Well, it's time for another update on the blog I think, since I haven't actually finished writing anything here that I've started in a while. I have made a few attempts at putting something on here, but whenever I did I either went off on so many tangents that the entry got immensely huge or I just lost my train of thought and it went to shit that way. I suppose it's a good thing that my mind isn't quite as hectic the past few days, but then my head's never exactly clear in the first place...
The past few weeks have been interesting, and I think that in a way there's a learning experience to be had here. I did, albeit briefly, get back what I wanted all summer and then promptly went and stuffed it up in a very similar manner to the first time. I do sometimes wonder whether or not I did something immeasurably wrong in a past life, or whether there's some force at work that is making things go wrong recently. I suppose it's a bit of a relief that things have settled down a bit now, and that they're picking up a little bit. I still know ultimately what I want, on a personal level, but I really don't think I'm likely to get a third chance at it. That sucks.
On the plus side, third year is going reasonably well so far. We've already had one piece of assessed homework, and it was a little bit tricky at first but after a little bit of thinking and consulting the notes it fell into place and all was well. Another piece of homework was given out this week just gone, and it looks lovely. Nothing makes me happier than having to use the Schrödinger Equation in its radial form with spherical polar co-ordinates. Still, it's something I have to learn and I reckon it can't be that hard if I put enough effort into learning the damn thing. Bit like elementary quantum mechanics - I wasn't too fond of that, coupled with being ill and missing a few lectures, but on the back of some very basic notes and some help from a friend I managed to pass what is quite possibly the most challenging module in the second year of a physics degree here. So, all things considered, if I put the work in I hope I'll be able to do at least that well in my third year and finally leave here with a reasonable degree. Hello "real world"!
Other than that, there hasn't been much happening. I've done a fair bit of cleaning around the house, and spent a lot of time sorting out junk in my room. I bought some new textbooks from Blackwells, one mathematics and one quantum mechanics, so that I can try and improve my understanding of these subjects - mostly 'cause my maths needs work and without quantum there's no way I'll understand any physics at this level.
On that note, I bid you adieu.
Showing posts with label sheffield. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sheffield. Show all posts
Sunday, 11 October 2009
Tuesday, 22 September 2009
Rock On Third Year!
Well it's been a while since I rambled anything on here, so I guess I should probably put down what's been going on. The past two weeks I've been quite busy keeping the new seniors at TSC quite inebriated and fulfilling my role as social secretary in addition to being the chair of the committee. I think I organised about 5 or 6 socials, in addition to a few others that were organised by the new seniors themselves. Pretty good that they all seem to get along with each other, should make working with them next year much easier.
On top of this, I got my resit results as well. Had to take 3, all exams that I didn't put that much effort into initially, so I finally decided to put some effort in and if it doesn't pay off then at least this time I did try. Well, it paid off. Passed all 3, but I don't know whether or not it was with flying colours 'cause everything is capped at just a bare pass. Whilst it's something of a relief to know that I do have a good enough grasp of everything to pass modules in such thrilling topics as quantum mechanics, it's somewhat irritating that the motivation to work has only really properly hit me now. That said, I think that if I can do well in my third year (which for me is the last year of my degree programme) I should be able to leave university with a 2.1 which is a pretty good degree. Should get me where I want to be at any rate.
I've been thinking, as well, that perhaps since one of the careers I'm considering perhaps going for is something research based (which I should be able to do with a 2.1) is having a crack at improving upon some of the notes from some of the lecture courses. I've found some notes for most of the modules offered at Sheffield, and whilst a lot of them are really pretty damn good there's quite a few that really suck. Couple this with lecturers that aren't all that brilliant and you've got a handful of students that might struggle. It'd also be quite good revision, since I'd be going over old material that's still relevant to the third year. Quite looking forward to some of the modules, as well.
The only other thing to report is that my room is considerably tidier than it has been. I can see my floor again, and all that remains now really is to vacuum it after I've got hold of some carpet cleaner stuff.
Catch ya later!
On top of this, I got my resit results as well. Had to take 3, all exams that I didn't put that much effort into initially, so I finally decided to put some effort in and if it doesn't pay off then at least this time I did try. Well, it paid off. Passed all 3, but I don't know whether or not it was with flying colours 'cause everything is capped at just a bare pass. Whilst it's something of a relief to know that I do have a good enough grasp of everything to pass modules in such thrilling topics as quantum mechanics, it's somewhat irritating that the motivation to work has only really properly hit me now. That said, I think that if I can do well in my third year (which for me is the last year of my degree programme) I should be able to leave university with a 2.1 which is a pretty good degree. Should get me where I want to be at any rate.
I've been thinking, as well, that perhaps since one of the careers I'm considering perhaps going for is something research based (which I should be able to do with a 2.1) is having a crack at improving upon some of the notes from some of the lecture courses. I've found some notes for most of the modules offered at Sheffield, and whilst a lot of them are really pretty damn good there's quite a few that really suck. Couple this with lecturers that aren't all that brilliant and you've got a handful of students that might struggle. It'd also be quite good revision, since I'd be going over old material that's still relevant to the third year. Quite looking forward to some of the modules, as well.
The only other thing to report is that my room is considerably tidier than it has been. I can see my floor again, and all that remains now really is to vacuum it after I've got hold of some carpet cleaner stuff.
Catch ya later!
Friday, 17 July 2009
Such Lovely Weather
Well, for any of you not in the immediate Sheffield area, the weather the past few days has been pretty abysmal. Rain, rain, rain; it's all we've had. Though, despite all the complaining that the good ol' British public do about the rain, I quite like it. More specifically, I like being out in it when it's warm. I'm not quite sure what it is about it, but there's something about walking around in the pouring rain that makes me feel better. I dunno if, perhaps, it's something I could express in a slightly abstract way - say, for instance, that the rain kinda washes my problems away, if only temporarily. But, as I did a little while back when it was gloriously warm and it rained, I took some time to wander around aimlessly in the rain and for that time I didn't really care about much.
That said, the weather does somewhat reflect my mood at the moment. I think, currently, I'm not feeling that down about much but I'm not exactly the most cheery person going. There's a few things still bugging me, that are making me feel a bit sad, but they aren't things I'm going to go into here and they're ones I'll have to try and sort out myself. I have, however, made a few realisations about myself though. For instance, I rediscovered the joy of 2-tone ska thanks to Last.fm suggesting that people who like Madness might also like Bad Manners and The Specials. I think that's kinda always been one of my favourite sorts of music, though I lost sight of that a bit by trying to fit in with the metal crowd. Don't get me wrong, I still like metal, but I just reminded myself that I also really like ska. Also quite fond of ska-influenced bands, like Less Than Jake or Rancid. Awesome.
As hesitant as I am to say it, I think I might be coming to terms somewhat with a few of the things that have been haunting me of late. Sure, the skeleton's haven't been completely removed from the proverbial closet and given a proper burial yet, but I think we've got at least to the point of opening the door. Might be a while before I notice any marked improvement, but it's something to work for. Something I hope I can achieve, really. Going back to music, I've noticed that I have actually since downloading iTunes been living up to my statement of "eclectic" musical taste. It's gotten to the point where I'm acquiring larger amounts of tunes that most people wouldn't have associated with me at all, but it comes back somewhat to the fact that at heart I'll listen to anything I think is worth listening to. That still doesn't include jazz, I'm afraid. I definitely think that, at some point, I put a bit too much emphasis on liking what others liked and not running with my own opinion. Hopefully that's something I can reverse.
Sitting here now, and thinking with a somewhat upbeat dance backing track, I'm beginning to see what I never thought I'd see. Myself, at least partially. I'm slowly but surely making an effort to shake off the shadow of all that's bothered me, and try and concentrate more on what makes me happy rather than what I think others *should* like. With hindsight, there's a few things that I would actually change about my life if I could, but alas such an event is never going to happen so I don't see any point in harbouring regrets over things. I think, from here on in, I should make more effort to ignore the well established voices in my head and instead listen to the voices of the people I'm friends with - the ones who, so far as I can tell, are actually speaking the truth.
That said, the weather does somewhat reflect my mood at the moment. I think, currently, I'm not feeling that down about much but I'm not exactly the most cheery person going. There's a few things still bugging me, that are making me feel a bit sad, but they aren't things I'm going to go into here and they're ones I'll have to try and sort out myself. I have, however, made a few realisations about myself though. For instance, I rediscovered the joy of 2-tone ska thanks to Last.fm suggesting that people who like Madness might also like Bad Manners and The Specials. I think that's kinda always been one of my favourite sorts of music, though I lost sight of that a bit by trying to fit in with the metal crowd. Don't get me wrong, I still like metal, but I just reminded myself that I also really like ska. Also quite fond of ska-influenced bands, like Less Than Jake or Rancid. Awesome.
As hesitant as I am to say it, I think I might be coming to terms somewhat with a few of the things that have been haunting me of late. Sure, the skeleton's haven't been completely removed from the proverbial closet and given a proper burial yet, but I think we've got at least to the point of opening the door. Might be a while before I notice any marked improvement, but it's something to work for. Something I hope I can achieve, really. Going back to music, I've noticed that I have actually since downloading iTunes been living up to my statement of "eclectic" musical taste. It's gotten to the point where I'm acquiring larger amounts of tunes that most people wouldn't have associated with me at all, but it comes back somewhat to the fact that at heart I'll listen to anything I think is worth listening to. That still doesn't include jazz, I'm afraid. I definitely think that, at some point, I put a bit too much emphasis on liking what others liked and not running with my own opinion. Hopefully that's something I can reverse.
Sitting here now, and thinking with a somewhat upbeat dance backing track, I'm beginning to see what I never thought I'd see. Myself, at least partially. I'm slowly but surely making an effort to shake off the shadow of all that's bothered me, and try and concentrate more on what makes me happy rather than what I think others *should* like. With hindsight, there's a few things that I would actually change about my life if I could, but alas such an event is never going to happen so I don't see any point in harbouring regrets over things. I think, from here on in, I should make more effort to ignore the well established voices in my head and instead listen to the voices of the people I'm friends with - the ones who, so far as I can tell, are actually speaking the truth.
Friday, 26 June 2009
...singing lager, lager, lager...
Well, another year is almost up. The contract for the house is up on the 30th, university's been out for a few weeks now, and I'm still making the same mistakes I always do day in day out.
It's quite sad, and yet slightly amusing, that so many of the people I've gotten to know over the past three years aren't going to be around next year. To be fair, my sticking around next year is heavily contingent on my being able to pass a resit in quantum mechanics and I'm not particularly liking my chances there. A lot of the people I've gotten to know, a handful of them quite well I should say, have all successfully finished their degrees and from what I've seen so far on Facebook a lot of them have done exceedingly well.
Looking back, I find a few things in the past year that I regret. For instance, I do quite regret not making more of an effort with quantum mechanics and classical physics last semester. As much as I find it amusing that we have to take a 10 credit module in obsolete physics, alongside a module on theory that pretty much underpins everything in the modern world, I do wish I hadn't been quite so un-motivated about it. Sure, I didn't particularly like the prospect of quantum since I'm a substandard mathematician but I could've at least tried harder. Same for classical. I regret more than that, for this year at least, but I can't change any of it.
Yet, I don't think I should entirely just turn around and concentrate on everything that went wrong this year. Granted, stuff did go wrong, but thinking about it a lot of stuff also went right. For instance, I passed the majority of the first semester. If I get my sorry arse in gear, and get a pass for the two modules I failed, I can pull my grade up some. The modules I passed were predominantly good grades, and I'm fairly confident that most of the second semester exams went fairly well too, despite the fact that I complained a lot about having to revise - much to a certain someone's annoyance. I made some new friends this year, and to an extent I do owe that to one particular friend of mine pretty much forcing me to talk to people. It's a bit sad that, despite having been going to lectures with them for two years now, I only know 6 or 7 people from the year. I guess that's something I need to work on: confidence. Not just in terms of having the balls to go up to someone and say hi, or having the strength of mind to change the way I think (that's a whole other blog entry right there, trust me) but to improve my confidence with maths and physics as well.
I guess it's funny that, for everything I look back on and see as a negative, the same occurance has usually spawned with it at least one positive thing. Even the fact that I'm behind a year, something I regret every morning when I wake up, isn't that bad. I've met some awesome people in this year, some more so than others, and I've learnt a few things about myself. Acting on this new knowledge, however, is going to prove the tricky part. There's still a lot that I need to even figure out, a lot of stuff that I still don't fully understand, and I think that until I'm sure I know how I feel and what's going through my head I'm not going to be able to completely fix things - or to improve myself as a person. Thankfully I've got a few months in which to do this, without a lot of the hassle of constant work and stress. I can take my stress out on zombies, though, since I still haven't completed RE4...
One thing I do know, though, is that I'm a considerably lucky man. Not only to be at the university here in Sheffield, to be given the opportunity to study here - as bad as I may be at it - but lucky that I've met the people that I have. Lucky that, despite the fact that I've been an immensely terrible person to them at times, they've still got the patience to put up with me. They're still my friends, and they're still willing to help me should I ever overcome one of my greatest flaws and ask for it.
I spent some time looking for a particular quote that, on occasion when I sit and think about what I think about my life, reminds me that I should never be quite so negative. But, unfortunately, I can't remember who the quote is attributed to and thus it lives solely in a file I don't have with me. So, I went and found another quote or two which I think should be inspiring enough for now.
"Self-respect is to the soul as oxygen is to the body. Deprive a person of oxygen, and you kill his body; deprive him of self-respect and you kill his spirit." - Thomas S Szasz.
"To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others." - Albert Camus
"Laugh at yourself and at life. Not in the spirit of derision or whining self-pity, but as a remedy, a miracle drug, that will ease your pain, cure your depression, and help you to put in perspective that seemingly terrible defeat and worry with laughter at your predicaments, thus freeing your mind to think clearly towards the solution that is certain to come. Never take yourself too seriously." - Og Mandino
I think the third one is the most appropriate. I also wonder exactly what would happen if any of my friends ever followed the link from Facebook to this blog...
It's quite sad, and yet slightly amusing, that so many of the people I've gotten to know over the past three years aren't going to be around next year. To be fair, my sticking around next year is heavily contingent on my being able to pass a resit in quantum mechanics and I'm not particularly liking my chances there. A lot of the people I've gotten to know, a handful of them quite well I should say, have all successfully finished their degrees and from what I've seen so far on Facebook a lot of them have done exceedingly well.
Looking back, I find a few things in the past year that I regret. For instance, I do quite regret not making more of an effort with quantum mechanics and classical physics last semester. As much as I find it amusing that we have to take a 10 credit module in obsolete physics, alongside a module on theory that pretty much underpins everything in the modern world, I do wish I hadn't been quite so un-motivated about it. Sure, I didn't particularly like the prospect of quantum since I'm a substandard mathematician but I could've at least tried harder. Same for classical. I regret more than that, for this year at least, but I can't change any of it.
Yet, I don't think I should entirely just turn around and concentrate on everything that went wrong this year. Granted, stuff did go wrong, but thinking about it a lot of stuff also went right. For instance, I passed the majority of the first semester. If I get my sorry arse in gear, and get a pass for the two modules I failed, I can pull my grade up some. The modules I passed were predominantly good grades, and I'm fairly confident that most of the second semester exams went fairly well too, despite the fact that I complained a lot about having to revise - much to a certain someone's annoyance. I made some new friends this year, and to an extent I do owe that to one particular friend of mine pretty much forcing me to talk to people. It's a bit sad that, despite having been going to lectures with them for two years now, I only know 6 or 7 people from the year. I guess that's something I need to work on: confidence. Not just in terms of having the balls to go up to someone and say hi, or having the strength of mind to change the way I think (that's a whole other blog entry right there, trust me) but to improve my confidence with maths and physics as well.
I guess it's funny that, for everything I look back on and see as a negative, the same occurance has usually spawned with it at least one positive thing. Even the fact that I'm behind a year, something I regret every morning when I wake up, isn't that bad. I've met some awesome people in this year, some more so than others, and I've learnt a few things about myself. Acting on this new knowledge, however, is going to prove the tricky part. There's still a lot that I need to even figure out, a lot of stuff that I still don't fully understand, and I think that until I'm sure I know how I feel and what's going through my head I'm not going to be able to completely fix things - or to improve myself as a person. Thankfully I've got a few months in which to do this, without a lot of the hassle of constant work and stress. I can take my stress out on zombies, though, since I still haven't completed RE4...
One thing I do know, though, is that I'm a considerably lucky man. Not only to be at the university here in Sheffield, to be given the opportunity to study here - as bad as I may be at it - but lucky that I've met the people that I have. Lucky that, despite the fact that I've been an immensely terrible person to them at times, they've still got the patience to put up with me. They're still my friends, and they're still willing to help me should I ever overcome one of my greatest flaws and ask for it.
I spent some time looking for a particular quote that, on occasion when I sit and think about what I think about my life, reminds me that I should never be quite so negative. But, unfortunately, I can't remember who the quote is attributed to and thus it lives solely in a file I don't have with me. So, I went and found another quote or two which I think should be inspiring enough for now.
"Self-respect is to the soul as oxygen is to the body. Deprive a person of oxygen, and you kill his body; deprive him of self-respect and you kill his spirit." - Thomas S Szasz.
"To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others." - Albert Camus
"Laugh at yourself and at life. Not in the spirit of derision or whining self-pity, but as a remedy, a miracle drug, that will ease your pain, cure your depression, and help you to put in perspective that seemingly terrible defeat and worry with laughter at your predicaments, thus freeing your mind to think clearly towards the solution that is certain to come. Never take yourself too seriously." - Og Mandino
I think the third one is the most appropriate. I also wonder exactly what would happen if any of my friends ever followed the link from Facebook to this blog...
Wednesday, 27 May 2009
A Productive Endeavour
Ah, the familiar feel of "blogging" is back. Mmm. Y'know, this is the third blog I've ever owned; my first being on MSN Spaces, way back when they first launched it. I even went as far as making a few friends through that thing, and I still have a few of them. My second was one that came with the joy of a MySpace account, after I bowed to pressure from friends and actually got one of the darn things. I never really thought MySpace was that fantastic, but then I never really got into the whole friend whoring emo thing. I don't really care how many people you want to claim to be friends with, I'll stick with people I actually know.
Hence, what with my other half going and getting one of these last night and thus reminding me of the fact I still have access to both an MSN Spaces account as well as a MySpace I went dredging through the annals of history and turned up my MySpace blog. I didn't remember, at the time, why I'd left it dormant rather than deleting it all together until I actually read the blog entries on it. Man, I was a fool back in 2006. Reading some of the things I wrote, some of the things I clearly felt strongly on, it just serves to prove how far I've come as a human being in the past few years. I'm not quite the same angry, socially inept teenager I was when I first ventured forth to university - I've grown up a lot, I think, and I think that I've bettered myself in a few ways. I'm still nowhere near perfect, but I don't think I'm quite as flawed as I was.
Anyway, that's a very brief history lesson for those of you who've stumbled upon this glorious example of why the Internet is fantastic. Yes, there's a lot of rubbish on the interweb, and a lot of it is put there by your average joe just like me, but perhaps one or two of you might find something interesting to read here or perhaps learn something. I doubt the latter will occur, at least not frequently, but we'll see.
So, why am I making a blog with the "Gods" of Google via Blogger? Well, that's a good question. Part of it is that I actually quite like blogging, I do rather enjoy the challenge of trying to order what's in my head. Most of the time, I don't think I manage it very well when I try and achieve this verbally. I don't think I'm particularly well suited to conversation, since it requires the ability to think through what you're saying as you say it and not make any hideous gaffes that alienate you from your peers. With the written word, however, you have more time and less pressure on you - time to sort out what you want to say at your own pace, in whichever manner you deem most appropriate. That said, conversation is also two-way and relies on you understanding - at least partially - the person you're talking to. As well as the fact that I do enjoy writing things down, I chose Blogger since I already have a Google Mail account. Saves me some time, no? Oh, and if you're wondering why or offended by the fact that I've referred to Google as "gods" - it's quite simply because Google satisfies a few of the requirements us mortals place upon our deities. They must be all-knowing, and omnipresent. Google knows far more than I do, and it's in a hell of a lot more places at once than I am, so I'll settle for accepting it as meeting those two requirments. All hail the Church of Google! Could be worse, I suppose... *cough* Scientology *cough*
I don't think I aimed to put anything useful into this entry at the start, so I've not really deviated from my objective - which was simply to allow a brief respite from revision of notes on solid state physics. I have an exam on it tomorrow, y'see, and I don't think it's going to go well. Admittedly, I do now know the equations for Debye temperature and Fermi energies, but there's a lot more in the course that I don't know. I'm looking forward to Saturday's exam, though, which is on optics. It's just simple geometry coupled with electromagnetic theory on diffraction and interference. Sure, I've never had to derive the equations for these things from first principles before, but I'm perfectly capable of drawing some diagrams and doing simple algebra to determine angles and lengths. Easy.
That's all for now, as I've spent the best part of twenty minutes procrastinating on here now. I'll drop by again soon, no doubt, with more equally pointless ramblings from my head. Perhaps now you realise why I chose the name I did, partially because these things are somewhat chaotic and I quite liked the fact that early physics theories for electromagnetism were concerned with the existance (or, eventually, lack of) an aether. Huzzah!
Hence, what with my other half going and getting one of these last night and thus reminding me of the fact I still have access to both an MSN Spaces account as well as a MySpace I went dredging through the annals of history and turned up my MySpace blog. I didn't remember, at the time, why I'd left it dormant rather than deleting it all together until I actually read the blog entries on it. Man, I was a fool back in 2006. Reading some of the things I wrote, some of the things I clearly felt strongly on, it just serves to prove how far I've come as a human being in the past few years. I'm not quite the same angry, socially inept teenager I was when I first ventured forth to university - I've grown up a lot, I think, and I think that I've bettered myself in a few ways. I'm still nowhere near perfect, but I don't think I'm quite as flawed as I was.
Anyway, that's a very brief history lesson for those of you who've stumbled upon this glorious example of why the Internet is fantastic. Yes, there's a lot of rubbish on the interweb, and a lot of it is put there by your average joe just like me, but perhaps one or two of you might find something interesting to read here or perhaps learn something. I doubt the latter will occur, at least not frequently, but we'll see.
So, why am I making a blog with the "Gods" of Google via Blogger? Well, that's a good question. Part of it is that I actually quite like blogging, I do rather enjoy the challenge of trying to order what's in my head. Most of the time, I don't think I manage it very well when I try and achieve this verbally. I don't think I'm particularly well suited to conversation, since it requires the ability to think through what you're saying as you say it and not make any hideous gaffes that alienate you from your peers. With the written word, however, you have more time and less pressure on you - time to sort out what you want to say at your own pace, in whichever manner you deem most appropriate. That said, conversation is also two-way and relies on you understanding - at least partially - the person you're talking to. As well as the fact that I do enjoy writing things down, I chose Blogger since I already have a Google Mail account. Saves me some time, no? Oh, and if you're wondering why or offended by the fact that I've referred to Google as "gods" - it's quite simply because Google satisfies a few of the requirements us mortals place upon our deities. They must be all-knowing, and omnipresent. Google knows far more than I do, and it's in a hell of a lot more places at once than I am, so I'll settle for accepting it as meeting those two requirments. All hail the Church of Google! Could be worse, I suppose... *cough* Scientology *cough*
I don't think I aimed to put anything useful into this entry at the start, so I've not really deviated from my objective - which was simply to allow a brief respite from revision of notes on solid state physics. I have an exam on it tomorrow, y'see, and I don't think it's going to go well. Admittedly, I do now know the equations for Debye temperature and Fermi energies, but there's a lot more in the course that I don't know. I'm looking forward to Saturday's exam, though, which is on optics. It's just simple geometry coupled with electromagnetic theory on diffraction and interference. Sure, I've never had to derive the equations for these things from first principles before, but I'm perfectly capable of drawing some diagrams and doing simple algebra to determine angles and lengths. Easy.
That's all for now, as I've spent the best part of twenty minutes procrastinating on here now. I'll drop by again soon, no doubt, with more equally pointless ramblings from my head. Perhaps now you realise why I chose the name I did, partially because these things are somewhat chaotic and I quite liked the fact that early physics theories for electromagnetism were concerned with the existance (or, eventually, lack of) an aether. Huzzah!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
