The Easter holiday has finally made it’s unwelcome presence on the Imperial campus and as we see Easter eggs piled up in Tesco and the thinning out of our timetables until they all become a big void of free-time, everyone has come to the realisation that they are inconceivably unprepared for exams. So as far as operations at Imperial go: all is normal. The library remains packed at all hours of the day/evening/night/early-morning, the JCR still makes a tidy profit during lunchtime and the campus is still awash with students, only this time with bigger bags and more books. The mad rush to cram a years worth of knowledge into our heads in as little as one month begins and everyone is either stressed, panicked or both.

This weekend I began organising all my messy notes into a series of folders and attempted to decipher their cryptic meanings. All five of my housemates have joined me in this activity, and so the house has become darker and quieter than even the most disciplined of monasteries. Though boring and often frustrating, it is the best environment to be in as you are forced to do something productive with your time. There is no escaping the important reality that exams are approaching fast and the best thing for us to be doing is working hard to try and overcome (pass with 40%).

After that, I returned home to see my family and enjoy the luxuries of a fully stocked, self-replenishing fridge; a massive bedroom and a TV licence. The only issue with this is that I forgot to bring the exam-panic with me from Hammersmith and all these treats are doing a great job of accelerating the clock in the living room. Having stressed housemates that you rarely see and an unhealthy amount of Red Bull in the fridge really does get work done. But, of course, it is very nice to be home and the upcoming Easter celebrations means a good influx of chocolate will soon hit my eagerly awaiting digestive system. Hopefully tomorrow I will begin doing something useful, but until then my Nintendo Wii looks rather lonely and in need of a good cheer up.

Thanks for reading,

Chris xx

P.S: Please direct any loud and inarticulate bursts of exam-stress to the comment box below. Also, what do you like to do to relieve stress?

One thing I really like about my field and my subject is the immediate relevance it has once you take an interest in it. While medicine, physics, biology and any subject taught at university are incredibly useful and worthwhile, their applications as hobbies require a bit of creativity. When you find computers interesting, all you need is a computer to explore. When you find programming interesting, you can do it whenever you want with equipment that almost everyone owns nowadays.

While one day, my medics will be saving lives and doing the Heimlich Manoeuvre at restaurants, they can only help with minor medical issues at the moment. If they have any kind of problem with their computer that doesn’t involve part replacement, I can help them there and then, with knowledge picked up purely from an interest in my subject and the easy accessibility of information and equipment. Every day in ISE I learn more and more about the way a computer works and what the interesting patterns on the motherboard mean. Every day I build on the confidence I once felt when I first opened a computer purely to see what was going on inside (which subsequently led to my Playstation 2, my old MP3 player, my sister’s iPod Mini, an old set of speakers and any other battery powered device I could get my screwdriver on, all being surgically opened for my curiosity).

A few days ago I decided to clean out two years worth of dust from my treasured Macbook. So without hesitation or panic about ripping apart the most expensive thing I have ever bought, here’s is a lovely picture of my naked laptop (posted with consent):

Thanks for reading,

Chris xx

I’ve got up to quite a bit considering the time of year and the inevitable “ranting blog posts” that are now circulating in my head. The start of this week saw an end to my second year, in that I no longer have any lectures and have no more coursework.

Much of the weekend was spent working on my compilers coursework, a 2 month project that involved many nights of confusion, energy drinks and nightmares about being attacked by C++ functions. Being a coursework of such a long duration, the majority of us in ISE had left the bulk of the work to this last week. After finally getting as much as I wanted done, I realised it was 2 in the morning on Sunday night and so I slept. The following morning (9 o clock, of course) I demonstrated my code and found that it did everything my lecturer wanted and even a few things I was unaware it was able to do. In a word: Epic Win!! (OK in a phrase)

That left me with the rest of Monday to revise for a spanish listening exam that afternoon, which I had got an extension on because of my illness last week (the Humanities department really are lovely!!). I also had a big Spanish exam on Tuesday, so the start of the week had a bit of a Mediterranean feel. As for how they went: I really can’t say. All I know is, it’s over!!

That left me with an afternoon to relax, as the panic about exams didn’t properly hit me till after my final lecture on Wednesday. When I got home, I rekindled the on-and-off relationship with my Playstation, watched as much iPlayer as I could and did a few nerdy things with my old laptop. A good afternoon being unproductive and unorganised, just what the imaginary doctor ordered.

But beyond the mundane talk of my academic timetable, there’s also been a few other things worth blogging about. EPOD recently did an interview with Head of the EEE department, Peter Cheung. This news really did enthuse me, so any free time I had was dedicated to getting the audio edited together. Peter Cheung is an absolute legend and talks about the banking industry and how us engineers need to approach it, and I do recommend any engineer give it a listen. (Download) (iTunes)

I also took a part in the CGCU elections this year. While most people are viscously campaigning and setting up facebook groups for support, I am taking a more relaxed approach. I am running for ISE 3rd Year Rep, which puts me in the unique position of being uncontested in an election only available to 20 people. It’s bad election practice to be cocky and presumptuous, but I think I can safely say I have got an exciting and important role in my department next year.

Hope everyone who had a humanities test on Tuesday or has one coming up did/does well. Let me know how it went by leaving a comment (preferably in your studied language). Hope everyone has a lovely and productive Easter and I will see you all when the exams finally rear their atrociously ugly heads; good luck!!

Thanks for reading,

Chris xx

Easter seems to get worse and worse every year. This weekend has been incredibly quiet, especially when compared to the double-post-whopper that was the one preceding it. With the medics having big exams as soon as they get back from Easter, Cathal having a language exam (Chinese) on Tuesday and me with my Compilers deadline and two language exams (Spanish); the house was deserted as we all chained ourselves to our desks. That said, kitchen conversations are unavoidable and whenever two of us found ourselves occupying it at the same time, we had to struggle past talking about work and found Easter was the obvious topic. Unfortunately that has the nasty effect of bring work back to mind, since that’s all any of will be doing whether we remain in Hammersmith or return home. How predictable student life becomes around this horrid time.

Me and My Lovely Housemates

Of course, with me, where there is work, there are infinite possibilities to procrastinate, so I went through a little Douglas Adams phase this weekend. I downloaded the audiobook of The Salmon of Doubt and listened to, the legend that is, Stephen Fry talk about one of the best writers to have ever wielded a pen (or a Macintosh Computer, in Adam’s case). It’s a real shame he was taken away from us all when he did, as he was a great voice to describe the things around us. Through the Hitchhikers series he had a way of making the world around us far clearer with his comic and individual writing style. To hear his views on the iPod or the latest generation of Apple computers would have been a treasured experience. Hopefully the Salmon of Doubt will be a nice couple of breaks as I try desperately not to fail over the next few weeks.

To everyone revising for exams, I wish you all a focused mind and a great deal of luck!!

Thanks for reading,

Chris xx