new bond

After class tonight I am going to see the first showing of the new bond at midnight on the largest screen in Texas. The primary reason I am going to the midnight showing is not because I like the first showing but rather that I don’t have time in my normal schedule to fit it in. Midnight, how convenient… I don’t now much about this movie except for it is the next installment in the classic bond trilogy. I am told that this is the best bond(the actor that is) however I have not yet established my opinion yet. When I went to go pre buy tickets on the way to class tonight there were only 12 tickets sold…? Go figure I figured they would be busy… Do people no longer care about bond or something.? There have been a good number of ads on NBC in the morning. O well we can expect another post to follow with my opinion of the movie. ttyl

Intro to marketing

If you want an easy class to fill an out of degree elective take intro to marketing here at UTD. Beware you may get frustrated that it is too easy. I have. This class is insulting it is so easy. It was a mistake for me to take it. They waste time on things like basic pre algebra to figure logical problems. I will be glad when it is over just because it is personally insulting as to the intelligence of the students. It may be me, it may be the class, it may be the teacher, but the class is complaining how hard it is while I am not trying or paying any attention in class and I am making a B+, A grade. What is wrong here? I thought school was supposed to require effort. Can I get a refund for this class in addition to a gas credit for the 90 gallons of gas I have spent? I am intentionally not paying attention in class as not to confuse her distorted log with true logic allowing for a way to easy A in this class.

good idea…

I found this great little thing in our atech degree that allows us to do independent studies. If you are self motivated, have a clear objective, and can find a teacher sponsor you can do a self study on the topic of your choice. This is not any less work, if not more, but it allows you to focus your education towards an interest of yours. I am greatly excited by this and figured I might pass it along.

utd + atech = ?

Ok, for those of you out there in the ATECH degree rut that I am in, I figured I would share a few things I have learned as well as a few frustrations. First of all what is up?  Just in my time here I have been trough 5 advisors and I have only been here for 4, ok maybe 5 years.  Some lady in the AH office, some guy with an old radio in his office who let you sign up for classes early, Tara, Jennifer and now the new person to whom I have yet to meet.  No wonder our degree plan feels so discombobulated. I have to give it to Tara , she has been the best so far, I just hope the school doesn’t overwhelm her ending up with a 6^th advisor.  Ok so what is up with this, We as atechs are required to have 9sci hrs.  Now my sci classes are 4 (3 class+1 lab) hrs a piece. So I take phys 1 and phys 2 and end up with 8hrs of sci.  To fill this gap my advisor(#2) then advises I take contemporary science, a moderately challenging and intriguing class.  I go into my advisor the next semester and it turns that the advised class does not count for a sci class hrs. Rrrrrrrr. Go figure.  I have just taken a science class for the fun of it, wasting my time and money, thanks utd.  Ok, so I am still short a sci hr. So I take EE-0, an intro electrical class to fill the requirements, with my professor unaware that I have already taken Phys 2 electromagnetism and waves the big, big brother to this class.  So this class is excessively easy for me.  So the school has me again wasting my time with busy non learning work wasting more of my valuable time and money.  You might ask why they did not substitute my other sci class as they advised it?  IDK, I asked and they refused. Go figure.

There have been some classes I have enjoyed and learned from on the other hand.  BW photography, Sound design, and lighting and texturing were my favs so far.  I wish I would have found a good theater, theater tech, or choral class (as I have done them professionally worldwide) but after attending a few of their shows I quickly realized they were pitiful and not worth my time.

Here is another thought.  When I attended an atech info seminar in 03 it was pitched with the curve of game design like things.  When I attended another atech session in 06(with my bro) it was pitched not as a game design degree but more of a simulations and modeling type of thing.  Does the school even know what the atech plan is for? Now is it just me or does it seam like that now that I am in the degree plan we are stuck in a rut with only one destination, game design.  I am a freelance photo,video,web guy time permitting and there is so much more to the arts and technology world than the degree is giving us.  When I got my full time job doing atech work it was like the deep end, nothing I learned was relevant and had all new stuff to learn.  I feel like this degree was a waste of my time.  But hey I probably shouldn’t be posting this on a class blog but I have stopped caring  I just want my piece of sheep’s skin.  I am now in the process of signing up for what I believe will be a real education, a CS degree in the ECS School.  And then we are required to have out of degree electives, I don’t have a problem with this, it is a great idea, however I made the mistake of taking a business class, intro to marketing.  Can somebody say a joke.  The class is struggling to do well with their test grades when the teacher essentially publishes the answers in her ppt.  Just read her ppt and you will do well.  They waste time arguing how to do basic math that my 12yr old cousin could solve.  Memorizing stupid formulas providing clumsy methods that simple algebraic logic can solve.  Then after class I hear students complaining to the teacher that the test was to hard and that bc this is an “intro” class, and I am paraphrasing now, that we are not supposed to do anything mentally challenging just memorize a few words and call it good.  Who are they kidding this is a UL class and I can sleep through and make a high grad on tests I don’t even study for.  I would advocate not showing up to class except that it is not my work ethic not show to show up to class. And then the part that annoys me is that I live over an hr from class and all we do in class is waste my time, how insulting to the students much less their desire to learn.  Can anybody tell that I am frustrated… Enough of my pointed opinions, more to come later…

Is this semester over yet.

This semester was moving at a good pace so far but lately It just seams to me that things have slowed down to the speed of molasses. A bunch of busy work and no real learning work. It just feels that my teachers have run out of material and are now spinning in circles until the semester is over. Of course by definition this class is excluded as you can not talk about a class in its own blog. Maybe it is just me?.. Maybe the weather is just making me want to go outside just for the sake of being outside. O and yes this is my favorite season of the year. If only it would stay like this all year. Another possibility for my current level of discontent could be just a touch of senioritis setting in.

RC Fun Fest

This past Saturday was the Royse City Fun Fest.  It was busy and fun.  This is one of those little things that a small city can do that is difficult for a larger city.  The RC Fun Fest was just a day of fun where the whole city came together and had some fun on Main Street.  This is more difficult for larger cities due to the sheer size of the city.  RC however is a 2 exit city with no grocery or 24hr convenience stores.  This allowed the entire city to gather on a single street for fun.  There was a dunking booth, a pay prison, talent show, horse rides, barrel rides, and inflatable slides.  It was just a fun day for the whole family.  Our church had our own booth where we handed out free ice water.  You would be surprised how difficult that is these days.  People are so untrusting and believe everything has a catch.  No catch, we are just a church in town giving away free water to our community on hot day.  There is nothing wrong with that is there?  Yes we would love it if they attended our church but we did not even mention we were a church unless they asked why we were giving away free water.  O well enough for more, more to come later. 

Gas

I must confess something stupid I did. My car does not have a working gas gauge. It has been like this for about 6months now. I generally just estimate it with the odometer. I generally get 380-400 miles per tank. I was driving home from the air show last Sunday at around 10pm. My gas light came on about 5miles from home so I just kept driving. There was not even a place to stop if I wanted to. Less than 2 miles from home I ran out gas. I could see the exit I just was not there. I coast for as ling as I can but It was not enough. I am now on the side of the road without a good flashlight. Aster waiting on the side of the road for a cop to come by a nice couple pulled over and gave me a ride to get gas. I was back driving within .5hr of stopping on the road. I am a bit embarrassed I was stupid enough to do this but I did and that was the story. The end, el fin.

Online auction

Ok, whatever you do not go to this webpage, it is addicting. http://auctions.samsclub.com/

I was told about it from a friend, what a friend right… Ok so I go to it for the first time and find this giant camping backpack that I totally don’t need but it is cheep and I figure I could have some use for it. So I give it a low bid, $15 and think I have no chance of winning it. 3 days later it is at my front door and my wallet is missing 30 dollars. I told you online auctions are addicting. Ok so a week later I go to the site again and find a ipod cables kit. I already have 2/3 of what is in the kit but I still want it, don’t ask me why because I don’t know. But needless to say it was at my door by the end of the week and I was again out $30. At least I will use this thing, I hope… Just know while on the computer in class I have bid on 2 camping cots and something else I don’t even remember. I don’t need any of it but I have again bid on them. Only time will tell if I will win them.

Wing dingers

Just a little bit of news. I have been chattering about a new coffee house in Royse city tx. This little place called Roots now has a neighbor owned by the same guy. It goes by the name wing dinger. They had their soft opening last night and today was their grand opening. I have not been inside yet but if it is anything like its neighbor it will be great. I was hoping to go today on the way to school but I was running late and did not have time. By default they will have wings I presume, but I wonder what else they will have. I think they will also have some sort of short order grill and probably a few fried things like chicken or something. But as of yet, I have not a clue, I will hopefully go in and find out soon, probably this sat for the rc fun fest.

Air show

Ok, so I worked at the air show this weekend. It was a lot of fun. We were again in charge of selling programs for the entire event benefiting FWAFA and thus TBC. The way this usually works out is we ask the school for volunteers to work the show. We usually like to have 10-20 volunteers at the show. This was however not the case for this yrs show. We had our numbers for the first day, Saturday. On Sunday however the general attendance was down because of competition with the Texas and OU game. Saturday we also had a problem with people showing up. It always bugs me when we are trying to help a group but the group has trouble helping itself by providing personnel. Sat we had a people of 8ppl pull a no show. This hurt a bit but was not critical because we had enough additional people to cover the gaps. Sunday however was where we had our problems. For our first shift we had 14 workers, however for the remainder of the day we had 4,4,0 per shift sign up. This was just unreasonable, we have 5 personal just working overhead much less manning the POC. Having less poc personnel than overhead personnel is a bad sign. IN an effort of a mad panic solution my bro called a bunch of his old hs and college friends and managed to get a few more hands. We also encouraged the few workers we had to work double shifts. It was still a challenge but all was well and we raised a good bit of money for our school. Thanks to all in the public who bought a program…