanked by several fires. Crossing my fingers that school will be cancelled tomorrow ... ;)Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-50263925967873292702007-09-29T21:00:00.000-07:002007-09-30T19:28:44.842-07:00Dinosaur Pilot Album Finished!This week has been quite busy, as <a href="http://www.myspace.com/dinosaurpilot">Dinosaur Pilot</a>, my friend AP's band, was finishing recording their first album, entitled <em>Pants on Fire</em>. Being a thoroughly kind-hearted individual, I volunteered to design their album cover, which I've been working on intermittently this past month or so. However, the recording was completed a couple weeks ahead of schedule, and I had to rush to finish the cover by the time mixing was completed. Nevertheless, I think the result is pre-tty good (credit for the crazy lettering work goes to Mike, the drummer):<br /><br /><img src="http://www.nisnevich.com/alex/misc/Dinosaur Pilot Front Cover.jpg"><br /><br />Oh, and the equally amazing back cover:<br /><br /><img src="http://www.nisnevich.com/alex/misc/Dinosaur Pilot Back Cover.jpg"><br /><br />Well, enough about my amazing graphic design work, you say. How is the band itself? Well, <a href="http://www.myspace.com/dinosaurpilot">listen for yourself</a>. I don't expect the album to top the Alternative charts, but they're not half bad. I'm not a fan of the genre, and I still like the majority of their songs. <br /><br />Bear in mind though that some of their best songs aren't available for listening - you'll have to buy the CD. The discs are still being packaged and the price isn't set yet, but if you want to purchase, just shoot an email to Adam Paul (adamxpaul [at] gmail.com) and say that Alex referred you. You'll get your copy autographed for free and hopefully I'll make a phat commission.<br /><br />There's no preposition I'd end a sentence with. :PAlexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-52663601606762312722007-08-29T20:46:00.000-07:002007-09-29T21:37:20.398-07:00First Day of SchoolToday was the first day of school, and summer has officially ended. First impressions of my classes:<br /><br /><strong>Per. 1 AP Chemistry</strong><br /><br />We were all very surprised to hear Mr. N's description of the class today. I knew that it wouldn't be as hard as Biology was last year, in part because it doesn't rely on memorization, but it turns out to be even easier than I thought it would be, definitely one of the easiest APs in the school. The only drawback is that, while almost everyone gets an A in the class, the AP test pass rate isn't the highest - I suppose I'll have to do some independent studying before the AP exam. Well at any rate, the class should be pretty fun and Mr. N seems to be a good teacher, so I'm happy with AP Chem.<br /><br /><strong>Per. 2 Guitar</strong><br /><br />I still can't believe I get to take Guitar as a class!! :D Mr. O is a big fan of Joe Satriani and classic rock, so this should be quite fun. Hopefully my guitar playing will be a bit less sloppy by the end of the year. :P<br /><br /><strong>Per. 3 Spanish III</strong><br /><br />Can't give any impressions at the moment, as Mrs. F wasn't here today. At any rate, there is no way that I would ever enjoy a Spanish class (still wishing I could take Esperanto instead :P), and Mrs. F seems to have a bad reputation. Pity.<br /><br /><strong>Per. 4 AP English III (Language/Composition)</strong><br /><br />English was never a particularly strong subject for me, but hopefully I'll survive this class. Mrs. S is a little bit scary: we must use a specific pen in her classroom (Pilot P-700 to be precise), and we have a whole list of things that we aren't allowed to do because they distract her (including getting up to get a tissue and using a holepunch).<br /><br /><strong>Per. 5 Computer Animation</strong><br /><br />Like Guitar, Computer Animation should be a pretty fun elective. Past students say that it's a piece of cake, and most of the time is spent playing games. And I'm earning VPA credit for this, hurray!<br /><br /><strong>Per. 6 AP U.S. History</strong><br /><br />After taking AP Euro last year, U.S. History shouldn't be too difficult, and Mr. J seems to be a good teacher. The workload is quite high, but not particularly challenging.<br /><br />All in all, my APs aren't as hard as last year's, and after two years of not taking any electives, I'm finally taking a couple. I think it's going to be a fun year. :)Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-12349839546442293602007-08-23T12:21:00.000-07:002007-08-23T12:28:17.172-07:00Summer is Ending :(High school registration yesterday. As though I needed any reminding that summer is about to end. :(<br /><br />On the other hand, this school year promises to be fun. My schedule:<br /><br />1. Chemistry AP<br />2. Guitar<br />3. Spanish III <br />4. AP English III (Language/Composition)<br />5. Computer Animation<br />6. AP US History<br /><br />Fairly easy AP classes, and two electives. Not bad.<br /><br />I actually signed up for seven classes, not six (wanted to take Computer Graphics too) but I didn't like the idea of going to school at 7:30 from the start, and didn't complain when for some reason or other I didn't get the class. :PAlexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-6547341935577454712007-08-14T16:56:00.000-07:002007-08-14T17:01:09.512-07:00Sweden, Photos!I promised photos, and <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/gregnis/SwedenTrip">here they are</a>! 423 of 'em, no less. <br /><br />They're not sorted by day, but knowing that 8/4/07 was Day 1 and allowing a few hours for time zone differences, one should be able to match up photos with blog entries using the date and time conveniently posted in red letters at the bottom of each photo.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-64487816107182537812007-08-14T16:31:00.000-07:002007-08-14T16:55:10.157-07:00Sweden, Days 9-10<strong>Day 9</strong><br />Had a bit of a scare this morning when my camera, with all our photographs from days 5-8, would neither charge nor turn on. Fortunately this problem was fixed by removing the rechargeable battery and putting it back in.<br /><br />I played a game of chess with Ivan. Surprisingly, it remained tied up until the late-midgame, when I accidentaly lost a rook. Ivan remains undefeated, after previous games with my dad and my aunt's uncle (see <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/gregnis/SwedenTrip/photo#5098412259330901538">http://picasaweb.google.com/gregnis/SwedenTrip/photo#5098412259330901538</a> for an analysis of the end-game position of one of these games).<br /><br />Had another picnic this evening, this time with 28 people in total, of whom all but one were my relatives.<br /><br /><strong>Day 10</strong><br /><br />We all woke up at 5:00 in the morning and at 6:00 were on our way to Arlanda Airport in a taxi. After two flights and several humorous incidents with airport security (involving, among other things, yogurt and automatically hibernating laptops) we were back in Oak Park. I miss Sweden.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-16479275623212008432007-08-12T03:52:00.000-07:002007-08-12T07:34:37.808-07:00Sweden, Days 7-8<strong>Day 7</strong><br /><br />We spent just about the whole day on a luxury ship going to and from the autonomous Finnish archipelago of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%85land">Åland</a>, making Finland the fifth European country I've been to (after Belarus, Russia, the United Kingdom, and Sweden). It's a pity that we couldn't stay in Åland longer though - as soon as we reached the main island, Fasta Åland, we were pushed into the ship that took usd back, making the whole journey a little bit pointless in my opinion. Nevertheless, it was an interesting experience, because it was my first time traveling in such a big ship (twelve stories!!)<br /><br /><strong>Day 8</strong><br /><br />Sadly, we are going home in two days, and while Regina and I want to switch places, it wouldn't work because passports are verified against the seating order in planes (why? why??)<br /><br />Today we hiked through a real Swedish forests. Very green, both the vegetation and the water. This evening we had a family reunion picnic, which was nice, although there was very little to do.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-52530033511539711682007-08-09T10:41:00.000-07:002007-08-12T03:52:32.031-07:00Sweden, Days 5-6<strong>Day 5</strong><br /><br />We went to Skansen today, the happiest place on earth! Or it may have been, if a rather heavy rain hadn't interrupted our stay there. Nevertheless, we saw most of the sites of the outdoor museum. Very interesting place indeed.<br /><br />After we got back from Skansen, we took a walk down Queen Street. We got to see the infamous harmonica hobo of Stockholm. I took a video and am editing it for Youtube as we speak.<br /><br />Sweden gets more and more ununsual every day. The tap water here is clean enough to drink, and in fact everyone does. There's so few cars that pedestrians never pay attention to the lights. Clerks at grocery stores do not bag your purchases; you even have to buy the bag yourself!<br /><br /><strong>Day 6</strong><br /><br />We went to the Swedish Royal Palace today, although it certainly seemed more like a museum than a palace. Most of the palace was accessible to the public and some rooms even had museum-like display cases. Nevertheless, it was an interesting trip, even if it didn't seem like anyone would live or work there. Immediately after leaving the palace, we got to see the changing of the guard, for the second time now. This time we saw the whole ceremony, which was quite long and interesting to watch.<br /><br />For most of the rest of the day, I had a walking tour of the "real" Stockholm, complete with stores, cafes, and libraries, with Regina and her friend Elizabeth.<br /><br />I am quite used now to people staring at me when I say that I'd rather stay in Sweden than go back to California.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-14253118623249647262007-08-07T10:06:00.000-07:002007-08-08T08:46:59.710-07:00Sweden, Days 3-4<span style="font-weight: bold;">Day 3</span><br /><br />Today we hiked to Kaknästornet, from which we could see most of the city. Stockholm is really one of the most interesting places I've ever been to, because the city is situated on 14 islands, and different districts are very much different.<br /><br />It was very hot today, as it was yesterday and the day before ... We're experiencing very strange weather here in Sweden, the one week a year when the heat actually matches that of California, the very heat that we tried to escape by going to Sweden. The locals seem to like this change from the usual.<br /><br />In the news: a suicide bomber was caught by police only four metro stations from where we live (it's a unit of measurement :P). Also, a murder took place in the small town where my cousin's friend was chillin'. Violent crime is relatively rare rare, but because of Sweden's small population, when it does happen it feels very close.<br /><br />Most television programs here are in English, with Swedish subtitles, as opposed to most other European countries, where programs have dubbed sound. <br /><br />Public restrooms cost 5 kronen (about $.80) to use, sometimes even for customers in restaurants and cafes. Socialism!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Day 4</span><br /><br />We went to the Stockholm City Hall today (very interesting place, photos on the way!). We wanted to see <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbOaP3M23Oc">this guy</a>, but we couldn't find him anywhere. We'll have to look again tomorrow. We did find <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpcQ0lQvX8o">the Little Dancer</a> though.<br /><br />We didn't have much to do today, I met some of my cousin Regina's friends ... over MSN. Seem like nice people, most of them, others are just weird. The people in Sweden aren't so different from the U.S. of A.<br /><br />Everyone in Sweden seems to be able to speak English, but everyone also has a British accent, due to the education that they receive. It's terrible, it really is. I'm trying to teach my cousins some real English ("yo wazzup home dawg" and so on and so forth) ...<br /><br />Everyone here also seems to be a soccer player, and a very good one too. My brother and cousins never have to look far for a game.<br /><br />My brother is an aspiring songwriter, and I decided to look for a guitar to put his gibberish to music. We managed to find an old acoustic that belonged to my second-aunt's husband, Ivan. The fifth string was snapped, but we managed to patch it together in a primitive knot; it works fine but occasionally gives problems when we attempt to tune it.<br /><br />Well, that's it for now!Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-55854147887229138932007-08-05T09:39:00.000-07:002007-08-05T10:38:37.992-07:00Sweden, Days 1-2 (Two for the price of one! :P)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Day 1</span><br /><br />Flew in to Stockholm this morning, after 36 hours (!!) in transit (had to stay in Newark for ten hours, and time zone difference accounts for the rest). My parents rented a hotel room, but there's not enough room for all of us, so I'm sleeping over at my cousins'. Speaking of which, I just met about a dozen of my aunts, uncles, and cousins for the first time - fun fun fun!<br /><br />First impressions of Stockholm:<br /><br /><ul><br /><li>Very clean place, at least those areas that I saw. People seem friendly.</li><br /><li>It's clean <span style="font-style:italic;">for the most part</span>. The amount of graffiti in this place is unbelievable, even to one who's been to LA and Detroit. Apparently, the government sends people to clean the place up regularly, but the grafitti just comes back again - a lot of money down the drain for the government.</li><br /><li>Car theft also seems to be a serious problem. My relatives have lost count of the attempted thefts of their car.</li><br /><li>Speaking of cars, I've never seen so many small cars in one place! Everything in Sweden seems to be small, from cars to ketchup bottles.</li><br /><li>Public transportation system is amazing. Bus lines, train lines, and metro lines (color coded for your convenience!) are all interconnected. Buy one ticket, and you can use any public transport service you want for a week. Sweet.</li><br /><li>There's a curious mix of old and new technology. Escalators are faster, automatic doors are more sensitive, toilets are more powerful. And yet, my parents' hotel room key is just a punch card. Most elevators I've seen don't have automatic doors, and something that I've never seen in the States.</li><br /></ul><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Day 2</span><br /><br />Went on a long tour of Stockholm today. A picture is worth a thousand words, and I have a ton of pictures to post, not today though.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-48670522153374854602007-08-02T18:58:00.000-07:002007-08-02T19:02:50.608-07:00To Sweden!In just a few minutes, I will be heading to the airport and flying to Sweden, where I'll be vacationing with my family for ten days. I'll make sure to blog about what I see! =)Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-8220935019880198132007-07-24T22:09:00.000-07:002011-05-24T05:42:43.926-07:00TI-89 Long Division ProgramToday I had to find the first 50 digits of 1/95. With all our modern technology, it should be easy to find, right? Unfortunately, the Windows calculator cuts off at 36 digits, and my sophisticated TI-89 cuts off all operations after a measly 16 digits.<br /><br />The solution? I wrote me own long division program:<br /><br /><span style="font-family:courier new;">div(n,x,t)<br />Prgm<br />""->res<br />10->n<br />0->d<br />0->s<br />While t>d<br />iPart(n/x)->q<br />n-x*q->r<br />res&string(q)->res<br />r->n<br />if s=0 and x>n then<br />res&"."->res<br />1->s<br />EndIf<br />d+1->d<br />10*n->n<br />EndWhile<br />EndPrgm</span><br /><br />This program accepts three parameters: <span style="font-family:courier new;">n</span>, <span style="font-family:courier new;">x</span>, and <span style="font-family:courier new;">t</span>. It divides <span style="font-family:courier new;">n</span> by <span style="font-family:courier new;;">x</span> and outputs the first <span style="font-family:courier new;">t</span> digits into the variable <span style="font-family:courier new;">res</span> (for result :P).Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-33999288468625277882007-07-17T21:52:00.000-07:002007-07-20T21:34:56.638-07:00Google = Big Brother<img src="http://nisnevich.com/alex/misc/googlewish_trimmed.png">Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-58717529369603272022007-07-11T22:41:00.000-07:002007-07-11T22:44:07.233-07:00Why I Don't Use MySpaceThis link is for a certain friend of mine, who I hope is reading this:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.jeffwoelker.com/2006/12/13/the-end-of-myspace-your-friends-are-boring/">The End of MySpace</a><br /><br />I would have written a mini-essay myself, but fortunately I found this one, which covers the same points that I would have used in an anti-MySpace debate.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-70821690767856811232007-07-11T22:29:00.000-07:002007-07-11T22:33:56.116-07:00Woo! I can drive!Well ... sort of. I just got a drivers' permit, which, while not yet a license, is still a remarkable accomplishment given my laziness (it took me nearly half a year to finally complete my mandatory 50 hours of driving education).<br /><br />In other news, AP results are in, and I got all 5s (on Euro, Bio, Stats)! =) And I thought I'd get a 4 on Bio for sure...Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-77652295083484176552007-07-08T22:18:00.001-07:002007-07-08T22:37:56.483-07:00Summer...It's funny, I thought that I'd post here a lot more come summer, but in reality there's not much to write about. I'm actually glad that I'm volunteering at the library, because at least it gives me <em>something </em>to do, even if I'm playing more than I'm working there, heh.<br /><br />There's a lot less summer work this year than last year, but I've still barely started. Out of six US History chapters and two English books, I've read ... one History chapter. I'd better pick up the pace, or I'll get stuck with a ridiculous workload in the last week of summer, just like last year ... ahh the memories ...<br /><br />I just saw The Phantom Riders live, a great instrumental band. If you live in Southern California, you should check 'em out - they play in Hollywood often.<br /><br />I haven't done much of my own stuff so far this summer, but I'll post if I make anything new. A new version of Little Fighter 2.5 is certainly possible, as is *but don't take my word for it* an online version of European Chess (once I figure out why Flash keeps crashing on my computer >.<).<br /><br />Finally, some cool links for those of you with some free time:<br />*<a href="http://www.librarything.com/">LibraryThing</a> - Can't believe I haven't heard of this site earlier. Now I no longer have to wonder about what to read next. Kudos to <a href="http://www.librarything.com/profile/adam-paul">AP</a> for telling me about this one!<br />*<a href="http://www.battlemaster.org/">BattleMaster</a> - Best online game ever, period. Or not quite an online game? Frankly, I don't know what it can be classified under, but it's amazing. Just try it and you'll see why.<br />*<a href="http://www.digisonline.com/tactics">Tactics Arena Online</a> and <a href="http://www.slimeathlete.com/show.php?page=index">SlimeAthlete</a> - Where we library volunteers go to pass the time in between Axis and Allies games.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-35628150893759400002007-06-23T18:06:00.000-07:002007-06-23T18:13:15.689-07:00Personal Website Online!After six months of work, I have finally completed <a href="http://nisnevich.com/alex/?p=index">my new personal site</a>.<br /><br /><strong>Features:</strong><br />- Fairly comprehensive <a href="http://nisnevich.com/alex/?p=aboutme">About Me</a> and <a href="http://nisnevich.com/alex/?p=interests">My Interests</a> sections.<br />- A much expanded, much improved <a href="">My Creations</a> section (compared to <a href="http://nisnevich.com/alex/?p=creations">my old personal site</a>).<br />- A fairly active <a href="http://nisnevich.com/alex/forum/">forum</a>.<br />- Even a <a href="#">blog</a>! Heh.<br /><br />Enjoy! =)Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-1824549265812987062007-06-17T21:56:00.000-07:002007-06-17T22:04:36.701-07:00European Chess Update<em>[From the <a href="http://nisnevich.com/alex/forum/viewtopic.php?t=581&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=">Forums</a>]</em><br /><br />Summer has begun, so let me briefly summarize the facts about the <a href="http://dasooopnazi.blogspot.com/2007/02/european-chess.html">European Chess</a> project:<br /><br />- A patent could cost upward of $10,000, although this cost may be reduced if Fienberg's uncle helps us. We still don't know about the necessity of a patent.<br />- We have until February 2008 to file a provisional patent (about $300 I believe), which would extend the patenting deadline by a year, giving us until February 2009 to file a full patent.<br />- We still don't know if a Euro Chess patent would be approved or not, due to its similarity to Chaturanji, which admittedly is a public-domain game.<br />- Peter Olotka, designer of Cosmic Encounter (off of which Euro Chess is partly based), could offer some help, so I'm trying to get in touch with him.<br />- I know nothing about what the commercial possibilities of Euro Chess. Would it sell? I have no idea.<br />- We still have not come up with a good name - I don't like Euro Chess much. A name design competition is a possibility.<br />- I am not sure about the possible legal issues that could arise from the Design Competition.<br />- An online game is a possibility. Do not ask me about it - if I do decide to make one it will be a surprise, but I guarantee nothing.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-55897924345138336442007-06-16T19:39:00.000-07:002007-06-17T22:14:49.926-07:00It's summer!At long last, school is out. I spent the last month struggling to complete various projects (for the most part, the notorious 18-minute long Historical Figure multimedia presentation project that is often cited to scare incoming sophomores), but since this Friday, I've been free ... for the most part ...<br /><br />Summer has been fairly uneventful so far, but I did sign up for volunteer work at my local library (upwards of 80 hours for doing absolutely nothing [literally nothing - some friends are even considering bringing an <a href="http://boardgamegeek.com/game/10093">Axis & Allies</a> board over to the library to pass the time]!! How could I have not thought about this before!?!Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-31937199862547648382007-06-14T21:51:00.000-07:002007-06-19T20:36:07.530-07:00Roger Waters! [A Concert Review]<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7a/Dsotmlive.PNG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px;" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7a/Dsotmlive.PNG" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />I went to a Roger Waters concert at the Hollywood Bowl yesterday night, with my dad, my brother, and some family friends. To sum it up in a word: <em>amazing</em>.<br /><br />We didn't eat dinner before we arrived at Hollywood at 6 (concert started at 7:30), and believe it or not, we had to wander the streets for half an hour before we could find a decent place to eat (so much upscale dining in Hollywood, so little fast food), namely a Subway.<br /><br />We got to the Hollywood Bowl fifteen minutes before the show was scheduled to start, but had to wait for some friends, and finally pushed toward the stadium at around 7:30. The crowd was huge, the biggest I'd ever seen in my life, but my friends estimated it to be between 10,000 and 15,000 people. Anyway, the Bowl was sold out (there were a bunch of people who went all the way to the Bowl without tickets, holding up signs like "Please give me a ticket. I am a fan, not a scalper." And plenty of scalpers too. Not to mention all of the "musicians" and T-shirt sellers standing outside the Bowl. There are a lot of business opportunities available there I suppose ...)<br /><br />We reached the stands at about 8:00, after much pushing and shoving and security (in my backpack I had two identical opaque bottles, one with water, one with iced tea. A guard picked one at random and asked, "What's in it?" "Water?" I guessed. The guard sniffed it: "That's not water..." and looked at me suspiciously. On the other hand, my friends ran past security, and managed to smuggle in, among other things, a camcorder and a digital voice recorder.) At the back of the stage was a large display showing an antique radio that played oldies, while a hand occassionally reached in to change the channel or pour some wine. Roger Waters entered the stage at around 8:15.<br /><br />The first setlist was pretty good, with both its high and its low points. The audience was so excited by <em>In The Flesh</em> that I was a little worried that they might take the song seriously. <em>Mother</em> featured a nice acoustic performance by Roger Waters but I never did like the song that much. I was surprised by the inclusion of <em>Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun</em>, a very old song, but it was played well and the inclusion of a slideshow old photographs in the back was in my opinion a nice touch. <em>Shine On You Crazy Diamond</em> was played well, and the visual transition (climbing out of the heart of the sun of the previous song, with various distorted images of Syd shown) was nice, but in my opinion David Gilmour's group played it better at the Pulse tour - one of the things I noticed about this concert was that Roger tended to keep the experimentation down to a minimum, playing exactly like the album version, while David's Pink Floyd played most songs a little differently, in some cases even better than the album version. <em>Have a Cigar</em> was an amazing song even in the studio, but played live it sounded even better - I was surprised by guitarist Snowy White's capability of playing exactly as David Gilmour had done in the studio, while still adding his own touch. <em>Wish You Were Here</em> had equally good guitar, but in my opinion it was Roger who was the weakest link here, as his vocals for this song seemed subpar, and he was speaking more than singing.<br /><br />It was at this point that the songs began to go downhill. The next two songs were <em>Southampton Dock</em> and <em>The Fletcher Memorial Home</em>, neither of which I ever liked particularly. <em>Perfect Sense</em> was one of Roger's better solo songs, and I liked its inclusion, but I felt that <em>Leaving Beirut</em> was overly segmented, with a very predictable spoken verse - guitar - spoken verse - guitar pattern. Roger finally closed the first half with <em>Sheep</em>, which was a nice touch, as it is one of Pink Floyd's loudest songs, in other words, perfect for closing a concert. And of course, everyone cheered and began taking cell phone photos as the pig flew above the stands (although my Republican friends cringed at the "liberal propaganda") - it's too bad that we forgot to bring a camera, but binoculars did help.<br /><br />Intermission lasted about fifteen minutes, during which a small dot on the back screen slowly grew into a moon, a nice visual touch.<br /><br />I didn't enjoy the second set as much as the first set, for the most part because at this point the smokers seemed to lose interest in the music, something that was only helped by the two repetitive instrumental passages, <em>On the Run</em> and <em>Any Colour You Like</em>. There was a guy right in front of us who was definitely an addict - he couldn't go for more than a minute without putting that thing in his mouth. Still, we weren't the worst off - in the section where some of my friends were sitting, they were literally the only people there who didn't smoke - my friend's brother actually passed out from the fumes. Other than that, though, the Dark Side of the Moon was played admirably well (I won't go into song-by-song analysis because it was played exactly like the album). There were some amazing special effects in the end, with the giant prism and the lasers. Good times.<br /><br />After Roger Waters congratulated us for being a great audience, blah blah blah, the band finally closed with five songs from the Wall. As <em>The Happiest Days of Our Lives </em>came to a close, the whole audience stood up for <em>Another Brick in the Wall</em>, singing along with Roger Waters. Similarly, after <em>Vera</em>, another short passage, the audience chanted <em>Bring the Boys Back Home</em>. personally, I only liked the last encore: Comfortably Numb, which was played very well, particularly the two guitar solos. Snowy White once again showed his talent in emulating David Gilmour!<br /><br />After another twenty minutes of pushing through a crowd, we walked thirty minutes to our parking space through Hollywood at midnight (admittedly not the safest way to travel), and drove home. The End.<br /><br /><strong>Correction:</strong> Dave Kilminster, not Snowy White, played lead guitar. To be fair, Snowy White played well too!Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-48586525148337694922007-05-21T22:06:00.000-07:002007-05-21T22:10:57.658-07:00Community Service for the DonkeyI was <a href="http://lf2.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=51920">just informed</a> that <a href="http://dasooopnazi.blogspot.com/2006/07/phpbb-problem-and-solution.html">a previous post of mine</a> was used to save the <a href="http://lf2.net/forum/">Little Fighter 2 community forum</a>. That's pretty cool =).Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-54204481129474580022007-05-19T22:32:00.000-07:002007-05-19T22:38:59.002-07:00APs are over!No more AP tests! I'm free!! Well ... sorta ...<br /><br />Last week, right after the AP Bio test, I had to work all week on a reflective essay. Next week, I'm going to have to present a group Stats project that we hardly started. And two weeks after that is the Hi-Fi presentation, widely believed to be the most difficult project our high school has to offer: a 15-18 minute multimedia presentation on a historical figure. Emphasis on the <em>15-18 minutes</em>. So in essence, my whole life now is just moving from one project to another.<br /><br />Well, at any rate it's still an improvement?<br /><br />How did the AP tests go? They were OK. Better wait for the grade sheet before I jump to conclusions about how well I did.Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-20604476001470614672007-04-25T16:52:00.000-07:002007-04-25T17:47:18.573-07:00USAMO!Whew - this week has been crazy. And I think we all know why ... it's <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_of_America_Mathematics_Olympiad">USAMO</a> time! Or was ...<br /><br />Fortunately, I was able to talk to Messrs Block and Micek, and negotiated my ability to take the USAMO, but at great cost. The first day I had to take the USAMO in Micek's classroom ... while freshmen were taking the STAR testing. They were loud, to say the least, and I could focus only with great difficulty, at least until 12:20 (3:20 ET - that is, 1:40 before time was up) when the freshies left. (But don't worry, I didn't break any rules - I was proctored and I didn't chat.) This may explain my relatively poor performance on Day One.<br /><br />The second day was easier, as I was able to negotiate taking the test in the library (don't worry, oh eagerly pissed-off USAMO graders, I was indeed proctored), and I performed much better. Big surprise.<br /><br />I was quite out of shape mathematically. I had only started practicing seriously for the USAMO about a month before, and I couldn't seriously hope to do very well with so little practice. Of course, taking old tests is a little pointless if you can't solve a single problem... ;) In this regard, I think I did much better than I expected - in the immortal words of <a href="http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?p=823133#823133">Ubemaya</a>, "my goal is a non-negative score, although I'd be happy to get a negative score also."<br /><br />My equipment wasn't the best either. The first day I took my dad's expensive Byelorussian sketching kit, but unfortunately the compasses there were rather dull, as they had not been used for quite awhile. Keeping this in mind, I took my own, much smaller compass set the next day, only to understand why I hadn't taken it the first day - the quality was so bad that I could hardly use them, and the set did not include a protractor, just when I needed one (for problem six, I finally had to resort to constructing right triangles on graph paper and then tracing 60 degree angles to draw a neat equilateral triangle). Once again Staedler's quality shows me why those guys should just stick to making erasers ...<br /><br />But enough about working conditions. Time to talk about the problems!<br /><br />As I mentioned earlier, I didn't do too well on the first day, partly because of the friggin freshmen, and partly because of my own stupidity of course. I immediately jumped ahead and solved the second problem, taking something like two hours to write up an incredibly neat, incredibly detailed solution - only to realize after faxing the solutions that I was supposed to find a circle with radius sqrt(2)/2, not a square with side length 1! Well, I hope I'll get two or three points, because other than this my solution is a pretty good one. Next, I attacked problem one, finding out some facts and then hitting a brick wall - I submitted some hastily done formulae in hope of maybe one point. And problem three - that I could hardly understand, let alone find a way to solve. Total for Day One: 3-4 points of a possible 21.<br /><br />The second day I performed much better. I solved Problem Four satisfactorily, for six, maybe even seven points. The great thing about Problem Four was that it asks for an answer - 8025 - so I KNOW I got the problem right! =) And I proved the equilateral equality for #6, though I did not make any headway into proving the general inequality: I'm hoping for one or two points for the equality. Problem Five I stared at and stared at, but couldn't solve, as, I imagine after seeing the <a href="http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?t=145771">solution</a>, neither could 99% of test takers. Total for Day Two: 7-9 points of a possible 21.<br /><br />So, in total I got 10-13 points, which isn't bad at all for someone who expected to get zero (see my previous post for details about all that). After a little practice, and hopefully without interference from pesky freshmen, I may even qualify for MOP next year! (18-20 points needed to qualify for sophomores and juniors)Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29872660.post-59946160165387176822007-04-22T22:54:00.000-07:002007-04-22T22:15:00.107-07:00USAMO?By an unfortunate coincidence, the two 4.5-hour days of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_of_America_Mathematics_Olympiad">USAMO</a> fall right in the middle of standardized testing week. To add to the problem, Mr. Micek won't be able to proctor me this time, and I'll need web access to download the problems. And suspiciously, the vice principal, Mr. Block, always seems to be in a meeting when I come by the office, and doesn't respond to my emails either. Well, tomorrow's the day before the first day of the USAMO, so I'll have to get some answers from him, even if I have to camp out outside the office. <br /><br />Of course, my practice test scores are rather depressing. By a very lenient scoring system, I give myself:<br /><br />0<br />3<br />6 (must've been an easy year ;) )<br />3<br />3<br />0<br />2<br /><br />Keep in mind that I'm practicing off old tests (4.5 hours / 5 problems), as opposed to new ones (9 hours / 6 problems). And I should remind my readers that the olympiad starts the day after tomorrow. Hopefully that gives an indication of how screwed I am >.<Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16568752541742717722noreply@blogger.com1