Wednesday, July 5, 2017

Post Archive

The purpose of this post is to give me the courage to delete my FB account someday. It worked!
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When I really want to spice things up, I'll call the freezers at my university "safe spaces for snowflakes on a college campus." This decision is always immediately followed by regret.



One time, I thought, "I wish I knew someone who would buy me flowers." Then I realized I knew myself, so I went out and bought a big bouquet of roses. And you know what? They looked absolutely amazing. Smelled great, too.



Every time I have to update Adobe Flash is another time I might forget to uncheck the "also install McAfee AntiVirus" box. I haven't slipped yet, but it's important to stay vigilant when so much is on the line.



One time, I showed one of my friends something I wrote. They said, "This is you. This reeks of Wei. Like, if someone wanted to know who Wei was, I would just have read this and it would tell them everything they need to know." So now I'm pretty sure I know what heroin feels like.



After years of soul-searching, I finally figured it out: My body is a tool, and its purpose is to generate capital. Every cent of shareholder equity I fail to create represents a betrayal of my ultimate purpose. Reading a book can also be cool from time to time.



New fantasy: I develop romantic feelings for a close friend of mine. It takes me months to gather up the courage to confess to her. When I finally do, she tells me she doesn't feel the same way. Our friendship deteriorates, but we both recover quickly, because we both have strong support networks and diverse interests.



When someone says, "we're being such nerds right now," what they mean is, "we're doing something fun and interesting right now, but we're really invested in it, so I feel the need to make a comment emotionally distancing myself so I look cool." Which is fine, I guess.



If the flight recorder (aka black box) in a plane doesn't get destroyed during crashes, why don't they just make the whole plane out of that stuff? Oh right, it's because they need to make planes out of aerodynamic materials with density and cost constraints, and also because the strength of the plane's exterior would have no effect on the safety of its passengers in the event of a crash.



Sometimes, someone says something and it really resonates with you, so you remember it forever. Other times, someone says something and it's unbelievably banal, so you remember it forever. Like one time, this guy said in a profound tone, "We're all addicted to social media. We're always checking our phones for that next hit of dopamine." And all I could think was, "Wow, I've heard that a million times before. That idea is so bland I'm going to post it on Facebook to see how many likes I can get."



The enemy of my enemy is my friend, unless the enemy of my enemy is constantly making vague, passive-aggressive posts about other people on social media. Those people will never be my friends. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE.



I feel superior when I compare myself to other people because other people feel superior when they compare themselves to other people.



What if you fail? Then again, what if you don't? What if you accomplish something genuinely meaningful? What if you exceed expectations and impress everyone around you? What if you inspire others to greatness? What if your earnest hard work gives you personal, lifelong fulfillment and gratification? What then, huh?



Someone was telling me about how much they hate awkward situations. I was like, "Dang, I'm glad you haven't seen me try to flirt. Oh, and on an unrelated note, you have beautiful eyes." She blushed, which was super cute. And also the last time I ever saw her.



Favorite event of today: Watching a serious person failing to stifle laughter as she listened to our conversation about banana-eating methodology from across the classroom



Someone asked me, "Ever wonder if you're as good at something as Michael Jordan was at basketball, but you just don't know it yet?" And I was like, "Whoa, that'd be cool!" But then I was like, "Oh wait, Michael Jordan was completely obsessed with basketball, only cared about winning basketball games, and spent the vast majority of his superstar career doing things for the sole purpose of winning as many basketball games as possible. So maybe not."



Michael Jordan famously said, "I've failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed." But, like, that guy also succeeded a lot. Which seems pretty significant, because a lot of people who've failed over and over again don't do that.



Sometimes, I want people to miss me. That sucks. That's basically me being so self-absorbed, I think, "I want someone to like me so much they suffer in my absence."



One of my favorite things in life is when people who are much older than me tell me about all the stuff they're still learning. It makes me feel young and energized. It fills me with hope.



Here's a weird fantasy I've been having recently: Decades of resentment and bitterness build up over the course of my once-great marriage. My partner and I make the tough decision to divorce. The decision, although painful, improves both of our lives. She eventually remarries someone better for her. I take up carpentry as a hobby and find it enjoyable.



My dream: Being really good at expressing my emotions, but in a way that makes everyone around me feel comfortable and empowered.



Sometimes, I feel like I like people too much. Sometimes, I feel like I don't like people enough. Sometimes, I just want to eat a lot of pistachios.



A lot of people say the journey matters more than the destination. I feel like those people should start picking better destinations.
Or maybe I need to get myself some roller blades.



Fine, I'll admit it: Listening to all this rap music has turned me into a more violent person. But if you just send me some Christian hymnals, the problem will be solved by Easter Sunday.



I was sitting in class watching my professor prove a set is closed and bounded if and only if it is sequentiality compact when I thought, "Who on Earth could possibly care about this stuff?" But then I realized, "Oh wait, it's me. I actually love this so much right now."



If you're anything like the old me, you sometimes find yourself in awkward situations where you really feel like you should say something, but you don't know what to say. Luckily, I discovered the perfect thing to say in those situations: "I really feel like I should say something right now, but I don't know what to say."



Today, I found a full tube of toothpaste on the ground and thought to myself, "Dang. The person who lost this will have slightly worse dental health for a while." Then I thought, "Wait, that doesn't make sense. They can just go buy another tube really easily, and the problem will be solved." Then I thought, "That's kind of a classist way of thinking. Maybe this was the only toothpaste they could afford for a while, in which case, dang, the person who lost this will have slightly worse dental health for a while." Then I realized I was closer to death than I'd ever been. (Temporally.)



Walt Whitman famously wrote, "I sing the body electric." But if he'd understood Coulomb's Law, he'd know electric fields are generated by charged particles, not music. But if I'd understood poetry, I'd know the human soul is stirred by amazing word choice, not meaningless pedantry.



I once saw this guy who was so lazy he actually sat through an entire episode of The Big Bang Theory because he didn't want to get up. It was at that moment I thought to myself, "Wow. I need to spend less time looking into mirrors."



Some things I love: small class sizes, snowflakes on eyelashes, conversations lasting till the sunrise.



All I want is to be judged solely on the basis of my irresistible sex appeal, but my brilliant intellect keeps getting in the Wei. #neverlucky



Here's a weird fantasy I've been having recently: In my mid-thirties, I neglect my partner in favor of moneymaking. After months of long hours at the office, I finally finish a big project and get a big payout. I realize it wasn't worth it, and my fresh perspective dramatically improves my relationship with my partner. But we're also much more financially stable due to the big payout I got, so we adopt a pet and go on cool vacations.
Much later, in her mid-90s, my partner contracts a severe form of cancer. Her passing isn't as hard on me as you might expect. It was her time.



Think about all the people who are less fortunate than you. Now think about all the people who are less fortunate than you. Now think about the only person on Earth who is exactly as fortunate as you are. See, isn't that amazing? Even when I tell you to think about other people, you somehow find a way to make it all about you.



Everything I post on Facebook is true. That way I get more targeted advertising. My goal is to make the ads on here so creepy and invasive that one day I'll actually click on one.



One day, I thought, "Geography is cool! Let's learn some geography." So I memorized the world map. Now I know the relative positions of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Azerbaijan.
As it turns out, geography isn't really as cool as I initially thought.



Sometimes, when I'm in a fast food drive-through, I'll buy the food for the people behind me. When I tell people I do this, they'll ask, "Why?", as though I need some pretext for kindness. I don't. Plus, $5-10 to make some strangers happy is a great deal.



Thanos' Infinity Gauntlet is a magic tool that enables him to teleport, rewind time, and obliterate half of all life in the universe with a single snap. Meanwhile, an L-infinity norm is a mathematical tool that enables me to determine whether a series of functions converges uniformly. You tell me which one you'd rather have.



I was talking to this little kid once and he was like, "You must be good at everything!" and I was like, "No, that's not true. There are some things I'm REALLY good at." Then his eyes got really big, which is the best part of this story. And also the end.



"It's really hard for computers to generate random numbers. My favorite way to generate random numbers is to flip through my freshmen calculus exams."
-More math professor savagery



I prefer calling to texting because I like hearing people's voices. People have some wonderful voices.



There's this video of me floating in a bunch of people's phones. The video is so bad that I want every single copy of it destroyed. If I'd known the the other guy was going to look so bad in our rap battle, I never would've suggested recording it.



Had to change my laptop wallpaper from a beautiful night sky to some generic art because I couldn't tell if what I saw on my monitor was the breathtaking splendor of the vast cosmos or some random dust that had accumulated on the screen



Here's a weird little fantasy I've been having recently: A burglary at my parents' home goes awry, leaving my whole family dead. At the trial, I find out the person who committed the crime is a heroin addict. I push for lighter sentencing and use the life insurance payouts I received to fund his rehab. His recovery process is smooth and he becomes like a surrogate father to me. Later, I find a twenty dollar bill on the street.



One time in middle school, this kid was poking me in the back to annoy me. I decided to get him back by reacting on a two-second delay, causing him to think I had some kind of central nervous problem. My plan backfired when he started poking twice as aggressively to better diagnose my fake condition, and that's how this story ends.



After receiving four calls from telemarketers in the same hour, I decided to really annoy the fifth caller by loudly beatboxing into my phone for thirty seconds. Turns out it was my dentist's office trying to remind me about an appointment I'd made. Vengeance is a lot worse when you enact it on an innocent serviceperson trying to be helpful.



The phrase "comparing apples and oranges" is supposed to suggest two things are not comparable because they're so different. But, uh, apples and oranges aren't really all that different. Try comparing apples and the economy of Mozambique, you'll find it a lot harder.



True despair is trying to count the number of paper towels I've seen on university bathroom floors.



Not wearing the same clothes as everyone else doesn't make you worse than they are, because you can still wear the same brand of shoes as they do. If that's too expensive, hair is a cheaper option. I would start at a baseline of four different hair products and build your way up from there.



Two reasons why I want to hyphenate my surname if I get married:
1) Everyone I know with 2 last names is a cool person
2) I will take pleasure knowing my child will have to spend more time on Scantron name-filling than everyone else



Here again I find myself trying to find fresh, exciting words to express my gratitudes -- for my healthy body, peaceful mind, amazing friendships, countless privileges -- but words are not enough.
I'll add that to the list of things I'm thankful for.



It feels good to compliment people behind their back.
It feels even better to tell people (to their face) the compliments you've heard other people say about them (behind their back).



Changing the world is easy, because you are part of the world. When you change, the world changes.



People always talk about how one group of people have it so much worse than another group of people, but I'm pretty sure the people who have it the worst are people I don't even know. I just feel so bad for them because they don't know me.



I hate how these immigrants are coming over and stealing all our jobs. An immigrant literally has my job right now.
Oh wait, it's me.



"During math exams, I would always finish later than everyone else. But the biggest difference between me and everyone else was that I would always get the right answer."
-My former math professor throwing some mad shade




My golden age is the Cenozoic Era.



I have this new hobby where I go around sexually assaulting people and lying about it later. I call it "practicing to be a Supreme Court Justice."



I don't crave social validation. You can tell because I'm constantly going around telling everyone about how I don't crave social validation and posting about how little I care about social validation on social media.



If you can't handle me at my worst, I should start taking serious steps toward improving my emotional intelligence and interpersonal skills.



Let's be honest, everyone actually loves drama. Except me. I'm literally the only person in the world who legitimately doesn't like drama. That's why I was so shocked when Rosie told me she heard Sylvester telling Amos that Bradford has a crush on Harriet.



Don't get me wrong, I know I'm still a young, wide-eyed idealist with a shallow understanding of economic realities. I'm hoping that someday, the brutal exploitation of my labor will successfully neuter my ambitions.



"Let's build some community up in this bitch." -Me, after I realized I wanted to build some community up in this bitch



I look around, and I see my friends facing immense adversity and grief with laughter in their voices. My heart sings at their courage, their strength. They inspire me.



My biggest turn-on: mutual respect and admiration built on a foundation of trust, affection, and reciprocity that grows steadily stronger as time goes on. Mmm.



All I'm asking is that people judge me solely on the basis of my material possessions, but my amazing personality keeps getting in the Wei.



People say you shouldn't look to peer validation for self-worth. Well, I trust my peers to give me honest feedback. That's why I keep bragging about how great I am on Facebook.



A lot of people talk about how you never know what hardships someone else is going through. Well, you never know what great joys someone else is going through, either. Maybe they just landed their dream job, beat cancer, found love. Anyone around you could be quietly celebrating, peacefully alight.



Damn, all these hardworking, humble Gen Z kids are ruining our society with their diligence and respectfulness. As a Millennial, I find these traits totally despicable.



It is wise to seek wisdom. It is strong to seek strength. It is seek to seek seek.



After heartbreak, it's natural to become cynical, closed off, jaded. But this is the opposite of what we need. The antidote to grief is love.
"You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens."
-Rumi




Before light pollution, the night sky was always alight with stars; the wonder of the constellations was commonplace. All you had to do was look up.
Nowadays, those who seek out starlight must travel to secluded places and plan their days around the venture. It's a bittersweet feeling. By stripping us of the accessibility of the cosmos, technology has made it even more special.



A lot of people find slow drivers annoying. Well, guess what? I find speeding tickets annoying. That's why I will do whatever it takes to avoid a police officer.



It is not a mistake to trust someone. Being betrayed, disappointed, or hurt is not a mistake. Trust is strength, trust is power, trust is love.



Sex is a natural biological activity and, at its best, a celebration of intimacy and love -- yet in movies, murder scenes are somehow more normal than sex scenes.
We should feel comfortable talking about our sexual preferences and our positive sexual experiences. Our unwillingness to do so reflects a society mired in outdated religious and patriarchal systems with no place in modern times.



It's not morally reprehensible to use our privilege in life for our own personal gain. But that's precisely why it's so morally virtuous when we opt to instead use our privilege to help others.



Those who hurt us have been hurt themselves, and those who are most evil are the ones who require the most compassion.



The older I get, the more I appreciate the importance of the fundamentals. Mastery is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.



I'm always trying to be the kind of change I want to see in the world. That's why I'm trying to turn into a quarter.



The heart wants what the heart wants, and what the heart wants is to make tautological statements about what the heart wants.



Cool, clean water has got to be one of the most delicious things ever. The texture is crisp when it first hits your tongue, but then it rolls around your mouth with perfect, gentle smoothness. The flavor is amazingly pure, bright, and refreshing. Every drink is a pleasure.



If a future-minded soccer striker re-sent an email pertaining to the blunt, laconic introduction of another way to say "verbatim" in a Microsoft text editor, that would be a forward forward forward of a forward four-word foreward for a word for "word for word" for Word.



I'm good with curdled milk remnants. If you were getting rid of me, you would be doing away with a Wei with a way with whey.



Opinions are like assholes. Sometimes, yours is all wrong, so you go to the doctor to have it examined, and she tells you it's a medical emergency, and you're going to have to undergo an expensive procedure, and then you have to decide whether you want to take out a second mortgage on your home or die of prostate cancer.



Maybe losing something we love enriches our love for it because its transience is what makes it precious.
Then again, maybe losing something we love is so painful that we have to delude ourselves with meaningless platitudes just to maintain our grip on sanity.



I'm gonna be dishonest with you here, my life lacks meaning and I'm unfulfilled. I'm not happy most of the time.



It feels good to be loved, and that says something about the nature of love. But it says something deeper that it feels just as good -- if not better -- to love someone else, to give rather than receive. Joy is kindness, selflessness, compassion.



We all know that guy who seems so considerate and kind on the outside is only like that because his loving parents worked hard to ingrain a strong moral code in him.



We already have chess boxing, so I want vector calculus boxing. We get to watch Mike Tyson prove that the outward flux of a vector field through a closed surface is equal to the volume integral of the divergence over the region inside that surface, and then we get to watch Neil deGrasse Tyson throw haymakers. Tyson v. Tyson!



Of all the content I'm exposed to on Facebook, maybe 2% is content I consider worthwhile, meaningful, or funny. 95% of that 2% consists of my own personal posts. 80% of that 95% of that 2% consists of meticulously crafted braggadocio, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, only rendered tolerable by a thin veil of self-awareness injected as a cheaply and thoughtlessly as silicone into the breast of a Hollywood A-list actress, the sort of self-awareness instantiated in this very post.
The other 5% of that 2% is cool, though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o589CAu73UM



When my peers and I are all 80+ years old, after we've all built loving, well-adjusted families, after we've all retired from our successful, fulfilling careers, I will start making jokes about how entitled and lazy we millennials all were, and no one will understand the reference (which by now is over half a century old), and I will perish cold and alone.
But I'll have generated a cheap laugh for myself.



Calling me and saying "Attention!" in an urgent voice is one of the quickest ways to lose my attention.



People who live in glass houses should build their houses out of stronger materials. Stone, for example. Stone houses are great. Except, people who live in stone houses shouldn't throw glass. Actually, no one should throw glass. Stop throwing glass all over the place, you guys.



People say I'm condescending. (That means I talk down to people, which causes them to lose respect for me and alienate me socially, which has totally shattered my self-esteem, which I attempt (in vain) to fix by being even more condescending, and the cycle continues.)



"Isn't it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, you realize Zeno was wrong because it's really easy to take the sum of a convergent geometric series?" -Me



Life is not like a box of chocolates. A box of chocolates comes with a key telling you what each chocolate is, so you always know exactly what you're going to get. By contrast, life is a dull-looking exterior concealing a surprisingly sweet assortment of...
... Wait.



It makes no sense to complain about how your children have it so much easier than you did. One of the primary reasons we as humans do anything is to improve life for our children. The easier your children have it, the more successful your generation was.



One time, I thought about copying someone else's Facebook status verbatim to see if they'd notice. But then I thought about how I consistently produce 10/10 amazing A+ 5 star original Facebook content. Y'all are lucky to have me.



I love the idea of a day devoted to gratitude, one of the most positive, selfless, joyful emotions one can express. Thanksgiving is the best premise for a holiday.
On this Thanksgiving, I am especially thankful for my friends, old and new. I've been feeling closer than ever to them recently, which has everything to do with how amazing they are as human beings. I am eternally grateful to know them.



Novel novel idea: A man ages like a reverse Benjamin Button. As he gets older, he learns language, bowel control, and social interaction. Next, he must come to terms with strange hormonal changes in his teenage years. He hits the physical prime of his life, but it doesn't last long. His body slowly deteriorates. Then his mind. Eventually, he dies as an old man, with only others' memories of him as his legacy.



There comes a time in every man's life when a (typically older) man comes up to that man and says, "There comes a time in every man's life," followed by some meaningless, cliche platitudes about what it means to be a man. It's rarely useful or interesting, and it's always needlessly gendered.



First I thought, "Gee, I'd love to be famous." Then I thought, "Actually, no, it's silly to derive self-worth merely from the validation of my peers." Then I thought, "Who am I kidding, I derive enormous self-worth from peer validation." Then I thought, "It's too hard to become famous. I'll settle for making shitty, too-long Facebook statuses that only a few people read because they're so long instead."
And here we are.



Someone told me my Facebook one-liners were good. I was like, one-liners? I need at least three independent clauses before I'm funny.



Even a broken clock is able to hang on walls. That's why I'm trying to turn into a gecko. People told me to take up rock climbing, but nope, I opted for the gecko metamorphosis.



Someone told me they were bored, so I told them to scroll through my Facebook feed, and to only stop when they weren't entertained anymore. Legend has it, even to this day, they are still talking about how I'm not a very humble person.



I'm so hungry I could eat a lightly braised steak served with chanterelle mushrooms and heavy cream sauce, along with sauteed shallots and garlic, paired with a '68 Cabernet Sauvignon.



People are always asking me if I work out. I tell them I regularly exercise my Constitutional right to plead the Fifth Amendment.



I read a lot of books. I don't like telling people I read a lot of books. I do, however, like telling people I don't like telling people I read a lot of books, because it's a way of telling them I read a lot of books while simultaneously seeming modest and smart and self-aware, and people really like it when you're those things. Especially self-aware.



I have words. I also have a way with words. That's why anyone who knows me can say they have a Wei with words, or a Wei with a way with words.



Someone asked me, "How are you so witty, smart, and good-looking?" and I told him, "You must first be humble," and then he, awed by my wisdom, kissed my toes in reverence, and then I, glowing with splendor, hurried off to make a Facebook post about the incident.



Every time I accomplish something amazing, a raindrop falls somewhere between Peru and Vietnam. This is how the Pacific Ocean was formed.



You can describe how everything moves using two letters: F=ṗ.
This tells you everything from the arc of a baseball, to the trajectory of a rocket, to the orbits of the stars. Two letters to capture the motion of every object in the universe.



I am so sick and tired of being so sick and tired of being so sick and tired. Just once, I'd like to be sick and tired without thinking about it too much. One order, hold the fries.
Disclaimer: I am neither sick nor tired



Why would you be humbled when you receive an award? Awards are designed to show that the recipient is in some way superior to non-recipients. That's the whole point of an award, and it's the exact opposite of a demonstration of humility. We are humbled when we lose, when we grieve, when stand in awe at the achievements of others, when we recall our insignificance in the vast universe. Not when we get an award.



"Missing a shot" is when you take a shot, and it doesn't go in. You can't miss a shot you don't take. Otherwise any random non-shot-taking action would be indistinguishable from missing a shot, and that doesn't make any sense. The entire reason the phrase "missing a shot" even exists is to describe a very specific circumstance in which someone tried to make a shot, but failed. Not taking the shot is a 100% failproof way to guarantee you won't miss the shot.



What doesn't kill you can still cause enormous physical and psychological damage to you, leaving you a broken shell of a human being. These traumas make you both literally and figuratively weaker.



Shoot for the moon, but don't miss, because if you miss, you'll be stranded in the cold, unforgiving wasteland of space, with nothing but your own myopic human mind to keep you company in the brief moments before your inevitable, grisly demise. You'll also have wasted an enormous amount of human energy and resources.



If I have seen farther, it is because those giants over there didn't let me stand on their shoulders, so I went and made myself a pair of binoculars. I did that all on my own. Nobody helped me do that.



Suppose I used social media, and suppose I had an insatiable lust for shamelessly aggrandizing and artificial depictions of the lives of myself and others -- but I repeat myself.



What words can I use to capture the awe of stargazing? Exhilarating? Breathtaking? Sublime? It doesn't matter. Go out on a cloudless night sometime and treat yourself. You deserve it.
If I could move heaven and Earth, I would bring them closer together.



Integration did not solve racial problems as neatly as it solved the ones on my physics homework.



I'm humble as fuck, yo. No one will ever be as modest as I am. Anytime anyone meets me, they instantly notice my searing, magnetic humility. I'm breathtaking in this sense.



You trust multiple strangers every time you drive through a green light. Or is that you trusting insurance companies? I'm not sure. You need to be more clear on who you trust.



Anytime anyone calls you with a smartphone, all human knowledge is at their fingertips but they are choosing to talk to you instead. Damn, you're cool.
Unless they don't have WiFi, then you're just slightly cooler than Doodle Jump.



You are more than just your TEST SCORES. You are also your HOMEWORK SCORES, in addition to the scores you receive on any assigned projects.



Imagine a bird carries in its beak a thin silk ribbon. Every time I post something cool on Facebook, the very tip of this ribbon brushes against the peak of a mountain range. The mountain range has become a canyon now.