biostatistics – Imaginary Sunshine

On eating habits and another final DONE.

Michelle — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 05:40:07 +0000

I’m going to have to admit: I may have giggled a little when I read the comments on my last (donut) blog entry about how it’s totally nutritious and a well-deserved treat. I’ll save you all from seeing what I ate for lunch today because it was practically soaking in oil, but oh so delicious, if not probably enough calories to last me an entire week. I try so hard to not be a good example.

I also baked cookies this morning. Nom nom nom.

My day went as follows: woke up at 5am, made breakfast, baked cookies, put cookies on cooling rack, ran around like a mad person getting ready and tossing a bagel into my bag (I put cream cheese on it last night – I anticipate madness), got to school at a ridiculous time, wrote an 8:30am statistics final (I feel confident that I did not fail the course!), hung around, chatted with friends post-final, listened to people hyperventilate, went home, ate my ~~disgusting~~ nutritious lunch, watched tv (omg, tv), napped, ate dinner, watched tv (!!!), knitted, drank tea, now I’m writing this blog. I may have left out a few things, but seriously, most chill day ever (considering I also wrote a final today).

In essence, I relaxed for the rest of the day after my stats final. My prof is awesome for not being a total evil person for wanting us all to fail! Three cheers for Dr. B! (I also wrote him a good review in my instructor’s evaluations).

But I still have two more finals to write – I’m going to be off to school tomorrow to study for oceanography (yet another required course – sort of, I need oceanography credits, but it doesn’t necessarily need to be that class, but I did spend $500+ on the course, so I’d better pass the darn thing!) and for my phytogeography class (which is made of utter love I tell you, love!). Two more finals before I’m free… It makes it seem like I don’t like school – which isn’t the case. I like getting an education, I hate having such a huge portion of my grade dependent on less than 3 hours.

I want sunshine!

Michelle — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 01:59:53 +0000

It’s been busy in my world lately, what with a midterm (Wednesday), working on a few new patterns for Chelle-Chelle.com (and I’m working on opening up a pattern store!), life in general. So it’s felt busy, at least to me! It’s still winter and the weather’s been utter crap. There was snow. And then there was hurricane-strength winds hitting the entire coastline of British Columbia on Wednesday. Power went out everywhere (and briefly out for me!). And then it’s been raining on and off, fantastic. I look outside and it’ll be absolutely pouring rain. A few minutes later there will be sunshine and no rain. Mother Nature, please make up your mind (and stick with the sunshine!)

I still have… 2 midterms left until the end of the term (I’ve finished 5 so far – I only have 4 classes, by the way). I have a handful of assignments left, one stats lab report to do (haven’t done the lab yet), one ecology lab report (haven’t done the lab yet) and then, you know, 4 finals before I’m done for the term. I’ve decided against taking summer classes mostly because I’ve done a summer course before and I’m just not fond of it (time constraints) and I only have 7 (seven!!!!) courses left between after this term and graduation, so I’ll be taking 4 in term 1 and 3 in term 2. 7 classes, zomfg. Heh, of course I’m applying for programs for after graduation, but still.

I’ll be done, briefly.

I picked up a vintage (ish) needlecrafts book last week that I’m so excited about. It was only $2 (from the thrift store) but in such amazing condition and has such great instructions for some fun stitch patterns (knit and crochet) and has a huge in-depth section on embroidery, cross-stitching, punch-needle, how to make rugs and so much more stuff. It’s amazing and has been a great inspiration for me lately as I’ve taken to sketching out more stuff that I want to make and have the inspiration to make. So I’ve just been drawing everything. I sketched out a crochet lace shawl that I want to make. Not that I wear shawls, of course, but I just enjoy a challenge!

But in the mean time, I’ve made these two outfits (knitted headband + knitted dress & crocheted hat + crocheted dress) as donation sets for 4alissia.com! Please check out the website if you haven’t already yet!

I’ve got a routine, bonus points for me

Michelle — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 03:30:01 +0000

I’ve been preoccupied with school lately, it’s basically my life at the moment. That and job searching. Speaking of which, if you know anyone who’s willing to hire a BSc student, currently in 3rd year, that has some some lab experience working with both living and dead animal and plant tissues; handling chemicals in a lab setting; and oodles of data entry experience and is a quick learner for most things computer related, let me know! Bonus points if the job is located in British Columbia, by the way.

I have weekly assignments and online quizzes and labs for oceanography (assignments + quizzes), ecology (assignments + quizzes) and biostatistics (assignments + labs). Plant geography blissfully doesn’t have any of that, but that also means that my grade is based solely on a single term paper, midterm and final exam. Peachy, isn’t it? (Reminds me of Animal Mechanics all over again.) But I’ve been keeping up with all of my classes thus far – it does help that I have two 3-hour breaks each day where I just sit in a comfy chair with my biostatistics textbook or read over notes for oceanography. Because I really am that much of a keener. It’s good though, right? Getting into a good study habit? I still have friends who complain about still being in holiday mode because they only had 3.5 weeks of winter vacation (yeah, you read that right, three and a half! I thought I lucked out with 2.5!).

Needless to say, I’m not feeling overwhelmed (yet), like I did at about the same time in first term. School’s exhausting sometimes, and it’s difficult to get a lot of sleep and time in for things for me. When it’s all school, school, school and study, study, study, I end up losing sight of what’s really important to me. Which includes things like watching a movie or hanging out with people that who’s mugs I don’t have to see every single day (I kid, I kid, I heart my school buds, even if they drive me insane with their constant “Why are you always studying?”)

This weekend has so far been doing assignments (oceanography, ecology) as well as doing online quizzes (oceanography, ecology), some review of already taught material (plant geography) and reading (and taking notes) for chapter 4 (biostats).

I plan on taking a little bit of time tomorrow to get some baking in because I really want cupcakes… Plus I need to do some grocery shopping for bagels (breakfast for the week!) and some more juice (someone keeps on drinking all my orange juice). I’m currently on a goal not to spend money on campus unless absolutely necessary. Necessary spending (in my mind) includes course materials (i.e. my biostatistics textbook was a necessity, lunch during first week on campus wasn’t really one and could have been prevented). So in other words, my goal is just to really not buy food on campus. Which means I either bring something to eat (due to a few ‘short’ days, my idea of bringing something to eat is usually an apple and a few granola bars and a bottle of water; for my longer days, with large breaks, I’ll bring another bagel, hah, with cream cheese along with fruit, granola bars, water). Trying to save money and eat remotely healthy… Interesting combination, no? I’m trying my best to cut out junk food right now, exceptions are things that are at home (i.e. cookies, cupcakes, ice cream – I deem these as okay as I can only eat them at home, and I spend more time outside of home than in, and I eat them in moderation, as opposed to when I’m studying and food just disappears…). So it’s really like, anything goes, as long as it came from my house. And that was a long-winded blurb about food.

I really try not to dwell too much on food and intake of food too much. Me getting too obsessed with checking my weight has led to incredibly bad things in the past that I would very much like to not revisit, but my craptastic eating habits during first term (a lot of buying food on campus = both disgustingly expensive and disgusting for my body) are not to be repeated.

I hope everyone had a lovely week, I should be getting back to my studies for the weekend!

First Impressions x4

Michelle — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 06:34:57 +0000

I’m about to bore you all and talk about first impressions of my classes. I’ve had 2 lectures of each class so far.

Class #1: Plant Geography
Prof comes highly recommended, he’s good and so far the class has been interesting! It’s my first 4th year class, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect. Apparently the class is supposed to have nearly 80 students but from the numbers that actually attend, this is not the case. I already have an assigned term paper topic (well, I got to choose, but he has to okay it). The material is fascinating and (the most important thing) I know someone in the class!

Class #2: Ecology (the continuation)
Profs are new-to-me (and one of them is new to the school). I know what to expect from the class (higher concept learning, weekly reading assignments and practice problems). The people I sat with in the first course (as this is the continuation) decided they were going to take it in the summer (note: I’ve already called them all traitors. To their faces.) but I know some people who are in my class and I’ve found people to sit with (yay).

Class #3: Biostatistics
Not just any regular old statistics class, it’s biostatistics (which means I’m going to flipping die of formula usage by the end of the term). Meaning we talk a lot about rate of births and rate of deaths. Because what’s essentially what you study in biology – sex and mortality. Survivorship and death rates. Whoot. Prof seems okay thus far, I have 2 friends in this class to sit with (yay) but there’s a lab component for my stats class. A lab. For stats. Holy hell in a handbasket.

Class #4: Oceanography (the continuation)
Profs are old to me and one of them is new-to-me. He’s old, reminds me of a professor from the Harry Potter film franchise (like a rounder Lupin, which is unfortunately because I used to like Lupin). And he’s from France and has a horribly thick French accent. So far it’s okay, I have a grand total of 4 friends in this class – I’m really happy about that. So far it’s okay.

So four classes. My schedule isn’t that bad… I do, however, have a 3 hour break every Tuesday and Thursday which makes me want to take a pencil to my eyeballs (but I haven’t gotten around to that yet). And I have an atrocious amount of breaks all throughout my schedule but I’ve been using my breaks to study and review material, so that’s always a good thing. My problem so far is that I have no one to hang out with during my 3 hour breaks, so I need to figure out a way to entertain myself with school work or something. There’s only so many Sudoku puzzles I can do before I get tired of numbers.