last week of classes - out w/ a bang

I've been wanting to post since I got home from an AMAZING concert, wed night. Went to see Bowling For Soup/American Hi-Fi w/ Mohit, Saigin, and Ellie. Unfortunately Dave Stanley got stuck w/ a programming assignment and couldn't join us... poor guy.

*Wednesday*
So I prepped for the concert in my usual way, given my past experience w/ many of these types of punk shows:

- cargo pants: many pockets to hold my stuff, no need for purse, things won't fall out if i mosh (though i'm too scared to crowd surf)
- long sleeved tee: don't have to touch all the sweaty people, more than possible

However, the show turned out differently than i expected:

1. The venue (Opera House) was really neat, smaller than I expected, had three sort of tiers, the top w/ a bar, the mid level just... a mid level, and the floor level in front of the stage. I think this set up was more laid back than the single large rooms that I've been to before, but at the same time, since ppl had more room to spread out, it wasn't packed near the stage. There were less people overall than I expected as well, guess Bowling for Soup isn't that big yet. I was standing maybe 6 feet from the stage, and not a SINGLE person was touching me! Yay no fat guy in front of me with his ass in my stomach! (which happened at a Weezer concert back in the day... eugh...)
   
   
2. Security was lax. Normally they really don't like you taking pics. But with the advent of camera phones... I guess it's gotten too much for them, or they don't care. I managed to take a bunch of pics w/ my phone, which i'll post here soon, in all their blurry glory. Again, no fear of dropping phone, cuz no one was touching me!
   
   
3. NOT A SINGLE PERSON CROWD SURFED. Cause if they did... haha they'd fall on the floor... the crowd wasn't dense at all. I remember at some other shows I've been to, ppl were so squished that when the ppl around me jumped up and down, I got carried up and down by DEFAULT - it was wicked :P There was no mass crowd jumping up and down, like usual. When BFS came on there were a few songs where more ppl jumped around... including me, i love that part. There was a couple of very brief thrash circles though. But that died down by the time BFS came on (they told everyone to play nice and give a random person a hug... whereupon i was hugged by a 14 yr old blonde girl).
   
   
4. I'm used to shows that have doors open at 7ish, and that end around 11ish. This show had doors at 7:30 (we got there maybe 8ish), then there were 3 front bands before BFS: MC Lars (more about this ridiculous guy later), Ritalin Kids, American Hi-Fi. BFS came on at 11. They played for... i forget... probably till after 12. I think i remember getting home at around 12:45am.
   
   
5. Overall the front bands were not bad - i.e. they were fine to listen to, american hi-fi in particular was not bad cuz i know some of their songs. A lot better than one of the front bands I remember from a SUM 41 ... guy singer, all goth and in a tutu, and i can't even describe their music, but it was quite scary.

Which brings me to MC LARS. He is an 'English major' at some uni in Cali. He raps in his dorm room. He has songs called "STAT60", about a stat class he sux at, and Raven, which is about Edgar Allan Poe ("Who's that/Who's that/Who's that, rapping on my bedroom door?/Raven/Raven/Raven, nevermore"). He is one man w/ music background that presumably he has mixed himself... in his dorm room. He SOUNDS like a kid in a dorm room, lol... it was... pretty amusing. It was like something on open mike night, poor guy. He had a ninja turtles jacket tho, that was cool.

Check out http://www.mclars.com/ if you so desire.

Bowling For Soup was incredible. They are really talented. Their live performace sounded like the CD, and in some cases, it was better - for example, they did a cover of Britney Spears' "Hit Me Baby One More Time", which is apparently on the Freaky Friday soundtrack... it was wicked, all rocked up, and of course the entire crowd knew the words and sang along. So fun. They also did a cover of Bon Jovi's "Shot Through the Heart", which was awesome. I completely enjoyed myself... they've got some great tunes. You could tell the difference between a good punk/pop band and one hit wonders... BFS's songs all had their own distinctive character, which is really refreshing - whereas some other bands had songs that tend to sound all the same. I've been pretty outta the loop when it comes to music, since EngSci, but BFS is on their way up for sure. Reminds me of the first time I saw SUM 41 at the El Mocambo (practically across the street from my apartment here!) - tiny club, band just starting to get recognition, intimate setting - amazing.

If you like feel-good music (it's more pop punk, not the usual whining about life punk), check out BFS.

*Thursday*
I GOT A JOB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
whooooOOOOOOOOOoooooooOOOOOOOOOOooooooooo
After months of agony, with the inept PEY office working against me at every turn, I have finally managed to get a job. The position is with the Materials and Process Engineering/Operations department at ********, so it's a chem/process eng type gig. 16 months, and salary is pretty good... man I'm going on a shopping spree after exams ;)

So on Thursday, when all the rankings were supposed to have been posted, I checked repeatedly and still no word about Honeywell (which was my last chance, as I only got 2 interviews before second round ended, and I didn't get ranked for my other position). I finally called up the PEY office and asked them whether they posted all the rankings. "Yes." - oh shit. I gave them my name and the position. "Adrienne Tanur... doesn't ring a bell." - double oh shit. "Hmm I can't seem to find that information for that position... I'll call you back" - triple oh shit.

I went to class for a couple of hours, during which I kept my cell at hand (on vibrate... I just wanted to know). Very nervous. See, I really had my heart set on this job. It sounds wicked... really engaging. Also I can get a Six Sigma Green Belt out of it, so they tell me.

After class ended, I just decided to brave it out, and I went to the PEY office. The lady there told me she hadn't bothered to call me (quadruple oh shit..) - because she sent me an e-mail (ooookay....)... and congratulations, you were ranked first!

BIGGEST RELIEF OF MY LIFE!

So even though I hate the PEY Office with a passion... I'm slightly mollified now that I actually have a job. Hope things go smoothly from here... crossing my fingers that nothing else goes wrong.

Along with joy, comes sadness... cuz I will be leaving the best classmates I've ever had in my life. Only 5 people in Nano are going on PEY so far: me, Saigin, Mohit, Daniel (Wen), and Naazia. I'm going to miss everyone terribly... we were a really close-knit class, everyone was comfortable with everyone else, and so friendly, and helpful, together in Nano misery. I am always debating whether it was the smartest thing to do, joining EngSci... but for the people in Nano 0T6: you guys make it worth it. Finest people I have gotten to know, and I know many will be wildly successful in life.

*Friday*

I had a lotta stuff due on the last day of classes. MSE lab report, Physics Problem Set, and Phyiscs Lab Oral Exam. Ouch. MSE was really annoying to write up, but then we got a 90% on it anyways, so it was all good. Problem set - thanks to Eral for helping me out, it turned out to be a not too stressful day. Oral Exam... ahahaha. We get to pick one lab we want to talk about, and one lab the examiners pick. I was lucky (perhaps) because I only got 2 examiners: Bailey, and Mirco. The third guy, some sort of 'on call' TA who really doesn't have anything to do with the course, failed to show up in time for my exam. Fine by me. So I pick to talk about Ge detector first, cuz it's the one I know in great detail, and also, Bailey gave me a good mark on that. I was untouchable... Bailey and Mirco couldn't trip me up. Then came time for them to pick a lab. I waited for a couple of minutes in nervousness, just HOPING that they wouldn't pick Fourier Transform Spectroscopy. Bailey: "Hmm... how bout... how bout... F.... " (nooooooooo!!!!!) "Oh well, actually... Conductivity in less than 3 dimensions. I didn't understand that last time."

A wave of relief washed over me, but that lasted for about 3 seconds. I should have been on my guard from those 5 little words, "I didn't understand it last time." This is BAILEY we are talking about here. He was going to ask me about a lab that he knew NOTHING about. Even when we discuss a lab that he oversaw, he goes on these crazy tangents and picks up the tiniest details that no one would ever think of looking at. My lab partner Dave (from that last lab of death), once told me that he handed in his lab book to Bailey for marking, and it was an old lab book from Chemistry or something like that, so he put in a sticky note to direct Bailey to the physics lab. When he got back his book.... not only was his lab marked, but there were COMMENTS written on ALL of the other labs in the book, that weren't even physics! Now that is just craziness.

So Bailey started asking me about the difference between 2D and 3D conductors. Whereupon I explained that the equipotentials were either spherical or 2D circles, with the current expanding out, blah blah blah. Apparently that wasn't satisfactory. The talons of his convoluted brain latched on: "But, you ARE measuring something, aren't you?" Then he wanted to know about the difference in terms of V vs. r potential, and he told me to draw V-r graphs on the board. So I did. I drew the ideal V is proportional to 1/r plot, etc. He stared at it and started mumbling about stuff, like how he doesn't understand why it plateaus and stuff. Then he started trying to understand where the 0 V was, since voltage had to be in reference to something. Then he scrutinized my data plots, calculating in his head whether my horizontal error bars were of the proper order of magnitude. Finally, in the last minute, he asked what my main result was - which was measuring resistivity. Noting that my manual curve fitting was pretty inaccurate (I ended up with a range of 3.0 -3.2 cm for the thickness of the graphite slab), he joked "Ah, nice range there, haha... well I suppose, as an engineer, you'd stamp that!" Ha ha.

So in conclusion, I aced one half of the lab interview, and bombed the other. I think this was a combination of 1) Bailey never being satisfied with simple explanations, always wanting I don't know what, and 2) the conductivity lab being run by Harlow, who is happy with the simple explanations and so I guess I didn't work hard enough to attain an air-tight understanding of every detail of that lab.

Oh well, I hope I get at least a 75%, then I'm all good to go for that course.


Last piece of news:

I am the new Nano Secretary for the Nanoclub next year! This is the first election I've won... feels kinda neat. I'm really excited about doing lots of stuff for Nanoclub. We're gonna put it back on the map. The exec team is also made up of excellent people, and I'm pretty sure we will be creating new positions and whatnot, to really get everyone involved. Basically, if you want to help out and contribute, then you will be a Somebody. I disagree with the need to have such strict "Exec" labels, and we'll be a lot more productive with more people, providing that the organizational structure is still there (and I will attend to that).

Excited for next year... I start work on May 30th, so I get a nice month off from school. Same w/ Chris, so it's great, might take a trip together somewhere. wheee!

posted by starfire @ 12:57 AM