So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish, part 2 of 3

I’m going to start this off by borrowing a line from the Beatles and saying “I get by with a little help from my friends.” Once again, this broadcast year has been made possible by Cornell University, my family, and contributions from viewers like you. Thank you.

It was an insanely busy/crazy year, but a very good one, so I’d like to recognize the people and groups who were a part of it:

- my family

- friends who participated in my adventures biking, rock climbing, roaming campus, venturing out onto the Commons, doing problem sets, hanging out in the dining hall, and baking

- AAIV, particularly my small group

- Cornell Productions, because hauling all that equipment up and down stairs must build character, or at least muscle, or something . . .

- the Big Red Pep Band

- the professors who taught us some stuff that we promptly forgot after the final will remember for the rest of our lives and the TAs who had to deal with us (there’s nothing quite like the panicked night-before-problem-sets-are-due crowd)

- Cornell’s ChemE class of 2016, because suffering is always less painful when done together. Here’s to two more years of late nights, impossible problem sets, and pain and despair.

The Courses of Semesters Past and Future

Because I spent the past semester beating Mathematica into submission and drawing the same boundary flow diagram on each of the nineteen parts of my fluids problem sets, I never got around to writing about the courses I’m enrolled in for next semester. [Not that I got around to writing much of anything last semester.] Since it’s now the end of the semester, I’m combining that post with my review of the classes I just finished (if I passed . . .).

Spring 2014:

Honors Physical Chemistry II: This may be colored a bit by the fact that I had a downright awful time with the final, but I’m more than a little glad to be done with p-chem. The second semester of p-chem covers everything from partition functions to thermodynamics to kinetics. The material was interesting and the problem sets were a good way to get practice, but I found a few too many of the exam questions dependent on studying exactly the right material or else finding you had no idea how to solve the problem.

Fluid Mechanics: Fluids and I got off to kind of a rough start, but it ended well. As compared to p-chem, the material was more applied, which is why I decided to major in chemical engineering, not chemistry, in the first place. The problem sets tended to walk a fine line between challenging, but doable, practice problems and what-the-heck-am-I-doing question fests at office hours. In case anyone was wondering, Olin is very quiet at midnight on a Friday morning.

Biomolecular Engineering: I enrolled in this class because it fulfills my bio requirement in the least number of credits. From what I heard from ChemEs who took this class last year, it underwent a major rehaul. That, however, does not excuse the fact that I found the class rather disorganized. Each lecture in and of itself was interesting, but I had little to no idea how most of the topics connected to each other.

Introductory Macroeconomics: Liberal studies. I spent three times as much time on fluids as this class and both classes were worth the same number of credits. The class was decent and I don’t regret taking it, though discussions weren't particularly helpful.

Physical Chemistry Lab: If I had to sum up this class in one word, it would be spectroscopy. I enjoyed the labs overall, though some of the lab reports leaned toward the tedious side. For the record, Excel and my computer do not appreciate having to plot 33,186 data points.

Fall 2014:

Introduction to Experimental Organic Chemistry: The organic chemistry version of the p-chem lab I just completed.

Principles of Organic Chemistry: In an unprecedented act, the ChemE curriculum has given me a choice. I can either take two semesters of orgo in one semester and go into less depth or take the first semester of orgo indepth. I chose the first option partly to get exposure to a full year of orgo and partly so I could jam my liberal studies class into my schedule.

Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics: Every other engineering major has their own thermo class, and this is the ChemE version. Haven’t heard anything good or bad about this class.

Heat and Mass Transfer: Another ChemE required class.

Introduction to Creative Writing: As part of my liberal studies requirement, I have to take a couple 2000-level classes that are, in theory, more advanced than 1000-level classes. Creative writing is not only 2000-level, but it’s also from a different category than my previous liberal studies classes. I know this class can vary depending on who teaches it, but a few of my engineering friends have survived it, so I thought I’d give it a try. Blogging totally counts as a form of creative writing, right? . . .

Small Boat Sailing: I've wanted to try sailing, so I’m taking the opportunity while I’m at Cornell to do so.

The No-Longer-Hypothetical List of Exciting Things That Have Happened to me at Cornell, Spring 2014 edition

As it turns out, this spring was busier than last fall. Attending class and doing problems sets was already the equivalent of a full time job with overtime, except I had to pay to do it. On top of that, I continued working for Cornell Productions, going to pep band and AAIV, and rock climbing in my spare time. Sometimes I even got to do fun things like eating and sleeping. As always, however, it was indeed exciting. Here’s the list:

1. Slope Day: My Slope Day experience involving the slope consisted of this:

The stage seems to be missing some parts.

The slope seems to be missing some people.

This was actually the day before Slope Day. On Slope Day itself, a couple of friends and I went to Cornell’s Hoffman Challenge Course, which is a ropes course about five miles off campus. They have high wire traverses (multivine, lily pads), a 64-foot replica of the clock tower with different ways to climb to the top, a zipline and swing out of the clock tower, and a trapeze, among other elements. I ended up doing a couple of the traverses, climbing the clock tower, and ziplining out of the clock tower. It was fantastic. [Thanks to Alternative Slope Day for organizing the event!]

The multivine

2. Going solo: I was sent to the Bear’s Den for Cornell Productions alone a couple times. Which meant that I was completely in charge of setting up, sound check, making sure nothing went catastrophically wrong with the sound during the show, and packing everything up nicely at the end. Besides the time that half the outlets weren't working, doing the shows alone wasn't too bad. At least I knew beforehand what the events were, unlike the time I showed up to work with another person and we were informed right then and there that a seventeen-piece live band was coming in. Thankfully there were several shared microphones.

3. Summer research: There’s a story behind how exactly I was offered my summer position, but the general idea is that I’ll be making models that demonstrate fluid mechanics (yes, I did spend the entire semester complaining about fluids; no, I did not actually hate the class – more about that in the next post). Besides getting to spend the summer in Ithaca when the sun exists, the project sounds like it could be pretty interesting.

4. Fancy hockey: For the last regular season home game of men’s hockey, the pep band members have the option of dressing up in fancy clothes. To make things even more exciting, this year the last home game was against Harvard. Wikipedia has an entire article on the Cornell-Harvard hockey rivalry, so it must be legitimate. To start off Harvard’s night, the pep band plays the theme from Love Story when they come out onto the ice for warmups. In Love Story, much as in real life, Harvard plays Cornell in a hockey game and loses. Later, when Harvard comes out for the lineups, the Cornell fans (excluding the pep band) throw fish onto the ice. And on this particular night, Cornell managed to come back from two goals down to put the game into overtime. Then with thirty-six seconds to go, a Cornell player scored the winning goal. How’s that for the senior hockey players’ last game in Lynah?

5. Penguins: I will very soon introduce the penguins that you may have met in my Mother’s Day post. They have been travelling across campus with me and are part of a photo project. As an added bonus, I got them on sale.

Halfway There

During my freshman year of high school I was mandatorily made to join the marching band if I wanted to be part of concert band. It was a bit of a misnomer because we didn't do any marching. We spent the time at football games watching the clock, learning the cheerleaders’ cheers, and trying to keep warm enough to be able to play. Then for about ten minutes in the middle of the whole ordeal, we’d run onto the field, stand there, and play the halftime show before running off. One of the songs in our halftime show was “Livin’ On A Prayer” by Bon Jovi. The chorus of that song goes as follows: “Whoa, we’re halfway there/Livin’ on a prayer/Take my hand and we’ll make it – I swear/Livin’ on a prayer.” Seems fitting to describe the first half of my college career.

What have I learned so far? No matter how early you start p-chem or fluids homework, you will always be finishing both problem sets at 2 in the morning on Friday. There’s no such thing as “a quick question.” Always carry an extra pair of socks. Earplugs aren't a bad idea either. I also solved the Navier Stokes equations, discovered the wonders of quantum tunneling, celebrated Valentine’s Day with MATLAB, used both the very sophisticated coffee cup calorimeter and a bomb calorimeter, and much, much more.

This past semester was my busiest yet (though according to my preliminary data analysis I actually got more sleep this semester than last) but it was also a whole lot of fun. There were impromptu field trips, baking mishaps, the end of hockey season, the start of the MLS season, and penguins.

I currently have a few weeks off and I’m hoping to do some writing here before I have to get back to work. There are some usual end-of-semester posts I’ll put together and then I’d like to highlight some of the things that made my spring semester so busy. [Problem sets. So many problem sets.]

This x 25 = problem sets for the Spring 2014 semester

A Message from the Penguins

[You haven’t met them yet, but my penguin friends are here to bring you a message today. They’re named after the Fellowship of the Ring from The Lord of the Rings.]

Pippin: May the Eleventh be with you!
Gandalf: Fool of a Took! It’s May the Fourth be with you. You’re seven days late.
Pippin: Seven? Eleven . . . minus four . . . hold on a second here . . .
Merry: That’s seven, Pip.
Pippin: All right then. But I did think there was a holiday today.

Aragorn: It’s Mother’s Day.
Pippin: What’s that you said?
Aragorn: It’s Mother’s Day, little halfling.
Pippin: That’s right. Happy Mother’s Day!