Here We Go Again

Ok so here I am again writing yet another blog post.  I guess the worst part about this one is that I am writing it 15 minutes before it is due at 11:45PM on Sunday night.  It really looks like I have learned quite a bit about procrastination.  Anyways on the other hand we only have 8 actual days of class left.  After that it's exams and then our glorious one month break which I have been look forward to for so long.  I am quite enjoying college life so far but the sad part about this semester is that well I don't believe it was the biggest shocker of the way college life could be like for me.  I only had intro classes, and basically just lower level easier classes.  Next semester I'll be getting into calculus, chemistry, and physics and well I know that I am going to get a real wake up call to what the college world is like.  My dad is going to Iraq January 7 so the worst part is that I will be busy trucking my siblings from place to place so they have rides because my dad will be away and my mom will most likely be working late.  The absolute best thing about this semester is that I have established a good starting out GPA for the rest of my college life.  I am really excited to see that this GPA is higher than what my high school one was, and it gives me a sense of acomplishment.  It also makes me feel like I am doing well and hopefully I can keep up the perseverance and hard work throughout the rest of my college years.  I need to get away from this staying up late though especially when I have 8:00 classes like every day.  But thats why I can't wait for next semester because I will only have 8AM classes on tuesdays and thursdays.  Life is good right now and I am definitely enjoying the college experience.  I love how the teachers give us one on one time and how the classes are small.  I think this is really going to help me become a better college student that I would be if I would have started out somewhere like UT austin, or even Texas A&M.  I will say that I have no regrets from this semester as it slowly draws to a close.  I am also not looking forward to all the brutal studying I will be putting in for my exams which are less than a month away now.  With all this being said I am looking forward to finishing the last few weeks of this semester with a bang. Go bulldogs!

Last blog I believe?

Wow already the last blog? It went pretty fast, Iw ould say.  If you think about it, the blog was like the rest of the college semester, it went by a lot faster than I expected. I assumed it would drag on day after day waiting for that last minute of class, so I could just be done with the day.  I was completely wrong.  Here I am sitting here writing my final blog for my FREX class in the final month of the first semester of college.  After that first week things really started to get moving and it seemed like just yesterday I was dreading going to orientation and now already the first semester is done.  I guess that is also what I will be saying when I graduate here in 2014 and I move on to Texas A&M.  I will probably be saying "wow it seemed like just yesterday I was dreading orientation and now here we are graduating".   I will also use phrases like wow ain't it funny how time just passes you by when you don't think about it.  I will say that there are positive things I can take away from this first semester here at TLU.  I got a taste of college life and I know that I really have to take things seriously.  Studying all the time should not be a phrase taken lightly as I did in the past.  I now know it takes many hours of study and at best hopefully they are spread out overtime instead of just crammed in the night before.  Because I have the urge to do well in college I am really trying to absorb the information I am learning to the best of my ability and I already feel like I have learned more than in the four years that I attended high school.  I know that college really is a place of higher education and not just another stepping stone in my life of school.  It's far more difficult and complex than I thought it would be in the beginning and all I can say is that I'm trully glad it is for if it wasn't well then I wouldn't have the urge to actually try and make good grades.  I would just try and pass by just like I did in high school when I quickly forgot how to actually care about school after my freshmen year.  Hopefully I do not get that same symptom here in college for I really and trully want to succeed.  I know it'll make my parents happy and it will be a great accomplishment for me in general.  I really want to get the rest of my life to start off with a bang and I think that all depends on how I do now and in my future years as a student of higher education. 

LAST BLOG MAYBE?

Ok this is going to be a long week! I have two papers to right in our class, one being the Krost paper and the other being the study abroad so I can get it in early for extra credit.  I am not sure but I could have an engineering test this week which would really suck.  Another thing I am stressing about is that fact that I really want an A in my elementary functions class but as of right now it’s not looking like that.  I really need to crack down and study more so I can get a high A on the final exam which hopefully will bring my grade up.  In the golf world as of now we are in the offseason again.  I don’t believe our fall season was to our coach’s liking so we really need to be putting more practice hours in.  The semester is really flying by which is the exact opposite of what I expected college life to be.  The only bad thing is that everything is moving at such a fast pace that there isn’t much time to just slow down and rest.  Many study hours are involved just so I can make sure I get the grade I want on the exam.  Times have completely changed since high school from when I would just go home and maybe do a little homework and not put any hours in for study.  I would either just go out with friends or family or anything similar to that to pass the time needed to get by to the next day.  Too bad our blogs are almost done as I think this is either the last or the second to last or something like that.  At least advising week is this week so maybe my bundle will be a little less loaded just so we can get our classes for next semester out of the way.  I can’t wait to live on campus sophomore year I am so ready.  My commute gets worse and worse every day.  Hooray for daylight savings or whatever we’re in I really love the extra sleep! It’s going to feel like I’m sleeping in for my 9 o’clock Friday class every day now.  HOORAY!! The best news is that even when I live on campus next year I will still be close to family so everything will be good.  These college years are going to be good. 

And then there was one month

So to put it into perspective most of us have spent so much time worrying about this first semester of college we are not realizing how fast it is flying by.  I decided to check how many days are left today and well there's not many.  We have less than a month and a half left to winter break which I am so excited about.  I mean come on we get a little over a month off to take a break from college life.  It's crazy it's like yesterday was freshmen orientation and we're already at winter break.  School is flying unlike the first week which seemed like it took forever.  I guess to me this means that I have gotten in the groove of things just like high school where the first day of freshmen year till the graduation of senior year felt like minutes.  It's good to know that I can keep my grades up while moving at such a fast pace.  In high school math classes it took a couple of days to go over a lesson.  In college math we go over a couple of lessons a day.  I completely prefer college math because for one there is really so much less homework than high school and two well I just happen to have a really good teacher.  It's funny I write this post now and well it's gonna feel like forever till winter break but when winter break comes it's gonna feel like today was yesterday.  It's weird how things work out when time flies.  You can't really control how fast it goes other than by not worrying about it.  When you don't worry about things as much time seems to move faster and in some cases this is good while in others it's bad.  When you are not worrying how long it's going to take you to get somewhere it's not bad but then again when you are not worrying about the time you need to spend on a term paper it's bad because then you'll procrastinate to the end and not give it your best effort.  The world just turns in circles that are uncontrollable and are hard to build a pattern around.  So in conclusion we have a month left of this first semester freshmen.  Let's try and do the best we can with it, putting are time into it, making the effort for at least decent grades, and giving back to your community, so that way when you go home for the winter you have a sense of worth and you can tell your families all about it.

Golf and Engineering

So last night I was told that I have a golf tournament this Monday and Tuesday.  This couldn’t be a worse time.  Next week is test week for me and our review days just happen to be Monday and Wednesday. BLAH! Also this means I have to do all my homework this weekend that I would be receiving on Monday and Tuesday which completely overloads everything.  I really wasn’t expecting to play this tournament, had no plans whatsoever, and then it was just dropped on me.  I guess the good news is that it’s a course I’ve played a few times before and I’m a little excited about playing.  I’m just happy I’m getting chances to play as a freshman so it’s kind of an achievement for me.  But the other reason it’s a terrible time for this is I just restocked  my golf bag with all new clubs and I am nowhere near as comfortable with them yet as I would like to be.  I guess this tournament is actually a good thing for the future that way I have some experience for next semester when how we do really matters.  This past week because of Dr. Rochin I have been studying a few engineering journals and magazines when I have time and I am just amazed.  The abundance of information about what I should be doing is amazing.  I think because he came to talk to us it made really want to try and broaden my knowledge on the career I want to pursue after college.  Plus I believe this will help me to get internships over the summer as maybe I will have a leg up on the people that don’t look at the items I am looking at.  Maybe looking these things up will give me ideas to discuss with whichever company I work for.  I am definitely going to continue to look items up because so far it has really helped me out to open up my eyes to the subject.  I mean I honestly only know I want to be an engineer.  Now whether that’s mechanical, electrical, civil, aerospace, or any others I have not yet committed myself .  I think the sooner I can commit the sooner I can really learn what I need to be learning here in college. 

School's back

So I really enjoyed fall break just like every other student I assume.  The best part about it was that well I had no school and had just about no homework.  It was only a few things here and there like this blog but it really isn't anything to complain about.  I am NOT looking forward to waking up early again tomorrow morning for class at eight but I guess I'll deal with it.  These last few day of just about 10 hours of sleep each day have been amazing! Being able to go to bed with a clear head and not worrying about homework to turn in or even a test feels so great.  I guess my study habits have sunk in for the most part.  I have stopped studying just the night or even day before for several hours and spread it out over time like an hour a day for a couple of weeks.  This helps with the test and helps to better retain the knowledge even after the test so that when finals come around you still have it stored.  The thing I hate the most is the classes that I feel are my easiest I have the worst grades but the classes I feel are difficult I have A's. I attribute this to always trying to study every chance I get for the harder classes and not giving any of my time to the others.  From now on I will be studying for those easy classes just as much as the hard that way my grades will be the same acros the board.  I feel like I need to take advantage of the classes I'm in now during my freshmen year because I know they are going to only get harder as I go on.  I am expecting more homework and more hours of study as the years go on so I really need to take advantage while I can.  I am really looking forward to next year because my parents gave in and are going to actually let me live on campus.  This means that my 1 1/2 - 2 hour commute every day is going to be depleted and I am so thankful.  This will give me more time every day to practice golf and study for school and even be more involved in the community as a whole. I mean I live close enough that if my parents really want me at home I am close enough to where I can always visit on the weekends and even during the weekdays on special occasions.  I will never be to far away and I am glad they have finally realized that.  I am stoked to say the least about living on campus next year.  Another great thing about it is I have already found a roomate so the way I see it life's going to be good. 

Eight O’ clock on a Sunday night and thank God I just remembered to write this blog.  This past week had some high points and a well only one low point so it was pretty good.  The low point was that my brand new driver broke on me after having it less than three weeks.  I mean mid-swing the driver just breaks, keep in mind I have had drivers for 5 years without breaking them so this is pretty surprising.  I would have been just fine with this if I could send it back and get it fixed but my coach tells me “we have to send it back so they can test it and make sure it wasn’t because I slammed it against a tree or something”. If this tests positive that I broke it against something well then I have to pay in the ballpark of $130 for the shaft which is really not want I want to do.  On the high points I found out I did good on all my tests last week and my grades are higher than I expected so I am really happy.  Also my girlfriend and I celebrated our one year anniversary this weekend so that was a good thing to.  I have noticed that I am starting to become more and more fatigued as the year goes on and I think that is because I am really not getting the sleep I should be getting.  At first not getting enough sleep was fine I could still be awake the next day no problem.  But it has really started to show in my workouts as I am not able to perform them as well when I first started which is not good because when you work out like this they should be getting easier when it’s the same thing over and over not harder.  I guess one of my main focuses from now on will be to try and manage my time better so I can actually get more sleep and be able to be more alert and focused in my classes.  More sleep I believe will equal better success and more happiness in the long run so it’s my goal.  Also another goal I have for this week is to get through it.  I am so excited about our fall break on this Thursday and Friday and if nothing comes up I will be at the coast by wednesday night.  The gulf is calling my name!

Stress...

“Stress is the emotional and physical strain caused by our response to pressure from the outside world.”  (Guy Slowik) Synonyms: Anxiety, Burden Pressure, Worry. Well since we are on the topic of stress or well I am at least let’s look at how it has impacted my college life.  First of all you don’t know stress until college, you may think you do but you don’t. High school had a bit of study here and there a few big assignments and some homework. Stressful Right? Wrong! I figured out that stress is when you think you are ready for everything but you realize you aren’t and well it hits hard.  This last week I discovered stress when tests came around.  Before that I was doing good in college turning all my homework in doing all my assignment and quite frankly I thought I was doing great.  When the studying started the stress set in.  I studied all my notes and for the most it was the first time since I had received them.  The problem with this was the more I studied the more I realized of what I did not know or understand from what I had received.  Something I thought would take a couple of hours turned into 15-20.  I lost a lot of sleep this week staying up till one or two or even three at night trying to get in all my study hours I needed after completing homework, golf practices, and mandatory workouts. It sucked going to sleep feeling like a failure because I knew that I still wasn’t ready every time I finally decided to hit the hay.  It was a wakeup call of sorts.  I hate this insane feeling of stress, the feeling in the bottom of my stomach that makes it turn, the worry in my head that I won’t do well, the burden of more and more study when I don’t have the time.  So I came to a conclusion in this matter.  From now on I’m going to listen to all the advice I have been told.  I’m going to put in 1-2 study hours a day if not more instead of just trying to cram in 12 hours the day before the few days before the test.  This way I won’t kill my sleep patterns and then when test week comes around I won’t have to worry about making time for all the other stuff I need to do such as my practices, my homework, and my workouts.  Stress is no fun and never will be.  Yes I know some stress is good stress but when you are going out of your mind trying to do 4 things at once just say you can stay caught up I think that’s the negative stress.  From now on I will try to be a good student and not stress myself out to much but can’t make any promises because I know how I am LOL. There was a positive out of last week though I can successfully say I did not bomb any of my first college tests. YES!! I plan to keep this up in the future just with a different less stressful approach. 

BLAHH TESTS!!

So here I am coming up on my 6th week of school and the only thing I can think about is tests, tests, tests... So far in the first 5 weeks I had my first college test in my math class on Thursday morning and I believe that it went pretty well.  The problem with that is, well it was math if you get it you get it and if you don't you don't.  In math I pretty much learn everything I need to know in class and during homework so there was not much studying involved.  Now on the other hand for my FREX and THEO and engineering classes I will be studying as if there is no tomorrow.  For one in my FREX class I know that I have done a little reading here and there but I have not completed all the required reading so all weekend I will be going back, rereading chapters and filling out the optional extra credit worksheets for the chapters we have covered.  Now in theology I have to go back and remember everyone's name and the years certain things happened and the message certain authors were trying to convey.  We are reading a book in that class about a man who goes to prisons and has bible studies with inmates.  I need to basically know how he would talk given a certain story and how he would tell it to the inmates.  I am not looking forward to the essay part of the test were I have to answer 4 questions in 7-10 complete sentences.BLAH! The one I am most worried about however is my Intro to Engineering class.  Throughout the class we have taken so many pages of notes it's unbelievable! I am so unsure of how I am going to go about studying for this but something tells me throughout this entire week I will be getting little sleep with tons of studying.  I'm not really sure if I have a test this week for my PSYCH class or not so I hope we don't.  If we do it is just going to make the week longer and more hectic for me.  It seems like stress is going to get me this week.  Now on the other hand I finally got my new driver and I am so excited.  I took it out to the course today and it's perfect.  I am hitting the ball further with it and also driving the ball more accurate.  People say "It's the Indian not the arrow" but in some cases in my opinion it helps if the arrow is a little more sharpened than the others.  Since my driver was such a success I now definitely cannot wait till my irons and my wedges come in.  I am so excited, but BLAHH it's going to be a very long week!

Still Truckin'

As week four starts to come to an end I am finally starting to fell bits and pieces of exhaustion and stress in my college life.  I found out this past week that all my tests are in the week after this one so I am going to be putting in long hours of study and receiving little sleep over the next few weeks.  I know I am up to it I just kind of don't want to do it.  I am a huge procrastinator and I am not looking forward to all this studying but I have got to figure out a way to push through it.  Time and time again in high school I didn’t do the studying I needed or put it off and never get around to it.  This was mostly my senior year of course, which was the same year that my GPA dropped the most.  Even looking at this blog I know its due in three hours and I am just getting around to it.  It’s funny because in college I go to school about 18 hours a week with my lab which is about half of the hours I attended in high school yet the work/study load is definitely quadrupled.  Time management seems like it is going to be my best friend this year.  I am going to HAVE to put my planner to effective use if I want to be successful this year.  On the other hand my new clubs should be coming in any day now that I ordered from the coach.  God I can’t wait, it will be the first time I have ever had new clubs, all the other clubs I’ve had have been hand me downs.  The fall season only has three tournaments left and maybe I’ll be able to make the traveling team if I score high enough.  Hopefully the clubs I ordered will help me take it to the next step in my game.  Oh and hopefully this rain keeps coming.  I am so loving it except for the fact that I will be cutting the grass again soon but still hopefully it stay’s we really need this rain especially for all the golf courses out there.  Maybe this will be a rainy season instead of just another session where it rains and then not again for three months.  Texas is pretty due well at least this part.  Also this is good for all the fires out there and the "dryness". Maybe now things will calm down and these wild fires that keep popping up out of nowhere will settle down as well. 

Tlu Week 3

So it was my third week here at Tlu not to mention college in general and it's going pretty good so far.  Classes are going well and college is definitely not as scary as what people made it out to be.  I am rather enjoying going to a school like this where teachers actually do help to an extent instead of just letting you be a head in the crowd.  It seems like just about all my time is being taken up between golf and studies.  I have homework every night just about and I study even more than that.  The hour and a half every day of commuting back and forth is really killing me so for all you people living on campus just know you got it good.  Our first golf tournament is tomorrow and although I didn't make the first team I at least made the second so I am happy about that.  The only downfall is that tomorrow is going to be such a long day.  I have to walk 36 holes of golf which equals anywhere from 8-10 hours.  It's going to be hot to, I kind of wish it was just winter already.  Following tuesday I have got to walk another 18 holes.  All this is completely different from my high school where most of the time it was walk 18 holes and you're done.  Another downfall is that I'm missing school and although in high school this was an awesome feat, now I actually wanna be in class. I know I can not afford to miss lectures as this could really hurt me.  I need to figure out a way to stay up with my classes even when I'm not there.  I can already tell this will be a difficult year but I know I'll find a way to push through it.  Being in college and also playing golf means so much to me and my family and I am just so thankful to be here.  Also thank you professor Barry for letting making us do these blog posts.  It doesn't just act like a journal and give me something to write about every day or at least once a week, it also helps me think about what I have to do for classes in terms of homework and studies when I'm trying to scratch out every last sentence to think about.  It's going to be a great year here at TLU and I am really looking forward to it.

First Two Weeks Of school

The transition from high school life to college life has been pretty good so far.  I am loving the shorter day's as they are giving me more time for my studies.  I may have to study more now and a have a bit more homework but it's worth it not having to sit in class for eight hours a day.  Tuesday's and wednesday are AWESOME as I am out by 11:45 each day.  I do rather regret being a commuter especially when every day i have class at eight except friday which is another awesome day of course.  I am loving how much time I am getting to spend pracicing for the sport I play which is golf.  It use to be I played other sports such as football or baseball and golf was once a week or twice a week if I was lucky.  Now it's like every day I have a chance to play with the two golf courses within five miles of the school and ofcourse the very convenient driving range on campus.  I am super excited I have all four of my qualifying rounds already completed so that way I don't have to worry about them this upcoming week of school.  I still have to write a two page paper for psychology over a 30 page chapter for this upcoming week but Labor day helps everything as now it's not due till wednesday and I have another full day to write it.  I have already made tons of friends here at Tlu and I think all my professors are awesome.  It feels as if i can ask any one of them for help whenever I want without them giving me the "stupid look" which I recieved a bit in high school from certain teachers.  I am so happy that I get the chance to go to college here in all honesty.  It's like a big family, I don't just feel like a another head the professor's are teaching to. Even the students are awesome no one categorizes themself as better than anyone else and all are friendly.  I am also really excited that everyone on the golf team is really nice and willing to help with whatever I need whenever I need it.  It looks like this is going to be a great year and I look forward to posting these blogs whenever I get the chance.