Good news: I have a Tumblr now. Bad news: my hipsterdom has just increased. Tumblr will be pretty much random bits of lulz, and in a way I'm hoping to eventually consolidate a lot of ASOIAF stuff over there since, well, that makes sense and all. (There is a large and vibrant ASOIAF Tumblr community, from what I can tell.) I'm andnowitbegins there, after the famous Tower of Joy scene in AGoT. Check things out here.
Also bad news: final at 3pm, technically today I guess. Yup, a final during 10th week. Rather cruel, I agree, but c'est la vie.
So very exhausted right now, and hot, and in need of a shower, and in need of sleep.
Showing posts with label finals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label finals. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Total bonanza
First, and foremost: DONE WITH WINTER QUARTER. That's all, really, on that front. Back to New England tomorrow.
On the Game of Thrones front, there are so many videos out as to make your head spin. House features for Houses Baratheon, Lannister, and Targaryen, PLUS character features for many of the Starks and the key Lannisters and Targaryens. The character features are exclusively for Comcast subscribers, but they have already started leaking onto YouTube. Not all videos are yet on YouTube, but many are.
First and foremost, the feature of House Baratheon, the royal house of Westeros since Robert's Rebellion about 15 years previous to the start of the story. This features King Robert, a tiny bit of Cersei (she's featured in the Lannister video, of course), Joffrey/Tommen/Myrcella (the royal children), and Renly, Robert's younger brother. This is not yet on YouTube, but you can find it here courtesy of TV.com.
Now the YouTube videos, embedded below, beginning with House Lannister. Cersei, Jaime, and Tyrion are featured here, with new shots and interviews with the actors. There is also a brief shot of Tywin Lannister, the infamous house patriarch, in his glorious lion-themed armor, which is something fans have been clamoring about for a while now.
House Targaryen is the former royal house, overthrown in Robert's Rebellion. The two remaining heirs, Viserys and Daenerys, were rescued and taken to the far east, where they've lived with the wealthy merchant prince Illyrio Mopatis. As the series begins, Viserys and Illyrio are marrying Daenerys off to Khal Drogo, a khal, or warlord, of the nomadic Dothraki people, in exchange for Drogo's help in taking back Westeros for the Targaryens.
Now onto the character featurettes done in collaboration with Comcast, beginning with the Starks. First up is the patriarch Eddard (Ned) Stark, beloved friend of King Robert, father of five legitimate children and one bastard. Serious and probably the most rigidly honorable character in the series, he nonetheless has a great soft spot for his children, including his bastard, Jon, whom he has, unusually for a lord, raised alongside his legitimate children.
Next is Catelyn Stark, Ned's wife, originally from House Tully of the Riverlands region. She is devoted to her family and yearns to see them rise in the eyes of the king and would do anything for her children, but she also can be fiercely stubborn and determined when need be.
First up among the Stark children is Jon Snow, the bastard child of Ned Stark, who decides to escape the shadow of his bastardy and his famous family by joining the Night's Watch, an order that protects the Seven Kingdoms from the wildling invaders from the north.
After Jon is Sansa Stark, the eldest Stark daughter and second-oldest legitimate Stark child (the Stark heir, Robb, does not have a featurette). Naive and drawn to stories of knights and chivalry, she dreams of escaping the wilds of the northlands and joining the royal family after she is promised to the crown prince Joffrey Baratheon.
Next is Arya Stark, the second Stark daughter and third legitimate child overall. Much more tomboyish and wild than her sister, she yearns for adventure and has a deep bond with Jon, as both are rather different from their siblings.
Last is Bran, the second-oldest legitimate Stark boy and second-youngest child overall (there is a younger son, Rickon, who is not featured in these featurettes). Too young to be much of a player in the political arena, he mostly lives a good life running about the castle but worries Catelyn intensively with the hijinks he gets up to.
The Lannisters have three featurettes, beginning with King Robert Baratheon, who is not technically a Lannister but is married into the family. A great warrior in his day, Robert has a soft spot now for wine, food, and women and was a much better throne-winner than he is a throne-sitter.
Cersei Lannister is Robert's queen and the twin to Jaime Lannister (who, strangely, does not have a featurette). Stunningly beautiful, Cersei has great ambition and an unusually strong lust for power for women in the medieval period and is good at playing the game of thrones.
Tyrion Lannister is the younger brother of Cersei and Jaime. Born a dwarf, his mother died birthing him, and his father has never forgiven him for it. Although his relationship with his siblings and father can be very tense, he acts a lot like the other Lannisters: he is extremely clever and witty.
Last are the Targaryens and associates. Viserys is the older Targaryen child and the heir to the ruined Targaryen fortune, and he has never stopped obsessing over his lost kingdoms and plotting to win them back, even to the point of (quite literally) driving himself mad. He is extremely possessive of his sister, Daenerys, whom he likely would have married were the Targaryens still in power (the Targaryen custom is to keep their blood pure by marrying brother to sister).
Daenerys is Viserys's younger sister. She has no memories at all of Westeros, unlike Viserys, and is dependent on him to learn about their family and their right to rule the Seven Kingdoms. As the series begins, she is to be married to Khal Drogo so that Drogo will provide Viserys with an army to take back Westeros. She begins to learn the art of ruling at Drogo's side.
Khal Drogo is the vicious khal, or warlord, of a horde of the nomadic Dothraki people. Huge, strong, and intimidating, he claims to have never lost a battle and accepts Daenerys as his gift-wife from Viserys and Illyrio Mopatis but slowly begins to fall in love with the much younger, and much more fragile, Daenerys and helps to teach her how to rule.
And that's it for now--so many videos, but they're all so good! Great shots in each.
On the Game of Thrones front, there are so many videos out as to make your head spin. House features for Houses Baratheon, Lannister, and Targaryen, PLUS character features for many of the Starks and the key Lannisters and Targaryens. The character features are exclusively for Comcast subscribers, but they have already started leaking onto YouTube. Not all videos are yet on YouTube, but many are.
First and foremost, the feature of House Baratheon, the royal house of Westeros since Robert's Rebellion about 15 years previous to the start of the story. This features King Robert, a tiny bit of Cersei (she's featured in the Lannister video, of course), Joffrey/Tommen/Myrcella (the royal children), and Renly, Robert's younger brother. This is not yet on YouTube, but you can find it here courtesy of TV.com.
Now the YouTube videos, embedded below, beginning with House Lannister. Cersei, Jaime, and Tyrion are featured here, with new shots and interviews with the actors. There is also a brief shot of Tywin Lannister, the infamous house patriarch, in his glorious lion-themed armor, which is something fans have been clamoring about for a while now.
House Targaryen is the former royal house, overthrown in Robert's Rebellion. The two remaining heirs, Viserys and Daenerys, were rescued and taken to the far east, where they've lived with the wealthy merchant prince Illyrio Mopatis. As the series begins, Viserys and Illyrio are marrying Daenerys off to Khal Drogo, a khal, or warlord, of the nomadic Dothraki people, in exchange for Drogo's help in taking back Westeros for the Targaryens.
Now onto the character featurettes done in collaboration with Comcast, beginning with the Starks. First up is the patriarch Eddard (Ned) Stark, beloved friend of King Robert, father of five legitimate children and one bastard. Serious and probably the most rigidly honorable character in the series, he nonetheless has a great soft spot for his children, including his bastard, Jon, whom he has, unusually for a lord, raised alongside his legitimate children.
Next is Catelyn Stark, Ned's wife, originally from House Tully of the Riverlands region. She is devoted to her family and yearns to see them rise in the eyes of the king and would do anything for her children, but she also can be fiercely stubborn and determined when need be.
First up among the Stark children is Jon Snow, the bastard child of Ned Stark, who decides to escape the shadow of his bastardy and his famous family by joining the Night's Watch, an order that protects the Seven Kingdoms from the wildling invaders from the north.
After Jon is Sansa Stark, the eldest Stark daughter and second-oldest legitimate Stark child (the Stark heir, Robb, does not have a featurette). Naive and drawn to stories of knights and chivalry, she dreams of escaping the wilds of the northlands and joining the royal family after she is promised to the crown prince Joffrey Baratheon.
Next is Arya Stark, the second Stark daughter and third legitimate child overall. Much more tomboyish and wild than her sister, she yearns for adventure and has a deep bond with Jon, as both are rather different from their siblings.
Last is Bran, the second-oldest legitimate Stark boy and second-youngest child overall (there is a younger son, Rickon, who is not featured in these featurettes). Too young to be much of a player in the political arena, he mostly lives a good life running about the castle but worries Catelyn intensively with the hijinks he gets up to.
The Lannisters have three featurettes, beginning with King Robert Baratheon, who is not technically a Lannister but is married into the family. A great warrior in his day, Robert has a soft spot now for wine, food, and women and was a much better throne-winner than he is a throne-sitter.
Cersei Lannister is Robert's queen and the twin to Jaime Lannister (who, strangely, does not have a featurette). Stunningly beautiful, Cersei has great ambition and an unusually strong lust for power for women in the medieval period and is good at playing the game of thrones.
Tyrion Lannister is the younger brother of Cersei and Jaime. Born a dwarf, his mother died birthing him, and his father has never forgiven him for it. Although his relationship with his siblings and father can be very tense, he acts a lot like the other Lannisters: he is extremely clever and witty.
Last are the Targaryens and associates. Viserys is the older Targaryen child and the heir to the ruined Targaryen fortune, and he has never stopped obsessing over his lost kingdoms and plotting to win them back, even to the point of (quite literally) driving himself mad. He is extremely possessive of his sister, Daenerys, whom he likely would have married were the Targaryens still in power (the Targaryen custom is to keep their blood pure by marrying brother to sister).
Daenerys is Viserys's younger sister. She has no memories at all of Westeros, unlike Viserys, and is dependent on him to learn about their family and their right to rule the Seven Kingdoms. As the series begins, she is to be married to Khal Drogo so that Drogo will provide Viserys with an army to take back Westeros. She begins to learn the art of ruling at Drogo's side.
Khal Drogo is the vicious khal, or warlord, of a horde of the nomadic Dothraki people. Huge, strong, and intimidating, he claims to have never lost a battle and accepts Daenerys as his gift-wife from Viserys and Illyrio Mopatis but slowly begins to fall in love with the much younger, and much more fragile, Daenerys and helps to teach her how to rule.
And that's it for now--so many videos, but they're all so good! Great shots in each.
Monday, March 14, 2011
The Maester's Path: Link 3
The third link for The Maester's Path is up and rolling; I apologize for not getting info up earlier, but it did not get released until this afternoon when I was actually already in my astro final. C'est la vie. The theme this time is "sight," and in this link you take the black, metaphorically speaking, and try your hand at being a member of the Night's Watch keeping an eye out for wildling invaders. It's got a first-person perspective and is extremely graphics-heavy, as it does a beautiful 3D video-game-esque conception of the Wall and the land beyond, so close out other windows and applications running before trying. Maneuvering is done by mouse only, so if you're on a laptop with just a trackpad it can be a little precarious, but it's doable. For how-tos and general help, check out the comments on this page at fan site Winter Is Coming. It took me a good 15 minutes to get with my trackpad being annoying, but it's very interesting.
The reward this time seemed a little bit shorter than the others, to me, and not quite as intensely interesting, but all clips are good clips so far, at least as far as this series goes. The scene is not particularly momentous but features a character we've already seen, as well as some first glimpses of a few others, and gives us a glimpse at a locale we haven't seen too much of yet. Highlight or copy-paste into a word document to read a summary: Tyrion is at the wall, discussing the growing threat of the coming winter, with what appears to be Maester Aemon and Commander Mormont.
In other news, astro is indeed done, and it went as well as expected. 25% completion of finals! Tomorrow is the take-home art history final, and Wednesday is Italian and turning in my Foucault paper. The worst is basically over, however.
The reward this time seemed a little bit shorter than the others, to me, and not quite as intensely interesting, but all clips are good clips so far, at least as far as this series goes. The scene is not particularly momentous but features a character we've already seen, as well as some first glimpses of a few others, and gives us a glimpse at a locale we haven't seen too much of yet. Highlight or copy-paste into a word document to read a summary: Tyrion is at the wall, discussing the growing threat of the coming winter, with what appears to be Maester Aemon and Commander Mormont.
In other news, astro is indeed done, and it went as well as expected. 25% completion of finals! Tomorrow is the take-home art history final, and Wednesday is Italian and turning in my Foucault paper. The worst is basically over, however.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Finals update & GoT trailer bonanza
Just finished 5 pages of Foucault draft-ness, so I'm feeling pretty good. It's good to have a whole draft down and the next two nights to do rewrites (on top of the 3 other classes I also have stuff for between now and Wednesday morning). I was on a productive kick again last night, spending about 3 hours at Harper (the general 24-hour reading room with gorgeous Gothic architecture) plus four hours at Harper today to plan out the Foucault paper, make my study sheet for astro tomorrow (smallest handwriting ever on that one), and actually draft out Foucault. I've never spent this much time in libraries, and yet it really is not a lot compared to what most people do during finals week. I'm already tired of studying astro, but the exam is tomorrow at 1:30, so I'll probably wake up my usual weekday time at 9:30ish and study until it's time for lunch/class, and then that will be done. Forever.
My just-finished-5-pages good mood has only been enhanced by the wonders the internet has shown me as regards Game of Thrones; apparently two different trailer-esque videos were shown on HBO tonight, and both are now online. The first, called "Fear and Blood," is a generic dramatic 2:20 trailer, focusing on the legend of the Others (which HBO are calling "White Walkers"), some new shots of the far north/Castle Black, and some great Jamie/Cersei Lannister dialogue. It's not yet on YouTube, so I cannot embed it, but it can be found at the official HBO production blog Making Game of Thrones--check it out here.
The second video, embedded below, is a "Meet the Starks" feature, and it is easily my favorite video posted so far about Game of Thrones. It begins with some basic "this is Westeros" explanation by George R.R. Martin, seen before, but then it goes into some brief clips of Ned, Catelyn, Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, Rickon, Jon Snow, Benjen Stark, and the north in general, including some more Castle Back stuff. Clips from interviews with the actors, glimpses of Winterfell and more, our first times really seeing Rickon and Sansa, and so much more--a really awesome intro to the Starks. I hope they do similar videos in the next weeks for the Lannisters, the Baratheons, and the like; it's really very well done.
Tomorrow's Monday, so it's almost time for the third link for The Maester's Path, which I will also hopefully post about sometime in between waking up tomorrow and taking my astro final at 1:30. I'll also be getting my copy of A Game of Thrones back from the housemate I lent it to sometime this week before we all leave for break, so I can finish a reread of it before the show premieres on 4/17 and start my reread of ASoIaF in general so I'll be done by July, when A Dance with Dragons comes out. Things are going pretty well, all things considered, for finals.
My just-finished-5-pages good mood has only been enhanced by the wonders the internet has shown me as regards Game of Thrones; apparently two different trailer-esque videos were shown on HBO tonight, and both are now online. The first, called "Fear and Blood," is a generic dramatic 2:20 trailer, focusing on the legend of the Others (which HBO are calling "White Walkers"), some new shots of the far north/Castle Black, and some great Jamie/Cersei Lannister dialogue. It's not yet on YouTube, so I cannot embed it, but it can be found at the official HBO production blog Making Game of Thrones--check it out here.
The second video, embedded below, is a "Meet the Starks" feature, and it is easily my favorite video posted so far about Game of Thrones. It begins with some basic "this is Westeros" explanation by George R.R. Martin, seen before, but then it goes into some brief clips of Ned, Catelyn, Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, Rickon, Jon Snow, Benjen Stark, and the north in general, including some more Castle Back stuff. Clips from interviews with the actors, glimpses of Winterfell and more, our first times really seeing Rickon and Sansa, and so much more--a really awesome intro to the Starks. I hope they do similar videos in the next weeks for the Lannisters, the Baratheons, and the like; it's really very well done.
Tomorrow's Monday, so it's almost time for the third link for The Maester's Path, which I will also hopefully post about sometime in between waking up tomorrow and taking my astro final at 1:30. I'll also be getting my copy of A Game of Thrones back from the housemate I lent it to sometime this week before we all leave for break, so I can finish a reread of it before the show premieres on 4/17 and start my reread of ASoIaF in general so I'll be done by July, when A Dance with Dragons comes out. Things are going pretty well, all things considered, for finals.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Fulfilling stereotypes + classes, at last
I'm not a big study-in-library person, in part because I'm lazy and, since I have a single on a quiet floor in the house, I usually see no need to study elsewhere. Last night--a Friday night, mind you--I went to Crerar, however, the moderately-creepy science library on campus, since a few friends were going. We nabbed a study room so that we'd be able to talk once in a while, and we left at about 11pm, 5 hours after we arrived. My friends mostly worked on papers due on Monday and Tuesday, and I worked on studying astronomy (four hours to go over notes and check solutions to homework, apparently) and started consolidating information to study later this week for Italian.
Now today, a Saturday, I've spent about three hours studying in one of the general dorm-wide lounges with another friend. Again, "studying" here means finishing writing out all my Italian stuff and consolidating info for my art history final, which really doesn't require much if any actual studying since it's a take-home final that's posted online at noon on Tuesday and due back by noon on Wednesday. It's open notes, it's three short compare and contrast essays for different artworks/monuments, and it really isn't much of anything to worry about, since after my initial B+ on my first writing assignment for this class, I've gotten As and A-s on the other graded assignments we've had, including the midterm. It's better to push papers around and take notes, however, than it is to work on my Foucault paper, the thing I am dreading most about finals week. It's now not due until Wednesday, but I have to spend Tuesday doing my art history final and studying for Italian on Wednesday morning, and I have to spend most of tomorrow making my cheat-sheet for astronomy on Monday (all of the class condensed onto one piece of paper is really fun to make). So really, I need to plot out Foucault pretty rigorously tonight, write it tomorrow/Monday, and do some sort of editing on Tuesday.
I really need to be thinking about Foucault, but I absolutely hate sosc papers (they are so joyless, compared to other types of papers, not that any paper is really that fun), and I know that no matter how much I try, I'm likely going to get a B+ on it (like I've gotten on all my sosc papers) and a B+ in the class for the quarter. I'm completely down with B+s, but I just do not want to write something that likely isn't going to be top-notch work anyway, since sosc papers require such agonizing succinctness and dry accuracy, a far cry from the "brimming-full-of-random-stuff, close-read-to-pieces" English-y papers I prefer to write.
Fortunately, the quarter is indeed almost done. Unfortunately, however, the most important (and most agonizing) part of the quarter is just beginning. As if determined to make it that much harder to care about these classes anymore, classes for spring quarter finally came out yesterday. I'm taking Italian 203, the third quarter of sosc, an English class called Modern Love in Victorian Poetry and Prose, and a psych class called The Social Brain and Empathy, which is taught by world cognitive-neuro-empathy expert Jean Decety. No astro, no art history, just stuff I actually could conceivably care more about (besides sosc) and/or enjoy doing work for (again, besides sosc).
After this quarter, I'm done with physical sciences for the core. After this year, I'll also be done with sosc. After this year, the only core I will have left is civ (civilization studies), which will be happening fall quarter. In Rome. Then, after I get back from Europe, I'll have to take classes that will eventually give me a degree and a future. Chyeah?
Now today, a Saturday, I've spent about three hours studying in one of the general dorm-wide lounges with another friend. Again, "studying" here means finishing writing out all my Italian stuff and consolidating info for my art history final, which really doesn't require much if any actual studying since it's a take-home final that's posted online at noon on Tuesday and due back by noon on Wednesday. It's open notes, it's three short compare and contrast essays for different artworks/monuments, and it really isn't much of anything to worry about, since after my initial B+ on my first writing assignment for this class, I've gotten As and A-s on the other graded assignments we've had, including the midterm. It's better to push papers around and take notes, however, than it is to work on my Foucault paper, the thing I am dreading most about finals week. It's now not due until Wednesday, but I have to spend Tuesday doing my art history final and studying for Italian on Wednesday morning, and I have to spend most of tomorrow making my cheat-sheet for astronomy on Monday (all of the class condensed onto one piece of paper is really fun to make). So really, I need to plot out Foucault pretty rigorously tonight, write it tomorrow/Monday, and do some sort of editing on Tuesday.
I really need to be thinking about Foucault, but I absolutely hate sosc papers (they are so joyless, compared to other types of papers, not that any paper is really that fun), and I know that no matter how much I try, I'm likely going to get a B+ on it (like I've gotten on all my sosc papers) and a B+ in the class for the quarter. I'm completely down with B+s, but I just do not want to write something that likely isn't going to be top-notch work anyway, since sosc papers require such agonizing succinctness and dry accuracy, a far cry from the "brimming-full-of-random-stuff, close-read-to-pieces" English-y papers I prefer to write.
Fortunately, the quarter is indeed almost done. Unfortunately, however, the most important (and most agonizing) part of the quarter is just beginning. As if determined to make it that much harder to care about these classes anymore, classes for spring quarter finally came out yesterday. I'm taking Italian 203, the third quarter of sosc, an English class called Modern Love in Victorian Poetry and Prose, and a psych class called The Social Brain and Empathy, which is taught by world cognitive-neuro-empathy expert Jean Decety. No astro, no art history, just stuff I actually could conceivably care more about (besides sosc) and/or enjoy doing work for (again, besides sosc).
After this quarter, I'm done with physical sciences for the core. After this year, I'll also be done with sosc. After this year, the only core I will have left is civ (civilization studies), which will be happening fall quarter. In Rome. Then, after I get back from Europe, I'll have to take classes that will eventually give me a degree and a future. Chyeah?
Thursday, March 10, 2011
New UDaR post on the deposit + end of classes
(End of classes for real this time. Except for the class I have to teach high schoolers tomorrow afternoon.)
There's a new post about the paying-the-deposit, officially-accepting-my-position process up at Una Donna a Roma.
In North American news, classes are finally done, in that I sat through the travesty of a sosc class this afternoon. It wasn't really a travesty, just kind of boring. But useful when it comes to our papers on Foucault due next week, especially since my professor changed the due date of the paper to Wednesday instead of Monday. I have enough stuff going on Tuesday and Wednesday, so I'll probably just be doing the paper this weekend anyway as originally planned, but it's nice to have a few extra days to look it over and pretend to edit it.
Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me is tonight. In an hour and ten minutes, actually, which means I need to shower (I just got back from the gym), grab some dinner quickly, and get ready to head out; I'm leading this trip, so I'm in charge of 9 other undergrads plus my own fine self and making sure that we get to the Metra station on time to catch the train north. It should be fun, all things considered (NPR pun? I swear it was unintentional).
There's a new post about the paying-the-deposit, officially-accepting-my-position process up at Una Donna a Roma.
In North American news, classes are finally done, in that I sat through the travesty of a sosc class this afternoon. It wasn't really a travesty, just kind of boring. But useful when it comes to our papers on Foucault due next week, especially since my professor changed the due date of the paper to Wednesday instead of Monday. I have enough stuff going on Tuesday and Wednesday, so I'll probably just be doing the paper this weekend anyway as originally planned, but it's nice to have a few extra days to look it over and pretend to edit it.
Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me is tonight. In an hour and ten minutes, actually, which means I need to shower (I just got back from the gym), grab some dinner quickly, and get ready to head out; I'm leading this trip, so I'm in charge of 9 other undergrads plus my own fine self and making sure that we get to the Metra station on time to catch the train north. It should be fun, all things considered (NPR pun? I swear it was unintentional).
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Done, or so I thought
Tomorrow is the embarkation (yeah, I don't think that's a word either) of the grand social/academic experiment known as reading period. For two blessed days before finals, we are supposed to be free of classes and homework; our eyes are now on that prize known as finals week, known as two-hour-long exams and multiple pages of essay-ing. We have tomorrow, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to prepare ourselves for the impending doom.
I also have a class tomorrow, during reading period, on Foucault. Thanks, sosc professor. I appreciate that. Granted, it's technically "optional," but he said he would not hold it unless everyone showed up, and for some reason a lot of the people in my class want to talk about Foucault yet again, so there we go. An hour and twenty minutes of Foucault tomorrow to brighten my reading period. Our paper (5 pages) on Foucault is due Monday, and we're supposed to bring in tentative outlines and stuff tomorrow, so I guess this could actually be a productive and helpful class period, but I'm rather attached at times to the idea of a lazy reading period, kind of a proto-weekend before I have to spend the actual weekend studying, reading, and writing for hours on end.
This reading period kind of looks like it will be anything but lazy, what with sosc and Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me tomorrow, teaching Friday, finding time to submit my Rome deposit and talk to the study abroad office, and probably other sundry things I'm not aware of yet but which will pop up out of the woodwork. Finals week itself will be moderately insane; my astro final is Monday at 1:30, my Foucault paper is due Monday by 5pm, my take-home final (three comparative essays of different artworks) for art history is posted on noon on Tuesday and due by 11:59 am Wednesday, and my Italian final is at 8am on Wednesday. And then I have to get ready to trek to the airport on Thursday to fly home for ten days for spring break. During which I have to secure employment for the summer if at all possible.
!!
I also have a class tomorrow, during reading period, on Foucault. Thanks, sosc professor. I appreciate that. Granted, it's technically "optional," but he said he would not hold it unless everyone showed up, and for some reason a lot of the people in my class want to talk about Foucault yet again, so there we go. An hour and twenty minutes of Foucault tomorrow to brighten my reading period. Our paper (5 pages) on Foucault is due Monday, and we're supposed to bring in tentative outlines and stuff tomorrow, so I guess this could actually be a productive and helpful class period, but I'm rather attached at times to the idea of a lazy reading period, kind of a proto-weekend before I have to spend the actual weekend studying, reading, and writing for hours on end.
This reading period kind of looks like it will be anything but lazy, what with sosc and Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me tomorrow, teaching Friday, finding time to submit my Rome deposit and talk to the study abroad office, and probably other sundry things I'm not aware of yet but which will pop up out of the woodwork. Finals week itself will be moderately insane; my astro final is Monday at 1:30, my Foucault paper is due Monday by 5pm, my take-home final (three comparative essays of different artworks) for art history is posted on noon on Tuesday and due by 11:59 am Wednesday, and my Italian final is at 8am on Wednesday. And then I have to get ready to trek to the airport on Thursday to fly home for ten days for spring break. During which I have to secure employment for the summer if at all possible.
!!
Monday, December 6, 2010
2:34 am
It's 2:34 a.m. here in Chicago on Monday morning, and I finished my paper draft. Entirely. Woot! It's pretty solid, for a draft, but what it needs is some good editing. That may not happen until Tuesday afternoon, though, since later today is going to be one big psych study party for my final in that on Tuesday morning.
Now I am quite tired and in need of bed and a book to read for a bit for pleasure before turning out the lights. Currently I'm reading A Clash of Kings, by George R.R. Martin, which is the second book in an ongoing saga called A Song of Ice and Fire. Each book seems longer than the one before it (this one is over 900 paperback pages), but they are weirdly intriguing, and I picked the first one up on a whim back in October at 57th Street Books here in Hyde Park. It's slow going, trying to read only really at night since there's no time otherwise, but it's a good way to transition from a day of hard reading and writing to something more mindless, something I can read without having to wonder all the while what my paper topic on it is going to be. :) Over winter break I think I'm going to be spending a lot of time reading this series.
Well, bed. Hopefully I will wake up by like 10 or 11 at the latest, especially considering that I'll have to wake up a little before 9 for my final on Tuesday. The past several days I've been completely ignoring usual sleep schedules and not actually getting out of bed until noon or so.
Sleep is so wonderful sometimes, really.
Now I am quite tired and in need of bed and a book to read for a bit for pleasure before turning out the lights. Currently I'm reading A Clash of Kings, by George R.R. Martin, which is the second book in an ongoing saga called A Song of Ice and Fire. Each book seems longer than the one before it (this one is over 900 paperback pages), but they are weirdly intriguing, and I picked the first one up on a whim back in October at 57th Street Books here in Hyde Park. It's slow going, trying to read only really at night since there's no time otherwise, but it's a good way to transition from a day of hard reading and writing to something more mindless, something I can read without having to wonder all the while what my paper topic on it is going to be. :) Over winter break I think I'm going to be spending a lot of time reading this series.
Well, bed. Hopefully I will wake up by like 10 or 11 at the latest, especially considering that I'll have to wake up a little before 9 for my final on Tuesday. The past several days I've been completely ignoring usual sleep schedules and not actually getting out of bed until noon or so.
Sleep is so wonderful sometimes, really.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Composed chiefly of finals!
The University of Chicago runs on what's affectionately (?) called the quarter system, which is somewhat different from your usual semester system schedule. The year is divided up into four academic periods (autumn, winter, spring, and summer quarters), although summer quarter is not required and few people take classes then, so in reality it functions like a trimester system. (We still call the normal academic terms autumn quarter, winter quarter, and spring quarter however.) Each quarter is eleven weeks long, and weeks are identified by number; the first week of the quarter is 1st week and so on and so forth. Pretty logical so far.
U of C does one quarter before winter break and two after; again, pretty logical. However, in order to fit exactly 11 weeks (no more, no less) in before winter break, while still actually giving students some semblance of a winter break before winter quarter classes start up immediately after new year's, the school year must start approximately 11 weeks before mid-December, which means starting the last week of September. Thus autumn quarter is from late September to early-mid December, winter quarter is from early January to mid-March, and spring quarter (after a week break) is from late March to mid-June.
Well, today is Sunday the 5th and tomorrow, December 6th, is the first day of the 11th week of autumn quarter, aka finals week. Last week, 10th week, was, like every 10th week, composed of 3 days of classes and two days of reading period--no new material introduced, just review sessions, and a lot of studying for finals. Hence I've been pretty busy the past week studying, or at least pretending to study, and generally trying to avoid the fact that finals are rapidly descending upon us all. They are finally here, though, and there's not much any of us can do anymore besides hole up with books and computers and ride it out.
You might ask how classes work with the quarter system. Well, you can take either three or four classes a quarter, and a lot of classes, particular in the core/general education, are what we call sequences--you take two or three quarters of them in a row. The core at Chicago is infamously large and mix-and-matchy, but it consists of three broad groups: humanities/civilization studies/arts, mathematical and natural sciences, and social sciences. You have to do at least two quarters of humanities class, at least two quarters of civilization studies class, and at least one class in the dramatic/musical/visual arts, for a total of 6 classes from that group. You have to do at least one math class (two quarters of calculus, if you use calc for that), at least two classes in the biological sciences, and at least two classes in the physical sciences, for a total of 6 classes from that group. And everyone, without exception, has to do three quarters (a full academic year) of a social sciences core class, which is basically a giant mixture of classic social sciences texts, from the economic (Marx and Smith) to the philosophical to the psychological (Freud) to the anthropological. There's also a foreign language competency requirement (basically a year of a language if you can't test out of it) and even physical education and swimming requirements, if you don't test out of those.
Last year I took two quarters of humanities (basically a small Englishy seminar type class that all first-years take), two quarters of calculus, and two quarters of biological science, to get rid of hum (as we call it), bio, and math. This year I'm taking the full gamut of sosc (as we call the social sciences core sequence), two quarters of physical science (I'm taking an astronomy/astrophyiscs for nonmajors sequence), and an art history class next quarter to finish that. I already have full PE and swim credits and language competency, and I'll be doing civ (as we call the civilizations studies core requirement) next year. So I'm sort of, almost done with the core.
What else do I take? Last year and this year I've taken Italian for the fun of it. Last year I also took a Shakespeare class, an English theory class, and a basic intro to linguistics class. This quarter I'm taking a social psychology class in addition to sosc, Italian, and my astro class. Next quarter I'll be taking sosc, Italian, the second part of my astro sequence, and an art history class on Islamic art and architecture from 650 to 1100 CE to complete my requirement in the arts. In spring quarter I'll finish up sosc and Italian and probably take some sort of English class and possibly developmental psychology. After this year the only core I will have left is civ (basically equivalent to the history of a particular world region); I'm considering doing civ as a study abroad thing (which is very popular) in Rome or Athens, where you go abroad for a quarter and get three quarters' worth of civ, but otherwise I will do my three quarters of civ, a glorious full academic year, on campus next year.
This is all a very long-winded way of saying that it's finals week for autumn quarter 2010 and I'm not crazy-happy about it. My finals week is back-loaded; I have nothing tomorrow but then something every day Tuesday through Friday, and I'm not going back to New England until Saturday. On Tuesday I have my social psych final from 10:30am to 12:30pm. On Wednesday I have a five-page paper about Max Weber for my sosc class due at 5pm. On Thursday I have my Italian final from 8-10am, and on Friday I have my astro final from 10:30a-12:30p. So far I've organized tons of notes about psych and planned out my Weber paper, quotes and all (although I haven't actually begun writing it yet). After I finish this blog entry, I'm going to study psych until dinner and then maybe start actually doing some legitimate paper-writing, although I have a secret santa party-type thing to go to at 8, as well as some other random social obligations, and that all won't be done until probably 11pm. At which point it's back to the grindstone for a few hours before bed. Tomorrow is going to be finishing a draft of the paper and hardcore psych cramming for Tuesday.
There's a vague sort of schedule in there, somewhere. It's hard this close to winter break to care about a lot of this stuff, but this is the most important part, when my focus is supposed to be the strongest of all. With that, I'll leave everyone to their own schedules and start in on some social psychology for a few hours. Hurray!
U of C does one quarter before winter break and two after; again, pretty logical. However, in order to fit exactly 11 weeks (no more, no less) in before winter break, while still actually giving students some semblance of a winter break before winter quarter classes start up immediately after new year's, the school year must start approximately 11 weeks before mid-December, which means starting the last week of September. Thus autumn quarter is from late September to early-mid December, winter quarter is from early January to mid-March, and spring quarter (after a week break) is from late March to mid-June.
Well, today is Sunday the 5th and tomorrow, December 6th, is the first day of the 11th week of autumn quarter, aka finals week. Last week, 10th week, was, like every 10th week, composed of 3 days of classes and two days of reading period--no new material introduced, just review sessions, and a lot of studying for finals. Hence I've been pretty busy the past week studying, or at least pretending to study, and generally trying to avoid the fact that finals are rapidly descending upon us all. They are finally here, though, and there's not much any of us can do anymore besides hole up with books and computers and ride it out.
You might ask how classes work with the quarter system. Well, you can take either three or four classes a quarter, and a lot of classes, particular in the core/general education, are what we call sequences--you take two or three quarters of them in a row. The core at Chicago is infamously large and mix-and-matchy, but it consists of three broad groups: humanities/civilization studies/arts, mathematical and natural sciences, and social sciences. You have to do at least two quarters of humanities class, at least two quarters of civilization studies class, and at least one class in the dramatic/musical/visual arts, for a total of 6 classes from that group. You have to do at least one math class (two quarters of calculus, if you use calc for that), at least two classes in the biological sciences, and at least two classes in the physical sciences, for a total of 6 classes from that group. And everyone, without exception, has to do three quarters (a full academic year) of a social sciences core class, which is basically a giant mixture of classic social sciences texts, from the economic (Marx and Smith) to the philosophical to the psychological (Freud) to the anthropological. There's also a foreign language competency requirement (basically a year of a language if you can't test out of it) and even physical education and swimming requirements, if you don't test out of those.
Last year I took two quarters of humanities (basically a small Englishy seminar type class that all first-years take), two quarters of calculus, and two quarters of biological science, to get rid of hum (as we call it), bio, and math. This year I'm taking the full gamut of sosc (as we call the social sciences core sequence), two quarters of physical science (I'm taking an astronomy/astrophyiscs for nonmajors sequence), and an art history class next quarter to finish that. I already have full PE and swim credits and language competency, and I'll be doing civ (as we call the civilizations studies core requirement) next year. So I'm sort of, almost done with the core.
What else do I take? Last year and this year I've taken Italian for the fun of it. Last year I also took a Shakespeare class, an English theory class, and a basic intro to linguistics class. This quarter I'm taking a social psychology class in addition to sosc, Italian, and my astro class. Next quarter I'll be taking sosc, Italian, the second part of my astro sequence, and an art history class on Islamic art and architecture from 650 to 1100 CE to complete my requirement in the arts. In spring quarter I'll finish up sosc and Italian and probably take some sort of English class and possibly developmental psychology. After this year the only core I will have left is civ (basically equivalent to the history of a particular world region); I'm considering doing civ as a study abroad thing (which is very popular) in Rome or Athens, where you go abroad for a quarter and get three quarters' worth of civ, but otherwise I will do my three quarters of civ, a glorious full academic year, on campus next year.
This is all a very long-winded way of saying that it's finals week for autumn quarter 2010 and I'm not crazy-happy about it. My finals week is back-loaded; I have nothing tomorrow but then something every day Tuesday through Friday, and I'm not going back to New England until Saturday. On Tuesday I have my social psych final from 10:30am to 12:30pm. On Wednesday I have a five-page paper about Max Weber for my sosc class due at 5pm. On Thursday I have my Italian final from 8-10am, and on Friday I have my astro final from 10:30a-12:30p. So far I've organized tons of notes about psych and planned out my Weber paper, quotes and all (although I haven't actually begun writing it yet). After I finish this blog entry, I'm going to study psych until dinner and then maybe start actually doing some legitimate paper-writing, although I have a secret santa party-type thing to go to at 8, as well as some other random social obligations, and that all won't be done until probably 11pm. At which point it's back to the grindstone for a few hours before bed. Tomorrow is going to be finishing a draft of the paper and hardcore psych cramming for Tuesday.
There's a vague sort of schedule in there, somewhere. It's hard this close to winter break to care about a lot of this stuff, but this is the most important part, when my focus is supposed to be the strongest of all. With that, I'll leave everyone to their own schedules and start in on some social psychology for a few hours. Hurray!
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