A Pox On You

There has been a few things going on since the last post.

For reasons only known to me, my laptop and the hideous graphics that the BBC decided to use for the T In The Park festival (seriously, if that was the best idea, you need to sack that person), I shall do it in the good ol' format - the good, the bad and the ugly.

First off, the good. It is rather a lovely good piece of news. To cut a long story short, I've passed my first year of university. Those many few already know my surprise to this knowledge. Allow me to expand.

For some reason, Glamorgan University doesn't tell you how you've done for the year, just for the assignments and the mean marks for each module. For my university (and I guess every other one, though correct me if I'm wrong), I'd need over seventy for a first, between sixty and sixty nine for a two-one, fifty and fifty nine for a two-two and then anything higher than forty for a third (the basic pass). Anything lower than forty would mean I'd failed the assignment/module.

Luckily, that was not the case. Overall in each modules, I had one third (Video Production), one two-two (Radio Production), three two-ones (Media Technology For Applications 1, Internet Technologies 1 and Computer Graphics Technologies for Integration 1) and, the one that shocked me the biggest, one first (Electronics for Music and Media). As you can see, the subjects that I like the most are the ones I was best at. Well, that and the two modules where I had group assignments were my worst. Grr.

Granted, these are probably not the final grades for the year. Maybe they'd chance slightly, but probably not enough to change the grade (though some of the marks are close to the threshold). Anyway, I was intrigued to see what was the overall mark I was given for the year. So, I did what naturally came to me at first but then deteriorated as the years eroded its abilities and used my maths skills. And what was the value I got? I shall tell you, it was 59.5.

That's a two-two. I should call it a 2:2, which I shall now. But yeah, that's half a mark away from a 2:2. Get in.

I was further intrigued, and wanted more accuracy in my results. I then added up the marks from all assignments individually and divided by the amount of assignments (which, for the few of the few who are interested, is twenty). And what did I get for that? 59.55.

Ooh, only 0.45 marks away from a 2:1. Yes, a low 2:1, but one all the same.

I'm not miffed that I didn't get that fraction of a mark to get a 2:1, I'm just pleased that I've passed my first year and rather decently. Maybe if I was bossy enough and told my groups in the Production modules to wise up and finish the work, I would've had the 2:1, but you know me, I'm no good at that.

Next up, the bad. Not going to dwell on this too much, though. The people at Wicid decided to give the members of the editorial team a charter to fill out. In short, it stated that if we signed it, we'd agree to not write anything that could be considered pornographic, sexually explicit, abusive and political. Please say you looked bizarrely at this idiotic blog as you read that last sentence.

Anyway, some of us disagreed and are now trying to make a new charter that will mean that the council would not block us out all the freaking time. Oh, and to let us write about whatever we want, be that on whatever subject matter the user wants.

To finish off, the ugly. It's me. I have chicken pox. At this time, I've been plagued with it for about six days now. The first day (Saturday, I think it was) was just me being bed bound. I couldn't get up at all. For all of that day, I think I was only conscious for about eight or nine hours. Not good.

The next day was when the spots came out. The doctor told us just to take Beechams and that will be fine. That was wrong. On Wednesday morning, going on for about three I'd say, I was heading back to the hospital. I had an epic fever, though by the time I got to the hospital to see le docteur, that had gone. Throughout, he told us tales of when he had chicken pox at the grand old age of thirty one, and he knows how bad it can get in adults (me, adults... ha). For that, he instantly gave me antivirals for the virus, and some stuff for the fever. Hopefully I should get better in a week or two. Enough of that.

I'm off now. For the moment, ya?

- I pity the FIN.