Linkstew

Twenty-two years ago, in theaters around the nation, a movie was released which captured the imaginations of millions and inspired countless movies for years to come. Then three years later, a second movie came out. And three years after that, a third movie came out, establishing a legacy of stunning visual effects, thrilling action sequences, and epic stories which tell a simple tale of good versus evil.

Living up to the legacy of Star Wars, which is perhaps one of the best known stories ever to come out of Hollywood, is by no means an easy task, and having to tell a tale which will set the stage for that well known story is a monumental task. Yet despite the size of the task he created for himself, George Lucas took the challenge and created Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

The Phantom Menace contains amazing special effects, from the high-speed race scene through caverns and canyons on a desert planet to the invasion army plowing through a forest, sending the native animals running for safety. It is obvious that a great deal of effort went into making this movie visually appealing, and that effort was well worth it. The breathtaking visuals shown on screen will undoubtedly again inspire countless minds with their quality and variety.

These effects are put to good use in the numerous action sequences which are found in this film. The movies climax seamlessly integrates four separate battles into a flowing sequence which takes ones breath away with it’s speed and choreography.

Despite the amount of action found in The Phantom Menace, there is really very little violence, and the movie is suitable for all ages. The most common target in the movie is the robot army, whose movements and synthetic voices are so clearly not human that the audience feels little reason to sympathize with them.

Even the human characters of the movie, however, were hard to empathize with. So much effort was spent in making the movie visually exciting and making the story fit into the existing framework, the characters in the movie seemed to have almost been added as an afterthought. The actors did their part well, but only so much can be done with dialogue that is stiff to begin with. This is easily overlooked, however, because some of the characters have already been developed in the original movies, and the movie is exciting enough that when you walk out, you’d rather be remembering what the characters did than who they were.

The story of this Star Wars movie, unlike the ones that came before it, is not so nearly clear cut as Good versus Evil. The story pivots around politics and ploys for power, where bad guys often appear as the greatest allies, and those who are apparently the enemy are only pawns of a larger power.

The Phantom Menaces also casts a new light on the classic Star Wars trilogy, and watching those movies again will never be quite the same after watching The Phantom Menace. Darth Vader, one of the best known symbols of modern evil, is seen in The Phantom Menace as a hopeful and innocent young boy who helps others without any thought of himself. This, along with other dichotomies, makes the Star Wars universe much less black and white than it once was, and everything is now tinted with shades of grey.

The Phantom Menace, despite the difficulty of its task, manages to be a thoroughly enjoyable movie which successfully integrates into the existing story while laying foundations for the upcoming Episodes II and III. However, if you’re out to critique the movie, you will find flaws to pick on.

Buy Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace on VHS from Amazon.

• Computer Science 61B
  • Course Title: Data Structures
  • Instructor: Mike Clancy: Painful and bad.
  • Memorable Quotes: "...and this for loop has an empty body. I saw something recently on the Discovery Channel about, how though history, people have been terrified of being buried alive... These people really welcomed embalming, because then there was no chance of them being buried alive... Anyway, when I said 'empty body', that's what triggered that thought..."
  • TA: Susan Lee: Pretty good.
  • Text: Annoying, not worthwhile.
  • Content: Best of the 61 series.
  • Room: 2050 VLSB Nice.
  • Grade: A- Earned.
  
  
• Computer Science 61C
  • Course Title: Machine Structures
  • Professor: Dave Patterson: Awesome.
  • Memorable Quotes: Final Lecture.
  • TA: Tai Ping Yu: Average.
  • Text: Awesome.
  • Content: Average.
  • Room: 2050 VLSB ice.
  • Grade: A Expected.
  
  
• Math 54
  • Course Title: Linear Algebra and Differential Equations
  • Professor: Jack Wagoner: Average for a Math Prof
  • Memorable Quotes: "My goal here is to get you over the fear of generalized eigenspaces."
    That, and there was the time he spent half an hour discussing the state of modern mathematics.
  • TA: Don Barkauskas: On Par with Edelman
  • Text: So So.
  • Content: So So.
  • Room: 155 Dwinelle too flat
  • Grade: B Expected.
  
  
• Psychology 2
  • Course Title: Principles of Psychology
  • Instructor: Jennifer Beck : Above Average
  • Memorable Quotes:
  • Text: So So
  • Content: Interesting.
  • Room: 145 Dwinelle Annoying.
  • Grade: B+ Expected.

So last I knew, I had gotten a B- in math. I was a bit disappointed by this, as I thought I had been doing B work, and when I worked out my percentage in the class, it was a B-. So I accepted the grade, and got on with my life. There wouldn't have been much use in questioning it, I don't think. But then a couple of days ago, my TA emailed me and said "Oops, I made a mistake when I was calculating everyones grades, and I told you a lower grade than you got."

It should be noted that when I first read this, I misread it as "You got a lower grade than I gave you", but I quickly reread it, figured out the right meaning, and read that my grade was actually 1/3 higher, so, since he reported a B- to me, I actually got a B. Woohoo!

In retrospect, I realize that, while I got a B- by percentage, I got the B with the curve. I knew I did pretty well above the mean on both midterms, and so the B- just seemed wrong, though I accepted it at face value anyway.

Perhaps there's a moral here? The only one I see is "Question Everything", but that wouldn't get much accomplished for anyone. I tend to question very little when it comes to grades, and I just take what I was given. This can be observed in my 61c grades, where I didn't even bother to ask if I could redo the homeworks that were missing from my overall grade, though in retrospect the extra points, while they weren't really necessary, would have been a nice cushion.

Though not the whole CD. There's still several tracks remaining. Some look to be a bit frenetic, while others look to be slow and a bit sad. We'll wait for a full review until the CD is over. However, this track is indeed worth commenting on.

In less than 12 hours, I'll be on my back to Bakersfield. Woohoo! What fun. I've got me a digital camera ordered (The Kodak DC265), though, and I'm going to see Star Wars again, and do a couple of other things, so it won't start off too bad.

I don't know when my next update will be, as I have yet to work out exactly how I will be handling updates over the summer. I expect there will be one before the end of June, however, so don't get too ANSI on me.

I don't know why this didn't occur to me before now, but now I feel really shitty. Next year will inherently be different, however. As an RCC, I will undoubtedly visit all 8 floors of all four buildings of Unit 1 before the end of the first week, if not the end of the first day. Additionally, with 28 some odd other people on my FLOOR, I'll be bound to get to know at least some of them. And then there will be around 26 RCC's I'll know through ResComp, along with the US's and other ResComp people.

Next year looks to be promising indeed.

Hell, I dunno, I forgot most of them already. I'll certainly forget all the people in Foothill I didn't know, thanks to living with Keith and Michael. I've already forgotten, or gotten a mental block against, Clancy. I don't want to remember the math.

I want to say that La Loma seems empty, because everyone has moved out, but it doesn't seem any less empty than it always does to me. Throughout this entire year, I didn't go in Building 1 once, aside from laundry, and I didn't go into building 2 aside from Fadia's (My RA) suite. And now that I think about it, I was only in one other suite in all of Building 3, and I only entered one suite in all of Hillside.

Jeez, I only went in four suites, counting my own, all year. That really sucks, and I feel really bad now that I realize it. There's nothing that I can do about it now. This is the primary source of my not knowing anyone around here. And the reason I didn't go in other suites is Keith and Michael.

The first other suite I went in was because Keiths friend Nick was invited in during welcome week, and I ended up watching a movie there. That's all. I never went back. Then I went in Fadia's suite, and I only went over there when I had to help her with the MESCHA web page. And then there was 7A40, where I went during Welcome Week to visit Heidi Price, and where I went maybe on average of once every two weeks over the course of the school year. The only other residence hall I went to was the 7th floor of Spens Black Hall in Unit 3, where I visited Steve about 7 times over the course of the school year.

I'll remember M'Piero, the CS 61C mascot. If you don't know, it's best not to ask.

I'll remember the three day coding sessions for 61b, though I'm sure there'll be more of those in the future.

I'll remember the exploding Jeep (Pictures to be posted soon. In other words, once I get back to Bakersfield and scan them).

I'll remember getting a C+ in Math 1B, and vowing never to get a grade lower than that, unless I really hate the class, or unless it's on purpose. (In other words, if I want to get a D to repeat a course).

I'll remember awesome lectures from Dave Patterson, especially his finale. (I'll write more about this sometime).

I'll remember the mysterious case of the disappearing John (Michaels original roommate) and Jacob (Michaels new roommate, and reason Michael basically moved into our room.)

I'll remember feeling a bit bad after not getting the job in the Computing Center in February, and then feeling great when I got the RCC job.

And I'll remember Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.

Despite the fact that I wandered through the semester at my own pace, taking each blow in stride and coming out on top for the most part, this was actually a difficult semester. It could have been harder, but it definitely could have been easier. (Though psych couldn't have been much easier, and yet I still will get a B+ or so...)

You know, I don't really have a point here. I'm rambling about the semester. I'll stop.

It really seems to me like the last month has just dragged by, but other than the last month, I can't remember much of my first year here at college. I spent most of it in my dorm room with Keith and Michael. I ate most of my meals with Keith and Michael. I saw most of the movies I saw with Keith and Michael... Yeah, well, for better or for worse, Keith and Michael had a significant impact on my first year at college. Thanks to them, I didn't get out and do much, and I didn't go out and visit other people too much, and I never had other people over here too much, because the room was already crowded, and they never had anyone over either...

I don't know, I'm not angry at losing my life to Keith and Michael, but sometimes I wonder what it would have been like otherwise. It certainly would have been different. I imagine next year will be different. I won't know my roommate at all that well, he'll probably be a freshman, I'll spend the first two weeks running around frantically fixing everyones computers, and I'll be living on a co-ed floor. Yeah, it'll be different?

Will it be better? I don't really know. Strange as it sounds, I look forward to not knowing my roommate that well to start with.

My last final was last night. It's 3 in the morning while I'm writing, so it was really only a little less than twelve hours ago, though it was still technically last night.

Anyway, my last final was my CS 61B final. It was long, and it was sloshy. I spent 4 hours on the test, and there was a good third of the class still working when I left. Clancy offered to stay as long as anyone was working, or until the Janitors kicked everyone out. I was grateful for the freedom to take my time, because while I could have been done in three hours, I would have been very rushed, and rushing on this test would have been a bad thing.

What do you mean by Sloshy?

I mean that for a lot of the questions, the right and wrong was pretty much non-existent. I imagine that the grading of the tests for the TA's will be a nightmare, and that the grading standards will be somewhat lacking. I'm sure some people will get screwed. I may very well be one of them.

Regardless, I feel I did as good as I could on the final. I didn't study beforehand. I didn't know what to study for an open note, open book, take as long as you like, test. I didn't know what to study for a final in the class whose subject matter is things which I am already intimately familiar with. So I didn't study. I don't think it hurt me. I looked up some stuff in the book for a couple of questions, and other than that, it was all just sloshy, open ended questions.

I don't feel incredibly well about the final, but the three people I have talked to about it felt the same way. So either everyone will do poorly, or everyone will do better than expected. I can't be sure. I'm sort of expecting a B+ overall for the class. Sure, I'd like an A, but I don't think it will happen, and I feel a B+ is acceptable in the context of the poorly run class, the A in 61c and the B in Math.

The night of May 19, 1999, Keith and Michael and I were watching The Simpsons, as we would be any other night. The episode in question just happened to be the first episode of the two part "Who Shot Mr. Burns" series, in which Lisa gets Tito Puente to be the instructor of the school Jazz program. Later that night, we went down to Shattuck and got in line to see Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. As we were standing in the line by Mr. E's (whatever Mr. E's is), I glanced over and saw a sign that said "Tito Puente, Jr: Need We Say More?"

Y'know, I still love these guys. Though it's not as though They have done anything to make me not love them, other than not come to visit me enough...

Seriously, though, while They don't have any tour dates planned for this coast yet (Though this is actually a good thing, because their current tour schedule doesn't run past the end of the summer, so if they were coming over here it would be way out of my way to go see them), there is another album coming RSN. The trick is, however, this album is being released only as MP3's, and will be sold by Emusic. The Long Tall Weekend will feature many tracks which were previously on Dial a Song or only performed at concerts, and I look forward to it greatly. If you go check out the Goodnoise site, They have a demo track of Older available to download for free, just to whet your appetite for what is coming.

I'm already wriggling my nine little toes in anticipation.