Of course, I managed to not actually update the blog at all over the summer. Quite silly, seeing as I had an exceptional amount of free time. Yet lack of posts doesn't mean this girl doesn't stop thinking about things, and there have been many thoughts going on that I'll just share now. Hell, it's 11 PM (ish) and I just watched Batman Forever for the first time, and I'm in the mood to ramble on about nothing particularly important.
First, the Fall quarter ended last week. What a roller coaster ride! While having awesome plans every weekend (literally, every weekend) for the past month and a half ensured I was experiencing my senior year in college to the fullest, it also meant I had just that much less time to focus on schoolwork. I, being my ambitious and adventurous self, was convinced I could handle it. Pretty sure the 3 separate colds (including one during finals week) I got this quarter were all stress related. You know, stress leading to a lowered immune system response and all. So basically, I would have some amazing weekend with my friends and/or family and then come right back to school. After 5th week, I just got used to starting every day exhausted. Surprisingly though, I had a very hard time sleeping all the way to my alarm; it wasn't until about 8th week that I didn't wake up before it. I learned a lot this quarter about working in a group, as I might have some of the least efficient group members to deal with. Of course, this project is only my senior design, about equivalent to what would be my "thesis." The concept itself is actually quite cool, I'll probably post about it at some point soon, but picking up the slack for useless coworkers got old, quick. My anatomy class was fascinating - I am really convinced that human biology is my favorite aspect of all bioengineering, especially the focus on muscles.
Speaking of muscles, I actually had a really consistent run of gym time before I started getting sick and midterms came around. I managed to go 3 times a week consistently, and by the time I stopped going I was repping my body weight in back squats! Very exciting. I hope I'll have time next quarter to restart that. There's nothing like the catharsis of kicking your own ass for over an hour. I've also become interested in reading up on new workouts, new theory on exercise and eating, etc. I just got a pass for 7 free days at the 24 Hour Fitness at home, so am lucky enough to get back into working out the fun way - kickboxing!
Back to the classes, my nanotech class was taught by one of the worst professors I've ever had and if he gives me less than a B... I've got nothing. But he'll really suck. The last class I took was a polymer chemistry class that went from easy and interesting to hard and memorization based. I loved my professor though, and even felt bad when I did poorly on homeworks, like I was letting her down. So we'll see how all these academics turn out.
Next quarter I'm taking Organic Chemistry Lab, which is apparently a soul-sucker. I'm also taking the next quarter's class of senior design, which ends with us presenting our project at the annual biotech symposium at the end of the quarter. The team with the best presentation gets to have their name on a plaque in the engineering building, forever staking your claim on campus. I can only dream of winning that competition, but am determined to help make my group serious competitors. The third class I'm taking is my last required engineering class! Very exciting. I've had a hard time in this professor's class before, but he uses the same textbook as the one I used for my anatomy class so I'm hoping the overlap will be enough to get me a kickass grade. Finally, I decided to sign up for a 2 unit technical communications class, where we basically work on our writing. As an engineer, I feel as if my writing skill has seriously deteriorated. I used to love writing, and felt very proficient at it in high school. Since coming to college, I've found I now feel more comfortable writing mathematical equations than essays. If I ever plan to be an attorney, this obviously needs to change, so why not take a refresher class now while I have to pay for tuition anyway?
As far as ultimate goes, I ended up not making the A team this year (my thoughts on this later). Captaining Midas is looking to be quite the endeavor. For the first time since its inception, Midas will not have a coach. This means we need to find someone to call lines. My co-captain, Maddox, and I will be writing every practice. The captains, but especially me as I am the only senior on the team, will be taking on teaching roles. I think overall these changes are all for the better. Not having a coach is the biggest hurdle to overcome, as far as who will call lines at tournaments and keep general order about the team. However, now Maddox and I are free to shape the team as we will. For example, we decided not to attend two tournaments in a row to start the quarter, but instead to mandate our teammates sign up for LeiOut, this epic beach tournament. Not only do they get in fun playing time, but they get introduced to the ultimate community outside of UCLA, an opportunity most people don't know even exists until they are prodded to participate. The captains also get the chance to decide what we want to teach. There have been significant communication issues in the past, where the coaches sometimes just don't understand/don't want to hear that they are wasting their time with certain drills or concept teaching. Either way, captaining is going to be a great test of my leadership skills and hopefully a learning opportunity. At the end of the day, I'm happiest working my ass off on the field, no matter who I'm playing with. I might also try my hand at some posts about ultimate stuff, even though I'm not sure if I'm the most informed person to be postulating for the community at large.
Tomorrow I go home to see my family for the first time since summer. That will be nice. I will be spending this break applying to jobs for after graduation, which is sorta exciting, and anxiety inducing. And looking back over this post, I feel as if there's so many things I want to write about now. So there will be more posts to come, I swear. Hopefully they'll actually have a point to them. Also I intend to start posting some workouts, so look out for that!
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