Finals Week Update

3 Classes dead and done. 2 will be dead and done by 5pm tomorrow. Final exam on Friday morning. I have two papers to write tonight.

I aced my ECE4607 exam, Wireless and Mobile Networks. I needed a 70 to make a C
I did about as expected on my GRMN1002 exam, which is only so-so. I needed a 50 to score a D
I bombed the hell out of my ECE4500 exam today. I have no idea what I need to pass, but he curves heavily so I have a chance.

I have half my final paper for ECE4884 completed, the due date was tonight but we're praying that they allow us the 24 hour extension we emailed them for. The final deadline is Friday so it shouldn't be a problem. OH! We finished our demonstration today, and we've made a demo video for you all! Matt Britt, our team leader, is the one operating the theremin in this video......http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZUk8hKIUjU
I have most of my final project done for ECE4460, but I need to run simulations tonight and write up my final paper by noon tomorrow.
ME3720 on Friday, I'm not worried about it. Actually, I'm most worried about sleeping through it because its at 8AM.

I have moved into my new place up here in Dunwoody, and I really like it here! It's huge! I can't wait to enjoy it as a work-free and school-free environment like I haven't been able to do in my place of residence for over 16 years...

I'm still setting up life now with insurance and cell phone bills and all that stuff, utilities...woo! Should be wrapped up soon though

A Farewell to AIESEC U.S.

Hey yall, my role as a LIGER has come to an end, and my role as an Alumnus begins in a week. I’m completing transition and everything now, and I believe Rachel is going to be an incredible Marketing LIGER for AIESEC U.S.

Before I begin to talk about some opinions of mine, I would like to apologize for the times over the past year when my suggestions, tone-of-voice, and conversations have come off destructively. They didn’t help the situations, and often contributed to the problems in communication. I have put a bad face on my LC with these actions, and I’ve put a bad face on those who supported my attendance in subgroup and LTM. That being said, I would like to end my time on the national Leadership Team by making some constructive suggestions.

I wasn’t able to make it to LTM this weekend, but I would like to share my opinion on one of the subjects. The name LIGER should be changed as soon as possible. I’ve been studying Marketing as it pertains to AIESEC externally and internally. Right now, those who weren’t actively involved or very close to those actively involved in creating the LIGER structure often see us as a joke. And the truth is, the name “LIGER” was created as a joke. Appearances matter, and for most people who haven’t physically met us, the name LIGER is our appearance. Most people don’t understand what LIGER means, even if you expand the acronym out for them, and it makes the role entirely ambiguous. I heard rumor that the ACE will become another form of LIGER, and I highly, highly suggest that we rename all of the LIGERs to be ACEs. AIESEC Connection Expert, now that describes what we do, that gives us a better face to the members of AIESEC U.S. LCs, and will ultimately make us more effective.

I would also like to express the importance of communication yet again, and provide a simpler solution than the ones I’ve suggested and asked for in the past. I’ve been involved in a community recently where face to face communication aren’t feasible, but hundreds of people who are involved in the community want to know what is happening, much like AIESEC U.S. The situation became volatile towards the end of 2007 in this community, and things came to a head when people who were financially supporting the organization were about to back out. Finally, they came to a solution that required very little work on the topside, but brought everyone back together. They had a Community Development Leader, similar to Andrew’s role, and every month, he would post a long update on everything that the teams have been working on for the last month, and the changes planned and in progress for the next. This didn’t involve extreme detail, such as financial records or the hour-by-hour workings of the teams, but it gave everyone a fantastic overview of the work that was happening. The CDL also created a thread for people to comment on the monthly update, and to give their input. This calmed the community down immensely. It’s been 5 months since then, and the entire atmosphere of the community has improved in an incredible way. The top level and the bottom level of the community are working together for their betterment as a whole. In truth, a similar move to increase communication was made by FDR back in the day with a televised update that he called “The Fireside Chat”.

We are now cutting down the national Leadership Team to the LCPs, LIGERs, and national roles. This transition is likely to cause people to get upset because they will feel less involved, but we all know that having 63 people in a room is not the way to make decisions. At the same time, much of the time spent in LTMs is spent updating everyone on what is going on, and then those who are there are given the expectation of taking this back to their LCs. The issue with this is that the information that made it back was often incomplete, and may LCs never heard about what is going on because they couldn’t/didn’t send representatives. The solution proposed above is one that can make the transition to a smaller LTM easier, faster, and more acceptable to the LCs, and at the same time, one that can more equally and adequately inform the members of AIESEC U.S. LCs, be they nationally involved or only locally involved. It is also an opportunity to help build the leadership pipeline from the LC to the MC by bridging the communication gap. It also builds a working history as time goes on. Better communication, and working together as a whole, makes people more positive and more willing to be active. Active members spread knowledge of AIESEC through word of mouth, events, etc., and will bring more members and exchanges, both incoming and outgoing, to AIESEC U.S. and its LCs. All of this for a simple, monthly update email or forum post.

This is a long email, I apologize. I’m almost done. I really hope that AIESEC U.S. will become more than it has been, both in terms of exchange, and in terms of developing leaders. I hope to see the gaps between the international, national, and local communities bridged. It is not impossible, although I have found myself believing it to be in the past. We are still far from where we should be after 50 years, and we must encourage constructive innovation in our members in order to catch up.

I wish that I had a chance to redeem myself after my last volatile email. I feel that I have discredited myself in the eyes of the national staff for my outbreak. I am sure you have seen people act as I have before, and I’m sure you will see more. When you run into people like this, give them my contact information and tell them to get in touch with me. I will attempt to share my experiences with them and to turn the destructive arguments into constructive ones. My contact information is in my signature.

Goodbye, and good luck. Please remove me from the Leadership listserv since my time as a member of the LT has come to a close.

Meh

What a piece of crap day. I finished everything about the project except for the calculations, and now I'm just stumped. The presentation is in 6 hours too, bleh.

You know its bad when you're the go-to guy for everyone else in the class and you still don't know what the hell you're doing. I'm like the token lab guy right now, everyone knows I've been here the longest and know the most about everything except how to create the model simulations.

Whatever. I'm tired. I said I wouldn't do this anymore. I quit until thursday.

My temperment is way off lately. I've gone off on two people in the last 24 hours. One of them was my senior design project team mate who waited until the last minute to try and do his part of the project and is delaying us finishing the class, the other was just someone who was being a pain in the arse. To the pain in the arse, if you read this, I apologize for being so rude, but I still stand behind what I said.

I need more sleep and I need to eat better, these are signs of pretty severe exhaustion. I talk about how I pull all-nighters a lot because I like to get the shock effect from people, but honestly, usually I sleep a lot during the day to make up for it. In dead week/exam week when I'm actually stressing the fuck out and pulling a lot of all nighters, I feel like a completely different person, I sound like a completely different person.... I fucking hate exams. Pointless goddamn work that I'm pulling my hair out for. I don't even know why. Fuck.

Let's hurry up already, there's waiting to do!

Continuation of the previous log...
10:30am - Went home
11:00am - Called Dunia
11:30am - Sleep
3:00pm - Woke up hungry, got taco bell, went back to sleep
10:00pm - Woke up, went to the lab
12:40am - Calculating Wiring Efficiencies Complete
5:20am - Having no luck making any progress on testing/simulations
7:30am - Gave up, went to the Windows lab to try to create the EBG
12:00pm - Take a break to call Dunia, get lunch, and take a nap
3:00pm - Back in the lab
4:00pm - EBG layout completed
7:35pm - Routing Layout Optimized as much as I'm going to optimize it; H-Structure Clock correctly set up.

I started this entry right after I asked my calculator to find the width of my top layer wires via an iterative equation. I'm still waiting on it to finish (it's been about 15 minutes).

This project is almost over. The routing involved manually connecting 103 pins together in 98 different nets via 5 layers of metal, which took about 15 or 16 hours altogether. The EBG involved basically guessing at different power-plane structures until it worked out to the right electric bandgap for isolation of the chips in the package, overall it took about 6 hours. I've wasted a lot of time trying to figure out what I need to do, and a lot of time trying to do things that haven't worked, all of which amounts to the remaining 9 hours I've been in the lab(s) this weekend. I have to figure out how to do several types of Simulations, how to calculate and simulate the Power Distribution parameters, and how to perform a Thermal Analysis of the final module. After that, all I have to do is write a conclusion and I'll be done!

I'm going to stay in the lab tonight until it's time to pick up Nate and Preston at the airport, then I'm going to work on German homework, Thermodynamics homework, and Optics homework. I plan to be in bed around 1am.

I'm going to go to the teacher/TA tomorrow and figure out how to finish this project, then complete the project and presentation tomorrow night. I'll complete the rest of my homeworks in all classes on Tuesday, and I'll write the final report for my senior design project on Wednesday. The rest of the week will be spent studying hardcore for my exams and taking much, much better care of myself.

It is so unhealthy to do projects this way. Two all-nighters in a row, sleeping through the day, eating fast food, not getting any sun, spending all day working with hardly any downtime... It's just a bad plan. I feel like all my reserves are depleted right now, which is made more evident by my current tendency to babble on and on about junk that gets dramatically worse whenever I'm this tired.


Almost free!

A Night's Log

Friday, April 18th, 2008

8:45pm - Arrive at the UNIX lab in the Klaus building
9:15pm - Successfully setup the program that I need to do my project in
10:30pm - Somewhat beginning to understand the project
12:00am - Finally understand what the project is asking me to do. 1) Estimate how many layers of metal I need; 2) Calculate the Wire widths for each layer; and 3) Route all the net signals by hand.
1:41am - Tentative routing figured out
3:00am - Spacing and Sizing calculations completed
3:30am - Routing Methods improved, calculations adjusted
7:00am - Top layer routing completed
8:30am - Bottom Layer routing completed
8:35am - Power and Ground planes completed
9:51am - Layout complete.

I'm tired.

Blah, almost there.

Less than 2 weeks to go.

ECE4460 - Microsystems Packaging: I have to have a multi-chip package designed by next Tuesday and a presentation for it ready. The project must be complete with working simulations and a final paper by 5pm, Wednesday, April 30th. This project alone will determine whether I pass or fail. I am very worried about this class.

ECE4884 - Senior Design: The project is almost complete, with a few testing issues that need to be worked out. We need to present by Friday next week, and the final paper must be completed by April 30th. This project IS my grade. I am not too worried about this class.

ECE4607 - Wireless and Mobile Networks: The final exam is on Monday at 11:30am. It covers chapters 6 - 12 and is open-book/open-note. I made a 45 on the first test and a 95 on the second test. Homeworks have been average. I have a homework due on Friday next week. I am worried about this class, but not overly so.

ECE4500 - Optical Engineering: The final exam is on Tuesday at 2:50pm. It covers the last part of the course only, and we're allowed 12 pages of notes. I'm not too worried about this class.

GRMN1002 - German 2: The final exam is on Monday at 2:50pm. It is cumulative. While I have been learning the language, and I would say that I am at least average for my class, my grades have not reflected this due to a huge number of external factors throughout the semester that took greater precedence than a pass/fail course. I am extremely worried about this class.

ME3720 - Thermodynamics: The final exam is on Friday at 8:00am. It is cumulative. I've aced the homeworks, I've not done too well on some of the tests, but my grade is a solid B right now. I'm not too worried about this class.

ECE2901 - I'm a TA here, this doesn't have an exam or anything, I just have to show up for 3 hours on tuesday to watch presentations and people's demonstrations.

An Exam to Remember

The F.E. Exam, or Fundamentals of Engineering Exam, took place on Saturday, April 12th this year. I failed to remember about it until around 10pm Friday night, even though I'd been telling myself to remember it all week. In any case, it was a horrid affair. I went to bed at midnight on Friday night, and roused myself from slumber at 6am. Upon completing my normal morning routine, I jumped in my car and grabbed a McGriddle before heading out to the test site.

I arrived at the Classroom building on Georgia State campus at 7:15am to find a couple hundred engineers sitting around in a hallway like homeless folk. The registration person was nowhere in sight. I found some folks I knew (because apparently everyone is from GT, just about), and spent the next half hour lolly-gagging because there was nothing better to do. At 7:45am, someone started walking out the door, and everyone followed. We were led to some building around the corner, and upon entering, we were filtered into rooms based on our seat number that was on our entrance pass. Mine was on the 6th floor. The beginning sounded very much like the SATs or the ACTs did back in highschool, the usual shpeal about the rules and filling in dots and such. Upon completion of the instructions, we were given 4 hours to complete 120 engineering questions.

This is where the F.E. became far different from the SAT/ACT. These questions were actually engineering questions, we were forced to use normal calculators when an actual TI-89 quality calculator would have been greatly helpful. They supplied a giant book of equations from all sects of engineering for the test, but looking up equations takes time, and we were only given 2 minutes per question. I used the book and am fairly certain that my first 70 answers are correct. Unfortunately, at this point I had 50 questions left and only 1 hour. The rest of the questions were answered in a flurry of what I have come to call "Engineer's Intuition", which means that I read the question carefully, looked through the answers, maybe did a few quick calculations, then took the best guess. Luckily, I believe the test was designed for this, because I was at least 80% sure of most of my answers on those 50 questions.

Oh if only my story concluded at the closing of the morning session, but no, this blog entry must continue! We were given an hour break, and then filtered back into our rooms for yet another 4 hour exam in the afternoon. This exam was more specific to the field of engineering that the taker majored in. We were given 4 hours to answer 60 harder engineering questions. I took the Electrical Engineering exam, and though I feel I was better prepared for it than most, there were a few questions that I wasn't readily able to answer. In any case, I finished this exam in 3 hours and was able to finally go home and crash.

In other news, studying is really hard to do. It's really hard to bring myself to do. It's even harder to admit to myself that I'm just procrastinating like I always do, and that I need to stop playing games (literally) and start actually giving a damn about school. I loathe school, I swear, every single problem we complete is useless, brainpower and time put to complete things that won't help anyone or do a darned thing. I can't wait to do work that is actually significant in some form or fashion to someone. In any case, yeah, I need to be ready for these exams. I have 3 on April 28th and 1 on May 2nd. Yes, I know I am allowed by the school to move one, but the teacher I'd have to ask is a pain in the ass, and I don't want to take the test on Saturday the 3rd. I'm going to try to move the exam on May 2nd to the week before finals so that I can be completely done with school on April 28th. If I can do that, then I'll get an actual week before work in to rest up and recover.

Even though I'm trying to stop playing games so much, I might as well say a few things I've noticed while playing Horizons. As soon as I joined up in the game around 45 days ago, I immediately researched everything I could to get through the learning curve. Soon after this, I found an informative group in-game that was able to teach me the information I couldn't find elsewhere. Once I was finally up to date on things (around a week ago), I began working with the leader of the group, C`gan, who is also a well-respected member of the game (been playing for over 4 years), to restart a team effort to build up different parts of the game-world. There was a team for this 2 or 3 years ago that everyone seemed to like, but in the end, beuracracy took hold and tore it apart (like it always does when left unchecked).

Based on this experience and many of my AIESEC experiences, I'd characterize my personality upon entering any world/situation as one of the "Young and Vocal Upstart", someone who gets shutdown by the real realities of a situation and/or the past-attempts of other vocal people. With experience, I'll probably become the "Old and Quiet Fart Who Gets Things Done", like my dad. We can only hope that day comes soon, but until then, I'm going to annoy the hell out of each and every one of you with my bright-eyed cheery hopefullness and close-following pessimistic optimism. :)

Hm

I've gotta stop sleeping through class.

Survival of the smart-enough...est

Well, here I am, 5:20am on Monday morning with a test in 2.5 hours. This just seems to keep happening, eh? In any case, I'm actually ready for the test this time, so I'm not really worried about it.

If you don't know already, I'm taking 7 classes this semester in order to graduate on time. 4 of them will have final exams, 2 will have final projects, and 1 will have nothing. I am in big trouble in about all 4 of the final exam ones, but here's hoping that I don't have to come back next semester. I have created a stringent study regimen for myself that will go into effect over the next week and last throughout April. This regimen will leave me rather useless to do anything else, which is good, because I need to be studying anyway. On the plus side, in the game I've been playing lately, Horizons, I've found a bunch of German folks from Bayern who have agreed to help me learn German :). Also, if you didn't notice just now, I have fallen back into the bad habit of making keyboard smiley faces. If this is a botherance to you, then :-P.

In other news, I've found a new home! I'll be moving out of my current house somewhere between April 25th and May 3rd into a townhouse off of Exit 30 on I-285. The complex I'll be living in is called The Columns at Dunwoody. I can't wait. Tonight, a chopper was flying around outside my house, shining a searchlight all around, and cops were everywhere. Apparently some crazy man was on the loose. The townhouse is a 2-bed, 2.5 bath, with about 1373 sq ft. of space. I'm moving in there with Dan, one of my current room mates at Zatch House. Originally we were going for a 3-bed, 2-bath, and Tom was going to join us, but he copped out. I think we got the better deal. I've been living in this house for too long, and the location is no longer worth the price, so it's time to bail out. The entire top floor of my house is vacating except for Tom, who is never here anyway. The bottom floor has 3 residents, I think they're all staying, but they never really interfered with us anyway.

Dunia hasn't had much time to update her blog, but I've been talking to her most every day for about a week now. We don't talk for long because of the expense, but I feel a lot better being able to hear her voice more often than I was. It's been about 3 weeks since she left for Kenya, and I can already tell it's going to be a long 35 weeks ahead. I'm planning to get out there in mid-August for her birthday, but it's still 19 weeks away. It's rough, and I wish she were here, but, selfishness aside, I'm glad that she is out there and actually helping the people who need it the most.

I can't wait until school is over. I can't believe I'm about to be working a full-time job. I'm kinda anxious about it, it's a serious departure from the educational world I've been a part of for the last 22 years.

Better Now

It's been a long-ass...5 days. Damn, feels like it's been forever.

I'm doing better now, I figured out what was going on. My opinions and my path haven't changed at all from what they were before this mess. I was just blinded by an emotional situation that I've finally gotten control over and, at least for the most part, put behind me.

Funny how none of this changes the fact that I have an Optics test in an hour that I'm not prepared for.

By the way, for international calls, use Rebtel (www.Rebtel.com), calling rates to Kenya are 24 cents a minute vs. the 40 cents a minute anywhere else.