chemistry – Imaginary Sunshine

Studying and pausing to reflect

Michelle — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 22:26:03 +0000

Do I get some kind of award for being a horribly inactive blogger? Although I’m sure there are other people much worse at updating than I am… I hope so, anyways!

It’s April! Which means that it is spring time and that also means finals season. I handed in my term project (website + paper) last week for my Animal Ethics class (website + paper was 45% of my final grade) – thankfully there’s no final exam for that class so I really just need to focus on my two other finals. I have my Health Psychology final this week and then I have my Human Sexuality final online anywhere from the 11th to the 23rd (thank goodness for online finals!). I’m quite looking forward to being done as it will be the last two finals for my Bachelors! I’m graduating in late May with my B.Sc, which is quite exciting!

Of course, because I’m about to graduate means that I’ve been pulling out my resume and tweaking it and updating it. Just need to wait until after I actually graduate to be like “Yay, my degree is no longer in progress and I’m not longer a B.Sc candidate because I’ve actually got it now!”. Job searching is scary. Sigh. Such is the life of growing up. I’m still waiting to hear back from schools that I’ve applied to for August/September. Getting all my ducks in a row for that, which is fun and fantastic.

I just finished writing the finals for my two upgrade classes (Chemistry 11 and Biology 12) today (wrote them between 10am-12pm!) so I need to wait for my high school transcript to get updated before really starting the application process for that school, but should be soon! I’m quite looking forward to being able to check that off on the list of schools to apply to.

Having scheduled classes twice a week this term has been fantastic. It made it possible for me to volunteer more on a weekly basis (Fridays) and also made it possible for me to go and write the tests and work on the upgrade classes (Mondays and Wednesdays). I’ve really enjoyed Animal Ethics (plus, I got to do a website as part of my term project, how awesome is that?) and I did my term project on the Animal Welfare Issues in the Australian Wool Industry – because I’m a crafter and I like wool products. I’ve also really enjoyed my Human Sexuality class which was distance ed and completely online (including assignments, tests, debates and the final will be online as well!). It’s a different dynamic and I kind of wish I had taken more online classes, but at the same time, it’s all about self-discipline and I probably wouldn’t have been able handle that kind of self-discipline in the earlier years of my undergrad.
Next time that I post, it’ll probably be after my finals for this term. Hope everyone’s been having a good spring so far!

Wait, March?

Michelle — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 03:47:29 +0000

I really did think that I would post more during February, but apparently I didn’t. Hello, March! We’re getting closer to spring (yay!).

Since my last post I have gotten my grad portraits done. It ended up being about 18 shots of me looking incredibly awkward (in my opinion) in a cap and gown holding onto a rather nice looking folder with my school’s name on it in gold. I’m pretty sure the bookstore sells them too, they’re pretty sweet. I’ve gotten the proofs (online) and have been trying to decide which one I’m going to get. I’ll probably only be getting one print, and it’ll be a similar size to the one that my sisters had gotten when they graduated from university. (My ego isn’t that big that I’m going to get one double the size of theirs, haha.)

Reading Week also has come and gone. I spent it studying and working on my upgrade courses (Biology 12 and Chemistry 11) and got a lot more of both classes done. I’m currently getting high 90s for both classes and my grades are based solely on the test scores, which is fine by me. I get worksheets for chemistry and practice problems for biology, but I don’t get marks based on those. I just go in and write as many tests as I’ve prepared for and move onto the next units as I go, which is pretty nice. I’ve gone through over half of each class so far in about a month and half. I’m planning on getting them all done by the end of March, which should be interesting as the teachers in BC are striking for three days (March 5-7) and I can’t go in take tests during that time, and then they get two weeks off (!) for spring break, so no test taking then either! So while they’re busy striking, I’ll be just working to get my notes ready and to just know everything so when they reopen, I can just go in and take all the tests and get it over with.

I need to start working on my term project soon (due at the beginning of April), but we all know how well that will probably go… I have to do a 10-15 page paper on an animal welfare topic of my choice (topic that I’m going to be doing is the justifiable welfare issues with the use of Merino sheep in fibre production) and then I’m doing a web presentation (as opposed to an oral presentation). My school has this blog system where we use WordPress and we have to use it, which I’m fine with because clearly I have experience using WordPress. But we have to sit through a class on learning how to use WordPress (seriously) and I’m not entirely sure if we get to change the themes or add plugins or not (if it’s on school servers, I’m thinking it’s probably a no for the plugins…).

And… yeah. That’s my life and what I did during February. I went to a doll meet in the middle of February and I’m currently on working on restoring two vintage Blythes, which is quite fun and they’re great new additions to my collection (a blonde and a brunette). I’ve been knitting a bunch, but not working on the sock that I started in January (horrible, I know, I’m planning on working on the sock this month though!) and I’ve been doing a lot of doll-sized knits. So some of the knits I did in February:

Saturday’s almost over… =)

Michelle — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 07:57:31 +0000

What’s a girl to do when she’s the only one in the house who doesn’t leave the house? (Because everyone seems to think that ‘psychology final on Monday’ is synonymous with ‘making sure Michelle realizes that she is under involuntary house arrest’. So I didn’t go to the crafts store today, despite a somewhat decent sale on beads, jewellery findings and yarn (argh). I didn’t go to the grocery store and get to pick up more coloured sugar for baking purposes (I have a full container of red but no more of green…). I didn’t change out of my pjs today (I swear, the only good thing about not leaving the house). But oh, I was still the “only one” who was available to cook dinner though (because one sister was out, the other was ‘busily crocheting’ – or rather, attempting to crochet, and my mom was watching television).

Anyways… Today I did more essay prepping (yay!) and then emailed back and forth with my friend who’s taking that class to see what we’re hopeless on. Unfortunately, my psychology prof is an idiot and cannot string together sentences that are easily understandable by university students. It’s one thing to translate part of the topic into everyday English, it’s another to be able to translate the entire topic into everyday English for easy understanding. Oh, I’ve also noticed that people in organic chemistry are still posting on the discussion boards. The final was on December 10th and there’s a thread going on about ‘exam weighting’ and ‘What did you think about the final?’ that each have over 200 posts, and counting. It’s a little odd. Do my fellow sufferers of organic chemistry have nothing better to do than to post and whine about the final exam and what they think would be a fair weight for the final in comparison to the two midterms? Obviously not.

On the other hand, someone posted on the discussion board for my invertebrates biology class that I’m taking next term (the one that I’m really looking forward to! Crustaceans, insects, worms, the whole nine yards!) about how they’re really looking forward to the class. I replied with a very enthusiastic “Me too!”. Have I mentioned lately how much of a dork I am? Then again, I’m the girl who used her organic chem model set to fashion a bracelet for a day or two before. Ugh. Note to self, stop making myself seem like a complete geek online. Not that it can be helped.

I finished a scarf for my mom’s Christmas present… In a colour that she likes, if you noticed some of my tweets tonight. I started one scarf but she noticed it and commented on how she wasn’t a fan of the colours (tear), so I started a new scarf in a more open pattern (so it was finished faster, but it was still nice looking!) and finished that tonight. I’ll finish the other one some other time, it went back into my closet for now. I even added a fringe to it. And now I know what my sister bitches whenever she decides that a fringe would look nice on something. Why? Because they’re a PITA to do, that’s why!

Anyways… Oodles of photos to be taken tomorrow, plus lots of studying and reviewing before my final on Monday (7pm, whoot… I hate evening finals. You have the entire day to go ‘zomg, what does _______ mean?! and hopefully find out what it means.). Hope everyone had a fabulous and stress-free Saturday!

Whoot?

Michelle — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 06:47:21 +0000

My organic chemistry final is over and done with. All I could do after the final was laugh. My friends thought I was losing it (did I ever really have it though?). First thing I said?

So was that as fun for you as it was for me?

Because, honestly, that was the most absurd chemistry final I have ever written. 48 multiple choice questions (all involving actual work) and 9 written problems (3 of them were synthesis problems – the practice final that was supposed to reflect what we had to do had only 1 synthesis question). Needless to say, it wasn’t very fun. I could get the practice exam done in around 2 hours (we get 2.5 hours for the final). The 48 multiple choice questions (with choices A to H for all the problems…) and 3 synthesis questions and 6 other questions… Took me exactly 2.5 hours. And I didn’t exactly get the chance to look over any of my work… Which I was not pleased with. Then again, I finished my organic chemistry final! Now all I need to do is wait for my grade to come in (and they come out a few days before Christmas? Yeah, not cool…).

Anyways, I was reading the news this morning and they’ve been showcasing gift guides for the people. For instance, if you believed everything that the paper wrote, all women want expensive perfume (not true), fluffy robes (true…), pretty lingerie (also true) and strappy heels (not true). All men also want coffee mugs, new headphones and, apparently, car jacks (seriously, that was listed in the article). Now the children? They want things like a toy hamster (I saw a commercial for it, it kinda looks cute – it has a heart shaped button-looking thing for a nose!) that is apparently the ‘It’ toy for the 2009 season (suggested retail price is like ~$10, so I can see why parents would like it), along with the regular assortment of dolls, race cars and assorted fun things.

Moving on from organic chemistry… My next final is on Monday at 8:30am (bright and early…) in cell biology. I’m attending 2 of the review sessions (one tomorrow, one on Saturday provided that the weather is decent where I live so I can get there…). I’m not worried about this exam, only because I’ve been doing weekly tests for the class throughout the term, so it shouldn’t be too bad as the tests were supposed to reflect past final exam questions. Well, key word is supposed to. And I know how that turned out for o-chem…

Anyhoo… I hope everyone had a lovely Thursday… And cheers to hopefully passing organic chemistry…

TMIs ftw (fun with abbrevations)

Michelle — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 18:28:24 +0000

TMI about… bodily fluids
So my explainable and oh-so-nutty random bleeding that sent me into a total panic yesterday was the result of… peanuts. Specifically, a teeny tiny sliver of peanut from my peanut butter that I used. And it didn’t even hurt, it just bled like crazy until I was half-convinced that I was going to feel the ill effects of blood loss very soon. Thankfully, it stopped. But honestly, while spitting out blood (because there was just so damn much of it that I kinda couldn’t swallow fast enough unless I was constantly swallowing), all I could think of was that “hmm, vomiting blood is a sign of end-stage liver failure…” then I double check my skin colour/eye colour to make sure that I’m not jaundiced. Not that I was vomiting up blood, it was just something that came to my head. Which did not help with my panic-mode that I was in.

Non-denominational winter holiday plans include…
Since my family is not having a tree this year… I plan on ‘adopting’ other people’s Christmas trees via holiday-time visits and on Flickr (so if you’re on Flickr, please post up lots of photos of your tree this year – so I can pretend that it’s mine). Also plan on doing a lot of baking (shortbread and sugar cookies, I’m eying you!) as well as crafting (finishing up my nearly endless Pi stole) and reading (for pleasure, not for educational purposes). One of my friends from school, R, was talking to me on the phone last night and asked what I was doing (knitting) and then she asked how many things I had finished crafting the last little while (6 Blythe-sized knits and crochets, 5 Christmas cards, 3 pairs of earrings, 2 necklaces and a partridge in a pear tree – too bad I didn’t do 4 of something lately!). And then she proceeded to inform me that I obviously need to get laid and stop doing so much crafting. Nice to know when it gets recognized…? On the bright side, my dolls are getting a shabby-fabulous winter wardrobe (complete with more hats, sweaters and 1 knitted coat – that I will definitely be doing another one, in a thinner yarn/smaller needles/etc. – so it doesn’t look so awkward). On the downside… R was definitely right, hah. So yes, my non-denominational winter holiday plans include: adopting everyone else’s Christmas tree, admiring the lights that people put up (read: people meaning other people meaning not my family, because people, meaning my family, suck that way), baking, reading, crafting and getting to see people and spend time with them while I have a (much needed) break from school. Oh, and hopefully not having to endure the wonderful family tradition of screaming/yelling/loud arguments that occurs sometime between waking up in the morning and opening presents.

And another thing…
Studying is going well. I have my first final tonight (7pm) for my non-vascular plant biology class (not called botany, because that’s a Masters/graduate school thing). My favourite word from this class for the entire term? Spitzenkörper. It’s German (if my notes are correct) and it’s the “vesicle supply centre for hyphal tip growth” in the sub-phylum Pezizomycotina (molds!) in the Kingdom Fungi. See, I learn useful things in school… Right? Like, for instance, I can identify the difference between liverworts and mosses. And, erm, I know how to draw organic chemistry mechanisms. And how infants develop. And how cells grow. All very useful things. Sort of. My reference sheet (which I am allowed… not sure why everyone keeps on a calling it a ‘cheat sheet’. Cheating implies that it’s prohibited!) is look rather full now… I used size 8 font for it (we were allowed to type it up) and now I’m just going to spend the day adding in diagrams and pictures. Shall be fun, no? I almost want to take photos of it (I won’t get to keep it).

Study, study, study, blood?

Michelle — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 19:33:21 +0000

I’ve been at school (in the student study centre) for the last couple of hours (since 8:30am). Since I’ve arrived, I have:

Found an awesome study spot (nice big half-round table, comfy chair, near an electrical outlet)
Spread out all my stuff – because I’m selfish and I refuse to share my nice big half-round table – I have my laptop (obviously), chemistry notes, chemistry problems, biology notebook, coloured Staedtler fine liners (red, orange and lime green catches my attention better than blue ball-point pen), pencil case, cell phone and mp3 player all over my table
Realized how many organic chemistry problems I had to do (45 problems) – from 8:30-10:30am I completed 43 of them (the other 2, I can’t visualize how they would be done – guess who’s going in to talk to her chemistry prof when his office hours are available?)
Eventually ended up sharing my nice big half-round table (friend from chem class showed up, she grabbed another nice big half-round table to make one big circle – I love tables on wheels)
Made some organic chem notes, worked on my reference sheet for my biology final (tomorrow night, bleh)

So far things have been fairly productive. Getting my organic chem problems done (good thing too, they’re due tomorrow at 11:59pm), getting some studying going. After completing my online review assignment, I realized that I haven’t forgotten as much organic chem as I thought that I had – yay!

About to eat lunch, due to the fact that my friend decided to do a lunch run (I watch her uber-expensive computer and I don’t need to get up to get lunch for myself – good deal!). Which is good, when I’m attempting to do my practice problems in hopes that I’m going to retain this information for my final. And my other friend who just arrived watched my computer (and the first person’s computer) while I just ran to the washroom to spit out blood.

Hello, random bleeding. This is probably TMI – but what on earth is the matter with me? I can’t see any cuts or anything (and I certainly didn’t bite my tongue or the inside of my cheek). Instead, I just spat out a few mouthfuls of blood-saliva. Bleh. I would make a shitty vampire. No idea why it started, no idea why it stopped – but I’m very glad that it did. I got a little frightened with it, since it looks like a lot of blood and it tastes like blood, yum? No clue why it started, but yeah… Whoot, random bleeding.

Would you give a child cough drops for Christmas?

Michelle — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 00:27:18 +0000

So, I found my sister’s Christmas gift (16 squares/side non-Rubik’s Cube Rubik’s Cube)… Granted, because of when she let me know what she wanted, and when I ordered (the day that she told me what she wanted for Christmas), it is likely to not arrive before the 25th. Which means that on Christmas, she’ll be opening a lovely wrapped box that just has an image of what she’s getting. And probably some crumbled newspapers.

Not to worry, it’s not the first time that someone in my family has received a box with just the picture of the gift-to-come in it. For instance, one year I opened a present from my parents and it just had the cut out advertisement of the mp3 player that I wanted (Creative Zen Vision: M, in white!) because I wasn’t getting it until Boxing Day (… it was on sale plus there was an extra $50 mail-in rebate… I don’t blame my parents for wanting to wait out on that one!). We were in and out of the store in 15 minutes, after we got in.

Today has been spent… studying, and eating (I baked shortbread, yum!), and more studying and more going ‘why the %$#* is my school’s server being as slow as a snail today?!’. I printed off practice finals, I’m working away on my last few organic chem assignments and wrapping up work on my ‘reference sheet’ for my plant biology final (Tuesday 7pm! Cripes, that’s soon!). I’ve also realized how badly I’m studying while at home, good thing I plan on being at school tomorrow (probably about 8am-3pm) and then most of the day on Tuesday (from 8am until I’m done my plant biology final). Then Tuesday, I’ll be getting home and crashing (since I’ll probably get home at ~11pm). Then Wednesday will be spent on campus, studying/learning what I never knew about organic chemistry. Same with most of Thursday (8am until I’m done my organic chem final, which should be at or around 6pm). It’s going to be a fun few days!

Curiosity is annoying, but what is the worst gift that you have ever received for Christmas or any other holiday (birthdays included!). Here are some of the ones that I remember getting:

A chocolate Christmas advent calendar… for Christmas (opened on Christmas) – this was from one of my parents’ friends
A small tin of lemon cough drops for Christmas (another gem from one of my parents’ friends)
A workbook for grade 5-level math. I still have this one, actually, somewhere in my room. It’s probably in the box with all my Chinese school textbooks… I got it for Christmas, from yet another parents’ friend, when I was in grade 7.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Sunday… And to everyone who has finals coming up, best of luck.

Musings for Saturday – studying & gift searching

Michelle — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 23:17:09 +0000

Sighs. First day post-end-of-lectures. I’ve been up for a few hours already (definitely did not wake up at 5am like I’ve been regularly doing since the beginning of September!) and have eaten breakfast, lunch, studied biology and chemistry and fought with my printer to spit out the practice chemistry finals. Am I fully impressed with my productivity? Not so fucking much. But I blame it on my printer, which is being super temperamental these days.

Also, cleaned up some of the old hostees stuff on my server – I found one of my hostees hadn’t updated since April, so her stuff automatically got deleted. As well as a few others that asked to be hosted, had everything set up for them, and then they never did anything with it. Yay for cleaning up – only freed up like 20mb, haha. But it’s not like I’m hurting for space right now.

Anyways… New theme, obviously. A little belated for the start of December, but since it’s still the first week of December, I figured that it still counted well enough for the start of December. Lyrics are from the song Sugar Free by Hedley, go take a listen (probably somewhere on Youtube, if you want to find it). And actively working on a few things right now: some things for chelle-chelle.com, some other things for amesrpg.com, studying (of course), Christmas gifts for the grouchy ungrateful souls that I live with, musings about baking, more studying (and hoping to pass organic chemistry…). So the next few weeks are going to be awesome and just so much damn fun…

That being said, have totally been working on my ‘reference sheet’ for my first biology exam. We get 1 piece of paper, single-sided and we get to write whatever we want. So you best believe that mine’s typed and has all what I consider to be ‘important’ information. Not sure how big I should make the font-size though. My original reference sheets for the 2 midterms were at size 11, so it’ll probably be smaller than that, and a bit more packed and with a lot more colours! Heart colours.

And… lastly for today, does anyone know where I can get something that looks like a Rubik’s Cube that has more than 9 (3×3) squares per side? It’s the only thing that my sister D wants for Christmas – she saw one down in LA that had 16 (4×4) squares per side, but she didn’t get it (and is now regretting it…). If you could help me out, that’d be awesome. I found one online that has 49 squares per side, but it was $71 with a 6 week shipping period so… Help?

Edit: Found one with 16 squares per side at dealextreme.com for $5.99USD + free shipping. Hello, sister’s Christmas present!

Hope everyone has a wonderful Saturday.

A treeless house

Michelle — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 01:25:56 +0000

Last day of lectures today. Just four more finals between me and my hopefully blissful winter holidays. I am just so looking forward to having a break from classes. School, work, school, work, school, work, school, work, school. More, more, more school. I go through this lovely cycle of school and work. And right now I’m in school and I just really want a break. Just a break.

However, it’s been a little bit over 3 months of school and I haven’t skipped a lecture (as far as my memory goes) and I’ve gone to all my labs for biology. I have been late occasionally (only to my 8am classes though) and have left a class early (for a midterm in a subsequent class), but that’s it. No late assignments, no missed online quizzes, no angry posts on online discussion boards (like this infamous girl who posts on the organic chemistry discussion board to argue with profs over how she deserves a single mark on a quiz worth, essentially, nothing). Overall, it’s been a pretty good term in terms of classes.

There were carolers at school today, I’m assuming that they were students and they were singing Deck the Halls in a round, it was actually quite nice. I haven’t been feeling well lately (started yesterday), drank an absurd amount of soup (cream of mushroom, vegetable with those alphabet pieces, and more vegetable soup) over the last two days and… hello, no longer sniffling! I got a lot of sleep… Not in my lectures though, hah, but between classes and on the bus and whatnot. I didn’t go to volunteering today (which I was disappointed about, but it’s better than going in when I know I haven’t been feeling well).

So many things to do. I’m planning on pretty much living in my organic chemistry prof’s office during his open office hours next week. Honestly. Organic chemistry is likely to kick my butt next Thursday afternoon, so I’m going to need all the help that I can get, which includes harassing my prof for help. Because I’m terribly hopeless at times. Especially with organic chemistry.

Anyways… My family’s decided that we’re not having a Christmas tree this year. Not even a mini one. Not the big 7-feet tall fake one in the basement. It’s really big and I can’t get it up the stairs on my own and no one else wants to put the tree up this year. I’m rather… bummed out by it. I wanted a tree this year. I wanted the crappy handmade decorations that my sisters and I made when we were younger decorating a fake plastic tree. I wanted the garlands and all the shiny glass ornaments and the lights that twinkle and the ones that don’t. It seems weird to think that there’s not going to be any tree in the living room this year. Maybe I could dig out the lights and string them around my room or something… somehow. Not sure how I would manage that though.

Do you put up a tree in December? A real or artificial tree? Do you put up handmade decorations along with the store-bought ones? What kind of lights do you put up?

Me, myself and I.

Michelle — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 05:41:46 +0000

I wasn’t late to chemistry this morning (yay). I actually got there a whole three minutes before my prof started talking – I really need to stop waking up and checking the time and seeing that my regular bus had just been missed. Makes me really want to just stay in bed for the rest of the day.

I handed in my biology project (last one for the term) before class, fed the mice some more (they’re so damn adorable).

I got my algae midterm remarked – I got 91% (A+) instead of 86% (A) (very pleased with that!). (I used to be incredibly competitive about grades in high school – once I got to university? So not competitive anymore. Depending on the class, I’m quite content with a pass or a low grade, like for organic chemistry. For other classes, generally biology, English and psychology, I do expect to get B’s or so.)

I didn’t completely fall asleep during psychology. My prof spend ~30 minutes on the same slide that he went over on Wednesday – the slide did not require that much explanation.

I hung out at volunteering for 2 hours – had fun despite having to tell one person that no, they could not have another beer because they were cut off from the alcohol for the day (yeah, that’s always a blast). Left volunteering a little early since I was the last volunteer to go and L didn’t need me to stay until 4:30 (so I caught an earlier bus and got home to help with making dinner).

I watched another episode of Pushing Daisies (I bought season 1 of the show for my sister’s birthday, she bought season 2 for herself) – the season premiere for season 2. Excellent show, very sad that it was taken off the air though, but at least it’s on DVD and I can watch it at my own leisure.

Hope everyone had a lovely Friday and an even better Saturday.