Nightmare Incarnate

Yesterday was the last day of finals. It was also the day that I had my Differential Equations final. I had spent part of Friday and Saturday studying for the test and all of Monday. The thing is, I had to do my studying without an answer key to the practice test. Last week I asked the professor if/when he was going to post the answer key so that we could study. And he said,"Oh, I don't know exactly, but, long before the final." OK. That was good. That meant it should at least be up by Saturday if our test was on Tuesday, right? Wrong. Not only was it not up on Saturday, it wasn't up on Monday. It wasn't up Tuesday morning. In fact, it was never up.

So, I had to study for the test without knowing if my answers to the practice test were correct. I was able to go to office hours and ask some questions, but since I assumed the answer key was going to be posted sometime soon, I didn't ask him to check all my answers, I just asked general how-to/DE-theory type questions. Anyway, all that to say that I spent hours and hours studying but I was never 100% sure that I had it all correct.

Fast forward to the test. It was supposed to be 2 hours long. There were 17 questions. You know, the sort of questions where each one uses all theory that you've learned in DE as well as quite a bit from Linear Algebra, Calculus 1 & 2, etc. Just the first three problems (which were the "shortest" and "easiest" ones) took me over a half hour. The questions didn't have to each be at least five or six different lengthy, complicated steps in order to test how well we understood Differential Equations. But apparently the professor seems to think that each problem should be as complicated as possible. Each problem incorporated things that were combinations of a bunch of different rules, each of which require multiple steps to sort out, and more if they're combined.

The test was so bad that no one finished it on time. In fact, no one finished at all. We just turned it in when we'd finished everything we could. Either that or when we'd been there so long it was starting to get absurd. Two other people and I were there until 45 minutes after the final was supposed to be over. And all throughout the test, people were getting so stressed out that they were leaving the room to pace the hall once or twice and then come back with "renewed zeal."

All-in-all, it was one of those tests that you "take" in your nightmares, but that you know would never happen in real life. How wrong was I...

Finals Week.

Well, finals are in full swing, and I'm starting to get my grades back. I got a 92% on my Economics final. It turned out that I only needed a 68% on that test to get an "A" in class (the weight of each test is kind of weird--a lot of your grade actually depends on other components like homework, pop quizzes, and a paper).

I also got my Art History grade back. I just took the test this morning, and the grades are already posted which is awesome because that gives me one less thing to worry about. Anyway, I actually got 100% on the test. I was surprised because there were a couple of things in the matching section on the test that weren't really on the study guide...

Now I'm waiting on my grade in Multivariable Calculus. And I still have to take my Differential Equations and Accounting finals. But, so far, finals week is going well. I can't wait for summer!

Last Day of T/Th Class!

Finals officially start next week Wednesday. So today was the last day of class for T/Th classes. And neither of my math professors this semester ever had us do teacher evaluations. Which is weird because they're required by the university to have teacher evaluations. It didn't really surprise me that my Differential Equations teacher didn't have us do the evaluations. He's a brilliant mathematician--he even helps the other professors with their papers, etc. I walked by his office once when he was "teaching" another professor; it was actually pretty cool. Anyway, because he's brilliant, and the whole math department knows it, they let him do pretty much whatever he wants. Plus, I'm sure he has tenure, and so the evaluations don't matter much anyway. But we didn't do teacher evaluations in my Multivariable Calculus class either. Hmm...maybe the entire math department is discontinuing the teacher evalutations.

I don't particularly care about doing the teacher evaluations. But I was hoping that if we did them in calculus 3 today, that we might get out of class early. Instead, we spent the first twenty minutes of so of class discussing the things in the book that we'd skipped either because we didn't have time or they were unimportant. And then we spent the rest of class watching him solve the homework problems that we'd just turned in. It was kind of funny, though, listening to the professor talk about and explain "the stuff we aren't going to talk about." I just kept thinking, "If we aren't going to talk about it then why are we talking about it?" Ah, well, we did have one really fun day of class this semester where the professor decided to talk like a pirate for the day because he was trying to help us remember to add an "r" to the integrals that you do with polar coordinates. The polar coordinate integral ends in "r dr dθ," instead of just "dr dθ." And every time he said "r" he would say it in this piratish "arrr!" So "r dr dθ" was "arrr! d arrr! d theta." I guess it worked. I've never forgotten to add the extra "arrr!"

Four-Test Week!

So this week I had four tests. An economics test on Monday, art history and accounting tests on Tuesday, and a Differential Equations test on Thursday (today!).

I think they've all gone pretty well. My econ and art history professor both post extensive study guides online, so studying for those tests is pretty straightforward. And, although we don't get a study guide for accounting, the homework is a pretty good estimate of what will be on the test, so that's not bad, either.

The test I was most worried about was DE. I was going to start studying really early so that I could be sure to be prepared for the test. And last week Tuesday, my DE professor said he'd post our sample exam before he left campus. Well, it still wasn't up by class time on the following Thursday, and he again promised to post the sample exam before leaving campus. So on Saturday, I figured I'd better get a head start on studying for the DE test, and I went online to print out the study guide that was supposedly posted before my professor left campus on Tuesday and Thursday and it still wasn't there!

Finally, he put it online sometime on Monday. But then there was no answer key posted, so it was impossible to know if you got anything right! I mentioned this to the professor at our class this past Tuesday, and he promised to post the answer key to the sample exam before he left campus that day. And, gullible dolt that I was, I believed him. I kept checking online for him to post the answer key, and it was never posted on Tuesday.

I've been considering this mystery behind how my professor could post something "before I leave campus today," and yet not have it posted until several days later, and I think I've figured it out. I bet he lives on campus. Maybe he's homeless and he keeps all his stuff in his office. Then he can promise to post things before he leaves campus as much as he wants and not ever post them, and his promise is still good because he never leaves campus! Except he's often not in his office during his office hours and cancels them at the last minute. If he really did live in his office, he would definitely be there when he's supposed to have office hours. Hmm...

Anyway, I met him in his office yesterday at 1:00 PM (yes, he was there!) and had him help me with a few of the problems and check my work on some of the other ones. Apparently, he'd finally gotten around to posting the answer key to the practice test around noon yesterday (the day before the actual test). So, as much as I wanted to get "a head start" on studying, the only time I was actually able to do much studying was yesterday. Still, the test went really well, and I'm pretty sure I got an A, although with DE you never know...

2 Tests, a Calculator, and an Elusive Driver's License

I had two tests today: Differential Equations and Accounting. I think I did pretty well on both of them. The DE test was much improved over the last one I had in that class. I'm thinking there's a possibility that I got an A, assuming he gives partial credit, which he did on the last test. Of course, I'm trying not to be too optimistic because it's way more awesome to get a test back and have a better grade than you thought than to get a test back and have a worse grade than you thought. I'm pretty positive I at least made a B, though. We'll see. I'm wondering when we'll get the grades back. Judging by how long he took the last time, we should get the grades back sometime after Spring Break. I'm hoping, though, that he'll have them graded by Tuesday of next week...

Oh, this morning when I was packing my stuff for class, I forgot my calculator. When I was on my way to my DE class, I noticed that I didn't have my calculator. I started to panic. But then I realized that the calculator doesn't actually do anything for the differential equations problems. I mean the calculator doesn't do derivatives, and it can't take the Wronskian of a set of functions so it's pretty much superfluous. I guess its only purpose in a DE test is a kind of "moral support" thing. I know it makes no sense that a calculator that can't actually help any is comforting on a test, but I'm not the only one who usually brings it. I suspect that most math and engineering majors suffer from a calculator addiction. Anyway, as I was finishing up problem 2 and moving on to problem 3, Mom waltzed into the room and set my calculator on my desk. I didn't even notice that she was there until my calculator magically appeared before my eyes! I told her I didn't actually need it. And I didn't, although I did double-check my multiplication on one of the problems, but it was right anyway... I would say more about the calculator thing except I think Mom's going to blog about it, and I wouldn't want to steal her thunder :)

My Accounting test was pretty uneventful. On the way home, I realized the car was really low on gas. So, I was going to stop at a gas station until I realized that my wallet was in my backpack, which was at home. That was OK; I could get home without filling up the car. However, that also meant that my driver's license was at home as well. I kept thinking it would be a great time for me to get pulled over for the first time. "Hello, Officer. I didn't know I didn't have my driver's license until I tried to get gas for the car and found out my wallet is at home and I really do have a driver's license--just not with me right now." Sure. Thankfully I made it home with no problems. Phew.

Straight No Chaser

Straight No Chaser is an a Capella men's singing group. I bought a couple of their CDs for my family for Christmas. Anyway, they had a couple fun music videos on youtube that I thought I'd post.

They did an awesome version of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight."


And they wrote this song "Who Spiked the Eggnog?" for their Christmas album.


Ariel

Mental Institutions and Econ Professors

So, the Spring semester has started at UTC, and I've had the first meeting for almost all of my classes. I have the same professors for English and Accounting as I did last semester so I pretty much know what to expect for those classes. And I think my Art History teacher is going to be good. Of course, I'm beginning to think that I must be committably, certifiably insane for signing up for a class that requires you to memorize the name, artist, time period, etc. of 60 works of art for each test, of which there are four, which makes a total of 240 items to memorize information about...sigh.

And then I have an economics teacher who I think is probably certifiable too, although my one request is that she please get stuck in a different mental institution than I do because I'd really love never to see her again. On the first day of class she told us all that no one had to come to class. Class is apparently "voluntary." She said, "If you're feeling really tired around class time, you probably need a nap, and you should just go home and take one." And, "If you think this class is boring, don't come." Etc, etc. Of course, she also said that there would be pop quizzes about once a week, so if you aren't at class you'll lose lots of points from missing the pop quizzes. And throughout her whole intro to the macroeconomics class spiel she kept inserting "jokes;" jokes that she apparently thought were enhanced by the addition of swear words. It was rather ironic when she started talking about classroom behavior and not being disruptive in class, etc. I wanted to raise my hand and ask if swearing was considered "disruptive behavior," and if so, what should we do if she was disruptive in class. Obviously I didn't actually do that, but I did consider trying to switch sections of Econ 101 so that I could get a different professor. Unfortunately, all the other sections are full. The wierdest thing was that I had multiple recommendations for this professor. This girl I knew from my speech class told me that the professor was "so nice." Hmm..."nice?"

Code Red

Well, I haven't posted in forever because I've been gone on a ten-day vacation--my grandparents took our family on a cruise to the Carribean. I was hoping that there might be internet access. And there was; it was just really expensive. Since a cruise ship is a geographic monopoly, it can pretty much name any price for anything. Anyway, long story short, the monopolistic nature of the cruise ship made using the internet impossible. Being unable to check my email, I discovered when I got back that I had around fourty or fifty emails, which was pretty cool. I'd never had that many emails at once. Of course, by the time I deleted all the spam there were only four or five emails left, but still, the 50 had looked pretty impressive.

Besides spam, I have an excess of pictures. Not that I actually took any of the pictures. I stole them all off of my aunt's camera. I'll probably post some pictures soon, so consider this my official disclaimer: I did not take any pictures on vaction (except for maybe one or two) and thus (almost) all of the awesome photography is my aunt's and I only have pictures because I "borrowed" hers.

The trip was a lot of fun. I did, however, learn that the sun is different in the Carribean as compared to here--I refused to wear sunscreen the first day off the ship claiming, "I don't get sunburned," and ended up with "a slightly painful tan" (read sunburn) that I slathered in sunscreen the rest of the week. Also, two days before the ship got back to the US, we were under a "code red," meaning that a huge percentage of people on the ship were sick. Apparently, all the automatic Purell dispensers that they had on every floor of the ship, and all over the dining room, were not enough to dispell the spread of the flu.

During the code red, we weren't allowed to touch pretty much anything. At the buffet you couldn't serve yourself--you couldn't even get your own packets of sugar for your coffee! Dad was actually the only one in our immediate family who got sick, although both of my grandparents did as well.

In fact, in spite of instructions to quarantine herself if her temperature reached 100, my grandmother showed up at dinner and announced that her temperature was 101.5. I'm not sure she grasped the meaning of quarantine...

We probably would've run into problems with being allowed to get off the ship if we'd docked in Florida under a code red, but the ship's status was suddenly changed right before docking (imagine that) to code yellow. So, we ended up getting off the ship early Monday morning, and from there we drove home and got here around 2:00 AM Tuesday morning.

So, that's a quick recap of our week. Tomorrow I'll try and post some pictures.