end of the storm

am i glad its finally friday or what.

this week's been the roughest ive had so far being at tech. almost as rough as that week before my spring break, but in a sense, worse. i had to compile the calculus project on monday, had my last econs test on tuesday, the last CS test before the finals on wednesday, research paper due on thursday and calculus homework, and not to mention, a CS lab due on the same night. i'd been going to the CS review sessions since sunday, and i practically spent the entire weekend studying econs or CS.

but its over. from now, i just have to finish my english and japanese project, and i can get to studying for my finals, which is in 2 weeks time.

i am rather pissed that i scored a 25 for my econs. had i gotten 27, i would have gotten A by default and not worry about the final, as it is optional. as it always is the case, i made dumb errors and ended up with a 25, which left me with a B. i have an average of 88.9 and it sucks that i have to take the final to up that. even if, i have to score 43 out of 45 to improve to an A. the professor mentioned there 'might' be a curve, which i am wishing there will be, but the chances are, there will be none, and even if there is, its a point at the most. im not sure if i should go for it, but there's no harm, since its almost impossible that i will end up worse than now, i'll have to do really bad in order to drop to a C. since its comprehensive and not topical, its another issue regarding if i can cover all the material in time. i find out my current grade sometime tomorrow, and im hoping for a miracle.

as for CS, it turned out better than i expected. though i still am not sure about object oriented programming, we were taught a standard constuctor function, which we put to memory, so the test wasnt exactly that hard. i should do the usual, i missed 2 important lines to my last question, but i should get partial credit for that.

as i had done most of my research and readings sometime back, composing my essay wasn't all too bad, it was mostly adding arguments in and rearranging the order of the existing paragraphs and elaborating certain assertions. that came out well, i hope, and as ive already settled my individual blog entries for the class, i just have to worry about the group project, which shouldnt be much work, with the only work being looking up relevant articles for our research topic.

i still had to finish off my calculus homework, which i had absolutely no idea how to do, so i was up til almost 3 looking up patterns (that's how i study for math, i see patterns, and i apply the same methods to all relevant questions) and trying to figure out what all that meant. i kinda did everything haphazardly in the end though. i got my test result back, which was just below what i should have gotten, and i might have to take the final for calculus too afterall, which really sucks. from being able to skip 2 finals and sit for only 2 finals, i might end up taking all 4 finals. my average for the test is a 87, and adding the project and homework, its 91, but there's some rumour going about that you need an average of 93 from just the tests to skip it. there's some grade fixing going on as some of the people had to endure a fire alarm test during the test, but even if that increases my grades, i doubt i'll hit that 93.

thankfully, our lab deadline was extended to next monday, but ive more or less done half of the work, so it wasnt an issue. i probably will go down after class today to clarify with the codings, which is continuously giving me a syntax error and i have no idea how to rectify it.

interesting stuff happening this week. first off, the RIAA (the recording industry of america) sued number of students from various universities. a lot of us stopped logging into i2hub.com for a while. i think 18 students that are in the process of getting sued is from my university, and guess what, one of them happened to be this guy staying across from my room, kyle 'the skydiver.' it was a shock, obviously, as his IP address was so different from the ones we have in our section. if indeed he has to pay a hefty sum for fine, we are thinking of selling t-shirts that has his IP address on it and having a message that goes something like 'save 128.20.524.246' or something, which would be really funny, but something i think that would work out fine.

and josh 'the hawaiian' got his nose broken few days ago. he was playing in the intramural basketball and as his opponent was backing into him, his elbow jammed right into his nose. the first night his nose was turned to the left side, which was freaky. it has now swollen up pretty bad and he obviously isnt too happy about it.

and of course, there was that course registration for the fall semester. i managed to sign up for all the ones i wanted except for MGT3078, as it was already closed off. im currently signed up for 16 hours, which is manageable, but as i am an 'overachieving son of a bitch' as scott, my peer leader, mentioned earlier in the semester, i might take up another class. i have to take MATH2401 (Calculus III), CS1322 (Java) and ISYE2027 (Probability), as they are my core classes and i need them to take the next set of my major classes, but its the electives that are giving me a hard time. i am currently taking PSYC1101 (General Psychology) and MSE3015 (Electrical, Optical and Magnetic Properties), but scott advised that i take ACCT2101 (Financial Accounting) as the professor being offered is really good. i also want to get done and over with my Labs, so i was thinking of EAS1601 (Habitable Planets), which means i have to give up one of my classes, and i cant decide. it also means that it will be about 19 or 20 hours, and if John Jewell lets me know about the environmental sustainability class, i might be taking the maximum 21 hours. you'd think that i learned my lesson from taking 19 this semester and that i was lucky this semester, it wont be like that for the next, and i just might be digging my own grave. but the difference is that most, if not, all of the professor's are great, which should be of comfort, but i still cant make up my mind.

the thing is, ive been having a change of heart about taking the MSE minor, or the Finance certificate. it goes with the question of whether its necessary. sure, it will make my resume look great, but as the expense of what? once i get the job, all that don't matter anymore, and its only a class, all these extra knowledge may not come into use afterall, so is it worth it taking more classes which may or may not hurt my GPA? so thats the dilemma i have to solve, as if i want to take the additional classes, its either i dont take accounting, or drop psychology, or drop MSE. dropping MSE migth be hurtful in the long run, as if i decide to take the minor, then i'll have to take a lot at the same time later, and this is kind of spreading the classes over the time here. whereas, theres this really great professor for psychology and accounting, and both are offered during the summer, which i will have to take next year, but psychology may not be that bad over the summer.

urgh, all these decisions...! i might just be driving myself to death. but since i will be having my own room and basically living in a cave, studying all day with no one to disturb or distract me, it might work out. i might have to put my plans of pledging back to Delta Sig behind, during the spring semester, when i will be working again, since then, i wont have to juggle responsibilities and duties and academics at the same time. if i do pledge during the spring, i think it'd be great, since once i come back from work, i'll have nothign to do, so i can just chill out at the house, and get to know the guys better.

alright, time to get back to class....