Thursday, April 15, 2010
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Pay Attention
From yesterday's discussion section:
Sitting in a discussion section where you didn’t do the reading you’re discussing isn’t easy. There are only two options: 1) Don’t do anything. Pretend to be keenly and actively listening to the opinions of your classmates and GSI, furiously typing on your laptop to gain every juicy word flowing from their mouth. 2) Try and say something vaguely related, related enough to convince the hearer of your completion of the reading. Option 2 is dangerous, as in you could be caught, and made more of a fool than if you hadn’t said anything in the first place. But that’s also where the money is, the participation points.
Today I’m opting for option one, writing this entry whole creening my head up and down the table, making a face of mind interest and even slight fascination. Maybe she can see though it, but even if she can, hopefully she doesn’t care. That can’t be guaranteed though, she’s come this far through and she may just finish through.
Paying attention has been painfully hard lately, I think it's because of the simple fact that, I know even if do pay attention it's not going to do much to change anything. All of the homework for the semester has been turned in, and now it's only the exams that are in the way. The thing about the exams though is, even if you do a horrible or phenomenal job on them, it's not going to do much to change your overall grade. For my first linguistics class LING 240, if the next exam is anything like the last one it's not going to be good, and it's only worth 25%, which in exam terms isn't much.
For my other linguistics class, I'm painfully close to a B+, even an A-. Should I go for that one, or try and get something out of my first linguistics class?
Sitting in a discussion section where you didn’t do the reading you’re discussing isn’t easy. There are only two options: 1) Don’t do anything. Pretend to be keenly and actively listening to the opinions of your classmates and GSI, furiously typing on your laptop to gain every juicy word flowing from their mouth. 2) Try and say something vaguely related, related enough to convince the hearer of your completion of the reading. Option 2 is dangerous, as in you could be caught, and made more of a fool than if you hadn’t said anything in the first place. But that’s also where the money is, the participation points.
Today I’m opting for option one, writing this entry whole creening my head up and down the table, making a face of mind interest and even slight fascination. Maybe she can see though it, but even if she can, hopefully she doesn’t care. That can’t be guaranteed though, she’s come this far through and she may just finish through.
Paying attention has been painfully hard lately, I think it's because of the simple fact that, I know even if do pay attention it's not going to do much to change anything. All of the homework for the semester has been turned in, and now it's only the exams that are in the way. The thing about the exams though is, even if you do a horrible or phenomenal job on them, it's not going to do much to change your overall grade. For my first linguistics class LING 240, if the next exam is anything like the last one it's not going to be good, and it's only worth 25%, which in exam terms isn't much.
For my other linguistics class, I'm painfully close to a B+, even an A-. Should I go for that one, or try and get something out of my first linguistics class?
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Entry Deleted
Yesterday I deleted my Youtube account.
And the moment after I deleted it, I had mixed feelings about whether that was actually a good idea or not. Doing a quick search on Youtube I found preview images of my movies but upon clicking them, it would go to a page where at the top in red it said "this movie has been deleted". On my profile page, it read "this account has been closed." While I knew it would say that, I still felt surprised, and even a little disappointed that everything was gone.
There are some things that I wish I hadn't deleted, like my first recording of "Far Away" with the ukulele, or my Japanese interview with Takeshi. Those I think were memories more than just videos, and know I should have considered that more before I throwing them all out.
When I was a high school, when I tried to paint something I would always get really frustrated about half way though, and had a burning desire to destroy the work. Take a knife to the canvas, or cover it in black paint. Today I still have that compulsion, when things go wrong just to throw it all out and start over. But I found that as long as I didn't give up on it, it would always turn out ok. Sometimes even beautiful. Maybe I should have done the same this time; instead of destroy, just fix.
On the other hand though there's safety, something that I need to seriously consider more. Even today I thought about going through this diary and deleting any references to where I am. There are truly horrible people that exist in the world, and I can't give them any advantage. Can't tempt fate. Some of my older movies also definitely didn't reflect the kind of person I am, and I don't regret having those removed... But I do want to start fresh, writing entries or making movies is something that I really enjoy.
When I go to Japan in a couple of months, I want to be able to record my experiences, whether in the form of a diary of a movie, or even pictures. Moments in life all become memories, and there are some that I know I don't want to lose.
And the moment after I deleted it, I had mixed feelings about whether that was actually a good idea or not. Doing a quick search on Youtube I found preview images of my movies but upon clicking them, it would go to a page where at the top in red it said "this movie has been deleted". On my profile page, it read "this account has been closed." While I knew it would say that, I still felt surprised, and even a little disappointed that everything was gone.
There are some things that I wish I hadn't deleted, like my first recording of "Far Away" with the ukulele, or my Japanese interview with Takeshi. Those I think were memories more than just videos, and know I should have considered that more before I throwing them all out.
When I was a high school, when I tried to paint something I would always get really frustrated about half way though, and had a burning desire to destroy the work. Take a knife to the canvas, or cover it in black paint. Today I still have that compulsion, when things go wrong just to throw it all out and start over. But I found that as long as I didn't give up on it, it would always turn out ok. Sometimes even beautiful. Maybe I should have done the same this time; instead of destroy, just fix.
On the other hand though there's safety, something that I need to seriously consider more. Even today I thought about going through this diary and deleting any references to where I am. There are truly horrible people that exist in the world, and I can't give them any advantage. Can't tempt fate. Some of my older movies also definitely didn't reflect the kind of person I am, and I don't regret having those removed... But I do want to start fresh, writing entries or making movies is something that I really enjoy.
When I go to Japan in a couple of months, I want to be able to record my experiences, whether in the form of a diary of a movie, or even pictures. Moments in life all become memories, and there are some that I know I don't want to lose.
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