First Quarter Round Up

Dear blog,
I'm sorry I've neglected you for so long. Look, I brought you flowers! Okay, I lied about the flowers. In truth it's been a really busy quarter. I restarted school, with some small success, fenced, did the climbing thing I usually do, and rediscovered my incredible need for caffeine. Sweet, sweet caffeine. Actually, it's often bitter, but whatever.

I managed to pass my first quarter reasonably well, so that bodes well for the coming year. I'm enrolled in a thesis program, so I'll be in this for two years. I'm doing a lot of coding, mostly MATLAB, and a lot of linear algebra, which is pretty standard I think.

So, let's review what worked and what didn't. Because nothing makes for a great blog like endless self-examination, right?

What worked: Studying with other people.
Okay, this is a no-brainer for most people, I understand. But I didn't really study with anyone in undergrad. Well, no engineers. It's hard to discuss structural engineering with political scientists and linguists, much as I probably wasn't a great sounding board for them. So studying with other engineers has been pretty helpful, especially near midterms and finals, as we could hole up in an office somewhere and review stuff for hours on end, clarifying small points for one another that we had missed somewhere. I felt like an actual grad-student!

What didn't work very well: Note-taking.
I had a couple professors this past quarter who did a lot of boardwork during lectures, illustrating everything and writing out all the equations, which made it pretty easy to take notes. I had another professor who basically projected the text on the screen and then pointed at the equations in question and discussed them at length. This didn't work very well for me, as I had a hard time figuring out what to write down and organizing what he was saying as he was saying it. So I identified this problem really early on, but failed to adapt and find another solution, and I think I took a hit as a result. I'm contemplating using a voice recorder next quarter in the eventuality that I can't take notes that work for me during the lecture alone.

My other note taking habit is to copy over my notes to a fresh notebook shortly after the original lecture so that I have a neater, more clear set of notes, and so I can correct any mistakes I made while transcribing them the first time. Overall, it really helped, so I'll be doing it again next quarter!

What also worked: The UCSD shuttle system!
I made extensive use of the UCSD shuttle program, hopping the bus from the graduate student housing most days of the week, and taking the Hillcrest shuttle the other days. At some point I'll probably figure out some manner of cost-benefit analysis of this whole thing, but that'll have to wait until I'm gathering actual data, and have time to do it. So expect it by, say, the time I graduate? Maybe?

Anyhoo, this is a pretty media free post, so here's a video of something my lab is working on!



More posts soon, I promise this time! Please do not go back and read the archives, where I have promised similar things and then not delivered on it.

Moving on, moving on

I'm about to embark on a new adventure! The grand adventure of grad school! I'll be working on a master's degree in aerospace engineering at my alma mater, UCSD, hopefully on the thesis track. I just stopped by the lab of my advisor, Professor Tom Bewley, and it looks like a really cool place, got to meet a bunch of people, see some cool robots. Check out the Switchblade!



I'm starting to get really excited about this transition. The prospect of not having income is still a bit distressing, but I'm sure I'll adapt in short order, perhaps get a part time job. The idea of working on something challenging and interesting is tantalizing, and to get into a different culture is also appealing. I'm not wholly certain that my current place of employment is a good fit for me. There's a focus on adherence to rules rather than performance, and I've increasingly felt that I have to censor myself in more ways than I think are really necessary for a workplace. It's likely that this is true of any work-environment, but I'll have to wait for my next one to see. My thoughts in this vein are pretty well summed up by one of my favorite XKCD strips ever. It's time to break my routine and set up a new one, and I can't wait.