Three ways to measure the posts I did not make

For a while I had a regular feature where I posted every time I made a platelet donation. As my last post on the donation topic was over three months ago, a lot of appointments have passed without comment.

I could measure this time by how big my cup pyramid has grown. Every time I make a donation I save my cup from the canteen.



I could talk about all the movies I have seen when I donated for the last few months:

Gran Torino Clint Eastwood yelling at people

Munich Track down and kill people who killed people

Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist Everyone wants to find Where's Fluffy? They should look on MacGuffin Street

Star Trek The fourth of the eleven Star Trek movies where a time distortion is a big deal

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen The explosions are gratuitous, but here is a good exchange:
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to get you a tighter shirt"
"They don't have one, we've looked"

Monsters vs. Aliens The monsters are coming to Modesto!

There is one other way I could measure how often I have made apheresis donations. Last week they gave me this.

Course Evaluations

Since it is the season of the ending of classes and finals for many people, I have a few comments to share. Specifically, comments I have written on course evaluations for classes I have taken. Some of these are born of bad professors, while others represent my failures as a student.

Antebellum America 1815-1860: The Emergence of Mass Society
I really enjoyed the assigned reading, especially the Crockett, Barnum, and Otter.
This refers to the autobiographies of Davey Crockett, P.T. Barnum, and William Otter. My comment is half true, as I had read Crockett's book and half of Barnum's book. I had not even opened the Otter book, but from the way the professor described it in class it sounded like reading I would like. Several months after I finished the class, I got around to finishing the three books and enjoyed them.

Sexuality, Gender, and Culture in the Ancient World
This class was on Tuesdays and Thursdays in Etcheverry. I only took it because Classics 130 (a degree requirement) was not offered for an entire year and it was the only class recognized as a replacement. If I did not take it, I would have had to take two classes to replace it in one semester.
On Thursday I did the Daily Cal Sudoku during class and on Friday I saved the Sudoku to do in class on Tuesday, since Tuesday's Sudoku would not last for the entire hour and a half.
The class was crosslisted with Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies and had a large number of people who had no exposure to Classics. This meant the professor spent a lot of time covering introductory material. This was very boring to someone who majored in Classics and had taken nine classes on the subject. It was also the same professor that taught me Introduction to Greek Civilization, so I had heard his commentary and read his favorite plays and ancient works before. I did clarify this in my evaluation.

Linear Algebra
My friend is not in class today, but he asked me to write a bad evaluation for the professor for him.
This professor was terrible and deserved the negative comments I wrote. I took this class in the Fall of my sophomore year. It was a great semester, I spent more time on Sproul tabling then I did in class. It was also the semester with my best grades.

Integral Calculus
The professor made a big deal how she never got a review sheet for a midterm in her entire life and explained how reviewing our notes on our own would be better then any review sheet we were ever given. Then she gave us a midterm where the last problem was directly from the review sheet, completely discrediting everything she said about review sheets.
I remember working through most of the problems on the review sheet the night before and deciding to go to sleep instead of doing the last couple of problems, specifically remembering the professor's comments both in class and on the front of the review packet. Unfortunetly for me, the last problem about series on the review sheet appeared on the midterm. So much for listening to the professor.

Multivariable Calculus
I learned more about the shortcomings of Stuart [the class textbook] then I did about calculus in the lectures.
The professor was a real Count in his native Eastern European county. He also thought the multivariable textbook he wrote was better, but was not allowed to use it as there were contracts to use the other textbook by Stuart.

The Right Questions

Sometimes there are failures in communication.

I was recently talking to my Associate, and he told me some big news about one of our friends. This was surprising to me, as I had chatted with this friend online a few times recently and emailed him, but he never alluded to anything. When I finally asked him why he did not tell me this big news of his, he told me it was because I never asked.

I wonder, what things are going on with the people I know that I am unaware of? What is happening that I do not know because I did not ask the right question?

In an ideal world, people would tell me new and noteworthy things before I run through a battery of twenty questions. Then I started to think, how many times has something new happened to me and I never said anything? I have waited many times for questions that never came. I write short speeches in my mind explaining what I think about, stuff that happens to me, and my feelings on situations. Most of these speeches remain on a shelf in my thoughts and never find voice aloud.

As an example, neither of the groups I am involved with at church know I spent five semesters leading a Bible study group in college. Even though one group is reading Peter's First Letter and I have a quasi-teaching role in the other, they don't know this useful experience of mine.

As a step in learning to ask the right questions, I will volunteer information about myself. Last week I started reading some Shakespeare. What started as reading Richard II took me to the library for more plays and to websites covering the Hundred Years War, the real figures behind Shakespeare's history plays, and questions about the "Pseudo-Shakespearian" play Edward III.

Thanksgiving and the Bears

It is the beginning of a new month. This means partial drafts and post ideas must go.

Thanksgiving

At the church group/fellowship I attend I have acquired a reputation for coming up with good ice breaker questions. Before Thanksgiving I suggested, "What is your favorite Thanksgiving memory?" My answer:

When I was in college, our Bible study group Seekers would celebrate Thanksgiving on the Tuesday before the holiday. One year I signed up to bring mashed potatoes. Since many people (30+) were expected and mashed potatoes are a classic dish for the day, I mashed 15 lb. of potatoes for the feast. I had to go out and buy a pot that was big enough to cook all of them. I also dumped sour cream and cream cheese into the potatoes for extra flavor (after putting a bowl aside for Fr. Charlie).

This past Thanksgiving, I offered my Grandma my pot to cook a large amount of potatoes, but she said that was unnecessary.

The Bears

In the 112th Big Game, the Cardinals (not the birds, but the color) took a 14-0 lead in the first quater. The Bears came back scoring 24 points, to take the led at 24-14. It ended with an interception by Cal at their own 3 yard line to end the game at 34-28. You can read the recap from the Cal Football site or any number of links on Google.

This means we keep the Axe!

There is one more game in the regular season at Washington. Then it is all about a bowl game. The predictions have Cal playing Oklahoma in the Burt Sun Bowl, which is played in El Paso. According to Google Maps, this is only 799 miles from my house. The stadium is easy to get to, there is less than a mile of driving after exiting the 10. This is 600 miles closer than the Armed Forces Bowl where the Bears played two years ago.

It would be fun to go to Texas for the bowl. My concerns are: I would want to travel with fun people and a trip would have to deal with the New Year's Eve crowd as the game is the morning of the 31st.