December in review

my body has mostly recovered from my first snowboarding experience. today is new year's eve and as of this moment, people in new york are eager anticipating the drop of the ball in less than 15 minutes. i remember the times when i was young and really wanted to stay up to watch the new year pass by but couldnt since it was way pass my bedtime. now i have no problem staying up that late, but it's no big thing. i've never really been to a new years party where there was an actual celebration. ok so its time for resolutions. i guess one of my resolutions this year is to be not afraid of new things. i was frankly a little hesistant to go to snowboarding this time, but it turned out to be really fun. so i need to remember successes like that. i'm sure i have other resolutions, but since no one really reads them anyway, i dont wanna think of them.

Snowboarding trip was fun. I had the opportunity to do it for two days. The first day I took lessons as part of the beginners package and it was hard. I wanted to quit and just sit. But once we moved out to the slope and the instructor had us try it on our own, i found out it wasnt that hard. the first day was all about learning what to do. the second day was more fun. it was all about doing all the things i learned the day before. a lot more falling the second day since i was trying to do things "right". but as the day went on, i felt i was getting better and learning how to control myself. but i still need to learn to do it "right". i would go down facing the wrong direction sometimes. it's amazing how in the beginning i wanted to quit so bad (because i was tired and it seemed like i would never get the hang of it) but the at the end, i was really enjoying myself. the drive back was "eventful" as predicted. but that's another story altogether. even tho im sore, i'm looking forward to the day that i can go back and snowboard again. i'm very proud since i exceed my expectations for myself. go matt!

Got all kitted out for skiing/snowboarding. Looking forward to the trip. I hope we dont run into any dangerous driving conditions. I hope I dont break anything. But now I gotta pack since we're leaving really early in the morning. Pray for me to have fun but not to break anything. Thnx.

Christmas Eve went ok. I had an argument with my brother. tomorrow, im gonna go to the sf rescue mission to help out. sadly, my heart isnt really in it. i'm more worried about the ski trip coming up: about what gear i need to get or borrow etc. hopefully i can focus and do whatever i can to help tomorrow. i'm also feeling really lazy now too. christ is born!

Today was the first day of my winter break. I actually got up a little early (9am) so that I could get things ready for the potluck at dot/deb/liz's apt. It's actually a pleasure to get up in the morning if you know that youre gonna be doing something fun that day. In fact, if ever you want to get up early to go out for breakfast with me or something like that, i'd be up for it. There's something energizing about getting up really early (like 4-6am). I love it how when you go outside, it's totally quiet and the streets are empty. It's sort of like the world is all yours and that you can do anything you want. Staying up late is overrated--it just makes you feel tired. But getting up early fills me with vim and vigor. the potluck party was fun and it was nice to be able to see a lot of the faces i've missed again. it was a fun way to just relax and chill after finals are all over. now tomorrow is nemesis!!! cant wait to see it. five years of anticipation will be fulfilled tomorrow! also i havent started christmas shopping. yuk. i dont like shopping, especially if i dont know what to get.

Done with finals! oh, the relief... i think this must be have the most excruciating finals week that i have ever experienced. i think what made it really different was that in all my classes i didnt start out the semester out well, scoring below the mean on the midterms. i just wrote them off and said that id just do better on the final. and along comes the final. it just put the pressure on the final for me to do well on it. not just ok, but exceptionally well to make up for the not-so-good grades earlier in the semester. the grading policy of my 170 class really reinforced the pressure. the final grade can overwrite the grades on the midterm if the final score is better. that means that the final would effectively count for 70% of our class grade. what i get on the final (after curving and whatever) is what my final grade will be in the class.

Ok, now for the boring recap of how i think i did on my exams. for ee42, i really needed to do well on the final since i scored poorly on the midterms. i knew i just had to get really familiar with the material so that i could do it my sleep. so that's what i did--did all the homework problems over again and went over every lecture. the exam was actually ok. it was nice that we got 3hr to do it instead of the normal 1hr for the midterms. i had time to settle on an answer and check it over again. so i think i did well on my ee42 exam. next was my 160 exam. this class was an exception this semester since i did do well earlier in the semester, so a little slippage on the final would have been ok. so i didnt really study all that much for it but instead concentrated on 170. the 160 was ok, with one question baffling me. my biggest worry was 170 since i really didnt know the material too well and plus it was 70% of the final grade. the 170 exam was ok. it was as difficult as i guess i suspected it would be. it was a bit tricky though. i think most people leaving the exam felt it was less straightforward than it should have been. i actually wrote something for each question so the time constraint pressure wasnt as bad as in the midterms. in nights before i was panicing that i couldnt cover all the material in my revision. but i ended up covering it ok.

in fact like most of my exams, i got to the point that i was just sick of studying and had to stop. i think it was for different reasons for each exam. for ee, i think i knew everything i felt was going to be tested. for 160, i didnt want to put the effort into it and instead focus on 170. and in 170, it was just really hard material and it was hard to study/learn. i'll find out my grades in january when they are released. i'm glad to put this semester behind me and focus on other things during my almost 4 weeks off. ive got a big laundry list of things to do.

Happy Birthday, Dad! It's always been disheartening every year that my dad's birthday is a mere 8 days before Christmas and right in the middle of finals week. Those two things combine to mean that I dont have the time to get him a decent present. While I know they are not justifications, but I'm sure he understands.

Anyway, today is Sunday night. I have to study for my CS160 exam (5pm Mon) and I also have to study for my CS170 exam which is the following day at 12.30pm. This means that it will be struggle to balance which class I want to study for more. Definitely I need help in CS170. I think I can do ok in the 160 exam since i'm already "sitting pretty" in terms of the rest of my grades for the class. Thus it means tonight I will spend all night trying to cover as much ground in CS170 as I can and use tomorrow morning or after to cram in all I need to know in 160. It will all be over by 3.30pm on Tuesday afternoon. Until then, don't bother me. Dynamic Programming is already enuf of a bother. One thing to look forward to is Star Trek: Nemesis! I'll probably watch it on Thurs or Fri or in the worst case, on Sunday. off to studys. *sticks nose back into textbook*

I've been studying furiously for the past few days. Yesterday I think I was getting something akin to cabin fever so i had to get out of the house for a bit and go to office hours. if anything, it was not to get away from studying but rather to get some human contact/interaction during the day. today i seemed to be entertained enough with studying for EE that i stayed in the house for the whole day. and now at the end of the day, i am feeling extremely restless. i can't seem to concentrate. maybe it's that im getting bored with the material. anyway, i need to chug away at these last few things to review since my final is tomorrow. and after my exam, tomorrow, it's off to studying for cs160 for the night. saturday will be spent studying cs170 (namely, dynamic programming is the topic i must get an intuition for). by tuesday afternoon, all my finals are gonna be over. hoorah? i guess, but boo at the same time. ok...CMOS logic awaits.

A mix of good and bad news today. Our group did very well in our final report in 160. the bad news is that it was confirmed independently that recommendations are priority one when it comes to applying to grad school. next is the research you've done and a distant third are your grades. i'm doing ok in the grades dept but in terms of research and recommendations, i've gotta use the next semester and summer to build up my research experience and also get connected to some interesting professors so that they will write recommendations for me. it does not look easy. so my priorities have now shifted to weight research much more heavily than it was in the past. i will hopefully dedicate special times to do the research rather than brushing it off. i *need* to make a good impression on the prof lest i not make it into a good grad school. this news/confirmation comes at an odd time since finals are approaching. i really want to work on the research stuff but i think finals needs to come first in this particular circumstance.

It was a pleasant weekend with much rest and relaxation before the onset of studying for finals. My first final is on Friday. Then I have one on the following Monday and another on Tuesday. It *seems* like I will have enough time to "revise" for everything, but that's contingent on whether i use my time efficiently. i am not using my time efficiently right now. off to review for cs160. i dunno who reads this, but if i seem like i dont want to talk to you online or reply to your emails, then the reason is because im engrossed in my revision. well at least i hope that's the reason.