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Topic #59: What’s your hidden talent? What is the skill or ability you have people are always surprised to learn you posses? What hidden talent do you wish you had?

I wouldn’t consider myself to have any hidden talents, but I have a handful of skills and abilities that most people are surprised to learn that I have.

The most frequent but interesting thing that a lot of people find out on their own is the speed at which I type. My overall average is about 130 words per minute; if I’m typing basic English text (with no num­bers, special characters, or complex proper nouns), my average speed increases significantly. I have had instances where people have heard me type and believed that it was hailing outside. Although my typing speed isn’t something I’m particularly proud of other than it being a useful skill, I have never met someone in person that was able to type faster than me.

Something that gets occasionally brought up is the fact that I play guitar and sing, and that I have performed on a stage before. I’m not sure why, but most people don’t see me as someone who performs musically, most likely because I’m introverted in peer settings and only become extroverted when I’m the center of attention (such as when I’m on a stage). I have played piano, cello, clarinet, saxophone, guitar, and drums on a regular basis during various past periods of my life. The musical skill I acquired playing all these instruments essentially made me able to pick up any instrument and play a basic tune on it without having any prior knowledge.

Finally, I find it odd that people are surprised that I have done martial arts in the past, and am still able to use it as needed. I thought this would be something that people think is obvious because I’m Asian and many Asians do martial arts, but most people think otherwise. This is most likely because I portray myself as a calm and collected person who doesn’t seem to fight or have conflicts much.

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Topic #60: What can’t you say no to? What things are impossible for you to turn down, at work, at home, at play?

There actually really isn’t anything that I literally cannot say no to. I’m relatively good at making decisions regarding things of strong desirability, and am extremely good at rejecting things even if it is not necessarily the approved thing to do in a social setting.

On the other hand, to take this question more generally, I can’t really say no to anything that will be beneficial to me and has little to no negative consequences. For example, if I was offered a multivitamin tablet, I wouldn’t say no to it because the vitamins would only help my body meet its daily nutritional needs. However, if I was offered five multivitamin tablets, I would say no to it because the risks of negative consequences resulting from overdosing on vitamins is too high.

So Far in 2011…

Number of Taco Bell tacos eaten: 18

Number of times I did my own laundry: 2

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Topic #57: What was the last time you did a random act of kindness? If you’ve never done a random act of kindness, do you think you should? Why or why not?

I’m not sure what this prompt is defining as a random act of kindness, but I’m pretty sure that what is generally known as acts of kindness are done by everyone all the time on a daily basis to make sure that society runs properly.

For example, people hold doors for each other so if someone is carrying something burdensome, they don’t have to worry about the door. Or, people don’t kill each other because we realize that we value our lives.

One “kind” thing that people notice that I do quite often that a lot of others don’t is that I stop and talk with homeless people if they approach me on the street if I’m not in a hurry. Obviously I’m not going to give them any money (and I won’t until I’m living luxuriously), but I reply to them if they ask me a question. I’ve been told a lot that I’m unique for doing so, because apparently, most other people just ignore them and walk away.

Other than that, I don’t think I do many kind things that most other people don’t do. As for the second part of the question, I don’t think it’s possible to lead a normal life and not do an act of kindness for someone else, unless you’re living alone in the middle of nowhere in Antarctica. But then again, that’s not exactly a normal life.

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Topic #58: What is the smallest thing near you? Write a paragraph about it. Use your imagination – are elements the smallest thing? atoms? quarks? How do you feel about the fact we keep finding smaller and smaller things inside of things that are already quite small?

Referencing the second part of the question, the smallest thing near me is a quark that composes the air touching my body. But that’s boring and it’s nearly impossible to write a good paragraph about that, seeing as I don’t even know that much about quarks, and don’t care enough to look it up.

The smallest thing near me that I can see are dust particles floating around my head.

Except for when I was a tiny infant, I’ve lived in new houses all my life. My parents have never purchased used homes before, so I’ve always been exposed to a clean and new living environment. After I came to my university, I had to live in an apartment, and one of the things that I noticed right away was the amount of dust here.

Back at home, there’s barely any dust around at all. Obviously, if I leave something in the same spot for months, there will be a thin layer of light gray dust that piles up on it, but I’ve never had any big problems with dust.

Here at my apartment, there’s a relatively thick layer of dust that covers my furniture every few days. When I first moved in, I thought there was a problem with my room, but apparently it’s just dusty because the building isn’t very new. I moved in during August, which is when my allergy symptoms spike, and the dust made them noticeably worse.

I’m slightly used to it now, and I vacuum much more often than I did when I was back at home. Either way, it’s slightly bothersome to have to wipe down my furniture and anything exposed to open air every few days to get rid of the dust.

So Far in 2011…

Number of Taco Bell tacos eaten: 18

Number of times I did my own laundry: 2

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Topic #56: What gets better with age? What is something you thought would get better with age, that didn’t? What is something you thought wouldn’t get better with age, that did?

I’m not quite sure what this question is trying to get at, because it’s obvious that things like cheese and beer get better with age, but that really isn’t something that I can elaborate on enough that I can write a blog post about it.

As for the last two questions, I have no idea.

This is the worst blog prompt I’ve ever seen.

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Topic #56: What keeps you up at night? What helps you forget about what keeps you up at night?

(Yes, apparently there’s two Topic #56s.)

I’m assuming this question is for the people who have so many worries that they have to think about that they can’t fall asleep at night. Fortunately for me, I’m not one of those people, and I don’t think about my concerns before I go to sleep at night, which means that I’m never kept up at night.

Usually, the last thing that you think about before you fall asleep is what you dream about during the night. Sleeping and dreaming is one of the most important parts of memory and cognition because while you are dreaming, your brain is creating conditional situations in your mind and practicing going through these situations. So, I take advantage of this and usually think about things that I need to improve at so I’ll dream about it and get more practice.

But regardless, I usually only go to sleep when I’m tired, so I generally don’t have that much time to think before I fall asleep.

Answering the question literally, sometimes the sound of my refrigerator keeps me up at night because it’s extremely loud. I live in a studio, so my kitchen is only a couple feet away from my bed. Usually I forget about the sound of the refrigerator when I hear it long enough that I become desensitized to the sound, or when I push my head into the corner of my bed into my pillows so the sound is lessened.

So Far in 2011…

Number of Taco Bell tacos eaten: 18

Number of times I did my own laundry: 1

If you have been paying close attention to the Post a Day topics that I’ve been doing, you will have noticed that I’m actually behind. Today is March 4th, but I’m still back on the topic from February 22nd.

I decided to spend the next few days catching up on Post a Day topics and doing at least two a day, seeing as I plan on studying for the next few days for my last exam before spring break, and nothing very interesting is going to happen. Starting from March 8, I’ll have more interesting things to blog about as I will have finished my exam and am free from urgent responsibilities until the end of spring break.

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Topic #54: How do you decide when a post is ready to publish?

I’ve never actually thought about when a blog post is ready to be published and should go live to the public; I generally just feel done when I’m done writing for the day. When I thought about it a bit more, I think there’s a few subconscious things I think about before I get the feeling that I’m done.

First is obviously if I have covered everything interesting that happened during the day. If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you have probably noticed that regardless of how hard I try, some days of my life are just plain boring. On those days, I obviously won’t have an interesting story to tell. But if that day was a day of action-packed twists and turns, I make sure that I include all the details of what happened.

Next, I usually try to include some sort of other segment (such as a Picture of the Day, Video of the Day, What I’m Watching, or anything else that I’ve previously featured on my blog). That adds more variety to my blog and gives more content to the people who are interested in reading more.

Finally, when I think a blog post is of sufficient length to meet the amount of excitement that happened during that day, I read it through once to make sure I didn’t make any spelling or grammar errors, then publish it.

Once in a while I get messages or emails from my readers pointing me to some sort of issue with my blog posts (such as an error I didn’t catch or a mistake of fact). If that happens, I usually go back into my blog and fix the error or add a note at the bottom addressing the problem. Once all that is done, I consider the post finalized.

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Topic #55: If you could have anything to eat right now, what would it be? If you could eat this food with anyone alive or who has ever lived, who would it be?

I don’t have anything specific that I want to eat right now, seeing as I’m generally not very picky about what I eat as long as the food is safe and isn’t bitter or unnaturally pungent. If I had to pick a specific food, I would go with either a type of food that I haven’t eaten in a long time, or a type of food that I would expect myself to like but haven’t yet tried.

I also don’t really mind who I’m eating this food with, as long as they’re comfortable to be around and they’re not constantly distracting me while I’m eating (such as attempting to engage me into an intense conversation or constantly taking pictures of me while I’m chewing).

So Far in 2011…

Number of Taco Bell tacos eaten: 18

Number of times I did my own laundry: 1

I just took a psychology exam today; I need to take one more exam in philosophy next Tuesday, then I am DONE WITH INTENSIVE ACADEMICS UNTIL AFTER SPRING BREAK.

Maybe now I can actually have some extra time to relax and catch up on sleep.

The best part is that the philosophy exam for next week is an essay exam, and I generally perform much better on essay exams than I do on multiple choice exams. Also, we went over the material repeatedly so much during lecture and discussion sections that I think it’s almost impossible for anyone to do poorly.

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Topic #53: How long do you think you could go without a shower?

I get asked this question once in a while, and a lot of people think that this is an embarrassing question and don’t want to answer it truthfully, but I don’t actually think that it’s embarrassing at all.

I think a large factor of people overreacting to this question and saying “eew, I couldn’t go a single day without a shower” is due to cultural influences. With today’s technology, generally everyone has a shower in their home or apartment that they have access to whenever they need it, so there’s essentially no excuse not to take a shower. Even for those who don’t for any reason, there are public showers available at public work-out areas and recreational facilities. Because of this, society as put a great influence on staying clean all the time.

However, before the technology of having water pumped straight to your home and through your shower head, people were unable to take showers on a regular basis. People would go weeks without even getting the opportunity to take a shower, because they needed to use the water for more urgent purposes (like drinking it). Based off of this information, I’m assuming that I can also go a couple weeks without taking a shower.

Of course, it would be more beneficial to me if I was able to spend those two weeks alone and not interact with anyone else, because I can bear my own smell while others probably cannot bear others’ two-week-old body odor.

However, I question my own ability to deal with my own greasy face or hair – I tend to produce a lot of oil on my face and in my hair, so much that I usually wash my face four to five times a day, and my hair becomes noticeably glossy about 16 hours after I last took a shower. So I am hoping that I would still have access to a sink in which I could wash my face and hair.

So Far in 2011…

Number of Taco Bell tacos eaten: 18

Number of times I did my own laundry: 1