Shane-- come back, Shane!!

Go Team Kristy

2006-03-10T10:15:00.000-08:00

So yesterday I received an IM from my roommate, Kristy:

"hooray team kristy... just got the [enter dirty roommate's name here] to take out the trash!"

Not only that, but I had begun an experiment in which I only cleaned my side of the vanity (for the guys: the counter around the sink) and left hers all toothpaste-y and dusty (I mean, why should I have to clean up her hair and her spit?). It took her 3 weeks, but she finally cleaned her side! That doesn't mean the actual bathroom is any cleaner, but at least it's a start. Now I know that she at least notices that things are dirty... well... compared to clean things.

Ah, Spring Break is soooooooo close...

Anyway, I'll be going to Boston for the first half of Spring Break to watch John Clark, one of the better A Cappella Recording Engineers out there, mix Nothin' but Treble's CD. I'll also be visiting Jason's sister while I'm out there. Fun fun.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!

2006-03-02T15:18:00.000-08:00

I want to move away. Far far away.

I don't understand some people, and when I don't understand someone, I have a hard time getting along with them. I'm also quite nonconfrontational, and so I let all of these little frustrations and annoyances build up until I can't stand it anymore. I like my apartment to be clean, I like to have reasonable roommates who appreciate music and enjoy what I do. I like to sleep at night and not be woken up by showers and hair dryers at 1am. I like for my toothbrush to not be wet from someone else's spit. I like for there to not be hair on my toilet. I like to cook something and have clean silverware and dishes to use. I like for there to not be food caked on the counter and on the front of the refrigerator. I like for eggs and milk not to be left on the counter for an entire day. I like for quiet hours to be QUIET and courtesy hours to be a COURTESY. I like for people to not talk behind my back, or in this case, in front of my face on the phone, in another language.

Amy, Oh Amy, why did you have to be smart and get a great co-op job in Tennessee and move away!!! I'm going insane! I really don't think I'll be spending much time at Georgia Tech after this CD is over. I will eat and sleep here and that will be pretty much a "when I have to" situation. Ugh, please let God's patience reign in me. Thank goodness I know who my roommates are for next semester... there is hope!

Appeasement

2006-02-22T11:57:00.000-08:00

So my sister says I have to post something, and we all know that I do what my sister tells me too.

Actually, it's a rare moment when I'm actually sitting at a computer with nothing to do. It just so happens that the only reason I have time to post right now is that I am waiting for some guy's 65 page power point presentation to print in the lab before my stuff will print.

On the subject of appeasement, I have a new roommate. She's nice I guess, but it's really hard to transition from one pretty great roommate and a great system where the kitchen and bathroom were always clean to now feeling like I'm cleaning up after someone all the time. I shouldn't be doing this... I don't have kids yet. It's so dirty that on of my OCD roommates, Kristy, won't use our kitchen any more. It's too dirty for her. There's something wrong with that.

For a while, I "appeased" and cleaned the kitchen every few days, but I have a huge deadline coming up and really don't have time to do that. So, we'll see if anyone cleans before March 5... by the way, I'd be happy to come to dinner any time between now and then ;-). It's really hard to cook when there's food all over the counter and no clean dishes.

However, we did have a breakthrough today. I got over my nonconfontationalism (a word?) and asked her to make some space in the refrigerator so I could actually put my food somewhere when I go to the grocery store. She did it right away, so that was good. Now if I had time to go to the store, we'd be all set.

As it is, I must go to class now and then work on a Formal lab report. Seriously, the only reason I don't post is because I have no time. You can rag on me in a couple of weeks when my life actually gets back to normal.

Yay for good concerts!

2005-12-04T19:21:00.000-08:00

So I'm sitting here in the library making a DVD of Saturday night's A Cappella Concert- and you will not believe how long this is taking. Now, keep in mind that this is the first time I've used iMovie and iDVD and I had to watch tutorial videos to learn how to do what I wanted. Let me lay down a timeline for you:

3:00 pm - arrive at library, wait for a computer in Multimedia Studio
3:20ish pm - finally procure a computer, firewire cable, and all other necessary items to continue my project
5:30 pm - finally finish importing all the video JUST FROM ONE NIGHT of the concert
5:45 pm - hit a problem saving onto my external hard drive- can't figure it out
6:30 pm - decide to try iDVD and see where that route takes me. Discover the awesomeness that is making your own DVD and customizing menus
7:30 pm - finally finish playing around with cool software and trying to burn to a DVD
7:45 pm - ask for help
8:00 pm - more competent guy comes along to help
9:00 pm - finally figure out how to get more space on the hard drive to save as a disk image, start the encoding process
10:26 pm - (current) still in the encoding process

Here is my projected timeline:

10:50 pm - finish encoding, start to burn to DVD
11:30 pm - finish burning DVD, go home, eat dinner, try to finish some homework, come back again tomorrow!

Tomorrow should not take as long for numerous reasons:
1) It was a shorter concert to begin with
2) I've used the software before and should work faster
3) I know the stupidity of my actions that kept me from having enough disk space to start the encoding as soon as I was done. Man, I hate wasted time.

Meanwhile, here are some cool pictures from the concert:

Yeah, freshman! Rock out!

Our boys singing a jazzy song... so cute!

Well now that that's finally over, I can relax and finish out the semester!

Thanksgiving ¿Haiku?

2005-11-23T18:29:00.000-08:00

And now it's time for a special Thanksgiving Haiku by Staci and Shane...

Yum, juicy turkey

cranberry sauce and stuffing

pilgrims come to play!

And now, loosely translated:

¡Yum! Pavo jugo-

so, arándanos y pan.

¡Vengan a comer!

Yum, saftiger Truthahn

Moosbeeren und Anfüllen

Pilgrims kommen zu spielen

Ho bisogno di mangiare!

Et moi aussi!

Christmas list...?

2005-11-21T12:19:00.000-08:00

My mother has requested that I formulate a wish list for Christmas. The problem is... at this point, I don't really have a clue what I would ask for. I figured I'd list what I need: printer paper... groceries... textbooks... and.. well, that's all I could think of. Those don't make for very good Christmas gifts.

So then I took to listing what I "want": a laptop... money... while those make for great gifts, I feel like I'm at the point where I should earn those things myself. Most everything else someone my age would ask for I've either already got or I don't need until I graduate from college. So, I've been forced to dig around for what I would consider "proper", yet pointless gifts:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/ladies/5b3a/

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/gear/61b7/

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/gear/3226/

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/blankets/574a/

Don't worry... I'll get a real Christmas list together... but for now, this will have to do.

So cute!

2005-11-09T19:45:00.000-08:00

Ok, since no one else has posted Micah pictures recently, I'll be the one to do it. Isn't he just so cool?

Boo yah!

2005-10-26T13:14:00.000-07:00

Is it just me, or does a 39 average on a test seem to indicate one of two things:

1) The test is entirely too difficult, or

2) The professor did not prepare the students at all for the exam.

Let's just say that I scored above average, which was not in the least a score that indicates I understand half of what's going on. But as long as I know more than 60% of the class, I'm good to go, right?

There's just something wrong with that.

A stamp in the passport...

2005-10-05T12:27:00.000-07:00

I just recently bought my plane tickets to visit my brother, his wife, and my new nephew in South Korea. On top of this being my first trip out of the country, it will also be my first plane flight > 2 hrs. On top of that, on the way back I have a 12-hour connection in Honolulu, Hawaii. How cool? In the middle of winter I will be laying on the beach between flights... it doesn't get any better.

And to make it even more wonderful, I will be done with my stinkin' ECE 3040 class that is killing me right now. There is a light at the end of the tunnel...

I promise not to complain forever about that class, just 'til the end of this semester. December will be long awaited.

I couldn't resist...

2005-09-28T19:01:00.000-07:00

I came upon this picture today.

Now you may be thinking, what on earth are those crazy college kids doing? Let's take a closer look, shall we?

That's right. I bet you didn't know this sign is on Bay Street in Savannah, GA. We found it one year at All-College and just could not resist the temptation- what a great photo opportunity.

Shane-- come back Shane!!

2005-09-28T17:00:00.000-07:00

Believe it or not, this is THE reason I got an A in 8th grade Language Arts:

Hopefully that's not completely true. However, my teacher did tell me at orientation that she liked me already simply because of my name. We read the book, of course, and watched the movie. The book was much better, but the movie was good.

However, I would like to clarify that I have nothing in common with a Western male character from the early 1900s.

Now, if only that had worked in college...

Picture Updates...

2005-09-23T12:37:00.000-07:00

So if you haven't heard, my nephew was born last week- Micah Patrick Mooney to Britt and Becca in Korea. For pictures, visit Britt's blog. Don't forget that there are also plenty of pictures of Micah's cousins at ShowMetheMooneys.com, too!

Straying towards insanity...

2005-09-19T14:24:00.000-07:00

The following is the ranting of a student who is seriously contemplating life and her decision to continue her rigorous coursework at an institute where a good GPA is a lofty goal...

To preface, in choosing to come to Georgia Tech I was severely mocked by the UGA fans in my community... which I'm sure was partly out of envy (which is beginning to look like wishful thinking on my part). I was consistently told that I was being sent to an "institution"... and I am beginning to see that this institution does not in the least try to offset, but rather specializes in the onset of, insanity.

And now, a few quotes from my ECE 3040 professor:

"Everybody's wired in a different way, so I do [X] to try and cater to different learning styles, ya?"

- Just so you know, his teaching style could not be any further to the opposite extreme from my learning style.

"This is a 4 hour credit, [4.5 hour/wk class] and the recommendation is that for every hour spent in class you should spend 3 outside of class. That means it's reasonable for me to expect you to spend 13.5 hours outside of classtime per week to prepare, ya?"

- The classtime we do have is filled with meaningless figures and derivations, all of which are provided in the book. I've tried two methods: 1) trudging through lecture without understanding a word and then reading the book afterwards... and 2) reading the book ahead of time hoping that I would understand enough terminology to follow the lecture. Option #1 only led to sleeping through class... which seems like a much better use of my time. Option #2 led only to me feeling like lecture was a waste of time because he simply repeated the textbook in an impossible-to-understand language and does not supplement the text with any examples or calculations whatsoever.

"This test was fair, ya?"

-This said after providing only half of the solutions to the test of which I believe I received at best 50% credit and assigning homework full of the problem on the test that was 25% of the grade that he did not give a solution too... my question is how can I correct what I'm doing wrong and practice more of that problem when I have no idea what I did wrong in the first place?

Don't get me wrong, so far I have greatly enjoyed my education- and I still do in EVERY OTHER CLASS... It's quite discouraging when you put forth so much time and effort and really feel as though you understand something... and then bam! Surprise! This exam is full of calculations that you've never seen worked correctly... and never really had explained to you aside from a "general behavior graph" which you desperately memorized in hopes that it would count for something.

Three of my friends have already dropped the class, and two of my friends (both of which are some of the people I believe perform better than me in EE) are strongly considering dropping the class. But let's weigh the consequences...

Let's say I drop this class. I may do myself a favor and increase the chances of maintaining a decent GPA, but I will lose eligibility for the honors that a good GPA gets you for this semester. On the other hand, what's the benefit of receiving faculty honors 3 semesters versus 2 semesters anyway? I've already proven worthy of honor to the faculty... do I really need any more? At the same time... dropping this class would mean a difficult and very time consuming last 3 semesters in school (assuming I can actually get out in 8 semesters... which, let's face it, I WANT OUT) - possibly even moreso than this semester.

So what's it gonna be? Am I willing to let my GPA take a hit and possibly go insane trying to teach myself in order to keep the hope of graduating after 4 years? I do believe that I paid for an education... and granted, some of the responsibility of learning does fall on me. But I do not believe that I signed up for an independent study class- and at this point that's what it is.

As it stands, drop day is not for another month... so we'll see how it goes...

Just a warning...

2005-08-23T10:45:00.000-07:00

I don't really keep up with this blog quite yet. I need a more eventful schedule to have something to write about...

But for now, how about some pictures and a quick synopsis of my summer...?

I thought it was ironic that the state motto is "drive friendly". Austin, TX has some of the worst drivers I've ever seen- yes, folks, even worse than Atlanta sometimes.

This was my commute to work (courtesy of google earth)- less than 1 mile (most days at least). I worked in building 5 on the Round Rock campus... pretty fun. I met Michael Dell!

This is Town Lake, or Lake Austin (really the Colorado River). The bridge is where the bats live. They fly out at sunset... we were on a dinner cruise.

The lonestar- it should be self-explanatory. But really, this was at the capitol building in downtown Austin.

And last, but certainly not least... the view from the beloved Oasis, a restaurant that was struck by lightning and burned down halfway thru the summer. But it was back up and running before I left... hence the picture.

Oh, the life...

2005-06-22T13:51:00.000-07:00

Yeah, so I just need a place to vent.

I feel like this summer is going so slowly, but I'm not getting anything accomplished. My project at work is losing momentum, especially since we can't seem to get the timeline going the way it should. Meanwhile I'm starting to realize just how much work I have ahead of me this fall for a cappella. Oh yeah, and school takes work, too. Sheesh.

As much as I love a cappella, I don't want it to take over my life. At the same time, I want this CD to be the best ever. Which brings me to another topic...

We need some logo ideas as well as CD title and art concept ideas. Got any good ones? Send me a note if you do. We're trying to get our logo done by the first couple weeks of fall semester. I'd like to decide on our CD title by the end of October, if not before. I have a couple ideas... but I know they're not the only good ones... I'd like to use all my resources. And who knows... maybe we'll start a list of titles to use later on, cause I hope that this CD stuff continues well after I'm graduated.

Speaking of graduation- I can't wait to. At the same time, I know I shouldn't be overzealous. Now, I know that this could be a sign that I'm a little too focused on the future and not enough on today. But it's so hard to know what you want, know it's going to happen, and then just wait. Where is the line between healthy restraint and torture? Aagh.

Of course, I won't be just waiting. I will be producing a CD, taking 4 semesters worth of class, possibly working another summer, maybe being a TA for a class, singing for Crusade, arranging for a cappella, being the president of a club, and maybe even starting another a cappella group. Goodness, gracious.

Well, you know what? God is Gracious- and I'm gonna need it. So thank Him that He is!

I feel better.

2005-06-04T15:41:00.000-07:00

The Campanile at Georgia Tech.

Everything is Bigger in Texas!

2005-06-04T15:30:00.000-07:00

I moved out here to Austin, TX, about a month ago. Don't worry, I'll be back in Atlanta in August!

Gina came into town for a friend's wedding in San Antonio but flew in and out of Austin. Fortunately, she's spending a few days with me before she flies back to ATL.

We visited the State Capitol today. It is literally the largest State Capitol building in the US- quite fitting for TX. It's even taller than the US Capitol building. The lone star is everywhere, and even the door knobs and door hinges say Texas on them.

As it is, I'll be coming back to ATL next weekend for a friend's wedding and to see Britt and Becca who will be in the states for a while. Exciting! And I'll be trying to post some pictures to the family web site soon. Til then, Don't Mess with Texas!