Respected Associates

My classmates are stupid.

Ok, let me back up a second here. For the most, I go to school with a LOT of inspired, intelligent, and brilliantly talented undividuals. They constantly churn out solid work that makes me feel exorbitantly jealous. I feel really lucky to be working alongside these fellow students I've come to know for the last four years (well, three and three quarters). A couple have become reliable friends, and a lot more are a pleasure to work with, trustworthy, and sincere in their feedback to help you to complete a project.

And many of them are very, very dumb. Let me list the ways.

First off, drinking on campus is an offense that can get you expelled, no questions asked. And yet some people still choose to do so - on those late Friday nights where everyone really wants to unwind but they need to stay in the studio to catch up with impending deadlines, they bring in a bit of beer or wine to sip while getting work done. No one gets drunk - at least that I've seen. And I kind of see where they're coming from, and while I wouldn't really say that I condone the behaviour, it doesn't bother me too much. They usually stick to the back corner and have the cans obscured from any security guard that saunters by. What is the most IDIOTIC thing, though, is that they leave their cans and bottles in the recycling. At the top. In the very studio they were drinking in and work in every day. Ugh. And at this point, they're a mere semester from completion. How RETARDED is that? Needless to say, the cans were found and a general warning was issued to all the 4th year students in the program. To risk getting thrown out this late in the program... Ugh.

When we first started attending, we were told by pretty much every single instructor and senior student we ran across that theft was a big problem, so don't leave anything valuable left unattended. Someone broke into the Jewelry department and made of with some $12,000 worth of tools, supplies, and completed projects. Then two years ago, a girl in our very program had her purse stolen while she slipped out of class for five minutes and there were students next door.  Last semester, I had to go and grab something, and I asked a classmate/firend if he'd be in the studio for a bit to watch my stuff, and when I returned he was outside taking a smoke break with no one left in the classroom to watch over the half-dozen open laptops, mine included. They weren't taken, of course, but I was so pissed off. He said that of course no one would take anything, and I reminded him of the previous two thefts, which he brushed off. I was angry, but maybe he was right.

Two months later, though, while all the students were in one classroom for a lecture, someone slipped into the empty class and went through a purse, stole another's backpack, and took someone else's iPod. VINDICATION! But the real display of stupidity was how the backpack that was stolen had the owner's laptop in it. A brand new Macbook Pro. Left unattended. For an hour and a half lecture, in an empty room. Points to the theives for being ballsy right in the middle of the morning. Points taken away for those people leaving their stuff behind and expecting it to be fine. It has many times before, sure, but it was only an eventuality. Again, I feel vindication for always bringing my important goods with me.

The real kicker to that one, though, is that despite the security presence on campus, including cameras, the only result of the theft was a stern reminding from said security to not leave anything unattended, some printouts of that message left around campus, and a department head taking that same email we'd all received and forwarding it to us again. Bravo. No one was caught, of course.

A third degree of stupidness lies in some of our own criticism's for the program.  Everyone has been getting frustrated with the program, feeling like we're being churned through a meat grinder, that the work is overly intense and there are some flaws with how the degree is setup. So at some point, the two most senior teachers in our program took the morning of a class to get everyone to discuss how things were going. There was a lot of legitimate, constructive feedback that people replied with. Some academic concerns, the way courses were structured, how feedback was given... A lot of legit stuff. But one student or group of students brought up that there were a problem with due dates in the courses that features semester-long assignments. They wanted due dates for smaller components of the projects along the way, rather than everything all at once at the end, to avoid a major rush in the last stretch to get everything completed. And I agree, I know I'd get my work done a lot quicker and more consistently if I had those deadlines. But.

I think it's damn unprofessional to bring that up. Yes, of course those dates would help, but we should have some amount of self-discipline to move things alone. When we get out of school, there won't be the hammer of academia hanging over our head, threatening us with poor grades. We need to suck it up and get the work done, one piece at a time. We should be setting those smaller deadlines and holding ourselves accountable for those missed dates. Not asking someone else to set those for us. Responsibility, people. It's time to get some.

On a side note, there's one student that's really outspoken about the workload of the program and many small (and not so small) grievances with how things are run. And where was she that morning when we were all together, discussing issues and trying to come up with a solution? She was next door. I told her about what was going on. She said something to the effect of "I can't deal with that right now, I have too much to do." I lost a LOT of respect for her right then and there. I don't ever want to be that kind of person that complains with no intent to fix a problem.

Our fourth and final observance of stupidity, one for each year and this one indeed most appropriate for the fourth... Is that people are starting to burn out. Which is totally understandable - I'm feeling it too. We're all so close to the end, we're losing steam, we just want to be DONE. And what are most people doing? Starting to not attend class. There are 40 people in my major, about 6 of which (plus myself) consistantly arrive every morning. There are maybe 25-30 people that show up, sauntering in and out during the day. That means a quarter of the students are starting to go AWOL. And when we're so close to being done... Ugh. In one course, my one friend hasn't talked to a prof in over a month, and we're supposed to do it once every class. There's another student that's only been in half a dozen times over the semester out of all of her classes, and we're not at the half way point. The thing is... After you've missed three classes, you're on grounds to fail the course. We're lucky that our profs are a bunch of softies, but still. It ain't so bright of students to be giving up this late in the show. One, for the sake of FAILING and not being able to graduate so close from the end, and two for the fact that this is the last chance we have to get whatever we can out of our education. I'm tired too, but I'm not going to risk giving in or not taking advantage of whatever I can.

Sigh. Maybe I'm too old/mature for most of these people, or maybe I'm boring and rigid and predictable. Maybe I'm getting worked up over nothing. But as a whole, it makes me sigh. I don't want anyone to fail, I have enjoyed working alongside them, and hope to graduate alongside them too. We have our differences, and I guess whatever works for them is what counts. Some days, though, I just don't get it.

Just a couple days ago, I had a small discussion with my friend that hasn't talked to our prof in more than a month. I reminded him of the fact, told him that I just wants him to make the most of his time that's left. He came right out and told me that he hates talking to me about schoolwork. He said that to me "it's all so heavy". Made me feel like... A stressed out guy. Which I know I am. It was kind of like I briefly looked into a mirror to see who I am. It sucks that I'm that guy.
-Cril

He drinks a Whiskey drink, he drinks a Vodka drink
He drinks a Lager drink, he drinks a Cider drink
He sings the songs that remind him of the good times
He sings the songs that remind him of the best times

Angus & Julia Stone - Tubthumping

The Drill

So. I've just been de-wisdom toothed. All of them at once. Which, apparently, was three - I already had one extracted some time ago, and memory decided that that was worth concealing from me. But it's been quite the buildup of anxiety for me, because my one sister was violently ill and took two weeks to recover, while my other sister was up and on her feet within the same day of the operation. I had no idea where I'd land.

Fortunately, it looks like I've landed in the latter camp. I'm feeling quite well - not a lot of pain, not sick, fairly lucid all the way around.

I should mention, though, that I was put under for this little operation. My first time that I've been under IV sedation, and it was an interesting experience. They set me up first - breathing tube, those little round patches placed on your chest with wires, and a little clamp for your finger. After getting me rigged up, the assistant left while we waited for the surgeon to appear. It took me a few minutes of watching the monitor itself to understand that the top graph was my pulse and that the low one was my respiratory rate. I got my pulse down to 51 at its lowest, usually around 60, and my respiration to 6. Whatever that number means. It was actually really fascinating for me - the dental assistant gave me the TV remote so I could watch something while I waited, but I didn't bother because I was way more intrigued by my own vitals. Noticed how my pulse jumped to ~80 whenever I stretched, and how my breathing varied when I talked. How both naturally slowed when I played through some more comforting memories in my head. It was really cool.

Eventually, the surgeon arrived and inserted the IV into my hand. That was pretty nervewracking - I was pretty anxious, as I'm not overly fond of needles and I'd never had this particular proceedure done to me before. But I kept an eye on my pulse, and kept it below 65 while I felt the cold metal puncture my skin, how odd it felt to have it travel in, and how alarmingly easy it moved once it found its way into the artery. Psychologically terrifying in a way, and physically peculiar in an other. Then they hooked me up to the sedation drugs, and I remember watching my vision start to feel wobbly before I woke up at the end of the surgery from what felt like was the middle of a nap.

Almost as if my sleep cycle was stuck somewhere in the middle - I was conscious but groggy. Didn't have an issue putting on and tying my shoes, but the discussions going on around me where wrapped in a layer of fog, and Earth's gravitational pull seemed a bit... Wobbly. But unlike the many stories I've heard about people doing hi-larious things after coming around (reportedly, my one sister laughed at everything, while the other sister stopped to take a short nap on every lamp post between the dentist's office and the car), I did nothing overly noteworthy.

It's an odd thought that I don't remember anything between starting the sedation and the end of the procedure, especially considering that I was supposed to have been in a semi-alert state. I feel like I've been robbed of some of the precious time of my consciousness - I experienced something, and then it was immediately whisked away from me. And then we rewind several paragraphs to where I had forgotten that I had already had a wisdom tooth extracted before, and maybe it shouldn't be so shocking. I know that my memory is not one of the sharpest tools in my inventory, but I guess the extreme immediacy of this one unnerves me a bit.

Aside from that, I'm feeling fairly recovered. I need to be under supervision for 24hrs following the 'operation', two very good friends got me to and from the dentist and have been taking awesome care of me, even letting me stay the night. I've been taking some meds, watched a lot of Top Gear and saw Looper (which was a freaking awesome movie - there were several really great moments in there with some neat twists and clever storytelling. I give it 9/10).

I ate some yogurt and applesauce in the afternoon, and then my one friend made spaghetti for dinner. Now, I'm technically supposed to be on nothing but soft foods for 3-5 days, but she makes a mighty fine spaghetti. Luckily for me, they recently got a baby-food processor, so we shoveled some pasta and spaghetti sauce into it, and blended it up real good. And man, it was weird. The tastes were no longer isolated, but merged together, and there was zero sense of texture aside from that of mush. I knew I was eating spaghetti, and it tasted like spaghetti. But my head had a small freak-out, because without the textures I was expecting and the way the flavours of the tomato sauce, meat and pasta were supposed to be allocated... It didn't quite make sense. After that bowl of pasta-paste, I ended up eating a very small bowl of Ye Traditional Spaghetti, being super careful with my chewing so I didn't upset anything.

Anyways. 'Tis late. I need to sleep. One thing's for sure, though, it's super-awesome to have people that are totally willing to care for you and help out when you need to get this kind of work done. Warm and fuzzies, people. Warm and fuzzies everywhere.
-Cril

I've been to the dentist a thousand times
So I know the drill
I smooth my hair, sit back in the chair
But somehow, I still get the chills

"Have a seat," he says pleasantly
As he shakes my hand and practically laughs at me
"Open up nice and wide," he says peering in
And with a smirk he says "Don't have a fit, this will just pinch a bit."
As he tries not to grin

When hygienists leave on long vacations
That's when dentists scream and lose their patience

Talking only brings the toothaches on me
'Cause I say the stupidest things
So if my resolve goes south
I'll swallow my pride with an aspirin and shut my mouth

Owl City - Dental Care