More classes

So the first week is over, and I can continue with my initial musings on my classes. Wednesday night I have Advanced Macro Theory. I used to think that I preferred macro to micro, but in recent years I've come to question that. Now I think I prefer both equally.

Anyways, macro is taught by a guy from Turkey who likes soccer. Yay! The class shouldn't be too bad, although the classroom itself is horrible. It's twice as large as it needs to be for the class size, which means that his voice echos horribly bad. This makes the slight accent a bit harder to understand, but it shouldn't be too bad.

The problem with both theories is that it seems like a lot of time is going to be spent on not a lot of topics. I don't know if this is because they're planning on going incredibly slow, or if the material is really that hard or complex. I guess only time will tell.

Thursday is American Economic History. The only bad thing about this class is also the room its in. Although it doesn't echo, the rows of desks are all connected, which means that if somebody on the other end of the row leans back, the entire row shifts. Super annoying. Plus, the desks are from that 1980's (okay, I'm possibly exaggerating). In general, I don't like desks, and wish that all classrooms had tables.

But the class is going to be awesome (I hope!). I thought it would only be recent history, but am plesantly surprised by the syllabus. We're covering a lot of topics, and there's going to be a lot of work involved, but I think the class will be great. Unfortunately, it's a bit on the applied side, but I guess that's what has to happen if you want to get most economic students interested in history.

All in all, I think it's going to be a good semester for classes.

Initial Thoughs on Advanced Microecnomic Analysis

After running back and forth between two different buildings multiple times, my prof finally figured out where he wants to hold class. And apparently he uses transparencies, meaning that I'm required to buy a book full of the ones he's going to use. This also means that my chosen seat (back left side) is in just the wrong position to be able to see what's being written. Lame!

It seems like we're going to get through the review section really quickly, although the review is really review. I'm going to guess that the topics will be review in general, while the math won't be. So that will be both good and bad.

More initial thoughts on my later classes as they happen, although I already know that if Thursday is held in the classroom that it's supposed to be, it's going to suck. I got much too spoiled in undergrad with really nice classrooms.

Beginning Again

Time to start a new semester! I must say, the beginning of the semester brings both pain and pleasure to me. I hate the first week of classes, mostly because they're completely worthless. But I love the fact that I have a whole semester of new knowledge (hopefully) to look forward to (of course this is usually lost on me by the 11th week).

Also, I'm amazingly looking forward to all my classes this semester. That was sort of true last semester, and I was disappointed with two of them, but I'm hoping that won't happen this time. Two advanced theory classes and a history class will be just what the doctor ordered for this semester, I think. Enough reading and writing in the one class coupled with enough math in the others should be just the thing. I've decided not to continue my Arabic class, but that's only because the class itself was worthless. I did buy the answers to my textbook from Amazon, so hopefully I'll continue with the language outside of the class (I also have Rosetta Stone).

More to look forward this semester:

• Only night classes, which opens up my days for working (money!) and snowboarding (spending money!).
• Running along the river in spring
• Kayaking along the river in late spring
• Soccer

So I'm excited.

Loving it

Christmas vacation is always rough on me, mostly because it means that pretty much the whole family is all home, occupying the same space for far too large a percentage of waking hours. This translates to me needing to be gone as much as possible during said Christmas vacation (I'm talking about the traditional two weeks off). However, I love my January vacation.

I get to sit home alone, getting stuff done as I choose. It also means that I can have either the television to myself (watching old movies that nobody else in the house really appreciates) or the stereo all to myself (listening to really loud, eclectic music that nobody else in the house really appreciates). I don't have to hide in my room due to the loudness that is my family when I'm trying to watch or do something.

In other words, I love the month of January.

I can't help it

I'm going to kill another show. I just can't help it. Maybe this one will break my curse, but since its already in its fourth season, and most shows don't last much longer than 5, probably not. But a girl can hope, can't she?

And no, I'm not sharing what show it is, but I don't think anybody I know watches it, so there's no need to worry.

New Year

I don't really do resolutions, mostly because New Years always seems to sneak up on me, and because I think they're pretty silly. So my non-resolution this year is to catch up with all the friends that I haven't talked to in a while. A lot of these I saw in October, but that was such a whirlwind weekend that while I saw people, there wasn't a whole lot of catching up.

So hopefully I'll use my free month to both visit and email people who I don't hear from very often. And hopefully in there I'll also find time to watch some movies, which have been piling up over the last couple of months (first on the list is a little bit of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton).