The semi-annual class (p)review entry

School

With 18 credits including 3 labs, senior design (not one of those three), and choir, this semester is promising to be pretty hectic. But I think it may actually be manageable… especially if I won’t be driving for CyRide. It seems like only one course will have a final exam, and as far as it looks right now, I don’t have to spend any money on textbooks!

CprE 308 – I hear this is a toughie, but if I read the book, sit near the front, and pay attention, I should be good for a semester
CprE 483 – My 4-credit elective: the only test is a midterm, the rest of the grades come from a project that is very similar to the one we did in the pre-req course. Should be manageable.
CprE 485 – Java – Instructor’s fun, material looks pretty simple. Quizzes, but no aparent exams. Plus I hear this is a typically easy course. I could use one of those this semester.

532, portfolio, and senior design are coming up later this week, but I have a small inkling about what each are going to be like. The added time from not working should help me pull off halfway-decent grades to graduate with. We’ll see!

Consistent living!

Life Musings

Well, it’s somewhat official. It’s been one year since I moved into this new apartment. For the first time since I came to college, I have lived in the same location for twelve months. It’s been great! I’ve expanded to three desks, I have a 5.1 surround system with a perfect layout for projected movies, my keyboard is permanently set-up, and there is still enough open space in the middle of the room to pull in a couch (believe me, I’ve done it!)

I spent the last week gradually cleaning up my room, sorting and putting things away, theoretically preparing for the spring semester. Though I’m sure that within a couple weeks it’ll go back to having papers and random junk thrown everywhere, at least on the desktops. I did, however, completely clean off my main desk and slid it forward a few inches. Now I actually have room to open a textbook or notebook in front of the monitors. Immagine that! I can do homework here now!

Wow… only four months of school left. I haven’t even started this last semester, and it already seems short! I just hope I survive!

No more 12-hr marathons

Leisure

… with non-stop snacking. Yesterday 4pm – 4am was my roommate’s long-awaited Lord of the Rings extended edition marathon. And I made it through the whole thing. Well, I think I may have snoozed for 10 or 15 minutes at the beginning of Return of the King, but I didn’t miss much.

Ugh. We had SO much food on the counter and in the fridge though (6 others came and lasted through all three movies). Though I did mostly have animal crackers and water… so there’s a small plus in favor of my health. It was probably all the bread I ate, though, that did me in. I’m not really sick or anything, but I plan to take it easy for the rest of the day. And thanks to ISU’s “highly-connected-campus,” we lost a section of the Internet again. Tom says the only thing left to do is sleep. But maybe I can get some things done around my room. Or at least finish the Left Behind series (had to wait a week on book 11).

Two more weeks

Bus Ramblings

Well, I made the official call this morning. January 22 will be my last day as a CyRide bus driver. I should really go in and try to get as many pictures as I can…. since I still (theoretically) want to work on that Buss-Stuff page of Scrambled.

Earlier this week, I had talked to Karen about cutting down hours this Spring, since there was no way I’d be able to take 18 credits, drive 20 hours a week, and still do a decent job search as well as plan a wedding. There was talk about dropping half my shifts and only working 9 hours a week. That would be the only way for me to continue to be an employee. After some number punching in Excel last night, I figured, with all the times I’ll have to be off for choir or other related things, along with the lower pay rate and using up vacation time that I’d get as a bonus if I quit now, I would only make about $300 more working all Spring than I would retiring now. Not really worth it with everything else going on this spring.

So in two weeks, I’ll be joining the ranks of ex-CyRide drivers. I will sort-of miss it; driving a bus was always fun. But I won’t miss fearing a malfunctioning alarm clock, scraping my car at 7am, and lots of other fun politics that have made other drivers quit. Well… I still have my CDL for the next 6 years. Might as well hang on to it in case I need it later!

Do the Church swap…

Wedding Planning

Well, nothing ever works out perfectly, does it? After we thought everything was a go for Redeemer on June 4, we start hearing that her parents would really prefer having the wedding near home for a number of very good reasons. Well, the problem is most of the churches around the area are Catholic, and Lutheran churches don’t seem to take very kindly to having non-members come in and use their church for a wedding with a different pastor.

So what’ll it be? My church which makes her whole family uncomfortable, a Catholic church which would make Amanda, me, and my family uncomfortable, or a local Lutheran church that makes everybody uncomfortable. Read on to find out the answer!!!! 😛
Continue reading Do the Church swap… →

Getting over the sickness

Life Musings

Well, this morning I am finally getting over this crazy sickness I’ve had all week. Not fun!

Monday afternoon, with nothing to do, I sat on the couch and read up until I was supposed to go to work at 5. Having a small headache when I got up, I took an Excederin before leaving. Not 20 minutes into my shift, my stomach started feeling a little unsettled. Despite Karen’s urgings that I conserve my sick leave, I called in sick on the radio and was promptly switched out. ….I was switched out at the cardinal endpoint, not 50 feet from my apartment, but I still had to drive the bus back to base and then drive my car back home…. but that’s beside the point!

Good thing I made the call… ‘since I tried to go to bed by 7 and ended up in the bathroom throwing up and other fun stuff well past midnight. I could never get to sleep so I finally sat in the living room and tried to watch Fellowship of the Ring. I guess I did get a couple hours of sleep in. Thankfully I didn’t have anything to do on Tuesday.

Continue reading Getting over the sickness →

Mis-matched church calendars

Wedding Planning

Well, last Saturday night, I talked a bunch on the phone with Pastor Carpenter, from the Lutheran church where I grew up. We talked about what’s needed to be done and other possibilities, like my Uncle Henry, a retired Lutheran pastor doing the whole service. It seemed like this were going to work out great.

Now Amanda and I wanted to get married on a Saturday in May. I graduate on the 7th, my niece Amy graduates on the 14th, and Amanda’s sister Katie graduates from high school on the 28th. So I asked Pastor Carpenter if Redeemer (the church) was available. He said it looked like it to him, but I’d just have to call the church and confirm on Monday morning. Whoops! That day’s been taken for a year and a half! Great… I guess now we were set for June 4.

(Note the past tense… this entry is still back-dated. More details to follow!)

Day at Cornerstone

Leisure

Today I got to play with a bunch of techie stuff at Cornerstone church. It was awesome! Well… pretty cool at least. I spent the morning recording a bunch of old messages and equipping hours to my hard drive. I thought that’d take awhile, like it did on Sunday, but it was going really fast. Plus I was using two comptuers, so I was bouncing around those for most of the morning.

I also got to take apart the DVD duplicator to figure out why one drive wasn’t working for someone. I didn’t really do much except for unplug it and plug it back in. I burned 5 Cds and it seemed to work fine for me. Maybe that’s all it needed.
Continue reading Day at Cornerstone →