joy and shadows

Settle down, children, for I have a Grad Student Story to tell, inspired by angstymcgoth's post about brazen students who call their TA to ask for answers on tests.

Many moons ago, I was a TA for orgo lab in my fifth year at Princeton. The class was being taught by Prof. Pascal, a tightassed perfectionist (no "toilet bowl" benzenes were to be drawn in his class.) When exam time came round, all the TAs would gather round to grade papers ASAP afterwards over pizza. Unlike Rutgers, the exams at Princeton are not multiple choice, and so there is some room for error in the grading.

If you, the student, felt that your test had been incorrectly graded, you had the option to resubmit your exam for a regrade. This was not without risk, as the TA might find something wrong that had gotten through the first round. However, in the majority of cases, the test either came back unchanged or slightly better. Needless to say, this presented a golden opportunity for the clever student to put one over on the TAs, mostly by writing the right answer out in the back of the workbook and saying "you guys missed this!"

Anyway. While Prof. Pascal was more than willing to accept that one of the other graders may have made a mistake, he himself (being who he is) was not willing to accept that he had made a mistake. So, unbeknownst to the orgo students, he photocopied the results of his grading before distributing the graded exams back to the students.

Not too long afterwards, one of the best students in the class came back with a misgrade request. Despite the incorrect problem, this fellow had already gotten an A on the exam. At the same time, another student's exam went missing. The two events seemed unrelated until Prof. Pascal went to the problem in question (it was an "assign the NMR spectrum" question) and compared it to his original copy - and found that the two didn't match.

This enterprising student had stolen an exam from another student who had gotten the question right. He erased all her answers, wrote in his own answers over Prof. Pascal's grading, and resubmitted it. Ten of ten for effort and cleverness, and only someone as anal as Pascal would have found it out. There was an ensuing whinefest about how the students should have been TOLD that their answers would be photocopied (what, so they'd know what question not to cheat on?) blah blah blah, but the facts remained.

The stupid part was that the cheater was an A student and hadn't submitted for a regrade previously, so no one could fathom why he would have wanted to polish his test results. The end result was that the cheater got a yearlong vacation from Princeton and failed the class. He should have been expelled, IMO, but that's what happens when your parents pay 40K a year for an Ivy Education.

I was all set to be bummed today, but the gods were smiling on me. Every day should be like today! This is why:

The Giants won last night

and

I had a hypothesis that the two compounds from two different vendors that I've been comparing were different compounds (which means Company 2 is lying) and I was RIGHT

and

My House and Coupling DVDs arrived today

and

Husband is making dinner for me

and

I have birthday cake to eat!

I will enjoy the happy while it lasts. ^_^

Kushiel's Scion will be out in June 2006!

Looks intriguing, too...

Naruto premieres at 9 PM, heralding a Brave New World.

All together now!

I'm a ninja, it's your birthday, I'm a ninja, it's your birthday...

Quiet, I'm trying to concentrate!

Dude, we're ninjas! We graduated from Ninja Tech!

(just throw the cake up here please)

Dry Cheerios
Cucumber salad
Beer

Any questions?

That's the number of the Red Cross. Which all of you Americans lucky enough not to be affected by Hurricane Katrina should be calling. It doesn't matter if you can't give hundreds of dollars. Give what you can.

You can also go to their website: The Red Cross

If you want to wear your support, you can get one of their super-cool field bags or shirts or knit kits in their Red Cross Store. I have the t-shirt and the bag, and they look great with jeans.

A lot of people were left with a bad taste in their mouth after 9/11 regarding the Red Cross. However, the ARC is a disaster relief organization, not a charity operation. They move in after situations like a natural disaster or during wartime and dispense aid. What money they don't use, they save for the next disaster. So let's all move past 9/11.

And can I say this to all you media people out there in TV-land who are trying to find something or someone to blame this hurricane on: CUT THAT SHIT OUT RIGHT NOW. KATRINA WAS AN ACT OF GOD, IF THAT TERMINOLOGY PLEASES YOU. IT IS NOBODY'S FAULT. PEOPLE ARE NOT PSYCHIC AND HINDSIGHT IS ALWAYS 20/20. KATRINA CAME ASHORE AS A CATEGORY 4 STORM, AND IF YOU DIDN'T EXPECT THAT TO BLAST A CITY THAT LIES BELOW SEA LEVEL BACK INTO THE 18TH CENTURY, YOU ARE OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MINDS.

I was thinking about all the unfortunate people who have been victimized by this storm, and it seems to me that it must be very hard to reconcile living in the 21st century with the reality of what has happened. You know that 150 miles in any direction, people are living their lives with water and electricity and communication and food, all these things that we have come to take for granted because our society is so advanced. You can understand why people are upset - it's more than the disaster. It's the whole "We live in the United States - how can this be happening to us? Where is food, where is water, where is transportation?" And then they think about aid to tsunami victims and Florida and get angrier. Then they get a gun. And then things go to hell.

Would one of you nice Naruto fans make or point me to a good screenshot of Tenten? I understand that she's something of a minor character, so I don't know what episode(s) to look in to find a good shot of my own. I've been working on the cosplay section of my site, and I need the cap for a graphic.

Thank you so much!

I saw an advertisement for Naruto on CN, which is premiering the second weekend in September.

Brace yourselves, anime fans.

Dear Hugo Chavez,

Please do not listen to Pat Robertson. He is a bona fide fruitcake. I don't know why anyone is paying attention to him in the first place.

Dear OCD gym room,

Whoever keeps putting on the Food Network during their workout should be taken out into the street and shot without trial. Let this be a warning to you.

Dear CC board,

If anything else is wrong with my documents, I will beat you with a stick.

Dear Biotin-BMCC,

Please dissolve in something or I will spit on you.

Love, me.