May 2002 Archives

I love how it is 7:30 in the evening here but it feels like 2 in the afternoon for me. That's because I got up at 12:30 this afternoon after a long night of pre-prom, prom, after-prom, after-after-prom, hotel lobby, car ride, etc.

It all started at 6:30 or so when, after thoroughly cleaning my car, I drove to the pre-prom party. There was very nice food there, and my non-driving colleagues seemed to be having fun ("Kai, I'm on my eighth champagne!") At 7:30 it was off to prom, and after getting lost in the parking garage, I finally made it.

Prom itself had a very happy atmosphere, although at times I just sat there pretty depressed, considering the fact that my high school is nearing its end. There must have been 30 pictures taken with me in them. Once I get them I'll add them.

When you are in the basement of a huge hotel you don't really notice what's going on outside. To everyone's surprise it was raining like hell out at 1:00 when prom was over. After a free shower, compliments of Mother Nature, we arrived at after-prom. After-prom was all right, but it was depressing. At around 3 (I think) a few of us decided to ditch after prom and go on tour of downtown. We went to an American Bar and sort of sat around for an hour until they kicked us out when they closed at 4.

Despite the fact that when we had gone on tour an hour earlier the raining had ceased, when we left this after-after-prom "party" it was raining like hell again. So a few of the few remaining of us went back to the hotel where prom had been and my car was still at. Then I drove five people home. Lots of fun. I finally got home at 5:45, and after watching all the video footage I had recorded at prom, I went to bed at 6:30. What a night!

What I haven't mentioned yet, and this is something I am pretty proud of is that I won two school spirit awards, one of which is awarded with &eur;1000 (about $900). My class chose one, and the student council awarded the other. I had no idea that I would win these, and the entire thing startled me beyond belief.

I just came back from a choir concert at school... A whole concert of Beatles songs... I'm never listening to Beatles again! Damn, every one of those songs is so depressing!

1. You know how to spell "Baccalaureate".
2. You've convinced yourself that colleges actually care whether you're in IB or not.
3. You write sentences on multiple choice tests (see below).
4. You need FOUR extra sheets to "use extra sheet if necessary".
5. It rains and you carry your umbrella over your backpack instead of yourself.
6. "Due" date means "Do" date.
7. You'd go into severe spasms if you lost your day-planner.
8. You wonder if there are Cliffs Notes on your Calc book.
9. Pressed for time, you conclude your History essay with "And they lived happily ever after. Amen."
10. You worry about the 98% you have in Advanced Topics.
11. You've laminated your bio flash cards so you can use them in the shower.
12. You've memorized the cracks in the stucco on the wall behind your computer.
13. Who needs Flinstones vitamins when you've got speed?
14. You actually believe "mental health days" are excused absences.
15. You chat on Instant Messenger and say 'cause instead of cuz.
16. Brewing coffee takes to long, so you just eat the beans.
17. You think MTV is a formula for mass, temperature, and volume.
18. You gave up your search for a "nice university with a good curriculum" and you've now redefined your search to "a nice bell tower with a good mount for a sniper rifle".
19. You worry about hyphens.
20. You've mastered the art of procrastination so well that your research paper finishes printing just seconds before you have to leave for school.
21. You're watching Animal Planet and are convinced that the one antelope is a Christ figure.
22. You go into hysterics when you've missed two points on your homework.
23. You've developed an imprint of your backpack on your bag.
24. You think "getting high" is a reference to grades.
25. You point out all the historically innacurate mistakes in movies.
26. Your every day sayings include "Wow, I just pulled a Holden Caulfield".
27. Someone says "Mmm, apple pie. That's what America is all about." and you can come up with an argument that apple pie is really communistic.
28. You sleep more in class than you do at home.
29. You can type 60 words per minute on a TI-83.
30. You buy caffeinated water.
31. You've consulted tarot cards for hints on a History test.
32. You use CAS as an excuse to go and see "Jurrasic Park 3".
33. You have nicknames like "Zapata" and various other Mexican revolutionaries.*
34. You've never been to church - heck, you aren't even Christian - and you can make bibical references to PokÈmon.
35. The exclaimation "Symbolism like JESUS!" sends you into a fit of uncontrollable laughter.*
36. You can list all five definitions on vocabulary tests.
37. You finish your English essay shortly before midnight. Your smile of satisfaction fades when you remember you need to start on your History paper.
38. You forget what it's like to talk on the phone for...what's that word...fun?
39. You skip lunch to cry/study in the bathroom.
40. You focus you WHOLE LIFE around the Group 4 project.
41. You accidently type "LOOL" instead of "LOL" in an IM conversation and explain it as "Laugh out ostentatiously loud".
42. *Ahem* You have end notes at the end of a list on your website.
43. Someone tells you to relax and you go into spasms - "Relax? RELAX?!?"
44. "It's a beautiful day outside to do that science experiment."
45. You go to school on the weekends and on national holidays to work with your extended essay coordinator.
46. "IB, therfore I B.S."
47. You can lead your way through a frog's instestines with your eyes closed.
48. You exceed the 4200 word limit on the Extended Essay.
49. It takes more than one trip to carry the books you need between your car and your locker.
50. You crash your calculator.
51. You skip school to do homework.
52. The word "ponder" induces hyperventilation.
53. You're American and you write everything using British spelling.

The third paper of my Chemistry exam was the most pathetically easiest thing ever. I finished after 30 minutes despite the fact that I had an hour and fifteen minutes. Now I'm just sticking around school to eat lunch in 20 minutes, after which I will go shopping for random prom stuff.

Yeah, so, my exams were a pain today. My German exam went pretty good, but my chemistry exam really, really, utterly, sucked! For some reason the damn IB thought it would be amusing to make today's exam 20 times harder than any of the practice exams (which are former exams) we did. Oh well, I don't really care. Tomorrow I got the third part of that wonderful exam. Thursday I end the damn struggle with the second part of the German exam.

As you can see I'm in a great mood again! In reality though, my mood is not really that bad. There's really not much more to write about. Good night!

I just came home from taking two IB exams. How they went Iëll talk about later. For now, enjoy the following:

Top 15 Reasons Why IB Sucks

15. IB backwards is BI.
14. The really smart people go to a math/science magnet school, such as Blair.
13. You'll end up dropping out after your [junior] year anyway.
12. I can't spell or pronounce Baccalaureate.
11. Damn IB Nerds!
10. [IB doesnët improve the teachers.]
9. You think you have no life now; just wait!
8. You think you have no self esteem now; just wait!
7. As long as we're still individuals, their work is not complete.
6. IB English.
5. Your GPA will drop considerably; even your weighted GPA.
4. The dreaded sixth subject.
3. IB exams.
2. [The literature.]
1. Two words: Extended Essay.

I don't know why, but for some reason I have been in a real depressed mood in the past few hours. I think I need some girls around! Then I just horribly hurt by backbone somehow. Damn, there have definitely been better Sundays.

That was bloody Sunday
It was followed by a blue blue Monday
And I'll never be the same again
I regret that day
It ruined my May
And I'll never be the same again

Hah, I just thought about the above lines from a song I wrote two years ago to the month.

Maybe TV can cheer me up... Hmmm Ton Loc is on MTV... with that 1989 song Funky Cold Medina. Nice, Nice, Nice! It's wonderful what a little TV can do to cheer you up.

Tomorrow I have two exams (see Events) that will be hell on my right arm. Today I couldn't even hold the phone since both my arms are hurting like hell as well.

Despite the fact that tomorrow is a catholic holiday, and no one has school in most parts of Europe, the damn IB still feels like making me drive up to school and write three papers.

My weekend wasn't all that bad. Friday was the first massive quarry event of the year, and I was there for a few hours. Then I went to a friend's house party for ten minutes (I came as everyone was leaving). Then I drove back up to the quarry but when I got to the community below it there were mad amounts of police and firefighters IDing people and putting out fires respectively. So I chickened out and drove home.

Last night I went to Billy's and hung out with the maybe ten people who went there. It was a pretty uneventful evening, but I don't care.

And before I realized it, I just wrote another page full of weblog material. Wonderful! I really hope I'm not sick or something, my legs are like quivering as I type. Scary...

I had a very quiet but fun evening tonight. I got home around 11:30 tonight and now I can't sleep. I'm in bed posting via phone.

Damn I'm tired. I just had 45 minutes worth of chemistry pounded into my head. Screw drugs, this is better! My whole head is like spinning! Anyway, doggie needs a walk, good night!

Today I had a very boring day at school, but it beats staying at home. Afterwards I went to see an exhibit by an Advanced Studio Art class at my school. It was pretty impressive.

It is always amazing for me to see artwork that was actually done by hand since I know people actually put tons of time into it. I am more of a quantity artist. I produce advertising "propaganda" posters, which I post all over school. Some of, actually all of the pieces I saw today were just flabbergastingly beautiful.

After coming home I horribly hurt a rib bone after my arm collapsed during a push-up. "Horribly" is a bit exaggerated, since I continued a few minutes later! I'm going to actually "study" some chemistry. I sort of have an exam Monday and Tuesday.

This enthalpy of Atomization stuff is really starting to annoy me. I quote my wonderful chemistry teacher Dr. Stˆri three months ago: "This is like a [nightmare], we have exam in three months!" Now I can say "This is like a hellish nightmare, I have an exam in three [school] days!" Methane, ethane, propane, butane, pentane, hexane heptane, octane, nonane, decane, this is insane!

The advantage I have over many of my classmates is that the IB exam is of no importance to my future. You see, many unfortunate souls decided to go to Great Britain, where colleges don't accept you, they make you an offer! They say something like "you need 30 points on your IB exams to come here." IB results come out in July or so, so they have no effect on my future. Still my parents paid like $80 an exam plus all these processing fees to the damn IB organization to take these things, so I canˆｴt really just say "screw the chemistry exam."

This whole next weekend and the following two weeks are going to be so stress-packed. This Saturday I have to buy/rent a tuxedo at some random shop, which was recommended to me. I need it for the graduation dinner and for prom.

I am looking forward to prom, since it is the last high school event I will ever take part in, besides graduation of course. I don't mean that last sentence like "get school over with,ˆﾆ I mean I look forward to enjoying it.

But there are all these extra events piled up. Pre-prom, after-prom, after-graduation, and "the morning afterˆﾆ parties. Damn! When I reach "the morning after" party, I will be so glad that the stress is over. Then there is just a week of relaxing Rhodes, Greece. Ahhhhhh, I'm getting a sunburn just thinking of it.

Whooo! I regained my lost prom date today. Guess my fighting helped! Anyway, I sat outside in the sun for twenty minutes today, and thanks to my crappy skin (redheads = bad skin) I'm almost burned. Although I have found that once the semi-burn recedes, my skin tends to be a tone darker. I can't stand the heat anymore. "Heat" right now means like 30°C (86°F) daily. I just can't take it. Can't wait to go to Rhodes, I'll probably melt. Speaking of Rhodes, the airline decided 4:45 is a pathetic time to fly and thus shoved the flight departure to 11:45 or something like that. That makes it just a bit more convenient!

I've been asked how it is possible to post to my weblog via my cell phone. It's not too difficult. Set up your email posting preferences here at Xanga, and then you just need a cell phone provider that lets you email. This can work two ways: You can either sms (text message) your provider through a special number, and they send the message for you, or if you have a cell phone with internet features, you can email directly to Xanga.

I like the first option better (costs me only about 20 cents a post), in which I just send a sms (text message) like this:

Newkai-(Xanga Email Code)@premium.xanga.com (Subject) #Message goes here.

That message is just sent to my provider's special number, and within seconds my message appears on my weblog. You can also send me a text message to my phone by emailing sms@newkai.com. +43 699 1151 8332 is my cell phone number here.

That was my little tech column for the day... Anyway, I'm going to go put on a little more after-sun. I wish you a pleasant day!

The weather is nice, and it seems to put me in a good mood. The only thing that has been depressing me a bit is the fact that I have about two weeks of basically optional school left. All my buddies think I'm crazy for going to school when I basically don't have to, but I figure I might as well enjoy the last few days. I already feel like such a college student. Utica College of Syracuse University is already sending me bumper stickers!

I am dead tired right now, though. Today, since I had the whole afternoon free at school, I picked up my cell phone from the repair place across town. That took two hours. Then, when I got home I ran 40 minutes. And then, if that wasn't enough, I did 252 pushups. I can hardly type, but it's a great feeling to know you just pushed your body to the extreme.

For some reason I feel like it's Sunday night. This weekend has just been too long, I guess. Thursday night I went barhopping, Friday night I went houseparty-hopping. Tonight I hung out with my dad at a local winery. Unfortunately I have a great problem on my hands. I sort of racked up a ’Ǩ1200 ($1080) deficit on my bank account. Buy some New Kai merchandise, so I can reduce it! Oh well, I'll just have to work three summer jobs... Going to school is so much fun these days, since I don't really have to. Everyone's just waiting for the IB/AP exams to end. Eight days after my last exam, on the 23rd, is graduation day. Now I just got to kill sometime. Although I don't even really want to graduate, since I'm so used to going to school here. Time to walk the dog. Then I'm going to go to bed and catch up on some sleep. Good night!

Yesterday I had a pretty uneventful evening. We have a four-day weekend because of a catholic holiday, and so I was expecting hardcore partying last night. No such luck, since I could hardly find anyone. Downtown there were leftist versus rightist riots, but they were still far enough away and under control. Still, many off my friends decided to use this as an excuse. Nothing will be happening tonight either I bet.

I'm done with my IB Math Studies exam. It was the easiest thing ever. I just wish my next two exams (German A2 and Chemistry) would be as easy. It's a nice today, and I'm going to go running.

Today I lost a prom date. No, it was not something I said, it was something someone else said... namely our principal. Yeah so, no freshmen at prom unless they have a "proven" relationship. Whatever that means. Oh well, it is time to fight back. See ya later.

You know, if I had had the same expiriences that I had yesterday a few weeks ago, I would have said yesterday night was boring. However, I have come to realize that small get-togethers have something relaxing to them. That is what happend last night, just a small get-together at Billy's.

Yesterday I had a pretty fun evening. It would probably be an eight on a scale from one to ten. I saw the movie Blade with three friends, which I didn't like at all (the movie, not the friends!), but then again, I'm not really an action/horror movie fan.

Then we went to Billy's Bones Irish Pub, and sat around outside with a few other friends. Then I and some of those friends drove up to our school's ritual Quarry get-together, which we have out on a field on Friday nights when the weather is nice. By the way, right now we're at 30°C (86°F) outside... I love summer!

Anyway, the Quarry thing wasn't too big of an event yesterday, so I dropped a few people off on the way back downtown with a few other people. We went back to Billy's and met a few of the original friends, and stayed there for twenty minutes. Via a detour I went back up to the Quarry and hung out there until about 1:30.

Anyway, I'm going to go out while the stores are still open (they close at 5 p.m. in Austria), and fight my way through all the "Legalize Cannabis" parades that are taking place today. I think it's like Global Hemp Day today or something.

The Bus Ride From Hell

Today I really have a story to tell about a trip that just ended a few minutes ago. You see, when I ride the bus to and from school, I'm talking about a school bus. Not a cute yellow bus, but a full-sized touring bus. You might have experienced or at least heard of how narrow European roads are. Vienna is no exception. My bus route definitely takes this to an extreme. So seeing that since we take full sized tour busses through narrow Viennese streets, we are already doomed. However, put me in control of the situation and all hell breaks loose!

Let me explain. This afternoon I basically took it upon myself to direct the bus driver, as none of my fellow students that usually do it were on the bus. These three have had a high tendency not to show up, especially in the last few weeks.

That was the background, here is the story:

Today, once again, I was in charge. Too bad that I was too busy socializing with one of my prom dates to tell the driver to go up a narrow street where we have to drop off a little girl every afternoon. Too bad also that the road we were on isn't much wider. Too bad as well that there was tons of traffic.

All in all, this is not the end of the world. While the bus driver was complaining to me that he had to be in a village south of Vienna in 50 minutes, I quickly came up with a new plan to get back to this girl's stop. It took about ten minutes until we managed to somehow get back to where I went wrong. The girl got off, and I wouldn't have given the whole thing another thought, but this wonderful prom date of mine used her womanly instincts and saved the day.

You see the girl's parents weren't at the stop. Why that was so you will find out soon. Anyway, my wonderful prom date with the womanly instincts, Karen being her name, got off right when she noticed the fact that the girl had no parents waiting for her at the stop. I wouldn't have gotten off; my manly ignorance would have stopped me. But then again I didn't even notice.

All right, so two or three minutes later, while we were on another narrow street, the bus driver's phone rings. He picks up (lawbreaker) and stops the bus so that no car (even a biker) could get by. It turns out the girl's parents had followed the bus when they had seen it pass, and (get this!) lost it someplace. The bus driver explained an adult student had gotten off and everything was groovy. But the bus company kept asking him all these questions, and that took ages.

Anyway, if it wasn't for Karen's great instincts, I would have gotten screwed over by the school and the parents for leaving that girl there, and I would have felt all bad.

But anyway, I got home like 30 minutes late, not that I have anything to do here. I wish I could just go to bed and wake up tomorrow morning. Sleeping is a great way to kill time.

The party yesterday was all right. Everyone seemed to have a lot of fun. I personally didn't socialize too much for some reason.

We are having hardcore summer temperatures in Vienna currently. Today we hit 25¬ƒC (about 77¬ƒF), that of course being the official shade temperature. It's amazing how the weather can alter your mood. Just check below, where it was raining sporadically. I was in a pretty bad mood on that day.

I had no school today because of May Day, which is the labor day of most countries in the world, including Austria. The U.S. doesn't want it because there is a lot of propaganda going around that it is communist. It is socialist, which is indeed a big difference, since socialism simply means representing the worker, which is another word for laborer, and hence we arrive at labor day. It was actually founded in Chicago, when a group of disgruntled workers hit the streets on the day where a new work-hour law came into effect.