Filing

My brother David has finished Calculus and has moved on to something more challenging: Physics. He is using my old Physics book and answering the practice questions in the back each day. I decided to help him out (heh heh) I would dig up my old tests and quizzes that I have filed and I would give them to him so he could do them when he finished the appropriate chapters. Therefore I went to my filing cabinet and pulled out my wad of papers. All assignments, tests, etc. from the past two semesters are shuffled together. So much for organization. Well, I found all my tests and quizzes for 104 but I was missing test 1, quiz 1, and quiz 2 for 103. Crazy... thought I. Where could they be? I double-checked the enormous wad. Nothing. I finally figured that I had not gotten into the habit of "filing" until after test 1 when something caught my eye: A file titled "Physics."

What actually happened was that I was organizing all my papers until test 1, when I got bored and started throwing everything together and telling myself I would file it later. It is like that Calvin and Hobbes' comic where Calvin is running all over the house looking in the sofa and under the beds yelling "Where's my coat!? Where's my coat!?" The last panel has Calvin looking inside the closet saying, "Hey! There it is! Who put it in a dumb place like THAT?"

Vulcan Trance

Good afternoon world. I just finished two super hard super critical finals and I'm feeling great. Last Tuesday I began my deep Vulcan trance that it is impossible to wake me from wherein all I do is meditate on my test subjects. You probably wouldn't understand because you are just an emotional human, but it is very important for getting good grades on tests.

I'm now waiting for the results of my finals to start pouring in. I already have two results to share. First, my Physics Lab Final, I got a 96!!! Woo hoo! That makes my grade an A! I'm so happy! My second bit of news is my Genetics test. I know what you're thinking: Hey! You took the Genetics test 3 hours ago! You can't possibly have it back yet!

Shows what you know. Dr. Kovach is probably the most efficient teacher I have ever had. Homework is always handed back really really insanely fast. It is incredible. And the amount of information she can pack into one lecture is mind-blowing. Also, I only have news on half my test: the scantron half. Understand now, humans? Anyway, when I was walking past her office after my Physics test she asked me if I wanted to see my scantron. I said sure. Here it is... 100%! Perfect score! HA HA HA HA HA! I'm going to bust into the heavens of A-dom! Woo hoo!

I mean, how logical.

Happy Hell Day

Hey, everyone. It's Hell Day again, that special time of year when our beloved Savior did some time in the Ultimate Clink. In honor of this momentous occasion, I wrote two papers that I've been procrastinating on for quite some time. And they are still not completely done. I descended into hell and on the third day rose again with my Grant Proposal and my Cochlear Implants paper all done. Anyways, Happy Easter.

Yesterday, my brother Luke asked why we called it Good Friday if it was the day Jesus died. It was very cute so I decided to immortalize his ignorance in a blog post. The reason I gave him was the Great news that Jesus rose just two days later! He is risen! He is risen indeed.

Deadlines

This semester I have had the most fluid deadlines I have ever had. It is probably because of the two snow days earlier this year, though. Both my Tuesday/Thursday classes have been moving their tests, quizzes, and homework deadlines around like a game of whack-a-mole. My Scientific Writing class also has extremely loose deadlines, although I think that is the teacher's nature instead of extenuating circumstances. Dr. Davies seems to be the most stable, since his tests are always when he announces them to be, although he only announces them a week in advance.

Over and Done

It is an extreme relief to be finished with my 20-page literature review. It was due Monday, but the teacher decided to delay the deadline to Wednesday because so many people weren't done. After thinking about it for a few seconds, I turned it in. After all, it was finished. What was I going to do to it in two more days? Anyways, I can now chill. It will be nice to not have to know so much about teratomas. Ah. A few minutes ago Mom asked me if I had any thing I had to be working on. Besides for a Latin test tomorrow, a Grant Proposal due next Friday, a paper on the Use of Physics in Real Life due next Thursday, a Genetics worksheet due Thursday and a Genetics test on Tuesday, I have almost nothing to do. Ah, sweet blissful rest.

Thrown Under the Bus

Saturday is usually the day when I make sure that all homework for the next week is complete. Alas and Alack, this Saturday shall be, shall we say, otherwise occupied. Therefore, I'm trying to get as much homework done today as possible. I am fortunate that since Physics Lab finished on Wednesday I have no more Physics Lab type homework to do. Also, although I have two papers in the works, neither is due next week. Although it kills my heart to put them off, I fear I must for the sake of my sister. (ha ha, yeah right. Look at me, dying of procrastination!) There is only one thing due next week, that is Genetics Homework due Tuesday. I swear by my beard, I shall have it done today! And as Touchstone might point out, since I have no beard, I am not forsworn! Ha!

Ode to Mom

Hey hey hey! It seems like I've been doing a ton of Ode to So and So posts lately. That is because there are so many birthdays to celebrate. It is my Mom's birthday today. Happy birthday Mom! I nearly forgot it was and asked Dad what the cake he was making was for. Lexie laughed at me. Also, in honor of Mom's birthday, I was the only student to get over 100% on Tuesday's Physics test. Ping! As it turns out, Physics was the first subject Mom ever almost got a B in. (She went to the teacher and argued it up to an A-) Well, to Mom! May you live a long and happy life with your wonderful college GPA and even more wonderful children! Ping!

Retrospect

A couple of weeks ago I had two tests the same week: Physics and Genetics. Genetics test came back and I had a 92. The teacher was really happy and said that the average was a B and since she didn't believe in curves, nothing bad was going to happen to us. She reminded us that all the Mendelian Genetics stuff was review, so don't ease up on studying for the second test just because we did well on the first test, etc. The Physics test on the other hand was very scary. I received a C, but because the class average was an F, not only under 60% but under 50%, I got an A. Well yesterday, I had the second exam on both.

The Physics test was a cakewalk. Everything was so easy. I don't have my grade back but I think I did astronomically! (Get it!? Physics! Astronomy! Ha ha ha! Oh whatever.)

On the Genetics test, however, I suspect that I did worse than on the last test. Because it was multiple choice, I think I managed to use my test taking genius powers to keep myself from dropping too far, but we will have to see. For one thing, I didn't study numbers. For example, how many base pairs are found on DNA or how many nm long is each nucleotide. Those questions were kind of like history questions that said "In what year was Franklin Pierce inaugurated?" And you think to yourself, "Dude! I have that in my notes, but I didn't look at it once!"

But here's the trick. The question was worded like "If there are 1734 strands of DNA, how many nm is that?" And the answers were "1.734, 17,340, 173.4, and 7253." Now, since I knew that nothing in the world was convenient enough to be exactly 10 or 0.001 nm in length. I could tell what the correct answer was. I hope.

PS. DNA is negatively charged, True or False? I said False, because I am now covered just in case DNA isn't charged at all.

Anyway, here's what Dad suggested, when the class does well, the teacher makes the next test harder. When the class bombs, the teacher makes the test easier. This sounds pretty reasonable so I tend to believe it.

Brain Death

I just finished my second test of the day. When I was finished with it, my Physics test looked like a series of scribbles. (Which it was.) At least I feel confident that I didn't make too many careless errors. I'm going to have to get my test back before I know exactly how many algebraic errors were made, but here's an error that I caught: I did the right hand rule... with my left hand. Seriously. Wake up, Duncan! I'm so tired, it is not even funny. And I didn't even stay up past 10:00 last night.

And that Genetics test nearly killed me. There must have been a dozen questions that I took random stabs on. The best part about multiple choice tests is that no teacher can take away my points if I get them all right. The worst part is that they can't give me any credit if I get them all wrong. Sigh.

Pumping Physics

Studying for Physics tests is very painful. Last night I began studying at 8:00 with intention to study until 10:00. It happened that by 9:45 I was so sick of Physics and all its variables that I went to sleep with a Physics-induced headache. All night Physics formulas jumbled around in my head. I am now a Physics Robot, which might or might not help with my test.

Right now my head feels like my muscles do a day after lifting weights. Very sore and dully throbbing.

I got a job!!!

Hey, I've heard there is a really bad economic downturn right now. Well, apparently it hasn't hit Chattanooga. I have received a job offer from the Physics department and have already gotten a job as a TA in the Chemistry lab from June 13-July 11. Perhaps nobody applies for this job because it starts at 8:00 in the morning and they don't want to have to wake up their cranky sister on a warm summer day to get her to drive him. That is possible. In my case, however, the economic profit exceeds the economic cost. Then again, this might be a heavy incentive for my parents to get me my driver's license so they won't have to put up with Alexie and me.

Status Report

Big News: The modem at our house died. It was actually still alive, but we figured if we didn't get it into intensive care, it would kick the bucket any day now. Its characteristics were sluggishness and failure to operate. Therefore Dad took it in to be repaired.

Anyway, with the modem gone, we have no internet and no printer. (Our printer uses the internet to print. Wha?) Therefore I had to do all my homework that is due next week today. Typically, I do it on Saturday, kind of a last-day-of-the-week-time-to-get-the-ducks-in-a-row type sentiment, but with no modem, that becomes impossible. Anyways, I've done my Physics Homework, Physics Lab Homework, and Scientific Writing Powerpoint Presentation all in the past few hours, racing to fit it all in between classes, Parking committee, and RUF. But I finally got it all done. Phew. Good for Duncan.

Variables

Today's Physics class was a dizzying flurry of variables. We seem to have reached the point where the lecture is pretty much "alright, so if X/T = V and E=delta-V/delta-X, and you know that V=Ad, then how many different variables did you just represent with the single letter V?" The answer is 3, velocity, voltage, and volume. Yes, we have long since run out of letters in both our alphabet and the Greek alphabet. We have even used up all the capital letters of all letters in both alphabets. We have reached out limit. If that is the case, why does science still insist on naming so many variables!? Sometimes I get the feeling that scientists make up variables just so they can name the unit that goes with the variable after themselves!

Well guess what people, the root means squared of the number of electrons in a single area A over change in magnetic flux per unit second is now called the Collective Uselessness of the Data and is described in units of McPherson. Ha ha!

Squeaking By

I have all the midterm grades that I'm going to get back. It is scary: all my grades are right on the knife's edge. My Physics Test was offset by my homework and quizzes so I have an A. My Physics Lab reports have been for the most part too short so I have approximately 91 there. My Genetics Homework assignments have been high B's and low A's. My Genetics Test was a 92, so I have an A in that class too. Both the papers I've written for English class were B+, but because of all the extra credit I've done I have an A-. Right now I'm walking along the face of a very scary black precipice that is called 3.999 GPA.

P.S. Latin is a breeze. Hooray! Oh, but Dr. Davies cancelled today again. What the heck.

First Quarter

Well, the first battle is over. I'm a quarter of the way through the semester and I have achieved fairly good grades through a series of miracles. Here are some areas I still need to work on:

1. Turning reports in on time. (Phys Lab)
2. Making papers longer (Phys Lab + Science Writing)
3. More studying before tests (Physics, and probably Genetics too)

Now I'm going to delve into teratomas for my paper due next friday. Although teratomas are super awesome cool, some of the information on them is neither easy to read or easy to get a hold of. Oh yeah, the Armawhatzit chirgiwhatever was actually written by a second guy with the same name, Johannes Sceltetus. The Johannes Sceltetus who was the first doctor to document a teratoma wrote a paper called Trichiasis Admiranda, which means "The Amazing Hairy Monster." Unfortunately it is in Latin, there's no translation, and there are only ten copies in existence, most of which are kept in Paris. America has two: One is in Harvard and one is in the National Library of Medicine in Maryland, so it doesn't look like I'll be getting a gander at it any time soon.

Curves

You know, I've never really cared about the existence of grade curves. They never really mattered. Ever. I'd get an 'A' and then after the curve, I would have an 'A'. Today in Physics I learned the importance of curves.

For example, if your test only has four questions and you run out of time before you have time to address one, you will probably get a very bad score, theoretically a 29.75/40. Gasp! You're thinking '73% is a C! AAAH!' But A-ha! What if, theoretically, the rest of the class sucked worse? What if the class average was 19/40! Then A-ha! Your score is suddenly and magically a 90.5%.

Guess what! That theory is a reality! Who could have guessed! My Physics teacher was extremely steamed and spent the first fifty minutes of class going over the first question on the test. (One which I got perfectly right.) Anyway, I have resolved that I will NEVER EVER get a score that bad on a test again. Failing this test has taught me more than passing all the other tests has combined. The silver lining is that it didn't matter that I failed the test: POWER TO THE CURVES! I get all the benefit of failing combined with all the benefit of passing the class! Yay!

So depressed

Today I got my first paper back in Scientific Writing. Where there should have been a grade, I got a little sentence that said "see me." What happened was that I did not have enough pages, therefore my paper was no good. Fortunately, the grading system works in that you only get your grades from the finished product. You turn it in to your teacher, she hands it back, you hand it back in at mid-term, then you get your actual grade. This is very depressing because my last two Physics Lab reports also had points taken off for being too short. The problem is that Physics Reports are always assigned Wednesday and are always due Friday. I literally wrote my most recent paper and my Physics Report yesterday in the one hour between Parking Appeals and the practice MCAT. This new paper isn't due until Monday so Saturday is going to be a day of Maximum Overhaul.

But this is a new revelation for me: I always thought my problem was that I was too wordy. Now the glove is on the other foot!

Unwelcome Love

I was working on my Physics Report and my appetite in the computer lab when I received a call from my Dad.
"Hey ho buddy! Heather has made a delicious dinner especially for you so if you want to come home, you may!"
Now, I knew that if I left campus, I wasn't coming back. Naturally I declined. The only problem being that I was extremely and ravishingly hungry and all I had to eat were two sandwiches with peanut butter that had gone bad that morning. (I knew it had since the one I ate before my Genetics Test tasted really funny.) Unfortunately, knowing that there is good food somewhere only makes bad food taste worse. I'm going to have to eat these monstrocities at some point, but I'm holding off because I hear that hunger is the best sauce. I'm trying to drown the sandwiches in it.

Oh yeah, my Physics Report still sucks and it is only one page long. The last two reports have had points taken off for being too short so I literally copied the same sentence and pasted it 12 times with all my different results plugged in. (You do the same experiment twelve times in this lab. Oh the pain.) Yes, even with all that it is still only a single page long. AAAH!

Study Strategy

You should try this sometime: To study for your test, program a program that will generate questions for you that you think will be on the test. After the test, you'll probably be very angry because your program didn't prep you properly, but whatever. Make any necessary adjustments. At the end of the semester, as you study for your cumulative final, open your program and relearn the stuff. I've done this once for Chemistry 122, and I think that was the most helpful of all my study strategies, since you get the benefit of teaching and learning. I'm going to repeat this with Genetics, and hopefully I'll be able to use it to up my Physics grade.

... Shoot.

Groan. I am currently overcome by a vast depression. Today is the first time in my entire life that I have run out of time on a test. I was so ashamed. I was furiously scribbling away at the last question when my Physics Teacher said "This is my first call for papers." Since I didn't want to be thought of as the kind of student who ignores his teacher and finishes his test anyway I handed it in. Alexie said that whenever she hands hers in unfinished she gets a 'B' so that is probably what I'm going to get. Siiiiiiiigh... Perhaps if I hadn't taken so long to remember Kirkhoff's law during the last question... or maybe if my calculator hadn't been acting up during the first question. Alas. All is vanity.