What can I say? I just handed in the last project for the last course that I'm most probably ever going to take in my life. If that's not a huge moment I don't know what is.

And the past few days were, totally crunch time, as it always is at the end of term. I had a 40% project due today, "term" project. As usual, I started working on it yesterday morning, from 8 AM. Before that I had nothing ... absolutely nothing, and I didn't even know what topic I'm going to choose (the course is numerical methods for solving initial value ordinary differential equations).

In any case, but as of 9 pm last night, I had 30 pages, 21 figures, tons of code and many simulation results. Yet again, another project started/finished a day before it was due. Just like last term ... and my friends are still amazed as to how I can always pull it off.

The answer lies in efficiency, mostly. Also, phenomenal searching skills. Deep search is key, and patience, and knowing how to search and what to search for, and again, patience, you can find almost ANYthing on the net, even the most obscure piece of code. And of course, bringing all the fragmented data together, understanding them, and even adding to them also requires some skill.

In any case, besides that I have one of my best friends here visiting me from the states, and some family friends are here from Iran, and ... umm ... things are quite busy.

Oh and summer is here, almost. For the FIRST time in MONTHS, today was actually WARM (like 20 degrees warm) ... so, it's totally refreshing. The sandals are out, pretty girls are coming out of hybernation, skirts, flesh, everything looks prettier ... and ... I'm DONE ... well as far as the courses go anyway ... it's scary to thing that was the last course I'm ever going to take ... and this term was quite a breeze actually, 2 courses, no exams, only homework and projects ... all smoothly taken care of, and mostly collaborative efforts ... the way of a true engineer.

ok then, I'll stop now and I'm going out to do stuff.

I'm sitting here ... in my apartment in Toronto, listening to the smoothest music ever (psuedo-Sade, Shivaree music [correction, it's actually Sade!]) ... and I'm chatting ... right now... a three-way chat, with my mom in downtown Vancouver, my brother in some library in some village in Japan, and of course me here in downtown Toronto ... and my dad's probably at work now and he doesn't use the computer much, but if he was to chat with us as well he'd do so from some desert in the UAE.

And I simply can't stop thinking ... about how bizarre this whole thing is ... and ... I dont know ... it's just weird ... who would have thought a year ago? That at this very moment, on the 27th day of April, I will be living on my own, sitting in my own flat, in Toronto, of all places ... chatting with my mother back in Vancouver ... and my brother ... in JAPAN ... of all other places ... and my brother telling me to turn on Tapesh to watch some hilarious thing he's watching ...

I almost can't believe how much I've grown up ...

heck

I even ate my vegetables yesterday!

I come home and check my mailbox and see a puffy package from Belgium. "Hmmm", I ponder. I remember ordering the 10 Euro Tintin coin from Belgian mint a couple months ago, but i never got a reply from them and they didn't have any credit card info from me so I assumed they never placed my order.

I open the package, and what do you know? It's one of the now completely sold-out 20,000 Ten Euro coins issued to commemorate the 75th birthday of Tintin. You have absolutely NO IDEA the sheer joy when I opened that package and saw what was inside. WHAT a day, it cured my nasty cold ... well, not really, but it was still great. Hmm ... and they haven't even charged me (or at least I think they haven't). They've sent the Bill (I think it's the bill, it's all in french) and somehow i have to pay the 31 Euros ... hmm ... gotta ask the bank I guess.

As I dash my way out of the building, running and stumbling down the stairs, anxiously waiting for the stupid pedestrian light to go green, the short conversation I had a few minutes earlier keeps repeating in my head.

-Good morning T, did anyone call for me?
-Yeah, Jayne called
-FUCK, what did she say?
-Nothing, she wanted to speak to you
-... FUCK

I knew I shouldn't have slept the extra 10 minutes. They had trusted me, you just can't be irresponsible when they trust you with such a valuable thing. People's lives were at stake. They told me Monday is going to be a busy day, and there may very well be an emergency, and they needed me on call. And I accepted. I said I'll be there when you call. Paniced and sweaty, I ran through the corridors towards Jayne's desk.
- Hi Jayne
- Oh Hi, we had a no-show but he just showed up, so we're good. But we need you on call in the afternoon too, is that ok?
- Yeah yeah, for sure

As I wipe the sweat off my forehead, walking back to my office, I let out a huge sigh of relief. Things were calm again ... until the next emergency strikes.

... all in a day's work of the on-call invigilator

Well, it happened. O-hum, had their concert in Berlin. BBC Persian covered the whole thing live, Unfortunately I wasn't aware, but I listened to the whole thing later.

Eventhough Shahram's lack of experience in live performances is recognisable and it's slightly disappointing to see the amazing quality of their studio recordings lacking in the live performance, I'm still filled with a feeling of melancholy for not being there. My aquaintance with the band is by no means a factor in my endorsement of their music.

In any case, I almost got the goosebumps hearing the concert. It was almost similar to when I watched Pink Floyd's Pulse concert live, on TV. I'm not, and never have been a hardcore Pink Floyd fan, and I've always decided to keep my appreciation for their music to myself as I don't like how some people try to buy themselves credit by merely accossiating themselves with everything Pink Floyd.

In any case, even back then in '94, staying up til the early hours of the morning and watching their concert live on TV, knowing that I'm witnessing a formidable moment in music history, gave me quite a rush.

Listening to Ohum now almost reproduced that. Specially hearing their new song (oh how thirsty they keep their fans, how many years has it been since they released anything?), "Eshgh e Saaghi". I just can't wait to hear the studio version, it's brilliant, and ... brilliant.

Hmm ... a lot of unnecessary shopping today. But had to be done. I'm sick of jeans and needed some slacks for the summer, so BR to the rescue, and then some weird tops from Zara ... and then a case for my camera (looks like a freakin' purse, ... just great) and the ever so important lens cleaning kit.

A lot of useless surfing, but at least i finally took a stab at a logo contest. A sports site i've been going to for years have put up a logo contest, and I wanted to give it a try ever since i heard about the contest. Well, so far i've been too lazy but i finally got off my ass and made a couple of rough ones.

For Iranian sites and organizations, when it comes to logos, I immediately think of arabesque. If done tastefully, I think arabesque has the potential to be extremely elegant for logos. You just need to choose the right shape and not overdo it, and of course breath some originality into it. In any case, here are the logos. I like the first one more, but you have to have the generic flaming ball ... so, yeah

I felt like I had pop rocks in my throat today. Serious. I could even hear them pop ... quite peculiar i must say ...

hmm 3.2% yogurt is the shit

btw my mom almost called me emo today ... and i swear this is the last time i'll use that phrase, just thought i'd mention it ...

... and I TRADE MIX TAPES (well, ok ... CDs) ...

fuck

OMFG ... I'm freakin EMO!!!!!

I mean ... I got the geeky glasses, too small sweaters, the EXACT same keychain, FRANNY AND ZOOEY (I don't carry it around though!), that's like 80% Emo ... bloody hell ... I think I'm gonna cry (!!!!!) ... DOPE >:|

Hmm ... another eventful day. It's amazing how things can turn around in a matter of minutes or seconds.

There I was, sitting in the office, not having a particularly peachy day, and not looking forward to the bluejays game that we were going to (which was at the same time as the Leafs' game, not that I'm a Leafs fan, damn bitches, but anyway). So there I was, when in a matter of seconds all hell breaks loose and my office mates go bizzerk. Suddenly there are people pitching/hurling foam balls, people batting with cardboard cylinders, foam balls hitting greek people on the head, and all this while the Benny Hill theme is blasting from someone's speaker. I mean, that music is enough to make you CRACK at the dullest things ever, so imagine it blasting in the background while such a frenzy is unfolding in the office, if only someone's supervisor had walked in.

In any case, the mood was further boosted by the GREAT news that my homey Deanerboy landed the job with PMC Sierra ... congrats to him ^ n.

The Jay's game wasn't as boring as I thought either. Eventho not everyone shared that feeling, by the end of the game only 3 out of the original 6 were still there. Then we checked out the mayhem on the street after the Leaf's game's win. I took some videos with my G5, check em out here, here and here. I didn't too many pictures, not enough light and no tripod, but since you might have come here thru Reza's looking for pics, here's one for you.

The evening was rounded off by watching the late show screening of "The Girl Next Door" . DAMN that Elisha is hot ... sizzzzzling ... anyway ... so, that's it I guess. Yes ... I wonder what mayhem is in store for tomorrow ... hmm

I finally designed Amir's new blog ... altho only now I found out a lot of bugs that weren't there when I was testing it ... so I gotta redo it for sure (and I'll promise I'll do it soon Amir).

I met Amir last summer, through my best friend Mehdi who absolutely selflessly let me mingle with his vast array of ultra-cool friends whom were all absolutely and amazingly welcoming and accepted me in their circle in no time.

Me and Amir had more stuff in common probably. I mean just the fact that we were both kids from Shahrak and both took the swimming lessons at Khayyam as kids under the same coach (Kakavand) makes us part of a unique brethren.

Now, after Mehdi himself, this guy (perhaps unknowingly too) had the biggest role in my intellectual developement (if there is any). He introduced me to Salinger, which for some extremely bizarre reason had the biggest of imapcts on my psyche and intellect ... Not only that, he gave me a shitload of books when I was leaving (The sweet Borges) and also a lovely Origami art (which he made himself, of course).

So ... it was a VERY long time that I wanted to do something for him in return, to express my grattitude. I wanted to draw him, in fact I wanted to do it last summer when I was still there, but for various known and unkown reasons, it took me only about 7 months to finally do it. Anyway ... I hope now he'll update more. He's one of the very few people blogging in English from Iran, you know, livin' it up, surviving in the ghetto (!!), so his perspective can be priceless ... if only he writes more.

Hmm ... k, well I was checking out the penny-arcade forum, as I usually do to scout some sweet art and I came across Lilzukkie's art.

And .... I know I'm freaking her out by my overly-enthusiastic jubilation and praises ... but I'm simply in love with her art. It's just ... she has such a distinct style that it's just amazing ... check out her art here. And I've added a link to her blog as well, unless she has any objections and I'll remove it.

Anyway ... *sigh* ... why are cool GENUINE artsy girls like that so evanescent here in TO ? arrrgh ... anyway ... lovely art ...

btw, as you might have noticed the photoblog is now a permanent link on the menu ... so that's one more thing to lookout for when you're here. I'll try to update regularly.

Oh btw Iran's trip to USA (to play against LA galaxy and Guatemala) got cancelled. So, if you've bought your ticket go return it!!

Visa issues, political reasons, perhaps failure to waive fingerprinting and other stuff were the reasons. I'm glad though, if we were playing against team USA then it would have been different. But LA Galaxy and Guatemala? That's pathetic.

There's nowhere I rather be more than in Germany right now, where O-hum are finally having concerts. I can't believe it. And I can't help but be frustrated, knowing that less than a couple of years ago, it could have been me organizing the concert ... in Vancouver ... arrrgh ... we even checked out the venue, everything was going GREAT .. I had no idea they had financial problems ... otherwise I'd have seriously tried to gather some sponsorship too, it wouldn't have been too hard.

Anyway, I also can't help but to feel for Shahrokh, who'se now back in Vancouver, and probably thinking it could have been him out there on the stage now with O-hum ... and indeed ... it should have been him. Behzad from BBC has done an interview with them (in Farsi) ... nothing I hadn't covered before in my interview (Ohum is alive) really (how cocky!) but it's tres cool (shamelessly stealing Saba's lingo).

What else? Oh yeah the great battle of the Aryans is now set. Or is it? Well the German federation hasn't made it official yet, but a delegate visited Iran and there were positive talks. Iran vs. Germany in October at the mighty fortress of Azadi is oh so close.

Mahdavikia also scored a winner for Hamburg SV on the weekend, that was good. And Iran is demolishing everyone in the Asian Futsal Champs. which is nothing new ... they better do better in the Futsal world cup, frankly their 5-year defeatless record in Asia is becomming boring.

erm ... that should be it.

Oh ya, if you're reading this, big hi to my bro who'se now in Japan :) Keep it tight.

Oh ... hehe, just found out the Leafs lost!! So it's on to game 7 for them too. That's what the eery quiet's for. Stupid Toronto ... take that biatch.

Couldn't let myself go to sleep knowing that the only highlight of my utterly unproductive day was a half-ass sketch of Uma thurman. So, umm ... here's a full-ass sketch.

SO looking forward to soccer tomorrow.

It was an eventful day, outing with friends, movies (Kill Bill 2), dining, walking. So by the time I was home I was pretty tired. It was around 12, and I was lying on my bed, almost feverish as I usually feel in my boiler room of a flat.

I had left my camera at the offce, with tons of pictures in it that I took this morning and still hadn't seen.

So, eventhough it was already midnight, and I was tired, and I was gonna wake up early tomorrow to do some work, I just couldn't supress the urge to go to the office and grab the camera.

So, I loaded up my mp3 player with some music, grabbed a jacket, and headed to school. I got the camera, and it was so damn nice and quiet outside that I decided to take some photos as well - from my office building, the university, and anything and everything else I found interesting. So, needless to say it's now 2:30, I just got home, and the only reason was that my memory card got full.

But, a lot of the pics turned out decent ... so I'm gonna post them up gradually.

Update: well, I've set up a beta photoblog ... I gotta fix it up a bit, but I think it's better if I have the photos in a specific place instead of flying around ad-hoc. Anyway, I'll link to it permanently on the menu later.

Well, it's friday and normally I'd do a musicbox thing. I usually spend a lot of time on those posts, choosing the best tracks, uploading them, researching them on the net so I'd provide more or less accurate info ... link to the resources ... but anyway ... I haven't gotten a good response, so, I'm not gonna waste my time doing that shit anymore ... I'll just name a band and if you're interested go check them out ... and they'll pretty much all be in the Electronic / Downbeat genre. This week:

Telefon Tel Aviv

I'm diversifying my portfolio.

arrrrghhh

did I say Arrgh before?

arrrrrgh.

Nice day outside though. Took a shitload of pics, gotta go home and see if any of them turned out good or not.

For fuck's sake.

*Spoilers ahead*

I saw Adaptation. I mean after Eternal Sunshine I had to see it.
How can you ruin a seemingly interesting movie? Well, by doing what they did in Adaptation.

I can't even begin to describe how sub-mediocre this shit was. You don't break the hollywood stereotype movie by TALKING about breaking the hollywood stereotype movie in the movie, and then ending it as any hollywood stereotype movie would end. With gun chases, accidents, swamps, and alligators eating humans.

I mean ... heck ... total crap ... it only took two dead bodies (including the guy's twin brother) for the guy to finally feel "happy" at the end of the movie and finish his script. I mean, like, how bout this for a conversation a short while after your twin bro is brutally dead (first accidentally shot and then rocketed out through the windsheild cuz you crashed your car while trying to take him to a hospital)

- so how you gettin' on?
-I'm OK ..... I miss him you know
-*nod* .... how's the script coming?
- it's good i'm almost finished ...

Oh and a genius scriptwriter he was ... at the end he just wrote the EXACT reality, WORD for WORD ... bloody hell ...

Hopefully i'll have some photography done by tonight. Anyway, I just wanted to say that I'm terribly and utterly greatful that god or whatever power there is didn't make me as stupid as most of the people are. OR, i'm thankful that he made me arrogant enough to THINK I'm not as stupid as most of the people are, either case I'm thankful.

What else? Hmm ... I've stopped reading a lot of the blogs that I used to read ... again, excuse my arrogance, but they've become unbearably dumb.

Oh yeah, I also wanted to acknowledge Reza and his friendship. I have a few good friends in Toronto whom I knew since I came here, and they know who they are, and I'm always thankful for all their help.

I've also met a lot of new people I never knew before. I totally clicked with some of them, like Hoder and Reza. I'm closer with Reza, eventhough we don't see each other much, he has been a very good friend, you know, the no-bullshit, no-persian-style-taarof, totally sincere kind of friend. And I'm sure he'll hate this cuz he'll think this is gay, but I wanted to acknowledge that.

What else? Yeah ... if I sound different in this post maybe it's cuz i want to break the damn nice-guy image I seemingly portray ... so anyway ... oh yeah and you know what I hate? I hate people asking me to draw them when they don't even know me or we meet for the first time (happens a lot actually). I mean, jesus ... not that I'm a good artist ... but I only draw people that are 1) my friends 2) I CAN draw 3)I WANT to draw ...

hmm ... so yeah ... can you tell I have a headache and my presentation got postponed yet another week? No ? Well you're stupid then.

Hmm ... don't have much to say really. I've been busy with the project all week. Went to a friend's Master's deffence today. They GRILLED him.
Poor guy. They basically found a potential mistake in his modelling that completely undermines his research. Damn ... it was scary ... he conducted himself well though.

Anyway ... yeah so that's it.

in the last 72 hours, for various reasons such as lack of time, being tired of chicken, not having done my grocery shopping for ages, and most of all my pure laziness, my only intake of food summed up to 3 bagels and two thin pieces of fried veal (the only non-white meat i had).

The problem is also partly becuz the nearest major super market (Dominion) is a subway station away. Even though it connects right to the subway and the next station is practically beneath my building, there's still a few minutes of walking involved, and dragging all those bags is tedious and unaccomodating, to say the least.

So I usually buy stuff on my way home from school at Rabba's, but their selection is limited and their meat doesn't strike me as fresh, so my shopping bag from there usually only consists of Humus, pita, and occasionally chips.

But today i felt so weak that I decided to cut the crap and shop from Dominion, so I did, and if I'm not my usual lazy self I might make myself a steak dinner tonight ... although ... it's getting a little late, ... so I think I'll just have it tomorrow lunch ... or ... anyway i'll see. I bought fruit as well, the easy stuff, grapes, strawberries and bananas (I know how religiously interested you are in knowing what kinds of fruit i buy, that's why i mentioned it).

The point is today was quite sombre and bleak, and it got worse when I went to get coke from the grocery shop downstairs (they don't have anything else, pretty much, so I just buy the heavier stuff like coke and milk from there).

The owner used to be an Iranian lady, which was surprising cuz there aren't many Iranian owned grocery shops in downtown. But she was very nice and it was just great to have her there. She knew i'm living alone here and always addressed me as "pesaram" and was always super nice to me, like never charged me tax (despite my insistance) and overall it just felt good to know there is a "hamzaboon" (!!! I hate that term btw, very javad) around, specially in downtown where there are so few Persians.

Anyway, but she was talking about selling the place cuz she wasn't happy at all, since a while ago. Well when I just went there, she wasn't there. There was a new guy, I think afghan, or I dont know, he speaked a weird and broken Farsi, and the place looked different (more products, more organized, cleaner). So I asked the guy did she leave? He said yes.

That really sucks, I didn't even get to say bye.

Here are some semi-random pictures of spring in Tehran, in case you don't miss it bad enough.

I saw this and remembered our little attempt at adopting one of these cute little baby chickens last summer. We were walking en route to IPM on tajrish sq. and we came across a pet shop that were selling baby chickens for 250 tomans (25 cents?). So, my friend Mehdi, went into a philosophical phase of pondering how a living being can be so cheap, decided to make one of the chicks feel special and buy one, against my advice. He wasn't carrying cash so I paid for it, so technically it was mine.

I must admit though it was the cutest thing EVER. We named her (or him? whatever) Choochool (!!!!) After accompanying us to some coffee shops where she was given special treatment from the owner, and shitting repeatedly on my hand, we took her to my place.

She wandered around my grandparents' house a bit, of course everyone adored Choochool, but it was making too much noise. So it was transfered to Mehdi's house, but her stay didn't last long cuz soon enough she got on his parents' nerves too (with all the noise) and they gave it away to their neighbors children and we never heard from her again.

It was good though, very very cute, and they get really ugly once they hit puberty anyway, and that's when you light up the joojeh kabab charcoal.

Here are some semi-random pictures of spring in Tehran, in case you don't miss it bad enough.

I saw this and remembered our little attempt at adopting one of these cute little baby chickens last summer. We were walking en route to IPM on tajrish sq. and we came across a pet shop that were selling baby chickens for 250 tomans (25 cents?). So, my friend Mehdi, went into a philosophical phase of pondering how a living being can be so cheap, decided to make one of the chicks feel special and buy one, against my advice. He wasn't carrying cash so I paid for it, so technically it was mine.

I must admit though it was the cutest thing EVER, and I was much more attached to it than Mehdi. We named her (or him? whatever) Choochool (!!!!) After accompanying us to some coffee shops where she was given special treatment from the owner, and shitting repeatedly on my hand, we took her to my place.

She wandered around my grandparents' house a bit, of course everyone adored Choochool, but it was making too much noise. So it was transfered to Mehdi's house, but her stay didn't last long cuz soon enough she got on his parents' nerves too (with all the noise) and they gave it away to their neighbors children and we never heard from her again.

It was good though, very very cute, and they get really ugly once they hit puberty anyway, and that's when you light up the joojeh kabab charcoal.

hmmm, nice day outside.

Well, time for another music box (actually i'm way late, but it's ok cuz you're in for a treat).

This week : AFTERLIFE.

Unless you spend a lot of time in Ibizza, or you're a Cafe Del Mar collector, you probably don't know these guys. I sort of got interested in the whole downbeat music bizness after hearing Afterlife, and I have high respect for them.

Besides featuring on every Cafe Del Mar album, they only have released one complete album. Simplicity, released in '99 (and later again in 2000 under the name "Simplicity 2000") on Hed Kandi.

These guys have always been huge on the Ibiza dance scene. Simplicity, is simply a festival of chilled breezy beats, warm sun-drenched vocals, luscious ambiances complete with a nicely blended flamenco flavor. It's silky smooth and at times even Jazzy.

With Sunrise, ou can just feel the first rays of the sun showering your face at 6 AM just after you're walking out of the club, walking back to your hotel along the beach.

Or take a plunge into the pool on that hot summer day's pool party by checking out Guitarra (although this is not featured in this album, but on the All Chilled compilation).

Relax again in the lounge by checking out the heavenly groove of Cry, feel the drum n' base to the max with La Nina or Glide, feel the trance with Blue Bar and get back into the flamenco mood with Never Again.

With Simplicity 2000, it's always summer. It's perfect for the "late-night hours where the breeze is right, the wine is chilled, and the lights are low."

Now, after four years, they are releasing their second solo album. It's "Speck of Gold" and will be released June 1st. The label is no longer Hed Kandi, but Bar de Lune. This is what the label has to say about the new album:

Afterlife’s ‘Speck of Gold’ is summed up by its title track - an emotional, lilting, silky-smooth, genuinely soulful and sophisticated, breathtaking, almost heartbreaking, form of chill - it’s like the best Café Del Mar album you never heard yet, but all by one producer.

If it's anything like the first one, then that's all true, and I simply can't wait to get my hands on it.

So, you keep thinking "damn, she looks so familiar" but you can't remember where you saw her. Well, if you're way behind entertainment news like I am, you still don't know. So here's the shocker.

Can you possibly believe, that Elisha Cuthbert (pictured above), who plays a porn star in "The Girl Next Door", is the same terirbly cute little (keyword = little) girl from Popular Mechanics For Kids, which played on TV only 4-5 years ago? And who didn't love that show? And it was all becuz of her, she was smart AND terribly gorgeous. In other words, can you believe, she is the same little girl pictured below?

So, it's crazy, how can you grow that much in just a few years? What do they feed them? Amazing .... and she's still cute.

Just got home. Went out with guys from the office. Some fridays it just happens, nothing pre-planned, but we just decide to go drinking at O'gradys, and then someone suggest some other thing, and some other thing, and before i know it i get back home at 4 AM.

So anyway, tonight was one of those, we did the mandatory drinking, then went to Paramount to see Hell Boy (ugghhhhh, SO bad). Then we head to one of the guys' place and played xbox. Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball. I'm telling you this game should be hailed as a milestone in game industry's history. Please watch the trailer, you'll know what I'm talking about. Actually, watch this longer one (all the stuff are actual scenes from the game, the pool-hopping game is sooo amazing, just look at the graphic of the water). Actually, forget about the trailers, watch this review with more game shots and a nice description of the game, this will give you the best feel for it. Not only does it have ample suggestive sexuality, but also the graphics is just amazing. It's on these tropical islands and the music is also soooo wisely selected that you just FEEL you're on a vacation. SO relaxing. And what other game is there that you can watch two other people (or one other person) play for 2 straight hours and not get bored? Besides, in the trailers and reviews you don't get to see any of the thongs !!!

Ahhhh, those girls, SOO hot, you gotta play it. Anyway, so that was pretty much it. (Poker night got cancelled cuz the host was out of town). I better head to bed now, lots to do on the weekend.

A little trip down memory lane. Why not?

They have a new album out, has any one heard it?

Check out the sketchpad.

I wanted to write about this earlier today, but I almost forgot. Have you ever had a dream in which you clearly heard sound or music? I mean, ok it's really hard to explain in words, but usually whenever I have a dream, I don't really hear the sounds. Well, ok no one does REALLY hear sounds, but you know what I mean right? Yeah you have conversations in a dream and even might hear music but you never feel it, the images are much more vivid than the sounds are, it's almost like you're communicating without words and just by thoughts, eventhough the images seem to be talking ... you know what I mean right?

Well today, at 11 AM, when I was taking a short power nap (!!!!) after a lot of work on the project (which i'm still working on), I had this really cool dream.

It was me, with a guitar. Now I have a guitar, but I don't really play the guitar, I play with it mostly. So, my strumming techniques are on par with a monkey's, or a robot's, or justin timberlake's.

So anyway, in this dream, I was there with the guitar, looking at the chords for "Moon River" (!!!!!) I think on the internet or something, and then I was playing it (I even knew all the chords), and I was playing it BEAUTIFULLY.

I mean, i could CLEARLY feel the sound, and the music playing in my ears, the DETAILS in the strumming, it was just totally weird in a good way. I was like, holy shit I'm strumming good. The funny thing is that eventhough I had a mini-obsession with breakfast at tiffany's when I was young, Moon River was never an absolute favorite or anything, I like it, but mostly cuz I loved Audrey Hepburn and the way she sang it. But in this dream, I was enjoying it soooo much, I probably hadn't enjoyed any music even in the waking world this much.

Then someone messaged me on MSN and my speakers were on and the sound woke me up ... actually it was Saba ... teehee :)

"When we hit that building I thought we had killed all the bad guys, but when we went in they didn't find any bad guys in the building," Col Byrne said.

Hmm, someone has to pacify this guy.

The delay in updates is solely due to the imminent assramming and current raping of moi by schoolwork.

You know what's a bad sign? When you search for your report topic on google and almost all results on the first page are papers published on the subject by your own prof !!!! He simply knows too much about this stuff. But I found a few good papers, which is a good breakthrough. Those damn precursor fields. It's interesting though, superluminal velocities which at the same time do not violate casualty and theory of relativity.

On a different topic, I simply love the crazy phrases mathematicians come up with. A different assignment I was doing today was numerically solving a system of equations involving the "cusp catastrophe". How cool a name is that? (The cusp catastrophe is the universal unfolding of the singularity

and has the equation

- from math world)

Hmm, what else? That's it. Oh sometimes I wish I was a mathematician rather than an engineer. Not that I'm terribly good in math or anything. But it's just so much more laid back, they're all wacky people in their own world far from all the hype and the pressure of the engineering realm.

Been working on the project which is due on Thursday, still don't know if I'm going to make it, I mean ok I know I am cuz I always do, but this one's probably the toughest challenge ever.

That's just how I am though, in all five years of my post secondary education, I don't think I've ever finished an assignment or a project well in advance of when it was due, I always leave it to the VERY last minute.

It's funny even people who have not taken any classes with me here, and don't know me that well, tell me to shut up when I complain about the looming project and they just tell me "but you always pull it off!" I'm like, baba how do YOU know? I don't like it much when people are too confident in me, it's like they automatically expect you to do well every time, but it's always been like that.

So anyway, I don't like tea. I mean I hate tea, I've said it before. I hate almost all warm drinks cuz I already have quite a high body temperature so hot drinks make me sweat and thus I don't like them.

Now when I'm studying, I get bored really fast, specially when the project is not due in less than 24 hours. I mean I read a page or two, and I HAVE to get up and walk around the house. Now before, like in undergrad, I used to go to the kitchen and drink water (straight out of the bottle), you know, just to have done *some*thing other than studying, even if it is only for a few minutes. So I'd drink CRAZY amounts of water in exam time.

Now, here, for some reason I do the same thing except with tea. Well the reason is that I don't drink tap water and I never have bottled water at home (too heavy to carry home on foot) and drinking tea just has some sort of a good psychological effect. Like it's gonna keep me up so I can *study* and all that. But in reality, I only do it to waste time, I mean just going to the kitchen, and plugging in the kettle and getting that blackcurrent teabag and all, is time spent away from the book.

So I bring my tea, and wait til it's fairly cold, and drink it, then I study again but then I get bored and start browsing the net or something for a long time, and then I suddenly come to myself and I'm like, "ok that's it, I gotta start studying again,

... but first, I'll have tea!!!", so off to the kitchen again and the whole thing repeats.

So, eventhough I hate tea, it turns out when I have serious studying to do, I drink like 5-6 cups a day.

Oh by the way, what I said about spring being here and blah blah a few days ago, was lies, all lies. It was like -15 or something today (with wind chill), craziness.

The genius title courtesy of Arash

My mom is a painter and my dad was also a painting enthusiast. So there were always TONS of painting books, works of great painters and such lying around the house when we were growing up. And I used to look at them when I was bored, so it's sort of been etched in my subconscious i think, and the ability to recognize correctly - more often than not - to which painter a particular piece belongs to.

Anyway, I was browsing some classic art online, taking a little break, today. And I saw some picassos.

What's your least picassoesque favorite picasso?
Mine's this.

And can you believe this is a picasso too? I don't think I had seen it before. It's so Renoir.

Bayern seal deal for Iranian ace Hashemian

BERLIN (AFP) - German champions Bayern Munich are reported to have completed the capture of VfL Bochum's prolific Iranian striker Vahid Hashemian for two million euros.

The 27-year-old, with 12 goals to his name this season, has agreed a three-year deal with Bayern, according to Kicker magazine.

Bayern recently confirmed their interest in Hashemian, contracted until 2005 at Bochum, and have taken advantage of a reputed get-out clause that allows the Iranian international to leave for two million euros.

The futures of Peruvian marksman Claudio Pizarro and Paraguayan Roque Santa Cruz, who have both endured disappoiting seasons, have been put into doubt over the move.

So I come home from poker night, and my friend Arash, from the Vancouver based Nova Stellar band, and whom I have known for 15 years now (!!!!), calls me up to tell me he's been making a song for me !!!!!!

I am totally falttered. I mean, last week was crazy, so many of my friends did extraordinarily nice things for me that it was unbelievable, and this just topped it off.

So, thanks SOOOO much arash, see you soon in TO 'aight?

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Apr 04

Spring is here

Thanks to another one of my gorgeous and extremely sweet friends, my place is now full of flowers. I had never thought about getting flowers before, I guess I'm not really a flowery person. But it's unbelievable what a huge difference they have made, first of all the blinding red has made GREAT contrast with my otherwise blue/green flat, and it's just so much more lively.

I guess I'm gonna start buying flowers now! Oh and first signs of spring are here, there was a wonderful sprinkling rain today, and the weather was refreshingly mild. And I just remembered today is Musicbox day, I'll post that tomorrow.

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Apr 04

More soccer news

Finally a decent friendly. Iran vs. Germany in Tehran Oct. 9. It's still not confirmed, a German delegate will fly to Iran this month to take care of the logistics and announce their final decision, but I think it'll be a go.

A portion of the proceeds will go towards the Bam earthquake fund.

Also, Bayern Munich is seriously after Hashemian (who currently plays for Bochum and has scored 12 goals this season). If the deal goes through he will be the second Iranian (after the mighty Daei) to have joined Germany's top club. I just hope he won't get benched.

Apr 04

Gigglethong

It seems good old Deaner boy has started a new blog. It's extremely refreshing to have his pearcing wit back online at a time where I was beginning to lose all hope in blogosphere and I had started losing interest in more and more blogs. So, without making any effort to seek his permission, I'm going to link to it now !!

If you don't check it out, you won't know what you're missing.

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