Charlie's Angels

The movie was fun!!! The angels are so sexy and funny. I like Lucy Liu in particular.

I woke up at 7:20. I thought it was morning, but only 2 hours had passed after I fell asleep at 5pm. This has been the saddest moment of my summer break. I seriously felt the need of ending this having-nothing-to-do life.

I donated my blood for the first time today.
It took 15 mins to pump out the blood they needed because my veins were all small and I didn't drink enough juice/water/coffee this morning.
I felt kinda wierd when the blood was going out through the blood vessel.

I had the broken muffler replaced today!
Now my car runs so smoothly and quietly. :)

Have you downloaded the newest version of MSN messenger?
It's well-improved.

This blogger site also revealed a new system. I love that I can view my blog in the same window with this latest system.

I found out yesterday that there was a hole in the muffler. No wonder my car has been making louder noises. The muffler and pipe will be replaced on Thur.

Today is the first day to work in G17 in FLB (Foreign Language Building, not a company!).
Dang it, this job is so nice! All I have to do is open/close the rooms, deliver TV/VCRs and do some house-keeping chores.
Then I can do whatever I want after getting things done. I am so glad that I quit the previous job. I am taking advantage of free time now. :)

Satomi left the town this morning and gave me so much good (and crappy :P) stuff. My room is occupied by stuff some friends didn't take to their countries.

Becky rocks!

UPenn Pros & Cons:

Pros:

- pretty buildings
- wealth
- convenient city-setting
- cheap good foodtrucks (most food cost less than $4)
- a hospital (not a health center like McKinley) and fMRI machines

Cons:

- small campus
- heavy traffic
- sucky dunkin donuts store

I came back from Philly with both good and bad memories.

I learned today that I was selected to be on the Living/Learning Communities Committee next year.
I thought I screwed up the interview, but they chose me. hmm... my guess is there weren't many applicants for that position. In any case, I got another thing to add on my resume and feel honored to get involved partially in the central student government system.

Today's lectures on Discourse sucked... Although Ellen Prince's talk was just fine, nobody was entertained by the following lectures on Lexicalized Tree Adjoining Grammars...

In the evening, we had a mock debate. This was actually an event to make fun of faculty members, and we had so much fun out of it! We divided into two teams, "the better team" (my team) and "the control group," and made fun of professors by performing a little play and imitating their characters. Both teams had funny plots and I cracked up so hard! :D

All the 21 people went out tonight. :)

It's been fun!

I don't get to use computer a lot here, so let me update my days at Penn when I get back.
I really like it here, but can't wait to go back to Urbana.

I love UPenn. :) I hate the crappy dorm food I can get for free, so last night I had Chinese from one of the foodtrucks on Penn campus. Oh man, it was so goooood!!! Food is cheap, too, starting from $2, and they cook in the truck and serve decent amount of food. Today I had Korean for lunch. :) I have a principle in which I should eat something that pleases me.

I visited UPenn Museum of Anthropology and Archeology in the morning. The museum was awesome! I liked exhibitions on Native Americans and Alaskan people. At the Egyptian exhibition, there were several mummy bodies. It was kinda creepy to see those bodies in coffins in a darkened room...

In the afternoon, I went to Reading Terminal Market. It's a great market in the heart of the city with fresh products, seafood, meat and baked stuff.

Also, I went out to South Street with bunch of people. It was a wild and lively place, and we ended up chilling out in a bar.

The vision week is over! yay! The lectures of the last day were most comprehensible among all the vision lectures.

Is it raining hard in Urbana? It was a sunny day in Philly.

Today one lecture on Philosophy of Mind and another lecture on fMRI techniques. Both lectures were interesting. Philosophy of Mind was a little difficult, but I never realized that there is a gap where you cannot fill in between phenomenon and characteristics of phonomenon, e.g., where does yellowness of yellow come from? This kind of problem is called Qualia i.e., "hard problem."

In the afternoon, we visited HUP (Hospital of Univ. of Penn) for fMRI interpretation.
First, we met a neurologist and he showed us fMRI scans of brain damaged patients and told how they behaved when he diagnosed them. Afterwards, we went to fMRI lab and saw how fMRI scanns were operated.

At night some of the participants went on a walking tour in Philly. I felt Chicago is architecturelly better than Philly. There are some cute places, but the way old and modern buildings are mingled looks rather messy.

So, as some of you know, I am participating in a mini-conference for undergrads in Cognitive Neuroscience at Univ. of Pennsylvania.
This week we attend lectures and lab tours in vision, and the next week we learn about language.
The day 2 went well though I was lost at some point of the morning lecture. The talk got inconprehensible when some math/physics formura started appearing, and I've learned that psychophysics is not an area I would pursue.
I sometimes don't understand it, but I enjoy everything happening here.
It's amazing that some of the participants are really involved in their researches and know a lot more than I could ever do. Those students are very smart and inspire me to achieve higher levels. :)

I got a big book shelf from Satomi. Since it didn't fit in either of our cars, we carried it for 4 blocks from her apt to mine! It was a good exercise.

My most exciting event of the summer starts tomorrow. :)

These days I just study with a relaxed mind unlike during semesters. I love these pleasure-studying times.

Birthday Rush:

5/31 Happy Birthday, Nobuko!

6/02 Happy Birthday, Chikako!

6/03 Happy Birthday, Shiho!