check your brain!

as previously mentioned, my buddy punster is overseeing a bunch of psych research that's going on at the local university. one of the projects involves an fMRI machine, some simple response tasks and a willing volunteer. on tuesday, I was that willing volunteer.

things didn't go quite as smoothly as initially planned. the MRI technician was over an hour late because of traffic. and if that wasn't enough, there was a very brief power outage that left me stuck in the fMRI machine.
:(
but all's well that ends well. in the end i got paid a decent amount of money and even better, got to keep my scans!

i wish i could show you all the scans but that would require a software download and a whole lot of work.

pretty cool huh???

rugby? who needs rugby?!?!

so on saturday, the leafs held a news conference to announce their new general manager and president Brian Burke.

i gotta say, so far, i'm impressed. i was particularly impressed with his 3 "mission points".
1. exciting & entertaining brand of hockey
2. financial prudence - it's not his money that he's spending, so he'll be careful when spending it.
3. community service - Burke says that his players will be more involved in the community than ever before and if any player is unwilling to fulfill his "civic duties" he can find another place to play. i especially like this one.

bottom line is that regardless of how exciting the leafs are, how much he spends on the payroll or how much his players give back to the community, UNFORTUNATELY brian burke's time here will be evaluated based on only one thing: the number of wins - and ultimately a stanley cup win.

*****

went to church with my friend jenn today and then chilled with my cousin justin in the afternoon. we decided to go check out a marlies game. had a great time. it was an entertaining game with the marlies winning in a shootout after the 7th shooter 4-3 over the rochester americans.

you know what the BEST part was though??? captain crunch was in the house!!! by complete chance, wendel clark was at the game signing autographs. what what!!!

best idea justin's come up with in about 6 years i think.

***so sore...***

after back-to-back workouts (cardio plus weights) for the first time in ages, my body is NOT impressed with me at all right now. my abs are KILLING me. it hurts to sneeze, it hurts to laugh, heck, it hurts to twist around and wipe my butt! >.<

i must be getting old... :(

new pet peeve.

students that leave their stuff to "save" their spot and disappear for extended periods of time.

so today i'm at robarts, just to switch things up a little. i came in just before 1pm after working out with my brother. being exam time and all, the library is pretty busy. the slackers tend to show up 2 weeks before exam period.
:p
but what i really want to rant about is how everyone dumps their stuff on chairs and desks and then LEAVES! no lies here, 1/3 of the seats in the reading rooms on the 2nd and 3rd floor have jackets/notes/umbrellas/power adapters/highlighters, but NO BODIES!!!

i mean if you're going out for 2 minutes to use the toilets or even 5 minutes to answer a phone call that's cool. but don't leave your stuff here then go off for a 45 minute chat session with your girlfriends. don't leave your stuff here and then head out for your 3 hour lecture. and yes the hot dog vendor/chinese food truck is JUST outside, but don't leave your stuff here to go out for a meal.
case in point, the table next to me has 2 power adapters, 3 jackets, 1 backpack and a whole pile of notes. the girls that are/were sitting there haven't returned since i got here - which was 90+ minutes ago!!!

if everyone actually took their stuff with them when they left there'd be plenty of space for everyone when people actually need it!!!

i wish the library could police this. but it's near impossible to do so. aside from the lack of man power, how would they know how long these people are gone for - although to a trained eye, that can be pretty obvious:
if there is no jacket and just some loose sheets of paper with a few pens, chances are they've left for lecture or a long meal. no jacket means they have LEFT the building. definite grounds for a boot in the butt.
if there IS a jacket, well chances are they are in the cafeteria yakking it up.

maybe we could do what parking enforcement does. a librarian comes by once or twice an hour and chalks the desk/back of seat or whatever. if you've been chalked but you're not back by the time the librarian comes around again, your stuff gets taken to the front desk where you have to go and re-claim your stuff. you could add a $25 fine for good measure.

an even better idea would be to increase the amount of theft that occurs at these libraries. if we could only get these theives to steal not just laptops, cell phones and wallets but also textbooks, handwritten notes, pencil cases and coffee mugs. :)

yo check this out! part 3.

i have a friend. i'm going to give him a pseudonym - just in case. let's call him "punster" because he's good with puns.

anyways... so punster is the head of some research labs at UofT. he was showing me around his new labs and we came across the coolest thing EVER. in one of the labs there was a driving simulation machine. and i got to try it!

it was so cool. when you turn the ignition on, the car and steering wheel hum just like a real car. from the master computer, you can control the weather, the amount of light, the amount of traffic, you name it and you can control it. it was quite real.

that brought a smile to my face. and i thought i'd share that with you. :)