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I'm not sure when or why this started, but I have a habit of writing "ya'll" all over the last minute study guides I make for myself during finals. For example, from my chemistry notes: "Buffers --> it's the common ion effect, ya'll." This is a function of how very, very tired I am, but always it makes me laugh like an idiot for much longer than is productive.
Posted at: 01:45
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Next Thursday marks the end of my first successfully completed year of college in five years of failed starts and half-hearted attempts. I still need to make it through finals between now and then, which is sort of complicated by my premature celebratory feelings.
I am starting to question whether medical school is a reasonable goal. I've had to really struggle to make it through a year of introductory science classes, and I know that it's only going to get worse. On the one hand, all of my classes were so basic and so abstract and boring that it was very, very difficult to muster the motivation to study. I'm pretty sure that my remaining classes will be more stimulating and less superficially challenging. On the other hand, these classes should have been really easy, and I made this hard by my well-practiced method of truancy and procrastination.
I frequently think to myself "I need to start acting like a pre-med if I'm going to have a shot at getting into med school." Haven't really seen much follow through on that, yet.
In retrospect this year seems to have been one indefinitely long, blurred memory.
In unrelated news, we got a new neighbor this week, and every night since he's moved in there has been hours of what sounds like RC plane noises in the skies around our complex. I've yet to actually catch him, or anyone, remote-handed.
Posted at: 02:20
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Some thoughts on future pharmacists
Walgreens had a table set up in the pharmacy department yesterday through which they were distributing bright red versions of the hideous backpack that I described here. Now that I'm boycotting Walgreens, I guess I'll have to find a new place to buy my recreational cough syrup.
I have a ridiculous amount of impotent rage for the pharmacy department at KU, for several pathetic reasons. There is a bridge that connects the biology building and the chemistry building. This is convenient because both buildings are on the side of a hill, so it's easier to cross this bridge than hike up the hill. However, all of the pharmacy classrooms and labs are on the chemistry-end of this hallway, and those students are perpetually standing shoulder-to-shoulder across the hallway. After eight months of dealing with this I've pretty much lost all reservations about just plowing through people.
I guess the main reason that I hate the pharmacy department, though, is that all of their stuff is so much nicer than ours. I look in to their labs and see austere beauty, whereas the undergraduate labs are foul and mouldering. The pharmacy hallways have giant plasma TVs that seriously display static images, acting as proxy bulletin boards. Our sister lab in Haworth had to beg for a year to get the facilities people to come and remove the plaster and plywood that was inexplicably covering the only window in their lab.
So, yeah, petty jealousy.
Also: one last midterm, and then Spring Break (woo).
Posted at: 18:04
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Tuesday I was on campus for 14 hours. Yesterday, another 14 hours. Today, another. Is it midterm time already? Nope, just three back-to-back days of evil, late night tests.
I really wish there was some place on campus that one could go to take a nap. I like the Nap Store, or the Sleep Library...or, a motel?
The most recent episode of This American Life, Tough Room features a piece about the writing process at The Onion. Go, listen.
---
PS: I considered researching how to properly typset the name of a radio program, but I realized I am far too tired to care.
Posted at: 17:55
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Unfortunately, I didn't see that school (and by extension, work) was cancelled until after I showered and drank some coffee at 6:00 this morning, so I got a pretty early start at puttering about the house aimlessly.
Double unfortunately, I don't really have any food right now. I just checked the pantry and I have like half a serving of dry pasta, a bottle of Sriracha chili paste, the detritus at the bottom of a box of Life cereal, and half a quart of rice milk. Every time I look outside, I see cars sliding through the intersection at the top of our cul-de-sac so I'm sort of afraid to leave the house.
While I often feel ridiculous still working on my undergraduate degree at 25, getting random days off due to inclement weather appeals to my inner man-child.
Posted at: 12:36
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Dude, can I have a moment of your time?
I've tried to be cool, but I really can't keep silent any longer. What the fuck is the deal with this:
Is that a backpack you're wearing? It looks like you may have been able to fit a book in there. And is that yarn or maybe twine that you have wrapped around your shoulders?
Are you going on a canoe trip or something? I guess you've been wearing that to class every day, so probably not. Did you lose a bet, or did one of the bigger kids steal your real backpack...was it that Johnson kid?
I notice there's a face screen printed on the back, there. I've seen a lot of these horrible things around campus, but they've mostly been solid colors. I guess you bought this...no, I can't accept that you paid money for it. So you chose this one to make you stand out? I guess having a menacing face staring out of your emasculating little nylon bag is fairly striking.
Did you see this on the MTV? Do you kids even watch MTV? Was it on the myspace or the facebook, or that wii? I'm just trying to understand here. Help me understand why I see these everywhere.
Posted at: 02:05
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I finally got my grades this morning. I would estimate that I have checked for them roughly fifty times over the past week. I remember my first few years of college, before KU managed to get any kind of web-based applications running, I had to wait for grades to come by mail. Of course, in those days I didn't really want to know what my grades were, and my only real concern was intercepting them before my parents checked the mail.
I got an A in my biology class and a B in my chemistry and calculus classes. I'm sort of disappointed with the B in chemistry, but I'm really proud of the A in bio and the B in calculus. I was pretty worried that I'd end up with a C in calc given my lackluster performance on the final. I guess everyone must have performed pretty poorly on the final. The midterm was curved by 25%, I wish I knew how much they curved the final.
I am frustrated with the chemistry grade, especially because I skipped roughly 1/4 of the lectures and I know I could have done better. But really, I skipped those lectures because I was up all night doing homework...and something has to give at some point. This was pretty much the first semester of my academic career for which I had to apply myself in any real fashion. I sort of had to bootstrap good study habits, since I've never really needed them before.
Could I have done better? Probably. But for now I'm just looking forward to applying everything I've accomplished so far to future semesters.
Mom's response to my grades: "Are those grades good enough to get into medical school?" Thanks for the support.
Posted at: 08:35
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In two hours I'll be done with classes for this semester. Of course, I'll still be insanely busy studying for finals this weekend, but I am definitely feeling some premature catharsis.
Posted at: 11:07
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The PBS website now has a fairly extensive hatemail page full of letters regarding the documentary I discussed in my last post. A common theme in the letters seems to be that the documentary was not "balanced" enough and had a "Darwinist" bias. I was actually really happy with this aspect of the documentary. I feel that they presented Intelligent Design to the extent of its substance. The fact that there is way more to talk about regarding the scientific point of view really should not be that surprising.
What I found most galling about the cdesign proponentsists was the "oh gosh" attitude they took as they described how they were just trying to point out that there is another "scientific" explanation for the origin of species. No, what you were trying to do was gain a foothold, some precedence for the presence of ID in public schools so that you could unleash a salvo of attacks across the nation. You're no more interested in the balance of science and ID in the classroom than, say, PZ Myers.
I will say that I was sort of disappointed with the tone of the presentation of the plaintiff's case. It certainly smacked of rhetorical trickery. But then, that's the problem with debating ID; your opponents will continually set back the goalposts and feel as though they only need to give you pause for a moment to unravel a century of research and publication.
This excerpt from the judge's opinion of the case sums things up rather nicely:
"To be sure, Darwin's theory of evolution is imperfect. However, the fact that a scientific theory cannot yet render an explanation on every point should not be used as a pretext to thrust an untestable alternative hypothesis grounded in religion into the science classroom or to misrepresent well-established scientific propositions. The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the Board who voted for the Intelligent Design Policy."
Posted at: 09:14
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This week PBS aired a NOVA episode about the trial in Dover, Pennsylvania regarding the teaching of Intelligent Design in a public school, by way of the book Of Pandas and People. I think that anyone who has a passing interest in science literacy or education would find it fairly interesting. It also gives a pretty good overview of the salient points regarding the science vs "cdesign" debate and serves as a good introduction to the intellectual dishonesty of the Discovery Institute.
You can watch the program on the PBS website.
Posted at: 09:31
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