Week 10 - A Day in the Life

As this is my first day back to school in a month, I thought I’d chronicle it for my blog this week.

8:50 – Awoken by alarm.

9:10 – Awoken by mother.

9:15 – Had to eat breakfast to take medicine. I thought to myself that it’s strange how bread isn’t considered a meal until you toast it. I hate it toasted.

9:20 – Took my medicine. As I did, I remembered having it as a kid and spitting it all over the floor the first time I took it.

9:21 – Cleaned my medicine up off the sink. Some things never change.

9:55 – Left home. I listened to my iPod on the way to the bus stop. I’ve listened to this song about a hundred times; I’m starting to think what I was told about it being full of satanic messages was false. Then again, there’s no way to listen to it backwards.

10:05 – Boarded the bus. The last bus ride I took lasted almost seven hours, but at least I didn’t have to stand.

10:45 – Got off the bus. I found myself getting oddly nostalgic over the route I generally dread taking. Mind you, I didn’t have time to listen to A through G of my music this time.

11:05 – Sat down in class. I felt a negative energy.

11:45 – Lunch. Being here is emotionally draining. I retreated into the wonderful, never judging arms of my sandwich.

12:08 – Couldn’t get on MyCampus in the game lab. I didn’t even really need to access it, but it frustrated me that I couldn’t. I think I may have ADD.

12:22 – Still trying. I made it as far as the Personal Information tab before the website crapped out on me. Also, people in front of me were having a heated discussion about which generation 1 Pokemon starter was the best. It was the most engaged I’d been all day.

1:07 – Squirtle. The answer was Squirtle.

1:19 – Struggling to maintain a tense, as I’m now writing this as it happens instead of recalling the morning.

1:33 – Went for a walk. The fresh air felt good. It’s surprisingly warm for the end of November. I also realise I have eight more hours of this before I’m done for the day, perhaps I should start spacing these out a bit. On a side note, the MyCampus portal is officially down. I WILL gain access before the end of the day.

2:33 – I have clearly missed a lot of animation classes. Why does something need two skeletons…? I must inquire during the break.

3:34 – The extra skeleton provides more points to animate.  MyCampus server is still down. Good thing I haven’t been trying every 15 minutes since lunch, that’s the kind of thing that’d really irritate a person.

3:55 – Apparently the character rig should take upwards of 40 hours to complete. I may be in trouble.

5:23 – Just got back from eating dinner, and finally logged onto MyCampus.

6:37 – In the GDW room.

7:03 – GDW has begun. Group members are looking slightly defeated. I’ve never heard so much cursing over infinitely spawning bouncing balls. Although in fairness, I’ve never even really considered that situation before.

7:23 – Did some course surveys. Turns out I strongly agree with astronomy. I also did a survey for Mario’s marketing class. I don’t drink coffee so I hope I didn’t screw up his data.

7:51 – GDW is over. The game is due next Monday. Huh.

Week 9 - You Can't Take Me Anywhere

Luckily, a totally unrelated stream of consciousness made me remember that I have a blog to maintain, or else I would have forgotten about it for the second week in a row. As of the day I got back from MIGS I have been coughing up lungs left and right. Not helping matters was the research paper I had to do for one of my electives, which I worked on 10ish hours a day for 4 or 5 days. The resulting fatigue coupled with my inability to go 30 seconds without a coughing fit had some adverse effects on my health, which after a quick trip to the ER was revealed to be a fairly serious case of bronchitis. Unfortunately, I was on the wrong kind of medication for about a week before said trip. All that being said, this has probably been the least productive two weeks I've experienced since before the term started (save for the lengthy paper). Later in the week should be interesting as I shift into catch-up mode, which will be daunting to say the least.

Week 7 - MIGS!

My week was dominated by the MIGS trip. We left on Monday at 9am and arrived at the Quality Hotel a little after 3. The name of the hotel was a trap. Nonetheless, we had a few hours to ourselves to enjoy the city and soak up the Montreal culture, by which I mean we watched cartoons dubbed in French before we stumbled on the English-speaking channel and enjoyed 2 or 3 hours of Cake Boss. That brought us to what was possibly the biggest obstacle of the experience: food. Never in my life have I consisted almost solely on Tim Hortons for days at a time, but given the rigid schedule of the summit there wasn't much of a choice. At least we had WiFi.

The convention itself was great. My only real issue was trying to decode some of the finer points of the Montreal accent, but I feel that I got the full potential out of each lecture regardless. My favourite lecture and what was undoubtedly the most important for me was the screenwriting lecture given by Alex Epstein. He outlined some ways to get your audience to be emotionally invested in your narrative and expressed the importance of a "pull" narrative as opposed to a "push" narrative. In a "pull" narrative, the audience asks questions and wonders about what will happen before it does, whereas a "push" narrative simply gives the audience things without any build-up. On the other hand, there was a lecture that I went to that turned out to be a pitch for a funding company, so I ducked out when the lecturer turned to get her laptop. All in all, I had a great time and am looking forward to attending again.