There’s been a laptop craze going around lately, with Tom’s purchase of a used Powerbook, Nick’s job financed Travelmate 800, and Wheaties’s gift financed iBook. All the recent laptop purchases has made everyone else zealous. Both Aaron and Trolley are thinking about the purchase of one now, and I’ve already been sucked in.

Next week I’ll be ordering a Sager 5680 notebook, which I’ll be replacing my current desktop with. It has great specs, the only downfalls being a short battery life (which I can live with) and a rather large size/weight (which I’m willing to deal with). I’ll be getting the P4 3.0 GHz HT processor (woooo!), the 15″ UXGA TFT screen, the wireless LAN, and 60GB hard drive options. The best thing is that it comes with a ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 Pro (Pro!) which hasn’t quite started it’s product cycle in North America yet. I’ll be looking forward to dual head display, being able to attend LANs without needing a ride, and possible digital speaker output (which I have yet to take advantage of).

I had no idea what I was going to name this entry until I saw Shaolin Soccer again.

I’ve discussed weakness in the past, and how it is frustrating to be a “weak person”. Now I realize that I’ve confused weakness with acceptance, that acceptance is not a sign of weakness but of strength.

It’s not easy to accept something that is imposed. Sometimes it is all that can be done and one must allow a certain discomfort involved to be present. Sometimes accepting is the best solution, even though one may not like it. However, it’s easy to be a weak person. It’s easy to give in, easy to let things go. The difference lies in how much of ourselves we give up and how much we’re willing to give up, and being able to distinguish the two becomes a task based on experience and the people involved.

I believe that I’ve been both weak and accepting in the past. Both are still possible, although I think that I’m more accepting now due to an increase in confidence.

Being able to distinguish the two in myself has become ever harder.

The more I put hope in people, the more I get let down.

I finally beat Pat at table tennis, although he was running on fifteen hours of sleep over the last three days due to four midterms. I realized that I was letting him play offensively when I was adapting to his game, instead of playing more aggressive than him, forcing him to be defensive which is his weak point. It’s tricky playing him because he uses a strong and powerful forehand grip that limits his backhand capabilities, but plays mostly off his backhand. I end up having to adapt to his unique shots every time I face him. I can feel myself improving, especially the consistency and spin of my serves, which is always a good thing.

This was not what I meant to talk about tonight.

There are too many…frustrating people to deal with lately. So many things piss me off, manifested in so many different ways through different personalities. I’ve never really liked people in general, which has usually made it hard for me to make friends, although this has caused any actual friendships to be rather solid. I’m starting to believe that “hate” isn’t too strong a word. Even though I feel like I’ve been able to come a long way in my tolerance of others and of the human race in general, there are still times when I feel like putting an axe through someone’s head.

Everywhere I go in everything I do, I run into at least one person I can’t stand. I can’t begin to explain myself, because every time I try I get flustered. Even at the table tennis club, when all I want to do is forget everything and focus on a single goal, I run into annoying, cocky, social rejects. Even when I simply try to relax and hang out with my friends, there are people there who just seem created to rub me the wrong way.

It’s all made me appreciate the friendships I do have. Even when I think of all the vexing situations people put me in, I feel I have little to complain about. My closest friends completely make up for the fucking idiots I have to deal with all the time.

Sometimes, that’s just hard to keep in mind.