PS. go have sicilian slices at pinocchios in harvard. 2 for $4.55. kind of awesome.
PSS. go see how to train your dragon. NOW.

2. they plan crazy things for holidays. like the bunny bar hop for easter weekend. only requirement: bunny ears. how awesome is that? is it because there are a lot of young people in the city? i don’t know what it is but please don’t stop!

3. banditos misteriosos. they plan some great urban adventures. i did this scavenger hunt thing last summer with a friend where we had to find all these places in 3 hours around the hub. i discovered several things: 1. boston is totally a walkable city. i am not kidding!; 2. people are really helpful!; 3…. um there is no three. so there are only two things. okay. they are planning a pillow fight this saturday! how cool! i’m so totally there.

4. the history. perhaps this is a bit corny but everywhere you turn you run into something of america’s past. it’s like israel where everything is super ancient but not really. israel is better. but boston is good, too! hello, battle of lexington and concord? walden pond?

5. red sox. haha. just kidding.

oh, and happy april!

it kind of should be self-explanatory why this reminds me tufts, but alas, it’s not. i first heard this song via the O show my freshman year. the bubs were doing a great rendition of it and i really think this is one of their strongest songs. i was estatic that i was in college finally. surrounded by new people, in a new place… in a chapel of all places that was beyond full, listening to what was my first hearing of college a capella. and it was awesome.

finally, happiness is finding buds on trees and seeing green rearing up for its comeback.

coolest video everrr.
look at all those art references!
ahhh so cool!

can you name them all?

there is lot of emphasis on strong ties within a network. it is through these ties that people access social, economic, and cultural capital that come in different flavors that range from social support to what book you might read next. however, there is a tendency for homophily to bind these ties together. so much so that the same information gets recycled over and over again and nothing new is introduced into the system. it isn’t hard to see why the word ‘stale’ is associated with ‘high brow’ interactions. weak tie interactions, on the other hand, allow for greater pool of information because dissemination is easy. i guess the threshold, so to speak, is low. it’s initially like that freshmen year in college. weak ties are formed at first through the connection with popular culture solely because popular culture is easy to discuss due to its generalized appeal to the masses. then these popular culture discussions branch out into different subsets, specializations that then encourage stronger ties.

college plays an integral part in shaping our future networks. facebook just helps solidify it. when we meet people for the first time, we assess (subconsciously or not) their instrumentality to our own networks and then use facebook to cement this budding friendship. not everyone can be your best friend but as people are finding out, it is your acquaintances that really matter. it is through these ties that you find job openings, potential spouses (yikes) and other hordes of connections. facebook is huge because they bring these acquaintanceship ties together in one easy to access program. you don’t have to know their phone number but because they are on your friends list, they’re somehow connected to you until one decides to sever that tie by deleting the account, or even defriending you (which sucks for you, sorry to say). facebook relates you to a larger network where everyone has action potential. this is why deactivating/deleting your account is considered social (even intellectual) suicide*. you are now isolated and insulated with stale information since your close network of friends can only know so much. this is also why people who have private pages are dumb because they’re restricting their own networks. so even if you may not even see that person again, because of facebook, they’re always there at your disposal.

*i’m the one to talk…. i deactivated my facebook. it’s liberating but isolating at the same time. i freaking hate the thing… :/

1. paint the cannon – yes, i’ve been at tufts for almost four years and i have yet to paint the cannon… damn. i don’t know what i want to paint on it but i will paint it! hm… something outrageous? artsy?

2. boston symphony – i miss classical music. i miss going to concerts (i love you walt disney hall). the boston symphony is supposed to be great and they have shows all the time with discounts for students. too bad i missed yo-yo ma when he was here. i’d love to hear some schubert, debussy or liszt… well, anything! and i like having an excuse to dress up .

3. duck tour – so, it’s cliche and such a tourist trap but damn, they look kind of fun.

4. a theatre show – i went to a play somewhere in boston to review for the daily my freshman year. it was a load of fun and it was a great show. since then, i haven’t been to one show. so whether it is a musical or a standard play, i wanna see one.

P.S. along the lines of this, seeing a performance at berklee would be awesome… and same with seeing             performance art at mobius.

5. museum/gallery tour – i have been to MFA boston, gardner and the ICA but there are so many more that i haven’t visited. that makes me sad. so i need to go to mass moca (but will have to find someone willing to drive!), decordoba, all those at MIT and harvard and BU… so many!

6. fooding – this may or may not happen. sure boston is no new york or los angeles when it comes to food but it still has a great number of amazing chefs and i need to eat at their restaurants. like craigie on main, the hungry mother, ten tables, sibling rivalry, chez henri… okay so maybe i’m not so concerned about chefs themselves but a list of restaurants i just want to eat at and experience the glory that comes with greatly paired tastes and textures. yay for restaurant week! now if only thomas keller had a restaurant here…

7. book talks/lectures/etc – boston is the hubbub of academia. throw a stone and you’re bound to hit a school. so with that many professors, visiting professors, fellows, authors, what have you, living so close to me, i have not attended much of the events. boo. since i’m reading christakis for my social networks class, i am going to see if he is giving a talk soon so i see the man for myself because his books is rather annoying.

that is all i can think of right now. but it’s still quite a list… one that will maybe keep me busy for the rest of the semester with fun, enlightening, yummy things!

*i just realized that this time last year i was in jerusalem, israel. wow.

although cute, i lament the fact that mixtapes or even mixcds have become such a faux pas, a la michael cera’s nick in nick and norah’s infinite playlist. i mean, done well, it can be such an awesome way of conveying emotion and ideas but i feel like people have been pushing it to the wayside of “emo”ness. hrm… maybe i should do a mix cd for tufts. yea?