Omar Abu

While on my way to the newly released movie Wanted, I saw something quite spectacular. I'll give you a hint. What do you get when droplets of rain interact with sunlight? A RAINBOW! This was unlike any rainbow I've ever seen though. Usually, I only see rainbows that are visible as a small arc in the sky, but this was completely different. This one spanned from one end of town to the other as bright as day. But wait, there's more! There was another full, although somewhat fainter, rainbow above this one. It was a magnificent sight.

As I was driving through town, EVERYONE was snapping pictures. At traffic lights, people stuck their heads out windows hoping to capture shots of the sky. In neighborhoods, people were outside their homes pointing and staring in awe. It was this beautiful thing smack dab over our town connecting everyone in a way.

Scroll through the photos, and if you desire a clearer picture of the scene I saw, check out the wikipedia article.








Now on to something more interesting. Wanted turned out to be a surprisingly engaging movie. I enjoyed the twists in the plot line and winced at the intense action. I found the story to be unique, especially taking pleasure in the novel ideas I had not seen elsewhere. Curving bullets around obstacles to reach a target is definitely a wickedly amazing way to shoot someone. To top it all off, there was an obscene amount of blood and killing, maybe even a little too much for me (keep in mind I play Grand Theft Auto IV a LOT). Anyway, I recommend seeing this movie at some point in your life whether in theaters or on DVD.

To end the perfect night, I finally got my AP scores, courtesy of the MIT 2012 facebook group and the people who practically announced it the second scores were available. After fumbling with the AP phone service for like 15 minutes because I clumsily pressed the wrong digits (that actually told me that I reached my error limit and must start over...so frustrating), I was told by the freaky robotic voice that I got 5s on the CS AB and both Physics C exams! w00t. Now I won't have to take 8.01. Now if only I did not have to take 8.02 or 18.02. ASE studying not ftw, but alas I must do it.

Well that's it for now. Good night all.

I just saw something amazing. I'm blogging from my phone in the car. Yea, it's that amazing. Pictures will come tonight. Keep checking!

For the past few days I've been hitting it up in downtown Pittsburgh, home of the Steelers, the smallest T ever, and a downtown that is closed by 5:00 pm (thank god the restaurants stay until at least like 9 ). There are some fun areas during the day, though, like the strip district (get your mind out of the gutter) that is a long strip on the outskirts of downtown brimming with all sorts of fresh food, such as bread and fish, and cool trinkets and the sorts. I also attended an arts festival, which featured art from all over the country from as far as Hawaii. I saw some incredible work, including these drawings that transformed famous pieces of writings into art. The next day, while I was meandering around downtown, a gay pride march began with people shouting, "We're here, we're queer, our families are real!" After the march, a gay pride festival started with bands, lots of food, and sumo wrestling (well pseudo sumo wrestling, you know with the suits)! It's so funny when people go down because they have so much trouble getting back up.

Now, why I'm really in Pittsburgh is not for the arts or for shopping, but because of the American Society for Engineering Eduction's annual conference, which is taking place in the Pittsburgh convention center. My parents always come so I decided to tag along and register. Today I'm going to attend a few lectures by MIT professors (including two bio(medical) engineering professors and explore the exhibition hall filled with companies showing off their amazing products. There's many companies from Mathworks (Matlab) to SolidWorks to National Instruments! I plan to wear my MIT shirt during the day and see what happens, sort of like an experiment. Anyone interested in seeing what happens? I already had one person in the elevator stop me and say, "Are you from MIT? I was class of '61!"

Well I better be off. I have many fun pictures that I want to post, but cannot because I only brought my firewire cable, and unfortunately the iPhone (along with all new iPods) does not have the firewire chipset for transferring data and syncing. I'll definitely post them later though once I'm home. Ciao!

"Do you know what a mathematician is? A mathematician is one to whom that [see below] is as obvious as twice two makes four is to you." ~ Lord Kelvin (a long time ago)



So do you pass this tried-and-true test?

For those who do pass, earn some extra credit by telling me how you found the answer (the square root of pi) when this integral's corresponding indefinite integral cannot even be solved.

I was perusing fellow MIT '12er Emily Zhao's blog and came across this great song. It's "Who's to Say" by Vanessa Carlton. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

I know I promised no more Apple related posts for a while, but I figured that since this is going to bash Apple and AT&T that you would perhaps forgive me. As I mentioned in the last post, the iPhone is now 200 bucks. Cool right? Amazing right? Affordable right? wrong :-( While I would expect this from AT&T - after all they are a conniving, bloodsucking phone company - I, along with everyone, expect more from Steve the man Jobs. So what's the problem? Well, let's go over it. The iPhone is 200 bucks on paper. Everyone from age 12 to 60 would walk into a store, see that price, hop up and down like little kids, childishly claim they want it, and hand over their seductive credit card, finally obtaining the shiny piece of metal they so desperately desire. They would have to sign the 2 year contract in store (more on this below) and then happily play with their iPhone for a month. One sad day a month later come the bills which are 70 bucks (without tax and the five extra bucks it is for texts), which then causes these unlucky people to drop their iPhones and yell excruciatingly loud. Why? Because these people have just realized how badly they had been cheated. Let's outline it.

| Old Plan | New Plan
-------------------------------
450 mins | 39.99 | 39.99

Data (req.) | 19.99 | 29.99

Texts | Included | 4.99
------------------------------
Total (-tax))| 59.99 | 69.99 (w/o tax)

Over the required two year period, you would end up paying an extra 240 dollars (24 months x extra $10) in the new plan. This essentially makes the iPhone $440 instead of the unbelievable $200 that it is advertised for. Now you see why AT&T is able to subsidize the iPhone for so much. In the end, they really are gaining much more, and because they require you to activate in store, they will no longer lose phones to unlocking unless the person does not care forking over 2000 dollars over two years. Overall, the process is now against the customer, as before activation occurred in the comfort of one's home and the phone plan was not so expensive. Despite this deceit, I still recommend the iPhone, since in actuality, all this pricing is beacuse of AT&T and not Apple, so don't ignore your thirst for technology just because the plan seems expensive. In my opinion, of all the phones out there, the iPhone does the best of really paying itself off in the form of usefulness.

Moving away from the iPhone, I have now submitted all my MIT forms that were due by today. I guess that's a good thing right!? My housing preferences are as follows in order: Simmons, Baker, Macgregor, and BC. I cannot wait to find out which one I am placed in. Does anyone know if we find out our roommate at the same time? I also submitted an application for the FPOPs. My desired FPOP is definitely the Mechanical Engineering one because building a soccer bot is without a doubt the best way to spend the last hours of the summer.

Well, this marks the end of my fun-filled post. Sorry there were no pictures. I'm a little tired from studying 18.02 and because of the lateness and so didn't feel like scavenging the vast space that is the internet for pixels to please your eyes. Instead I hope you enjoyed my table! Until next time, stay classy!

Excuse me for sounding like a 12 year old girl (referring to the title), but something amazing happened yesterday. Yes, I think you may know what I'm talking about. I finally saw the Blues Brothers. Oh wait...hmm...that's not so amazing... So if it's not that, I guess it could only be the new Apple iPhone! When Steve Jobs said 3G, the crowd went wild with shouts and cheers. On top of that, there is even GPS tracking. And wait, there's even more. It is only 200 dollars. In actuality, I really should have no reason to be happy considering that just docked the value of my current iPhone to next to nothing. Luckily, someone is willing to buy it off me for 150 (he is planning to unlock it). That way, the new iPhone will merely be an upgrade and not too expensive. Yes, like I've said many times, I AM an Apple fanboy.

Okay, this post will probably be the last of my obsessive posts over Apple for a while until of course I buy my Macbook Pro. What do I do in the meantime to distract myself from Apple? I play Rise of Nations: Thrones and Patriots. I've been playing late night LAN games with friends. As I haven't touched this game for years, I'm a bit rusty and did in fact lose in 25 minutes the other night. I will say though that the map we played was completely unfair considering that because of a lake, the computer team had to pass through me to reach the rest of my three teammates. That pretty much means I became a human shield for my team and was defeated in no time. Needless to say, I will build up my army from now on much quicker.

Regardless of my terrible playing skills, it is still an enormously fun game. I love watching soldiers with guns shoot down infidels with bows and arrows and submarines take down wooden ships. Ah, the beauty of rising civilization.

Nowadays, I'm just volunteering at the hospital and continuing my research. I begin in the lab again tomorrow and am stoked to once again open up leeches.

Yesterday, I spontaneously drove up to Grand Rapids for shopping. Today I was poked with a needle as part of the annual TB test required by the hospital I volunteer at. Tomorrow who knows what will happen (meh I do...probably watching OCW lectures lazily at home), but at least I'll be a day closer to MIT and a whole new world.

Hey everyone! I've finally graduated from both my schools (remember I went to two schools, half day for each). The past week has been fun since I've been going to a lot of recitals and open houses. In fact, today I went to 10. From 12 to 10 pm I was pretty much driving around trying to catch all the parties I wanted to attend. Oh poor me right :-p. Now that I'm out of school, which feels weird by the way, I'm looking more and more into MIT and what I want to do there. I'm really excited to be there next year, despite my reservations about how good of a school it is for premed. I'm trying to finish up all my forms that are due by next friday, but they are very important and I don't want to rush them. I think I'm going to choose Simmons for my first choice since I really liked the new feel and concrete architecture. I also am not sure about whether I want a freshman advising seminar or traditional advising.

My highlight this week was trekking out to the new Threadless store in Chicago. If you don't know what Threadless is please go to their website and see their amazing selection of clothes. They tell artists to design shirts and then let people vote on them. The best voted designs are printed on shirts that people can buy. These shirts are trendy and many of them are extremely hilarious. One of the most popular t-shirt designs is the Communist Party one, which has Stalin and many other Communist leaders with party hats and cups partying it up, representing a Communist Party. Get it! Anyway, I went to the store and giddily bought 6 shirts. They are priceless and a joy to wear, especially because of people's comments when I wear one. The one I wore today had a clown vomiting a rainbow into a toilet. Funny stuff.

In other news, the supposedly revamped 3G iPhone should be announced next week. I am considering buying it if I can sell my current iPhone and am stoked about what features it will have. I am truly an Apple fanboy. Check out this questionable picture of it below:



Well, now that I'm not extremely busy, I will keep trying to update this blog more frequently. Please keep coming!