Lets see if I remember how to do this...
Sup everyone. It has been a very long time since I put anything new into this. Seeing as how this particular weekend is kinda light I figured I would put a few of my thoughts down just so that I don't have to think on them any longer.
So recently I began working at the Technique, the student newspaper at Tech. Its cool and I like the people, but for an extracurricular activity it is really sucking my time dry. I mean I like working there (in fact as soon as I get the paperwork done....which will be soon....I'll be getting paid), but in addition to my work its sometimes really overwhelming.
I've been trying my hardest to get into research here but its been taking much longer than I thought it would. I mean the people who are looking for undergrads for their labs seem to like me, but because their grad students don't need anymore people they have no space for me at this time. Its quite annoying and incredibly frustrating since there's alot of really cool research going on that I'm not apart of and am desperately trying to participate in.
Class work this semester seems to be falling back into my usual routine of a bad round of first test grades with good homework grades. Which of course means I need to do harder on the next few rounds of exams before finals roll around.
Finally, the last issue that I wanted to talk about was transplantation. I'm not talking about organ transplants, or moving a plant from one pot to another. I'm talking about moving a person from one place to another. Specifically myself.
Ever since I arrived at Tech I have been alienated from familiarity. I try to put on a strong face and pretend that its just my imagination. But when I'm alone the thought resurfaces making me feel like a stranger in my own life. At the end of this semester it would have been 2 years since I arrived at Tech. That probably means that I shouldn't be feeling this way.
I've tried to figure out why this is happening, but I have no concrete answers. Logically that scares me. Though I have a few guesses, but they all seem to stem from reasons that I've talked about before. Like my love life, my social life in general, and my academic life.
Whats even more strange is this strange aggressiveness that I seemed to have developed. I can't quite explain it, but it seems directed at my parents more than anything else. For example when my dad calls me its always really aggravating. It might be the nature of his phone calls which more often than not fall into three distinct categories: the "How was your day? / What are you doing?" call or the "I need you to run this errand..." or the "What grade did you get on your ____ test?" call. Let me describe those in a bit more detail so that you can understand why I'm annoyed and eventually aggressive:
"How was your day? / What are you doing?"
I think every kid has this call with their parents. I mean its a universal topic of conversation. Everyone uses this as the opening topic. I guess I find it annoying when my parents ask it because I usually have nothing to tell them, and the fact that I have to take time away from whatever it is that I'm doing at the moment only helps to make it more annoying. It becomes a major source of irritation when my parents call and then call the next day asking me what I'm up to. Its as though they expected something catastrophic/amazing to have happened in the last 24 hours. Its not like I'm Jack Bauer or a nuke fell on Atlanta. Atlanta, from my standpoint is just as boring as Chicago was when I went to school there. And there is a reason for that....its called school. I'm not supposed to be facing constant excitement or danger at every turn. I just pray that my day begins and ends smoothly with as few ups and downs as possible. Lately I haven't had things be that convenient, but even so they don't even warrant merit in a phone conversation with my parents.
"I need you to run this errand..."
This one is irritating since it makes me have to take time out from my daily routine so that I can solve some problem my father is having with something down here. Now sometimes its just a simple visit some office and pick-up deal. Other times its a please check your mail kinda deal. Sometimes though its a drive 2 miles, wait an hour, only to be told you don't have the right material and come back later repeating the first 2 steps again kinda deal. I could understand taking care of an errand if your parents are around, but when they aren't its like being told to do something by Casper. I mean sure hes a ghost, but as a ghost he's intangible and therefore is unable to physically push you do something. In the same way my parents believe they can physically get me to just drop everything I'm doing and take care of some business for them. Its like every matter is an urgent life-or-death situation that requires Dr. House and his crack team of specialists to solve while a time bomb lies ticking in my head. In addition, its a huge waste of gas money.
"What grade did you get on your ____ test?"
This has to be the question I hate the most out of all three. Its actually difficult for me to write about without pounding my fists into my keyboard or bashing my head through my monitor. In high school I didn't much care for it when my parents took an active interest in my academic affairs. Though in high school my parents possessed enough knowledge to help me with homework if I asked them. However, I'm so far into my major now that that no longer is applicable. They have such high expectations for me and are grossly disappointed when I don't live up to them. The worst part is that no matter how hard I try they continue to believe that my grades equal my fault. All I can do is my best. I'll admit that my best is not good enough alot of times, but I'm definitely better than an average student. Lets take a typical situation where this call comes into play and upsets me. Lets say its the beginning of the semester and I got a bad grade on the first test in a class that has 3 exams. My father begins by going into a sanctimonious and overstated speech about how I always do poorly and when is it going to stop etc. To which I reply that this is how stuff usually goes and that I'll do better. However, despite this my father will talk, and talk and get more upset for about an hour or more. Honestly I can't stand it and it drives me nuts. At this point I wish they would just stop caring. The grades I get are the grades that I get, and there is nothing I can do to change it. I study hard for all my tests, I spend alot of nights sleepless and for what? To get yelled at for getting a B on a test or a B for a final grade. Its beyond annoying and it makes me downright homicidal. Its especially bad when my father refuses to understand that our classes are graded on curves which means that all hope is not lost. Anyway to get away from having to write anymore on this (since its starting to make my fingers cringe) lets just say that this is the worst possible conversation I have with my parents and is probably the main seed for all of the aggressiveness that I harbor towards them.
Anyway, hopefully that satisfied the 3 people that read this blog. I'm tired and I'm having lunch with someone tomorrow so I'll write something more later on.
So recently I began working at the Technique, the student newspaper at Tech. Its cool and I like the people, but for an extracurricular activity it is really sucking my time dry. I mean I like working there (in fact as soon as I get the paperwork done....which will be soon....I'll be getting paid), but in addition to my work its sometimes really overwhelming.
I've been trying my hardest to get into research here but its been taking much longer than I thought it would. I mean the people who are looking for undergrads for their labs seem to like me, but because their grad students don't need anymore people they have no space for me at this time. Its quite annoying and incredibly frustrating since there's alot of really cool research going on that I'm not apart of and am desperately trying to participate in.
Class work this semester seems to be falling back into my usual routine of a bad round of first test grades with good homework grades. Which of course means I need to do harder on the next few rounds of exams before finals roll around.
Finally, the last issue that I wanted to talk about was transplantation. I'm not talking about organ transplants, or moving a plant from one pot to another. I'm talking about moving a person from one place to another. Specifically myself.
Ever since I arrived at Tech I have been alienated from familiarity. I try to put on a strong face and pretend that its just my imagination. But when I'm alone the thought resurfaces making me feel like a stranger in my own life. At the end of this semester it would have been 2 years since I arrived at Tech. That probably means that I shouldn't be feeling this way.
I've tried to figure out why this is happening, but I have no concrete answers. Logically that scares me. Though I have a few guesses, but they all seem to stem from reasons that I've talked about before. Like my love life, my social life in general, and my academic life.
Whats even more strange is this strange aggressiveness that I seemed to have developed. I can't quite explain it, but it seems directed at my parents more than anything else. For example when my dad calls me its always really aggravating. It might be the nature of his phone calls which more often than not fall into three distinct categories: the "How was your day? / What are you doing?" call or the "I need you to run this errand..." or the "What grade did you get on your ____ test?" call. Let me describe those in a bit more detail so that you can understand why I'm annoyed and eventually aggressive:
"How was your day? / What are you doing?"
I think every kid has this call with their parents. I mean its a universal topic of conversation. Everyone uses this as the opening topic. I guess I find it annoying when my parents ask it because I usually have nothing to tell them, and the fact that I have to take time away from whatever it is that I'm doing at the moment only helps to make it more annoying. It becomes a major source of irritation when my parents call and then call the next day asking me what I'm up to. Its as though they expected something catastrophic/amazing to have happened in the last 24 hours. Its not like I'm Jack Bauer or a nuke fell on Atlanta. Atlanta, from my standpoint is just as boring as Chicago was when I went to school there. And there is a reason for that....its called school. I'm not supposed to be facing constant excitement or danger at every turn. I just pray that my day begins and ends smoothly with as few ups and downs as possible. Lately I haven't had things be that convenient, but even so they don't even warrant merit in a phone conversation with my parents.
"I need you to run this errand..."
This one is irritating since it makes me have to take time out from my daily routine so that I can solve some problem my father is having with something down here. Now sometimes its just a simple visit some office and pick-up deal. Other times its a please check your mail kinda deal. Sometimes though its a drive 2 miles, wait an hour, only to be told you don't have the right material and come back later repeating the first 2 steps again kinda deal. I could understand taking care of an errand if your parents are around, but when they aren't its like being told to do something by Casper. I mean sure hes a ghost, but as a ghost he's intangible and therefore is unable to physically push you do something. In the same way my parents believe they can physically get me to just drop everything I'm doing and take care of some business for them. Its like every matter is an urgent life-or-death situation that requires Dr. House and his crack team of specialists to solve while a time bomb lies ticking in my head. In addition, its a huge waste of gas money.
"What grade did you get on your ____ test?"
This has to be the question I hate the most out of all three. Its actually difficult for me to write about without pounding my fists into my keyboard or bashing my head through my monitor. In high school I didn't much care for it when my parents took an active interest in my academic affairs. Though in high school my parents possessed enough knowledge to help me with homework if I asked them. However, I'm so far into my major now that that no longer is applicable. They have such high expectations for me and are grossly disappointed when I don't live up to them. The worst part is that no matter how hard I try they continue to believe that my grades equal my fault. All I can do is my best. I'll admit that my best is not good enough alot of times, but I'm definitely better than an average student. Lets take a typical situation where this call comes into play and upsets me. Lets say its the beginning of the semester and I got a bad grade on the first test in a class that has 3 exams. My father begins by going into a sanctimonious and overstated speech about how I always do poorly and when is it going to stop etc. To which I reply that this is how stuff usually goes and that I'll do better. However, despite this my father will talk, and talk and get more upset for about an hour or more. Honestly I can't stand it and it drives me nuts. At this point I wish they would just stop caring. The grades I get are the grades that I get, and there is nothing I can do to change it. I study hard for all my tests, I spend alot of nights sleepless and for what? To get yelled at for getting a B on a test or a B for a final grade. Its beyond annoying and it makes me downright homicidal. Its especially bad when my father refuses to understand that our classes are graded on curves which means that all hope is not lost. Anyway to get away from having to write anymore on this (since its starting to make my fingers cringe) lets just say that this is the worst possible conversation I have with my parents and is probably the main seed for all of the aggressiveness that I harbor towards them.
Anyway, hopefully that satisfied the 3 people that read this blog. I'm tired and I'm having lunch with someone tomorrow so I'll write something more later on.
posted by Vi at 3:23 AM
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