Journal Entry

Saturday, December 9, 2000

Two out of three finals down, only one left!

Math was far too early Thursday morning. 9am. I had to get myself out of bed at around 7:30, force down some breakfast (these exams are 2 1/2 hours long!) and do some last minute cramming. Well, the exam itself left others to be desired. I think I did okay, but plenty of other people thought it was horrible. I can see the mean score being around 90 points. Out of 150. It had also snowed that morning, so my stroll to Barton Hall wasn't exactly a walk in the park.

The atmosphere in Barton was amazing. You could almost feel the brainpower--or maybe it was just the tension--of all 400+ people in the hall. For non-Cornellians, Barton is a huge multipurpose facility that houses the military offices, and hosts most indoor sporting events. The main floor where we were tested is actually a full size track. Hundreds of tables were set up for us. The only down side was that any announcement that was made by a proctor couldn't be heard. Large spaces like that tend to absorb and distort voice.

Then back to the room by 12 noon to study for chemistry. Friday's chem exam was scheduled for a time slightly more conducive to brain regurgitation. It began at noon, and about half of the students in the class were assigned to the large chemistry auditorium where we usually hold class. My section was assigned to the balcony.

Then we meet the test itself. Ouch. They disregard anything and everything we were taught the first 3/4 of the semester, and tested us on the last three chapters, exclusively. Not only that, but they also presented rather interesting applications of equilibrium combined with reaction rates that we have never seen before. Here, I project a mean score 120 out of 200.

So today I attended a 90 minute review session for computer science, whose exam will be Tuesday at (ugh) 9am, also in Barton Hall. CS will be interesting, considering the fact that a couple months back we completely dropped MATLAB and moved into Java, and this exam will be comprehensive (covering both). Time to relearn...

But enough of exams... Possibly the last EMS shift of the semester, tomorrow at 11am. Should be fun! Also expecting more snowfall tomorrow. Then, I'm back to Portland by Saturday night. What a semester!

Aaron