Grading for Winners

I have had a few jobs in my life:  Babysitter, tutor, camp counselor, fry cook.  My newest job is along the lines of a couple of those old ones, but from a different side, and I don’t mean food critic or mother.  I have become the Holy Grail of college upper division jobs: a grader.  Yes, I now grade papers for a living, so I have officially become the most disjointed educator ever.  I take roll, I lead a class and write on a board for one of my jobs, and in a totally unrelated job in a different school in a different field, I grade the work of a bunch of students.  It kind of goes towards what I want to end up doing and it’s amazing experience.  Well, not necessarily amazing, but it’s enlightening for sure.  I’ve learned that one of the best forms of entertainment is grading on a Friday night, and here’s why.

How I began my evening was making tea and cracking open some delicious creme filled ginger snaps for a sugar high to keep me motivated.  Even a regular night with these two would be delicious, but I decided the cherry on my sundae of school would be a pile of papers to grade.  I got out my red pen, ready and willing to be used, and turned on Iron Man 2 (to get the right amount of ego in my system) and began.  I won’t get into the nitty gritty about what went down, but I will say I yelled…a lot.  Mostly exclamations of “What?  What the hell?”  and some tossing of paper and cursing and wishing for whiskey.  Thinking of it now, I might have some in the freezer for later…no, bad idea, I’d just become meaner.  The first, I would say, 20 papers I went through, I tried to be nice, but 21 was almost no work and just felt like the person phoned it in.  That’s when my heart began to fall and I ate a cookie.  I went on to the next paper, and it was, if anything, worse.  Even Robert Downey Jr. inventing a new atom couldn’t bring me back from these doldrums.  I finally finished the last paper, and breathed a sigh of relief.  However, did I mention that I was going only one part of one problem at a time?  No?  Well, I am.  As of right now, I’ve finished the first two parts…out of more than I’m willing to say.  I was a distance swimmer in high school, so I’m rather good at pacing myself, which I’m going to do now.  That way, when I come back to this pile of doom tomorrow, it will be with fresh, less agressive eyes.

Sound like a plan, Stan?  Too bad, because I’m going to do it anyway.  Now, where’s that whiskey…?

How to Be a Poor College Student

I’m what is lovingly referred to as a fifth year senior, and I’m fine with that.  What I’m not fine with is that I have little to no money, but that’s what comes with college.  It’s amazing how quiet life is when you can’t afford to go out.  Like tonight, it’s just me, my textbooks and Parks and Rec.  I love Parks and Rec.  I feel for Leslie Knope, she’s kind of my soulmate.

Now here’s what I’m going to get to the point my post:  how to ENJOY being a poor college student.  I know it’s a strange kind of sentence, but it’s a skill that needs to be shared.

1.  Read.

You’re in college.  Studying is like 80% of your job anyway.  But while you can’t afford a lot of things, access to reading material is pretty simple to come by.  First of all, you’re reading right now.  (MIND=BLOWN.)  There’s also this fancy place called the library which has free books, both in paper and digital form.  Often there’s a waiting list for the more popular books through digital library downloads, but there’s always an amazing selection.

2.  Go fly a kite.

Go outside, do recreational things.  Everyone, and I mean everyone, has a few frisbees stuffed in the bottom of their closet, or like a four square ball or a basketball.  I, myself, have a wonderful kite wedged between my freebie frisbees.  I’ve had a few different awesome beach days with friends, bon fires and my kite.  The hardest thing for me to do is to get out of my house, but having toys makes it better.

3.  Cook.

The best way to stretch a buck is to make a big meal that will go a looooooooong way, and it’s wonderful to have food that tastes good when you’re low on funds.  It’s a weird kind of comfort.  Here’s a suggestion:  Food Network has a ton of food that is like take out, but it ends up being leftovers for a good amount of time.  I also just enjoy cooking in general, and it’s something to do.  Turn on some music, feel like Alton Brown and get ‘er done.

4.  Make something.

Draw, write (like I’m doing…), craft, paint, sculpt.  It’s pretty easy to use stuff that you already have to make something kind of cool.  You can always cut up a t shirt that you have but are not overly fond of and make something out of it.  Paint is cheap, paper can be cheap, glue is cheap, and it feels amazing to make something.  Knitting, while fun and an excellent way to make useful pieces, can be expensive if you’re a fiber snob like me, so enter at your own risk.

5.  Be friendly.

All the above are made infinitely better with the help of friends.  Misery loves company is an awful phrase, and I prefer to think of it in a more positive light, like I have amazing people in my life and I want to have fun and I have fun with them.

Well, there it is.  This is how I enjoy myself as a poor, sad college student.  Yes, they are all straightforward and pretty cliche, but they work.  Look at me, I am a fair happy and up beat person, even though I’m studying physics, which is another way of saying I have a high potential of being an alcoholic. AS IS LIFE.

Quick Rant 1: Lizards

I know this is random and ridiculous, but it kind of ticked me off. I was watching something on TV and this little girl said to her mother “I want the backpack with the lizard.”  Her mother said, “You can’t have that, you’re a girl.”  I know I’m probably taking this out of context and being overly sensitive, but since when are girls not allowed to like lizards.  I love lizards!  And physics!  I’m going to add another feminst post later today, I just wanted to do a quicky.

Here we go again

Whelp, summer is more or less over for me.  I’ve packed up my most prized possessions (including a few new ones, including a fish named Ulysses S. Grant) and hauled myself, with ample help from my family, to San Francisco.  New apartment, new roommates, new fish but lots of old and dear friends to see, so lots to do.  Some of my new roommates are those dear old friends.  I did make a few new friends though.  The mosquitoes.  I currently have a constellation on my arm, my foot, my hand and, happily, my face.  It’s a rather humbling experience, but I won’t let it ruin my happiness.

I’ve picked up a few new habits as well, like running.  I’ve never been much of a runner, unless it was for my life or at work.  You’d be surprised how often I find myself running in the capacity of kid wrangling.  Okay, maybe you do, but that’s not the point.  So yeah, I am now a running, which I feel like negates or contests my swimmer status from high school.  Maybe a better phrase would be frequent jogger.  Or a moderate speed speed-walker.  What I mean to say is, I’m not fast.  I have endurance, but speed will hopefully come later.

I think one of the most defining aspects of San Francisco is the fog.  We live in a cloud at all times, separating us from the outside world and making the myth of vampires applicable with our pasty, pasty skin.  Even Buffy would be confused here.  Anyway, yesterday was an anomaly.   There was sun, sapphire blue skies and a tingly kind of warmth in the air.  To commemorate this event, my roommate and I went to the beach, without getting in the water of course.  Those Alaskan currents aren’t worth the hypothermia it would induce if I had jumped in.  We lay on the beach chatting and reading and studying and preparing for my animation course.

Wait.

Wait a minute…did she say…animation?

OH WAIT DO I FINALLY NOW GET TO TALK ABOUT THE ACTUAL POINT OF THIS BLOG!!?  YEAH!!!

I am finally FINALLY beginning some animation courses.  Therefore, I can proudly wear the name artistic scientist.  While I began this quest possibly on the day of my birth, I feel like I’m so close to actual making some headway.  I have a portfolio review to do on Monday, so wish me luck.

I wish I could have written some prolific prose or made a more concrete essay out of this, but it’s really just an update on my life.  Believe, the next one will be insightful and all that jazz.

Just kidding!

Herding Cats

I feel bad for letting this blog slip for a while.  Here’s my apology.
Sorry.

And now we’re done with that.  Basically, I’ve been working full-time for the summer as an assistant instructor at a camp for preteens and I must admit, although I’ve done this before, it remains a challenge and time consuming.  Along with the fun of finals, I’ve completely let a ton of stuff fall by the wayside.  I was supposed to be penpals with someone and I’m ashamed to say that we’ve kind of missed a few weeks.  The best part of all this is my legs have that lovely tingly sensation of being on my feet for days on end.  And it’s my day off, so that’s great.

That’s not to say I don’t love working with kids, I really do.  They just have this amazing ability of not listening.  I can stand next to a kid and say their name over and over and over and over and they’ll eventually look at me and say something like “I didn’t hear you.”  I have choir voice training.  Meaning, I’m very, very, very loud.  I have the ability to yell over traffic without damaging my throat…at all.  While I’m not shouting at the kid, I tend to have a fairly strident tone, which I’ve learned from other authority figures and it’s hard to ignore.  The best part is that they’ll scream in my ear, so now I kind of lost hearing in my left ear for a little bit.  It’s also related to the slight congestion I caught when a kid sneezed and coughed in my face.

However, kids are hilarious!  They say the most honest and pure things, and it’s hard not to burst out laughing.  These kids are also brilliant.  I’ve had wonderful discussion of basic physics concepts with them and they’ve asked me questions.  I think truly genius people become that way by asking well thought out questions and then listening to the answer, so these kids are halfway there.  There have been some kids that I’ve wanted to take home with me, and some that I feel I’ve really connected with, and that makes it worth it.  I’m proud that I’m helping foster future nerds, and showing kids that being a nerd is cool.  I mean, I wear glasses and have a tattoo of a Greek symbol found in most equations for Pete’s sake, and these kids think I’m cool.

Well, there’s no accounting for taste.

Anyway, I’m just glad that this program is around to foster a love for science and creativity and give kids like me a place to be and people to look up to.  Whoot.

Anywho, on an equally nerdy note, 5 days until I go to San Diego and 6 days until Comic Con.  WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOT.