Why Am I Here (Again)?

No Surprises

2009-05-13T17:40:00.002-05:00

3.684 GPA. It brings things up to a 3.373 overall. I'm up to 201 hours completed.

4 Grades In

2009-05-11T16:22:00.003-05:00

After going the weekend with only one grade posted, three more were posted today. Only 1 B so far (Islam), which is pretty surprising. Islam doesn't surprise me. The A in Major British Authors surprises me. Sure, I had A's on all of my papers and individual work (B's on all group work... golly, thanks for putting us in groups!), but I put practically no effort into the research paper. I was telling someone in the class that it was the second worst thing I'd ever turned in (nothing will ever top my turbomachinery project), and I'm sure it doesn't deserve better than a B, even with the most generous grading. The final exam was take-home, and it was worse than the research paper. I didn't even answer all of the questions. Of an expected 4 page minimum, I turned in two. Where's the motivation to actually try? A's in French and Western Religion round out the grades I have. I'm expecting A's in astronomy and archaeology & the Bible, followed by a B in Major American Authors. I figure it'll be a 3.68.

Woo.

2009-05-09T14:20:00.002-05:00

I'm done with my last final ever in North America. Unless I go back to school of course. Last undergrad final ever? Last one I need? Whatever, I'm done, bitches.

Need Money

2009-04-29T12:42:00.003-05:00

I have a little more than two weeks between my last final and departure for Paris. If you've got any ideas for making a decent amount of money in that time, let me know. I could sure use it.

You Know That Last Week Of The Semester?

2009-04-27T17:02:00.003-05:00

Dead week? Yeah, right. How often has this been a true dead week? Anyone ever have one? I've got two papers due, 15% and 20% of the grade for the classes, and a final exam in astro lab. I guess it doesn't really matter, because by now every single one of my readers should know that I wouldn't study for exams this far in advance anyway. Right? You did pick up on that by now, didn't you?

But I'd still love to be on the outside of the library instead of the inside, and I'd like to be lying in the grass laughing to myself at all the people cramming for tests.

Research. Gah. What a wretched idea.

Has It Really Been A Month?

2009-04-25T12:55:00.002-05:00

I guess so. I haven't much wanted to talk about school, much less actually go to school. And there really hasn't been that much new or interesting to write about. Papers due, papers postponed. Two more due on Thursday, then a slew of exams. The end is near, and I'm very, very thankful for that.

I went to the release party for the Delta Undergrad Literary Journal last week. A friend of mine was reading a few of his poems that got accepted, and it turns out that I knew most of the other people that were reading. I'm sort of on the fringe of the literary scene at LSU. I used to go to Writers' Club meetings frequently, but I haven't been to a single one this semester.

Another group that I'm just barely acquainted with is the students in the philosophy department. A friend of mine was presenting a paper, and when I went to that I again saw several people I knew (though again not really well).

In more exciting news, I booked my flight for Paris today. May 28-July 29. So if you just happen to be in Europe at the time, send me an email!

Bad Policy, Good Help

2009-03-24T23:13:00.002-05:00

I had to check out a camcorder from the Communications Studio/Media Center to record the French skit. I was going to try to figure out the editing ahead of time, but I noticed I was missing something. I had no cable to connect the camera to the computer. When I went back to renew the camera, I told them I didn't get a cable. They replied that they don't check out cables, and you have to do it in the studio. What good is the camera if you can't put your video on a computer? There's no reason for them to limit you to working only within the media center.

But one thing that I will say - they were very helpful when it came time to editing it. I got there right when they were opening and the place was empty, so maybe the student worker had nothing better to do, but he was good. Very helpful, informative, and friendly. Pretty impressive for a student worker, I'd say. We finished editing it in about 20 minutes, and I'm sure it would've taken at least an hour on my own.

Want To Walk To School?

2009-03-23T16:37:00.002-05:00

If so, ride the bus.

I've seen buses broken down on the side of the road before, but until this morning I've never had the joy of being on one. It died just before getting to the intersection of Burbank and Nicholson. It wouldn't even start back up to move it to the side of the road. Luckily for traffic, it had made it to the point where the single lane splits into two, so it wasn't really blocking much. The driver called the shop and everyone poured out of the bus to walk the last mile to school.

I've never been much impressed by the local bus service. A few years ago, there were more buses on the route and traffic wasn't as bad, but I don't remember the buses ever being very clean, or having very professional drivers, or even a long period without a breakdown. I get the impression it's not a very well managed company.

What Is A Word?

2009-03-22T12:51:00.007-05:00

Before I go into an extended discourse, let me give the context for this. Yesterday the linguistics organization on campus held their Scrabble tournament. Like last semester, I won easily. But during one of the games, my opponent was obviously upset over the words I was playing. The best example, and a large part of the reason why I'm writing this, was when I played MIR and she challenged. It's good, and the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary (OSPD) gave defined it as a Russian peasant community. She said that was absurd and it shouldn't be in the dictionary because it's a Russian word. I kept quiet then. A few turns later, she played RIO* and I challenged it off. That really set her off - she was in disbelief that they would allow MIR and not RIO*. "If they accept Russian words, they should accept Spanish too. Everyone uses rio, but I've never even heard of mir." I tried to provide some explanation, but she wouldn't even consider it. To the end she complained of how she lost because she got "screwed by the dictionary."

So what is a valid word? A word in the dictionary, you might say. But how do the editors choose which words to include? In the case of the OSPD, it's fairly straightforward. If it's in another dictionary, it gets included. Originally it was a compilation of six major English dictionaries. If a word appeared in Oxford, Webster, American Heritage... or a few other English language dictionaries, it was included in the OSPD. It's certainly not without errors of its own however. Supposedly, there are some words that have made it into the OSPD because of typos and they've remained. But for the most part, it's hard to place the blame on the Scrabble dictionary. If you want to argue that a word should or should not be included, you have to take that to one of the very reputable dictionaries of the English language. (In my American Heritage Dictionary, mir appears with the same definition, while rio only appears in reference to specific river names.) It's important to note this because the OSPD gets a lot of flak for containing "fake" words. How arrogant is it to assume that you have better judgment of a word than professionals who compile the most esteemed dictionaries?

In the case of mir and rio, why would one be accepted by an English dictionary and the other be rejected? My answer during the game was that mir had been adopted into English while rio remained a Spanish word. That didn't help anything because, though true, you still must ask why mir alone is adopted. Unlike rio, mir has no counterpart in the English language. Rio has a direct translation to English - river. There's absolutely no reason to incorporate rio when a direct translation exists. However, look at a word like burrito that has been adopted from Spanish. It was adopted because there was no English counterpart to the word. Given the introduction of the burrito itself, English speakers had the option to either call it by its Spanish name or create an entirely new English word. In most cases, I think the foreign word is adopted***. Similarly, I believe mir was adopted into English because it was necessary to identify mirs in some way, and the native name was easier than creating an entirely new word.

Seems logical, right? I'm sure it's not that easy for all words, however. Like I mentioned in a previous post, transliteration becomes a huge problem. Why do some transliterations make the cut and others don't? Should all of them be included? One of the great examples of several different transliterations being accepted is the Yiddish word ganef. Ganef, ganof, gonef, gonif, goniff, and gonof are all accepted as valid words by the Scrabble dictionary (which means they appear in the major English dictionaries as well). Many of the q without u words are adopted from transliterations of Arabic. But many alternate spellings (especially the ones used by my Islam textbook) haven't made it to English. I'm at a loss for how that's resolved. I can only guess that the editors of dictionaries adopt it when it becomes common enough in scholarly work or popular usage.

Scrabble and other word games are in a unique position because of their reliance on an external data field that is constantly changing (even if those changes are only reflected every few years with dictionary updates). No other games have this problem. Chess, Monopoly, any card game - they all have fixed rules that are contained within the game itself. You never hear of anyone throwing down the newspaper and cursing their Sudoku for including the number 7. Even with the changing dictionary, you should never hear the vast majority of complaints about words in Scrabble. When you're playing any game, you agree to play by whatever the rules are. When you agree to use the OSPD as judge on disputed words, you're taking that word set as it is. It could be a completely arbitrary collection of words and it wouldn't make any difference (and some people choose to use a less inclusive dictionary, which amounts to the same thing). When people complain that a word shouldn't be allowed because they don't know it, they're rejecting one of the fundamental pillars of the game: good word knowledge is rewarded. It's absurd to judge the validity of a word based on personal exposure. If you don't believe it, open up a dictionary and see how long it takes to find a word you don't know.

*** This is less true of French. The French are notorious language snobs and have L'Académie française, an official organization in charge of the language. They're more likely to create their own words (or at least a uniquely French accent and pronunciation), but many foreign terms still make it into the language via popular usage.

How Dark Is Your Sky?

2009-03-20T22:34:00.002-05:00

As an extra credit project for my astronomy lab (which I need, since I forgot to go to class), we can write about light pollution and submit information about the night sky in our city to GLOBE at Night. Light pollution is sort of a pet peeve of mine because most of it is preventable (well, okay... any kind of needless pollution annoys me). It's just one of the many reasons I'd rather live in the middle of nowhere than the city. On a completely clear night such as tonight, I can see a meager fraction of what I could see in a small town. Once you've been in a place several miles removed from the nearest electric light, you'll never be satisfied with the city sky again.

To contribute info on your location, go to the website at http://www.globe.gov/GaN/index.html and follow the directions. It only takes about 5 minutes to do, but you will need a clear night. They're collecting data through March 28, so you only have another week.

At my house, it is about a magnitude 3 sky. What is it where you are?

I Despise Group Work

2009-03-20T11:12:00.004-05:00

We have to do ridiculous skits for French class. They're required for every semester (though hopefully in France they'll make us go talk to people instead). It counts as an oral exam grade, but since we have so many grades in the class (2 tests, a final, 2 oral exams, 5 homeworks, quizzes every week), it's 7.5% of the total grade. Not a lot, but enough to where it has to be done. In the past two semesters, they've gone pretty well. I had pretty responsible people in my group. Still, we probably invested 6-8 hours in writing, filming, and editing it. That's a lot of time investment for such a small part of the grade. The final is worth almost three times as much and I won't study for even half of that time.

This semester, I thought the skit was going to be much easier. I got in what I thought would be a good group. We have 3 people, instead of the usual 4, which means we only need 4.5 minutes of speaking instead of 6 (90 seconds of speaking per person). One of the guys sits in the front and always participates in class, and the other seemed studious enough. Sounds good, right? Last weekend I met up with the participating guy (PG) to start writing the lines. The other guy couldn't make it, but that didn't bother me because we had given only a day's notice and not consulted him on the time. I worked with PG for about an hour to write 4 scenes, each one with about 8-10 lines. That's it. And he said that was enough and any more would go over our time. We read through it very slowly and it came up around 2:35 when we need at least 3. Which I know from past experience won't be nearly enough once we film it. But he didn't want to work on it anymore. He's made a habit of saying how busy he is and how he doesn't need the course. And then he dropped the course, but he's still going because he wants to learn French - he just doesn't have time to do well in it. But he still says he's going to do the skit.

Other guy hasn't shown up to class all week. We decide to meet today during our normal class time in the classroom as we have the day off to work on the skits. PG said he'd get in touch with the other guy as they're friends on Facebook. I go to class today, my only one, and I'm the only one there. Fantastic. I emailed other guy and told him to let me know by the end of today if he still wanted to be in the group, and he replied shortly after saying that PG hadn't told him we were meeting. Great. Guess you should've gone to class then, eh? You would've made the meeting had you just gone to the class during our normal class time. Brilliant.

He can't work on it this weekend either, so it won't be until Monday, I can't do it Tuesday, and it's due Wednesday. Greeeeat.

Summer

2009-03-15T13:17:00.002-05:00

Last semester I mentioned that I had gone to the study abroad fair. I don't think I've mentioned it since then, but a few weeks ago I applied for LSU in Paris this summer. I've put down my deposit and it's official; my last semester will be 5 weeks in Paris.

All I need to graduate is 3 hours of French, but the program requires you to take 6 hours. I'm taking the last of the intermediate French sequence (2102) and intermediate oral communication (2154). So in addition to finishing my degree and being in France for 5 weeks, there's a pretty decent chance that I might learn how to speak the language. Which would be stellar, as I'm still really struggling with the speaking.

It's not exactly cheap, but I applied for the scholarship and that should help. From what I hear, the scholarship is not difficult to get. I've also got faith that my letters of recommendation are fantastic and my academic record is better than most.

Knowing that I won't be in Louisiana this summer is a huge relief to me. I am dreading the oppressive humidity and heat, so hopefully I'll be able to avoid most of it. It will be late July or August by the time I get back, and I'm hoping I'll be able to move elsewhere soon after. Being in France will hinder the job search, so I need to get started on that now.

I'm not even considering the summer as work anymore. To me, I have but seven weeks of school left and I'm done. Done.

I Think It's An Overstatement

2009-03-12T23:02:00.002-05:00

The grad student teaching my major American authors class (groan) promised on Tuesday that we would be reading one of the most convoluted and oddly constructed sentences in American literature in reading today's assignment. He trumped it up to be barely a sentence, a sequence of phrases so twisted that it would make you stop and ask what just happened. I didn't find it. As I found out in today's lecture, I read over it without so much as batting an eye. If this is one of the craziest sentences American lit has to offer, consider me unimpressed. Judge for yourself. The following is a passage from Herman Melville's Benito Cereno. (This might spoil the plot, should you ever hope to read it. But if you're taking a lit class like mine, they'll probably spoil it for you anyway.)

He smote Babo's hand down, but his own heart smote him harder. With infinite pity he withdrew his hold from Don Benito. Not Captain Delano, but Don Benito, the black, in leaping into the boat, had intended to stab.

Babo is the black referenced in the "crazy" sentence. And it would make more sense if you knew the story up to that point, but it's not so weird, is it? Reading it the first time I didn't even notice the structure because it flowed so well in the story. Yet the grad student talked for five minutes on how it stops the reader and makes him stumble through it. Eh.

The Conscious Can't Convince The Unconscious

2009-03-09T21:14:00.002-05:00

I've done a lot of things at the last minute. In an earlier post (Too Much Reading) I mentioned some of the assignments I had to write. Four different assignments were due on the same day, and I did all of the writing the night before and the morning of the due date. I'm somewhat embarrassed by my chronic procrastination, but I mention it to prove a point: that I am no amateur when it comes to crunch time.

I've seen how these professors grade. I know that all I have to do is throw some words on the page and I'll likely get an A, or a B at worst. I have complete confidence in my ability to bullshit, and I know approximately how long it takes to pull a paper together.

Yet tonight, with two 5-page papers due tomorrow, I still have the symptoms of stress. I don't understand why that is. I've got plenty of time - one should take no more than 2 hours and I think I can do it tonight if I stay awake. The other might take as long as 4, which means I'll get up at 4am (SOP for paper writing) and have 4 hours in the morning AND a bonus hour and a half between classes. It all fits nicely, yet I'm still "stressed." There's no reason to be!

Transliteration

2009-03-03T18:58:00.005-06:00

I'd venture to say that the most difficult thing about being a religious studies major is dealing with foreign languages. It's the only true obstacle I've found in the program. I had a brief introduction to the problem with Asian religions, but that was just a survey course and it wasn't detailed. It mostly relied on translations of concepts and putting the ideas in Western terms.

That's not true of Hinduism last semester and Islam this semester. A Hinduism course is packed with Sanskrit terms that have no one word or short phrase translation in English. Take for example the term "atman." It's loosely translated to mean "soul," but that's really a shallow understanding of what it means. It's NOT the soul that we have from Christianity. (For those interested in etymology, atman is derived from the word for breath, just like spirit in English (aspiration).)Translators of texts have to choose between making it accessible by using the closest English word that has an incorrect connotation and having it precise, using the untranslated term. Most academic translations tend to go with the latter, and you can get a rough measure of how good an edition of a text is by what they choose to translate and what they leave.

It might not be too big of a problem to have the occasional word in a foreign language if the language is not too distant from English. French or German would be no problem at all. Ubermensch? I can see it and at least have a pronunciation in my head. It would hardly phase me when reading. This isn't the case with Sanskrit and Arabic, primarily because the alphabets and sounds aren't the same. And that's where it gets messy. When transliterating words from Sanskrit to English and our alphabet, the end result is often cluttered with dots, dashes, and a slew of accent marks I didn't even know existed. Here's an example that I just pulled off another website: adhikāradr̥śā (I have no idea what this means). What the heck is that diamond? If you see that reading, does it flow? Or does it take five minutes to try to figure out how to pronounce it before you can even consider the context? I've found that it really is necessary to get the pronunciations, because the accents change the words, and they're similar enough to where shortening it to "adhik" in your mind will just confuse it with other words.

It took several weeks of Hinduism before I felt comfortable with the transliterated words. Halfway through the semester, I'm still struggling with the Islam.

Grades on Moodle

2009-03-02T20:50:00.002-06:00

If every teacher posted grades on Moodle, motivation would be easy for me. There's just something about seeing where my grade ranks in the class that motivates me. I'm not happy unless I'm first; I like to reaffirm that I'm better than them. It's meaningless, especially in small classes (where a rank of 1 of 20 only means 5th percentile), but being second (or worse) would nag the hell out of me. This is probably one of the reasons my grades are so good in French. It's the only class that posts grades to Moodle this semester. For the first few weeks we only had participation, homework, and quiz grades (there are myriad grades* in the class) and I was ranked 4th-8th (except for one quiz where I was 17th of 46 - ouch) on each, but second overall. Last week was the first of the big grades and with a solid paper and a 98 on the test I moved into the lead. Anyone can do homework and quizzes. Papers and tests separate the wheat from the chaff.

*how's that for concision? :p

Graduate Checkout

2009-02-26T19:17:00.003-06:00

Today I went to the College of Arts and Sciences for my graduate checkout. I was expecting a longer process, but it just involved filling out a form to say if I would attend the ceremony (I'm not) and where I want my diploma mailed. Then I had to sign something that said I understood which classes I had left to take (French 2102 - 3 hours) and that I should notify them if something changes.

I don't quite think of it as just 3 hours yet. There's still this semester to go through, and not enough grades have been taken to ensure that I'll pass even if I don't do any more work. At that point - probably by the end of March, I'll consider it 3 hours. Right now it still seems in the distant future. Which is good, since I have no idea what will follow.

Word Clouds

2009-02-25T10:14:00.002-06:00

Having recently learned about wordle.net (Thanks S!), I thought I'd put together a word cloud of the main page (before this post was written, so it includes the 7 entries prior to this, excluding all text not part of the body of the post). A word cloud throws all of the most commonly mentioned words together and makes the most frequently mentioned words largest. Common words like articles and pronouns are omitted. I started to do it out of curiosity, but I think it's much more useful than that. For instance, it shows how often my writing sucks. I know it's a problem (and I even cringe a little when using them), but "really" and "just" show up far too big in the word cloud. While I don't make any great attempts to have superb writing on this blog, it's still disturbing that they show up that frequently.

The big words aren't surprising. Semester, pages, teacher, REL.... But when you consider that this was arranged by a computer program, I'm not so sure I like the proximity of "need" and "date."

Mardi Gras

2009-02-23T14:08:00.002-06:00

I really appreciate having a holiday that no other state has. I'm loving it this year, as I needed a break from school. I need to get caught up on a lot of things, and a five-day weekend gives me plenty of time to get some work done and relax. I normally have difficulty getting things done on the weekend (except for Saturday morning, which I just can't figure out), and I didn't get anything done this weekend, but I still have three more days of no-school goodness. Even Thursday, my arch-nemesis of days, will be tame this week. Two classes are canceled because the teacher (same for both) will be attending a conference. I might even try to do some essays that are due mid-March. But that might be overly ambitious.

Scratch That

2009-02-18T20:56:00.003-06:00

I was going to check out a specific book from the library tonight (yet another mode of procrastination), but when I checked the catalog it listed it as checked out with a due date of May 23. I guess I'll give up on reading that this semester. I'm assuming it has several requests and that's figured into the date it's due to be back on the shelf. I can't see how one person could renew it for months this far out.

Oh, right, the procrastinating. Yeah, I'm supposed to be writing an essay on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The usual tripe.

A Little Knowledge

2009-02-12T22:38:00.002-06:00

It's a dangerous thing, eh? Even more dangerous is thinking you have knowledge when you really don't know anything. And you think it's your duty to impart that knowledge to others. Like the guy on the bus today who was talking to a friend about the economy. He was saying the same things that have been said over and over by the media. No big deal. Then he starts to put forth his comparison to the Great Depression, which was apparently started by FDR because he was involved in some kind of scandal, then four years later he resigned. And the next president ended it by signing some bills and creating jobs.

This moron will graduate from my university. Why should I think graduating is something worthwhile?

Too Much Reading

2009-02-01T22:36:00.002-06:00

The reading this semester is downright absurd. From last Thursday to this Tuesday, I need to read:

240 pages (and write a 5 page paper)for 2030
80 pages (and write a 2 page paper on unrelated material) for 2270
40 pages (and write a 1 page paper) for 2220
40 pages for 3004

That's the stuff that I absolutely have to get done because of graded work. Additional reading that I'm supposed to be doing:

60 pages for 3004
50 pages for 2030
50 pages for 3786

So 400 necessary and another 160 I should do. 40 pages an hour is probably an overly generous estimate, since a lot of it's not exactly light reading. So 14 hours all together? Yech.

As of this post Sunday night, I've read the 240. I might get halfway through the 80 pages tonight if I'm lucky. It's never a good sign when the teacher tells you you're going to hate the book.

A Sign of the Times

2009-01-29T16:14:00.002-06:00

I forgot about my astronomy lab last night. Whoops. I missed the week before due to illness, so my grade is tumbling. Ah well, what a loss. One is dropped, so I'm looking at around a 93 max now. Which is probably plenty of leeway to get an A in the class. I'm ready for this semester to be over.

Same As Always

2009-01-23T15:45:00.002-06:00

School is, well, school. Some classes are good, some so-so, and some downright awful. It's the drudgery of it that's getting to me. And as there's nothing new to say, posts will probably be pretty scarce. I noticed them starting to repeat last semester, so I'll just save all of us the trouble and make rare posts when something interesting actually occurs. I'm thinking once a week is pretty optimistic at this point.

Spring Schedule

2009-01-14T21:34:00.002-06:00

I'm pretty peeved about the whole thing, because it's so far from what I want to take. But between the section being canceled, finishing requirements, and single time offerings on religion classes, I think I'm stuck.

FREN 2101 - Intermediate French
REL 2030 - Honors Christianity/Judaism/Islam
REL 3004 - Archaeology and the Bible
REL 3786 - Islam
ASTR 1109 - Astronomy Lab (the second)
ENGL 2220 - Major British Authors
ENGL 2270 - Major American Authors

Islam was supposed to be just a place holder until I got into the great Wednesday night class. Now Astro is Wednesday night. REL 3004 and French are the only two I'm really looking forward to. The teacher for the other religions seems pretty good though, so hopefully it'll be worthwhile. The Major * Authors classes are going to be misery. I needed two lit classes from a fairly short list (3086 from two semesters ago didn't count), and nothing else fit the schedule. I was in the bookstore and cursing for not being able to take 2202, which had amazing books on the shelf. Several were on my list to read, and I have at least one of them. But no, that's only offered at the same time as REL 3004. Even the other sections of the Major * Authors would be better. Something to get me away from these Norton Anthologies. I should stop bitching now, because I've got to go read the rest of Beowulf. Aaaaaaarggghhhh!

Sigh

2009-01-13T10:03:00.001-06:00

Another semester, another semester of morons. Take, for example, the person sitting across from me in the computer lab talking on a cell phone directly in front of the sign that says no cell phones. Faaaaantastic.

Book List 2008

2009-01-07T22:33:00.003-06:00

Because I don't have anywhere else to post it, and most of the books I read in 2008 were for school anyway, I am presenting my list of everything read in 2008 here. It's marginally school related. The goal was 80, not so much just to have that number, but to push myself to read more. In short, it didn't happen. I was on pace through May, but read very little throughout the rest of the year. Most of my classes in the fall only used parts of books, so I couldn't add them to the list by my standards (must finish the entire book, no re-reads).

1) Postcards from Ed: Dispatches And Salvos from an American Iconoclast – Edward Abbey

2) Everest: Summit of Achievement – Stephen Venables

3) Middlesex – Jeffrey Eugenides

4) Amulet – Roberto Bolano

5) Special Topics in Calamity Physics – Marisha Pessl

6) Ship of Fools – Katherine Anne Porter

7) The Plot Against America – Philip Roth

8) The Age of Reason – Thomas Paine

9) Cheap Amusements: Working Women and Leisure in Turn-of-the-Century New York – Kathy Peiss

10) The Unbearable Lightness of Being – Milan Kundera

11) The Book of Daniel – E. L. Doctorow

12) The Plague – Albert Camus

13) The Buddha in the Robot: A Robot Engineer’s Thoughts on Science and Religion – Masahiro Mori

14) Good as Gold – Joseph Heller

15) The Embezzler – Louis Auchincloss

16) When Bad Things Happen to Good People – Harold S. Kushner

17) Tao Te Ching – Lao Tzu

18) Goodbye, Columbus – Philip Roth

19) The Future of an Illusion – Sigmund Freud

20) Timequake – Kurt Vonnegut

21) Herzog – Saul Bellow

22) A Rumor of War – Philip Caputo

23) Lamb – Christopher Moore

24) The Stranger – Albert Camus

25) Him with His Foot in His Mouth and Other Stories – Saul Bellow

26) Slaughterhouse Five – Kurt Vonnegut

27) The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals – Michael Pollan

28) Cults in America: Programmed for Paradise – Willa Appel

29) Starbucked: A Double Tall Tale of Caffeine, Commerce, and Culture – Taylor Clark

30) The War of the Worlds – H. G. Wells

31) Siddhartha – Hermann Hesse

32) Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations… One School at a Time – Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin

33) The Serpent and the Rainbow – Wade Davis

34) Coffee: A Dark History – Antony Wild

35) Best Evidence – Michael Schmicker

36) Word Freak – Stefan Fastis

37) Ramayana - retold by William Buck

38) The Life of God (As Told by Himself) – Franco Ferrucci

39) Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior – Ori Brafman and Rom Brafman

40) Death Be Not Proud – John Gunther

41) Bhagavad-Gita – translated by Barbara Stoler Miller

42) God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian – Kurt Vonnegut

43) The Know-It-All – A. J. Jacobs

44) Numbers in the Dark – Italo Calvino

Ohhh I Nearly Lost It

2009-01-06T16:08:00.002-06:00

I was just lazing around today, enjoying the last week before school starts, when I decided to check my email. And wouldn't you know it, there's one waiting for me.

"You are currently enrolled in ASTR 1109 – section 002 – Astronomy Lab for the Spring semester of 2009. We regret to inform you that ASTR 1109 will not be taught this Spring due to changes in department scheduling. This course will be offered next year. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. "

Oh, fucking fantastic. Before I let myself think over how miserable it would be to have to stay another year for some 1 hour class, I wrote back explaining that I needed this to graduate in August and ask if they would offer another lab as a substitute. I got a nearly immediate reply explaining that there was another section still open (section 3). Of course I immediately go to PAWS and try to schedule that section, only to find out that section 3 isn't being taught either. But section 1 is, and I got into that. This person needs to proofread their emails a little better, because they sure made it sound like no sections would be offered (if there were other sections, why the hell didn't you mention that in the first place?), and then gave me a wrong section.

And even though it won't prevent me from graduating in August, I'm still pretty furious about this. I scheduled months ago and picked this section for a reason - because the other one didn't fit with what I wanted to take. So now I have to alter my schedule and take some shit instead of an awesome class with a great teacher. Thanks for letting us know about it 5 days before classes start, too.

"Inconvenience" is a gross understatement.

Wooty

2008-12-17T10:21:00.002-06:00

Grades are in, and somehow I've pulled off an A in existentialism. That's good for back to back 4.0 semesters, and the only two 4.0's I've gotten in college. It's a shame I have so many hours accumulated, because my overall GPA is barely inching higher. When I dropped out, I had a 3.13. After last semester, I went up to a 3.24. This semester will bring it up to a 3.34, which is still a pretty good climb - but keep in mind I took 20 hours. If I take only what I need to graduate (25 hours - well, technically 22, but that's another post), and I get straight A's, I'll leave with a 3.48. I would have to take an additional 7 hours to have a shot at a 3.5 overall GPA. So that's not going to happen, because it'd mean an extra semester (unless I took something ridiculous like 26 hours in the spring). It is tempting.

Snow

2008-12-16T11:31:00.002-06:00

It's been 20 years since we've had this much snow here. I was impressed, to say the least. I have a goal of seeing snow every year, and though it didn't last more than a few hours, I think I can definitely count this as this year's snow. It started snowing around 5:30, but didn't stick until probably 6-6:30. We had gotten probably an inch of rain or more before it started snowing, so the accumulations on the ground weren't as much as they could've been. I went to campus around 10, and not long after it switched to rain and the snow started to melt.

Waiting for the bus:

The quad:

Squirrels freaking out:

Clock tower:

Greek theatre:

No snow would be complete without sledding... except that the only hills around here are the indian mounds.

Parade grounds:

The parade grounds held the most water, and by the time I had gotten there it had been raining for probably half an hour.

Despite the rain, I'm surprised how long everything lasted. There was still a decent amount of snow on the ground when I went into my 3pm final, but when I came out, there was practically none. By the time I got home, there were only little patches of icy snow left in the shade. I'm definitely going to live somewhere that has significant snowfall every year. It's just too great of a thing to have once every 20 years.

Slacking

2008-12-16T11:12:00.003-06:00

I know, I'm really behind with things on the blog. I'm still in decompression from the semester, or at least that's what I'll say. I've shifted from studying - yes, I actually did a good bit - to an overabundance of laziness. I guess that shouldn't be a big surprise to anyone.

Grades have been trickling in over the past few days, and so far, so good. Still waiting on the two potentially 4.0-ruining classes, but the Hinduism prof posted the final exam grades on moodle and I got an A, so I'm good with that one.

And yeah, the pictures of snow are coming... eventually.

It's Getting Better All The Time

2008-12-11T09:37:00.003-06:00

Yesterday went well. Spent a lot of time studying for existentialism, but the test turned out to be relatively easy. I still don't think I got an A, but it should be no worse than a B. So there's a chance that I can still have a 4.0. 4 finals down, 3 to go.

This morning I woke up to snow! It's been rainy and cold since yesterday morning, and when the forecast said a chance of snow, I didn't really believe it. But I got up just to check anyway, and sure enough it was there. Since it was so wet and above freezing, I figured it wouldn't stick - but again I was wrong. Pretty good accumulation too. We haven't seen snow like this in almost 20 years. So if I'm overly excited about it (and I am) it's because it is such a rare occurrence. I was 5 or 6 the last time this happened here. I'll post some pictures when I go back home.

Now how am I supposed to focus on exams when there's snow outside?

2 Down, 5 To Go

2008-12-10T09:33:00.002-06:00

Yesterday was a good day. I finished my paper for Hinduism, met with a group to study existentialism, looked over some parapsychology with C., crushed the parapsychology final, and then capped off the day at a new sushi place off campus. I felt so productive. Granted it did take a lot longer to do everything than it should have.... But who cares? I got a lot accomplished.

While 5 exams left seems like a lot, I'll be stress-free by tomorrow. I have to write a quick essay for tonight and really crack down on the existentialism today. My B in the class is a sure thing, but there's still a very slim chance I can pull off an A. No real rest tonight, as I've got my other hard final tomorrow. After 5pm tomorrow though, it's smooth sailing.

School's Out For Winter

2008-12-06T13:22:00.002-06:00

At least the classes are done. Just the finals left, and I've only got two that are somewhat intimidating. Existentialism will no doubt be the hardest, because I haven't a clue what's going on in there, and I still have to do a lot of really dense, difficult reading (that I probably won't do). I have an A in there now, but not by much. I'd need an 88 or so on the final to get an A, which I'm not optimistic about, since I had an 86 on the midterm on material I knew much better. On the plus side, I only need a 65 or so to get a B, and that should be easy. Hinduism is my other final that I have some concern about, but it shouldn't be nearly as bad. I'm probably around a 93 or so average in the class, and if I get a 90 on my last paper (that I've yet to do) I only need an 80 to keep an A. All the other classes have easy finals and I've got a strong A. Even so, I'm planning on going to study groups for all but one. It's not like I've got anything better to do.

Titles

2008-12-05T10:02:00.002-06:00

It really bugs me to have to address professors as "Doctor." It's too damn long. If they've got a long last name, I might have to say 5 or 6 syllables just to address them. But they can just say two in return. First names are easy, usually short, and when they're not short, they at least flow well. There's no such requirement for last names. In some ways that's the biggest concrete effect of getting a doctorate. Suddenly you're more than just another dumb human; you're now a Doctor. I'd hate to take that away from them, but I wish it was shorter.

Over The Top

2008-12-03T22:33:00.002-06:00

For existentialism, we had to write a 5 page paper on a topic of our choosing. The assignment was to pick a topic and think about it existentially for a month, writing down ideas every day, and then composing the paper at the end of the month. They stressed the everydayness as an absolute necessity. But of course it turned out to be all hype. I wound up writing it in a couple of hours before class with the only previous thought being the quizzes in class where we reported the progress of our thinking. And I got a solid A - a 95. I'm fairly used to that by now, and though it really bothers me that a terrible paper (compared to what I'm capable of) gets such good grades, I just shrug it off these days. It's frustrating because of the lack of standards I think the grading system implies and because it doesn't reward better work. If I really put a full effort into doing this right - if I keep a journal every day and put 30 hours into it over the course of a month - how is that going to affect my grade? It'll go up maybe 2, 3 points?

But I'm digressing. What really pushed me to post about this paper was the comments that the TA returned with the grade. He typed a third of a page, single-spaced, 10 point font. It's a great example of what constructive grading should be. He commented on the style, specific points, and the potential to improve certain aspects. There are legitimately good, thought-provoking questions brought up by his reading of the paper. And I really appreciate it.

But... I think the compliments for the quality of the paper are a bit overstated. I think this is the single best comment I've ever gotten on a graded work. The first line reads, "This is an unpretentious, organized, coherent, interesting, and truly existential paper."

I'll take it.

1 Down, 6 To Go

2008-12-02T11:44:00.003-06:00

My first final was last night - astronomy lab. Since it's a lab, the final is during regular class time in the last week of school. It's nice to get it out of the way, but it really wasn't a concern. There were questions as difficult as "You have a scale of 1.29arcmin/mm. You measured value for the image is 5mm. How many arcminutes is that?" I think the only problem requiring thought was the bonus. I wonder how many people got that right.

I'm glad the semester is almost over. I'm looking forward to the break so I can get some reading done. I've got piles of books that I haven't had time to read - or just the will to read. One more week... 6 exams, 1 paper. And now that I think about it, one of those exams is a paper, so 5 and 2. Good times.

No Turkey, No Problem

2008-12-01T12:04:00.002-06:00

Thanksgiving is generally one of my least favorite holidays, but the last few have been great. Two years ago, I went to San Francisco for the week. Last year was a family camping trip. This year the travelling theme continued as I visited a friend in Tennessee. Having two classes on Wednesday cancelled, I skipped a third to get out of town in the early morning. It made for a still short trip, but I really needed to get out of here. It was a weekend of no noisy neighbors and no one talking about football. It was very good indeed.

The downside is that the restlessness I felt has gotten worse by travelling. Driving home, I really didn't want to take the right exits, wishing instead to follow the road west instead of south. It's probably a good thing I didn't have a tent with me. I don't know that I'm burnt out on school; I'm just disinterested in the same things by now. Today is about how I predicted it would be in the car: drudgery, going to classes that don't really teach me anything, and killing time in unproductive ways. In French, it was just people presenting bonus power point presentations. How can I be "excited" about that? Where's the motivation to go to school?

And now, it's time for a lecture on Heidegger.

It Pays To Be A Dork

2008-11-23T18:26:00.002-06:00

Literally. I'm $90 richer thanks to a Scrabble tournament on campus.

I saw the flyer on a bulletin board last Wednesday. It advertised a $10 entry fee and $100 to first place. I've been playing a lot of Scrabble lately, so I was all over it. I think my enthusiasm might have been a bit much, because I was the first person there by about 15 minutes.

I was glad to see they had the official Scrabble dictionary, because I went to a charity thing where they used some random dictionary. The turnout was pretty low, but they were thinking big and sent someone to buy extra boards just in case. The year before they had about 15 people, and they thought they might get closer to 30. I was pretty impressed by that, and figured more than 10 would be a big deal. In the end, 10 people played.

The people that did play were all very cool and friendly, so it was a lot of fun. I played pretty well and won the first round with two good plays, the bingo WINERIeS and my absolute favorite word in Scrabble, ZOEAE on a triple word score. Second game I won with two bingos, STILLEd and REAUDITs*, the second of which was no good, but neither me nor my opponent was sure about it (the correct play would have been pREAUDIT or EUpATRID, neither of which I knew) and it stayed. The last game was a really ugly board, so there weren't any stand-out plays.

Single elimination brackets (which don't really work so well for a game where luck plays such a big part) kept it to 3 games, so the whole thing lasted about 3 hours. And they had some really good homemade cookies. They also had homemade hummus and spinach and artichoke dip, but I had just eaten lunch and wasn't hungry. Which is disappointing, because everyone said they were both awesome.

Short Week Made Shorter

2008-11-23T11:29:00.002-06:00

It's Thanksgiving week, so the week is truncated to Monday - Wednesday. Night class on Wednesday is cancelled, as is another, earlier class on Wednesday.

The argument for cancelling Wednesday's day class (existentialism) was pretty poor if you ask me. The professor reasoned that since we had already made up a day on a weekend and missed fall break (both due to hurricane make-ups), it wouldn't hurt to miss a day. And, since many people expressed that they would not go to class, it wouldn't be fruitful to have class because he wouldn't want to start lecturing on the next topic because it's so mind-blowingly complex that anyone who misses will be unable to comprehend the next readings. Seriously, that's about how he said it.

It's not really a class that has a specific curriculum that must be finished, and he shifts it around as he wants. If there's more interest in one philosopher than another, he'll spend more time on it. So yeah, I guess it's not like we're missing too much. But, if you're going to make students go to class on a Saturday, I don't think you should be cancelling a regular class day because you had enough classes already. And if people want to skip a class, let them struggle through the readings. I'm not terribly disappointed with this class being cancelled, but the reasons for doing so are pretty abhorrent.

At Least She's Nice

2008-11-21T17:58:00.002-06:00

I went to an advisor in the English department to see if I could sub a 3000 level class I took (Contemporary Fiction) for one of the 2000 level "Composition/Literature" requirements. The college of arts and sciences couldn't do that substitution, so they sent me to the English department. The advisor told me that the required classes satisfy the general ed requirements set by the college and she couldn't substitute something else. It sounds pretty circular to me, but whatever. It won't change anything, and I can still finish all but the last French in the spring.

The advisor was this little old lady who clearly didn't like giving bad news (but she didn't want to try to change it, either). After she said she couldn't do anything, she said she had something for me. I was thinking on the order of a form to fill out requesting the substitution from some other office, but she pulled out a box of bookmarks and sifted through them until she found one appropriate for my major. "I'm sorry, I don't have any religious ones, but this one is kind of philosophical." It's got a quote from Lincoln on it, "Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be." Then she asked if I liked any sports. I thought she was just asking to be nice and make conversation, but when I said I run, she pulled out this ginormous file of folders - the kind you'd see in an elementary school kid's booksack, bright colors and soccer balls or skateboards. Luckily she didn't have anything on running and I stood up and thanked her before she had time to push any more crap on me.

Al

2008-11-20T11:13:00.002-06:00

I saw the albino squirrel yesterday evening and got a few pictures. It was around dusk, so the pictures aren't great. But it's still a pretty cool squirrel.

Hell Is In Every Building

2008-11-19T14:15:00.002-06:00

I think the worst parts of every day are using the bathrooms on campus. The bathroom really shows you how thoughtless and annoying most people are. First of all, they're all disgusting and smell horrible. They're never what I would call "clean." And that's surprising, because it seems every time I need to use the bathroom in Coates, it's closed for "cleaning". They especially like to "clean" them during breaks, so when you're cramped for time, you have to go to another floor or building. I don't know what the hell they're doing, but I can tell you what they're not doing. They're not mopping the floors. They're not cleaning the sinks. They're not making sure that there are ample paper towels and soap. I think all they do is run a toilet brush in the urinals. And it really shouldn't be such a bad thing if they do a half-assed job in cleaning, because ideally people wouldn't trash the place. But they do. Why do people feel it's acceptable to not flush a toilet? Why would they throw paper towels on the floor or leave them in the sink? Why the hell wouldn't you wash your hands?

Once I was in a bathroom at a highway rest stop. A father was taking his young child to the bathroom. After his son finished, he went to flush the urinal and his dad said, "Don't touch that. It's dirty." So they left without flushing and without washing their hands. Guess what buddy: when no one washes hands, the dirtiest place in the bathroom is going to be the door handle. It was a damn sad scene.

If I had to guess, I'd say better than half of people don't flush the urinals. Which is why the place smells so terrible. Probably 90% don't wash their hands. I just don't get it. And what I really don't get is people spitting gum in the urinal. So they're passing a trash can on the way into and out of the bathroom, but they're going to spit it out in their piss where the janitor is going to have to pick it up.

To put it in one nice sentence, the bathrooms constantly reinforce how disgusting and inconsiderate the vast majority of people are.

(Needless to say, I'm a man and this pertains to the men's restrooms. I haven't been in the women's, but I hear they're at least a little cleaner.)

The Squirrel Hunter

2008-11-18T10:43:00.002-06:00

I charged the camera last night, and today I'm going in search of the albino squirrel. I didn't see it this morning, but I think my odds are better in the evening. I've only seen it once, so I realize my chances aren't great. But I'll go back to the same place at the time I saw it - evening under an oak by the clock tower. I wish I could tag them to see how big their ranges are. Other than the albino and one other tan colored squirrel, they're pretty much indistinguishable. I'm thinking the quad squirrels stay entirely within the quad, but for others I think the range would be closer to a city block. If I do get a picture of the albino, I'll submit it to Squirrels Squirrels Squirrels.

No Juice

2008-11-17T09:45:00.003-06:00

I was going to bring my camera today to get some more pictures for you text haters. Unfortunately, when I tried to take the first picture, I realized the battery was dead. So y'all will just have to do without.

The first picture was going to be of the frost on the roof and car. It was brisk this morning - 34. I wish it would stay that way, but it's going to warm up to around 70 today. The change in temperature is much more of a pain than the cold. If it was going to stay cold, I could be comfortable in a jacket all day. As is, you've got the option of freezing your ass off in the early morning or carrying a jacket for half the day. I'm not really consistent with it. Today I've got the jacket - mostly because I really love this one - but I'll probably do without tomorrow.

On The Afterlife

2008-11-14T14:09:00.002-06:00

Graduation date is officially set for August 09. Two more semesters and I'm done. So then what the hell do I do? I've given some thought to doing Teach for America, but from what I've seen it's a summer training and then you start teaching in the fall. So I'd have to wait another 9 months before doing that. I'm also considering the Peace Corps... but it seems like such a long committment to be in a poor place. It seems like it'd be a real setback to being established. A great experience, yes. But it would be pushing back the world for another two years, and then what? It'll be this same situation again.

I'm actually giving some thought to grad school. It's probably not the best idea, because I'm getting bored with school and it just doesn't have any further meaning to it. I think it'd be great to have a phD and teach college, but I don't want to invest years more to get there. It's still a reasonable option, if I could get a fully paid trip to a good school. I think I'll take the GRE just to see what the options look like.

Touched By His Moodly Appendage*

2008-11-10T06:12:00.002-06:00

Moodle seems to be down this morning. It's the first real problem I've had since the first week of school, so for me it's got a pretty good track record. This morning aside, it's been working smoothly all semester. I still hear people complaining about it though; few people seem to like it. Amazingly, some people claim to have preferred Blackboard. Surely that's a sign of mental instability, no?

*If you don't get this reference, you need to brush up on your internet culture.

Language

2008-11-10T06:02:00.002-06:00

Why is it that "overlooked" and "oversaw" have opposite meanings?

Writing In Books

2008-11-09T17:30:00.002-06:00

I don't really like buying used books because it never really feels like mine. It's always still someone else's book, and I'm just borrowing it for a while. It's a silly neurosis that doesn't prevent me from buying used when there's a significant savings. Invariably, I seem to get the books formerly owned by people who just didn't get it. Their comments are so mundane, worthless, and quite often completely incorrect. In my copy of Ramayana, one girl (I'm making that assumption based on the swoops and swirls in the writing) wrote that a character oversaw the burial of the father. It's a simple summary of what happened on the page. Except for the fact that the father wasn't buried, and burial is not at all common in the culture in which the story is set. I'm guessing she didn't do particularly well on the reading comprehension part of the SAT.

Language Swap

2008-11-06T23:05:00.002-06:00

On Wednesdays, the French department hosts a table at the Chimes (bar/restaurant right off campus). It's an informal get together that's meant to provide an opportunity to speak French outside of class. Most of the people that go seem to be grad students, instructors, or at least people in higher level French classes. It's somewhat intimidating to go and not be able to carry on a conversation. I've gone to a few meetings, hoping that it'll help with the listening comprehension. If nothing else, the sounds will at least be more familiar. I haven't been to more than two or three because it's right before my night class - a time usually consumed by writing the essay for the night class. But when I do go, awkwardness and lack of comprehension aside, it's a pretty good time. When I leave, I'm torn between languages. On one hand, I want to keep speaking French. It seems more natural to greet the next person I see in French than English. But on the other hand, once I can speak English again, I feel incredibly brilliant. I'm amazed at the complex ideas I'm able to convey so effortlessly in speech. With French, it's a real struggle to say what I ate for lunch. But switch back to English and suddenly there's this explosion of ability to communicate.

I'm So Productive

2008-11-03T17:04:00.003-06:00

I was on a roll this weekend. I got almost all of my work done through Wednesday, with the exception of writing Wednesday night's essay and a presentation for Hinduism. But the presentation wasn't much (I did it today and it turned out well), and I did all of the readings for the essay.

Then I got to school today and realized I didn't do the philosophy readings.

Geez.

Oops.

2008-10-31T11:49:00.002-05:00

I missed my first class of the semester Thursay morning. I slept through two alarms and woke up 20 minutes after class started. Well, I woke up at least once while the alarms were ringing, and apparently turned them off instead of snoozing. I was dead tired, and even after I woke up I went back to sleep for a few more hours. I had been sick most of the week, so I don't really feel bad about missing the class. Given how much better I felt after a really long sleep, I'll try not to mourn the loss of my class too much.

I think that's only the third class I've skipped since I've been back in school, and the other two had a legitimate reason.

Too Late

2008-10-27T20:48:00.002-05:00

Scheduling opened last night. Unfortunately, I forgot about it until this morning. But I figured it'd be no big deal, since the next group can't schedule until 5pm. One of the classes I really wanted filled up already. It's offered as an honors class, and honors college gets priority scheduling (the same priority I have), so I'm guessing they jumped on it like a rat on a cheetoh.

Damn. Now I'm going to have to play the fun game of watching for someone to drop. Odds aren't good since it's a small 3000 level class on an interesting topic. Back to the drawing board I guess.

A Day In The Life

2008-10-23T10:23:00.002-05:00

I usually get up around 5:45, take a shower, then make some coffee and find something to eat. I always have something that I've procrastinated, so I work on that in the morning. It's a pretty productive time, and if I could manage to wake up at 5 every morning I'd do it.

I try to leave by 7 if I'm riding the bus, or 7:10-7:15 if I'm taking the bike. I opted for the bike yesterday.

Get to campus around 7:25-7:30, lock up the bike, and walk to class. I love campus in the early morning because it's so quiet and you see more squirrels than people.

At my building just as the bells chime 7:30.

After two classes I have a 3 hour break. I went to the library in hopes of getting that paper finished, but I had other things that took priority, and I soon left.

Like the study abroad fair in the union:

Walking through the union, I found 60 cents! What a great day!

It's around 11am, and I've been hungry for a couple hours now. The buffet and plate lunches aren't very appetizing today, so I go with pizza and some crappy pasta salad that I'll never eat again.

It's still about an hour before my next class, and I still need to complete the paper for my 3 o'clock. The computer lab in the library is undoubtedly packed, so I go to my class. It's empty the hour before, and I'm almost always there early.

Now I can get some real work done. It's quiet and I have a computer and no distractions. I finished the paper in about half an hour.

After class I went to the library, waited on a computer, then printed the paper. Sat in the quad until class started talking to a friend and catching up on the readings.

Class from 3-4:30, then back to the library to write an essay for my night class. It's a really short paper that's easily graded, so I can write it in under an hour. Print it out and head to my night class in the ugliest building on campus.

Three hours later, head back to the quad to get my bike.

Ride home, find something to eat, and go to bed.

It's an exciting life, isn't it?

My Major Is Awesome

2008-10-22T22:14:00.004-05:00

If you ever have a friend that can't decide on a major, tell them to go into religious studies. The classes are interesting, socially relevant, and easy. There's a good bit of writing, and usually the professors require some adherence to proper form, but it's not graded like an English paper. It's only 27 hours of religion classes and 100 hours of gen-ed. There's very little required of you in terms of what you have to take. You have to take one class in Eastern religions, one in Western, and one in theory. After that, take whatever the heck you want. Not interested in something? Hate the teacher? Don't take it. Almost all of the profs I've met are great. The material is thought provoking, but not really difficult. In one parapsychology class we had a medium come and give a reading. You'd never see that in engineering.

The best part? Being able to shred the arguments of religious people who knock on your door.

Time To Schedule

2008-10-22T21:51:00.002-05:00

I register for the spring semester this Sunday, so I met with my advisor on Monday. It's pretty amazing to me that it will be my last full semester to get a degree. And I really don't need much. As it stands now on my degree audit, I need 3 religion classes (2029 (western) and two 3000 level), 2 english/lit classes, 2 language classes (in sequence), and 1 more astronomy lab. I made an appointment to see an advisor with the College of Arts and Sciences to see if some other classes I have will substitute for those. I should have at least one of the lit classes, and possibly a substitute for the astro lab (I don't think they'll accept my engineering labs because they're morons. But in theory, a 4000 level engineering thermal science lab should easily fulfill a physical science lab, no?). Worst case scenario, it'll be 19 hours. Which will leave me with one class 'til freedom: the 4th French.

Checking Email - Bad Idea

2008-10-20T11:21:00.003-05:00

The paper (see last post) is going pretty quickly. I'm midway through the third page. I'm starting to think that I'll need a bathroom break in the next hour, but at this rate I can finish the paper and get out of here. But wait, let me check my email. There's a note from the prof saying that she'll extend the due date to Wednesday. My motivation to finish this is pretty shot right now. I had a lot of momentum, I had a looming deadline, and I was getting it done. Now, I have no immediate deadline and no imperative to keep me here working on it. Did I mention how nice of a day it is?

I think she extended the deadline because it hasn't been mentioned in class for a couple weeks. It's on the syllabus and on the guidelines distributed a couple weeks ago, but I'm thinking a lot of people didn't realize it was due today.

Argh. I'm going to try to finish it. No reason to put it off. It shouldn't take more than half an hour. No reason to put it off. No reason to put it off. No reason...

In The Computer Lab

2008-10-20T10:55:00.002-05:00

I'm stuck in the lab on this gorgeous morning (sunny, crystal clear, and 60 degrees... a perfect sampling of autumn) because I've put off this 4-page paper until now. I think I have to address it now, since it's due at 3. But it's going pretty quickly, because it's just bullshit anyway, and I have enough time to also wander aimlessly about the internet.

It's crowded in here, as it always is from 10 til mid-afternoon. I'm directly under an air conditioning vent. Terrible place to be. It's not that it's cold. It's actually quite nice in here. But it is annoying. It is, quite literally, the building breathing on the back of my neck.

Night Lectures

2008-10-19T09:02:00.002-05:00

In my quest to give a damn about school, I've attempted to get more involved. I've talked to my professors more than I ever did in engineering, I've not skipped classes, I've kept up to date with assignments, and I've looked for more out of class opportunities including lectures. I went to one Friday night that was put on by The Collegium for Religion and Science. It was on the subject of the religion of recent presidents, and it was given by a well respected professor from a well respected college, or so I'm told. It was pretty interesting, and I felt it was worth the time to go, but turnout was pretty low. The audience consisted mostly of professors, a handful of students, and a smattering of people with no connection to the university.

Friday morning I overheard one of my professors trying to pressure a student into going (and coming nowhere near succeeding). "But it's Friday night!" "Well sure, but it will be interesting. It's at 7 and won't last too late. You'll have plenty of time to go out after." "But it's Friday night!"

I'm assuming Friday night was the only time available for the speaker. I attended a lecture on a weeknight last semester and it had attracted a much bigger crowd, especially of students. I hope the organizers aren't too put off by the low turnout, because I think a good lecture series such as this is very beneficial... even if it is just a handful of students benefiting.

Be Sure To Write Legibly

2008-10-17T15:33:00.002-05:00

Here's your test. Write all of your answers in the Blue Book. You won't have enough space to complete the exam using just the front of the pages, so be sure to write on the back. You have 50 minutes.

Does that seem fair? A Blue Book is 8 pages. I don't think I could write 8 pages worth of material in the given time even if I already knew what I was going to say. I couldn't do it if I was copying off of another sheet.

It wasn't an 8-page test, but there definitely wasn't enough time to write a "good" exam. I think I'm average as far as writing speed goes, but generally I know how I'm going to answer and don't have to waste time thinking about the question. I feel sorry for those that write slowly. I'd like to see a study done to investigate a correlation between writing speed and test scores. At what point does it become a legitimate disability? If you're a really slow writer with no obvious physical impairments, do you still have a legitimate reason to request an oral exam?

I'm not opposed to long tests. I'm opposed to writing long tests in short periods of time. If only we could type them...

Sensory Overload

2008-10-13T20:56:00.002-05:00

Being a very introverted person, I'm susceptible to sensory overload. It's very difficult for me to focus on reading, homework, or studying when I'm on campus. In the quad, the atmosphere varies so significantly that there's always something new. In the morning there might be a slight fog, and it's quite peaceful with just the squirrels chittering about. I can sit there for a while and just soak it up and enjoy it. At class changes and near midday, there's plenty of activity. And if it was consistently bustling, I could probably tune it out, but it's constantly in flux. The environment changes dramatically in 5 minutes, and I'm always drawn to look at how things are different. I like being an observant person, but if I'm trying to do something else, I'm too observant to be productive.

The library is sometimes a good option. Early in the morning, when it's nearly empty, I can get some serious work done. But any other time, the library is as distracting as any other place. It's so quiet that any slight noise gets amplified and my brain jumps to it. Someone walking in flip-flops, people whispering, the squeaky door... they all drive me insane.

There's only one solution. Well, there are two solutions, but I think of them as the same thing. One would be to have a sensory deprivation cubicle. I'd love to have a solid white cubicle, clean, no decoration, no frills, just white walls, white desk, chair. Isolated from all outside noises. I think I could focus incredibly well in something like this. I've thought about renting a carrel in the library, but I don't think it'd be enough isolation. The other is a place like the union at lunch time. From about 11-1, the union is packed and you're lucky if you can find a place to sit. But the noise is so complete that it's very similar to being in complete quiet. That is, it's hard to pick up on an isolated sound and analyze it.

I need a ganzfeld setup, minus the ping-pong balls.

Elsewhere in the Blogosphere

2008-10-12T11:01:00.003-05:00

The College of Arts and Sciences sends out emails with details on events, deadlines, and whatever else they can find that's remotely related to the college. They sent out one with information about a blog started by an LSU student in his last semester. And holy hell is it awful; it's exactly what you'd expect of a business major attempting to write. Rife with clichés, praising the merits of networking, and mind-numbingly dull. This guy is well on his way to a position of upper management in a Dilbert cartoon. Take a look if you like, but don't say I didn't warn you.

Looking Ahead

2008-10-12T10:42:00.002-05:00

I'm trying to be more organized. I try this every semester and it never really works, but I keep trying anyway. I bought a day planner thingy that's useful for writing things that I'll never again read. And thus far I haven't even been writing down much. So this morning (Saturday morning, that's right - I've been up since 8 doing homework) I've endeavored to write down all the key dates for tests, papers, and other assignments. I even looked up all of my final exam times, something I've never done before the final date to reschedule exam conflicts (I've always relied on luck that I wouldn't have conflicting tests).

This semester's final exam schedule is going to be much easier than it was in the spring, despite having one more class. I have two easy exams on Monday and Tuesday the week before finals week (for a lab and a night class) and then a full week to rebound before the others. Wednesday of finals week I have two: Existentialism and History of God. Existentialism will probably be the hardest final, and unfortunately it's late in the day. 5:30-7:30. But it leaves me on campus for the 8-9 final which will be just writing an essay about the course. No big deal there. Hinduism final Thursday afternoon 3-5, which will probably be the second most difficult. The last two finals will probably be very easy, but encompassing a lot of material. So I'm not too disappointed to have them on Saturday, especially because they're early. Old Testament is 7:30-9:30am and French is 10-noon.

My exam schedule makes a lot more sense than it did last semester. Last semester was almost entirely morning classes with afternoon and night exams. This semester, the 3 night classes have night exams, Hinduism, Old Testament, and French are scheduled for nearly the same time as the classes, and only Existentialism is several hours later than the class. The Saturday finals don't really bother me much. The week is much more manageable with two late exams, and I'm still done by noon on Saturday. Much better than having the 5-7pm last slot.

Well, That Was Close

2008-10-03T14:21:00.002-05:00

The buses get worse and worse. Someone almost died today.

The bus comes up to an intersection and gets in the right turn lane. The corner is a normal bus stop, and there's a short, clumsy, overweight woman trying to get there in time. I don't know how the driver didn't see her, but he didn't stop and started to make the turn. The woman doesn't want to get passed up, so she runs (or the closest she can muster to a run) up to the bus as it's turning. She should've realized that the driver couldn't see her by then. She should've let it go. But she didn't. She kept running forward and tripped off the edge of the sidewalk and landed directly under the turning bus. People on the right side of the bus see her and yell for the driver to stop. He turns around and asks why they want him to stop. "There's someone under the bus." For a second I thought the driver was going to keep going because he didn't believe them. She couldn't have been more than a few feet in front of the rear wheels.

The driver got out, made sure she was okay, got her onboard, and pulled over once he got out of the intersection to call for a supervisor. So that added about 15 minutes to the trip home. The bus driver made the most of the wait with a fairly impassioned safety speech.

I can only fault the driver for not seeing her as he was coming up to the bus stop. She wasn't at the stop yet, and maybe she didn't look like she was even hustling to get to the stop, so even that might not be his fault. I can't see how the woman thought that running up to the side of the moving bus was a good idea. And being so completely unaware of where the sidewalk stops? What the hell? Would you normally run into traffic? She's lucky, to say the least.

Tragedy Strikes!

2008-09-23T13:49:00.002-05:00

After 7 years of use, my booksack has had a potentially life-threatening injury. The right shoulder strap has broken. I had noticed it was starting to fray, but I thought it would stop halfway when it got to the middle seam. I think the middle seam held death's advance for a week, but in the end it was too much. Damn you entropy! I picked up the bag leaving French class today, and as soon as I put it on my right shoulder it gave way.

I started using this bag as a sophomore when my last bag broke. I borrowed it from my roommate at the time, so I'm sure it had at least a year or two of wear on it already. I've broken one of the zippers and given it a rough life. It might be time to let it go. OR, I could sew it back up with some fishing line. Meh, maybe it's time to get a new one. And soon, because carrying it with one strap sucks. It's too awkward to carry it on my left shoulder only, so I slung it over like a messenger bag. That might work on a Tuesday, but definitely not on a Wednesday.

Saturday Night Class

2008-09-21T09:32:00.002-05:00

Last night I had my first Saturday class. I don't think I've ever had one before. Yesterday was one of the make-up days for the Tuesday we missed due to Gustav, and the day was treated as a normal Tuesday schedule. Which means I had class from 6-9 on a Saturday night. During the LSU-Auburn game. Since no one else voted for a Saturday class in my other class, and since this one was at night during a football game, I figured I'd be the only person there. I wasn't. Total class = 3 students. It's a lot more than I expected. Campus was deserted. In the lot closest to my classroom (between Nicholson and Coates), there was one other car (belonging to a girl in my class). I'm pretty sure I could've parked in the quad and no one would have noticed.

I Stand Alone

2008-09-19T18:27:00.002-05:00

Since we missed days for Hurricane Gustav and an afternoon for Ike, the university scheduled make-up classes on four Saturdays (Though each class only has to meet on one Saturday - you get to choose). Most teachers are treating it as a bonus class. They're either teaching material that will not be on the test or they're making lecture notes available online for those who cannot attend. One professor decided to ask the class how many people wanted a Saturday class.

I was the only person to vote for it.

I'm not at all surprised by the result, but it's a little disheartening. Out of 40-50 other people, not a single other person wanted to go to an extra class. Is it really asking that much for an hour of your time on a Saturday? Or is there something wrong with me? It's an interesting class... I could understand if it was materials selection, but it's not. There's no work involved, no extra homework, and minimal note taking. Unless you're leaving town or have something planned for the whole day, it's completely negligible. But, so be it. Cut the class down.

Oh Hell No

2008-09-19T10:00:00.002-05:00

So I'm sitting at the bus stop this morning at 7:10 am, waiting to be shuttled off to my life of scholarly joy. I'm doing the same thing at 7:20. And at 7:30. By now I know I'm going to be late for class, and since it's a class where the professor closes the door and asks that you don't enter if you're late, I'm pretty peeved. When the bus arrives I grudgingly take a seat by the window. Heading towards campus, we pass another bus parked on the opposite side of the road. For a moment I cool off as I realize the tardiness is due to mechanical problems. There's not much they can do about that.

Then I see the driver of that bus run across the street from McDonald's carrying a bag of food. Oh hell no. I'm late for class because some dipshit didn't eat breakfast before his shift started? Is anyone watching what these guys do out there? Apparently not, judging by how often they use cell phones and eat while driving.

I submitted my complaint via email. I don't know how much good it will do, but at least someone will hear about it. And in the end, I was late for class, but so was the teacher. It's nice to have a bit of luck every now and then.

Are You Kidding Me?

2008-09-12T14:07:00.002-05:00

I got to my 12:30 class about 15 minutes early today. I thought it was odd that no one was there yet since I'm typically early and several people are there before me. I used the lectern computer to check my email, and I'm glad I did that instead of reading a book. Email sent out at 11:26am: all afternoon classes are cancelled due to Hurricane Ike.

They can't be serious, right?

Here's the weather forecast for today from weather.com. Today: Windy with showers and thundershowers likely. Isolated tornadoes possible. High 84F. Winds E at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 60%.

What is so threatening about that? It's windy, but not dangerously windy. Flooding is not expected. It's just a rainy, windy day.

It doesn't make sense to cancel only afternoon classes [especially an hour before they start] when the majority of people that have class in the afternoon are already on campus. It's not like the weather is expected to get worse. There's no rush to get home and hunker down.

Check Please

2008-09-10T22:20:00.002-05:00

Today's lunch might just rank up there with the worst service experience I've had in a restaurant. I ate at the Magnolia Room in the union; I've been there before and the server was incredibly nice and friendly, so it's not like they don't have competent servers. The guy took my order for sweet tea and I moseyed over to the buffet. I got a salad and a plate of food and went back to my table. There was unsweet tea waiting for me, but I don't really mind. I drink both and don't have a strong preference. I hear the girl at the next table tell the server she got sweet tea instead of unsweet. He takes it back. Then he comes to my table and takes my unsweet tea and walks away as he's saying he gave me the wrong thing. I didn't have a chance to stop him. But no big deal I guess, he's just trying to get it right. I can appreciate that. Every meal comes with bread. They bring it with the drinks. Every table around me got bread. Me? No bread. After I finish my plate, then my salad, I decide to go back for more. Increasing value, if you will. I get up and walk back to the buffet. The waiter comes over and hands me my check while I'm walking. It's just a ticket that you pay at the door, but I think it's pretty weird that he walks over to give it to me instead of just leaving it on the table. So I turn around a few steps later and the dude is clearing my table. I've got my booksack on the chair next to mine and books on the table. It's quite clear that I'm not leaving yet, as if the plate in my hand wasn't enough evidence. I had to go tell the guy that I wasn't done. What the fuck?

Aftershocks

2008-09-10T22:09:00.004-05:00

Gustav has been much more influential than I expected it would be. Not just because of damage, but because of how things have changed after the storm. We've been under a curfew from 10p-6a, so the bus service stops running at 8:45 (why not 10, I don't know). That's a pretty awful time when night classes end at 9. The campus routes might run past 8:45, but I'm not going to stand in the dark for 20 minutes to figure out that they aren't. The library has been closing early - I assume for the curfew as well. It closes at 9 now, so it's no good after class either. Hm... what else? Career day is moved to the colliseum, but that's pretty inconsequential. I guess most of the other effects are on par with that. But the first two...

Good Call

2008-09-04T15:12:00.002-05:00

School has been cancelled through Friday. I'm ready to go back, but most of the city is a mess. I haven't been to campus yet, but I might try to get over there today. I could list some examples of destruction such as downed trees, the vast majority of people being without power, and on and on, but I don't think any will convey the seriousness of the situation better than the following. Nothing else can begin to say how much normal life has been disrupted. Nothing else captures the magnitude of this calamity. Prepare yourself, because this is pretty bleak.

Saturday's football game has been cancelled.

What's Another Day?

2008-08-31T14:52:00.002-05:00

Just for good measure, the university cancelled classes on Wednesday also. I thought Gustav would be out of here by then - if not, then certainly dramatically weakened. Right now the forecast is just rain on Wednesday. I wonder if they know something I don't. I wonder if they're thinking it will be a big event requiring a lot of recovery. If it is, they may decide to cancel the rest of the week also.

The dorms and "essential services" remain open. In addition, LSU hosts a special needs shelter for evacuees that require some form of medical attention. This should have a minor impact if any upon university functions.

The extra day off helps in some regards. When just Tuesday was cancelled, it put more pressure on me to get things done for Wednesday, which is my hardest day. I have the same amount of time before those classes, but it's always easier to do work during the week than on the weekend. The library is closed, and I needed to do some research there, which would have to be done today. With Wednesday also off, the rest of my week requires little or no preparation and I'll have Thursday and Friday to get ready for next week. It's not all rosy though, since classes may be truncated, or I might find out that two weeks of work are due the next Wednesday.

Well, Maybe Just A Little Hysteria

2008-08-29T15:34:00.002-05:00

The university has cancelled classes for Tuesday. It strikes me as too early to make that decision, but I can see the reasons behind it. It is a holiday weekend and many people may leave and return without knowing the situation. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, no one wants to be accused of reacting too slowly after the Katrina debacle. Contraflow on the interstates and highways will start tomorrow as parishes southeast of Baton Rouge will be under mandatory evacuation. It should be an interesting weekend.

Hysteria? Not Quite.

2008-08-29T09:03:00.002-05:00

Gustav, for now, seems to be heading this way. The predicted path shown above is further west than it has been in previous days, and I wouldn't be surprised to see future predictions continue that westward move. Despite the unpredictability with hurricanes, I've heard people criticizing the university for not cancelling class on Tuesday (Monday is Labor Day). I started hearing this on Wednesday, almost a full week before the forecasted landfall. The majority of these are students that just want an extra day off (since a one-day holiday after a week of class is clearly insufficient). These are the same people that were hoping the first day of class would be cancelled because of Fay. A few are from out of state and have never experienced a hurricane. I suppose these have most of their exposure to hurricanes through news stories of Katrina. And while Katrina was certainly enough to create a fear of storms, most probably do not realize how unique Katrina was. During the local coverage of Katrina, I remember the local news comparing it to previous storms. They listed the storms with the largest wind impact on Baton Rouge, and Katrina and one other (I think Audrey) produced the highest winds in the range of 50mph. Not even hurricane force. As far as I know, Baton Rouge has never experienced hurricane force winds.

The university has sent out the usual email about how they're closely monitoring the storm and will act in the best interest of safety for students. I expect they'll make a decision sometime late tomorrow or Sunday. If the storm just grazes the area, I hope the administration keeps the university open. This is Louisiana; heavy rains and a little wind should be nothing to disrupt normal schedules.

Moodle Update

2008-08-28T09:32:00.002-05:00

So far it's crashed for a day and was missing one of my classes.

But it's still good. They're addressing the issues.

Don't mind my hopeful optimism. Four classes use Moodle; I need to believe there's something better than Blackboard.

Hooray For High Gas Prices!

2008-08-27T21:30:00.002-05:00

Due to increased fuel costs, the city bus service increased its fees charged to the university. Instead of merely paying the extra money, they decided to cut bus routes and reduce the number of buses on some routes. On my route they cut two buses but changed some things on campus, and they proclaim that they will be able to continue the same consistent service. It sounds bad, but as of yet I haven't noticed any problems. I normally try to get to campus a half hour before class starts, so it's unlikely to affect me.

The real reason I'm so happy about this is the rerouting of the night bus. The night bus is and has been a combination of 3 popular daytime routes. Since it was such a long route, and there wasn't enough ridership to put more than a few buses on the route (I'd guess there were 2-3), it took a hell of a long time to get home. It wasn't unusual to wait 15 minutes for the bus and then have a 30 minute ride. My stop was toward the end of the loop, so it was longer than most, but it was still an unreasonable amount of time considering I live 2.5 miles from campus. I've walked home faster than the night bus.

But no more. With the new route, I waited for 5 minutes (may not be typical) and rode for 8. It's amazing what can be accomplished when a route is rationally created. The last route was ridiculous. It went through campus and out to northeast campus, all the way down sorority row, then back (and all through that loop I have NEVER seen anyone board or exit the bus), then finally off campus. Once off campus, they'd stick the bus driver with a left turn onto a busy street with no signal light. I'd avoid those turns in a car - and they want a city bus to cut into traffic like that? Yeesh. The new route cut all campus travel and moved the route over to take advantage of signals. There's only one left turn that presents any problem and it's not a bad one.

The only downside is the location of the stops. Since they cut all of the route through campus, the only places to pick it up are at the rec and on Parker behind the CEBA lot. Both are extremely long walks from the Quad, Library, and Union. I don't really mind having a 5-10 minute walk to a stop if the service is consistently fast, but I could see it being a breaking point for some, especially women (safety being compromised off campus). I'm really not sure why they didn't run it through campus by Tureaud, because it could easily be looped into the route (and even eliminate that one problematic left turn).

8 minutes... I thought I'd never see the day. Erm, night.

So What Is The Perfect Schedule?

2008-08-25T22:53:00.003-05:00

With 20 hours, I'd want it spread out as much as possible. Class every day with one or maybe two night classes mid-week. First class at 9:30 (or 9), 2-3 classes before a 1.5-2 hour break, 2-3 more classes. An easy but interesting class or language first, with the difficult class coming right before the break. Night classes should be limited only to interesting, easy classes.

And for sanity's sake, please give me a short walk between classes. I don't want to run across campus, but even more so, I don't want to be in Locket 09 for 4 hours straight. Or any classroom. But especially Lockett.

Feel free to comment with your idea of a perfect schedule.*

*The REAL perfect schedule has no class.**

**What a classy pun. ***

***Sorry.

The Elusive Perfect Schedule

2008-08-25T22:08:00.002-05:00

I've pretty much given up on the search for it. The stars and planets and a couple other celestial thingamabobbers have to align in some kind of funky hyperbolic curve to get a perfect schedule with 20+ hours. This semester is so far out of whack that there's little hope of bringing it together into a passable schedule.

I'm stuck with a 7:30 class, which isn't bad by itself. I like the early mornings, but there are logistical challenges associated with the earliest class. Buses start running at 7, meaning they're on campus at 7. I don't think they ever leave campus at 7, and the first bus was at 7:23 this morning, putting me on campus at 7:32. It's time enough to get to class (class starts at 7:40), but it leaves you with no room to spare for stopping by the bookstore, picking up a book for class at the library, or getting breakfast. But it's just as well, because none of those are available so early. Bookstore opens at 8, library at 7:15 (which gives you a tiny window), and, well, I lied... breakfast is definitely available.

The worst part about my 7:30 is what follows it: a big hunk of nothing. I don't have another class until 12:30, and I have class for the rest of the day, getting out of night classes on Monday and Wednesday at 9pm. I'm not a fan of night classes; this semester I have three. Astronomy lab has obvious grounds for being a night class, but the others are high level religion classes that really should be taught during the day.

Tuesdays and Thursdays are pretty dead with only French during the day. Tuesday night is Religion and Parapsychology. Fridays are looking pretty dead also with just the 7:30 and 12:30 classes. I'd like to switch the 12:30 for a T-Th class that would abut the lone French, which would make T-Th more worthwhile and open up an effective 3 day weekend. The 12:30 is my "bonus" class, so it's not required, but it (Existentialism) is one I really want to take. And I don't want to drop it for a T-Th until I get set on the French. I'm unimpressed with the teacher (quite the understatement there), and might try to get into another section with my teacher from spring semester... which would be mid-morning and split my long break into shorter breaks and open up more breaks in the afternoon. Which is also not desirable, because the breaks would be short enough to limit what I could do (such as going home, taking a nap, or watching a movie).

It's a real clusterfuck, and I may just tough it out with what I have. All schedules have advantages, so it'll just be a matter of taking advantage of what I can.

Student Profiles: Really Loud Headphones Wearer

2008-08-25T09:02:00.002-05:00

This is, unfortunately, an ever growing demographic. Be it on the bus, in the five minutes before class, or in the sweet-dead silence of the library, the Really Loud Headphones Wearer (RLHW) must rock. And not rock softly. No, reasonable volume is for the poor frail-eared undergrowth of society. The RLHW is completely unaware of his surroundings, which makes him easily startled. In extreme cases, an RLHW will miss phone calls despite the the loud ring right beside him. Others in the vicinity may become agitated and leave. The RLHW leads a solitary life, alienated by those who prefer not to hear tinny music at 100 decibels. But do not feel pity for him; he has 12 more hours of battery life and 18 hours of Led Zeppelin to keep him company.

Moodle

2008-08-23T15:05:00.002-05:00

I've never met anyone that liked Blackboard. Fortunately for me, few professors ever used it. That last sentence is a pretty apt indicator of Blackboard's reputation. Its function is to help with the organization of class documents, grades, and announcements, yet I was always better off without it. This semester, LSU has moved to Moodle. I suppose it has the same function as Blackboard, but it is much, much, much better. One big problem with Blackboard was reliability, and I can't vouch for Moodle there yet, but it has been in beta for the past spring and summer semesters.

This Class Is Going To Be AWESOME

2008-08-22T09:22:00.002-05:00

I've been looking forward to Religion & Parapsychology since I signed up for it last semester. I picked up one of the texts, A Skeptic's Handbook of Parapsychology, last week and it looks pretty good. The syllabus was posted on Moodle yesterday, and now I can't wait for class to start. Here's a sampling of topics from the syllabus:

ESP
Poltergeists and Psychokinesis
Healing, Auras, and Exorcism
Near Death Experiences and Out of Body Experiences
Hauntings
Witchcraft
UFO Sightings
Abduction: Aliens and Raelians

How cool is that! I had no idea I could go to college to study UFO's.

Fall 2008

2008-08-22T09:13:00.003-05:00

After a long summer, I've had some problems kicking myself to post again. For the past two weeks, I've been preparing for the next semester. Hopefully the transition to school goes better than the blogging.

This will be my first semester as a Religious Studies major, and the largest course load I've had to date. I'm signed up for 20 hours in 7 classes.

REL 1004 - Old Testament
REL 3203 - Religion and Parapsychology
REL 4050 - History of God
REL 4600 - Hinduism
FREN 1002 - 2nd Semester French
PHIL 3001 - Existentialism
ASTR 1108 - Astronomy Lab

I'm not worried about the course load at all, with the possible exception of existentialism. Coming from engineering, the work associated with religion classes is almost negligible. There's a lot of reading, and I'm expecting existentialism to be the most difficult reading, but it's nothing too demanding.

School starts Monday, the 25th.

That Was A Waste

2008-05-30T18:44:00.002-05:00

At the end of the semester, my prof for contemporary fiction said he'd be in his office the Thursday and Friday after the final in case we wanted to see our tests or had questions about our grades. He wrote some useful comments on my midterm, so I wanted to see what he had to say about the final. When I turned it in, I said I'd probably stop by during the allotted time. I went on that Friday and he didn't have any of the exams with him. No big deal; he's teaching an intersession class and will be in his office every day at the same time. I'm on campus fairly regularly anyway, so I didn't mind coming back. Next week, he didn't have it again. I was going to just drop it, but he insisted he'd have it next week. So I went to see him again today. He did have it, but there were ZERO comments on it. Just a grade. I got an A in the class; I really don't give a damn what grade I got on the test. I want useful commentary. Something that will, oh, I don't know... teach me something? Some relevant criticism? What worked well? What didn't?

It's just another way school is geared to getting a grade and getting the hell out instead of really learning and bettering yourself. I want to know how well I did on other finals too, but no professors specifically set aside time to see them, and I'm not so sure it'd be useful. Since they know they're not giving them back, I'd bet that they're all devoid of comments. Every semester should include one day of class after finals where the prof returns final exams. Otherwise it's just stumbling in the dark. I know I missed something but how am I to know what it is? Where's the dark spot in my brain?

Officially Out of Engineering

2008-05-25T14:55:00.002-05:00

I went to the college of arts and sciences on Thursday and switched to religious studies. Technically, it's a philosphy degree with a concentration in religious studies, even though there are no philosphy classes required. It's sort of silly, but that's the way they do it here.

When I got home, I had a letter from the College of Engineering congratulating me on making the dean's list or whatever it is for getting a 4.0. In the college of engineering, out of 2,112 eligible students, 68 others had a 4.0. I think the 2,112 is counting only those that took at least 15 hours.

Grades Are In!

2008-05-15T07:15:00.002-05:00

My first ever 4.0 in college. And really it wasn't that difficult. Finals week was rough, but the rest of the semester was easily manageable and I went into finals with a strong A in most if not all of my classes. It makes me think about all those other semesters. Looking back, I can imagine how little I cared to just accept easy B's and C's. It's true that engineering classes are much more demanding than the stuff I took this semester, but there's no legitimate reason other than laziness. Going forward, I'll try to maintain this and not slip into my old college self too much. There's still plenty of room for improvement, like writing papers before the night before it's due.

It's Giving Me an F5 Complex...

2008-05-13T10:31:00.002-05:00

Refreshing just to see what comes next. Except that when you refresh the final grades, it brings you back to the PAWS homepage. 3 have been posted, and I'm halfway to Scott's $10. Granted the ones that have been posted are the grades I was most secure about.

The Waiting Game

2008-05-12T11:43:00.003-05:00

Nothing left to do but wait for the grades to be posted. My first exam was last Monday and it was a scantron exam. Grades haven't been posted yet. How lazy is that? They should have been up the next day. My last exam was Saturday night - a 5 page French test. It's already been graded and posted. That's what I like to see, teachers not wasting any time. I'm impressed. That's the only grade posted so far... I'm expecting the rest late this week as most of them are essays for larger classes.

Done!

2008-05-11T13:59:00.002-05:00

Got out of the last final at 7:30pm Saturday night. Now I've got a few months to slack off until the fall rolls around. I'm not sure what I'll do with the blog yet, but since I'm not in school there won't be much to write about. I may make a couple of posts if I can find related material, but it'll likely be on hold until August.

Slowly But Surely

2008-05-08T17:28:00.003-05:00

Knocking out each final. 3 down, 3 to go. Still procrastinating on the take-home due Saturday, but it's really the only one I should be putting a lot of effort into. History tomorrow should be a breeze, though I need to read about 150 pages to finish the extra book. It's a good read and goes quickly. After 2:30 tomorrow, I'll have to start cranking out that 8 page essay. Plenty of time. Turn it in at 9am Saturday, goof off until Saturday night, take an easy French final, and I'm done. So close. 2 days.

One Down, Five To Go

2008-05-05T18:05:00.002-05:00

My first final was today. I've got a brief hiatus tomorrow before finals on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. The fifth to go is a take-home final due on Saturday, which is also the one I'm most worried about. It won't be very difficult, but it will be time consuming and a real pain in the neck. And I'll likely reach a point where I give up and just write down some crap. But if it's graded like the midterm, that will still get me an A. I'm a little behind on readings, so I have to read about 500 pages this week in addition to reviewing. My grades are good enough to where I only need a low to mid B on all tests to keep an A, but I'd like to end on a good note and ensure that I'll get some money from Scott. 19 hours of class hasn't bothered me all semester, but when you have to take tests for all of them in one week, it's not quite as fun.

Dead Week

2008-04-28T17:35:00.002-05:00

This is the last week of classes for the spring semester. And for possibly the first time in my college career, dead week is actually dead. I have no homework, no projects, nothing big to speak of. The only thing worth a grade is the oral comprehension section of the French final, in class on Thursday. Meh.

Le Livre Francais: Il est une chienne.

2008-04-22T16:45:00.002-05:00

This French text is lacking something very important - a decent English-French glossary. Since we're only supposed to use the text and not outside dictionaries, it seems fairly important to me. The French-English that is included is excellent, covering pretty much everything used in the book. The English-French leaves you wondering how the hell you're supposed to say something. I had to use it a few minutes ago to figure out how to say "sit." It's not in there. But if you look further up the page, they have an entry for "sexism." Sexism makes the cut but not sit?

"Francois, what are you doing standing up?"
"Well, I don't know how to sit, and if I stand right here I can make sure my wife isn't slacking ass on the laundry."

In case you're wondering, sexism is "sexisme," and not surprisingly it's masculine. Le sexisme.

Back in Action

2008-04-22T16:41:00.002-05:00

I've been blogging like I've been reading for classes lately. But I hope to turn both around this week. The semester is drawing to a close and there's no good reason to slack off so much with only a couple weeks remaining. Next week is dead week, followed by exams. And if you're the optimistic sort, you could say I'm getting my money's worth by having the longest possible semester. I have a final in the absolute last time slot: the dreaded Saturday night final, 5:30-7:30.

Spring Is In The Air

2008-03-16T10:32:00.003-05:00

It's warming up, the azaleas are blooming, and those scraggly trees in the quad have a bit of green to them. Most importantly, this week is spring break. A time for college students to get away from the drudgery of binge drinking and skipping class to... get hammered at the beach. I'm especially enjoying my break because it's fairly quiet in Tigerland. It's almost as if I lived in a semi-respectable neighborhood.

Falling Into Old Habits

2008-03-10T11:59:00.002-05:00

I didn't finish my essay until 8 this morning. I find it very difficult to write that sort of thing (assignments I don't want to do) without a strict deadline. And when I'm working on something after 10pm and hit even the smallest roadblock, I go to bed and set the alarm. I function best under extreme time constraints, and I think I think (damned if that doesn't look like a typo, either way it's ugly and shouldn't be used) best in the early mornings. It's made so much better by the complete quiet and stillness, and, with the time change, darkness. I enjoy the feeling of having been up since 5 and gotten things accomplished. I enjoy the feeling of sitting at a table, steam rising from a cup of tea, sunshine gradually appearing and creeping down from the treetops. But I guess I'm just a morning person.

And a champion procrastinator.

Note to Self: Make Notes to Self

2008-03-09T12:22:00.002-05:00

For this faith and doubt midterm, I'm realizing how much of a mistake it was to not make notes and record page numbers for particular passages in the texts. I'm trying to quote someone yet I have only a slight idea of where the passage is in relation to the others, so it takes a while to find it, if I find it at all. Lesson learned.

Live From The Dining Room Table

2008-03-08T20:38:00.002-06:00

It's Saturday Night!

And I'm working on a take-home midterm for Faith and Doubt. I've never been a fan of take-home tests. The biggest reason is length. In class, you can't write more than a few pages of an essay, and most teachers aren't so cruel as to give obscenely long tests. This doesn't apply for take-home tests. For the one I'm writing now, there are two questions, each with a minimum answer length of three pages. Having started on one of them, three pages will be inadequate to address all of the facets needed for an A. By the time I'm done (if I don't give up and start writing crap), I'll have at least 8 pages. Blah.

I used to like tests. With my old attitude toward class, test days were easy days. No learning required, and it always feels good to get past that bit of stress. You get out of class early (if you finish early) and don't have any homework due. Test days are great for lying on the parade grounds watching the clouds go by. That's how I used to feel.

Now they feel like a waste of time. I'm losing a day of class when I could be learning something. I'm stuck doing tedious regurgitation. I'm happy with the amount of knowledge I've gained thus far, and I feel I could get an A on any test. But I don't want to have to prove it, merely because it's boring. It's akin to the feeling I get when trying to help others learn something that's already been reviewed: Look, we've gone over it 5 times in class already. Do I really need to say it again?

It's a Surreal Ride

2008-03-03T16:33:00.003-06:00

Definitely one of the more interesting bus rides this afternoon. When you ride the same bus route 10+ times a week, it gets pretty dull. You start to appreciate even the smallest things - so this might seem trifling to many. But it made the ride unique.

I ended up sitting next to Rainman doing a Rubik's Cube. I've seen people solve them before, but never with such proficiency. This guy would scramble the sides blindly, then solve the thing in under 30 seconds. He did it over and over again with such smooth mechanical precision that only comes from extreme repetition. After watching several times, the bus was going down Nicholson with the storm bearing down from the northwest. The sky was dark, trees blowing in the wind, and the bus passed a midget on a child-size bicycle. She was obviously struggling against the wind, repeatedly getting out of the saddle to stand on the pedals. The bus was slowed by the light and traffic, and the midget pedalled past on her orange bike, standing out from the dense green of the grass and blue grey nimbuses.

Waking Up Is Harder When You Want To Die

2008-02-26T03:12:00.002-06:00

Apologies to The Eels.

If the title is true, I must have the life force alive and well in me. I woke up this morning at 2:30. Why, you ask? Well, I just woke up. And I thought it was 6:30. I must have woken up at the end of a sleep cycle, because I felt no more tired than when I normally wake up between 6 and 7. I thought I had woken to my alarm, but this is clearly not correct since the alarm is still set for 4 hours from now. I looked at the time on my phone when I woke, and I thought it said 6:30. I crawled out of bed, took a quick shower, and went to the kitchen to cook breakfast. I thought it odd that it was still dark outside, but it was still very overcast. I checked the temperature (ignoring the clock 2 inches above) and thought it odd that it was still so warm (68). I figured the cold front hadn't pushed through yet, which was also odd because it was supposed to overnight. It wasn't until I sat down to check my email that I saw the clock on the laptop read 3:08AM. Erm... that's not right. I figured there was something wrong with the clock. I got up to check the time on the alarm clock. 3:10. Damnit.