Moving along at my own pace

[silveradept]

I watched Team America: World Police today after an otherwise lecture-and-homework-filled day. My first instincts are right - there’s going to be a lot of paper expended this semester. This does not produce a particularly good ecological feeling in me, but I suppose it’s got to be done. Have to remember to apply in for graduation this semester soon, too. Which means things need to be signed off on, approved, and set in motion.

Team America, however, I’m quite glad that I didn’t see it in theaters - I was a little too aware of the parody aspect to be enjoyable. A bit over-the-top, and somewhat crude. It’s definitely a Trey Parker and Matt Stone movie. Some of the puppet stuff is rather fun to watch from the over-the-top aspect, but overall, I didn’t particularly like the movie.

Onward to the links, then. The real Team America has been busily trying to find personnel and money to continue its undeclared war, and the President admits that not sending in more troops was a mistake. Rather humble of him. We shall see how much the Democratic Congress decides to give him, or whether they’ll actually make the President withdraw troops. I’m not holding my breath on a reduction in troop levels over the next two years.

That said, if she wants to, Mother Nature can be quite cruel herself - witness the drunk who wandered near a pod of dolphins and nearly got drowned for it.

At times, though, one’s fellow humans are the top of the cruelty pyramid - a pledge who died of alcohol poisoning also had derogatory messages scribbled on him. In the fine tradition of taking the Sharpie to the guy who’s passed out. We’re not particularly amused. For the moment, the United States outlaws stoning as a punishment. Considering our record in international affairs, it’s sad that when there’s an outreach from Iran for our assistance to stop stoning, the message is help us stop stoning as a punishment in Iran, please, but don't think this outreach means we support America's foreign policy. Sad that pleas for help now require conditional statements. Sadder still that stoning is practiced anywhere in the world.

Before everyone gets used to the iPhone name, Apple will have to deal with Cisco's suit that iPhone is already trademarked by Cisco.

Advice for persons like me, who are graduating soon, or for those who won’t be graduating for a while - keep your grades up. Employers are starting to screen candidates based on their GPAs (NYTimes). If yours isn’t hot, work to bring it up, and if you need to, hide it from your resume. Still, internships and experience will help show that you can do well, even if some parts of your academic career aren’t as stellar as you might like.

From the community quicknews, which doesn’t claim to be “all the news that’s fit to print”, the Sudanese president turns away UN peacekeeping forces, claiming they're not needed, and Daniel Ortega returns to power in Nicaragua. Maybe this time around, the U.S. will have better relations.

I’ve been keeping a bit of an eye out every time I hear about fabricators or 3-D printers, but appaarently, there’s a desktop fabricator available right now - some assembly required. The plans are available, the technology can be bought, then it all needs to be assembled and programmed, and then, it’s time to make things in three dimensions. Wonder what kind of file formatting you need to do to get a properly built three-dimensional object...

Another great actress goes to her rest. Yvonne De Carlo, best known for Lily Munster (or Moses's wife in the Ten Commandments) has died at the age of 84. The worst part about reading other people’s obituaries is that it reminds you that some day, people will be reading yours. And really, I’m not ready for that, yet. I’ve still got eighty years to go, at least.

Comments

[shadesfox.livejournal.com]

On the subject of 3-D printers,

I forget what format was used in the last machine I saw, though I'm sure that the $2,400 version will be different from the one I saw. Still, it is a nice little tool to have, makes prototyping a lost faster X3

[silveradept]

I'd say. Having a model of your contraption in front of you will make it a lot easier to spot potential problems that don't always appear on the blueprints. I think that's what the Fab@Home people want - build the machine for rapid prototyping of your things, using our plans and your cash.

Re: Team America

[uncle-pervy.livejournal.com]

I thought it was funny as hell. Loved Kim Jong-il. "I'm so Ronery, so ronery."

If anything, you should have others watch it and if they find it a great movie for the "true way" America should act within the world, then you'll know you've got a problem.

[annaonthemoon.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I see why GPA would have anything to do with how well someone might perform in a company. Having a "low" GPA doesn't mean that you were a bad student either - you might have done badly in a gen ed class that brought your grade down, or even a class within your major that didn't have a whole lot to do with what you were planning on doing. I know I didn't do as well in classes on the elderly, because that wasn't what I was focusing on, but was a requirement for graduation. And of course, I did excellent in my stats classes, because I loved that stuff. It's sort of silly. I always thought folks with high GPAs who flaunted them around were doing it for the sole purpose of bragging about it. I don't even remember what my GPA was, though I'm sure it was at least above a 3.0. I guess if you don't have a lot of other experience to list on your resume or school activities putting your GPA on it might help - especially if it is a higher-end GPA. It might explain away the lack of activities. To remain a Circle K state officer you had to maintain a GPA of 2.5 or higher. (that's what? a C+?) Not too overly-achieving, but high enough that you couldn't afford to fail anything.