Waste of time: Exam Seven.
C4 today.
Question Two was fine, I do love a good binomial expansion. Worked out quite well and did it quickly, which was awesome. Question Two was also great, trapezium rule and integration, same as other people: fabulous.
Then it went downhill, real fast. Answered only bits of questions from then on. Happy that there was no differential equations question, but the big 14 mark question on vectors was a complete fail.
Which I believe, according to my shaky and approximate maths, I've gotten a D in Maths. Which means I should be aiming for 85/90 (roughly) UMS tomorrow to get a C, to guarentee a place at Derby. Which plainly and simply will not happen, ever. So I just hope I get an A in ICT and Derby like me.
Gonna start revising for PA10 in a bit, which should be fun going through 4 modules. Or 4 and that bit of the optional that everyone had. Should probably find out, to be honest.
23 hours left. Dreading the last two, but can't wait either.
Farewell!
Things are going alright.
For once. It's quite great, I do have to say. Had a lie-in this morning, exam was good, I've gained lots of money, my record of achievement has reappeared, and I've gotten two free songs off of iTunes.
ICT went really quite well. Which is obviously the only exam where I'm going to come out thinking that, with C4 and PA10 next week. Most of the questions went really well, apart from a few.
And that database question was awful, mainly because it wasn't normalised! It annoyed me so much.
Anyway, I hope I've got a B there, which will hopefully get me an A overall, the only decent grade from my A Levels. Unless I do get a D in Physics, which is what I'm expecting. Not really a good grade, though. Especially not good enough for my university choices.
Off to Derby again for another open day to go see Peak Court and talk to the course leader.
Weird that in 93 hours I'll be done with exams. Eep, should probably start learning C4 soon.
Farewell. =)
I'm not sure how I forget to post.
As I do quite enjoy posting.
Oh well, in the past five days I've not done much.
It's consisted mainly of sleeping, The Sims 3 (I do love that game), Big Brother (meh, a bit, you know), random pub visits (you know, spontaneous), Twitter (hell, most of my time consists of Twitter now), YouTube (have been watching literal videos and lots of random videos also), The Apprentice (phew), and not revising.
Going through those in detail now, I suppose.
The Sims 3 is an enjoyable game. According to the official TS3 community, that opinion is wrong. However, I haven't had any problems, and am enjoying it greatly. It's very time consuming, but I don't see that as a bad thing. Lots of things to do. I also like how the neighbourhood evolves around all the characters, which is also fun. But yeah, it's awesome. Also awesome is the USB plumbob I recieved due to my purchasing of the Collector's Edition. It's a bit broken, but still awesome. It is being held together with Blu-Tack, which I may see about getting a replacement. Another awesome thing was GAME reducing the price, and then re-imbursing me for the difference. Only £5, but that's £5 that I had before.
Big Brother is next on the list, so it's obviously the next thing to write about. Rodrigo to win, obviously. And I thought Siavash should have gone, but I can see why Beinazir did go. Impressions so far is it's a bit crap. However, Big Brother US 11 starts next month in the US, obviously, which I prefer to the UK version. Mainly because they have more interesting tasks and a better format.
Random pub visits. Well, visit, but it was still a spontaneous visit that was fun and enjoyable.
Twitter. Not really much to say, but I do like hearing the ping of Twhirl every 40-55 seconds. Without it I feel bored and incomplete. Plus there are lots of exciting people there. Which is obviously awesome.
YouTube.
I've watched that so many times over the past few days. It amuses me greatly.
The Apprentice. Regarding the finalé, I honestly did want Yasmina to win. Thought she'd mess it up with the presentation, but a deserved winner. Still haven't seen You're Hired! yet though, which annoys me. Also, I really want to try a strawberry and basil chocolate.
Not revising. That has been a big thing. Instead of revising, some of the more minor things that I have done include cleaning out my arrow keys on my keyboard (oh my, there was so much stuff in there, this summer I may have to have a day removing every key and cleaning this keyboard thoroughly), correctly tagging all of my music with their correct date (not a laborious task, doing the genres however might be different), watch lots of television (lots of Mythbusters, American Dad! (which I have discovered that in the UK we're watching season 2 on BBC3, and in the US they're about to show season 5, so I've been downloading three seasons recently)), fix my Mighty Mouse scrolling (sort of fixed it, now it doesn't scroll very well and is held together by Blu-Tack, whoops), dismantled an old computer (I was bored), bought some new clothes (and a new tie for prom, be ready to be amazed), and looked for a job (I was that bored).
That's it.
So long, farewell.
Ahh, that creepy Alan Carr advert is on. It's like those toilet paper adverts with the child. All creepy.
Night.
Another good day.
Well, almost all day.
Some bits were just plain hilarious!
The start of the day, the Core 4 mock, was a waste of time. I did worse than expected. Which sort of put an expected downer on my day. Following the Core 4 mock, we went to Bloomers & Tarts for the usual Tuesday sandwich. Which was nice, as usual. I spent a couple of hours in the area catching up with even more friends, which was also nice.
Come 12.30, and I start heading home. No. 1 was 5 minutes late, which was usual. The No. 33 to Norton Canes was on time, as usual. That's where the problems began. Mainly because the bus overheated (another reason why the current UK heatwave is failing, whih can be added to congested nose and bad sleep), and broke down outisde the Spar in Heath Hayes. Which amused me. Apart from the fact the bus was oh so hot, it was being stranded two minutes away from my house. And by stranded, I mean far too hot and exhausted to walk back. The No. 32 was around soon enough though, so I was home, relaxing.
Then I did nothing for four or so hours, until the E3 conferences of the afternoon.
As expected, Nintendo's was truly awful. For me, anyway. I don't care about Motion Plus (or Motion+, or however they're branding it), Golden Sun, DSi, Wii Sports Resort, or the Wii Vitality Sensor. I mean, seriously? No, bad Nintendo. The only thing announced that did interest me would have to be Super Mario Galaxy 2, but I'm planning to trade my Wii in soon anyway due to the 10 month lull in using it, and based on E3 there's nothing new coming in the next year that interests me enough. So, the Wii should cover Lips and Microsoft Points hopefully, and more.
Sony's conference, however, was in a completely different thing. Lots more interesting things that interested me. Uncharted 2 looked visually stunning, but I can't see how standard clothes could stop a helicopter mounted machine gun's bullets. But that's nitpicking. Anyway, other things that they showed was FFXIII, which looked visually stunning, nice to see more of it, very confusing with all the terminology being thrown around, along with the mad camera panning.
Favourite bit of Sony's conference was what I thought, and probably most people watching, was Jack Tretton showing FFvXIII gameplay, but announcing FFXIV was just immense! Don't think anyone expected that, but it was a good reveal. Even if FFXIII isn't out before they announced it, which I feel is a bit weird. Anyway, best game shown for me (as I care not for God of War, Metal Gear Solid, MAG (which I fail to see the point of, big woop about the 256 simultaneous players, it doesn't seem to add anything to gameplay, apart from the fact that you need to be pretty skilled in commanding 127 other team mates), or Trico or whatever the hell was happening in that) would have to be the latest game in the custom content, sorry, Play, Create, Share genre, ModNation Racers. It looks like a fun little game, with one mad custom race track creator. The way it was so fluid in its running was just simply amazing, and I can't wait to give it a go.
Sony's new hardware is something else that's a bit interesting. The worst kept secret of E3, the PSP Go, seems like a fabulous idea, but it just seems far too overpriced to be something I'd buy. The other thing they introduced didn't have a name, but I couldn't take it seriously when they said that you could cast fire and get a red, lit up ball. To be honest, it did look good, but I honestly don't care about motion control all that much. The way it was represented was very good, but when you can draw on a virtual screen as precise to 1mm, what's the point? (I was thinking that all the way through the Wii Sports Resort stuff as well) If it's that precise, why not just draw? Ah well.
I don't think it'll be as successful as the Wii's motion controls, or Project Natal. The reasons being that the Wii relies upon the motion controls, and Project Natal doesn't need two lit up wands to operate. Also, they'll probably be optional with few games needing them, so you know. They made for a good tech demo, anyway. I think Project Natal will be more successful as it does more, in my opinion. I see the facial recognition, voice recognition and full body motion tracking with nothing more than one USB peripheral just mad, and with lots of interesting possibilites. I mean, Milo, for god sake, the creepy boy that reacts to your emotion. It's weird, but amazing, and if that's where games are going, I really need to pass my A Levels. Here's hoping.
Anyway, in general, I felt Microsoft had the best press conference this year. The stage was sexy and exciting, they had Steven Spielberg, Hideo Kojima, and the Beatles on stage, and they showed more games that I was interested in (Halo: ODST, Halo: Reach, Modern Warfare 2, The Beatles Rock Band, Crackdown 2, Left 4 Dead 2, FFXIII) and announced lots more exciting functions to add to the dashboard (Last.fm, Facebook, Twitter, Sky, and of course, Project Natal). They also didn't blart out lots of statistics, marketing crap or NPD data like Sony and Nintendo did, which made for an enjoyable two hours of games and experiences.
Sony had an alright stage with an alright conference (I don't care how big the screen is, to be honest, I just want games and no showreels), and showed a few games I was interested in (ModNation Racers, FFXIII, FFXIV, Uncharted 2), and their unnamed motion tech was pretty awesome, though I see it a bit useless. But what do I know? Oh, they had Hideo Kojima too.
Nintendo was just one big pile of awful. Apparently, "Everyone's Game" which is a load of crap. Weird screens and no Zelda made me a bit disappointed. And they didn't have Kojima either. Or Ravi Drums. Ah well, maybe next year? Hah.
That's been a basic representation of my day, really. And with the rest of this week off school (study leave seems so much more interesting with me not actually going into school, I do have to say), I should get some revision done. Well, I need to get some revision done. I want to be helping to create mad games.
However, The Sims 3. That is all.
Oh wow.
Let's recap today.
Went into school for no reason whatsoever, but still caught up with some friends, which was nice.
Then I came home, finally found a working a stream of Microsoft's E3 press conference. Fell in love with the stage and the video screens, it did look fabulous. Then it was the announcements, Halo: ODST, Halo: Reach, FFXIII English 360-powered gameplay, Sky, Last.fm integration, Facebook integration, Twitter integration, Crackdown 2 announced, and then Project Natal.
What a fabulous little device.
Milo is creepy though.
That's about it for today.
Gonna try revising this evening so I don't totally bomb out tomorrow.
Oh, chose a new theme for the blog. I got bored of the other one, the positioning on widgets made me die a little inside.
This one isn't so orange, but there's an orange RSS icon floating around.
Oops.
I forgot to post again.
All week.
So it's time for a mega long recap.
Problem there, is I've done very little, all week, making both the need for a post each day futile, as they'd all end up like the posts I made throughout May last year. (I'd recommend not clicking onto the May 2008 archives, it's truly awful) Still, I did do a few exciting things. Or witnessed a few exciting things.
This week has mainly been about Britain's Got Talent, in the same way the week before was all about Eurovision, and the week starting tomorrow will be mainly about Big Brother. However, what a wonderful week of Britain's Got Talent it was, loads of exciting peformances and fabulous acts, really enjoyed Diversity and thought they were a deserved winner.
Another exciting thing was recieving my RAM replacement. Instead of putting it back into my netbook (awh, Dell are discontinuing the Mini 9), I decided to put it into my iMac to give it a boost from 2GB to 3GB. I never really noticed the difference when it was in the netbook, so it seemed a bit futile to keep it there. Plus, with The Sims 3 RAM requirement of 2GB, putting the extra may make me a bit more awesome.
Or something like that. To be honest, I don't really see what RAM does. I believe bigger is better, though.
Oh well.
A third exciting thing was the arrival of my Bacon Salt. As suggested by Matty, it does smell like (Barbecue?) Pringles, but it tastes a little like bacon. Am planning to try using it on many things over the next months. Oh yes.
That's all for highlights.
Another, sort of highlight anyway, is the fact that I've done much revision at all. Like, nothing. I still don't know much Core 4, and I have a mock exam on Tuesday.
Though I'd count that as a highlight, it led into the biggest fucking lowlight ever. I've basically completely given up on exams now, as I just can't be bothered because of how Mechanics 1 went two Fridays ago. It's also made me think about how I'm not going to get the grades I need to get onto my university course, and whether I'll be able to manage and cope on the course if I do get upon it. Then I started thinking about what I'd do if I failed my course, or even if I failed to get on the course in the first place.
='(
Plus, because of the hot weather and my hay fever, I've been sleeping even more erratically than usual. Like, trying to get to sleep at 11pm, yet not falling asleep until 5am, then waking up at 8am because it's so bloody hot.
I'm off to go lie down and attempt to sleep, ready for my single revision session tomorrow. Actually, I do wonder if we have an ICT session tomorrow. Not that I care, to be honest. Ah well. I'll end up probably listening to some Lady Gaga and maybe watching some Big Bang Theory.
I hate this part right here. Like the song though.
/violin
Tuesday.
That was the official day of the week for May the 19th, 2009.
I didn't do much. Mainly went to revise at school, or watch Mythbusters, or listen to some classic Eurovision songs, or calculate what I really want to buy from Lips DLC (costing me 2760 Microsoft Points, gah, so many good songs, I mean check out this Spotify playlist), and having a nap.
Oh, doing some revision at home too, as I do have some exams on Thursday and Friday.
Ah well, all over in 28 days.
That's becoming really soon. And I don't know most of the C4 content I need to know. Fails.
However, for Sam's week of most under-worn Ties, today I wore my Union Jack tie. Tomorrow should be something fabulous.
A title.
78 days until I finish my summer exams. That feels really quite weird. Mainly because I don't know much of the content for the seven exams I'm sitting. So really, I need to start doing work. Which, to be honest, I'm doing.
Last weekend I got almost up to date with all of the ICT. This weekend, well, that didn't go so well. Sort of did some Maths, worked through the first C4 chapter. Spent most of it not doing anything, however.
This week should be average. Here's hoping, anyway.
The past three weeks.
Well. They've been full of ups and downs.
Basically exams the first week. Not helped by the chest infection I had.
In a nutshell;
- General Studies ended up with me giving up due to not understanding the questions, plus the lack of care I have for the qualification.
- My ICT resit, which I think went really, really well.
- The Thursday afterwards brought the joy of Mathematics for Core 3, which went badly.
Next up were people's birthdays.
Jimmy's Birthday meal at Jimmy Spices was highly enjoyable. So much food. That was tasty and infinite. I'd like to go back, I must say.
And then Lozza's Birthday Party at Lozza's house was fun. Lots of fun photos. Fun times.
However, after these fun events, I was back into exams.
This week of exams,  in a nutshell;
- My Statistics Resit was awesome, I got lots of marks, and was overall happy with the paper. However, damn you Rohit.
- Physics doesn't warrant a conversation.
So overall, for the five exams in January, the only worthwile ones were the ones that I had underperformed in before. This does not bode well for PA07/W, PA07/P, PA10, C4, M1 [maybe, I have most of the prior knowledge from PA02 (that I failed previously)], and ICT4.
Between Physics on Wednesday and being back to school on Monday, I spent most of my time with an open (well, hidden) piece of ICT coursework. I also went for a meal, spent a day out with the family, and slept a lot. To be honest, I could have been a bit more productive.
Then we're into last week, which has been the first full week back for a while. Which is actually a good thing, as out of the last six EMA payments, I recieved one. I hope so much that I get this EMA bonus this week, or else I can't do anything. Crap, forgot about Leaver's Hoodie Money. =(
Anyway, my lack of productivity and attendance was hardly noticed, as I'm now caught up with everything new started in Mechanics and Core 4, got all the materials I need for Physics and started to catch up on ICT coursework and timed exam work. Which, according to the time plan I started three hours ago, I'm already ahead of myself.
Also last week, I have determined I have many frees. With General Studies being pushed off, I have a total of 22 hours every two weeks with no scheduled lessons. Good fun.
I also set my highest QWOP score of 70.6m which is running properly, and an Impossible Quiz 1 score of Q91.
Exciting party in the form of Jay's party yesterday, which was awesome. Lots of choones.
One thing I have identified in the past week is how much work, and by work I mean ICT, I have to do before I go to Las Vegas in nine days. I should probably start Task Five, actually, as it's due in today. Oh well, I fails. At least I have some Galaxy, Skins and QI to keep me entertained as I think about starting working. Mebbeh.
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