Saddam is Dead

They hanged him today. I feel mixed emotions. I have no doubts he did messed up things. Crimes against humanity and what not. I just have this thing in my gut that tells me this is barbaric. Why not life in prison? Or something like that? Did he get a fair trial? Oh well. Better people have been executed before.

J.V.

WTF, Chavez Person of the Year?????

Jon, you must be behind this.

Hello Bloggers Everywhere!

Like 99.999995% of the time, I have nothing insightful to add to the blogger world, but, out of habit, I am updating you with information about my somewhat-boring-sometimes-crazy life.

As you may know, I now have a bachelors degree, I just took a badly needed vacation to the left Coast, I mean, West Coast. And I am sitting at home without a job until January, something that I must admit, enjoy very much, not that IBM was a bad place, but it is nice to sit around and just...relax.

Relaxing

Which I am doing in my own way. If you know me in person you know that I can't just sit still. So I've been staying at home cleaning, fixing and organizing stuff. I have cleaned and organized most of the house, and it's going to take a little bit before I can say that I am "done" and there's nothing else to do around the house. It's quite therapeutic to take a chaotic closet and turn it into a Marine Corps regulation wall-locker. Don't get me wrong, I am by no means a neat freak, but I don't like messy rooms, they bother me a little bit.

Announcement from both of us

Martha and I have a reason to be happy these days, we are expecting a baby girl in May. We have told everyone NOT to give us anything until Martha is at least 7 months along. I have so many things to look forward to. Basically I have gone from being a college student to being a Family Guy.

Grad School

I promised Martha that I would wait a year before going back to school, but, I feel a great desire to keep going and getting my Masters ASAP. But, I will remain true to my word and I will give it a rest. I will try to never stop learning new things though, I am studying for the GRE, and I am trying to review the things I am going to need for my new job.

I am thinking about either doing long-distance internet degrees with The University of Florida or Georgia Tech, or doing it locally either back at the Alma Mater or the University of Miami. I don't know, it depends on what is more convenient.

Reading an awesome book

Kamran, thank you for recommending The Brothers Karamazov, it is one of the best books I have read, I am still at page 76, but each chapter is filled with magnificent thought-provoking narrative. I like that.

I've been Thinking about God

And the Bible and the Virgin Mary, and all the Saints including Santa Claus and other Superstitions, why are we so credulous? Because we want to believe in something.

I'm looking into all that.

Merry Christmas, Hannukah, Kwuanza, Winter-Solice, and Holidays in General

Hope ya'll have a good one. I have to vacuum the bedroom.

J.V.

99% of the people you will meet in college

Oh this is so accurate is funny. I must admit (with some embarrassment) that I was a "Major Elitist".

West Side!

I really like Portland. It has been raining everyday, but still. I have fallen in love with this city.

It is the opposite of Florida in almost every aspect. Yet I feel like I could live here. Of course, I would stand out as an outsider, there aren't that many Venezuelans here. But, with all the coffee shops and all the cool little neighborhoods. Who wouldn't like to live here?

I am staying at a Place called Ladd's addition, in Hawthorne, and it's just so nice. The people, the architecture, the culture. It's amazing.

We go back to FL tomorrow.

J.V.

Oregon

That's where I'm sitting right now. We did a surprise visit to Joel, a friend of mine from Iraq, he is a photojournalist that just published a book, A night of a thousand stars and other portraits of Iraq.

We flew to New York right after the graduation ceremony. Then we caught a plane to Portland Oregon, where it has been raining on and off.

It's nice, yesterday we saw a bit of snow in the Coastal Range mountains, and we saw the Pacific Ocean (first time for me), we had salt water taffes and a taste of Oregonian food.

Today I plan on going to some big bookstore, supposedly the biggest technical bookstore in the country. I'll try not to go wild in there.

So, life is good right now. I have to find a part time job when I get back, since it's going to be three more weeks before I start my job, I would like to catch up with my reading. I plan on finally reading the brothers karamazov, and I,Robot. Besides the latest book by Richard Dawkins and Carl Hiaasen. On the plane I finished reading Iwoz, the story of the founder of Apple Co.


Ok, that is all for now.

I finally graduated

I finally finished. I am at the FLL Airport, Flying to New York.

I can't believe it. I am DONE!

Such a great feeling.

Next Stop. Corporate America.

See you soon.

J.V.

Iraq Study Group report (full text PDF) is here.

Speaking of being a Geek

I think this is hilarious, Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer's music video. He is very passionate about developers.

developers developers developers developers
developers developers developers developers
developers developers developers developers
developers developers developers developers

It does not feel so bad to study for a class that I actually like.

The final for Data Communication is tomorrow, I never thought that network theory could be interesting. But, I am geek like that.

Stressed

I didn't think this week was going to be stressing, but it is. It's not the finals, it's when all kinds of small things pile up at the same time that I get like this.

One thing I hate about myself is that I became an asshole when I am stressed out. There is no excuse for acting like that and I know that is something to watch out for. When I am stressed out, I get mad easier, and I say mean things to people that are close to me.

Admitting that is hard for me.

I am trying to be nice.

I am sad that Venezuela will have Chavez as president. I get mad at people that think it is a conspiracy, I don't know, they might be right, but they don't have proof. I truly believe that if the majority of Venezuelans wanted him out he would have been out by now.

Of course, the theory that the elections were rigged and that there's no way that he could have won by 61% makes perfect sense. I admit it is naive to think that the current government would not cheat on the elections. But, face it, we lost. Chavez is staying. Let's get over it.

Also, I did not vote, I could have voted, but I didn't. My fault.

My car would not start, the cat got sick, my wife is not feeling well, the chemistry final was a tough mother, I had a huge headache yesterday, today, I don't have a headache but it has been a hectic day. I have to cram for my Data Communications final on Thursday, it will be a hard test, but at least it will be on a subject that I enjoy, plus, I am sure it won't have a bunch of unfair trick questions like the chemistry final, that pisses me off so bad. I mean, one thing is to test if you know the material, another thing is to ask ambiguous bogus crap on a multiple choice test. Crap that wasn't on the book and that was never covered. Or subtle word play, that type of thing pisses me off so much because it's not fair. Of course complaining about it to the prof only makes you seem immature or lazy..oh well. I guess I am done ranting.

J.V.

Chavez wins re-election

Shit.