None of these goals are in any particular order. The original order was what popped into my head at the time. Now the lists went through a makeover and have (slightly) matured as I have. I achieved almost all the goals I set for December 2011! All that’s left are life goals, some of which I hope to achieve relatively soon, aka FIND A JOB.

My day:

There is a student in one of my classes who does not have the mental capacity to endure learning and teaching at a pace that is slightly faster than normal- or so he said when he let us all know in class today. He made it quite clear to the professor and to everyone in the room that he was not learning anything and that teaching him is like “talking to a wall”. My professor, who if I might add is an exceptional professor at this university due to her enthusiasm for the subject as well as enthusiasm to help people understand, encouraged this student and showered him with positivity. He refuted these motivations and proceeded, in a very distracting manner, to talk to people about how much he didn’t understand and how frustrated he was because he couldn’t understand.

Ok, so I get where he’s coming from because I, too, like any normal human being, get frustrated when things don’t go my way and if I don’t understand something. For example, today I realized that my grades, although “average”, are just that. Average. I don’t like that. I don’t want to be average and I know I’m not an average student. I’m just lazy. I know that I shouldn’t be lazy, and although I’m sitting and blogging about how I should study instead of studying, I know that I need to change my work ethic as I do every semester.

What I don’t get is when people just give up and then start dragging people down with them. I also don’t get when students argue with a professor who is trying to encourage them to do better. If anything, special treatment from professor is a sign that the professor wants the student to do well. The professor does not want you to fail. How would that make the professor feel if her entire class failed a test that she thought wasn’t difficult?

Which brings me to the next part of my day. Around 6:50 p.m. I debated going to class or not. I figured we’d start a new chapter today, seeing as we weren’t going to go over our midterm exam in class, so I went. Bad choice. Instead of doing Spanish homework or something productive like scrolling through Facebook photos, I spent an hour listening to students argue about getting bad grades on their exams. Mind you, I didn’t do so well either; however, arguing to a professor and even almost blaming him for receiving a bad note is beyond me.

The professor explained to us how he reviewed the test the first time and there were 14 F’s. That’s more than half the class. Because of this odd occurrence, he decided to be “nicer” and reviewed the tests again, changing the F’s into D’s. It makes me wonder what the second-round F’s were before he reviewed them again.

I understand that people are frustrated because a D or F would make me flip-a-poo as well, but I wouldn’t blame the professor for a mistake that I made. The arguments that these students set up could be easily refuted… by a fellow student. Plus, one student even got an A, which means it wasn’t impossible. Another student thought it was logical to argue that the student who received the A was here last semester, an argument which many permanent students (including myself) fired back with “I’ve been here for 3 years, and I don’t have an A.”

Another student claimed that s/he took both tests (because there was the exam, then a make up exam for people who weren’t able to take it the first time- which in my opinion, the professor had the right to make it more difficult because 1) It’s a second chance, which I’m sure at a university back in the States, a professor wouldn’t give you and 2) If you missed it the first time, you get extra time to study for the second time), so s/he took both tests and said s/he did poorly on both of them. Then, s/he had the audacity to lobby for something that could up his/her grade and made it seem like getting a bad grade on both tests was not his/her fault, but the professor’s because he told us that the test was going to be “easier” than it actually was. Yes, he did tell us that there were going to be 6 cases and not 3. But what does that matter. What if he gave us 6 cases on 6 of the terminology we couldn’t define on the first part? Would we have complained then? Either way, the argument that we weren’t prepared to do ONLY 3 cases, and that we were ready to do 6 wasn’t legitimate.

As for lobbying for extra credit or a make up test. Ok, I can agree with extra credit. That’s a good call. However, a make up test or completely disregarding the first midterm is a bit much. You can only negotiate so much. Firstly, don’t take advantage of the fact that we can negotiate with grades here. It’s rude. Yes, it’s a bit of the professor’s fault because he told us the test wasn’t going to be that bad. But it’s also our fault for not studying as much as we should have. Yes, there are students who studied and got a bad grade. But those students know who they are and can probably go talk to the professor, who would be more than happy to sit down and have a level-headed conversation than be attacked in front of an entire class. Secondly, the professor also gave us the opportunity to raise our grades with an optional quiz on Monday. Then, people started asking specific questions about a test that the professor had just decided on making. His guess was as good as ours as to what’s going to be on that test. Honestly, think about it kids, when he says, “Ok, so… how about this… how about we have an optional test on Monday. I haven’t made it yet”… students: “So how many questions is it? What’s going to be on it? What do we have to study?” Him saying, “I don’t know yet” isn’t because he wants to spite us, it’s because he really doesn’t know.

To top it off is the end of class. By this time, I just wanted to go home because people were just being stupid. It makes me really frustrated, too, that at the end people started to laugh at the professor’s accent. He says, “Focus” like “Fuck yous”. I’ve had a professor like that, yes it was funny the first time, but come on, be mature and get over it. Honestly, after an entire class at basically insulting the man’s teaching, the last thing he needs is a room full of his failing students laughing at him for a reason he doesn’t even notice.

And just to cover my bases here, and I said it before, I did not do well on this exam. I’m not saying that it’s fair that the professor said it was going to be easy and then it turned out that it wasn’t. But it’s our responsibility to study for a test like it’s going to be difficult. Just because he says it’s easy, it doesn’t mean it will be. He’s the professor, he can do whatever he wants in his class. And I’m not saying that arguing with a professor isn’t legitimate, because sometimes, sometimes it is. I’m saying that it’s disrespectful to argue with a professor in front of a classroom of students. It’s disrespectful to blame a professor for your mistakes when you know you’re in the wrong, but you just want to get a better grade.

I feel like a better grade because of this experience, because he went back to look at our tests and he’s going to go back again to maybe give us an extra point for writing our name would make me feel a bit dumber. My grade reflects how much effort I decided to put into studying. It’s not the professor’s responsibility. He’s already been through this stage. The blame’s on me and it’s me who has to change the way I think, the way I study, the way take tests in order for me to do better.

And lastly, don’t be stupid, kids. Professors are people too. Professors have feelings and lives just like everyone else. When they show their faces to us everyday, they have to look positive even when they’re having the worst day of their lives, even when we’re not even looking at them, not paying attention, doodling, or sleeping. They have to put up with us making excuses about why we don’t have the homework, lying about the internet not working, lying about there being a paper jam. We’re doing poorly because we’re doing poorly. Seriously. Think about it.

FRIDAY! YES! The weekend was almost near! I went to classes then excitedly returned to my apartment where Rachel was waiting and ready to go. It wasn’t the nicest day out, but it wasn’t pouring, so a tour of Madrid was in session! I feel like kind of a cheat since I’ve done the Madrid Tour so many times, but hey practice makes perfect. Plus, there’s food at the end of the tunnel, but I’m getting a little ahead of myself here.

We hit the usual spots [spoiler alert for anyone who reads my blog and is going to come visit me within the next year]:
- Sol
- Opera: Opera House, Gardens, Palacio Real
- Calle Mayor to the Plaza San Miguel
- Plaza Mayor
- Sol to see the “center-center” and the Oso
- Kebabs!

Whilest we were eating it started to rain a bit, but nothing some chit-chat and good food couldn’t wait out.

That night for dinner, we decided to have tapas since we didn’t get tapas that day for lunch. We made our own tapas as well as our own hybrid of Tinto de Verano and Sangria, now named Tinto de Sangria.

It was nice to just sit, drink, and munch on frutos secos (as in mixed nuts)… AND we had a pomegranate! Random right? Totally worth it. I have to learn how to upload videos on Blogspot so I can show you the process of getting the seeds out.

Anyways, the tapas were wonderful and delightful and wonderful!! What a great dinner for Adventure Dinners Part 2!

 

The day has come and gone. It seemed like so long ago when Rachel and I were planning her trip down here. At first I didn’t know if it would work out, but in the end, I’m so glad that it did!

Rachel arrived in Madrid later than anticipated. While she was still flying through the air, I waited at the arrivals gate; the incorrect arrivals gate, actually. After I re-checked the board and realized that I should be at the neighboring arrivals gate, but still had to wait about 45 minutes, I went to grab an overpriced cheese sandwich, then moseyed my way over to arrivals Gate 1. I enjoyed my sandwich as I sat, amused at the large group of Asians walking by me. I wondered if they were Japanese, and I was pleasantly satisfied when I saw the last few group members wearing masks. Only in Japan. :] There were also Spanish high school students cheering every time the arrivals doors slid open. They, too, were waiting for a flight from the UK and to keep themselves busy, created the game of cheering for random people. The first few times it was funny. Some people waved back, fist pumped, and cheered as they passed the group of high-schoolers. Other people walked on in a puzzled way or craned their necks over the rowdy crowd to find their rendezvous. As each wave of strangers came through those doors, I stood on my tippy-toes to attempt to find Rachel and her “turtle-shell backpack.” I thought about her plane being even more delayed and I wanted to check the arrivals board, but I didn’t want to leave my prime observing area. So I waited. And waited. I watched as the high school students finally cheered for the correct group of people, who were also high school students (from Ireland, I think). I watched as they all nervously greeted each other. And waited. Until finally, an hour later, the last couple stragglers were coming out. Rachel was one of the last ones. I lost sight her, as she was walking behind a larger person. When I saw her again, we couldn’t help but bro-out a little bit, giving each other a “Hey wassup?” of a head nod. Then when we were close enough, hugs were in order!

After the initial greeting, we made our way to the Metro station inside the airport. 1 line transfer and a short walk later, we were at my apartment, ready to get the weekend started. The first order of business was to feed Rachel. I figured, since it was her first night in Spain, I’d make her a Tortilla Española. I bought a new pack of eggs specifically for this dish. So we cut the garlic and onions and potatoes. Then fried everything and what not. I was about ready to get the eggs, which were sitting on the counter and I saw that one corner was a bit off the edge. So I went to move something (I can’t remember) out of the way, and CRUNCH! Eggs to floor. Fail. 11 eggs were in a goopy mess on a floor that I will just say I will never eat off. Epic fail. SO, all my eggs are gone. After having a hardy laugh and cleaning up the gross mess, I ended up borrowing 3 eggs from my roommate and the tortilla was a success. That was such an epic fail. For the entire time Rachel was here, we measured the amount of “fail” by comparing it to 11 broken eggs. Beautiful.

After a nice dinner of tortilla and pre-sliced chorizo, Rachel and I headed to bed only to talk for another 3 hours. Ah, it felt great to have someone familiar to talk to! The weekend started off great!

Anyways, although the day (as in, when the sun came out) started out pretty dull, my birthday at midnight was AMAZING. Emily sent me a themed-package. I couldn’t wait to open it, and I didn’t want to go to sleep, so I opened it at midnight. As I did, I recorded my reaction (because Emily wanted to be there, but didn’t), and to my surprise, the box contained various items that lead to finding the DVD of “Penelope”!!!

After a good night’s sleep, I Skyped with my dad, went to a piano lesson, Skyped with Andrew for a little bit, Skyped with my brother, and then Skyped with Andrew again. Since I don’t want to bore you all with the details, let’s just say that after Skyping with everyone, it suddenly felt like my birthday! :] So, that night I had to celebrate somehow. So I invited my friend Cathie over and we ordered Chinese food. Then we poured mugs (yes, mugs, because the glasses were all dirty) of Tinto de Verano, toasted, and drank to my first still-legal experience of alcohol.

So this post is a bit late, but anyways… last weekend was pretty amazing. Saturday was a girls’ night and Rachel, Lujain, Alexa, Cathie, and I went to Pacha, yet again. We were smarter this time and packed our heels in a big purse and walked to Pacha in our comfy shoes.

We slept over Lujain’s house, which was really nice. And in the morning, Cathie and I left only to go to McDonald’s to buy 4 cheeseburgers. After I had told her about how Andrew made a “McGangbang”, she was definitely excited to partake in such fun activities. We took playing with our food to a whole new level. It became an art, actually.

And eventually the burgers made their ways to our stomachs. Delightful. Nothing better than a wake-up burger. No problem, intestines, if you feel like exploding, you have the right to do so.
This weekend is Valentine’s Day! YAY! I LOVE Valentine’s Day so much! Today, Maria Jo (of the Bookstore) let me know that I had a package. I’m so glad she remembers my name now! TEHE! Anyways, the package is from Andrew (YEY), but I can’t open it until Valentine’s Day. I also wasn’t allowed to read the custom’s sticker, so during my visit to Ariadne in Student Life, she took the sticker off so I wouldn’t peak. AH! I want to open it!! Oh well, I guess I can wait. I love February, but I hate the wait to awesome days like the 14th and the 16th! I remember when I was a kid I used to get ready really early even if my party was in the late afternoon/evening. And then I would wait for my mom to bring home balloons or cake or something. Then I knew that it was almost ready for me to celebrate!! Great memories! :]

Happy 9th! Happy early Valentine’s Day! And I suppose, Happy almost Birthday to me!

Happy 9th!! :] <3

Another one I want to do is limit procrastination. For example, right now I’m procrastinating. I could be reading up on International Accounting, but instead I’m writing about how I’m not. Talk about public procrastination. So another one 2) Limit procrastination. Get work done before the last minute. (I think that’s a good one, and I’d really like to carry through with it.)

Ok, so that’s two. I think that should be good enough since I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew. So for this year’s Lent I am:
1) Limiting the amount of time I spend procrastinating. I will not leave work for the last minute.
2) Not going to say “like” as a filler.

I can already feel the procrastination one prodding me to take it back…