University Life

Guess what week this week is? If you said “It’s SEX IT UP WEEK” you are absolutely correct. It
happens every semester and it’s organized by the student union of Monash University in Caulfield.
Unfortunately, it’s not as interesting as it sounds. Heh. It is mostly a safe sex and sexual
awareness week. Today there was a massdebate (har har) in the student lounge. The most promising
event is on Thursday night, where there will be a blow job competition (it says so on the flyer).
Don’t know what that’s about, but I’m not going to go anyway. I’m absolutely swamped with
assignments and there are two due this week.

I was late going to queue up for the shuttle bus to Caulfield today. I had to go to the
operations office beforehand to ask about one of my bills and there was this line already formed
when I got to the bus loop.

Good thing there were still seats left after this line crowded into the shuttle. I had to be on
this shuttle because there was an Industrial Experience supervisor meeting I had to attend. Anyway,
I have another meeting tomorrow – an ITPM one at the unholy hour of 9 am so that’s it for
today.

The worst thing about taking the shuttle is being the 26th person in the
queue for a 25 person capacity bus. If only I had walked a little
faster, I would have been the 24th person instead. I got into the line
just slightly behind two girls. Oh well. I took the Oakleigh bus
instead since it was already docked and ready to leave. Oakleigh is one
station in front of the Huntingdale bus that I usually take.
Unfortunately my 10 trip Zone 1 ticket got wet during the
snow-in-pocket fiasco during my trip to Mt Buller and it didn’t quite
work on the validation machine. Good thing the kind bus driver let me
on anyway. I’ve only been to Oakleigh station once before, because the
nearer stations are Huntingdale and Clayton. There is a lot of
community artwork on the station wall, which looks slightly depressing
and dodgy.

Well, I had my first supervisor meeting for my Industrial Experience
project today. It was with Ashley Cambrell, a very likable guy who also
happens to be the person who wrote the program we’re supposed to be
updating now. Mmm…inside information. =D Oh, something rather
embarrassing happened to my during the IE lecture. I haven’t had anything
to eat since last night and I was chewing gum during the lecture. People
who have done this before can attest to the fact that this is a big no no.
Apparently, the chewing action produces a reflex where the stomach
produces digestion acids (can’t be bothered to check for the correct
terminology) in anticipation of the meal. However, with a piece of chewing
gum, there is no tangible “meal”. The stomach does not like being tricked
like this and will tend to protest with a loud rumbling. I swear it was so
loud, my friend looked at me and asked “Are you hungry?”. Sheesh…what
loud rumblings my stomach make. It wasn’t just a one off thing too, it was
so loud the row behind me could hear it. Heh. I finally excused myself and
got a chocolate milk and some spring rolls from Merlins to satiate the
beast.

I picked up my Mt Buller V/Line [vline.vic.gov.au] coach transfer ticket today.
It’s A$103.60 return. That’s pretty steep but it’s the cheapest coach transfer to Mt Buller that
I could find.

Anyway, one Good Thing^TM happened today. I bumped into my IE Project coordinator
today and got enrolled in the subject. =D It turns out that you can’t start IE in summer starting
from this year, so I can either do it now, or wait till March ’03 to do it and graduate November
’03. IE takes two consecutive semesters to finish, and it requires ITPM as a prerequisite.
Unfortunately, I only took ITPM this semester due to failing SDI the semester before, and SDI is a
prerequisite for ITPM. I hate these “chain prerequisite” subjects. Fail one and it could fuck you
up. But I did pass SDI last semester, so I took ITPM this semester. Back to the situation, since I
only took ITPM this semester, it seems that I’m doomed to graduate in November ’03. However, the IE
Project coordinator was kind enough to enroll me into IE even though I haven’t done ITPM because I
would have graduated in July ’03 if I wasn’t held back by IE. Woo hoo. =D Apparently, you can get
special consideration for IE if you’re going to graduate otherwise. Cheers to my mate Vivek for
informing me about the “no starting IE in summer” rule.

Well, I can’t overload while doing both IE and ITPM at the same time, so I’ve dropped one of my
subjects. The IE weekly meeting clashes with my ITPM tutorial too, so I was hoping to go to one of
the earlier tutes to see if I can get myself into one of them. But even better than that, I just
happened to log into Allocate+ (our tutorial allocation system) and found a space for tomorrow’s 12
pm ITPM tutorial! There wasn’t space in those tutes a couple of hours before. Heh. It seems to be a
day of Good Things^TM today. I shudder to think of tomorrow when Newton’s Third Law will
be invoked. =D

I only had about four hours of sleep last night, so it was a record 30 minutes after waking up
before I started nodding off again, in the shuttle no less. I dragged myself to the first lecture
of the day and had several micro sleeps, which prompted the guy beside me to look at me smugly
while taking conspicuous sips from his Coffee HQ mug. Hmph…I got myself a large latte (which I
downed in three long swallows – my poor, scalded tongue) and a Chunky Kit Kat during the break.
It’s either that or fall asleep on the nice carpeted lecture theatre floor. Perked up a bit after
that and even managed to catch a bit of the really interesting lecture about the different
grades of twisted pair cables. Long day today…I had two tutorials after the lecture with a one
hour break in between. I grabbed a turkey ham/pineapple/raw onions sandwich on sour dough from
Merlin’s Cafe and camped outside my course coordinator’s office during my one hour break to discuss
some course issues with her.

Merlin’s Cafe

No sign of her though. Oh well, at least I got 10/10 for my graded exercise during my last tute.
I’m going to catch an early night and pick up my Melbourne -> Mansfield -> Mt Buller V/Line
coach ticket tomorrow after my single lecture. I can’t wait…I’m chomping at the bit for some
winter sports action already. Heh.

Tomorrow is Monday again. It seems that the weekend has slipped by without
me realizing. Cliché, but true. Since I didn’t manage to go to the city
yesterday, I’ll have to wake up early at 12 pm tomorrow to head down to
the city to pay for my Mt Buller accommodation. My class only starts at 5
pm, which I take is a pretty good start time for Mondays. =D I’ll be in
classes till 9 pm though. Not as bad as my 8 pm – 10 pm lecture last
semester, but 9 pm is pretty late coz I need an hour to get back from my
campus. Anyway, I haven’t been up to much today…just read my lecture
notes for a bit. Pretty hardworking huh? I had dinner at the halls dining
room. Saw a tempting cheesecake but decided to eat (relatively) healthy
and settled for fried noodles with fish and a fruit salad. Heh.

Halls dining room aka slops

Oh, and my
newest Mirror Project submission
[mirrorproject.com] is up. This one is pretty uninspired, but hey, I’m
feeling pretty uninspired today.

There I was, walking to the bus loop to catch the shuttle to Caulfield, when I caught sight of
the line. It was really long and I started counting before I reached the loop. There was 24 people already waiting in line and the shuttle fits 25, so I picked up my pace a bit and walked briskly to the bus loop. When I was about halfway to the waiting bay I saw this guy walking from the other end.

He caught sight of the line too and started to trot a bit as well. Not to be outdone, I started to walk faster as well. I needed the stability whilst running but must keep the pace too so the shoes I had on proved to be very helpful. Unfortunately, the waiting bay is closer to the other end of the bus loop so naturally he reached there first. Grrr…I had to take the bus and the train to
Caulfield. Oh well.

I slept for a nice, solid 12 hours last night. I cast a resurrect spell on myself at
around 7:30 am and went to the halls dining room to grab some breakfast. It’s good to know that I
can barely finish two bacon and egg muffins and two hash browns. I used to be able to eat three of
each. Perhaps that is a sign of better things to come. I’m planning to go on a diet, coz my weight
is becoming atrocious. I dunno how much I weigh now, but I feel heavy. =D Well, I met Vivek in my
IT Project Management lecture, and he told me about this gym promotion where you can get a
membership for the price of a renewal if you register on the 5th of August. I’m planning to get a
membership coz the Clayton branch of the gym
[monash.edu.au] is just a 2 minute walk from my halls and I can also use the Caulfield branch if
I want. The gym is owned by Monash University’s Sports and Recreation
[monash.edu.au] department, but it’s pretty well equipped. Anyway, I went for my first lecture
today – the aforementioned IT Project Management. It seems to have a pretty aggressive
deliverables schedule. Starting from Week 5, there will be a part due every week. Nasty.

Outside the Cummings (I kid you not) lecture theater.

Margot Schuhmacher is the lecturer for this course.

Anyway, I only had one lecture today so I went to the bank after that to bank in my bank draft
(try saying that three times, fast). I also managed to pay my Optus bill at the post office. Good
thing I thought to bring it with me this morning. Went to the Asian grocery in the campus center
after that to get some much needed laundry detergent and also a box of Cola chicken wings with rice
to eat later. Pretty good stuff, it’s nice to see that the rice boxes in Frank and Lily Lee’s Asian
Grocery has been beefed up with new products.

Today’s exam was pretty easy, which is good. I woke up at 11 am and didn’t
have time to eat lunch so I just grabbed a couple of power bars and a coke
from the Nature Pantry in the campus center. It’s on the way to the bus
loop. The creatine one tasted pretty good. I feel like I’m growing
already. Heh. The protein bar one is called Nitro-120 and supposedly
contains 40 grams of protein, 3.8 grams of glutamine and 10 grams of
glycerol. After eating it, I saw the label said Warning: Due to high
potency consume with plenty of fluid over a period of two days. Half a bar
before or after training. Not suitable for children under 15 years or
pregnant women. Now you tell me. Oh well, I’ve got another exam tomorrow.
Wish me luck.