Phil's G.I. Joe Page
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Tuesday, August 31, 2004
Can you believe it's the last day of August already? Ugh!! Well, that aside, I have to say that the month has been pretty uneventful, save for the two weddings I attended (the second one being last Saturday). My days were mostly spent at home or at the theater, and on many of my full days off form work I went to Universal Studios or Disneyland. I spent more money than I should have, and took a lot of pictures that I'll only glance at once. I also got served with a jury summons, but I'll have to postpone it as it's the first day of school. And for anyone wondering, that's September 23rd. Well, I guess I'll wrap up this longwinded, wandering post before I've worn out my welcome. ...Too late, huh? Wednesday, August 25, 2004
Yesterday mom and I went down to my apartment in San Diego to check and see if any bills may have arrived in our absense, as well as move in a few things (including a large Stargate: Altantis standee I got from Edward's). Mom wanted to stay the night so she wouldn't have to drive over and back from San Diego in the same day, which is a wish I can respect. (And before you go knocking on me for not driving, realize I've made the round trip 33 times per the last two school years, so I'm a little sick of the drive, myself.) We spent the rest of yesterday driving around San Diego, after stopping at a homebrew supply store to pick up a ridiculous amount of stuff for dad, including a giant metal grape destemmer/crusher rental which wobbled precariously in the back of the Explorer. Of course, I was no slouch when it came to buying stuff in the last two days. In the order that I remember them: Star Wars Original trilogy 3 3/4" Han Solo Action figure Star Wars Original trilogy 3 3/4" Princess Leia Action figure Star Wars Original trilogy 3 3/4" Ben Kenobi Action figure Star Wars Original trilogy 12" Boba Fett Action figure "The Batman" Batman action figure "The Batman" Bruce Wayne action figure "The Batman" Joker action figure G.I. Joe Anti-Venom Task Force 6-pack Justice League Wonder Woman figure Justice League Ultra-Humanite figure X-Treme X-Men vol. 4: Mekanix Uncanny X-Men vol. 4: The Draco Just a Geek by Wil Wheaton Yessir, I have spent a pretty penny here.... Sunday, August 22, 2004
I guess I'll be able to make this post sooner than intended. I present to you: The Saga of How Phil Got an "F" Okay, so it's not a great title. That's not important. What is is that I did get an F in one of my college courses. "Contemporary Computer Topics," to be exact. Now, if you remember, this is the course I claimed would be really easy back in Spring Quarter or the last school year. (That's 2004, for those of you keeping score.) Anyways, this course was essentially, meet in groups and make up a 4000 word report about an imagined technology which could be developed from existing wireless internet resources. My group came up with Wi-Scape, a sort of virtual world where art could be displayed, except that the virtual world would be the real world. Simplistically, this was virtual graffiti in an existing 3-D space. Sound pretty cool? That's what we thought, too. so did the professor. We did everything required and did it on time, if not earlier. The teacher was impressed. We were happy. We left Finals Week thinking we'd done good. End of story, right? Apparently not. For the next two weeks after school's out, I'm on my California road trip, and effectively cut off from the internet. I come back home and check my grades, and I'm surprised to find an "F" as my grade for the course. I'm nervous, but I take some comfort in the notice that grades are not yet finalized. So I forget about it for a few weeks. I remember that grades are now finalized and recheck the school website. ...It's still an "F." Now I get into a nice little panic. I use the e-mail address the teacher gave us students to ask about my grade. After all, I checked with one of my group members and he got an "A." This has to be a mistake, right? No response to the e-mail. I find another e-mail address for her and try again, thinking she may have disregarded my earlier message as spam. No response. I wait for a long while thinking the teacher will write back. No luck. Finally, I get up the courage to e-mail the department faculty member in charge of grades. Here's how the e-mails went down. Me: Hello, I'm writing this e-mail as an inquiry into the grade I received for ICAM 130. I believe the F I received for this course has been in error, and I have repeatedly tried to establish contact with my instructor [instructor name] at both her [instructor e-mail #1] and [instructor e-mail #2] e-mail addresses without success. I know confusion has arisen before over this class being cross-listed with VIS 149. Any assistance at all would be appreciated. Faculty Member: Hi Phillip, When did you take the class? [Instructor]'s new email address is: [instructor e-mail #3]. Once you let me know when you took the class and your student PID number, I can try to contact [instructor] to inquire about your grade. Me: I took the class Spring Quarter '04. Faculty Member: What is your PID? Me: Whoops, forgot about that! [PID number] Faculty Member: Hi Phillip, I emailed [instructor] this afternoon. I will let you know when I hear from her. Instructor: [Faculty Member]: This is incorrect. Phillip did not earn an F, but an A. I am very sorry about this oversight Phillip! Phillip may have tried to contact me via my popmail account, which i have just closed because of all the spam. Faculty Member: Hi Phillip, I have received an email from Prof. [Instructor] and she had incorrectly filled in your grade. I am completing the paperwork to change your grade to an "A." The department chair must approve this grade change before it is sent to the registrar's office. The registrar is responsible for changing your grade in the system. Please give 3-4 weeks for the change to show up on your StudentLink account. If your grade is not changed by the end of summer, please let me know. Instructor: phillip: I feel absolutely terrible about the error I made! Of course you did not earn an F. I gave you the same grade as [group member], an A, and thought you guys did an exceptional project. I don't have any excuse-not a good one anyway. I haven't made an error like this before, and I hopefully won't again. I do remember seeing your email in my inbox, and, frankly, becuase i am very tired of being approached by students who are unhappy aobut their grade, I did not check emails about "grade". since I won't change their grade for them. anyway, hope it did not cause too much stress. Good luck with your endeavors. ----------- So it appears as though the whole thing was some sort of freaky clerical error. I just e-mailed both of them to let them know the school website now recognizes I have an "A" in the class. Hopefully, this whole thing is behind me now. Saturday, August 21, 2004
Revenge of the Random Thoughts for the Day: - Just when I think I'm getting better, my leg acts up again and hurts even more. - I've had trouble finding G.I. Joe toys lately, but you probably don't care about that. - I've gotten a summons for jury duty. The date? The first day of school, naturally. - I got the weekend off from work without asking. It's a pretty sweet deal. - Sometime within the next two to three weeks I'll have to tell "The Saga of How Phil Got an 'F'". - My room has been at its messiest since I got back from Comic Con. I need to do something about that. Tuesday, August 17, 2004
So the wedding went off quite nicely, even in spite of our attempts to lose ourselves in Silicon Valley. Oddly enough, the marriage ceremony was mostly done in Colombian Spanish. This was a favor to the bride, as the groom understood little Spanish, despite his Latin roots. (Hey, he's kinda like me!) The dialect was so odd that even my brother and mother had a hard time understanding what was being said. But hey, a wedding is a wedding, and this one was beautifully done. Thursday, August 12, 2004
Yet another one of my brother's friends is getting married this weekend, this time in Santa Clara. So once again, I'll be out of town for the weekend to attend this with my family. I know I'm erratic enough with these postings, but at least this time I'll have an excuse for it. Sunday, August 08, 2004
In my never ending quest to buy more toys than I need, I ran across this Spider-Man 2 playset at Target a few days ago. I decided to put a few pics online and show my G.I. Joe mailing lists how Spidey can be compatible in their scale. Yeah, I know, this is probably one of the geekiest things I've ever done on this site. But, hey, you may see him pop up in another dio-story of mine. So there. Saturday, August 07, 2004
Two nights ago my brother and I were walking the dog. Apparently in my efforts to get him to take the leash I provoked him into starting an impromptu wrestling match wth me. Rolling around in the grass at 10 pm in my work pants wasn't quite the night I had envisioned. At my first available opportunity I got up to walk away, but I guess Mike wasn't done yet. He blindsided me with a body grab, and as I spun around while being brought to the ground I heard and felt several popping noises in my lower left leg. Yup, it was twisted. I painfully limped back home and have been waiting for my leg to return to normal for the last two days. It's getting better, but I can guarantee you it's not very comfortable standing on a strained leg for hours as I sell movie tickets. Wednesday, August 04, 2004
Yesterday a box arrived for me from UPS. Inside was my set of X-Men and Marvel toys I had pre-ordered months ago. Kind of nice to see a big ol' pile of toys waiting for me. That is all. Sunday, August 01, 2004
My god, it's august already! Where did the time go?? *sigh* Anyways, I've been continuing spending all my money on X-Men trades. I bought a crapload at Comic Con (many at reduced prices!), but now I'm buying trades of just collected issues of the current books. No crossovers, just the regular issues. I'm closing the gaps in my Uncanny and X-Treme X-Men collections, but all the while I'm wondering, is it really worth it? Maybe I should fill out my bookshelf with these. A sort of library of comic books, no? |
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| The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of Phillip Donnelly. Unless explicitly stated, all statements are those of Phillip Donnelly. So there! |
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