impossibly polite

Current Mood: adventurous
Current Music: "Thunder and Lightning" by Phil Collins

Goals for Thanksgiving Break:

sleep 10 consecutive hours
read a book for fun
spend the night at David's house
watch a movie I have not seen or play a video game
eat Gold Star at least twice
visit Amelia HS (if possible)
NOT feel guilty for wasting an entire day
do just a tiny little bit of homework or studying?

Well, here in just a few hours I'm going to close up shop here in Hill 326. For the first time since August 10th, I'm headed home. I'm such a loser...I can't live without internet for more than a few days, and I'm already thinking about turning my computer off and not being on AIM. I suppose there's that cellular phone I have that I rarely use. If you want to talk to me, that might be a better outlet for the next few days. This of course means email and blogging will be reduced, that goes without saying.

So...the Amtrak. I'm a little worried, to be honest, going to the station and finding my train and seat and everything for the long ride home alone. I kinda just want to get back to home (not this confusing nomenclature thing again), eat some warm chili, and get some real rest away from this bastion of black and gold. Sometimes, I just plain get sick of Purdue for a bit. That said, as much as I want a smooth and uneventful ride home, I secretly hope something exciting happens. You know, something like Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. At least a daring high-speed train-roof escape with a tunnel along the way?

>visual communication
Our final COM project is a group speech, asking for a (hypothetical) $2,000 grant to help Purdue in some way. We chose to tackle the problem of flyers being all over the campus, and our proposed solution is to create some billboards. As part of the proposal, we're required to give a detailed plan with a visual aid. Sunday, Kristin gave me her rough sketch of the billboards (with the materials and dimensions), and happened to mention offhand how it would be great to have a better sketch.

I'm the only engineer in the group, and have spent the entire semester learning CATIA, a $20,000 industry standard autoCAD program for designing and modeling things. In 3-d. Like, creating a model of a Boeing 747, down to the rivets (in fact, that's what my professor does).

So I grabbed the hand sketch and make a crude model using CATIA in about half an hour like it was no big deal. I even drew it to scale with tolerances and dimensions, and named all the sub-parts like we were taught. It's simple, but it's pretty and I like it. It felt great to really put my engineering skills to use.

>winter time
I firmly support finishing one holiday before starting another. No Christmas lights or trees until Dec. 1st. That said, with the recent chilly weather (and flurries) 'round Purdue, I'm starting to get in the Christmas-y mood. A quick look at some December things:

Dec 10: Going to the Purdue Musical Organization's Annual Christmas Show with my new girlfriend Jenny the same day of the Ship of Fools corporate gig

Dec 12-17th: 3/5 finals (Calc, CS, CGT)

-> Future post: Christmas List

Dec 26: Fellow Fool John "Freshman" Tubergen has invited me to go on a four day skiing trip with him over Christmas break to his private ski resort cottage to carve up the slopes. I haven't been to the slopes in over two years! The slopes beckon!