The Pnebleu Blog

Yesterday, was a great day!  In the morning, I had my 6-month review at work, which went very well.  I got a $0.50 per hour raise!  Then, in the afternoon, I finally got my Aggie ring.  Here’s a picture.

I have been counting down the days/hours to get this, and now I finally have it.  Thanks to my parent for buying it for me as a gift!  Thanks to them, again, and everyone else who has helped me get to this point in my life!  I love you all!

Today was the first day of class of my senior year at Texas A&M University.  It was a great day!  My classes are going to be difficult, but my schedule is very satisfactory (except for lunch, I have to squeeze it in to the time I drive from work to school).  I’m taking Nutrition, Post-Civil War U.S. History, Web-Enabled Applications, MIS, and ERP (Enterprise Resouce Planning).

I work for 4 hours in the mornings and have class from 12:45PM to 5:25PM in the evenings on Monday through Thursday.  Fridays are my flex-days.  I am scheduled to work only the four hours on Fridays as well, but I don’t have any classes on Friday.  I can use the afternoons to do homework or projects, or I can just stay at work and get more hours.  It is up to me.

After a few chores and homework today, I am going to change my blog’s theme, I have been wanting to for quite a while and now I have a reason.  I have a Smugmug account and I can’t add the photos link to my current pages list.  So it time for a change.  You will soon see.

Here’s a quick summary of what is going on: summer school at Blinn is done, grades will be transferred on Thursday the 7th, soon after that I can apply for my Aggie Ring (Whoop!), August 6th-22nd I will be working 8am-5pm, and August 25th the fall semester of my senior year at Texas A&M begins.

I am so glad to be finished with English and speech classes.  They were some of the most difficult and challenging courses I’ve taken.  Grades should be post by the end of this week.

I can apply for my Aggie Ring as soon as the credits get transferred to Texas A&M.  Once ordered, I will receive it in November.  I am taking 15 hours this fall, and my parents agreed to purchase a sports pass this year, so I plan on going to as many games as possible.

Today, tropical storm Edouard came though town; I’ve seen more water come out of a sprinkler system.  I was very disappointed; I wanted a drenching thunderstorm.

I think I am going to redesign my blog this month, before school starts up.  But don’t hold me to it.  Trying to do things when working 40 hours per week is not always as easy as it seems.  I like when school is in session, because I feel like I get more done.

If you’ve read the sidebar, you should be aware that I’m a junior at Texas A&M University.  TAMU is full of traditions.  Greeting passersby with a “howdy” is one of the most recognizable traditions practiced on- and off-campus.  Every year there is a cyclical decline of the use of “howdy.”  High in August and decline through December.  There is a low spike in January, then it declines to it’s lowest in May.  I’ve notice over the pass three years an overall decline in “howdy’s” use.

I attribute the iPod as a leading reason for the decline in “howdy’s” that I hear.  The popularity of the Apple iPod and other mp3 players lead to people wearing headphones to and from class on campus.  Listening to music, Aggies are less likely to spout a brief “howdy” to the person walk by, and if you walk by someone wearing headphones/earbuds you are less likely to say “howdy,” as not to disturb them.

This is a sad trend here in Aggieland.  I hope the new classes admitted will push to bring back “howdy” to the levels it once was.  I’ll do my part and say “howdy” to everyone I pass.

Today, I had time to take a walk around campus, so I took some pictures. Take a look at them here: http://pnebleu.com/blog/photos/campus-tour-08/

Today didn’t start out so nice, but quickly improved!  I woke up early (negative) and went to class.  The class turned out to be cancel and replaced with an online lecture, but the professor felt bad because a couple of us came, so she gave the lecture in person anyway (positive).  After that class, I walked to my bank to find out if I was going to need to apply for another debit card when my current one expires; I don’t, another is sent in the mail to me before the old one dies (positive).  I had an hour and a half until my next class, so I decided to walk from my bank to Wehner, probably about a mile, along University Dr. (positive).   It was very interesting, I don’t know why, but I felt a sense of adventure and exploration.  When I arrive at Wehner I still had an hour left, so I got a Blue Bell ice cream sandwich, the cookies ‘n cream kind, and a Starbucks iced coffee (positive).  The total was less than $5 (positive).  Next, I had class with a few friends (positive).  After that class, I had Marketing class.  At first I thought it was going to be as boring as it normally is, but today we discussed some of the marketing campaigns Texas A&M University is using and came up with ways to improve or add to them (big positive).  It was a lot of fun in my discussion session today.

At work, I was able to complete or, at least, send several ISER’s on their way (positive).  After 5 PM, I worked on a project to upgrade all of the PC’s in one department to Office 2003.  This involved uninstalling Office 2000, installing Office 2003, and running an audit program that scans the PC for software.  All of the PC’s except one were updated and most PC’s had successful audits (moderate positive).  I’ve almost completed that project task (positive, I really like completing things, it gives me a sense of accomplishment).  So, I was able to leave work at 8:30 PM (moderate negative, it could have been later), totaling a little more than 22 hours for this week (positive).

I made it home in time for Battlestar Galactica and I will watch Battle 360° when it repeats at 1 AM (positive).  When I checked my email, I discovered that I might be getting a second job as a web designer from my former boss (major positive)!  This has really got me excited!

Later this evening, I’m going to take a hot shower (positive) and go to sleep for close to 11 hours (big positive).  I hope everyone had and will have an excellent day!

I’m tested out. I had two tests today: History of Landscape Architecture in North America and Finance. I feel moderately satisfied with the LAND test, but I feel really good about the FINC test! Normally, the exam keys are posted online after the test is over, but they are not up yet. I’m anxiously awaiting them. I need to make an A on the finance test to have the chance to get an A in the class. I could make anything better than a C on the LAND test. My brain is a little fried this evening.

Two quizzes, two online lectures, and a paper are due Friday for my lame/boring Marketing class. The material could be presented in a much more engaging manner this it is currently. On Friday’s, we have breakout discussion sessions. These are used for simple group projects and, obviously, discussion of the topics. They are the worst part of this class. They are a waste of my time and don’t increase my understanding of the material in anyway.

Mays Business School will be “experimenting” with differentiated tuition this coming fall semester. One of the main reasons sited for this cash grab is the increase in the number of classes with breakout sessions. Most of the classes offered currently are of a large lecture nature, usually with 150+ students. My largest is about 350 students. The administration wants to reduce this number for the discussion sessions. My questions is why? Every breakout session I’ve had in the business school has been mostly a waste of time when I could have been learning more material in a lecture or just studying on my own. One of the reasons I love Texas A&M University would be the fact that most of the classes required are large lectures with 150+ students. I like the anonymity and unidirectional nature of these classes. I wanted to be a number: ***-00-**** (hidden for my safety).

Update: I just discovered that I made another 88 on my finance test.  This is the third test and the third 88.  I’m a little frustrated.  I’ll talk to the TA to discover the problem with one answer that I’m not sure why it’s incorrect.