Well, I wish I could say “Happy New Year!!” But, my new year started from one of the worst news. Dr. Thelen who was my mentor at IU has passed away. So, who is Dr. Thelen? I am pretty sure most of you have no idea who she is, but if you are in the field of developmental psychology or kinesiology, you must have read her articles or books once. When I started working with her, I had no idea who she was nor what the hell was developmental psychology or dynamic system theory was. I was just looking for the lab I could work, so I could fill full the research experience credits which were required for everyone who was majoring in psychology at IU. Actually, Dr. Thelen’s lab was my second choice to work. At that time, I was more interested in clinical psychology, so I contacted one of the professors from clinical psychology department. Of course, his lab already had enough students, so I contacted Dr. Thelen because well, I just randomly picked! Duh! But, seriously, I do think I am the luckiest guy on the earth! I was lucky enough to pick her email address from the faculty list, and I was lucky enough to work at her lab! I still vividly remember the day I met Dr. Thelen for the first time! She wanted to interview before she let me work her lab, so we had a meeting on 8am, sometime September, 2000. I couldn’t get into the lab because I got there the way early, and the door was locked. I was kinda confused if I was at the right lab (well, right door!!). Then, I saw the middle age lady came in to the building. So, I asked her if she could tell me where Dr. Thelen’s lab was. She didn’t understand for the first time because well, I guess my English was sucked. She looked at me and seemed to be kinda confused. So, I asked her again “Do you know where Dr. Thelen’s lab is?” Then, she was full of smiled and said to me “oh, you must be Ken!” Yep, she was Dr. Thelen! After our initial contact, she unlocked the door and showed me around her lab. She told me that she was interested in me because I majored in both psychology and computer science. I was like “Ooooh yay! I can get research credits!!!” because I was desperate to find a research lab. I really didn’t care what she was doing! But, well, after I worked at her lab for couple semesters, I was hooked!! I was hooked with her!! She is the one put babies on the treadmill and discover the relationship between infants’ weight gain and motor control! I mean, C’mon!! Who thought about that! Putting babies on the treadmill!? During the lab meeting, she told us that she wasn’t sure how her research proposal got through the IRB!! It was just so amazing to learn what she had done. I read a lot of her articles, and they were just awesome. Her writing style was sooooooo beautiful. She never used big words. I even could understand what her points were. Although she was well known scientist, she was super ultra down to earth!! She didn’t like us to call her “Dr. Thelen!” So, we just called her “Esther.” How cool is that!! I still call the professors “DR~” here!! I am in the grad school, but my professors don’t let us call them with their first names!! Well, Dr. Thelen was super cool, but at the same time, she was tough!! When I was working my honor thesis, she just gave me tons of articles (which were super hard to understand) and expected me to read all of them over the weekend and wrote something about them. She didn’t like the people didn’t work hard because she worked super hard! She was supervisor, co-author, reviewer, coordinate for international conference, etc etc… I still cannot figure out how she managed to make a time to have meetings with me!! I was just one of the stupid students! Well, this is kinda long blog, but my point is, she changed my life. She changed my academic goal. She inspired me soooooooo much! I can write about Dr. Thelen forever!! I know I am just one of her students, but I really really feel super luck to know her!

Thank you Ester.

Mmmm, so I gained almost 10 lb in the past couple months. I am suspecting that’s because of the meds I am taking right now. Well, but still, as a guy who has very distorted self body image, I have been freaking out. So, I stopped by the Vitamin Shopper store and bought CortiSlim. Yes, as seen as on TV thingy. Ugh! It cost me $29.95 for a bottle which is supposed to last 30 days or so. I asked the guy in the store if the product really works. And he said that it just boosts metabolism and helps burn fat. Mmmm, well, I guess that’s what I needed! Also, he told me that CortiSlim is the best selling item in the store. Wow, fat America!!

I don’t know but, I am kinda getting tired of hearing the news about Tsunami. I mean I know tons of people have died, but it is really depressing to see corpuses on the street or destroyed towns or whatever on the TV. Also, I was pissed off to that Westerns are heading to those areas for their vacation.....their reasoning is it will help re-build the area. I mean, c’mon!! If you have money to go there for vacation, just donate fucking your money! I also heard children who lost their parents were abducted by the slave traders or whatever! Sick!

I actually had very healthy weekend. I did not drink any alcoholic beverages! Wow!! I ate lots of veggies, but didn’t overeat. Mmm, Abs diet is kicking in! Tee-hee!! Ooooh, but I did drink a lot of diet coke….well, kinda substitution for beer. Mmm, now I am sodaholic!!

Today is my first day of class. Yes, this is my last semester at Loyola!! Yaaaaay!! Since I hate my program so much, I am so happy I am finishing up!

I was at Ryan’s in Indy over the weekend. It was really nice to see Ryan because I hadn’t seen him for a loooooong time. He was still very much Ryan, and I was very glad. I called Andrew as soon as I got there, so we could hang out together. We just browsed the mall because Ryan wanted to buy jeans….well, but he didn’t buy any….well, he wasn’t really looking for one! I love hanging out with Ryan and Andrew because we have some kinda weird chemistry (I think). I love weird dynamics going on when we all three hang out together!

I went to Dr. Thelen’s memorial on Sunday. Well, that was the main goal to stay in Indy. Although Ryan wasn’t really willing to go to Bloomington with me, I kicked him butt and forcefully took him there. I just dropped him off at Nick’s, so he could watch Colts game. The memorial was really good. I saw many people I hadn’t seen for a while. Especially, I was glad to see Dexter, lab manager guy, there. He has been helping me about the letter of recommendation and other stuff, and he is such a nice big guy! During the memorial, I was pretty crying all the time. It was just so beautiful that Dr. Thelen touched many people’s lives, and she is truly missed.

Oooh, by the way, I got fired!! I got fucking fired!! Noooooooooooooooooooo!!! Now, I cannot shop!

2nd term eh? Well, I don’t give a s*#t!!

The group counseling class will be annoying one. We had a first class today, and the instructor was super ultra anal-retentive guy! During the break, he took out an apple from his bag, and then, he also took out paper towel! Yes! Paper towel! It was not like portable one. The piece of paper towel which obviously he took out from big roll! Oh no!! And he kept wiping his mouth with it while he was eating apple….. Geeeez. I was actually kinda scared of him. He would be the kinda guy everything has to be in right place and right angle without any dust. Mmmmm.

I was just reading over the weekend. Yes, just reading. I had so much readings to do for my stupid classes. Ugh. I don’t do reading! Last semester, I didn’t do any readings, but I was fine! However, this semester, I have a feeling that I will be in big trouble if I don’t do reading! Oh well, at least, text books are kinda fun to read, it’s okay…. I guess.

So, Ashley finally got French Bulldog, and he is such a cutie!!! He is soooo small, and it’s like stuffed dog running around! Soooooooooooooooooooooooooo CUTE!! I can keep playing with him all day!! He bites and licks at the same time! Aaaaahh!!

It’s kinda funny, but I got accepted from PhD program at University of Iowa today. Yay! Yeah, it is super cool. I finally get to do what I wanna do. But, it’s just so weird to think about me, Kenny, going to the PhD program. Mmmmm. I was so exited when I got accepted from the master’s programs because I could stay here. But, now it’s weird. I am, of course, very happy that I will be able to keep living here for next 5 years. But but but, it’s fucking PhD program! You know!!!??? I am not even American, but I am getting PhD here! Mmmmm, how the hell did I get here? I know it’s just beginning for me to being accepted from PhD program. I even don’t know if I can finish the program. I have seen many PhD students suffering! But, just for today, I wanna say to myself “hey, you did pretty job!”

My weekend was very intense. I attended to the Tavistock Group Relations Conference at NU. I had no idea what the conference was all about, I just registered cos I was interested in group relations. Well, mmmm, the conference was awesome and awful. 3-day conference had super intense schedule. Friday, members were assigned to the small groups and talked. Well, this small group was intense as hell!! There were consultants, but we didn’t get any direction or what we were supposed to do. They just sat on the chair and said nothing. So, we had to figure out what we were supposed to do. It doesn’t sound anything, but it was something! I had couple breakdowns, and I was soooo psychologically drained and exhausted after the conference! But, I learned a lot and I am really glad that I did attend this conference. I am not sure if I wanna do it again though!