Forgotten Knowledge

Well, my first final is today. I studied about four hours (without moving, mind you... well, moving from the chair, that is), so I'm not too worried.

This final is for my medieval romance class, and, though it's an English course which is mainly oriented around essays and discussions, I feel that the final is justified. There's no other way for our professor to test if we've been reading or not, as essays allow you to focus on just one book, rather than all of them. I would not be surprised if a number of students in our class aren't reading the books, since it hasn't been enforced at all, but I don't really know why considering that the books are all quite enjoyable (seriously. King Arthur, anyone?). In any case, I'm sure that I have much less studying to do than many of my classmates.

This brings me to my topic for the post: finals. With a final like this, I think it's perfectly suitable to have one. You know what I have never, ever understood though? Cumulative finals for classes that already have exams.

What is the point of
Re-testing knowledge that will
Soon be forgotten?

I just do not see the point. It's pretty much the teacher's way of saying "I want to make sure you've understood the class, even though all of the tests that we've taken so far are supposed to show that. I also want to make sure that you retain the knowledge, even though you will likely forget all of it the minute you finish exam, considering that you're reviewing a semester's worth of reading over the course of a couple of days." I mean really. If you've already been tested on it, there's no need to retest it. You clearly know it, and you're clearly going to forget it- so why bother? No one can give a good answer for that question. Finals just result in more work for the professor and more work for students. And less sleep for everyone.

Try and use good grammar

Alas! Today is Wednesday, and tomorrow I have my first (and second to last) final exam! This one is for my medieval romance class, which thus far has been all fun and games, by which I mean that all of the readings have been more or less enjoyable and the lectures have been nothing but entertaining (and that wasn't sarcastic). Now, however, I will be asked to identify twenty passages, saying where they're from, when they're from, what language they're in, what the context of the passage is within the book, and whether the author was a cat or dog person. (That last one was a joke... all of them were dog people). Luckily we get a review packet with 60 passages (the 20 will be chosen from these), and we only have about 7 books. But a difficult task nonetheless.

I'm not too worried about it though, I've already done a good two hours worth of studying. I'm more worried about all of my papers. And Christmas. But mainly my papers.

The other day, I discovered came across something rather interesting. I learned that the word "acronym" does not cover as much as I had though. There is another word, "initialism," which is what I had thought acronyms were. Acronyms are abbreviation types thingies where you are supposed to pronounce the name. For instance, NATO or CAT (Condescending A-Hole Terrestrial). Initialisms, on the other hand, include all acronyms, but also those things that you are not meant to pronounce, such as BBC or CCCLLLCTAA (Center for the Containment of Celebrities who have Lucrative, Lovely, Lives but who Cheat and Throw it All Away (Current Population: Tiger Woods)).

This is one of those little tidbits of information I will always need to correct people on now, something I never get tired of doing.

There are some things in
Our language that are just plain
Wrong. Work to right them.


I'm talking about all of those little grammatical errors, but not like "you're" and "your." I'm referencing the errors that have become so commonplace in our society that even some of the most avid grammar police don't think about them. My prime example of this is "try and." The sentence is "try to." To "try and" implies that you succeed, which defeats the purpose of the word "try" which has a sense of uncertainty. For instance, if you say "I'm gonna try and kill him tonight" it means that you are going to kill him tonight. And if you are going to kill him, why don't you just say that? You mean to say "I'm going to try to," which suggests that there is actually a chance of failure (even though you probably thought it all out and have that elaborate trap set up under his mattress and everything).

There are other little errors such as "who" vs "whom," but I shall not go into further rambling regarding this.

This is the start of something new...

Alas, 'tis Sunday, but I am afeared not. For, now that studies have ceased, a Sunday by any other name remains a day, and no day holds greater precedence over another.

If you were unable to read that, what I was trying to convey is that a weekend during finals means absolutely nothing. Quiet hours remain ridiculous on weekends (22 hours a day... only at Cornell would there be quiet hours at 3PM in the afternoon), dining hall hours are mostly the same, and finals are even given on weekends (preposterous as it is).

On that note, I think I will dedicate this post to finals week(s). Not finals themselves, that will come later. Maybe when I actually have a final.

Finals weeks could be
Great, were it not for those which
Take place during them


I know I'm a bit ambiguous, but I did that on purpose... mainly to fit the syllable requirements, but also for effect. By "them" I'm referring to "finals weeks," and "those" refers to finals. Yes, finals weeks would be amazingly awesome without finals. Although I probably don't need to tell you that. Two weeks, no classes? It's just like orientation week, only you already know people. Imagine, if we didn't have to spend the whole two weeks studying, we could spend the whole two weeks doing fun stuff, such as watching all three The Lord of the Rings movies in a row, playing Life in the lobby at 2AM, or make an epic hopskotch game across the whole arts quad (please note, all 3 are things I've either  wanted to do and/or seen people doing). Instead, however, we are expected to spend all of our time studying for finals. Sad days.