Papercrafts

So during that almost year long hiatus, surely you would think I did not just spend all my time at school.

An example of the many things that can be built from paper

Paperwork was something that I was brought into as a kid, through origami. It all at a summer camp where a group leader taught me how to fold a star. I instantly gravitated towards this new found hobby and went on to explore more origami models.

Small star, meet big star

Eventually, I moved on to papercrafting. The main difference is that papercrafts involves the use of a paste or glue whereas origami does not.
And within the community of papercrafts, there are two main roles, the designers and the builders.

The designers are the ones that create the templates, design and make the model look fancy and nice.
They utilize various CAD programs to do so, but I haven't had much experience in this department yet.

The builders are the ones that do exactly that, they build. They take the template, cut and score it and so the problem solving begins. Note that a lot of templates don't include instructions like the order of the pieces to build (which is really key and important) so it all becomes a huge puzzle, with a rewarding end.

Read, once in a while...

Well, listen AND read (for context, see the previous post).

You have no idea how much this peeves me (well not really, but still). So due to the sheer size of the course, there is a page (on the front of the exam) for students to circle their lecture section to more easily sort exams. Instructions are displayed on the first page of the exam indicating that students must circle a lecture section, and failure to do so will result in lost marks (I think 5 was the case). So not only are instructions explicitly written down, we also do the courtesy to read out those exact instructions.

So during the mid-term exam, while collecting signature forms (basically stating that you were at the exam, and that you are who you claim to be on your photo id), I decided to spend a few seconds for each person and check that they circled their lecture section. About half of the people I checked did not. I'm sure they can do the math; losing 5 marks (on a section of the exam that's worth 20 marks), is a really big deal.

No seriously, we assume you are at least half literate, so READ.

When it came to final exam time, I figured that these people probably know their lessons by now, but I'll still read out this specific set of instructions. And luckily for people who handed in their exams early (of which I could check if they circled, as opposed to everyone rushing to pile in their exams at the end), I caught a few that neglected to circle. I even chased one of the students who was outside the classroom to get him to fill it out.

You may think this isn't a big deal, but there are two major reasons to follow said instructions:

1. To not lose marks:
   Note that the exam indicates that you'll lose marks (5 in my case), but when we actually mark your exams, somehow, we get too soft and end up only deducting 2. Either way, you still lose out.
   
2. Making TA's lives and your lives easier:
   Realise that there are ~1500 exams and TAs need a systematic way to mark them. By writing down your name and lecture section, we can categorize and allocate exams accordingly. In addition, when it comes time to inputting your marks into the system, all the exams are nicely ordered. So if you neglect to write down crucial information, you waste our time attempting to figure out what lecture you belong to and will delay the return of your exams and marks.

So if you can read carefully and follow instructions correctly and write (well legibly, we do try our best to decipher what you write, but try not to give us a hard time doing so...) you are already off to a good start.

I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please contact me.

I'M BACK!

Hope everyone's first week of the year has been a blast so far.

A very late, but happy new year to all you followers and people
that have stumbled on to this blog

So after a long hiatus, I'll be back for the foreseeable future. Feels like it has been 2 years 2 months (high-fives for those that got that reference), but no, it has been just less than a year, but a really jam packed year.

Going back to "2 Years 2 Months", a pathetic reference to FOD's - 2 Years 2 Months for those that remember the song from AuditionSEA (one of my favourite ones, considering the winter season and the incorporation of a variation of Pachelbel's canon). Had a huge trip down memory lane when I stumbled upon an actual functioning site that archived all the old songs from SEA and KOR (and still is updated with all the new stuff). Also taking a second to pay my respects to xeanz, a site that has seemingly disappeared without a trace. Kudos to Veiss for running it as long as he could, it was also great working with you.

Now back to my "year-in review", which will be spread out through many future posts and at random times of the year.

I guess this is a good time to talk about it since a lot of people are starting school again, but I'd like to share with you my experience being a TA (teaching assistant).
A quick disclaimer to cover my butt so I don't get into legal trouble or whatnot: The words, views and opinions expressed on this site DO NOT represent the view and opinions of University of Toronto, the CUPE/Union, and any of the University's employees and staff members and related organizations.

Okay, now that I got that out of the way, back to the topic at hand.
TAing, above anything, is an interesting look into the logistics of how those stacks of paper that magically appear on your desk come test time and how that big fat A is spat back out at you.

Not sure how this works for courses that have a small amount of enrollment, but for the course I TAed (~1500 students), we go through a process to sort and divide exams. A tedious, but necessary task since the appropriate amounts of test papers must be allocated through the 10+ classrooms the test papers written in.

Now here's a thing for all you first years out there.
When the TAs or professors say something while you are writing the exam. LISTEN UP.
You have no idea how important this is. There may be an error on the exam paper (blame whoever wrote them), or special instructions or even dictating instructions that are on the first pages of your exam.

More of my banter and ranting on this topic for my next post. So stay tuned folks, and I hope to see y'all in the very near future.




I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please contact me.

A Damn Cold Day

With the constant fluctuation of temperatures, there wasn't a lot to look forward to until...

Fancy some food trucks?

After months of eating the same old on campus, I was elated to hear that 4 food trucks would be making their way to UTSC. Oh, how I've dreamed of finally being able to savour various tasty morsels of pure gold that I've only been able to witness on TV (We don't get food trucks much, or even at all where I live; they only frequent downtown).
For those that aren't local, we've had flucuating temperatures like you wouldn't believe. Yesterday, it was 20c+, today was only 4c, and this didn't help me on the day the trucks were visiting. Needless to say, I wasn't the only one tired of our food choices, so it was no surprise that the line ups were going to be long, but I should've known it would take some time for food to actually get out of the trucks.

You know you want some sammies

I think I lined up for just over 1 hour to place and receive my order. Was it worth it?

Behold, BBQ Brisket sammy and...wait, what is that?

And here we have Beef-Bacon Maple Doughnuts

First, with the BBQ brisket sammy. The slaw was a nice and acidic contrast to the smokey beef, but the beef itself, once you get deeper into the sandwich, was very dry. I also think the brisket was not tender enough. At first, I thought these beef-bacon doughnuts were something special; what a letdown. These doughnuts had a nice crispy shell, and a nice doughy centre with bacon bits spread about. I feel that these are very comparable to fried Timbits with bacon bits stuffed inside.

So was it worth it? Well, definitely not for the 1hr wait in the cold, but would I visit them again, given what we have on campus. Maybe

Have you tasted any fares from your food trucks? Anything special you've seen on food trucks that you've tried, or have been dying to try? Let me know in the comments below!

Here Comes "The Governor"

With the conclusion of season two of "The Walking Dead" (which just aired a few minutes ago as of this post) we finally get closure to the cliffhanger from season one and a whole new cliffhanger for season 3.

Introducing Michonne

For the peeps that remember from season one, we finally get to know what Dr. Jenner told Rick at the CDC in the last episode, which Rick was able to confirm with his own hands (I'll try not to spoil too many things in this and future episodes). We also get introduced to a new character (picture above) who rescues Andrea (you know this is going to be a great character for the next season). We also get to see a helicopter fly across the sky a one point...who knows what this means.
I really can't believe how closely they are following the comics with the series (although I am not caught up with the comics, I am guessing that I have read far enough to probably where season 3 will end) and for those that know what happen in the comics, I wonder how they'll be able to interpret that on national television.
And for those that couldn't make out the structure that was shown at the end of this episode, it is a prison facility.

As always, leave a comment on your predictions on the next season or comments on this and past season!

I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please message me.