Happy holiday to all, whatever we’re celebrating. We’re
having our annual three-day weekend here at Harvard. I thought I had a lot of
free time, so I scheduled a bunch of things, and then I discovered I had almost
no time left over, but it’s working out. Also, I have all three of my midterms
next week, so that’s going to be fun, but at least they’ll be over with.
What have I done this week? I suppose the largest event was
the Navy and Marine Corps Birthday Ball. I’ve ended up helping with set up
every year, so this time I figured I would actually volunteer to help. It went
pretty quickly; not that much needed to be done. I was there from around one in
the afternoon until around eight in the evening – we started earlier this year
– and then left when the dancing started to get going. I needed sleep.
Sunday I went to church, which ended, as it does every year,
with the sounds of the brass bands marching in the annual Honkfest parade
outside. I have yet to figure out what, exactly, this parade is for, but I walked
back next to it, just like I do every year, before turning off to go back to
the Quad. After church I got some work done, although I wish I’d spent more
time outside. We’ve had a little rain, but the weather has been pretty nice,
and the trees are starting to change. Sunday night a friend came over, and we
watched TV and ended up talking until past eleven.
On Monday I went apple picking for the first time with Cru.
Fall is a big thing here, and we drove about an hour to a huge orchard and
spent about an hour clambering around hunting for apples. You pay for a bag of
a certain size to put apples in, so three of us split one, and we each ended up
with quite a few apples to take home. They also sold doughnuts and pies and
cider, but I passed. Afterwards we came back to the Quad for chili and
conversation.
The other event of the weekend was someone’s setting off the
fire alarm at 1:30 Saturday morning, much to my annoyance. Not that they woke a
ton of people up; I think most people were still awake. They had to call the
fire department to check it out. There was no fire, but at least we know if
there ever is, the fire department will be there and ready to go. It also
helped me practice my reaction times. Upon waking up to the alarm, I took the
time to change into proper clothes and brush my hair before grabbing some stuff
and leaving. And I still made it out before some of the people who were already
awake. Go figure.
I spent most of
Friday night attempting to write an essay explaining a very technical philosophical
account of personal identity. It’s surprising how hard defining a person
actually is. You can’t define a person solely in terms of his body, because you
can imagine people switching bodies. You can’t define a person by means of a
soul or spirit, because that’s ‘spooky stuff’, and in any case, that still
leaves you having to define a soul or spirit, which is no less difficult. Most
people attempt to define a person in terms of his memory – eg only I have my
memories from my perspective. But that leads to all sorts of problems if
memories can be transferred or transplanted into multiple people… In any case,
the topic is complicated enough to have a class dedicated to it.
In any case, life has suddenly become a lot more stressed,
and I’m going to need a Sabbath soon, but I’m okay for now. I haven’t needed to
worry about school for a long time; it’s probably good for me; it gets my blood
going. The next few weeks are looking pretty busy, but that just means time
will pass all the faster. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing,
but I can’t stop it, so I might as well look on the bright side.
Well, that’s about all for this week. Classes are going
alright; I’m a little stressed, but not terribly. And things will be much
better after midterms are over, hopefully. I’ll be right in the middle of them
the next time I post – we’ll see how it goes!
Pictures:
So... this is how I view MIT:
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