Wednesday/Thursday – Day 254/255
April 16, 2013
Wednesday I woke up even worse for the weather. My body was telling me it was time to get more sleep. I slept in a little and then at 10AM headed down to the Moore labs to work with Charu Jangid on some homework due later that day. She showed up pretty late as always but this time I had been expecting it and so wasn’t too unprepared.
Once the work was done we headed to class but soon realized that given that the TAs were lecturing, we weren’t going to gain much out of being there, so we headed out for lunch together. As we arrived at the counter of the chocolate artisserie, Charu realized that her wallet was missing and sped off to find it, leaving me alone with two hot chocolates.
By the time she got back (without her stolen wallet), it was time for my security class. Again, nothing special today but the professor mentioned that he wanted to speak to me again soon. I wondered about what but thought it would definitely be wise to go ahead.
Following that, I had a little time to get a little sleep, texting Joseph to let him know I was too sick for the first bit of rehearsal. At 5:30 I woke up for a quick dinner at Hillel before a Time to Shine Rehearsal. That was disastrous for me as it required me to exert my voie and certainly didn’t make me feel any better. Pretty much as soon as it was up I headed to bed, my work left stagnant on the table.
Thursday I wasn’t feeling much better and a little disappointed that I was sick at this time. Spring Fling, the most important student party of the year, was just around the corner and I wasn’t up to attending. The OCP was hosting a fantastic dinner and I was worried that I wouldn’t even be able to make that.
Most of the day passed in a blur, Physics in the morning, plenty of work in the afternoon, and another nap. I was intent on. Additionally Thursday afternoon we held another TA meeting in which plenty of work was divvied out. I got back to my room and set to work until a message from JHo arrived inviting me to go see Avenue Q with him. I gladly agreed to go and had a wonderful evening enjoying Vanessa Lam as Christmas Eve and Anya Lichtenstien as Kate Monster (the best performer of the evening).
After that it was back to bed in an attempt to recover on time for the weekend.
Monday/Tuesday – Day 252/253
As my workload ramps up, my time at Penn is slowly ramping down. I’ve started chucking out the things I don’t need and have arranged face to faces with a number of people I still stand to set things in order with. Though it may seem early, there’s a lot to be done in between now and the start of May. It’s a particularly weird situation because Penn is now starting to feel like home more than home in Melbourne. Probably a good thing I leave now then.
Monday things were pretty crazy as always. This was heightened by the fact that I was literally panicking over my Physics exam. I skipped all my classes and recitation was a little underwhelming, I just didn’t have the energy to make it as wonderful today. Hopefully my students forgive me. I count two sub-my-standards labs thus far in a semester of 14 weeks.
Monday night I took some time off the study for a Glee Club Gig at the Kimmel Performing Arts Center, the most important arts venue in Philly. We were performing on a sidestage for the acapella festival and ran a forty-five minute set. It was actually quite enjoyable but my mind was elsewhere. From there I raced back for a short dinner at Hillel before it was off to the music buildings for Brahms’ Requiem rehearsal. That went ok but again, my mind was on Maxwell.
I got back to my room and felt sick stressed and exhausted so I decided better to go to sleep early and work on the physics in the morning.
Tuesday I was up at 6:30AM studying for the test and things weren’t actually going as poorly as the could’ve. I was understanding the material even if I wasn’t exactly capable of drawing many unique solutions or new thoughts from it, at least I had the basic idea of what was going on.
A few hours later I headed off to the exam itself and sat down. From my perspective the paper was a disaster. Questions I had no idea how to solve and important things I had forgotten. I did my best and managed at least to write down a few things for each question on the paper, hoping it would be enough to scrape by.
My afternoon was planned to be a bit more free but unfortunately, the stress that I had caused myself with physics got the better of me. By now I was thoroughly sick. I went to my singing lesson with Brian and had to cease after my warmups. My body just wasn’t taking it. Unfortunately, the repercussions of the exam would last a while.
I went straight to sleep, only waking when it was time for another Glee gig. This was another internal awards ceremony for esteemed alumni. I could hardly croak out a tune, and during the performance my voice cracked audibly. I should not have been singing. Thankfully, Scott Ventre had my back, covering me as a baritone despite his lovely tenor sound.
Following that I escaped briefly for dinner at Hillel before it was back with Glee for the conclusion of board elections. Things were tough and tight but ultimately, I feel that strong candidates were selected for all the positions.
Finally, just past midnight, I was able to get to sleep, and try and aid my aching body.
Wednesday/Thursday – Day 247/248
April 10, 2013
Today started in the usual manner, classes that were unremarkable for the most part, the usual stresses of work etc. However, in the afternoon an exciting gig was planned
We were meant to be performing for the resignation party of the CEO of a Fortune 500 Company, UGI Energy, and being paid a hefty eight thousand dollars for the privilege. Supplementary to that, we were being offered spots and the party and our travel covered.
Unfortunately for all us lay-clubbers, this turned out to be a clever April Fool’s joke perpetrated on us (and even the business manager!) by the President Scott Ventre. However, as I will not detail here, this had far reaching repercussions. One must be careful about taking pranks too far…
Thursday was meant to be a little more relaxing but my day was packed full again! In the morning I proctored the CIS-121 midterm on which my students did pretty well. I also watched a pre-recorded physics lecture on electrodynamics and the derivation of optics from first principles. Fascinating stuff.
The afternoon was packed full with the usual work, but mostly trying to get as much of my group project work done as possible, before my study for the Physics midterm, upcoming on the next Tuesday.
Dinner post-hillel dinner, with the Glee Club was at Zach Costa’s (our Publicity Manager) family’s restaurant; The Blind Pig! Famous for their Thanksgiving Balls, they served pub style foods that were greatly enjoyed by the PGC. I for one, had a delicious cider that was on tap. However, dinner was slightly marred by internal politics within the PGC, that although eventually came to nothing, were worrying for a short time.
I got back far too late, and had far too much work to get done, but midterm grading was to start early the next day and so I took a relatively early night.