Friday, January 21, 2005
Good Golly Cal Poly
Hi-dee-ho, neighbors! It's me, writing the first real entry in two weeks. Can I get a woot woot? No? I can't pull that off...oh well. On with the entry!
I have been stressed for the last week, chiefly for two reasons. The first, as one might be tempted to guess, is academics. As I said before, I have more classes this quarter, and they're harder. I'll give a brief update on how each class is going:
--EE 112 (Electric Circuit Analysis): This class is, thankfully, quite easy. I'm learning how to analyze basic circuits, which I did a lot of last year in physics. I have about five problems a week in homework which usually only take me a half an hour or so. Factor in the fact that this class only meets two hours a week (a two-unit class that actually doesn't meet for more than two hours a week...what a concept!) and this class turns out to be a breeze. Hooray! I also am interested in the subject matter. I like taking the complicated circuits and figuring out the equivalent easier circuits to analyze. So yeah, yay for EE 112.
--SCOM 101 (Public Speaking): This class is slightly more work for me than EE 112. I will be giving seven speeches over the course of this quarter, and there are a couple of simple midterms (which include take-home sections!) and five writing assignments. I have already given one speech: a three-minute, ungraded speech about myself that I think went rather well. I have to give a three-to-six-minute story speech on Monday; I've decided to tell the story about my house burning down. It's a story that means a lot to me, there are a lot of juicy sensory details in it, and it has some profound morals at the end of it (namely, finding the good in everything). I have not yet written that speech, but I'm not worried. I don't actually have to write anything...I'll just throw together a rough outline and practice it a few times. I'll be fine. I really don't mind speaking in front of an audience, especially when I get to choose the topic. All speeches aside, this class is usually pretty fun. My teacher is awesome; she always has some fun speaking exercise for us to try. Also, everyone in the class is very friendly, so I don't mind speaking in front of them. It's actually nice to see these people every day (speech is the only class I have all four days). Hey, and look at that! A four-unit class that meets for four hours per week. Incredible!
--Chem 124 (General Chemistry for Engineers): Now we start getting into the "fun" classes. I'm doing much better in this class than I thought I'd be. I've heard so many rumors about it, and now that I'm actually here it doesn't seem to be that big of a deal. I will say that the workload is a little higher than the average class, but it's nothing too amazing. We move at a quick pace, and usually the lectures move fast enough that you don't really grasp the concepts without reading the textbook. (You aren't actually required to read the text or do any of the homework problems; you just have to do it out of your own motivation to succeed. Hence people fail tests and spread rumors about the class.) I've had a couple of quizzes and, though I haven't actually received either of them back yet, I think I did pretty well. So woop-de-doo. I halfway enjoy the subject matter of this class, but I have two two-and-a-half hour blocks of this class per week, and it gets to be a pretty long time, particularly at 5:30 in the evening. But it isn't the worst thing...we do experiments and worksheets and stuff, so it's not like I sit there taking notes the whole time. I'd have shot someone by now...
--CSC 101 (Fundamentals of Computer Science): I like this class a lot. Well...actually...I like computer programming a lot...I'm not too sure about the class itself. The instructor's lectures are not very well planned...or organized...and therefore are very difficult to follow. He tends to come to class and look through the textbook and mumble things like "oh, this command here does such and such a thing...(flips page)...this program here is a good example of blah blah...oh, you should never do this....here's another example of something or other." I can't really take notes on his lectures because they turn out being a random collection of factoids about the Java computer language as opposed to something that will actually help me down the road. Yeah. And while were on the subject of computer science, here's a bit of news: I failed my quiz in this class on Thursday. I haven't gotten it back yet, but I'm guessing I'll probably get three to five out of nine. Abridged version of my excuse: we barely talked about the stuff on the quiz the day before we had it; we did not practice any of it in the lab before the quiz. I had eight minutes to write three-ish different programs (yes, eight minutes...this guy is a clock nazi) and I had no idea how to do it. After having gone to the lab afterwards and experiment with the new stuff I now understand it...very well, in fact. I do believe the quiz was unfair...most people in the class also seem to think they did very poorly. I don't really know what to do about it...I don't know what I could have done to prepare for this quiz. I'm just hoping that it was a fluke.
--IME 156 (Basic Electronics Manufacturing): This class is the one that revolves around producing a working power supply box, which includes designing and etching a circuit board, soldering all the parts to it, and assembling it into a nice pretty box that I built myself. This class is a moderate amount of work, but it's actually building something rather than doing problems out of a book. So hooray for that. My only gripe about this class is the reading I'm supposed to be doing. The text for this class is the most boring book I have ever laid my eyes upon. Here's an excerpt: "Glass styles used predominately in the rigid printed board industry range from a thickness of 0.0018 to 0.0068 in. The thickness of the pressed laminate has been achieved by careful selection of prepregs made from these glass styles. FR-4 laminates generally can be supplied from 0.002 to 0.62 in., in 0.001 in. increments, depending on the glass style and resin content percent of the prepregs used." ..............what?....oh....sorry, I fell asleep there for a second. I have a midterm on this stuff on Tuesday. Thankfully I have started the reading, which is a pretty darned good accomplishment considering half the class hasn't even purchased the book yet. That aside, this class isn't so bad.
--Mustang Band: MB is fun. I have my two-hour rehearsal on Tuesdays, and then games on Thursday and Saturday evenings. I only have to go to the Thursday games (we divide into two bands and share responsibility), although I've gone to every one so far, for no other reason than that I enjoy them. It is nice to know, though, that if I have a weekend where I just have a ton of stuff to do I'm not required to go to the game. Woot. As far as the games themselves go, they're only moderately interesting, albeit much better than RB's games were. Now that I've been promoted to second part I have to sit on the other side of the band, which puts me squarely behind the basket. My view is now obstructed, which is kind of a drag. I've gotten used to it now though. The Mustangs haven't been doing so well...the women's team has won about half the games that we've been to, and the men's team has lost them all. They're like 2-13. I know you can't win them all, but you'd think they'd at least win some. (Stacie, our women's team beat you that night I talked to you, but, sadly, our men's team lost - by a heck of a lot - that Monday.) In other news, tomorrow's game is televised! I'm sure I'll be on channel 455 or something like that...but be on the lookout for it! Cal Poly vs. Cal State Northridge, 7:00.
--Wind Orchestra: I'm considering dropping windO after this year. I don't like the way J conducts rehearsals. We're there for an hour and a half twice a week, and in that ninety minutes he tries to work usually about four or five songs. I know this doesn't seem like a lot, but we spend forever warming up and tuning. We spend about fifteen minutes on a song, which is barely enough time to get out the music for it and play it through one time. I really don't feel like we get anything done. J has been absent from a couple of rehearsals, and we've had this one guy - Rudolph is his first name...I don't know his last - lead rehearsals in his place. Rudolph is hilarious, and he spends our time the way I would if I were conducting: a little warmup and tuning, and then spending a lot of time on a couple of songs. His presence only serves to highlight what I don't like about J. So yeah...I don't strongly dislike windO...it's just that I'm not sure it's really worth my time investment. MB is great...worth every second. I can't say that about windO. There is a good side, though. You know how in high school, band drops your GPA down from the 5.0 you have in your AP classes? Well, in college there ain't no 5-point anythings, so my A in band is worth just as much as my A in any other class. Woot for GPA-boosters! And you know what's even cooler? WindO is a one-unit class, but we're allowed to enroll in the other band (which for me is wind ensemble) and, without having to go to extra rehearsals or do extra work, get another one unit of A applied to our GPAs. Take that, established system!
And that's all for classes. I'm staying on top of them for the most part, except for comp sci, which is a class that's a little hard to predict right now. The workload isn't bad, but last week was pretty tough just because I did so much over the weekend: basketball game Thursday, errands all day Friday, beach and basketball game Saturday, church, studying in park and playing Sheepshead (card game, see rules at http://www.pagat.com/schafk/shep.html) Sunday, and basketball game Monday. It was a heckuva lot to get through. I immensely enjoyed myself until I found that I was behind on all my homework. But hey, what kind of college student would I be if I was always caught up?
The other thing that's been causing me stress is my rooming arrangements for next year. I know that now is the time to start looking for a place to live off campus next year, but I have not yet started. It doesn't bother me that I haven't found a specific apartment...that I could go out and do on any weekend (or two or three). But I don't know anyone I would want to room with next year, and that's what worries me. I definitely don't want to just room with some random person they assign to me, because chances are my living style will clash with his. He'll want to play loud music and party, and I'll want to do homework and sleep. So I know I want to room with someone I've met myself. But therein lies the problem, because I don't really know anyone who I think I'd like to room with. Not even a little bit. So I've not known how this situation would resolve itself.
Today, however, a possibility has arisen. Heather's (Rosalie's roommate...remember?) family has purchased a house in SLO so they can rent it out to students and make a pretty penny (and, conveniently, so Heather can stay there whilst she attends Cal Poly). Heather was talking to me about it today as I drove her to her dance class. It turns out that the house has three bedrooms and that Heather doesn't know with whom to fill them. I was halfway joking when I said that I would be happy to live there...but...well...you can imagine where the conversation went from there. I'm very excited about this possibility simply because...well...it's the first possibility I've come across. And I would have my own room. My own room! MY OWN ROOM!!! It would be a little weird rooming with Heather...but...did I mention that I'd have my own room? Well, we'll save this discussion for another time. (I will, by the way go ahead and answer the question that's on all of your minds: will Rosalie be the third roommate? Maybe...she'd like to but she thinks the rent is too high. So she's investigating the possibility of living elsewhere. I would like to point out that I am aware of the possible pitfalls of living with someone who (whom? please correct me.) is a potential romantic attachment for me. This is as good of a time as any to say that, as much as I really like Rosalie, I think I've lost...or am losing...interest in dating her. I have my reasons...this is another discussion we'll save for another time.)
The point is: both of the things that have been stressing me out have gotten at least somewhat better over the course of the past couple of days. So yay for that. I hope you all have been enjoying yourselves since the last time I've written to you. I shall talk to you soon.
Cheers,
Josh
mood: a mix of stuff...still a little stressed
music: Too Hip! - Cal Poly Mustang Band
location: dorm (Kevin is staying with his arkie friends tonight. Partay over here!!)
I have been stressed for the last week, chiefly for two reasons. The first, as one might be tempted to guess, is academics. As I said before, I have more classes this quarter, and they're harder. I'll give a brief update on how each class is going:
--EE 112 (Electric Circuit Analysis): This class is, thankfully, quite easy. I'm learning how to analyze basic circuits, which I did a lot of last year in physics. I have about five problems a week in homework which usually only take me a half an hour or so. Factor in the fact that this class only meets two hours a week (a two-unit class that actually doesn't meet for more than two hours a week...what a concept!) and this class turns out to be a breeze. Hooray! I also am interested in the subject matter. I like taking the complicated circuits and figuring out the equivalent easier circuits to analyze. So yeah, yay for EE 112.
--SCOM 101 (Public Speaking): This class is slightly more work for me than EE 112. I will be giving seven speeches over the course of this quarter, and there are a couple of simple midterms (which include take-home sections!) and five writing assignments. I have already given one speech: a three-minute, ungraded speech about myself that I think went rather well. I have to give a three-to-six-minute story speech on Monday; I've decided to tell the story about my house burning down. It's a story that means a lot to me, there are a lot of juicy sensory details in it, and it has some profound morals at the end of it (namely, finding the good in everything). I have not yet written that speech, but I'm not worried. I don't actually have to write anything...I'll just throw together a rough outline and practice it a few times. I'll be fine. I really don't mind speaking in front of an audience, especially when I get to choose the topic. All speeches aside, this class is usually pretty fun. My teacher is awesome; she always has some fun speaking exercise for us to try. Also, everyone in the class is very friendly, so I don't mind speaking in front of them. It's actually nice to see these people every day (speech is the only class I have all four days). Hey, and look at that! A four-unit class that meets for four hours per week. Incredible!
--Chem 124 (General Chemistry for Engineers): Now we start getting into the "fun" classes. I'm doing much better in this class than I thought I'd be. I've heard so many rumors about it, and now that I'm actually here it doesn't seem to be that big of a deal. I will say that the workload is a little higher than the average class, but it's nothing too amazing. We move at a quick pace, and usually the lectures move fast enough that you don't really grasp the concepts without reading the textbook. (You aren't actually required to read the text or do any of the homework problems; you just have to do it out of your own motivation to succeed. Hence people fail tests and spread rumors about the class.) I've had a couple of quizzes and, though I haven't actually received either of them back yet, I think I did pretty well. So woop-de-doo. I halfway enjoy the subject matter of this class, but I have two two-and-a-half hour blocks of this class per week, and it gets to be a pretty long time, particularly at 5:30 in the evening. But it isn't the worst thing...we do experiments and worksheets and stuff, so it's not like I sit there taking notes the whole time. I'd have shot someone by now...
--CSC 101 (Fundamentals of Computer Science): I like this class a lot. Well...actually...I like computer programming a lot...I'm not too sure about the class itself. The instructor's lectures are not very well planned...or organized...and therefore are very difficult to follow. He tends to come to class and look through the textbook and mumble things like "oh, this command here does such and such a thing...(flips page)...this program here is a good example of blah blah...oh, you should never do this....here's another example of something or other." I can't really take notes on his lectures because they turn out being a random collection of factoids about the Java computer language as opposed to something that will actually help me down the road. Yeah. And while were on the subject of computer science, here's a bit of news: I failed my quiz in this class on Thursday. I haven't gotten it back yet, but I'm guessing I'll probably get three to five out of nine. Abridged version of my excuse: we barely talked about the stuff on the quiz the day before we had it; we did not practice any of it in the lab before the quiz. I had eight minutes to write three-ish different programs (yes, eight minutes...this guy is a clock nazi) and I had no idea how to do it. After having gone to the lab afterwards and experiment with the new stuff I now understand it...very well, in fact. I do believe the quiz was unfair...most people in the class also seem to think they did very poorly. I don't really know what to do about it...I don't know what I could have done to prepare for this quiz. I'm just hoping that it was a fluke.
--IME 156 (Basic Electronics Manufacturing): This class is the one that revolves around producing a working power supply box, which includes designing and etching a circuit board, soldering all the parts to it, and assembling it into a nice pretty box that I built myself. This class is a moderate amount of work, but it's actually building something rather than doing problems out of a book. So hooray for that. My only gripe about this class is the reading I'm supposed to be doing. The text for this class is the most boring book I have ever laid my eyes upon. Here's an excerpt: "Glass styles used predominately in the rigid printed board industry range from a thickness of 0.0018 to 0.0068 in. The thickness of the pressed laminate has been achieved by careful selection of prepregs made from these glass styles. FR-4 laminates generally can be supplied from 0.002 to 0.62 in., in 0.001 in. increments, depending on the glass style and resin content percent of the prepregs used." ..............what?....oh....sorry, I fell asleep there for a second. I have a midterm on this stuff on Tuesday. Thankfully I have started the reading, which is a pretty darned good accomplishment considering half the class hasn't even purchased the book yet. That aside, this class isn't so bad.
--Mustang Band: MB is fun. I have my two-hour rehearsal on Tuesdays, and then games on Thursday and Saturday evenings. I only have to go to the Thursday games (we divide into two bands and share responsibility), although I've gone to every one so far, for no other reason than that I enjoy them. It is nice to know, though, that if I have a weekend where I just have a ton of stuff to do I'm not required to go to the game. Woot. As far as the games themselves go, they're only moderately interesting, albeit much better than RB's games were. Now that I've been promoted to second part I have to sit on the other side of the band, which puts me squarely behind the basket. My view is now obstructed, which is kind of a drag. I've gotten used to it now though. The Mustangs haven't been doing so well...the women's team has won about half the games that we've been to, and the men's team has lost them all. They're like 2-13. I know you can't win them all, but you'd think they'd at least win some. (Stacie, our women's team beat you that night I talked to you, but, sadly, our men's team lost - by a heck of a lot - that Monday.) In other news, tomorrow's game is televised! I'm sure I'll be on channel 455 or something like that...but be on the lookout for it! Cal Poly vs. Cal State Northridge, 7:00.
--Wind Orchestra: I'm considering dropping windO after this year. I don't like the way J conducts rehearsals. We're there for an hour and a half twice a week, and in that ninety minutes he tries to work usually about four or five songs. I know this doesn't seem like a lot, but we spend forever warming up and tuning. We spend about fifteen minutes on a song, which is barely enough time to get out the music for it and play it through one time. I really don't feel like we get anything done. J has been absent from a couple of rehearsals, and we've had this one guy - Rudolph is his first name...I don't know his last - lead rehearsals in his place. Rudolph is hilarious, and he spends our time the way I would if I were conducting: a little warmup and tuning, and then spending a lot of time on a couple of songs. His presence only serves to highlight what I don't like about J. So yeah...I don't strongly dislike windO...it's just that I'm not sure it's really worth my time investment. MB is great...worth every second. I can't say that about windO. There is a good side, though. You know how in high school, band drops your GPA down from the 5.0 you have in your AP classes? Well, in college there ain't no 5-point anythings, so my A in band is worth just as much as my A in any other class. Woot for GPA-boosters! And you know what's even cooler? WindO is a one-unit class, but we're allowed to enroll in the other band (which for me is wind ensemble) and, without having to go to extra rehearsals or do extra work, get another one unit of A applied to our GPAs. Take that, established system!
And that's all for classes. I'm staying on top of them for the most part, except for comp sci, which is a class that's a little hard to predict right now. The workload isn't bad, but last week was pretty tough just because I did so much over the weekend: basketball game Thursday, errands all day Friday, beach and basketball game Saturday, church, studying in park and playing Sheepshead (card game, see rules at http://www.pagat.com/schafk/shep.html) Sunday, and basketball game Monday. It was a heckuva lot to get through. I immensely enjoyed myself until I found that I was behind on all my homework. But hey, what kind of college student would I be if I was always caught up?
The other thing that's been causing me stress is my rooming arrangements for next year. I know that now is the time to start looking for a place to live off campus next year, but I have not yet started. It doesn't bother me that I haven't found a specific apartment...that I could go out and do on any weekend (or two or three). But I don't know anyone I would want to room with next year, and that's what worries me. I definitely don't want to just room with some random person they assign to me, because chances are my living style will clash with his. He'll want to play loud music and party, and I'll want to do homework and sleep. So I know I want to room with someone I've met myself. But therein lies the problem, because I don't really know anyone who I think I'd like to room with. Not even a little bit. So I've not known how this situation would resolve itself.
Today, however, a possibility has arisen. Heather's (Rosalie's roommate...remember?) family has purchased a house in SLO so they can rent it out to students and make a pretty penny (and, conveniently, so Heather can stay there whilst she attends Cal Poly). Heather was talking to me about it today as I drove her to her dance class. It turns out that the house has three bedrooms and that Heather doesn't know with whom to fill them. I was halfway joking when I said that I would be happy to live there...but...well...you can imagine where the conversation went from there. I'm very excited about this possibility simply because...well...it's the first possibility I've come across. And I would have my own room. My own room! MY OWN ROOM!!! It would be a little weird rooming with Heather...but...did I mention that I'd have my own room? Well, we'll save this discussion for another time. (I will, by the way go ahead and answer the question that's on all of your minds: will Rosalie be the third roommate? Maybe...she'd like to but she thinks the rent is too high. So she's investigating the possibility of living elsewhere. I would like to point out that I am aware of the possible pitfalls of living with someone who (whom? please correct me.) is a potential romantic attachment for me. This is as good of a time as any to say that, as much as I really like Rosalie, I think I've lost...or am losing...interest in dating her. I have my reasons...this is another discussion we'll save for another time.)
The point is: both of the things that have been stressing me out have gotten at least somewhat better over the course of the past couple of days. So yay for that. I hope you all have been enjoying yourselves since the last time I've written to you. I shall talk to you soon.
Cheers,
Josh
mood: a mix of stuff...still a little stressed
music: Too Hip! - Cal Poly Mustang Band
location: dorm (Kevin is staying with his arkie friends tonight. Partay over here!!)
