No title for some reason

Skepticism

The clouds could open up
revealing the face of god
and I would attribute it
to a phenomenon of weather
an odd congruence of wind
and stratospheric distortion

So ready am I with explanations

"I feel Him when..."

When your endorphins kick in,
when you can't stand alone,
when mass reassurance
is the most volatile form
of peer pressure.

A man could walk across a lake
his glowing halo hazy
in the morning mist
arms outstretched as the blind
drop their canes
and the homeless cluster
around wine-spouting
water fountains,
and I'd say,
"just another copycat illusion,
a Criss Angel-style wannabe."

Poem:
Yep, I'm jaded. But also:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBQLq2VmZcA

What are you supposed to believe these days? What would the second-coming have to do in order to get people to actually notice? A few willing conspirators and some special effects, and you've got a miracle.

Observation:

There is a sign at our local food store Fareway stating they ID anyone under 40 years of age. I thought this was an okay idea at first. That way they don't have to actually ID the people who are obviously over 21, right? Like the ninety year-old lady who wants cigarettes. Sure, that makes sense. But think of the other complications. Like the prematurely balding 33 year-old. This guy walks up, hand in his pocket already grabbing his ID, which he pulled out from his wallet with the expectation of flashing it quickly, only to be rung up and sent on his way, no questions asked. The worst part? Maybe he's so focused on the sequence of events he's expecting that when the cashier jumps straight to asking for cash, he is thrown off, fumbles, and bumbles, and now not only is he feeling prematurely ancient, he's clumsy too. That's sort of the obvious drawback of the ID sign. It doesn't prevent you from offending people by asking them for their ID, it just shifts the demographic of people you upset.

I guess you have to weigh your options. If the sign says you ID everyone, will the old people be mad? And will they be more mad than the 43 year-old guys you make a mistake about and who aren't ready with their ID's? And the 37 year-old ladies you just implied looked older than 40 by not IDing? I think they should probably err on the side of universality here.

The best magic player in the world said:

I think the biggest thing is the deep seeded emotional understanding that the right play is the right play regardless of the outcomes. The ability to make a decision five straight times, lose because of it, and still make it the sixth time if it's the right play. Magic players have been developing that since their teens, and it's just so applicable to... life in general. I read an article... where they talked about it making you immune to bad luck. You just take the bad beats in every area of your life in stride and move on.

There is a certain truth in that. Of course, I'm not the best player in the world, and I might grow skeptical if five straight times the thing I thought was right turned out to have lost me the game. But I think it's true that if it's statistically correct to make the right play, I will make that play no matter what has happened in the past. There are so many articles that mention that the difference between a professional player for Magic: the Gathering and a non-pro is around 5-6% win percentage. The best players in the world win around 60% of their matches. That's not a lot. But over time, it sure makes a difference. And consistently making the right play is where those percentages are made up.

I wish I could say this attitude spilled over into my everyday life, but I'm not really sure. As almost anyone can attest, I hold grudges. Then again, if there's something I can't change (and I'm smart enough to understand that), I am often able to let it go. Like bad traffic, or bad weather, or something like that. Of course, in bad traffic, I'm often too paranoid about driving and being killed or something to actually come across as "letting it go." So maybe it's just the weather. My real problem is probably that I think I have control over a lot more than I actually do. I blame myself for a lot of things, and then get in a bad mood because of some "mistake" that I probably couldn't help. But I think I'm improving in this area too. It recently crystallized in my mind that people don't intentionally do "wrong" things. If someone could accurately ascertain the results of their actions, then they wouldn't be upsetting other people (usually me).

This could easily turn into thousands of words about how this perfect knowledge is a real reason I have a problem with the idea of God. I can't stand the fact that people claim God knows everything, and yet claim that he holds them accountable for their actions. If God knows exactly why you're doing something, and knows every fiber of your being, then He knows there isn't anything you could have done to change yourself at that moment to do something differently. Put another way, imagine there is a sinner (or you know, just a normal person, since we're all sinners) who is thinking about whether or not to ask God for forgiveness. The way I understand it, that's all that's needed to gain eternal salvation, right? So imagine this person considering asking for forgiveness, and then decided not to, because he doesn't actually believe in God. According to what I've heard, this person isn't deserving of heaven. But God knows this person was never going to believe in Him. He knows every reason behind his not asking. Say he was raised to not believe in Christianity. God is still going to blame him, knowing as He does there was never any hope for the man to ask forgiveness? I can't believe it.

Put a final way, and a way much more succinct: If heaven excludes Gandhi, Confucius, Mark Twain, Einstein, and all the other great men who deserve it more than an idiot who kills his kids and asks God's forgiveness, why should I want to go there?

I could, of course, go on, but I'm sure I'd disgruntle people more than I already have, and to no point. That is, of course, the frustrating thing about the topic. Dialogue is impossible. Dialogue, of course, is the meaningful back and forth between two people. Nothing of meaning is ever heard when this topic is presented. This is not to say nothing meaningful is said. But nothing closes the ears (mind) faster than bringing up religion. I'm beginning to think everyone is as ridiculously terrified of death as I am on some level. They just find so many reasons not to acknowledge it. They cling to religion, the equivalent of a child covering their ears and yelling "I can't hear you." It's even followed by the same lilting sing-song. That's a church service, from what I can tell. I've only been to a couple, but what I heard was a man telling people it was okay to cover their ears, followed by a bunch of songs

Wow. Okay. I should really get off this soapboxy-thing. I have a lot of frustration here obviously. And since it's something I really can't change, I should really let it go. It's the right play, right? Or is this one of those times where the right play has been to speak up, and it's lost me the game five times in a row. Should I keep going? That's the problem when there are no statistics on either side.


I heard a guy in Beyer Hall the other day asking his friend what he thought dying would feel like. His friend responded he was trying to avoid finding out. Of course, that's the smart-alecky thing to say, but the guy pressed on, saying he was actually really curious. That made me a bit curious, but also made me think about my generation. We are the biggest group of non-believers in history, I think. I'm not sure how we got here, and I'm not sure whether it's the right or wrong place to be, but it could very well result in chaos. Religion, for all the things I hate about it, plays an important role in keeping people in line. Threatening people with an eternity beyond what they experience in the here and now is the only way to get them to do what you want. If we all start thinking that nothing matters because we're all going to die anyway, society could be in for quite a swing. And it's everywhere these days.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARlTV1ZGJk8&context=C44da71dADvjVQa1PpcFNlv3U8_zLTMfbEDvhh3X7oRa7Zga_Nq0E=

That's from a couple of days ago. I would have laughed a lot more if I wasn't so busy nodding. I don't like the Pascal's wager bit, but everything else was pretty good.

I'm not sure whether it's more normal for my peers to believe in God or not. About the only thing I can figure out is that it's not something you're allowed to talk about unless there's an incredibly blatant segue. Like, I found a book on atheism in my friend's car, so I asked. That's about the only situation I've found where questions on the topic are allowed. So maybe I need to start carrying around some literature to encourage discussion. Because I do like talking about it, even if I do wind up depressing myself (and frequently others) with my negativity.

Thanks for reading. Hopefully I'll lighten up soon. No promises, though.

A further defense of Magic: the Gathering

My hobby has been compared to gambling (more specifically, slot machines) which is something I can't abide. So I will attempt to explain why it transcends other games dependent on chance, while perhaps further explaining it to those who don't quite understand why I find it so compelling.

First, magic is huge. This is not speaking to its popularity, which is seeing a significant increase as well, but rather to the sheer number of cards in existence. There are over 12,000 cards in print. Their ability to be played depends on the format of tournament you are entering. At the tournaments I've been attending recently, over half of those cards are legal. Just knowing the possibilities available to be played against you is a significant endeavor in and of itself. Granted, a much smaller number of these cards are actually of a high enough quality to see play in a tournament. With the rise of the internet as a way of gathering information, "stock" lists of certain decks frequently make the composition of your opponent's deck a known quantity. But the people who truly enjoy the game are willing to sift through the thousands of options and emerge with interactions and strategies that are unique and powerful all the time. The constantly changing landscape of the game, as well as the potential to find new things to do make the game incredibly complex.

So deck-building is something that differentiates the game from other games with outcomes that depend on chance. Some decks are simply better than other decks. Things usually function in a way such that there is a rock-paper-scissors sort of effect. One type of deck beats another type, but loses to a third. Of course, there can be five, six, or seven types of decks, which make it a much more difficult to predict what's headed your way, but things are only random to a certain degree. If you have a particular type of deck you want to defeat, it is not difficult to build a deck that will do so. The trick lies in making it resilient to the other ones out there. So chance plays a role in which type you get paired up against, but skill comes into it in your initial decision of what deck to play based on what you're expecting to be popular and do well.

So magic is not at all like pulling the lever on a slot machine and crossing your fingers. Sure, there is some amount of luck involved, but when skill enters the equation, you'll find some patterns. For example, compare slot machines to poker. Both are theoretically based on chance. And yet you don't see any professional slot machine players. (well, maybe there are people who consider themselves as such, but let's not give them credit.) There are, however, people who do reliably well at poker. Despite the fact that there is plenty of chance involved, the same people rise to the top. Obviously, then, this is a game determined as much by skill as chance, and the same is true of magic. There are professionals who consistently do well in tournaments. It's not always the same eight guys in the top eight of a tournament, but I would venture to say that the top eight is usually comprised of 50% professionals (the top 30 or 40 guys). This wouldn't be possible if the game were based only on luck. Sure, the best players can have a bad run. The (arguably) best player in the world went 1-5 in the last pro tour. But in the top eight were three of his teammates and two other players from the hall of fame. (Yes, there is a hall of fame.)

Then there's the actual gameplay. Sure, you've controlled what went in to your deck, but how can you say that you'll draw the cards you want in a 60 card deck? There is a huge difference even between magic and poker in that regard. In magic, there is a mulligan system, where you can shuffle your opening seven cards into your deck and draw a new hand with one less card. This significantly reduces the variance with which you have to contend. It is perhaps the hardest part of the game trying to decide which hands to keep and which to return for one less card, because the cards you start with so drastically determine the course of the game, your early strategy, and therefore, which player establishes control. But again, this is a skill, not a random effect. There are obvious decisions, of course, but the subtle ones are where the good players make up for the fact that chance is a factor. If you play enough, the fact that neither player knows their next card results in a parity which is broken by good and bad decision making.

So when I say I did poorly because I played against decks well-designed against mine, that doesn't mean I had bad luck. It means I likely chose the wrong deck. And when I didn't draw well, that is something that can happen to anyone, but something that only prevents the less-than-professionals from winning. I saw my favorite player reduced to keeping a sketchy five card hand, but he played his way out of it and won through good anticipation and correct decisions. All in all, the game is made fun by the variance far more than it is hurt. Chess has no variance, for instance, and while it is a fun mental exercise, I can't play it long before I get tired of the same old, same old. The sheer size of the card pool, the fact you get to pick your weapons, and the huge branches of the decision tree during the actual game make magic the most fun I've had in a passive hobby. Granted, if they incorporated physical fitness somehow, I'd be on cloud nine, but I'll take what I can get.

Hello there

I feel a little silly writing about some things these days, but I guess I might as well get all the stuff on my mind out there. Maybe it will make more sense if I can see it written out.

I'm not sure whether it's seasonal affective disorder or what, but I've been having these bouts of overwhelming sadness at the oddest times. The other day I was driving back from Minnesota (having a really great time talking with Xavier), and I went in to a gas station to use the restroom. All of a sudden I got swept up in this wave of dread, which concluded with me basically running out of the gas station, getting back in the car, shaking this kid awake and forcing him to talk to me so I could be distracted. It sneaks up on me sometimes. Usually it's just at night, right before I go to sleep, and it's always while I'm alone. I don't know how my mind gets turned, or tweaked, or obsessed, or whatever it is, but I've been on a bit of a binge recently. If it's not my own death I'm concerned about, it's my parents, or even just a random person on the street. Yesterday I was sitting on the bus watching some people talking, and I felt sorry for them solely because they were going to die eventually.

I had a dream last night where I was a passenger in a car, and from the back seat someone told the driver that this highway driving wasn't anywhere near as exciting as the stuff he used to do back when he was a kid. So the driver grabbed the parking brake and we started skidding. A car passed us in the right lane (going the same direction), and I could see the faces of the people in the car looking really confused. We fishtailed, spun 360 degrees, and continued a ways up the highway, eventually sliding gently into the ditch, only to see that the other car had run into the side of a bridge. I jumped out and ran over. Somehow, there were already paramedics there, and the two people from the car were stretched out on the ground. One was being immobilized, and the other was just being given up on, dead. I went back to the car and remarked that it was funny, because the dead guy looked so much healthier than the guy with all his limbs strapped down. I followed that up with a joke I don't remember the punch line to, but I do remember thinking at the time that it was really inappropriate. Everyone in my car laughed, though. I couldn't tell whether or not it was because it was funny, or because it was just easier to laugh and not actually think about what happened.

There's probably something to that dream, but I don't really feel like thinking about it too hard. I rarely remember my dreams though. Usually I don't sleep long enough in one go to actually get to the point of dreaming, but a couple times this past week I've just felt like staying in bed. I have a really hard time falling asleep initially, but once I'm asleep, I can wake up and fall asleep again really easily. So I just went back to sleep instead of getting up as normal, and was rewarded with some interesting dream material. There were a couple of other ones, but I don't remember them any more. I think this is one of the reasons I don't really like operating on a schedule. Left to my own devices, I would probably sleep at the randomest times. I could definitely see myself falling asleep at three in the morning, waking up at eight, doing something for a couple hours, going back to sleep, waking up to do something outside, and just scheduling my day around whenever I felt tired. As things are, the nights I don't fall asleep result in a tiresome day of me being slightly frustrated by everything. I have to hope that I coincidentally happen to get tired by eleven at night to have any shot of getting a decent night's sleep, but that rarely happens.

This segues very awkwardly to the next thing that's been on my mind. I need to find somewhere to live that isn't my parents' house. Opinions seem to fluctuate between "we're happy to have you around, ride bikes, lift weights with you, etc." and "I can't stand how you spend your time; we both have real jobs, and you need to get a life." While it's certainly nice to imagine the former is the majority opinion, it seems to be losing ground. Recently, I've been likened more and more often to a parasite, a slacker who isn't living up to their potential, and a general disappointment. Sometimes this is accompanied by a sad tone of voice lamenting the fact that "good parents need to promote independence and make sure their kids can make it on their own." I guess I don't strike them as independent. Or capable of figuring things out for myself? I'm pretty confused, actually. When I asked what I should do to live up to my potential, I was told I should get a job. When I asked what sort, my mom suggested Walmart. Because that's the place well-known for fostering potential...

One of the things I remember most about my childhood is my mom constantly saying all she wanted was for me to be happy. I guess I've been a pretty reticent person for quite a while, to the point where she took me from activity to activity all day every day just so I would be happier. I appreciate that still. But I'm really not a naturally happy person (in case that's somehow not clear). I'm still only happy when I'm engaged in an activity. Right now those activities are handball and magic the gathering. Occasionally I feel good while on my bike. I certainly feel alive when I'm on my bike, which in turn makes me feel better about the rest of my life. But I'd rather live in my car than work forty hours a week at a job I don't like. So yes, I'm sure it's irritating to see me spending my time frivolously. But it's a choice I'm making consciously. If we're talking about living up to potential, I'm honestly not sure how to go about doing that. Potentially, of course, I could do anything I want. The problem is quite obviously that I don't want to do anything. I don't object to going back to school. I enjoy school even. But I mostly enjoy it because it isn't work, and I get to spend my time how I want. When I was in college, I think I spent an average of four hours a day on the internet. At least. Certainly not living up to potential. The thing was, not very many people knew it. I got good grades with the rest of my time, did the sports I do now, worked a similar amount of hours. Just substitute a few more all-nighters filled with homework for some of the all-nighters filled with insomnia and my life there was the same. So the real reason I need to move out is so I can keep doing the things I'm doing, but have fewer people know.

To tie this all together, one of the biggest reasons nothing excites me as a career is that I'm growing to be more and more of the opinion that if I'm just living on this planet for a relatively short amount of time, it really doesn't matter how I spend it. If I get by while being broke, from paycheck to paycheck, nothing is significantly different from working 40 hours a week, except that if I don't have money, I'm sort of screwed if something bad happens. But if I'm happier doing that, maybe it's worth the risk. This is probably offensive to a lot of people. I don't mean it to be. But consider it from a bunch of different perspectives. Biologically, the imperative is to survive long enough to reproduce, and be successful enough to ensure your offspring have a chance to meet that goal. I have no interest in having kids. In fact, the only reason I've ever considered having kids is that I've heard it gives meaning to life, and I frequently wonder what that meaning could be. Anyway, because I am not going to reproduce, biologically I have no significant pressure to push myself to my "potential."

Economically, our system is based on capitalism. The basic idea as I understand it is that in a free market, those with the most desire and best set of traits rise to the top. I won't go into the flaws that prevent our system from realizing those goals, but it's certainly worth noting that there is plenty of room for people to just coast though the "system." It rewards consideration and thought as much as effort. If you work really hard, but spend your money at the roulette wheel, you will find yourself behind in the system. Conversely, if you make very little money but spend a lot of effort investing it wisely and maximizing its use, you can probably get slightly ahead. But there is a middle ground. The people who make almost nothing, but who can be smart about it. I won't be raising a family on my almost zero income. I won't be drinking, doing drugs, or frequenting casinos. I'm capable of being a careful consumer. Yes, I will be below the poverty line if I continue with my present course, but is it worth deviating to live up to my "potential?" I'm not sure.

Morally is where the real debate might occur. The whole parasite thing is bound to come up again. As a person with a heavy leaning toward atheism, I could attempt to sidestep the debate entirely, denying the existence of an objective set of morals, and rerouting the debate to one of the social system. But even people with a heavy-handed morality have cause to think seriously about the rightness or wrongness of my actions. Am I causing undue harm? Probably not. So the question becomes one of whether or not there is a responsibility to live up to potential. What is the value of being a complete human being? Is taking an active role in the economic and social circles of civilization a necessary part of being a good person? I would obviously argue to the contrary. I feel as though I am generally a moral person, though of course I don't usually think of my decisions in those terms. I further believe that my time is for me to decide how to spend, as long as that decision doesn't adversely affect the people around me.

So I wound up rerouting the debate to the social system after all. I'm just not good at thinking about things from a purely moral perspective I suppose. If there is an objective system of morality, I might be hard-pressed to justify spending my time how I do. Then again, anyone who believes in this objective morality is pressed even harder to justify their opinion, so I am comfortable with the standoff. Anyway, the societal component of rules generally falls in a couple of major camps. There are the people who think that people should be free unless that freedom infringes on the freedom of another, and those people who think that people should be forced to follow rules that, in general, promote the well-being of society. Either way, I don't see any conflict. If the first group is correct, it should be obvious I'm free to get by doing as little as possible. If the second group is correct, I need only conform to the rules set out by society to ensure general happiness, something I'm willing to do, but only to the absolute minimum degree.

So basically the point of this whole things was:
Life is futile, so I'll do what I want.

I hope my next posting catches me in a bit of a better mood, or that I at least have the sense to hide it as I usually do. I'm pretty tired right now, so my train of though just kind of made its way into the computer. Thanks for reading.

Grand Prix Lincoln

I was going to write a tournament report about this past weekend, but then it went incredibly poorly, so I figured I'd just blog. It was at that point I realized they are exactly the same thing, since I'd be focusing less on the game play and more on the whole experience and the mindsets and whatnot. So without further ado, here is my tournament report. Or, you know, just another blog entry.

I spent the week leading up to the grand prix thinking I liked my deck but not sure it was the right call because people would be prepared for it. Unfortunately this assessment was spot on. I seriously debated switching to a different deck the day before we left, but decided that without any games of practice, it would actually be worse than staying the course with a worse deck that I knew well. I expected a decent matchup against everything for the first game, and then varying degrees of preparedness to make the second and third games of each match more difficult.

We had planned to leave Ames around 5:00, so I went for a bike ride at 3:30, got back at 4:30, showered, and was ready to go. It turned out that a guy named Casey had his friends bail on him last-minute in Cedar Falls, so he drove to Ames to ride with us the rest of the way. This meant we left after 7:00, since we had to wait for him to show up, but it wasn't a big deal. The three and a half hours in the car were pretty easy considering that all magic players by default have enough in common to converse for days, and the drive was pretty short compared to many other car trips. All in all, the traveling experience was great. One of the guys in the group here in Ames has friends in Lincoln, so we crashed at their place for free. Plus, they knew good places to eat, how to get around town, and were pretty cool in general.

We spent much of the night before the tournament making last-minute changes to things. I only really wanted some advice for my sideboard, but some of the guys took that as an invitation to examine my whole deck. One of the many things I regret is listening to them as they criticized some of the choices I made. I wound up switching a couple of things because they made sense when people were explaining their thoughts to me, but I was the one with the most testing in, so I really should have stuck to my guns. We all went to bed late, but I figured since I had three fewer rounds to play than everyone else, it wouldn't matter as much. That was another mistake.

We go to the event site early the next morning to register and meet up with the rest of the Iowa contingent. I loaned out a bunch of stuff to complete some lists for friends, and then waited for the first rounds to start. Once they did, I looked on as almost every person I knew got off to a terrible start. One exception was Xavier, a guy I only met recently. He was playing a dedicated combo deck which had the sole purpose of taking the entire 50 minutes to win the first game, at which point the other two games are a draw and he wins the match by default. Needless to say, this frustrated many of his opponents. He wasn't breaking any rules, but it still isn't fun to sit down across for someone and watch them take 30 minutes on one of their turns while you sit there unable to do anything. After his third round his opponent was so frustrated he signed the results slip with such vigor that he ripped a huge gash in with the pen. And it turned out he had signed in Xavier's spot, so Xavier just scribbled something sort-of illegible in the guy's spot rather than let him know. It was pretty amusing.

Then it was time for my first round of play. I was paired against Gerry Thompson, a popular writer for a major magic website and fresh off a top 25 finish at the pro tour. I won the first game easily. I was riding high. I lost the second game. I changed a few cards because I was going to be going first in the third game and wanted a slightly different strategy. At the crucial turn he cast a spell his deck is known for, and I cast one that lets me search for a card in my deck and put it into play. I had switched it out because I was playing first. I lost. And I looked really stupid doing so. He probably won't remember it for long, and maybe he had a good laugh with some friends about it, but it was pretty terrible for me.

Had I won that match, I would have been playing other undefeated players, giving me a much higher likelihood of being paired against good decks. And because they are good, chances are I have a plan against them. As it was, my next round I played against someone piloting a really off the wall strategy that just happened to be really good against me. I made a minor mistake in one of the games now that I think about it, but I wasn't going to win that match.

My third round was against a deck I knew might be a possibility. It's pretty even, and it came right down to the wire, but I lost, ending my tournament as rapidly as was humanly possible. I watched my friends finish up. It turned out that nobody I knew made it past the first day of the tournament. We were all pretty worn out, so although there was still plenty going on, we left to get some food. Another great thing about knowing people in the area is that we get good restaurant recommendations. We didn't really want asian food, and the first place we walked into had over an hour wait, so we wound up at a place called Buzzard Billy's. The name was a little off-putting to be honest, but they served Cajun food, and that was on-putting enough for me to be looking forward to my meal. The five of us who went split two appetizers, one of which which was breaded alligator, while the other was bacon-wrapped chicken. Both were delicious, but the bacon-wrapped chicken things were definitely superior. For my main course I ordered a plate with blackened chicken, beans, rice, gumbo, and hushpuppies. The chicken was dry, the rice and beans were bland, and the hushpuppies didn't have much flavor beyond the taste of cornbread. The gumbo was good, but not enough to make up for the rest of the meal. Luckily, Xavier didn't want all of his steak, which was quite tasty.

We went back to the house, where we discussed a bit of magic, played some mental magic, and then went to sleep. Mental magic is where you take a random stack of cards and can play them as they are any card in the game as long as they have the same property for casting. There is limit in that you can't play a card that's already been played that game. It really rewards having an extensive knowledge of what cards have been made, and takes a lot of skill to play well. Luckily, none of us are very good, so it was still fun.

The next day I found out that I had managed to sleep through the somewhat triumphant return of a bunch of the lincoln natives from the bars. I say somewhat because while they had some pretty good times and stories, one of them did wind up falling down the stairs and throwing up on himself. I'm not sure if that's the order things happened in or not, but I am sure they both happened. I'm amazed I slept through it actually. The best story I heard about the events of the previous night was about a confrontation one of the guys had with another guy on the street. He was being his usual loud self, and somehow got himself into the situation where the second guy was quite annoyed and ready to do something. So he threatened our protagonist with a knife. Now, our protagonist, being quite intoxicated, did not take offense at this as one normally would. Rather, he just enthusiastically said, "wow! Cool knife! Can I see it?" and before the antagonist could construct a response, he grabbed it and started looking at it. The guy said something to the effect of "I have another one," and, indeed, pulled out a second knife. To which our protagonist responded, "no way! Really? Let me see!" and grabbed that one too. So here our protagonist is, with two knives in his hands, but still not quite realizing he might have been in danger, while the antagonist is a bit bewildered, less angry, and probably wondering if our protagonist is in a state where he should be having two knives. The situation concluded with the knives returned to their owner and our protagonist on his merry way.

We got a late start to our morning what with all the drunk people and figuring out transport and the locations of our bags and such. We ate a brunch-style meal at a Mexican place, and got to the tournament site at noon. That's when we heard the announcement that it was last call for a side tournament. Xavier and I scrambled to get registered and submit our decklists barely squeaking in. It was going to be a six-round tournament, with cash prizes to the people who finished with only one loss. I won my first round, and was called over by a judge right after. It turned out I had only written down 13 of the fifteen cards in my sideboard, so I had to start the next round with a game loss. I won the other two games, though, and was undefeated. The next round my opponent and I were picked to have our decks checked. This means they go through the whole thing and make sure you wrote down everything correctly. In my rush, I had switched a card. So I had another loss to start. This time I lost again, so I had to win the rest. I didn't, and wound up with nothing. It was nice to get some wins with my deck, though. I felt pretty bad that I got two losses for such similar things. I wish they had checked my deck the first time, because once I turn in the list, it's out of my hands, and it felt like I was being punished twice for the same thing.

It was a fun weekend, and between splitting gas and staying with people, it wasn't very expensive. Of course things could have gone better, but it's all on my shoulders that it didn't. I think I'll try again soon.

Not a real post

Today I slept in, did some dishes, shoveled a lot of snow, and did a bunch of research on Magic the Gathering decks for the coming weekend. That probably sounds silly to a lot of people, but with the strategy changing on a weekly (sometimes daily) basis, there is a lot to stay on top of. I feel good in my knowledge of what's going on, but there is a lot I can't predict. According to the sources I've looked up, four or five particular strategies should be the most popular, and I feel okay about most of them, but two things can happen. The first is that my deck could show up on everyone's radar, in which case I will need a plan for their plan against my original plan. This is what's referred to as the "metagame." My deck has a powerful strategy. Other decks have ways to stop it after the first game they see it. So I need to decide whether I need to have a second plan, or whether they will not be prepared for my strategy. If they are prepared for it, things get worse quickly, because then I have to decide what ways they will prepare for it and be ready to not only execute my original plan, but stop their counter-plan. This is one of the main reasons for choosing a deck that people aren't expecting. Then you only have to worry about your plan and their original plan. It's a one and two level system rather than a three, four, or five level system. At some point it may even be correct to assume they are ready for your plan and completely change plans in the second or third game. Or change plans for the second and revert to the original for the third. Or if you're playing someone you know, and they think you're changing things drastically for the second, leaving everything as-is could be the right move. It's not easy to figure out. So that's the research I was doing. And I feel okay about it, but my deck has been showing up a lot more places recently, so it's a bit unsettling. Hopefully this weekend is just early enough that people aren't quite ready, because I'm pretty sure it's too late to switch. Acquiring new cards at this point would be a pricy endeavor, and I'm really the most comfortable with my deck so the switch would take some serious reconfiguring of my play style. Unless something changes seriously in the next couple of days (which could definitely happen), I'm staying the course.

I just typed this on my phone, so there could definitely be some fascinating typos. Sorry in at advance, and thanks for staying tuned. I'm not sure when I'll be posting normally again, but I'd like to think Wednesday.

I wrote this application essay

This has taken a while, and it's still not done. I know I've been over thinking things at every step, so I'm just going to post it and think a little less.

I'm tired of shrugging. I'm tired of furtively glancing in another direction as I muster another halfhearted justification for the past four years of my life. "What did you major in?" followed invariably by "And what are you going to do with a degree in philosophy?" I'm tired of the way I've grown accustomed to thinking of philosophy: as a diversion or a pastime. I've been asked so many times why I took the classes I did that I'd almost forgotten how I felt while I sat in them, and more than once I've doubted that philosophy has served me better than a degree in engineering or computer science. In trying to justify my decision to others, I've inevitably adopted their system of values concerning the goals of education. This essay, therefore, isn't so much an appeal for entry as it is an attempt to figure out what I actually think about the path I took. 

The thing is, when I was surrounded by philosophy majors and professors, there wasn't room to doubt the importance of philosophy. In much the same way a physicist must look at the world and think theirs is the pursuit of the fundamental aspects of the universe, philosophy majors run rampant with their conviction that reason and pure thought are the pinnacle of education. This belief is fostered (even actively encouraged) by our teachers, who never hesitate to point out that at one point all the branches of science were once considered topics of philosophy. Though I never quite became fully absorbed, my haughtiness was at an all-time high when I was sure the field I had chosen was the epitome of next-level thinking. Even the names of the classes I took flaunted their superiority. I wasn't taking physics; I was taking metaphysics. And what other field can lay claim to a class called Truth, Belief, and Reason?

With graduation and the subsequent dissipation of the sheltering college environment, education's pedestal cracked. The flurry of questions became accompanied by varying degrees of skepticism. My job washing dishes seemed all too typical of a recent graduate with a liberal arts degree. " But what more could a philosophy major want? Mindless work gives you 
plenty of time to think." The lab I worked was focused on altering the genetic composition of corn and soybeans to make them resistant to herbicides, and having succeeded, they were in need of a process for determining where their altered gene had established itself in the corn genome. My boss knew I was a fairly intelligent person, and rather than hire a new worker (a grad student to whom he would have to explain every aspect of the lab), he gave me a shot at it. I am now listed as an inventor on a patent application we have every expectation of receiving soon.

Sure, philosophy didn't teach me very many specific career skills; I wasn't going to be piloting an airplane or calculating the stresses for a building. But I had learned how to learn. I learned how to think critically, evaluate efficiently, and assimilate information to the point where I felt comfortable in a new research environment and  could begin contributing without knowing much more than the goals of the experiment. Understanding not only how to do research, but the value and enjoyment contained in the learning process are the most important things I've found relevant from my undergraduate experience.

This doesn't make answering the questions easier. People aren't looking for an answer that sounds as holistic as, "my philosophy degree made me happy to think and eager to learn." Under job-related skills, "thinker" will never carry as much clout as a specialized degree in the field. So I'll cross bridge-builder off my list, since it doesn't appeal to me anyway. But what, then, is a good fit? What do I say when the next person asks me how my degree is working out, all the while smugly picturing me flipping burgers or toiling at some other stereotypically demeaning job (like washing dishes)? I'd like to tell them I'm still at it, that I'm still learning, still immersed in the educational environment I love, and on my way to a job where my penchant for research and my proclivity for writing will serve me well. And I'd like to say it while looking them in the eye, back straight, and proud of my degree.

Thank you for your consideration,
Ryan Pesch

My weekend

Yet another autobiographical post. I guess that's what a lot of blogs are, but I feel like I should be doing more. Anyway, on to my weekend.

I traveled to Colorado to play handball this weekend with my parents in tow. My dad drove the entire way to Fort Collins and the entire way back, which was pretty amazing of him. It's not like I didn't offer to drive or anything, but the truck isn't my favorite vehicle, and some of the weather did get rather interesting. We left Thursday afternoon, stayed in Kearney, Nebraska where they were expecting 11-15 inches of snow the next day, and hoped for the best for the remainder of the trip. We woke up to no snow on the ground and nothing really evident, and made it almost the rest of the way without incident. A couple of hours from Fort Collins things got slippery and white, but we obviously prevailed. Along the way we stopped at a couple of outdoor gear places, where I had the pleasure of sitting and trying to scold my parents over their selections in clothing. The price was right on a bunch of stuff, though, and I think their receipt said they saved over $400 or something. Plus that weekend there was an additional 20% off purchases of $100 or more, compounding the good deals.

We made it to Fort Collins and drove straight to La Luz, a Mexican restaurant we were recommended for our first trip four years ago and have stopped at every time since (sometimes multiple times per visit). I got a fish and potato burrito, and my parents got fish tacos, all of which were delicious. We shopped around downtown until my mom was kicked out of a couple of different establishments (her enthusiasm borders on the maniacal occasionally), but we found some cool stuff during the process. There was a cooking store that had a variety of kitchen gadgets and whatnot where we bought cups and narrowly avoided acquiring the most colorful plates ever. Our criteria for cups is strict, and stems from the fact that we don't use a dishwasher, making it necessary for our hands to fit inside without too much pain. This is actually a more challenging criteria to meet than you might think. I don't know if our hands are unusually awkward or if cups just aren't designed conveniently any more, but it was good to find them either way. At one point my mother was so excited about the possibilities she bordered on giddiness, and when she drew a random lady's attention, I loudly said this is why we couldn't take her out in public, which drew a smile from the onlooker, but really, it was just fun to see her enjoying the cool stuff.

We wandered around for a while at a garden-y store, which was unexpectedly a more subdued experience. We found a book, but didn't buy anything. On our way back the car I remembered a cool jewelery store and we stopped in. The guy who came over to help us was pretty awesome. It was obvious he was incredibly enthusiastic about his profession, and it seemed he could talk forever. Some of the rings he had crafted were really interesting. They were multi-layered with folded metals which results in this:






















Needless to say, my mom was fascinated. Woodgrain sorts of things interest her, as, apparently, do opals, which he showed her next. I think she was almost to the point of buying something before she remembered she doesn't wear jewelery. If we ever go back, though, the guy said they took scrap metal as raw material and would accept some in trade for the labor, so there's the possibility of something working out eventually. Of course, with the one-year communication delay, it's possible things might get bogged down a bit.

From there we went to the club where the tournament was being held even though it was a bit early. That was a good thing, though, since I was able to enter another division and play a half hour after our arrival. So I was in the A division and the open division. I won A's, but lost in the first round of open, confirming my suspicion I am somewhere between the two. So I guess I just need to get a bit better. I was actually surprised with how many shots the open players hit that I felt weren't of amazing quality, but I guess the fact is that they are always on the run, and if they are ever allowed to set their feet and take the shot they want, the result is a point for them. So maybe the trick isn't developing the hard shots, but getting your opponent to hit you easy ones by keeping them off balance. It's a lot less fun, but probably more practical.

I won my A matches pretty easily. Highlights included my opponent calling a hinder when I passed him on the complete opposite side of the court when he hadn't yet returned a passing shot when he was on the correct side. This wasn't terrible on its own, but it was immediately followed by another very questionable call. The combination of the two made the score 8-6 in my favor. I went on to win 21-6. Interestingly, I lost my first game of A's, but got my head in the right place, got warmed up and in the rhythm of things, and wound up winning the next two 21-2, 11-0. The finals could have been closer, but my opponent started off a bit slow and never really got into things. There were some actual highlights in this one, including a between the legs shot I hit left-handed that just barely made it to the front wall and almost rolled out. It was fun to win, but now that I can't enter the A's any more, I'm in an awkward position if I travel to tournaments, since it's unlikely I'll get many matches in the open divisions.

My dad played in his first singles tournament, which was pretty good, but one of his two opponents didn't show up, so while that meant he was in the finals, it also meant he had paid his entry fee and driven quite a way for not a lot of playing. Luckily we found him another match for fun, and he made a fair account of himself in the finals, hitting some pretty good shots once he got going. All in all, the trip was a success. We spent some good quality time with friends during meals and between matches, enjoyed our shopping, and the travel went as smoothly as we could hope after hearing the forecast. The only real (or imagined) downside is that I still don't know who won the super bowl. I guess I'll go watch a highlight reel now.

Thanks for reading.