The year has gone by so quickly – I could never have imagined even half of the things that happened this year. Drawing from experience, I can only infer that I will have absolutely no idea what events may transpire over the next 365 days.

However, that is not to say that I don’t have any hopes for the upcoming year. I’m going to be moving down to my new apartment in June, on the first day of Senior Week. I’m fairly nervous because I have never lived in my own place before, and I feel like I will be lonely and unable to take care of myself. However, I’m hoping that I’ll be able to have fun even when I’m by myself and be able to better myself while I’m doing it. Maybe this means cooking a fancy dinner once a week for practice, or making myself follow a work out regimen so I don’t get fat.

Another hope of mine is that I can find a good hobby to do in the evenings or weekends. I still do miss singing, perhaps an opportunity will come up where I can begin singing again. A choir? Another A Cappella group? Or who knows, maybe I could even be in a band! Dream big, they say, right? Maybe I’ll pick up an interesting sport, like rock climbing, or biking.

I’ve been thinking about getting better speakers. I love the Creatives that I own now, but they’re about 7 years old and the remote is starting to die on them. I want to get a home audio receiver and probably stereo speakers. It’s going to take a lot of research (and money), but hopefully I will have the ability to gather both of those in the near future. Luckily, I received a $100 GC to an electronics store, so I’ll be able to take advantage of that. Even with that, I’m guessing I’ll spend about 400 total.

Of course, work is going to be a big aspect of my life. I think my biggest goal for the next year is to absorb and to learn as much as I can about the working world. After 16 years in the school environment, I will be finally putting whatever skills I’ve learned to the test, and I certainly hope that they are up to par. I’m also aiming to be more up front when I have a question, rather than spending excessive amounts of time to complete confusing tasks.

Finally, I want to be truer to myself (cliché, of course. This should be true for everyone) but also to my friends. There have been a ton of new people in my life this past year, and I want to make sure that I can keep being friends with them, and continue to make even more friends.

Well we’ve finally come to the last day of this long journey. Thirty posts in Thirty days – I wasn’t sure that I could do it. Even though I was unable to totally follow all the rules, I at least made sure that I had a post for each “sleep cycle” that I had. Thanks everyone so much for reading my blog – I hope you’ve learned something interesting about me, or that I caused you to think of something in your own life.

Thanks for reading Byronasaurus!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

May 2009
BME 307 Hell, Meeting LIFE group people, 2nd Allnighter of college, Dillo Day (Decemberists, Tally Hall, Mike Posner, N.E.R.D), Discovered Dropbox,

June 2009
Finished Junior year, Senior Week (Charis, MCA, Portillos, Dutch Blitz), Missed flight home, CCC Annual Concert, MJ Passes, HTC Hero Announced

July 2009
Move to Berkeley, New roomate!, BASE Begins, Lots of new friends!, Meeting up with Berkeley buddies, School with the Sis!, Visit to SunPower and Cisco

August 2009
Second time I meet Wayne!, Internship with Aruba Networks, Hang out with Stephanie for Ramen, Breakfast with Carrie and Kenny, Yogurt and always lots of fun with Katie, Meet up with Jerry in Mt View

September 2009
Visiting new baby cousin in LA, Panda Bread with Lanvy and Kristine, TC50 setup and volunteer (Hangouts with Maya, Dan, Leo, Fan, Nik!), Zune HD Released, Back to start Senior year, LIFE Group (even more friends!)

October 2009
Starting Job search, BME 390’s idiocy begins, John Legend Concert (Schapiro’s Inaugural Ball), SWE Industry Day (First encounter with Pepsico), NU Wins Homecoming, At Michael+Christine’s introduction

November 2009
Pepsico Interview day, Slivka, Thanksgiving dinner, Get my job offer

December 2009
Finals, Going home, No ski trip, Boeing 787’s first flight, Christmastime at Squaw Valley

January 2010
New Years party (Tiff, Carrie, Kenny, Myles, Tina), CES (Meet up with Calvin and see Pauley Perette)

February 2010
Spending tons of hours in 355 lab, making new friends (Brian, Meredith – woo lab), Celebrasia, David Choi concert

March 2010
NUvention 1st quarter pitch, Spring Break Cruise – Bahamas! (Messed up flight plans, lots of food, karaoke bar daily, Steven’s B-day karaoke), Calvin’s BWW Birthday

April 2010
Apartment searching, TASC Listening Party (Cynthia Lin, Vienna Teng, Shanghai Restoration Project), Stacy’s surprise birthday, Chicago surprise niceness (Charlotte, Tim, Teddy, David), NUVC Pitch Competition, Passion Pit Concert

May 2010
Lots of birthdays, Tiramisu for Vania, Squishable for me, Tango Sur for Matt, Publican for Alan, Dillo Day (Regina Spektor, Guster, Super Mash Bros, Nelly), Signed apartment lease

A lot of new things this year – thanks everyone for making it amazing. There are about 2 weeks left of school, and then I’ll be shifting into a whole new life again. Cheers to change!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

The first picture of me at NU. Fling at the Field Museum – 9/2006. The first group of friends I met at NU: Joyce, Sandra, Nick, Yee Hoong, and Christina. It’s been a long 4 years, kids, and I would have to say that it has been pretty awesome.

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

12:00 AM – Woot Off! Really, what else needs to be said

2:00 AM – Purchased my domain name! I’m really quite excited! You can now get to my blog from byronasaurus.com. It is a bit silly, but I like it, and I hope you do too! Unfortunately, that URL is only a redirect, but I’m working on getting it to be the top level!

9:30 AM – Woke up this morning, fairly late. I had this really interesting dream. I had a really long “brick loft” style studio, with a gallery window. It was on the first floor and right next to a cafe i frequented often. Man, if only that was my place – that was really cool! Unfortunately, dream. Internet-ed for a while, because that is what I love.

11:00 AM – Got hungry, made myself three slices of wheat toast with Nutella. Seriously, if you don’t like Nutella – oh wait, that’s nobody! Ha! Watched NCIS: LA. It was dramatic, as usual. Still fun, though.

12:30 PM – Some more internet! There is a lot of internet to do this week, because TechCrunch Disrupt is currently happening in NY! I’m not really following it as closely as I would follow TC50, though, by virtue of “I’m not there.” Also, school kind of takes a lot of time.

1:00 PM – Showered, because having classes late in the day allow me to do it. Also, because I was hoping that someone would want to play tennis with me in the morning. No such luck!

1:30 PM – Leftover pizza from previous nights! It actually was really quite delicious. Pizza is always a success, I think. Well, not always, but it is easy to be a success. Also watched some Digimon: Data Squad, because that is how I roll. Also, because I’ve watched the first 4 seasons earlier this quarter. I’m not really making myself look to good here am I?

3:00 PM – Went to Tech to scan my drivers license for some stuff. Bumped into Chiarng napping outside, because evidently it is too cold inside Tech. Apparently he has class with Ryan, Mike, and perhaps Erick. Also found Zach, John, and Stacy in Tech Lab, and passed by Grace in her Bio lab. So many people!

3:30 PM – Had a guest lecture for NUvention – the Vice President of Product Development at Groupon, Suneel Gupta! He’s a pretty cool guy, and he had a lot of good words to say to us about the entrepreneurship space. He was very adamant about his last point: When making decisions, go ahead and take that risk. Very characteristic of this generation of entrepreneurs – all the good ones stick their necks out.

7:00 PM – Dinner cooking time! On the menu tonight: Mustard Pan Friend Detroit Style Chicken and Mixed Vegetables with Goose Island Summertime. The chicken isn’t really that fancy – its the same hot sauce as last time, and chicken breast that was pan fried in mustard instead of BBQ/Basted with honey.

9:00 PM – Prepared the tour for my team’s (Enthusiast Apps) demonstration for a client tomorrow. I went through and found various interesting tidbits (ok, maybe just one) that would be useful for demo.

11:03 PM – Now. I’ll probably be up for another 2-3 hours, just poking around at the internet and/or homework. I need to plan the remainder of the week too, since lots of fun stuff is coming up!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

Ga-In of Brown Eyed Girls. She has the most amazing eyes. It is the crazy. Also, when she smiles, it just seems so genuine, it makes me melt. I wish that I had those features – I feel like I just appear really disingenuous sometimes, even when I’m trying to be totally honest about my happiness.

Matthew Mitcham – Australian Olympic Gold Medalist Diver. He is a diver. By definition, he has a good body that I would probably kill for. Makes me wish that I had been a diver, been really good, and then gotten famous. But maybe more on that later.

Short post today, by virtue of me having been playing this evening (woo pizza!) I do believe that my apartment was cleaner after people left than before they came. Awesome!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

So I guess this is, in a way, cheesier than it is inspirational. It was a viral video that went around about a month ago. Basically, it has a lot of the memorable lines from movies that were inspirational or were used to garner support and enthusiasm.

But really, though it might be over the top, it means a lot that there are so many movies that are so inspirational. Goes to show that the human race can always use some more inspiration.

What gives you inspiration? Maybe you can share it with me, because nothing really comes instantly to mind for me.

PS. As I tagged this, I found that i also tagged the post from 3 days ago as inspirational – the song that makes me cry (or not). Check that out if you need inspiration, I suppose!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

I actually haven’t really purchased anything recently. I’ve been really quite frugal these days, since I’m realizing that my money supply is decreasing at an alarming rate. The fact that I am no longer working also hurts. The stuff I end up buying these days isn’t really that interesting.

I could tell you about my latest trip to Dominick’s (Safeway, for the California Kids), and what I bought (2 Gal 2% Milk, 18 eggs, Chicken Fillets, Sirloin Beef, Jalapeño Cheddar Focaccia, Goose Island Summertime) but that is also not very intriguing.

However, just because I personally haven’t bought interesting things does not mean that I will not be! One thing that people might find interesting is my living space for the upcoming year!

I’ll be living in a studio at 474 N. Lakeshore Drive. It’s a 61 story building that is right off of Lakeshore and E. Illinois. This picture above is actually the only really good one i have showing the space. But! I’ve got two from a craigslist posting of a similar unit that show the rest of the unit.

It’s a pretty nice unit. However, from these pictures, you do not see the real gem of the apartment – the view!

The unit faces west, and the building to the west is 3-4 stories. Since units in this building start on the 16th floor (coincidentally, where the pictured deck is), there is a beautiful unobstructed view for a while to the west. North and Southwest views are of a park, and short buildings, so it’s actually really quite amazing.

It’s kind of crazy thinking that I’ll be living in a unit by myself – I’ve become accustomed to living with friends all around. I’m probably going to start moving the week before graduation. In order to reduce the possible loneliness, please visit me! For the NU kids, its only a 10 minute walk from the Intercampus stop!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

I don’t really know much about art, but I follow a blog called “Today and Tomorrow”, that finds a lot of really interesting pieces of art on the internet. Two series I liked are shown below.

Stukenborg

This guy uses a printing press to create his art. However, instead of using letter tiles like a normal press, he uses the faces of dice and makes various arrangements. I think someday I’d like to purchase one of these prints (or at least make them) because it is really quite simple, and they really do look good. It’s amazing how much you can do simply with 6 different patterns. Definitely check out his store on Etsy – there is a lot of cool stuff.

Nina Katchadourian

This woman uses books as her medium, using the titles printed on the spines to create witty/interesting/intriguing phrases. It’s funny how we always have stacks of books on tables or in our bookshelves, and we walk by the library shelves and never really notice how the titles and words may line up.

Art, although sometimes foreign, is sometimes quite intriguing

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

This is kind of a weird prompt. Songs don’t really make my cry, but they make me want to dance sometimes?

Well, today, I decided to write about a song that is pensive and such.

Sade – By Your Side

It’s about how someone will always be there to help you up when you’ve fallen, to help lead you back onto the path if you’ve strayed. “Oh, when you’re cold, I’ll be there, by your side”.

Listen to it! Maybe if you’re feeling down this will make you not cry, but to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days

La Familia at the oldest restaurant in the world! It is called Sobrino de Botín (wiki). As the wikipedia article says, the painter Goya may have worked at the restaurant. Hemingway also writes about it in one of his books. Therefore! It is a pretty cool place.

Ah, family vacations – gotta love it! Especially when it comes to art museums and not being allowed to take photos I believe this grainy thing is Dali. I’m not a big aficionado, so I wouldn’t know – my sister might be able to recognize it though. Of course, my sister is one of those risky types, so she got a not too bad picture of…

Guernica, by Picasso! It was also pretty cool being able to see the sketches of portions of Guernica. Madrid + Spain was lots of fun – and so are family vacations!

For more info: 30 Things in 30 Days