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tabular_rasaBloody Nose
The first fifteen minutes of Abnormal Psychology (or, erm, lack thereof . . . ) were quite interesting, today . . .
I had gotten in at about 1:00, a little bit later than I usually do, and had gone to my usual seat, five row back and three seats in from the left. I had to climb over the boy who always sits in the aisle seat, but we're both creatures of habit and know each other in this, and so it was all cool. Yet as I'm getting out my folders and my notebook for this class, I feel something drip out of my nose. I put my hand up to it, and realize I've got a bloody nose. I pull my hand away, only for a moment, and there's a rush of blood. I have this atrocious iron count (remember? *pass out*), so this blood is weak, runny, and flowy. It spills out of my nose and into my hands and runs out through my fingers and all over, down right to my wrists. I know I don't have a functional kleenex in my bag (having needed one earlier that morning), so I immediately spring up and make a mad dash for the bathroom-- up all those steps I came down to get to my seat in the third row, past all those students coming steadily and slowly in for class, just as it is beginning. The blood is clearly flowing out through my fingers, even as I cup my hands about my face, and I have issues getting through doors, scared to touch to them my bloody hands. Thankfully, they were all such a direction that with an elbow-knock to the French handles and a push, I'm alright.
I get into the bathroom-- thankfully, nobody else is in there, and collapse over the sink, just letting everything drip off me, spewing into the sink. It's very unpleasant. Then, I cup my hands again, and grab some toilet paper from the stall next to me. Then, as trained per Girl Scouts and old folk tradition (Nosebleeders, take note; these are both, the latter however silly-sounding, immensely successful methods), I pinch the very bridge of my nose (right along the bone, so that it goes numb), and stuff a rolled-up lump of toilet paper between my upper lip and upper row of teeth. Then I lean forward (fuck anyone who ever tells you to lean back; they're a vampire who clearly enjoys the taste of their own blood :-P), and let what is not caught in the tissue I am holding to my nose (with my nose-bridge-pinching fingers) simply just drip and fall right into the sink.
It takes a while. Eventually, a large clump of congealed blood (or blood and snot?) falls out and is caught in my tissue, which I discard into the trash-- and the nosebleed is miraculously over. (I've noticed a pattern with this; I'm almost half-tempted, the next time I get a ridiculous bad nosebleed, to simply blow until I get that sucker out . . . ). Then, to be nice, I wipe down the sink, the floor, and the mirror (more toilet paper and running sink water). I grab some toilet paper for the road, and head out.
The TA asks me if I'm alright as I enter conspicuously through the loud back doors, and I smile and say that sure, I am (I mean, I was, at that point, lol . . . nosebleeds, ahh . . . if only all injuries were that transient . . . apologies if you're hemophilic and don't find them to be /-:). There was some blood on my desk, which I wiped up, and some irreparable stains on my paper folder-- and I've got a stain or two on my skirt and boots. Ah well, such is life.
Bitch Stole My Seat
I had a Cognitive Psychology exam, last week. Now, in this unit, for this third of the class, for this exam, we were taught about Encoding Specificity in terms of memory. This is one of those semi-obvious things we're all aware of, but don't really think about, at least not enough to give a hoity-toity name to. Basically, you do worse when tested in a different circumstance from the one in which you studied. This applies to room (Orgo kids are more fucked than they ought to be, tonight), seat/perspective, and even state of mind (if you study high, though you're pretty much doomed overall, you will indeed in fact do better testing while high . . . so pack the pot . . . ).
So, when I go into the examination-- which, as our professor is not a dumbass or a hypocrite, is located in the same room our daily classes are held--
I go to take my usual seat, my every-day seat, my seat which I have always claimed without a fight since the first or second session-week in class: Leftmost section, three rows back, seat closest to the aisle. However, somebody clearly didn't fucking study enough for this exam. Somebody didn't know about Encoding Specificity.
Bitch stole my seat.
I don't know where she usually sits, or whether she even usually comes to class. All I know is that my seat was taken. Hence, due to the principle of Encoding Specificity, I did more poorly on the exam than I otherwise should have.
So I wade my way to the back of the room, which is the only place not completely jam-packed. I take my test.
(We were asked to list an example of Encoding Specificity on the test, in fact. I listed the example in the book-- something about divers, and in the underwater vs on the land-- yet also, as a comical note, added that I was guarenteed to do more poorly on this exam due to my change in seating arrangement. I was right-- unless it was the comical note that killed me, in which case GODDAMN IT, DANNY, YOUR CURSE IS RUBBING OFF ON ME!!!)
The really funny thing is, our professor wonders why no one comes to office hours, particularly in regards to examination grades. There'd really be no point; it's all a big joke. I mean, you can't go in and say, "I really, honestly, genuinely knew the material!" because we learned, also in this unit, that metacognition sucks ass and you don't really ever know what you really know. You just know things. Hence, if you do badly on a test, that's apparently a worthy gauge . . .
Examinations in Cognitive Psychology really all are just a big mind-game . . .
Based on my scores, I guess it looks like I'll being staying in fucking St. Louis until the 22nd of December, so I can take the cumulative final that replaces one of the three exam grades. Though, at this point, I don't even know if it's even worth it, as I'm just fucking getting a fucking B (not even a B+, probably; most likely, in many cases, a B-) in fucking everything and there's no use in fucking trying at fucking anything anymore.
"Try to get your grades up in Japanese," Marcus-sensei tells Joe, Kiwi, and I at the Study Abroad information session . . . HAHAHAHAHAHAHA *Shoots self in the head.*
The first fifteen minutes of Abnormal Psychology (or, erm, lack thereof . . . ) were quite interesting, today . . .
I had gotten in at about 1:00, a little bit later than I usually do, and had gone to my usual seat, five row back and three seats in from the left. I had to climb over the boy who always sits in the aisle seat, but we're both creatures of habit and know each other in this, and so it was all cool. Yet as I'm getting out my folders and my notebook for this class, I feel something drip out of my nose. I put my hand up to it, and realize I've got a bloody nose. I pull my hand away, only for a moment, and there's a rush of blood. I have this atrocious iron count (remember? *pass out*), so this blood is weak, runny, and flowy. It spills out of my nose and into my hands and runs out through my fingers and all over, down right to my wrists. I know I don't have a functional kleenex in my bag (having needed one earlier that morning), so I immediately spring up and make a mad dash for the bathroom-- up all those steps I came down to get to my seat in the third row, past all those students coming steadily and slowly in for class, just as it is beginning. The blood is clearly flowing out through my fingers, even as I cup my hands about my face, and I have issues getting through doors, scared to touch to them my bloody hands. Thankfully, they were all such a direction that with an elbow-knock to the French handles and a push, I'm alright.
I get into the bathroom-- thankfully, nobody else is in there, and collapse over the sink, just letting everything drip off me, spewing into the sink. It's very unpleasant. Then, I cup my hands again, and grab some toilet paper from the stall next to me. Then, as trained per Girl Scouts and old folk tradition (Nosebleeders, take note; these are both, the latter however silly-sounding, immensely successful methods), I pinch the very bridge of my nose (right along the bone, so that it goes numb), and stuff a rolled-up lump of toilet paper between my upper lip and upper row of teeth. Then I lean forward (fuck anyone who ever tells you to lean back; they're a vampire who clearly enjoys the taste of their own blood :-P), and let what is not caught in the tissue I am holding to my nose (with my nose-bridge-pinching fingers) simply just drip and fall right into the sink.
It takes a while. Eventually, a large clump of congealed blood (or blood and snot?) falls out and is caught in my tissue, which I discard into the trash-- and the nosebleed is miraculously over. (I've noticed a pattern with this; I'm almost half-tempted, the next time I get a ridiculous bad nosebleed, to simply blow until I get that sucker out . . . ). Then, to be nice, I wipe down the sink, the floor, and the mirror (more toilet paper and running sink water). I grab some toilet paper for the road, and head out.
The TA asks me if I'm alright as I enter conspicuously through the loud back doors, and I smile and say that sure, I am (I mean, I was, at that point, lol . . . nosebleeds, ahh . . . if only all injuries were that transient . . . apologies if you're hemophilic and don't find them to be /-:). There was some blood on my desk, which I wiped up, and some irreparable stains on my paper folder-- and I've got a stain or two on my skirt and boots. Ah well, such is life.
Bitch Stole My Seat
I had a Cognitive Psychology exam, last week. Now, in this unit, for this third of the class, for this exam, we were taught about Encoding Specificity in terms of memory. This is one of those semi-obvious things we're all aware of, but don't really think about, at least not enough to give a hoity-toity name to. Basically, you do worse when tested in a different circumstance from the one in which you studied. This applies to room (Orgo kids are more fucked than they ought to be, tonight), seat/perspective, and even state of mind (if you study high, though you're pretty much doomed overall, you will indeed in fact do better testing while high . . . so pack the pot . . . ).
So, when I go into the examination-- which, as our professor is not a dumbass or a hypocrite, is located in the same room our daily classes are held--
I go to take my usual seat, my every-day seat, my seat which I have always claimed without a fight since the first or second session-week in class: Leftmost section, three rows back, seat closest to the aisle. However, somebody clearly didn't fucking study enough for this exam. Somebody didn't know about Encoding Specificity.
Bitch stole my seat.
I don't know where she usually sits, or whether she even usually comes to class. All I know is that my seat was taken. Hence, due to the principle of Encoding Specificity, I did more poorly on the exam than I otherwise should have.
So I wade my way to the back of the room, which is the only place not completely jam-packed. I take my test.
(We were asked to list an example of Encoding Specificity on the test, in fact. I listed the example in the book-- something about divers, and in the underwater vs on the land-- yet also, as a comical note, added that I was guarenteed to do more poorly on this exam due to my change in seating arrangement. I was right-- unless it was the comical note that killed me, in which case GODDAMN IT, DANNY, YOUR CURSE IS RUBBING OFF ON ME!!!)
The really funny thing is, our professor wonders why no one comes to office hours, particularly in regards to examination grades. There'd really be no point; it's all a big joke. I mean, you can't go in and say, "I really, honestly, genuinely knew the material!" because we learned, also in this unit, that metacognition sucks ass and you don't really ever know what you really know. You just know things. Hence, if you do badly on a test, that's apparently a worthy gauge . . .
Examinations in Cognitive Psychology really all are just a big mind-game . . .
Based on my scores, I guess it looks like I'll being staying in fucking St. Louis until the 22nd of December, so I can take the cumulative final that replaces one of the three exam grades. Though, at this point, I don't even know if it's even worth it, as I'm just fucking getting a fucking B (not even a B+, probably; most likely, in many cases, a B-) in fucking everything and there's no use in fucking trying at fucking anything anymore.
"Try to get your grades up in Japanese," Marcus-sensei tells Joe, Kiwi, and I at the Study Abroad information session . . . HAHAHAHAHAHAHA *Shoots self in the head.*
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no subject
Date: 2006-11-07 02:53 pm (UTC)I love being tested on how best to take tests, how well I know what it is "to know," and what my probabilities in getting something right are if I just guess . . .