So I got my physics test back two days ago as expected. Also as expected, I got rocked. How bad did I do you ask? I did bad enough that I’m not going to tell you how bad I did. In fact, my raw test grade was bad enough to put me in tears. In situations as dire as this, your last ray of hope is the almighty curve.

Luckily for me, I’m not the only one received the exam like a knee to the groin. The class average was a 51. Out of 100! So after the curve I’m (thankfully) walking away with a B. The obvious goal is always an A, but I’m going to take my B and shut the hell up.

Next week is my physics final. I’m pretty worried about it after this last exam. Looks like another week of burying myself in my physics textbook. Once again though, there is a silver lining. I’ve already taken the finals for my physics lab (why the hell is there a final in a lab??) and for my digital design class.

I think a 4.0 in physics is pretty much gone now, so I guess I push for a 3.67 now, but I think even that’s being pretty unrealistic. –sigh–

OK, so before I took my first exam I was a little worried that I wouldn’t do well. Then when I somehow managed to pull out an A, some of you seemed less impressed with my whining:final score ratio. Well I took the second exam almost 2 weeks ago, and it seems to contrast the first exam in almost every way.

For exam 1 I allowed myself to fall behind and spent the last week & a half in a panic trying to catch up on all the material. For exam 2, though I didn’t fully keep up, I was never more than a chapter behind the material (not good, but better!).

The biggest challenge prior to exam 1 was quantity of content. I simply had a lot to get through. The biggest challenge of exam 2 was comprehension. The content it getting tougher and I’m spending more time getting through mathematical proofs.

In exam 1 I went in extremely worried. For exam 2 I had kept a reasonable pace, completed and understood all of the sample problems. I was feeling pretty good about exam 2.

After all of my worrying, by the time I finished my first exam I was feeling much better. I obviously wasn’t expecting an A, but I knew I did OK. As for the second exam… well, not so much. I took the entire alotted time to complete the test, which is not something I normally do and I left feeling quite icky. I can’t imagine pulling out a grade I’ll be happy with on this one.

In 3 hours I should be in physics class. Today we should be getting our graded exams returned. I’m not looking forward to it…

Well I guess the news first. I got my physics exam today. Seems like I’m not dropping the class just yet. I got a 95 out of a 100. I’m a little annoyed because it really should’ve been a 96 as that one point was taken off for something I did that was immensely stupid.

I was the 2nd one finished with the test (there were about 150 people in the lecture hall), and I’m kicking myself for not going over the test before I turned it in. Taking my time would have likely won me those last 4 points. But I’ll take this and appreciate that I’ve got room for improvement.

That was the “up”. The “down” came, surprisingly enough, in my digital design class. Last week I went to class, sat down, and prepared for two hours of high-bandwidth data transfer into my noodle. When the professor walked in much of the class got up to hand in that weeks homework. I on the other hand simply thought to myself, “There was homework due today?” I then spent the first hour of lecture frantically doing the homework assignment.

Yesterday the homeworks were returned to us. I got a 60, out of a 100. Now here’s the worst part of it. Only one question was actually wrong, only 4 points. The rest of the 36 points were stupid, stupid mistakes because I rushed. An extra bit here, double negation there, and an entire question (20 points) answered in binary when the question clearly asked for a final answer in decimal. Stupid.

I spent the previous week living and breathing out my physics book. My panic-induced studying paid off, however it cost me more than I expected. What really bothers me is that there was no reason not to have done my homework. The digital design class was supposed to be my 4.0 class. This isn’t a problem of of not understanding the material. This is exactly what I talked about two days ago. Perfect of example of me being a shitty student.

I won’t kill myself over it this time. This is supposed to be a learning experience; well I’m learning. Better organization, better studying habits, better time management. And slowly: better Kane.

The homework is just a small downer. The physics exam is a big, big upper. Physics is only going to get tougher, but it definitely helps to have survived the first hurdle. Happy day.

You know what else? I grabbed some Chinese food for dinner tonight. No joke, here’s my fortune:

Even the grand oracle is cheering me on. Nice.

Since I didn’t bomb physics I should reward myself, don’t you think? Hmm… maybe on Sunday I’ll…