The Grove

You two are some of the smartest high schoolers I've ever talked to, and the only reason you doubt yourself is because you surround yourself with other very intelligent people. Compared to the general population of high schoolers, North and Bobble, you are brilliant.

5

Please remember that, okay? <3

When you talk to smart people a lot it makes you doubt yourself, but you have to remember that you are above the cut.

It's not a competition, and even if bobble has better grades in some areas, bobble is in a different field applying to different schools and therefore will have a different experience.

So there's no need to compare :)

/thus ends mick's soapbox and i will drink my cocoa

Prince North Læraðr

1:22 AM

But you have to be like a genius to get into some of these schools

Also I'm genuinely wondering if I should even apply to Northwestern

You need a whole freaking research paper

Sciborg

If you feel underqualified for a school, you don't have to apply. It's okay to keep your expectations reasonable. Private schools are hella competitive

Prince North Læraðr

But then again, maybe the research paper will be good for my academic resume in general

My mom also doesn't think I can get into any composition programs because She says I should have an entire portfolio done which like

She might be right ;-;

Sciborg

If a school is completely insane and has dumbass entry requirements, it's okay to just be like "it ain't the one." The fit and whether you would want to go is more important than being impressive or whatever

Don't just apply because it'd be impressive

What North feels comfortable with is more important than it being the Really Good School

Prince North Læraðr

;-;

Sciborg

If you truly genuinely love a school, it's okay if it's not like top 10 in the state or whatever. It's about where you genuinely want to spend your next four years.

I know multiple people whose parents pressured them into going to some really good school, got addicted to Adderall or became party drunks, and dropped out because the pressure was too much

Prince North Læraðr

1:27 AM

Well, the Wheaton Music contact person has been answering all my questions

Sciborg

Sounds like that is one of your "this is a good fit" schools, then. That's what matters

Prince North Læraðr

At least with Wheaton I've built a little rapport with the music admissions counselor or whoever she is :)

Recruitment manager

I need some reach schools though

Sciborg

You liking the school is what matters. If they seem really cool and you would feel good being there, that's where you should apply :)

Prince North Læraðr

Well, John Hopkins seems like a cool school too, and I can double major in Communications and Composition

Oh yeah I never told yall

Sciborg

Sounds great, apply there too!

But don't feel like you have to apply to the insane ones

Prince North Læraðr

1:29 AM

I'm looking into getting a degree (major or minor) in Communications so I'll have some useful degree

@Sciborg Well, John Hopkins is insane :P

At least their audition requirements are crazy though

Sciborg

Then decide if you want to go enough to do the insanity :P

And if you don't, don't apply

What does North want

Prince North Læraðr

Idk what North wants

North wants to go to a good college he can afford

That's what North wants

Sciborg

As long as you ask yourself what you want and not what your parents want or your peers are pressuring you into etc. That's all I care about

Prince North Læraðr

And then maybe plan on getting a JD

Sciborg

Borg is dadding you and Borg wants you to feel comfortable and happy

Prince North Læraðr

1:31 AM

Well, my parents have been trying to get me to see if I want to do something other than a music major

If I can't major in music, I'm going to major in communications

because i like talking

Sciborg

Communications is a neat degree! Lots of my friends did that and have great careers.

Prince North Læraðr

Yeah, it's actually a useful degree -_-;

Sciborg

You typically end up doing social work, psychology, or interfacing with people, i.e. analysts.

If you want to do it, go for it

Prince North Læraðr

uh oh

But I'm introverted as heck and get social anxiety sometimes

Sciborg

Well, Communications can also lead to social media or journalist stuff. Like being a social media person

Prince North Læraðr

1:33 AM

I want to go into Communications so I can learn how to do good public speaking and debates

Sciborg

Debating is also a good one, although I don't 100% know if "debaters" is a job

Prince North Læraðr

Yeah

Maybe a spokesperson

Sciborg

Being able to public speak very well is a great skill for marketing, managing, etc.

It applies to basically anything involving clients or people

Prince North Læraðr

Yeah - that's the appeal of communications major

And a good major for Law too

Though not as great as like philosophy or political science, but I need a degree that's useful for outside of law

Sciborg

My manager is hinting that he may scoot me into being a Business Analyst if i prove myself in the app developer position, and Analysts do a lot of client-interfacing, communications, public speaking, etc.

That's a great career path for a Communications person

bobble

1:34 AM

I'm familiar with the school I committed to. It's practically in our backyard, on the scale of good universities, and since it's the closest state school to the area, local competitions like using their buildings. (School is happy with this because they can ~~spread propaganda~~ convince smart local kids to choose them)

Prince North Læraðr

Hehe

Looks around at local universities near me

Sciborg

Local universities are awesome

Prince North Læraðr

Let's see... ooh competitive college there, insane college over there, local school that's also hard to get into... ah, the SoCal life

Sciborg

Ah yes, California :p

Prince North Læraðr

I'm considering applying to UCLA just because their campus is SO nice

But then Idk how good their music program is

But seriously UCLA campus is gorgeous

Sciborg

1:36 AM

"Local universities" near me is basically Ferris, Calvin, Cornerstone, GRCC, Aquinas, and a couple small Christian colleges

and obviously MSU and UM

California, meanwhile.... oh god :p

Prince North Læraðr

Why do three of those schools sound like Christian/Catholic universities

Calvin, Cornerstone, and Aquinas?

Sciborg

i think they are, yeah - Aquinas and Calvin for sure. I've never been to Cornerstone

West Michigan has a lot of them

Prince North Læraðr

Cornerstone just sounds like a Christian University

Sciborg

to my knowledge Cornerstone is a smaller community college, but i can check

Prince North Læraðr

@Sciborg I can't even begin to ist all the colleges that are like an hour to hour and a half drive from where I live

Sciborg

1:38 AM

California has so many colleges

Prince North Læraðr

Southern California itself has an insane number

There's so many I can't even

Honestly why even go out of state :P

Prestigious music conservatory? I can list at least four off the top of my head

Sciborg

Michigan: ah yeah we've got a couple lil colleges, pretty modest, and we got MSU and UM -
California: hold my beer

Prince North Læraðr

USC, Cal Art, San Francisco Conservatory, and that other One that only takes performance majors

Christian universities? Well, we got Biola, Azusa Pacific, and Pepperdine

Oh, also Cal Baptist

We have all the UCs which are like some of the best public universities in the country

Cal States

Hehe, Boston looking cute with your Havard and Julliard

Ever been to LA?

Sciborg

i've never been to California, no

bobble

Visiting family friends. Mostly just Chinatown

Prince North Læraðr

1:43 AM

Oh, I also forgot to mention Cal Tech and Stanford

Sciborg

the closest i've gotten to the west side of the U.S. is Tennessee

Prince North Læraðr

Ivy League schools: "We're the best :D" California: "Hold my beer"

@Sciborg Wait... that doesn't seem western to me

Isn't that like

Southeast of Michigan?

Sciborg

yes, that's the joke :P

Prince North Læraðr

You should visit California ~ we have great weather :P

And great food

Sciborg

one of these weekends I'm gonna just say "screw it" and drive to California just so i can torture North by being a total tourist and taking pictures of his landmarks

Prince North Læraðr

1:45 AM

And great traffic >:D

@Sciborg Meh, doesn't bother me

Sciborg

"HEY NORTH LOOK WHERE I AM"

Prince North Læraðr

As long as you don't ask me for where the Hollywood stars are :P

"You're from LA? Have you met -"

Sciborg

isn't the hollywood sign legally copyrighted now? i can't even take pictures of it :p

bobble

I dreamt I crashed your and sam's wedding and ate all the cake

Prince North Læraðr

@Sciborg It's been copyrighted for a while now yes

Sciborg

1:46 AM

@bobble seriously?? that's amazing

bobble

Granted, I couldn't actually find either of you, there were too many people

Prince North Læraðr

Hehe

Was tree there

bobble

Mostly l wandered around somewhere that looked vaguely like my parents' wedding video

Sciborg

now i want to ask Sam how he pictures our wedding but i'm a little nervous that will prompt a Serious Relationship Talk, so maybe later :p

Prince North Læraðr

Hahaha

bobble

1:48 AM

Tree was speechifying but it was something boring about marriage law so I went looking for cake

Sciborg

Honestly that's completely accurate to North

"According to Michigan law......."

We used to joke semi-seriously that since my gender isn't legally male yet, our wedding would look completely heterosexual on paper

"Yes Mr. Government Officer, we PROMISE we're straight, please ignore the fact that my bride is wearing a suit and tie and putting away the entire cake"

bobble

birdy is good at dadding

Am not sure if Rio is good at dadding, however...

Sciborg

gasp

i think Rio is an okay dad, maybe slightly bad at teaching moral lessons but otherwise :p

like, "it's okay to steal as long as they're rich bastards"

bobble

I don't think he falls into the "all murder is bad" camp

Sciborg

"all unjustified murder is bad, mijo"

bobble

1:57 AM

"okay, so what justifies murder?"

Sciborg

"......."

"....maybe we should go play cards"

bobble

why do I have the feeling this conversation has happened multiple times for them

Sciborg

rio always finds a way to change the subject so we never finish it

bobble

I sense a possible Character Conflict

... which will never, ever come up, right, Gray? :)

Sciborg

now i imagine the conclusion of Finding Rio will involve some Rio-Tifer arguing about Morals :p

"how can you lecture me on ethics when you were a pirate" and so on

Character Drama

bobble

2:02 AM

Would Rio ever pull the "I'm an adult and know better" card?

Sciborg

i hope not, no

that's the equivalent of pulling "i'm older than you so shush"

and Tifer's probably sick of that one

bobble

Especially because he's small for his age so people underestimate him

Sciborg

yeah - i would assume Rio tries his best to avoid pushing that particular button

but the Tree must come back before we can do Drama

HTM

@Sciborg You know you've made it in life when someone you haven't met in person has literal dreams about you :)

Sciborg

:P

i'm trying to recall if i've had a dream that involves bobblies, there may have been a bobblecrown on a bookshelf in one of my lost-in-a-hotel dreams

HTM

2:08 AM

And re the H******** sign, I believe there's a Tom Scott vid on that topic, but I currently have YouTube blocked

Sciborg

my anxiety medication gives me very vivid dreams sometimes, so i'm sure i've had a bobblie-related dream at some point but can't recall specifics

and yup, i heard about it through Tom Scott

"The H******** sign"

HTM

We dare not speak its true name

Sciborg

the Hollywood sign? audience gasps

HTM

@Sciborg No, no, what have you done???

Sciborg

FBI OPEN UP

HTM

2:11 AM

low rumbling

Sciborg

apartment door crashing

HTM

H̶̨̰̞͔̲̲̺́̾̓̐̆̏̓̓͌̚Ë̴̡̡̡̺̗̗͈̻̣̦̺̞́̽̾̔̏̒͋͂̒͊ͅ ̸̹̲̭͐̆͆̚̕C̶̢͇͕͎̜̦̭͈̈̐͂͐͐̅̌͒͛̄̇̑Ǫ̸̢̥̣̻͑͘M̸̲̫̪̥̪͚̑́̅̽̑͝Ê̴̩̦͕̩̦͉̮͓̟̤͆̍̚S̶̼̭͚̈́̿̕ͅͅ

(lol we're taking this two separate directions)

Sciborg

HTM

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Sciborg

I'VE AWAKENED THE HOLLYWOOD

RUN

HTM

2:15 AM

Forgive us for our sins!

bobble

Y'all are weird

HTM

@Sciborg Aaaaanyway... when I search "bobblie" (I know what that actually refers to btw), I get this

Sciborg

okay but was there ever a point where you thought we were normal?

@HTM welp, today i learned

bobble

I joined a website for Puzzling, this is what I expected

Perhaps a might queerer than originally thought, however

Sciborg

sorry, i'm worth like seven queers by myself so i throw off the whole balance

HTM

2:19 AM

in The Sphinx's Lair, Nov 12 '20 at 3:57, by HTM

If you've ever used Stack Exchange in any way, shape, or form, chances are you're probably a nerd

Corollary: Everyone who uses SE is weird. Period.

Sciborg

We call this "The Shibboleet Theorem."

HTM

The proof of which is currently not ready at this time because we have to shave our alpaca

Sciborg

And also we hate writing proofs with a burning passion of a thousand suns.

HTM

Math Overflow would like to have a word with you on that...

Sciborg

Let them at me, I'm skilled in nerd sniping

bobble

2:25 AM

0

Q: Finding a local normal form regarding distribution rank properties

I am working in geometry control field, fall last week on this exercice and I can't figure it out. I have a distribution $\mathscr{D}$ with $rank(\mathscr{D})=m+1$ in $\mathbb{R}^n$ with $n\leq 2m+1$. I know that there exists an involutive sub-distribution $\mathscr{L}\subset\mathscr{D}$ with ran...

first question on their homepage

Sciborg

i don't even know what half of those words mean

HTM

Amazingly, I can kinda understand what that's talking about

Sciborg

are you okay, htm

HTM

It'll probably be years before I fully understand though

Sciborg

we're here if you need therapy, htm

HTM

2:26 AM

(I'm currently taking algebraic geo and have done some abstract algebra, if y'all are wondering)

@Sciborg Thanks for the offer, but I already have that covered (thankfully)

bobble

there's a precious person on MO (Math Overflow) who is posting questions as a proxy for their son, who is currently imprisoned but is using the time to learn high-level math

Sciborg

i got through most of my college's math minor track and squeaked through Calc IV, but had to quit at the last hurdle. advanced vector spaces and higher math was too much to handle

chemistry minor was easier and let me do a lot of fun science

@bobble imprisoned??

HTM

@bobble Aw, that's really nice of them to help out :)

bobble

213

Q: Need advice or assistance for son who is in prison. His interest is scattering theory

The letter below is written by my son. I have been sending him text books and looking for answers on the internet to keep his interest up. He has progressed so far on his own and now he needs direction and assistance from a professional in mathematics. Any advice or assistance you can provide is ...

advice research

Sciborg

it's nice the guy is helping out his son, it sounds like he was sentenced pretty young so i imagine it was one of those dumb-kid things that he regrets now.

poor guy

the only people i know who went to prison that young went because of dumb mistakes

HTM

2:32 AM

Letter states "I'm 25, I've been in prison for the past 6 years..."

Sciborg

i just hope it was for something like "got drunk at a party and mooned a cop" and not assault... :/

HTM

Man, how is it that a prisoner has more motivation to study than I am? I better step up my game

@Sciborg Regardless of what it was, it seems they aren't bothered by it that much anymore, so that's good

Sciborg

Yeah. Six years is a long time, though... makes me wonder

Hopefully they're working through it, I guess

bobble

> He is currently serving a prison term for a OWI causing death.

using equipment while drunk

Sciborg

.....ah

bobble

2:36 AM

oh, drunk driving

Sciborg

takes too many lives. i hope he learned his lesson.

multiple people i know got messed up by drunk drivers

i'm not sure that's something to laugh about :/

HTM

@PrinceNorthLæraðr Oof, not sure you should be saying that in this context...

Prince North Læraðr

Oh I completely misread that

I completely did not realize what the context was

HTM

Hey, don't worry, you know now

No but seriously this is some really inspirational stuff, I'm gonna bookmark that post and go back to studying now

Prince North Læraðr

Yeah

Sciborg

2:41 AM

On a primal level it's hard to forgive drunk drivers, but i know sometimes you mess up and sometimes it unfortunately hurts people and that's no reason to carry hate. If he learned his lesson and can forgive himself i guess that's what matters.

bobble

from the timeline given in the question it seems he was in college at the time, probably went to a party and then made the stupid decision to go home drunk driving

Sciborg

yeah. and it's really sad that stupid choices can end an innocent life and he would never have wanted to do that. but i guess sometimes that's life.

poor guy. probably haunted him

bobble

bobble promises birdy to not drink and drive

Sciborg

birdy-dad is glad

have a kitten in a bowtie

HTM

Sometimes it takes a tragedy for real personal change to occur... I just hope I don't have to experience one personally

bobble

2:50 AM

@Sciborg i want TWO kittens in bowties now

gimme gimme

HTM

(Guess this is as good of a time to say this as any...) I don't think I ever revealed this to you all but... I've been struggling with my academics the past few semesters, and I'm pretty certain I will fail most of my courses this semester

Sciborg

@bobble i cannot find any ;-;

HTM

I'm seriously doubting my ability to even graduate, let alone perform well

Sciborg

Hey, man. That's rough. I'm sorry :(

bobble

I assume you've already exhausted your ability to get tutoring?

HTM

2:52 AM

@bobble No, this is an issue of motivation - I've barely turned anything in for any of my courses

Sciborg

Are you in the solutions phase or the feelings phase?

HTM

You all may have noticed that I somehow appear to be on this site 24/7 since I'm almost always prompt to reply to pings. Well that's because I can't bring it to try and "make up" all the past stuff I've missed, so I hang out on here to avoid having to do any real work

Well now finals are coming up within three weeks, so I can't escape anymore

Sciborg

That's really rough, dude. It's been a very tough year in general so I imagine this is just kinda your culmination of stress. It's nothing to be embarrassed about.

Have you talked to your therapist?

HTM

@Sciborg I've talked extensively about this with many people, including my therapist. The problem is really enacting any plan - it's the first moment when I start doing something that's always the toughest

I've also realized that I want two competing things right now: academic/professional success, and freedom from stress. So far I have not been able to reconcile those two

Sciborg

It sounds like this is an executive problem - you're overwhelmed and having trouble getting started in the first place, let alone contemplating finishing things.

You're 100% not alone on that, I imagine.

HTM

2:55 AM

Definitely not, but it sure does feel like it sometimes

Sciborg

I think if you talk to your classmates you'd hear similar stuff - college students in general are struggling this year just because it's a very stressful time to be alive, with Covid and financial problems and etc.

HTM

Stuff like that MO post remind me that even though I've messed up so much, I still have opportunities ahead of me - I just need to learn to seize those opportunities

@Sciborg I know someone from one of my English classes from freshman year who's also having a similar problem with completing coursework, only for him it's even more dire because he's also on financial aid, and any bad performances could potentially mean he has to drop out

Sciborg

Yeah - you are absolutely not alone on this. The main thing that is good to remember is that this doesn't lessen your value or worth as a person. You are seen and you are important and you shouldn't judge yourself as an individual based on how a school thinks of you.

HTM

@Sciborg I wish I could believe that... but literally every piece of evidence I see around me says otherwise

And like I said, I do desire academic success as well as the ability to perform well in high-skill situations, so it's not like the pressure is completely external

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