Things That Arent Studying

Things That Aren’t Studying Two weeks ago, my life was studying. On three consecutive days, I had 7.013, 8.02, and 5.12. (My brain is still recovering from the trauma.) So last week, I decided to make up for it bydoing a 9.00 essay? How, uh, relaxing. And now, to punctuate the beginning of this week, Ive got a 5.12 p-set, an 8.02 p-set, and a 9.00 test all to be taken or to be turned in on that same day. If I start sounding unintelligible, its because my brain cant do the think now because it thunk too hard and wants moosh made of it now blah. (Editors note: my spell-checker just insisted that thunk is actually a word. I hope they meant it was onomatopoetic) But luckily for me, I began procrastinating hardcore turned last week into a study break of dubious productivity. And I Gave people MRIs. Its one of those things that you could feasibly learn to do before learning to drive. Purely hypothetical situation, ladies and gentlemen. Pictured: mad geek cred.Building 46, home of the Brain and Cognitive Sciences department, has its own fMRI machine, and at MIT, there always needs to be at least two people manning the controls. There are green/blue badges and yellow badges, which are to the A.A. Martinos Imaging Center what drivers licenses and learners permits are to the roads. As with driving, practice makes perfect so naturally, Ive done 3 scans (and counting!) Ate a burrito THREE burritos. Including a double golden burrito! What does it mean?!When I first got my grub (on Wednesday-ish of that week), I despaired, since I wasnt quite sure whether it would turn into a triple golden burrito. But it did. (But on Saturday.) Auditioned for Mic Check and moved on! That might not seem like such a big deal, but its actually harder to make it through auditions than you might think. Just ask guest blogger Susan Shepherd. Personally, I wrote a slam poem lasting roughly five minutes a mere two days before auditions, then lost plenty of sleep as I memorized every line. Despite the complex internal rhymes and references, the stiff competition meant I had to wait a little longer to see if I had been accepted which, actually, is really awesome, since that means Engineers arent just engineers at MIT.But heres a fun fact: both my roommate and I are performing that night. Coincidence? Or was our room blessed by the patron saints of art? Ill leave that to wild speculation. Its worth noting that if I win any prize at all, I still wont be the first (prospective) doctor to make a living out of making rhymes. Laughed at bad chemistry jokes, because thats my life now. When chemists die, we Barium. Found on the internet! And some others! Like, Dead chemists are not remembered when they Argon a gem from Alex, one of my friends back in high school. Or a brain-teaser: If a bear in Yosemite and one in Alaska both fall into the water, which one dissolves faster? The one in Alaska, because it is polar. Nyuck nyuck nyuck. So punny, all of it. Binged on reading Reddit and various macros. Im particularly a sucker for Joseph Ducreux ones, because at one point of my life, I sort of wrote like that. Went 8-4-8 against a computer in Rock Paper Scissors. On Veteran difficulty. A hat tip to my boss, Chris Peterson, for finding this challenge. He equated it to playing Jeopardy with Watson and its an apt comparison, because it was kind of hard to get even those eight wins in edgewise. Its even worse when you consider that the program was probably designed to win or tie more than it lost.At some point, I may welcome the monopolization of RPS skills by robot overlords, but for right now, I still have a shred of pride. So for the time being, call me the Ken Jennings of Rock Paper Scissors. Wrote this blog post, punctuating my inability to reason with this procrastination vice. As comprehensive as this list seems, I know theres so much more that Im missing! So now, let me ask you, kind readers: How do you like to procrastinate?