Most Textbooks Gather Dust.

I used to wonder how much of the stuff I learned in school I could apply in real life. My conclusion was that I could take just bits and pieces of the things I learned in my 100- and 200- level classes and apply it randomly to certain situations, but for the most part much of the statistics, theories and facts I scraped from various lectures and textbooks frankly could've stayed there and I'd be no worse off.

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Now that I'm almost finished with the RT program here at FHSU though, I'm glad that the vast majority of the information I've been cramming into my head will be of some use. There are still tons of material that probably could have been left out as I believe (for now, anyway) that they will have no bearing whatsoever in what will be my daily professional life. But I guess if instructors only taught the absolute bare essentials, all of our classes would only last a half-hour each. They're getting paid to teach, and might as well fill up the time with something. In the meantime, many of my $100+ textbooks sit and gather dust because most of the material we're tested over come straight from the PowerPoint presentations we go over during lecture.

Yay.

At any rate, I tend to dump most superfluous information minutes after I take tests. If you ask me what the last questions was on some exam we just took, there's a good chance I will already have wiped it from my memory.

I'm not sure if that's a good thing. Probably not.

Lastly, apologies for the late update today (come to think of it, I've been kinda off since this weekend). I'm currently gearing up for the second half of the week: outline due at midnight tonight, presentation and test tomorrow, then the fourth and final test of the week on Friday. Need to finish strong.

Lent Update.

It's Day 29 of Lent -- time for an official update to my list of things that I gave up a month ago:

1. Eating "land meat". Happy to say that I've been getting all my protein from water-dwelling animals, and not really missing the meat much -- although a recent trip to L&L Hawaiian Barbecue did an excellent job of testing my will. I gritted my teeth, passed on my usual chicken katsu, and ordered fried mahi-mahi instead which was actually pretty tasty. Success!


2. Drinking carbonated beverages. During a moment of weakness while helping my sister and brother-in-law move into their new house in Kirkland, I broke down and had a bottle of Coke and later, a half-can of Sprite. What can I say -- it was hot and I was in dire need of rehydration. I know I should've resisted the icy cold refreshment and gotten some water though. Fail!


3. Pleasures of the flesh. It's not like I'm in a situation where I can partake in this on a regular basis anyway, so it's been relatively easy to maintain my abstinence. (Still, the mind drifts.) Success!


4. Cursing. I have my good days and bad days. On the good days I sound like some sitcom family from the 50s. On the bad days I could make paint curl and peel from the walls with the sheer force of profanity spewing from my mouth. The important thing to take away from this so far is that I have stopped cursing casually, but I still have major problems with four-letter words when I get irritated or frustrated. Still working on it, but I'd say this particular one is a bust. Fail!

Saw this clever little Venn diagram on the always-entertaining Indexed and thought it was appropriate for the post:

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I consider myself squarely in the A circle, desperately trying to make it to the B area. But not too much longer now. Hopefully I can improve by Easter.