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Year View| Summary| Highlights| May 2005 (Month View)
Jan ‘05 | Feb ‘05 | Mar ‘05 | Apr ‘05 | May ‘05 Jun ‘05 | Jul ‘05 | Aug ‘05 | Sep ‘05 |
01.05.2005 – Sunday 1 May – Downfall
- • We walked to the Buddha’s Birthday Festival again, where we met Kat, listened to a talk on reincarnation, and had some nice food. We watched the fireworks after buying a Sundae in a boat from Cold Rock, and then went and saw “Downfall”. This movie cannot be rated, and is diametrically opposite to the truth. Caxton Street was blocked for a wine festival. It looked more like a beer and rum festival to me, and made it hard to get around which isn’t good when it’s raining.
02.05.2005 – Monday 2 May – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
- • After a lazy morning doing not much, we headed down to South Bank and saw “Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy”, which is hilarious, and enjoyable enough to be worth two old boys, or one Shaun of the dead. We found some practicing buskers and circus folk playing around after the movie and watched them for a while, before heading out to the airport to pick up people.
03.05.2005 – Tuesday 3 May – Assignments & Iced Coffee
- Morning
- • I got a message from Maz, reminding me that our PSYC1030 essay is due tomorrow, something I’d entirely forgotten about, so I headed into uni to work on COMS4200 and this essay.
- 2:36pm
- • Maz, Craig and I are working on our COMS4200 assignment. It is not going well. We’re having many problems and very slow progress. I’m going to go buy my PSYC1030 reader now and visit the Ville for food.
- 5:05pm
- • I attended my CSSE3004 meeting. Chesapeake wasn’t present, and it went for an hour.
- 8:29pm
- • I’m going to the Ville for food. This code is slowly getting there but very slowly – too slowly. I’m also not sure where it’s getting.
- 4:52am
- • The COMS4200 assignment is mostly working. I have drunk a little under two litres of iced coffee, and am now beginning my PSYC1030 assignment. It should be noted that drinking large amounts of iced coffee is not to be tried at home.
04.05.2005 – Wednesday 4 May – Psychology Essays
- 7:13am
- • PSYC1030’s essay still isn’t begun, but I have finished reading the reader, and am onto reading the online document. The sun has got up, and the only other non-Maz person in the lab just left. This, I feel, is an important milestone in the development of the morning.
- 9:55am
- • Maz went home, with COMS4200 still very buggy. I am not happy.
- 4:01pm
- • Craig submitted COMS4200. Who knows if it even works – I’m not happy about that. I ran up to the psychology building, then back to the IT building to print out a coversheet, then back to the psychology building again, where I submitted my PSYC1030 essay, having written it at breakneck speed while liaising with members of my CSSE3004 group and helping Craig with COMS4200. I then went and saw Clint and relaxed for a bit, before heading back here to begin the CSSE3004 Project Plan Introduction, due tomorrow morning. What joy.
- 7pm
- • I “finished” my part of the CSSE3004 “Project Plan”. It’s a shocking effort though, but I just don’t know what I’m supposed to do.
- 8:45
- • Kieran, Maz and I saw “xXx – The Next Level” (or “State of the Union” if you saw it at South Bank) at Indooroopilly. It was a pretty shocking movie – lots of mindless action but bad enough to break me out of my dazed state from time to time. I give it an eighth of a true lie.
05.05.2005 – Thursday 5 May – Sleeping & Working
- • I came home last night, for the first time in ages. Also for the first time in ages, I had no assignments due the next day, so I slept in for most of the morning, missing all my lectures, and only headed to uni for work.
06.05.2005 – Friday 6 May – Wherein I buy a milkshake
- • Slept in, left around midday for uni, eating a six inch “Veggie Delite” subway on the bus for lunch. I then had a rather long meeting with Ken about CSSE3004 and went to POD and printed CSSE3004 stuff for a meeting tomorrow. Evening consisted of signing myself up as a PSYC1030 guinea pig and working. I also bought a milkshake. It was chocolate flavoured.
- Comment by Maz – Saturday 7 May 2005, 2:06 AM
- About your milkshake, an inside joke and about a sandwich. Bonus points for that effort.
- Comment by Jojo – Saturday 7 May 2005, 10:18 AM
- Ned's alive. woo hoo. you hadnot posted in weeks and i was worried you had stopped blogging!
CSSE3004 is silly isnt it?
May i ask (and you may say no) what types of things did you discuss with Ken? course things or group things? Cheers. - Comment by Ned – Saturday 7 May 2005, 10:38 AM
- What did I discuss? I had reported myself as unsatisfactory. To quote, “Ned was sick and unable to work for several days during this period, meaning he did not complete his assigned tasks on time. He also had two other assignments due on the Wednesday preceding the Thursday that the Project Plan is due, and as they are worth 15% and 20% of their respective courses, as opposed to the few percent that the Project Plan is worth, he gave them precedence over his assigned tasks for the Project Plan. Due to the delays caused by his medical condition and the other assignments which he has got extensions for, he has also stayed up all night and, while he can’t say for sure, he suspects that other group members may feel that he is unlikely to do a particularly good job with his assigned tasks due to this. Fortunately, however, he has two litres of iced coffee and hopes that this resolves all his problems – Allah be praised!” Ken wished to discuss why I felt I was unsatisfactory, and how I should go about resolving this. I also had a marks complaint to resolve, some general course questions, and a little chit-chat about life in general and the IT department and helpdesk here in particular.
- Comment by Mum – Sunday 8 May 2005, 9:50 PM
- Twas only a little while. He is alive and well. Allah be praised. (I mean this)
- Comment by Clint – Thursday 12 May 2005, 11:07 PM
- Good to see you're better uleh
07.05.2005 – Saturday 7 May – Group Meeting
- • I enjoyed a pleasant, relaxing day – apart from the unpleasant or unrelaxing parts. In other words, I attended uni, which is not a good way to start a weekend. At uni, I attended a CSSE3004 group meeting. This is an even worse way to start a weekend. We discussed relevant things, apart from Chesapeake who discussed overly complex, geeky and ugly document formatting systems and the superiority of the clearly inferior command line interface. After this I went to Bronwen’s, which would have been a far better way to start a weekend.
08.05.2005 – Sunday 8 May – Mother’s Day
- • After sleeping in until midday, putting washing out and bringing it back in because it began to rain immediately we’d put it out, eating breakfast, and drinking a coffee, I was ready to go back to bed, but instead walked to Chez Tessa. This took about an hour, and then another hour or so to sit and watch the river roll by while eating, and then another to walk back again. I then caught a bus to the train station, and a train from that station to my station, upon which I planned to draw Use Case Diagrams for CSSE3004, but instead wrote lists of things within things because Use Case Diagrams are stupid. After arriving home, I ate some chips with lots of vinegar and tomato sauce, phoned Mum, and applied for another Citibank Online Cash Manager account.
09.05.2005 – Monday 9 May – Monday
- Morning
- • Every Monday a Monday comes along, which surely must be one of the greatest curses of our times. We live in hope that one Monday, just one Monday, it will be a Friday – but it is a vain hope, for every Monday brings another, as sure as today comes before tomorrow – and the day after that, except in February. Today, being this week’s Monday, saw me at uni trying to learn about network management. Sadly, at least as far as my learning was concerned, I had only five hours sleep last night, and wasn’t about to concentrate on abstract data representations with a foreign accent.
- Lunch
- • Clint had to buy two fish, because he didn’t have any. Because of this anomaly, Maz and I drove with him to Indooroopilly, where I ate green goo for lunch and Clint bought two fish, because he didn’t have any, and Maz couldn’t buy a stereo because they didn’t have any either.
- Evening
- • I had my weekly CSSE3004 group meeting. We took half an hour to prioritise and rewrite an already written list of twelve or so items. This is a good example of why groups are amazingly inefficient, as I had already prioritised the list in my head in the same order we eventually ended up with, within the first minute or two – and I don’t think I’m especially gifted with client-sponsor interview question list prioritisation. We then spent the remaining half hour of our meeting wasting more time, and putting off until next meeting what we’d already decided to put off until this meeting last meeting. Just think how much more efficient life would be without Monday.
- Night
- • Maz and I witnessed a miracle. With the smallest of code changes, our COMS4200 assignment two supported concurrent file transfers, as required by assignment three. Everything synchronised. It had no problem trying to transfer two identical files at the same time. It handled packet loss. It had heaps of bugs. It was a miracle. It also took me two pages of diagrams and the entire train trip home to figure out how to solve the lost-last-ack problem.
- 1:11am
- • Ned is remarkably cold. Ned thinks this isn’t helped by sitting wrapped in a wet towel with wet hair, but Ned knows it is too cold to get up and change this. Ned also knows he has to get up at half past seven tomorrow. Ned thinks he should go to bed.
10.05.2005 – Tuesday 10 May – Toilet Paper, Vomit & Psychology
- • This morning the people across from me in the train talked about toilet paper. They talked about toilet paper loudly. They talked about toilet paper incessantly. They talked about toilet paper all the way from my station to the city. Then, on the train to uni, a girl vomited. She vomited quite voluminously. But, onto uni – I attended my PSYC1030 lecture, where I learnt nothing (other than that psychologists are clinically stupid) but had a nice coffee milkshake. A coffee milkshake is the only way to survive psychology lectures after less than six hours sleep.
- Evening
- • I spent the afternoon and evening working on COMS4200 and doing my INFS3202 practicals for Friday.
- Night
- • Kieran dropped me off at Maz’s and Maz dropped me off at Bronwen’s, where I spent the night.
- Comment by Maz – Thursday 12 May 2005, 10:15 AM
- That is a perfect description of a psychologist.
11.05.2005 – Wednesday 11 May – Psychologically Surveyed
- 9:05am
- • Arrived at Psychology survey on “Internet Use, Social Anxiety and Attitudes to Therapy”, and completed it in twenty minutes. Sprinkling and cloudy.
- Morning
- • Spent in labs doing CSSE3004 and completing a psychological survey on “Males in Biological Families”.
- Midday
- • Going to psychology survey on “Personality, Abilities and Attitudes”. I just finished a gruelling two-hour timed survey, where I was required to answer several thousand questions as fast as I could. My arms are exhausted and my back hurts. It would appear that I’m a racist homophobe who can’t determine when A does not precede B. Hopefully this information is useful to someone.
- 4pm
- • Had a CSSE group meeting, half hour long. Assigned tasks for SRS, then update the Wiki to reflect this. Now going to work. Before this, I had an “Attitudes” study for Psychology, about animal testing and so on, took half an hour and only I turned up.
12.05.2005 – Thursday 12 May – Management Discord
- • After a far too late night and nowhere near enough sleep, and no sleep on the train or bus either, three hours of CSSE3004 seemed pleasantly unreal and fuzzy. I had two hours of lectures, the first by Ken and the second by Lisa, who hadn’t lectured us yet. I then had an hour-long “client sponsor” interview, where Darren mimicked being the sponsor for our project, and answered questions we’d previously submitted. After this, I woke up Clint, got yoghurt, and walked to the Ville where I bought a veggie sub – the kebab place being shut. I then attended my CSSE3004 tutorial somewhat late, and headed up to argue marks with Ken.
- Ken
- • Ned attended the project office on behalf of Q Group.
Ned informed Ken that six members of Q Group had a clear recollection of Darren telling them that they would not lose marks for the late submission of their initial timesheet, which was supposed to be included in the initial project report.
Ken informed Ned that he had a clear recollection of telling the entire class that marks would only be deducted for late submission, for the initial project report.
Ned informed Ken that Q Group did not contest this, but that Q Group had received seemingly contradictory information verbally from Darren.
Darren was called into the conversation.
Darren informed Ken and Ned that he did not recollect precisely what he had said during the period under discussion.
Ken reminded Ned that he is the course coordinator, and that what he says is definitive. Ken further reminded Ned that late penalties had been applied to all groups as applicable and that another staff member cannot contradict Ken.
Ned stated that, in light of past contradictory information, Q Group would no longer accept anything as definitive unless it is in writing from Ken, including this decision.
Ken informed Ned that he was referring Ned to the course profile, where this decision was already in writing, and additionally informed Ned that he would attempt to give Q Group any decisions and other such commands in writing, but that he may require prompting from time to time. Ken further informed Ned that if he felt it was unreasonable to do so, that he would not do so.
Ned informed Ken that his group saw no other solution to this problem.
Ned and Darren departed the project office.
Ned apologised to Darren personally for putting him on the spot in front of Ken, Lisa, and whoever the young bloke is, and thus concluded an unsuccessful attempt to regain a quarter of a mark. - 5:07pm
- • I am now going to head off to the Ville for dinner, and then head to work. On second thoughts, I might message Clint and find out if I can get yoghurt somehow. On third thoughts, I can always eat my yoghurt later – I should eat a proper meal, and it is rainy and a Thursday so I won’t be able to spend a lot of time checking rooms as they’ll either be full, or somewhere that would require me walking in the rain.
13.05.2005 – Friday 13 May – Black Friday
- • I slept in a bit, getting over seven hours sleep for the first time in ages, and went to the Telstra shop and Govinda’s on the way to uni. At uni, I went and saw Ken again about marks allocation, which was sorted out. He wants to meet the entire group after next Thursday’s lecture. It rained heavily with some lightning, I worked, and Maz and I decided that staying up tonight working on COMS4200 is a better idea than staying up the night before it’s due. This we duly did – spending all night working on our assignment and getting very little actually done. Around four o’clock we collapsed into bed, and by the looks, we’ll have to spend at least another all-nighter on it. As bad as it is, I still think two litres of iced coffee is better than two litres of L.A. Ice Cola.
14.05.2005 – Saturday 14 May – Kickboxing
- • I managed to wake before midday, and caught a train back home, from where I caught another train and bus to Southport. After not getting off where I should have got off, and having to walk for ages, I found the kickboxing venue, and my sister, and spent the next several hours there. The fights were amateur – no one who had fought over five fights was allowed to fight, which meant a lot less gore but not necessarily any less interesting. Both of the Full Boar fighters won, making it a success for the club. It is cool how there’s always a few people wearing Full Boar shirts, so far from home.
- Comment by Damian – Monday 16 May 2005, 4:10 PM
- Maybe in the rarefied world of academia a psychologist can live in a bubble of theories and assure themselves that psychology is actually a science. But where I work, the resident chief pyschologist attests that pyschology is IN NO WAY to be considered an empirical science (as opposed to an experimental art), there are no absolutes about human behaviour apart from certainty of change (or its' potential) and for all his expertise and so on, for all his carefully crafted assessment tools, and all of his skills and knowledge, etc... the poor bastard in the seclusion room at the hospital needs help, and there has to be something, even if it's just the effort, in place to facilitate this. That's a skilled person, accepting the limitations but embracing the intent.
15.05.2005 – Sunday 15 May – Sesame Seeds, Cinnamon Sticks & Cheese
- • Tis the day for forgetting what I did, tralala, tra-la-la. Actually, I’ve remembered. I sorted out papers.
- Night
- • I stayed at Bronwen’s. I had planned to head to uni, but by the time I got to the city, it wasn’t worth it.
16.05.2005 – Monday 16 May – Mt Coot-Tha
- • COMS4200 was its usual self. He skipped the tutorial to work on CSSE3004, and attended a meeting for this, which he had to leave after only twenty minutes so that he could get to the city in time. He stood at the back, in the slipstream around the side of the City Cat, feeling like a dog out of a car window – and the spray lightly on his face.
She arrived, as a beautiful mermaid, gliding through oceans of people as they faded into insignificance.
They walked, talked, drove, and bought pides. They saw the city, as a sea of ghost lights – a stadium extraordinaire, without depth or end. Then they got cold. The funny thing was, Maz and Hollie arrived as they were sitting there, merely metres away – yet neither knew.
17.05.2005 – Tuesday 17 May – Prince Charles Hospital & Gay Mushrooms
- Morning
- • Despite staying in bed longer than expected, I arrived at uni in time to print my PSYC1030 notes, buy a pie and get my ubiquitous milkshake – coffee and vanilla this morning. I then spent an hour at my two-hour PSYC1030 lecture, which was as bad as usual, except perhaps worse. Today we discussed what created gender – despite the answer being incredibly obvious, apparently no psychologist has yet worked it out. The second hour was on measurement – so Maz and I skipped it. Somewhat suitably, the morons from the UQUnion had put hundreds of little pink flags all over the grassy knoll near the main refectory. As far as I could tell, each one represented one gay student. Sadly, I couldn’t think of any way of burning or mowing them down without being mobbed or arrested. People are mushrooms. Union representatives are toadstools. I’m not sure what cane toads are.
- Afternoon
- • I inadvertently caught the most indirect bus possibly to Prince Charles Hospital, which didn’t matter, as I still had to wait ages to be seen. It wasn’t quite what I expected – I lay in the lap of an attractive woman, while she smeared jelly all over me for half an hour. She then asked if I’d be interested in attending a sleep study. They call this an electrocardiogram.
- Night
- • I went to Govinda’s, slept on the train, and arrived home remarkably early – just after dark.
18.05.2005 – Wednesday 18 May – Nokia & Masala Dosa
- Morning
- • I went to the Telstra Shop to send my phone away for repair, and was told that it would be far quicker if I dropped it off at Nokia Care myself, so I did, after spending half an hour finding them.
- Afternoon
- • Kieran drove me into the city and I picked up my phone. Apparently, my complaint was a “2911 – Ringing Tone” or “Int. no alert or vibrate when SMS comes through” complaint, and the fix was, according to Dave, “Open and inspected phone. Cleaned and re-tensioned all contacts. Restored factory defaults. Deleted messages in inbox as it was full and was causing reported fault. Tested in workshop and on air, all okay”. This sounds like an implausible fix, so I’m suspecting the problem will reoccur.
After arriving back from the city, I attended a CSSE3004 group meeting, which was rather uneventful, although the group member who compiled the final document after the meeting made a plethora of changes – which presumably no one else had reviewed or wanted, and which she herself had presumably not had a chance to review beforehand. This makes the entire point of having a group review process useless. All I can do is hope that the changes were for the better, as I had already signed-off on the marking allocation sheet. - Night
- • After a pleasant City Cat ride into the city, I found an Indian food place that does an authentic Masala Dosa. I plan to return.
- • I stayed the night at Bronwen’s.
19.05.2005 – Thursday 19 May – Management Meeting & Hail
- • After the usual three droll hours of management spout, my CSSE3004 group and I had a meeting with Ken. As far as I can tell, the main, and perhaps only, purpose of the meeting was to ascertain whether it was just me being difficult, or if I was representing the wishes of the entire group. I have a feeling that Ken was suspecting I might have been acting on my own, or that I might not have been accurately transferring his thoughts back to the group, so he wanted to make sure everyone knew what was going on. Apart from that, I haven’t a clue what he said, as it was all in some kind of manager-gibberish. It seems it is impossible to get an answer from Ken – or at least one that is related to the question. He simply answers something different in some peculiar tangential manner, and ends up making little or no sense. I then went to Indooroopilly with Kieran and Maz for lunch.
- Night
- • I was just heading towards the Ville to get dinner before work when it began to rain, hail and thunder. This made going to the Ville somewhat suicidal, so I didn’t – instead finding new and innovative ways to use fire escapes to get to work without being struck by lighting or flying ice, although watching people getting soaked on the way to the buses was fun. After work I headed into the city, through piles of snow-like ice, feet thick in places. Roads were closed and cars piled into street signs and stuck traction-less in intersections. Trees were shredded and covered in hail – looking just like freshly fallen snow. It was also quite cold.
- Comment by Lucas – Tuesday 24 May 2005, 10:01 PM
- haha, so true about Ken! At least with Darren he'll tell you he doesn't really know how to answer your question and THEN go onto talk about something totally unrelated.
I just hope this year for you guys they aren't 1/2 hour late for the exam like last year. They teach us about punctuality, time-limits, deadlines, and organisation, and then screw us like that! Nice for showing us by example guys! See my blog entry from a year ago for my bitch and moan: http://lucascosti.com/blog/index.php?blogid=71 - Comment by Mum – Wednesday 25 May 2005, 7:36 PM
- Apart from the ins and outs of computering and all that jazz, the heavens opened up with something a little different for Brisbane and environs. Something to think about, apart from this and that person who give you the , er, um, shifts. Shifts of a different sort. The real world rains, hails, shines. Might as well enjoy it. Suffer it. It is all God. Whether or not you actually LIKE it. Ma
20.05.2005 – Friday 20 May – Transport & Late Night Labs
- • I snoozed my alarm for half an hour before heading reluctantly into uni. There are still piles of ice around the place, and large amounts of shredded leaves. I’ve just finished a veggie roll and milkshake, and am ready to begin INFS3202.
- 3:54pm
- • I just got back from the city, having been to QLD Transport with Maz, to ask about bike licences. I’m going to the Ville for dinner, then to work, quite soon.
- 12:19am
- • Maz, Clint and I are sitting in the labs working on an INFS3202 assignment. I have eaten five or so mint patties. We worked through to about 3 AM then went back to Maz’s to sleep. New Rembo reboot system is in place, with a warning.
- Comment by Jojo – Tuesday 24 May 2005, 9:08 AM
- the new rembo is nice isnt it. it gives you >30 secs to save and run away.
- Comment by Mum – Wednesday 25 May 2005, 7:39 PM
- 5 or so mint patties! ! Holy Mackerel, one is toxic.
21.05.2005 – Saturday 21 May – Meeting and Lazing
- • I woke up at 9:30 and caught a bus from Maz’s into uni where I met my CSSE3004 group just on the way into the engineering library. We had a meeting through to about half past twelve. I then went down labs and drew up a draft entity relationship diagram for the group in Visio, and am now going to phone Bronwen and try not to think about uni.
- Evening
- • I spent a lovely evening lazing about doing very little and repressing any thoughts of uni.
22.05.2005 – Sunday 22 May – Star Wars & Sarah’s Birthday
- • I slept in until midday. I then walked to the city and wandered around. “Star Wars Episode III – Revenge of the Sith” was sold out at South Bank until half past nine, so I had a nice Indian meal from a place in West End, before watching the movie. It’s surprisingly good – still immature and simplistic, but with a reasonably developed plot, earning it two Old Boys, or three quarters of a True Lie.
23.05.2005 – Monday 23 May – Networks & Information Systems
- • I attended my COMS4200 lectures, during which we were given an extension until next Wednesday. First, Maz and I thought the assignment was due last Wednesday, then found out it was due this Wednesday, and now it’s due next Wednesday. This is a good thing, as we really didn’t have time to complete it. I then spent the rest of the day starting my INFS3202 assignment – it is proving slower than anticipated. I stayed up a bit later than I probably should have.
24.05.2005 – Tuesday 24 May – Psychology & Bad Moods
- • I didn’t get as much sleep last night as I would have liked, and can feel it today. Two hours of psychology lectures probably didn’t help, although the milkshake did. I used the hour between my psychology lectures and their tutorial to finish off my psychology lab report, and submitted that just before the tutorial. I’m now going to try to get some work done on my INFS3202 assignment, which has fallen behind schedule and is proving more time consuming than anticipated.
- 8pm
- • I am in a very bad mood. This semester is two weeks too long. It should have ended last week. This week is too much. My INFS3202 assignment is proving to be horrible. I wanted to go see a movie tonight, but that fell through. I then wanted to go see what sounded like an interesting selection of weirdness at a film club, but that fell through too. I then walked to the Ville where I bought dinner – which hasn’t fallen through yet but I’m sure it will. On the way back I ran into several hundred stupid uni students, dressed up and boarding buses. It was the perfect opportunity to eliminate the lot, but unfortunately the most lethal items I had with me were two litres of chocolate milk and a punnet of mixed vegetable satay. I can only hope an overpass will collapse while all the buses are on it, and they will all fall through into the river and be eaten by Russian sharks. Actually, that’s no good because the sharks will be happy. Maybe the sharks will choke on all the tinsel. Now I go back to working on my assignment, as I continue to exist surrounded by despair and gloom, hoping that something terrible happens to everyone else, to lighten my night.
- Midnight
- • I am starting to lose track of things here. I can’t remember what I was editing, or why, so I’m just using the undo feature to get back to the last state that actually compiled.
- 1:40am
- • So tired, can’t think. Can’t remember what I was supposed to do. Can’t code. Going to Maz’s place to sleep.
- Comment by io – Saturday 28 May 2005, 2:17 PM
- Those college students you speak of boarding buses on Upland Road; it was the ICC Pubcrawl.
25.05.2005 – Wednesday 25 May – Oracle is bad, Tomorrow is Today
- • Kieran collected Maz and I, and we returned to the joy and happiness that abounds within the walls of GPS.
- 2:22pm
- • I just got back from Indooroopilly, where Kieran and I had lunch. Now, back to INFS3202, which I’ve been working on all morning.
- 4:04pm
- • Going to walk to the Ville for food and then go to work. Maz is heading off with Kieran, also to work.
- 9:07pm
- • Here I am back in the labs after an uneventful night at work. How happy I am that I can once again be with my SQL.
- 3:53am
- • After spending hours trying to fix a stupid, spastic, horrible Oracle error, I am now back to actually getting some work done. Kieran has just left.
- 5:45am
- • Showered and cleaned teeth – and am now feeling somewhat more human.
- 8:39am
- • So tired. Going for a walk and to look for food.
- Morning
- • CSSE3004 is not what I wanted this morning – I am so tired. Ken refuses to release any tutorial solutions. Ken refuses to provide a sample exam. Ken refuses to release past exams. Ken refuses to provide the sample exam question lecture slides we were shown today. I am paying for this course, and Ken is making it as ineffectual as he possibly can. Ken must go.
- Afternoon
- • More INFS3202. What a horrible assignment – Java is a horrible language, and JSP has to be the worst server-side language possible. Oracle is a despicable joke, and Tomcat ridiculously slow.
- 3:42pm
- • Off for food then lecture to see Kieran lecturing. In retrospect, he did not do any lecturing, but I did get a free chocolate bar.
- 5:54pm
- • About to head off to work. In labs with Kieran, Clint, Marcus, having just got back from the Microsoft .NET demonstration.
26.05.2005 – Thursday 26 May – Sleepy
- Midnight
- • Well, I’m finally home, and I can finally get some sleep – something I haven’t been getting much of recently. As far as I can tell, most of today happened yesterday, so there’s really nothing more to say – see yesterday.
27.05.2005 – Friday 27 May – Oracle Dies, I Electrocute
- • I woke up when my alarm went off, and made one of those clever decisions one makes in the period between waking and becoming – that I would sleep in. I carefully weighed up the amount of work I had to complete on my assignment, the length of time it would take me, including how long it would take me to get to uni in the first place, and then I realised it was very cold. A few hours later, when it wasn’t so cold, I trained into uni, refreshed and ready to do a last minute panic for INFS3202 – and panic I did. Oracle, the crap joke of a database that it is, only worked one in a hundred attempts. It would seem it can’t handle being used as a database by more than one person at a time. I had done most of the work in my all-night stint, and only had testing and a few minor modifications to make. Had Oracle not failed most of the time, I could easily have done what I needed to do, but it is very difficult to test a modification that could have ramifications all over the place when Oracle will fail after three queries, repeatedly. There were people all over the place swearing and cursing. If Oracle are trying to give students exposure to their product by placing them in universities, I think they should reconsider. I will now attempt never to use an Oracle database, and most certainly couldn’t recommend one to anyone.
- 4pm
- • It is funny how stressful deadlines are. I submitted my INFS3202 assignment, hopefully working but largely untested, a minute or so before its four o’clock deadline – and I only forgot to submit one file. The lead-up to the deadline was not fun. Watching minutes tick by, database connection exception by database connection exception, interspersed with the occasional time when I could actually connect to the database, wasn’t my first choice on how to spend the evening. Looking on the bright side, I now have database error catching code in my assignment. I was sorely tempted to loop connecting until one actually worked, and keep a pool of spare connected connections for when it died, but I figured the people having noisy nervous breakdowns beside me would kill me if they found out.
- 5pm
- • I headed in to work after a quick trip to the Ville for Spaghetti Napolitana. Work involved much rushing around campus, testing things, experiencing electric shocks, and generally enjoying myself. I’m beginning to think that staying up all night occasionally is good – I felt rejuvenated and happy. Even when I should have been angry, upset and stressed, I saw it as a challenge and was amused by the anger of others.
- Night
- • The two men sitting behind me held a heated discussion about train control systems. They were particularly, and vehemently, interested in how they determine the length of a train, and what happens when a train isn’t that length. Their favourite phrase was “no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, that’s not what I’m saying”. A close second was “no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, what I’m saying is...” As exciting as their argument was, it couldn’t match the drunken football fans, who screamed, yelled, and either passed out or drank more in their admirable attempt at achieving a state as close as possible to that which any sane person would avoid, otherwise known as blotto. The bloke who woke up his passed-out girlfriend by blocking all her airways seemed to be a particularly innovative and caring type – I can’t help wondering why they never taught me that in first aid.
- 3:45am
- • It is a quarter to four, according to “Banshee Screamer”, my clock down in the corner where the mouse pointer inexplicably jumps to when it runs off the edge of its pad – and I’m nearly out of jellybeans, so I should probably consider bed. In other news, Google have approved my next ad payment – but it breaks their terms of use to mention the amount. I suppose sleep must be got, so to get it I shall go.
- 5am
- • I’d have thought I’d be tired after getting very little sleep all week, but apparently not. I am, however, now going to bed – tired or not. I’m also nearly frozen. I will use the “push” technique of sleep enforcement – setting an alarm so that I will only get five and a half hours sleep. This will mean that, eventually, I will be tired early enough to go to bed early. I may patent the idea (if I don’t die from sleep deprivation or jellybeans first).
- Comment by Lucas – Sunday 29 May 2005, 10:36 PM
- I've used oracle at uni for 3 assignments in seperate courses over the past 3 years and really haven't much troubles... well at least nowhere near the amount you seem to be having!
Maybe the DBAs are on holidays...
28.05.2005 – Saturday 28 May – Engagement Party
- • I slept in, having stayed up all last night and most of the week.
- Evening
- • I entrained for the city, grabbed something to eat from Subway, and headed off to an engagement party.
29.05.2005 – Sunday 29 May – The Sea Inside, but not the Gold Coast
- • Today I had planned to go to the Gold Coast. I even went as far as walking to the city with nothing more than a towel. This seemed like a good idea at the time, but after wandering pleasantly around the city for a few hours, it began to get cold.
- Evening
- • I went and saw “The Sea Inside” at Palace Centro. It was quite a powerful and moving movie, earning itself just more than an Interpreter – one and one tenth to be precise, which somehow works out as eleven sixteenths of a True Lie.
- Night
- • I spent the night with Bronwen at her place.
30.05.2005 – Monday 30 May – Uni, Unhappily
- • COMS4200 lecture, submit SQL for INFS3202, COMS4200 assignment until late broken only by a meeting for CSSE3004, Maz’s new car to McDonald’s, then home.
- • Demoi is the plural of demos, which is not the plural of demo.
31.05.2005 – Tuesday 31 May – Psychology and Networks
- • PSYC1030 lectures in the morning, followed by a tute of the same where my assignment was returned. I then spent the evening and half of the night working on COMS4200, writing an RFC for the reliable file transfer over UDP protocol I’ve developed. Maz and I left for his place sometime after two o’clock.
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