I'm baaaaack
Back at school once again, for my last semester ever! What a crazy feeling.
I had a wonderful, four-week-long Christmas break. It was tough to come back; I couldn't sleep very well the last few nights due to preemptive stress. I was seriously so lazy over break; I knew I was about to have a lot less time on my hands and a lot more work to do.
My parents dropped me off Sunday after treating my sister and me to dinner (thanks!). At about 6, Laura, my roommate, came. Laura was my roommate sophomore and junior year. She studied abroad in the Philippines last semester which is why I was rooming with Ren instead. Now we're living together again. It was really good to see her! It had been so long!
Monday, I had four classes, starting at 9:10 with ice skating. We didn't go on the ice, just listened to the instructor go over the syllabus. I'm kind of excited to start learning stuff; I'm kind of nervous too. I know I'm gonna be really bad. It seems like there are people of all different skill levels in the class. Some have been figure skating all their lives; others like me are pretty much brand new to the ice. And then there are some in between. There are around 25 people in the class. I just hope there's someone worse than me.
Immediately after ice skating, I headed to Erikson Hall for my senior capstone design course. All MEs take it their last semester. This course involves being in groups of four and working on a corporate sponsored project. We were choosing our groups yesterday and ranking our preferences for projects. I was scared I'd get in a bad group. It sounded like a lot of people had prearranged their groups before class. I was gonna be stuck with the leftovers no one wanted to work with. One person I definitely didn't want to work with was Allen. (By the way, the banquet turned out fine, for those of you who are curious. The food was good; people seemed to enjoy themselves. And it ended up being a lot cheaper than if we'd held it at the Kellogg Center.)
After talking about some stuff, our professor set us loose to go form our groups of four. I just stood there looking lost. I didn't know who to approach about being in my group. Bev asked if I would be with her. I agreed. She's an older woman, around my parents' age, one of those cases of coming back to school years later to earn a degree. Then we went around looking for two more people. It seemed like everyone we talked to was a group of three looking for a fourth. We were just talking about splitting up, when we found someone not part of any group yet, Matt. I hardly know the guy, just recognize him from some of my classes. We still needed to find a fourth. Finally, from across the room, I spotted Dan sitting forlornly in the corner. I took that to mean he didn't have a group yet, so I motioned for him to come over. So that was that. We had our group of four. Dan is an interesting character; a bit odd. But it should be good.
Then we ranked the fifteen projects according to what we were interested in. Today, the project assignments were announced. We got our first choice, the Motorola project. We'll either be working on a tactile Bluetooth alert device or 180 degree hinge mechanism development for a QWERTY keypad.
My next class of the day was Vibrations. Our teacher is a grad student. At least, I think; he seemed very young, and I'd never heard of the guy before. He said he intends to make the course very challenging. Gulp.
And lastly, I had my philosophy class. It's way out in Wonders Hall, about a 20 minute walk from Shaw, where I live. It seems like all my classes are fairly far away this term. The ice arena is 20 minutes away, and the intramural building where I have volleyball is a pretty good distance also. I guess I know I'll get plenty of fresh air walking to and from classes.
Philosophy was definitely different than the classes I'm used to. I'm sure it will be interesting. It'll be very discussion based, and I'm sure you can imagine, very different from an engineering course. I'll probably find it difficult to speak up and share my opinions, since that's not something I'm good at. But it will be good for me. I'm not looking forward to the papers I'll have to write or the essay tests, though.
Those were my four classes Monday. Then I went to quiz bowl practice that evening. And afterward, Laura and I and some other friends of ours all went with Choua to see the movie she's in, Gran Torino, with Clint Eastwood. Isn't that so cool? My friend has a role in a Clint Eastwood movie! I've already told like everyone I know. It was a good movie; and when Choua came on screen, we all made a lot of noise. Choua plays the character of Youa, the love interest of the main character. She even has lines and everything.
Today, all I had was my volleyball class. It sounds like we're gonna be playing quite a bit every class period. Yay! It's going to be sweet!
I had a wonderful, four-week-long Christmas break. It was tough to come back; I couldn't sleep very well the last few nights due to preemptive stress. I was seriously so lazy over break; I knew I was about to have a lot less time on my hands and a lot more work to do.
My parents dropped me off Sunday after treating my sister and me to dinner (thanks!). At about 6, Laura, my roommate, came. Laura was my roommate sophomore and junior year. She studied abroad in the Philippines last semester which is why I was rooming with Ren instead. Now we're living together again. It was really good to see her! It had been so long!
Monday, I had four classes, starting at 9:10 with ice skating. We didn't go on the ice, just listened to the instructor go over the syllabus. I'm kind of excited to start learning stuff; I'm kind of nervous too. I know I'm gonna be really bad. It seems like there are people of all different skill levels in the class. Some have been figure skating all their lives; others like me are pretty much brand new to the ice. And then there are some in between. There are around 25 people in the class. I just hope there's someone worse than me.
Immediately after ice skating, I headed to Erikson Hall for my senior capstone design course. All MEs take it their last semester. This course involves being in groups of four and working on a corporate sponsored project. We were choosing our groups yesterday and ranking our preferences for projects. I was scared I'd get in a bad group. It sounded like a lot of people had prearranged their groups before class. I was gonna be stuck with the leftovers no one wanted to work with. One person I definitely didn't want to work with was Allen. (By the way, the banquet turned out fine, for those of you who are curious. The food was good; people seemed to enjoy themselves. And it ended up being a lot cheaper than if we'd held it at the Kellogg Center.)
After talking about some stuff, our professor set us loose to go form our groups of four. I just stood there looking lost. I didn't know who to approach about being in my group. Bev asked if I would be with her. I agreed. She's an older woman, around my parents' age, one of those cases of coming back to school years later to earn a degree. Then we went around looking for two more people. It seemed like everyone we talked to was a group of three looking for a fourth. We were just talking about splitting up, when we found someone not part of any group yet, Matt. I hardly know the guy, just recognize him from some of my classes. We still needed to find a fourth. Finally, from across the room, I spotted Dan sitting forlornly in the corner. I took that to mean he didn't have a group yet, so I motioned for him to come over. So that was that. We had our group of four. Dan is an interesting character; a bit odd. But it should be good.
Then we ranked the fifteen projects according to what we were interested in. Today, the project assignments were announced. We got our first choice, the Motorola project. We'll either be working on a tactile Bluetooth alert device or 180 degree hinge mechanism development for a QWERTY keypad.
My next class of the day was Vibrations. Our teacher is a grad student. At least, I think; he seemed very young, and I'd never heard of the guy before. He said he intends to make the course very challenging. Gulp.
And lastly, I had my philosophy class. It's way out in Wonders Hall, about a 20 minute walk from Shaw, where I live. It seems like all my classes are fairly far away this term. The ice arena is 20 minutes away, and the intramural building where I have volleyball is a pretty good distance also. I guess I know I'll get plenty of fresh air walking to and from classes.
Philosophy was definitely different than the classes I'm used to. I'm sure it will be interesting. It'll be very discussion based, and I'm sure you can imagine, very different from an engineering course. I'll probably find it difficult to speak up and share my opinions, since that's not something I'm good at. But it will be good for me. I'm not looking forward to the papers I'll have to write or the essay tests, though.
Those were my four classes Monday. Then I went to quiz bowl practice that evening. And afterward, Laura and I and some other friends of ours all went with Choua to see the movie she's in, Gran Torino, with Clint Eastwood. Isn't that so cool? My friend has a role in a Clint Eastwood movie! I've already told like everyone I know. It was a good movie; and when Choua came on screen, we all made a lot of noise. Choua plays the character of Youa, the love interest of the main character. She even has lines and everything.
Today, all I had was my volleyball class. It sounds like we're gonna be playing quite a bit every class period. Yay! It's going to be sweet!
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