Wednesday, March 30, 2011

A Welcome Break

As i type this, i'm having home made hot cocoa. I'm yet to find a whipped cream that is diary or lactose free, but if you know where i can find one in Australia, please do let me know. I'm done with all things assessments for this week; got an awesome grade in my tests and still waiting for the feedback from my presentation on General Electric.

Next week i've got 4 tests and a presentation all from Monday - Thursday, that should be a lot of fun. My glasses will certainly be happy cause i've been using it to study for the most part of this semester. But this evening, it's all about sitting down and relaxing; enjoying some down time without having to calculate any financial ratios or determine strategies for firms that have no idea i exist. I'm definitely going to be watching a few episodes of Grand Designs Australia tonight, i must say i'm proud of some of the houses i've seen on the show and for its first season, it's pretty solid.

Tomorrow i'll be back to being a student and searching for grad jobs online. It just feels like my week so far has been defined by journals, case studies and textbooks! I can't say i'm looking forward to the weekend, but i'm definitely looking forward to Friday next week :) Hope you all are having a lovely Wednesday

Monday, March 28, 2011

The Luxury Of A Good Night's Rest

I haven't had the luxury of a proper night's sleep and i'm really looking forward to it. I had my presentation today and my weekly test; both went awesome and i'm so happy about that. Now that i've got those out of the way, i've got a 6 page group essay due Wednesday at 12pm and the rush is on to get that sorted and done. But that's the main problem with group assignments, it's pretty difficult to control what the other members of your team are doing.

We're a group of 4 and i can say that 3 of us seem to be on track. I've received all the necessary bits from 2 of my group members, done my part that needs to be included in the executive summary. All i really need to do is read through all the documents i've done and collate them in a sensible manner to yield a 6 page summary. The only problem with that is one member of the group seems to be AWOL. He hasn't replied any of our e-mails, nor has he sent his part to me to proof read and include in the essay. Being that we're getting a group mark, this worries me a lot because i feel like our score is going to be compromised by his non-chalant attitude.

Good news is that we've kept copies of all the e-mails we've exchanged, minutes of the group meeting we had and also all the information regarding how the work is meant to be split amongst the four of us. If he hasn't pulled his weight by the time of hand in, we have no option than to file a report. I'm personally not willing to do his part of the work because i already have more responsibilities than the rest of the group. This leaves the other 2 to decide if they want to split the work amongst themselves. I thought by the time people got into final year, they'd take uni more seriously instead of giving priority to getting drunk at the pub when everyone else is relying on you to do your work.

Oh well, that was quite a rant on my side. I really need a good sleep tonight because i have a lot to do tomorrow; a test and this essay/summary. I'm hoping i'd be able to sleep at least 6 hours so i can wake up a bit refreshed. I spent the bulk of my day in the library studying and doing my assignment, so right now, my brain can't seem to handle anymore information :(

I hope you all are having a good Monday so far. To my fellow Aussies, it's almost bed time right? Do have a good one everybody and speak soon :)

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Weekend Break?

Or so i thought! I was really hoping that the weekend would give me a chance to slow down and rest my eyes a bit. But it hasn't been as stress free as i'd hoped, but i'm not complaining either. I've spent pretty much the whole weekend studying for tests i have on Monday & Tuesday, a presentation i have on Monday (which i've gladly finished writing up) and another presentation i have in the upper week. So it's been all textbooks and highlighters for me. The only good thing about having such a stressful time now is that later on in the semester, i'll have less assessments due and more time to study for my finals because i chose to do my presentations earlier.

I guess the other thing that motivates me is the fact that i like reading. Luckily for me, i don't really have any boring textbooks this semester and that's really a good thing. It's so easy to get put off from studying anything just because the textbook not only looks de-motivating but is lacking in colour! That's usually where my highlighter comes in. Ok, so the main purpose of me highlighting is generally so that i can easily browse through the key things in each chapter; but using a fun colour (orange for today) makes it even more appealing.

So, enough blabbering from me. How has your weekend gone so far? I hope you've had more time to relax than i have. I'm truly looking forward to the 7th of April when i finish my 2nd presentation and finally have a proper break, sleep in all day on the Saturday and watch as many movies as i choose to (i also happen to have four tests in that week so a break is well and truly deserved)

Until next time, stay blessed :)

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

It's Been A While

Hello blogosphere, it's been quite a while since i posted anything. Between attending classes, weekly assessments and looking for jobs i haven't had the motivation to do anything else. I have to say i do think i needed the break from blogging, i didn't want to blog whilst lacking motivation so i just focused all my time on uni and job hunting.

I've just finished researching for a presentation i have on Monday in relation to climate change and the Copenhagen talks. It's very rare for me to finish an assessment days before it's due because i work quite well under pressure. But because i've been bothered by a few other things going on, i've just done my best to stay occupied daily until i'm exhausted so there's no room for me to think about anything and get down in the process because i'm already heading in that direction and i'm doing my best to pull myself back.

You'll notice that i've made some changes with how the blog looks. I hope you guys like it. If you have any suggestions or anything you want to see, please let me know either in the comments section or via e-mail. I finally added pages to my blog, i can't believe it took me so long to figure out how to do it...so lame of me.

I probably won't be back to blogging full time until next week; from then, i'll try to put up at least a post a week and depending on if i have much to talk about, more posts. Until then, i do hope you have a good week. I surely am looking forward to the weekend as i want to try and organise my room because it currently looks like i emptied a box of loose A4 sheets everywhere

Happy Wednesday blog-ites :)

Friday, March 11, 2011

Strong Cravings

For some unexplained reason, i've been having serious cravings for all things sugary! I don't know why but i've been wanting donuts, chocolate muffins, cookies, brownies, juice...you name it! I read somewhere that our cravings is a way of our body communicating to say that it's lacking something...some form of nutrient. Well, if anybody has an answer to this please let me know because it's driving me crazy especially since i'm trying really hard to be a good girl while working out.

Right now, all i want is the double chocolate cookies from Subway! Either that or home made pancakes stacked with diary-free chocolate spread and some maple syrup all over it! I've been thinking of ways i can control my cravings. So far, i've been eating apples and grapes because they both have that sweet taste to it without all the fat and calories that come with actual processed sweet goods. I think the fact that i can't consume regular chocolate is even making my cravings more intense; since i'm lactose intolerant, most of the chocolates are pretty much out of my reach because i always have some sort of reaction after eating them. Of course, that didn't stop me from having Snickers on a weekend i had no where to go.

Cravings aside, i've managed to curb my coffee consumption since uni began! I'm proud to say that i've only had coffee twice in the 2 weeks i've been back to uni (both on Tuesdays after my 8.30am class); and i didn't add any espresso shots to them like i used to do last semester. I'm beginning to think those are the only days i'll actually have coffee while at uni as i've been able to survive other classes without it.

All i need to work on is incorporating more veggies into my meals on a daily basis and healthy snack ideas to help with those cravings!

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Week 1

The first week on uni is always an interesting one because it sets the mood for the entire semester. Getting all those course outlines in your first lecture just determines how much sweat you have to put into your assessments, especially when it's one that involves a lot of group work.

I have to say that in the past, i rarely showed up for my 1st lectures because i can download the course outlines for each subject i'm enrolled in off the uni site; infact, i rarely attend lectures during the semester. I have a very short attention span so i usually can't stand being in a lecture theatre for 2 hours because my mind completely drifts to everything else other than what the lecturer is saying. I usually prefer to spend this time in the library reading the textbook and doing the necessary prep work for my assessments. I guess because i'm not an auditory learner, it doesn't affect how i learn. If i can't see and read what i need to learn, it never sticks in my brain.

But before this semester began, i made the decision that i'd make the effort to attend at least 80% of all my lectures. And in this first week, i can proudly say that i went to all of my lectures. Ok, for one of them, i only stayed for about 50 minutes because it was an introductory lecture. For the other 3, i stayed right till the end of class, without the help of coffee! And i didn't doodle on any of my sheets at all which is a huge surprise because i tend to doodle in lectures.

For the remaining weeks this semester, i'll be having 2 tests weekly (Monday & Tuesday) along with the usual individual and group work; mid term assessments and all. This is my final semester for my undergrad and probably my last semester as a commerce student as i'm applying to study for a Masters in Information Technology. I still haven't chosen a back up subject yet and i'm not actually sure if i will. 

I found out on Thursday that i have more credits than i actually need to graduate; so i have a choice of dropping one of my subjects as i don't need to do it. The only downside is that it happens to be the most interesting subject i'm studying this semester because it's from an entirely different faculty. I'm studying the history of France and i absolutely loved the first lecture. But this has no relation whatsoever to my degree, it's just going to be an extra subject and i feel like i'm wasting my money doing it because i already have more credit points than i need to graduate; so doing this subject would just be more unnecessary credit points. 

Oh well, i have till the end of March to decide if i want to continue with French history or not