Well it has been a while since I written here. Univeristy is going well. I'm still aiming for straight A's so we'll see how that goes. It looks like I'll have a new place at the beginning of the next month near the school, which is cool. It's close enough that I could easily walk or ride my bicycle if I wanted or needed to do so.

In other happenings:

My mom seems to like her new job, though she is still a little uncertain about how she got it in the first place. I think she'll come to enjoy it as much as her old one. She just needs time to adjust is all.

Also got some good news. My best friend's dad is doing much better with his recovering from a heart attack. There was some concern his dad was going to have some serious problems but it looks like he's going to be okay. Just the normal post recovery lifestyle changes and stuff like that.

Let's see, SuperBowl. Who should win? I don't know. I kind of like both teams. Just pour syrup on me and call me waffle.

Well, the second week at ERAU is overand things are going well. I've gotten A's on all my assignments and quizes so far, which bodes well for the rest of the semester. So now I'm using the long weekend (thanks to the MLK holiday) to get ahead in my classes. It's strange in a way. When I take 16 credit semesters, they go well and seem almost easy; anything else and I do only okay.

Today's exam in MA441 was a bit of a joke. I was all ready for the killer basic skills exam last semester's MA441 prof gave and instead got something that looked like highschool pre-calculus or something. Don't get me wrong. The exam was easy, but I can see some areas that I need to go back and brush up on a little bit.

Good news for my Mom today. She was offered (and accepted) a new job that her boss found for her. So as of net monday she's now a Controller instead of an accountant at a precision metalworks company making the same amount of money as she currently makes. I especially like the fact that her soon to be ex-boss knew he was going to have to let her go for lack of work and instead found her a new job. Not many businessmen like that in the world anymore. If companies were more like him with regards to their employees, there wouldn't be any problems about employee loyalty or labor disputes. It's very refreshing to see an honest businessman concerned for their employees well being.

ERAU Spring 04 Day 4

Well today was the first day of my full class schedule. Five classes straight in a day isn't as tough as I thought it might be. Admittedly, my Catia class is essentially a drafting class (which is my current profession), so it's a bit easy. The hardest part is getting used to Catia's differences from AutoCAD and Microstation.

I also had homework due in Solids and Dynamics, as well as a Dynamics quiz which I'm pretty sure I aced.

It's weird, especially since what happened last semester, but Dynamics seems to be actually making sense now. Of course I like the changes he made to his presentations. They make understanding Dynamics a bit easier, though most of the class still is struggling. Maybe it's also because he knows a handful of us took Dynamics kast semester and will call him on any mistakes he makes so he's being more clear and concise about the whole thing.

Math exam tomorrow. Bleh. Oh well. Just try and do my best and hope I do not bomb it completely.

I didn't do much today, just some homework and watched some football. I was surprised when my mom and brother came back home from shopping and gave me three Farscape DVDs ( the last two for Season 3 and the first one for Season 4). Wow. Family. They're awesome people.

ERAU Day 2

Well MA441 went okay today. We had a substitute professor teach the class as the regular prof was attending a math conference in Phoenix. I think I'm going to do well with this TTH math schedule. Feels more comfortable to me for some reason.

Now all I need to do is work out a schedule so I can go to all my study group meetings.

ERAU Spring 04 Day 1

First day of Spring classes at ERAU were great. It was nice to see some old friends and associates while going to new classes. The MATLAB Programming class looks like it'll be easy as does Solids. My Dynamics prof wasn't particularly suprised to see me. In fact, I think he was glad at a few points because so few of the other students would answer his questions out loud even when they knew the answer. Thermodynamics is cool; just about everyone from the Fluids class signed on to the Thermo class just so we could have the same professor.

Tomorrow is MA441, Advanced Engineering Math. Yep. The class I dropped last semester. This is the only class I have on Teusday and Thursday for the semester, which should help out some. I seem to thrive on TTH math classes for some reason. I already downloaded the syllabus and just about died laughing at it. It's in the exact opposite order as last semesters class. That's actually a good thing if you ask me. Cover the easy stuff first before advancing, not slamming everybody with the most difficult part and then getting easy. Even more interesting, an 85% is considered an A in this class. Guess that means the prof grades tough.

Tomorrow classes start up again at ERAU. I'm looking forward to it, new challenges and another step closer to my degree. Some of the classes should be pretty easy given my previous experience and the others shouldn't pose too much of a problem. Famous last words, huh?

I've got some ideas for Farscape fics that should cause a bit of a stir amongst Scapers if I ever get off my eema and actually write them. New ideas and twisted paths I haven't seen written for Farscape yet. Some gory, some not. I expect a few will outright hate them. Of course I should finish the other stories I've been working on first. What to do? What to do?

Should be fun. ;-)

I got my books and other supplies today. Came off pretty well with only a $300.00 hit to the old pocketbook. It would have been fifty bucks less if not for the bookstore not having any used Thermo books, but that's okay. I suspected this was going to be the case given some thing my Fluids prof mentioned about his teaching Thermo in Spring 04.

Apartment hunt looks good. Checked out a couple of places and their neighborhood and they look good. So all it's a matter of now if calling them up and getting a walk through. If all goes well I'll be able to move in this weekend.

Looking forward to classes starting Wednesday.

ERAU Spring 04

Yep. The next semester at ERAU Prescott begins next week. Monday and Tuesday are orientation day and classes start up again Wednesday. Should be an interesting semester, considering I've put upon my self the goal of getting A's in all classes like I used to do at Phoenix College last year at this time.

So tomorrow I'm off to Prescott to grab my books (and old mail) and hunt up an apartment. No matter what I will not be driving from Phoenix to Prescott. It's too tiring and hectic to deal with.

Scape

I really need to get back to writing fanfic. I've got way too many fics waiting to be finished. I didn't even realize it has been so long since I finished a fic until today while perusing some stories at ScapeRoute. I guess between the Savefarscape campaign and school I just haven't felt like writing stories much. Maybe I'll go watch some Farscape DVDs to get into the mood to write again.

Martian Times

NASA's been doing pretty well in the last couple of days with a pair of successful missions: with the Spirit rover successfully landing mars and the successfull comet mission. Hopefully the ESA will be able to establish contact with their Beagle 2 probe, though it's looking less likely every day. Next up for NASA is whether Spirit's companion rover, Opportunity, will successfully land 25 January 2004 on Mars. Not an easy thing considering that the total number of Mars missions are only garnering about a 40% success rate.

Mars News, Science, Technology at MarsDaily.com
Stardust Mission at SpaceDaily.com

New Year

Ah, another year. 2004. Resolutions? Not really. Just the same old things I plan to do anyway, so nothing special to be resolute about. OK, maybe two things:

1. returning to getting A's in all my classes. Not an easy thing for aerospace engineering, but not impossible. We'll see how it goes.

2. returning this blog to friviality and leaving the long winded opinions and commentary for my Floating Dolphin weblog back on my website.

Looking forward to a new semester, a new apartment, new Farscape ep's (crosses fingers) and all around good year.

Women in Combat

I found this article interesting considering events in the world since September 11, 2001Women's Combat Role Draws Little Comment
-iWon News.

I'm not surprised that most consider the presence of women in frontline, dangerous missions a non-issue, nor am I surprised by those misguided individuals who would ban women in most military duty. Groups like the Center for Military Readiness (CMR) ignore the change in attitude in the United States since September 11 in order to try to return the United States to a state that would weaken our defensive posture and make it nearly impossible to complete missions in many conservative nations in the world while claiming they only want to protect women from the predations of war. People remember too well the thousands of innocents who died during September 11, 2001.

The problem is that this war can strike anywhere and at any time by individuals who hold nothing but contempt for human life be it civilian or military, man, woman, or child. There is no safe place anymore, especially not on the battlefied. The CMR dishonors the memory of the women who fought and died in Iraq and elsewhere while defending this country. Instead they wish to use their sacrifices as an excuse to continue policies that discriminate against women and weaken the capabilities of the U.S. military in the name of protecting them from rape, maiming, torture, and murder by the enemy and the need to be a "civil society".

Guess what? The world is populated by too many uncivilized people who would rape, maime, torture, and murder men as easily as they would women. Why is it okay to kill men than it is women? Does the CMR hold males as inferior and therefore expendable? Why doesn't the CMR endeavoe to protect men as much as they do women? Afterall, it takes both to continue the species, does it not?

Yes, I'm getting sarcastic here, but my point is that all life should be considered equally precious and deserving of protecting. This means that both genders need to be responsible for this protection and be willing to accept that the ultimate sacrifice of both will sometimes be required to achieve this goal. Therefore, the CMR should not be pushing to hamper this protection by removing half the population from that process.