Tag Archives: studying

A day of studying

Posted on by
Reply

I did not do much today on this lazy Sunday (which was my second Saturday). I went up at 9am, had a banana/egg pancake and then wrote on my paper in Transportation Engineering lab. I wrote two whole pages and will probably add a half more tomorrow. I then took a break when I ordered a lot of stuff from Amazon. I got Amazon Prime yesterday which means I can get free two-day shipping. I ordered a mattress pad, 3 inch thick memory foam for $99 instead of $530. I so look forward to when that comes! I also ordered two flags to put up on my walls, a Swedish one and a California Republic one. Pins to put it on the wall, three bathroom baskets so I don’t have to have those things in my desk anymore. I also got a cheap memory foam bathroom rug, a small LED lamp to have by my bed, a dish rack, a small cutting board and a new purse since mine (which I’ve had since like 2009) is falling apart. I also found my black/see-through-neon-green sunglasses that broke this summer and ordered them too. All that for $220, yay!

Then I sat on the couch for a while reading about the old Egyptian kingdom in Architecure History.

At 5pm I went to the library for the first time to study with Johanna and Eric on our project in Transportation Engineering (yeah, it is two different classes, Transportation Engineering and Transportation Engineering Lab). We decided that we wanted to look into the Swedish roundabout and right of way system and compare that to a city of the same size here in California. We are gonna compare to the 4-way stop intersections they have here and maybe take a look at the enviromental impacts. This will be a fun project I think.

After that I got home, Kelsey was baking almond bars, but muffins. They were delicious so I got the recipe. It almost tasted a little bit like marzipan. Yummy! Right after we went to Target so I could buy some food, but I guess Sunday evening isn’t the best of days to go grocery shopping, it was completely empty. So I guess I have to go to Albertson’s tomorrow to buy ground beef and onion and stuff so I can make spaghetti with meatsauce. And since I am almost done with my homework this week (that I know of so far) I will hang out by the pool. I need to work on my tan ;).

After Target me and my roomies just talked for a long while and now everyone’s in bed earlier than ever before. I will go to bed now as well and watch the season premiere of Once Upon a Time. Goodnight (/goodmorning)!

Beach volleyball @ Pismo Beach

Posted on by
1

This post used to contain pictures, but due to new storage limitations from WordPress, I had to fix the problem and decided to create a new blog that works as an archive for all the posts from my two years in California. This full post can be found here.

I’m sorry my 25 readers (which is more than last year, yay!), my blog has been dead because I’ve been too tired to update. So, I think Wednesday was the last day I updated. Since then I’ve gotten a 15 page paper due on Thursday next week, been to downtown again, walked all the way back and stopped to refill energy with a donut at the 24/7 donut shop. On Friday I baked muffins and cupcakes with my roomies and people from the building came and said hello. A great way to meet people. We had about 100 and we actually got rid of all of them.

Cupcake frosting with LaurenOne of my roommates, Lauren :).

In the evening on Friday we went to a house party and I have now something more on my experience list. The party got rolled, which means that the police came and asked everyone to leave. It was kinda weird and I really don’t understand how that works here, because it seems like all the house parties get rolled, even if non of the neighbors are home (like yesterday). The police earns money from it, so I guess that’s why they prioritize parties. It was only 23:30 so we headed back to PCV and hung out with some guys on the fourth floor playing Cards Against Humanity. The most fun game ever.

This morning I went to Pismo Beach with Ryan, Johanna och Franzi which is a German exchange student. We played beach volleyball for like three hours. At first not very serious, just to get warmed up. I ended up playing my last game with some pretty good players, that was fun. It was too bad though that the wind is always coming to the beach here at like noon.

Pismo Beach

On our way home we had lunch at High Street Deli which is SLO’s best sandwhich place according to pretty much everyone. It was very good and much needed after so many hours in the sand. It felt good to be back, but it’s gonna take a while to get into playing again.

At home I took a shower and then a too long nap. So I didn’t have time to study… I felt a little bad actually. But I am going up at 8:30am tomorrow to write on my paper about the High-Speed Rail in California. It is a group project, but it is still a lot of pages to write. I think it will be done pretty fast though as soon as I just get into it, which I will do tomorrow. I think I am meeting up with my group in Engineering Transportation sometime during the day as well to figure out what our project this quarter should be about. The 15 page paper of the California HSR is in Transportation Engineering Lab. I also have a lot of reading to do, so that’s what I will do tomorrow. I am also checking to see if anyone is going grocery shopping. I finally have a few ideas of food I want to cook. I am thinking spaghetti and meatsauce tomorrow. Or maybe Monday.

After the shower, nap and dinner (the other half of the delicious sandwhich) I went to Grover Beach with a bunch from my WoW-group to hang out. At Grover Beach it is okay to drive with the cars on the sand and it is a huuuge beach and you can just put the bonfire right in the sand. It was a very nice evening! I smell a lot of smoke right now, but it was worth it. My roomies were up and running when I got back at like 23:30. They were hyper from lack of sleep. Haha. I like them, they are so sweet and so funny. I am gonna miss them so much when I have to leave (way too soon!).

Bonfire at Grover Beach

I guess I should go to bed now so I won’t be too tired to get up at 8:30 tomorrow…

1st+2nd day of class and Pint Night

Posted on by
Reply

This post used to contain pictures, but due to new storage limitations from WordPress, I had to fix the problem and decided to create a new blog that works as an archive for all the posts from my two years in California. This full post can be found here.

I’ve spent two days in school now and I have gone to one of each class. And I like it. Yesterday morning I had Fundamentals of Transportation Engineering at 7:40am to 9am. The teacher seems to be really good and the topic is interesting too. I actually had no idea what I signed up for months ago. The teacher introduced me and Johanna in front of the whole class because we were from Sweden and that he was probably gonna ask us during class sometimes how it works with transportation in Sweden.

At 9:10 I had to find my next class. It wasn’t too hard but I was one of the last to get there so I had to sit in a left-hand seat. The tables you have in front of your chair in the lecture hall and it is just a tiny piece of table you fold up from the armrest and a few have a table on the left side, so that was weird. That class was History of World Architecture : Prehistory-Middle Ages. It is a fun subject. But I heard it is a tough class, much to remember and read. But I will probably be fine. The teacher is very monotone when he speaks though which makes two hours extra long. But I’m sure the multiple choice tests will be easy enough.

I went home after that, had a quinoa salad (so far I have actually been healthy!), and then went to my last class for the day which was a lab in Fundamentals of Transportation Engineering. It is two different classes for some reason. The teacher was nice. He called everyone’s names and he asked most of us if we preferred what he said or a nickname. So he asked me if I wanted to be called Alex or Alexandra. I said Alex since everyone here knows me by that name. Alex is a very very common name here. I meet Alex’s all the time. In the lab we were just doing a little research about the Interstate Highway System. It took a while for me, I need to get used to this. But I hope it was okay.

After that I went home, hung out at Ryan’s for a bit before we headed downtown with Johanna. Taco Tuesday offered $1.50 tacos and $3.50 margaraitas. That was fun. Then we went to trivia night at Woodstock with some of Ryan’s friends and then we headed to SLO Brew where we spent most of the evening. Apparently a guy from LMFAO was there so the line in was long, but it went really fast anyway. Not many people from our WoW-group was there but a few and it was a nice evening. So Pint Night works like this. Every Tuesday a few bars downtown sells a pint of beer for $1-3 depending on what beer you want. You first buy your own glass and then you just reuse that all the time. Cider was available for $3 which was awesome! I met a girl named Martina there last night and I met her in San Diego last year when she was roommates with Hanna (who did this exchange program two years ago). She was also an international student back then and now she is back for her graduate degree. I had no idea she was back and when I saw her, that was a nice surprise. She is very nice. I wasn’t too drunk but I still walked the bike home. I got home at 3am. And I am so glad I don’t have any early classes on Wednesday’s.

This morning I skyped with mom for the first time since I got here. It felt so normal, like I never left San Diego. Was I ever home in Sweden?

After that I went to the pool here in PCV and did a lot of reading. Here it is apparently normal to read what the teacher says before class to be prepared. So I spent a few hours by the pool reading about architecture history. I think I got a little tan. Not any redness at all. I think I am getting used to the sun here which is good. Of course I had a lot of sunscreen on but my first weekend here I got burned anyway.

Studying at the pool

I got home, took a shower, had another salad for dinner (I don’t have that much food yet) and then headed to my last class, which is Sustainable Environments. That class will be so much fun. We are gonna watch a lot of movies, he encourage us to listen to music like Bob Marley and Ramones (he put links to songs on the course webpage). And we only have three hours of class every week instead of four (it is a four credit class). So those last ten hours that’s missing we are going on field trips. The teacher gave us a lot of suggestions and after each we have to write a paper. On Monday I am going to a documentary called Cowspiracy, which is showed downtown and then I will go to a solar panel thing and a landfill and maybe something else. I need ten hours. We talked to the teacher afterwards and he seems really cool. I need to remember to bring a cup of coffee or something next time though. I got pretty tired and I don’t wanna fall asleep during class.

Tomorrow’s another Tuesday. Thursday’s and Tuesday’s look exactly the same. I don’t look forward to going up at 6am to go to class at 7:40… Goodnight!

Late evening

Posted on by
Reply

Shit, I should already be in bed and sound asleep. What happens with time during the night? And why do I always feel like procrastinating when I really can’t do it? Tonight I have emailed a lot of people at Cal Poly asking how I will pay for my rent and Week of Welcome. Since Cal Poly is blocking web addresses from out of country I need to use PeerTransfer and it works okay. So my first rent will be paid tomorrow, $838.75 (=5957 SEK). It’s retarted that I have to pay that much for a tiny tiny bedroom. Well well, I pay for the experience of living abroad again, it’s worth it.

When it comes to Week of Welcome it’s not so clear though. I really want to be a part of it, but I don’t get any answers from the board of WoW on how to pay. When I use PeerTransfer it gives m four options for what kind of payment it is, Registration and Tuition Fee, Housing, Dining or Continuing Educataion. What to choose if I am paying to an orientantion event? I need them to answer soon. Orientation starts in less than three weeks!

Today I was up early (compared to yesterday when I slept until 12:30pm. I didn’t do that much studying. I did two problems and read through all the theory questions like six times. I didn’t want to try to learn anything new, that would have juts made me confused. So I’ve played RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 today. I will so enjoy my free time after tomorow. I have a lo of things to do tomorrow after the exam, but after that  will be free!!

Dinner was almost ready when mom came home from work. Pulled pork in tortilla bread. It has smelled amazing the whole day. But I have to admit that it tasted more last time. I don’t know if it was because we marinated the meat over the night or if it was because of the gas oven instead of my electrical one. But with some extra bbq sauce it was really good anyway :). We were both full as a small-pancake though (that Swedish saying wasn’t translated very well…).

So, the exam is tomorrow. I have to wake up at 6:30 am, and the hours until then are disappearing faster than I would have wanted. But at least I am tired now. Yesterday I couldn’t fall asleep until 3am, wasn’t tired at all!

Wish me luck on tomorrow’s five hour exam on Structural Engineering. My fourth try. And I think I might have a good feeling about it this time.

Good luck, me!

Thank you, me!

Studying

Posted on by
Reply

The only thing I’ve done today is studying. I ended the day by writing a 8 page summary of all different types of problems this course include. It is pretty obvious what types of problems I know more about. Easier to write things when you know more. Wood and steel are nice types of construction materials. Concrete not so much…

I did feel prepared yesterday. It felt good and I felt that I could have a chance this time. But today, when I finished all the problems that I told myself I would do before the test, it doesn’t feel that good anymore. I think it is because I know time is running out to prepare and it is too little time to do everything I want to do and it just gets overwhelming and I don’t know what to do instead. I think I will do some problems tomorrow but focus on the theory. I haven’t done any of it since June!

While I’m studying tomorrow I will be cooking dinner for mom, pulled pork!! We put the meat in marinade tonight and I hope it will taste even better this time.

Lightning

Posted on by
Reply

This evening has been retarted. Lightning across the sky every 20 seconds, no thunder though, that came later. The sky is being lit up all the time and with the thunder it is a bit scary. But lightning is beautiful! On the way home from work I actually caught a couple of lightning bolts on camera. My first photo and I got it. I tried for a while more on mom’s balcony but I only got the last millisecond of it, which was pretty cool too. After that I tried to study for a while but I didn’t understand the problem so I just quit halfway through the problem and will continue tomorrow. I am so exhausted from the last week.

It’s been a crazy week. I feel like it is time to make it official online. On Monday, August 18th, I broke up with Chad because of some reasons. I don’t want to go in to the details here because that’s no other person’s business. But everything bad between us has escalated so quickly and it has ended with him moving out very sudden and me living on mom’s couch for now. He hates me and I am trying not to think about him with my exam coming up on Wednesday. I need all my attention on that so I can pass this stupid thing.

I am very sad about what happened, I really am… But it was for the best for both of us.

I didn’t go in to work yesterday and today was really tough. I was at Berget and had a lot of different attractions instead of two or three at Balderado. For the first time ever I had to ”break” Höjdskräcken. And at lunch right before that I talked about how I had been on breaks on all the attractions on the mountain except Höjdskräcken (none at Balderado). A break is when the attraction is closed due to technical issues.

Mom picked me up from work and we drove to my place to pick up some more clothes and water my plants.

Now I will go to bed (=couch), watch the second half of a True Blood episode I started watching this morning. I hope I will be able to fall asleep with all this lightning and thunder going on outside! Because I have a long day of studying tomorrow…

Chip helping me to study Chip was keeping me company late last night when I was studying.Pink-blue sky at my placeA pink/blue sky outside my apartment. So beautiful! LightningMy first try at a lightning bolt photo! Success! LightningThis is the second best shot. This is at the very end of a lightning bolt. It was behind that cloud. Pretty cool.

Crawfish party

Posted on by
Reply

Every year at the end of the season the different departments and areas at Liseberg have crawfish parties. A crawfish party is something very Swedish where you sit down with friends for a night in August, eat crawfish and shrimps and drink. It is a very fun occation!

Last night, at Berget’s crawfish party (kräftskiva in Swedish) I didn’t eat any crawfish though. I haven’t had time to buy anything so I did what a lot of others did, bought pizza. It was very good aswell. I will miss the Swedish pizza.

During the evening awards were handed out. I didn’t even get nominated for anything. But that’s okay, the only thing I felt that I could have won was Pooler of the year. But since I’ve almost only been at Berget people don’t really see my as a Pooler.

The evening was over at 2 and I stayed behind and helped cleaning for a bit. At 2:45am I started walking home and got home at 4. It was a long walk from Majvallen to Svingeln. Now I have blisters on my feet from walking that far in heels/barefoot.

It could have been a more fun evening if it weren’t for the situation I’m in right now, but it was still a nice evening with friends!

 

Today I’ve been studying a little bit. I only did 1,5 problems though. But all 9 problems I have left are concrete ones. And the tough concrete ones! I got stuck on the second because of way to many minuses and it got me confused. And I also got distracted when dad and Karin invited me to dinner at Öltullen, the bar/restaurant at the corner of my building. It was a nice couple of hours. And when I got home from that I saw that the information about my housing at Cal Poly was available. I will be living in Poly Canyon Village – Gypsum with three American girls. One of them emailed all of us already and told us a bit about herself and asked if maybe we should make a list of things we need in the apartment. It will be so cool living in an apartment with four bedrooms and three other girls. It is way better than what college dorms looks like in the movies. I have a good feeling about this.

I most definitely need to go to bed now, I have to get up early to be in school to study with Linnea and after that I will work. But only for 5 hours.

Rabbit Party

Posted on by
Reply

Last night was the seasons last rabbit party for us Lisebergers. And because of that I decided that I wanted to go.  Preparty right after work where I spent my 7th day of the season at Balderado. All the attractions I have there are single manned from now on, so I was all alone the whole day except for 1,5h in the middle where I was at Berget. I closed Kristallsalongen so I sat there for one hour, not doing much except eating candy and mentally preparing for the party. It was actually okay sitting there solving crosswords.

I changed into my beautiful Abercrombie dress, brushed my hair and then went will all the others to Hisingen where Victor lives. The preparty went by so fast. It was fun! And at 11:30 we went to Valand, the nightclub where the rabbit parties are. I could skip the line and paid 125 as cover and wardrobe and then I was in.The music was good, but I’m not much of a dancer. I spent most of the evening on the outdoor patio talking. It was nice! At 1am the Helix song went on and we were all inside dancing to it, but that was all the dancing I did. I talked to a lot of people and actually felt that I connected with a lot of them. Alcohol makes people honest and sharing.

I was there until it closed at 3am and then walked home. Took me 45 minutes.

Today I woke up at 10am, I didn’t feel bad at all, a little, but not much. Took a shower and then went to Kosmetisk Kirurgi to do an IPL treatment for hair removal under my arms. In total it was my 7th time I think and it is definitely working. Almost all of it is gone, but I still have a little left, so after this today I will go there once more after my year in California. Then I will probably be done, but I’m not sure all the hair will be gone forever. Anyway, it hurt really bad. I forgot how painful it is. At the end of the second armpit it hurt so much that I started wincing. Normally the burning pain is there for a millisecond, but after a while it hurt all the time. Not a nice feeling. I am still a bit sore, but it’s not too bad.

Today I also enrolled in the EDES 406 class. Open enrollment started today and I now have it on my schedule. So fucking awesome to have that done!  I also tried registering to the semester at Chalmers but I couldn’t since I’m not enrolled in any classes at Chalmers. But I need to be registered for CSN to see that I am doing some classes. I sent Chalmers an email and will probably get an answer tomorrow. I will call them otherwise. I was gonna call my landlord also to tell them my fridge is kinda broken. There is always a pool of water at the bottom of it. But I forgot. That’s for tomorrow.

After that I spent the afternoon studying and talking to mom. The problem I’ve been trying to solve for two days makes sense to me now. The mistake I made was that the ”d” in the formulas wasn’t the diameter which it normally is, but it was the distance from the top of the beam to the center of the rebars in the bottom. After I realized that I actually understood the problem. Yay! I love breakthroughs. Tomorrow I will start with wood again, and I might have time for another steel problem as well. But I have a feeling I won’t be in a study mood, but we’ll see.

In the evening anyway there is Berget’s crawfish party. I’ve been looking forward to it the whole summer, it’s gonna be legen… wait for it… dary!

Crown of Midnight

Posted on by
Reply

Last night I finished Crown of Midnight which was the second Throne of Glass book. So amazingly awesome! The ending was so unsuspected and I so look forward to the next book which will be published on September 2nd. Until then I will be reading the prequel The Assassin’s Blade

This series, written by Sarah J. Maas, is about a young orphaned girl who was taken in by the league of assassins and she is the best in the land at what she does.  She is betrayed though and ends up in a slave camp and the first book begins when the king’s men get her out of there so she can fight in a tournament to become the King’s Champion and then get her freedom. A lot of other things happen to around all this. Magic, demons, love triangles. If anyone is looking for a book to read, I highly recommend Throne of Glass.

Today was my Sunday and I tried to study for a while. I managed to solve two problems today before I found myself infront of a contrete problem. I decided to take a tiny break, but I ended up taking a break for the rest of the day. Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 is too fun. But I don’t feel bad, I did 5 problems yesterday! And I will get up early tomorrow and solve this concrete problem before work. And then I have three days off when I can study.

While I was studying yesterday I was also cooking dinner. I tried pulled pork for the very first time and it turned out great. I flavored it with honey barbecue sauce and garlic. It was served with mashed sweet potatoes. Yummy in my tummy!

Tomorrow’s 6 hours of work and then Rabbit Party! It’s the last for the season so I thought I would go. But right now I’mnot so sure. I am going to the pregame but I’m not sure about the real party at Valand. It is 100kr and I don’t even like nightclubs. We’ll see. I have to feel okay on Monday too to study.

Now I will go to bed, read, and mentally prepare for an early morning with concrete and rebars and then work and party!

New haircut

Posted on by
Reply

My computer was kaputt last night, so even if I had a lot of interesting things to write about, I couldn’t. My weekend is over and it was over way too fast. I wouldn’t have minded another week or so. My Friday was celebrated at Stage Door (a bar) with some of my colleagues. A very nice evening that ended at 1:30am.

Yesterday I woke up at 1pm I think. It was awesome to sleep in that long for once! I had an ambition to study some, but I realized I had lots of time so I decided to do some other necessary things. I called Radiotjänst again and asked them if they could give me back the last 500kr for wrongly charging me for the TV-license. They told me I would have it by the end of the week. The phone call, waiting including, took almost 30 minutes… After that I tried to call Kosmetisk Kirurgi to make an appointment for hair removal. I have two left since 2012 and thought I should get at least one done before I leave again, or hopefully both, but they have vacation now until the beginning of August, so I will have to wait. Not many people know it, but I have been going through some IPL treatments to remove hair under my arms. I am not done, but what an improvement after 6 (I think?) treatments. I can go one or maybe even two weeks without shaving, when I had to do it every day before.

My third call that day was to the hairdresser, they had an appointment just a couple of hours after I called so I took it. I like being spontaneous. I knew my hair was getting pretty damaged, even if it didn’t look too bad. But 6 months since last time, it was needed. It felt kinda stupid afterward though. I paid 400kr and the before and after picture look exactly the same… It feels better though and it definitely is healthier now with no split ends. I wanted to have the hair in the front a bit shorter as well, so there is a little bit of difference actually. I will post the before/after picture just because it’s so silly to pay that much for that little…

Before/after hairdresser
On these pictures it actually looks better on the before picture, probably because I am newly showered and the light is better. And I suck at taking selfies… Tomorrow my hair will look awesome after a shower and a hair mask and when I can style it the way I want.

I walked around in Nordstan (downtown) after that, tried to find a place who could fix my sunglasses. My engineering skills aren’t that good yet. No one could help me so I decided to make one final serious attempt to fix them. I bought thin iron thread and made a new loop and with some glue and tape it actually seems to be working. I just have to be careful and not put them in my purse anymore. If this doesn’t work I’ve actually found a website that sells those spare parts and I will order some if they break again. I know I am stupid for trying so hard to fix a pair of sunglasses that just cost $4, but they are so cool and so me and I love them. I don’t want another pair unless they look the same!

I did some grocery shopping on the way home because I had a very special plan when it came to dinner. Pierogi (according to Google Translate)! I had found a recipe for pierogi with spinach and feta cheese with pink pepper, parsley, hazel nuts and garlic. It wasn’t as perfect as it sounds, but definitely edible and a little more. Probably not the best with vegetarian food for me right now though. I’ve realized I probably don’t get enough proteins anymore. Poor and no time to cook real food have made me a temporary vegetarian. I like vegetarian food, but I think I need to focus on the meat now when I have money again. I have 17 000 right now in my account! But as I’ve said, I am a saver from now on.

Spinach/feta pierogi

And just when I was about to start updating the blog yesterday my computer pretty much died. No, it didn’t, but I couldn’t go to any webpages that required a login, like Facebook or my blog or even Google. It said something about an SSL problem. I googled it on my phone and after a while decided it was time to reinstall it. I probably got some virus… That’s what I did this morning inbetween my study sessions. Now it is working perfectly fine again. I tried the option to reinstall the operative system without removing my personal files (which is stupid when I have a virus, I know, but it worked!). It went’ smoothly and I just had to reinstall some programs.

I studied for a few hours, but I only managed to solve two problems. The easy wooden and steel pillar problems are done and I am now getting myself into the concrete ones. I hate concrete… But it started out pretty okay, I understood what I did and just when I reached for a new paper to continue the problem on, I realized all of them were out. It was raining outside but I was in such a good flow, so I took a break, went to Nordstan (where by the way, hundreds and thousands of million people were!! On a Tuesday afternoon?), bought two notebooks, a new deodorant and went home to continue on the problem. That’s everything I did actually when it comes to studying, but I am trying to understand what I am doing, not just copying the answer key, so it’s okay that it takes time. I will do some more tomorrow before work.

I had another pierogi for dinner and then played a few hours of Guild Wars 2 before I noticed the late hour. Time just flies when playing that. What’s so awesome about GW2 is that they are always updating the game. They release new seasons of the game with new storylines and map changing quests. The first season I missed because I was in California. It was a fun one I’ve heard, maybe it is possible to go through it by reading about it or something. I know the biggest thing that happened, and that was that the biggest city on the map got completely wiped out. I was so surprised when I logged in after a year and saw it and had no idea what happened. This time though I am playing through season 2 from the start. Today the second part of it was released and it turns out that another big-ass dragon is awaking! So much fun! I love this game, it’s not just the same thing over and over, but they are always changing it, good job, ArenaNet, you have really succeeded in making a great game!