Hacking Europe

Chicago Apartments

fatal-error — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 03:02:20 +0000

I hate looking for apartments. There is always that dream loft apartment just out of my price range. I’m going to go thrifty this time tho, I’m going to move in with some old roommates that I can stand and know pretty well. I gotta run for now, another few days of work and then DefCon! Woot!

Jag talar ut

fatal-error — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 23:55:58 +0000

I speak out … I don’t really have anything to say right now so I’m just saving the title.

iPhone 3G = iSucks

fatal-error — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 23:13:03 +0000

Ok, so it’s not that bad. My real quarrels with it have to do with the keyboard and the infamous keyboard lag issues. Otherwise it’s a solid handheld device with an interface generations beyond it’s time. The exchange integration isn’t really where I’d thought’d they be either. However for what I wanted it for, media player + phone + organizer and emergency Wikipedia … it’s pretty good.

I gotta run, DePaul sent my outstanding balance out to collections already. I have to make sure that doesn’t hit my credit history. You would think DePaul would make some effort to make contact with me BEFORE they send it off, however they ship it off and then call me …

… Still Busy …

fatal-error — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:07:25 +0000

I’m still really busy, I love work … and I’m going to get an iphone g3 Friday. Maybe I’ll get around to posting some pictures.

Super Busy

fatal-error — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 22:44:38 +0000

It’s great that I love my job, but it’s also bad. It takes up the majority of my time. I have to ignore other aspects of life ( social ) in order to fulfill my career goals. Speaking of being ignored, DePaul and the administration has also been ignoring me. I even owe the money, you’d think they would be all over me about that … Anyways I’m sure it will get cleared up, but I still haven’t heard any of the plans for getting us taken care of … Nor have I heard anything about the visas for the others …

Portable Faraday Cage

fatal-error — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 02:27:45 +0000

***/Tech Rant/***
This is more of a personal note then a post, but oh wells … anyways I was working on this RFID thesis and I had this little jolt of an idea which I want to test out and build now that I’m back home. Anyways the idea is a portable Faraday cage. It might be possible to build this into a briefcase, with wire mesh, foil, maybe a counter source etc., … now how might a portable Faraday cage be useful, well protecting your laptop against EMP blasts, protecting certain RFID chipped travel documents *cough* U.S. Passport *cough* … but for the criminal, if your able to prevent or seriously distort the passing of electronic / radio signals you could place an expensive RFID tagged item into the briefcase and pass right through the readers without setting off the alarms … I need to check it out, it probably has already been done but I thought it was interesting.
***/End Rant/***

Anyways I’m super busy at work and most of my writing energy is going into the journal assignment. I’ll post some parts of it when I turn it in.

Freedom!

fatal-error — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 17:34:51 +0000

Alright well, first off the final seminar went ok. It was like a communal learning experience. It wasn’t hard to tell that everyone didn’t read all the papers. But what people did read from your paper they got the general idea and was able to ask something or comment about your paper. I don’t think that our papers can be considered real theses but we certainly learned about what they should be. Jack and I barley passed the thesis course. The grading scale was ABCDEF which is a little odd, but none the less we got a E. In the grand scheme of things I failed. I am missing two credits from France. I believe that the administration didn’t get the grades back from one of my retake exams in time for graduation and the Swedes are pretty firm on not giving out the degree with out conformation of completed course work. Worst case is that I failed the class and will have to retake the final in Chicago. The good news is that all of the hard stuff is out the way like the thesis, Finance and Project Management. So I guess I will eventually get my degree but I do not want to pay DePaul until I am absolutely certain of this.

On another note we have this final journal assignment due the end of the month. I’ve been going back through initial part of this blog and trying to bring up memories from last year. Since doing this I’ve noticed a lot of changes. I feel like I’m more aware of whats going on around me. I feel like I’m always on edge over here on the ball so to speak, constantly trying to figure things out, conscience of what I’m doing, how I look etc, what people are talking about, just trying to get the sense of flow and normality. I think overall I’ve learned that the notion of normal is irrelevant. I keep striving to be normal … to fit in, to not be out of place. In a major sense I think that this kind of constant re-checking myself is pointless but I think it’s what keeps me in check.

My views on society and culture has also changed dramatically. Culture as I see it is this social set of rules that are considered normal by a society, like France’s double kiss greeting and Sweden’s obsessive desire for orderliness through the facet of numbered lines. Anyone can fit in to a point of coalescence by accepting and following these rules in a fluid manner. This point of acceptance can be seen as normal. Before I left for Europe, I was concerned with fitting in, making easy transition to a different lifestyle. I think it’s important to be aware of these things, but in any case there will be that weirdness when you get that cheek to cheek contact or the lady at the deli looks at you like your crazy because you forgot to take a number. I think it’s going to be interesting to see how these experiences carry with me later on when I’ve be re-integrated with the American culture.

On a more practical note, I sent some packages off today via Air Cargo. They are going to be waiting for me at the airport which is really neat. Not only was it 2000sek cheaper and its much faster too. Anyways the France vs Romania game is on and then the Netherlands vs Italy, I’ve got money on both games CentSports be sure to mention my name if you sign up, I get 5% on top of whatever you win!

Burned Out

fatal-error — Sat, 31 May 2008 23:57:29 +0000

Alright, I finally have a minute to get some things out there. After working relentlessly on this thesis I took a short break and flew over to Berlin for a few days. It was pretty sweet, I saw checkpoint charlie the Ristag and other government buildings, walked the wall line and even drove the little eastern European convertible! We did it all pretty cheap too.

Anyways we are back and we have to work on a presentation for the final seminar. Now from what I understand of this process, we are graded on our presentation of the thesis. The kicker is that we are not presenting our own thesis, we are presenting on someone else’s thesis. Now on one side I see the point of this, they want to see how well we can dig into a paper and analyze it. But this means that the whole process is “qualitative”. It’s based on how well the mentor’s think we understand about the process through a presentation. I completely disagree with how they are grading this. All that is needed to pass is the ability to present well. I also heard that they are going to try and keep track of who is participating in the discussions of the theses. This is the main thing at the moment, I have some other projects I need to work on like Showasis and my portable faraday cage.

I gotta run for now and get some sleep ….

Mood : exhausted

Busy

fatal-error — Thu, 29 May 2008 15:40:06 +0000

Delayed post until this weekend when I have some time.

Nothing Today

fatal-error — Thu, 22 May 2008 15:25:34 +0000

Super busy, still working on this thesis like a mofo, evidently it will never be perfect and I’m sick of working on it. Anyways I passed Project Management, so all I need is Finance ( doesn’t look good, the study material they gave us was shit and incomplete ), Strategic Marketing ( which was also shit, only 4 classes, thoes four classes sucked, kids were singing and talking … during class and the only materials for the final was the class so I have to track down the powerpoints ), and this thesis.