Monday/Tuesday – Day 266/267
Posted on 29th April 2013
Monday and Tuesday were my last days of classes. Unfortunately things didn’t run quite according to plan.
Monday was particularly intense with a number of major things due. Physics in the morning was passable. My midterm for Networks after not so much, more of a disaster than anything. As much as I knew the subject decently, two questions out of six I had no idea on (a graph I recognized but didn’t recall the details of an an acronym I couldn’t remember were the basis for large segments point wise).
I was pretty upset after that and so was a little too downbeat in my final recitation, especially when four out of my nine students didn’t show up, having been under the impression that the recitation wasn’t happening (last two days of semester). However it still ran ok (not my best work this semester) and the survey results gave reason to hope! Still plenty to work on though as an educator, but I’m looking forward to the challenge.
The next part of my day, I’ll actually cover in my next post and it is deserving of it’s own full block of space. I’ll leave it at that.
I missed glee rehearsal due to the above, and University Choral Society was done for the semester, so I chilled with Sarah at Hillel for a while, practiced some piano and polished off my last physics assignment. Not too bad.
Tuesday. Last day of classes at Penn. Physics in the morning and everything came together. Two semesters of work for two difficult looking equations. Finally we could present a complete classical picture of electrodynamics for a point particle. Simple sounding but the equation was hideous.
Singing with Brian was excellent, despite the remnants of my cough. Didn’t quite have my song perfected, but it was in decent shape for Friday’s performance!
Spent the afternoon sleeping and just enjoying a little freedom before the monster exam to come. At around five PM I headed to office hours. I perhaps frustrated Dennis a little because I spent much of my time discussing with my students matters a little unrelated and also assisted a student or two with higher level coursework. One noteworthy student was Shilpa Kannan, a delightful person with a talent for the material. I did my best to push her towards computer science for which she displayed obvious flair, however I feel the Sauron’s burning eyes were too strong: she was well in Wharton’s grasp. At the end of the day, all students were attended to, and my final office hours drew to a close.
Tuesday night was my last proper Glee rehearsal, and our final ‘Afterglow’ brought a few tears to my eye. Not quite the end of the story with Glee, but it was symbolic nonetheless. It ended a little past midnight and thus, so too did my night end there.