In which Pearl questions her sanity

(Or, in which Pearl's brain becomes so fried that she can't act sane.)

Konbanwa, minna-san!

Well, I'm certainly quite a bit more upbeat than I was the week before Winter Break. I feel like I shouldn't be, considering Culminating Activity deadlines and the ever-terrifying exams are quickly approaching. Then again, this might just be my way of keeping myself sane. Yes...acting crazy to keep myself sane...what a reasonable explanation.

I wonder why people stare at me strangely when I say "This is so interesting!" about a crime fiction/mystery novel. Or a show where something - doesn't matter what: vehicles, trains, airplanes, houses, barren fields, etc. - blows up. Or a chase scene. Or a gunfight scene. Is it strange to like that?
Meh. Castle always says (and yes, this is part of the introduction to each episode) "There are two kinds of people who spend their lives thinking of ways to murder people. Psychopaths...and mystery writers."
I relish in that kind of stuff.

Anyways, before I completely forget what we did in ICS this morning, let me write it down here.

Today was basically another work period for the Culminating Activity. (Why do I capitalize that? Is it simply an example of how much it towers over me; an example of how much of our mark this is weighted on?) Yes, er, well. I made some necessary edits to the About the Authors page, since Shreya joined our group. Lisa had asked for it to flow better (see, before I had tried to follow the model of a short About the Author[s] blurb in the back of a fiction book), so I had to change a few things.

Last night, Shreya sent me the glossary terms she wrote. I put those up on the Wiki. Looking over them, I feel like we'll have to do some editing. The language is not exactly professional, but that's okay. At least she has the basic idea. Don't get me wrong - I'm very glad she's so eager to contribute to our project. But...the grammar Nazi I am, I just...I'm picky about these things.

Which reminds me, as soon as exams are over, I need to reply to my pen pal (sort of) on FF. I still remember the days when we sent several messages back and forth on the same day.

So, for tonight I have to finish the flow chart about Tutoring Turing and the edits to the AtA page. Lisa will (hopefully) send me the rest of the introduction so I can put the two parts together.

I can't feel the pressure. Is that a bad thing?
Nevertheless, we're making good progress. Hm. That's probably why.

I'm feeling wistful now. Mm.
I think I'll go talk to my friend on MSN for a bit. He's always fun to talk to.

Mata ashita!

---

Current Music: Victory Korea - Super Junior
[Zarin-dono, you'll be happy to know I've gotten somewhat addicted to their songs. And Amy, too, if you're still reading my blog.]

In which our CA group gets a new member!

Konichiwa, minna-san!

Even as I type this, I'm creating flow charts for our ICS Culminating. Oh, the month of January is so busy! With exams coming up in two weeks, and Culminating Activities to finish, I'm as busy as a bee. Some people are stressing out, but not me! No, my mind has already blown up! I just get really hyper and then sporadically change energy levels and get depressed. Then I get hyper again. Yes...if you see me acting drunk, you know what happened.

"Mi-mi-mikuru, mi-mikurun-run!"
You might hear me singing that. Three cheers for Mikuru and all the people who act like her in real life (a.k.a. me)!

Yup. That's how far I've gone.

Well, today we got a new addition to our ICS Culminating group! I'd like to extend a welcome to Shreya, from Class A. She will be taking care of the glossary - not exactly an easy feat.

As for my tasks, all I have to do is edit the About the Authors page and the first part of the Introduction. Then I'm going to help Zarin-dono with the Case Statements lesson, and I have offered to help Shreya with the Glossary. Then, I will get to work thinking up test questions.

Ah, but before that, I have to finish creating the flow charts that were requested. It's pretty easy, and everyone else is doing so much; so I want to contribute as much as I can in any way possible.

Then I must memorize my lines for English CA; and do research for French CA, which is more about science (environmental problems). If I may, I'd like to voice my anger at Naeem for basically forcing our group to do Climate Change - something he's been obsessed with for the past two years (at least).
It's shameful.

Ah, well, there's no time to blow up at anyone. Besides, my brain is already fried.
"Koi no magiku, mi-mi-ku-run-run!"

Mata ashita, minna-san!

---

Current Music: Koi no Mikuru Densetsu - Yuko Gotou (Mikuru Asahina from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya)

In which Pearl forgets...again.

Ah!! Gomen nasai, minna-sama! *bows down repeatedly*
I totally forgot about this blog entry... Please forgive me...
My excuse? Er, well, you see... After school I went to Fairview for a reunion with my classmates (it was a failure, though, because barely anyone showed up). Then I had a headache so I went home. I got home at around four-ish and went straight to bed. Now, uh, I...didn't wake up until...11:30 PM, when my mom was getting ready for bed. She told me to go to sleep, so I did. I woke up at...2 PM the next day. So you see...I didn't even go on the computer for the past three days. I guess I was suffering from sleep deprivation. The past week...I barely got a day of sleep.

So, Friday was the last day of school before Winter Break. It was a half day, so classes were only 45 minutes long. Because of this drastically shortened day (and most likely the fact that it's the last day of school), teachers decided to put away the old teaching handbook (I'm guessing here) and have a relaxed class. In my English and Science classes, we had a small party and conversed with each other. In my French class, Mr. Vretranos gave us a little talk (nothing serious) and we got the rest of the period to chat with our friends.

In ICS, Mr. Arkin gave us another work period. Zarin-dono and I worked on the "Window Edge-Tracer" program. I figured out why the rectangle wasn't going to the last row - it was because I hadn't used the dot-dot option after my put CHARACTER statement. And lo and behold! It was fixed and working perfectly!Until...

Mr. Arkin told Zarin that our if statements should be separate. However, when I did that, the rectangle did not go to the corners of the run window. I need to fix that glitch, and I'm planning to do so over the break.

---This next part does not pertain to computer science at all, so you don't have to read it---

I admit it. The pain of staying away from anime, manga and video games has finally caught up to me, and I'm facing withdrawal symptoms. The past week, because I've been working so hard on editing people's essays and doing my own; as well as the homework from other subjects, I didn't get to read one fanfic, one manga, one doujinshi... I didn't get to watch one crime show (other than Hawaii Five-O, and that was on Monday), one anime... I didn't even get to draw, for goodness' sakes! And my DS had been broken since August...August!!! So...I admit to "binging" on these things, as well as sleep for the past three days. *smile*
I believe that the aforementioned factors have also made me quite irritable and grumpy, too.

Nevertheless, I have recovered! Now I'm off to look for an old video game that will work on a PC, so I can cure that video game withdrawal! Oh, and I need to write a Christmas-themed fic as well~ I have a pretty good idea. It's fluff. Fluff for the holidays~
(And Zarin-dono, don't worry, I have a good idea for your Sebby/Ciel fic too~)

Anyways, have a great Winter Break, minna-san~!

Merri Kurisumasu! (Merry Christmas!) Happy Hannukah (though I believe that it has passed)! Happy Diwali! And Happy Holidays!




Image belongs to Owaranai Kiss.
Saber and Fate/Stay Night (c) Type-Moon

 

Another laidback class...

Ah, nostalgia...
I knew visiting MacMillan wasn't a good idea. Now I'm going to be stuck in this state for the next few days, if not weeks...

Anyways! What did we do in class today...? I can't remember...
Oh, yes! Today was a shortened day, so we didn't get to do much. Basically, all we did was take down glossary terms. Again.

Actually, most of the period was spent discussing the process of booting. It turns out that to boot up a computer, you not only need primary storage (RAM), secondary storage (hard disc), and a CPU; but ROM as well! Well, I didn't know that! You learn something new every day.

Speaking of which, Mr. Arkin taught us a saying: "lift yourself up by your bootstraps". I've never heard of it until today, but it's an...interesting quote. Besides, I love adding quotes to my collection! I'm sort of a English fanatic...so...yeah...

Well~! I'm off to finish my other homework now!

Ja ne, minna!

"The first shall be the last"

"The first shall be the last"

That was the quote that Mr. Arkin put up on the board today. Why? Well, I was confused at first, too, but then he explained it to the class. Since today was Grade 9 Day, we were the only class he had the whole day! In other words, we were his first class as well as his last one! (Oh, oh, and did you know that it came from the Bible? I sure didn't!) Ha, well, enough of my rambling. Let's get to what I did today.

Mr. Arkin finally assigned a due date for our Superpower Assignment: Friday.

Ah, it doesn't affect me that much, since I pretty much finished everything a week ago. Now, I'm just putting the finishing touches on it. One thing that Mr. Arkin cleared up today that was incredibly useful for me was how to link to directories "above" the one the file I'm editing is in. (I'm referring to the hierarchical file structure) Nngh...I had forgotten that ".." means "one directory above" (or something along those lines). I feel so stupid...especially because I've used FileZilla pretty much every day, and have seen ".." every time I used it.

I spent most of my time today making sure I used special character entities consistently and appropriately. Then I made sure my spelling and grammar were correct. When I was absolutely positive that it was fine, I checked the marking scheme to see if I missed anything. Unfortunately...I did. Although I am, er, slightly confident that I will get a good mark, I'm missing something. My images aren't visually integrated.

This was a problem before, since when I first tried to do so, the HTML Validator claimed that there was an error in my coding. However, even Mr. Arkin couldn't figure out why, and suggested that I put each image in a paragraph of its own. And...it worked! Now...I'm not sure what to think, or do for that matter.

Other than that...I think I'll be okay. I'm drawing my illustrations at this very moment (literally!) and I'll be replacing the ones I currently have with my own pictures. Ha! Take that, stupid websites who don't indicate whether their image is copyrighted or not! (Oh...I feel sort of pathetic) Heh...anyways, back to work I go!

Validating HTML is a pain! But...it feels so rewarding when you succeed!

Now, today was a shortened day, so we only had an hour to work on our super-power assignments.

Yesterday I quickly wrote an Index page for my website. Today, I validated it. At first, I had a problem, but after I read it over, I found out that I had forgotten to put an arrow bracket! Then I felt stupid.
But I fixed it, and the HTML for my Index page passed the (dreaded) validation exam! (Ha, I'm exaggerating a little, but I got pretty frustrated trying to figure it out.

Now, when it came to my super-power assignment HTML file, I got extremely frustrated. I used the template, but after that, the validator kept saying that it couldn't check my file! I asked Mr. Arkin about it, and he told me that there was something wrong with Line 24 and how to fix it.
But even though I followed his instructions, it still wouldn't work! So, Mr. Arkin said that he'd help me figure out the problem, and to email the file to him via Wikispaces. Thank you, Mr. Arkin! Hopefully I can get it fixed and validated before I go to sleep!

Because of the validation process, my opinion of HTML went down quite a bit. But now that I understand the problems, I don't feel that way anymore. Of course, personally, validating my HTML is the most dreaded part of this process.

After I finish writing this, I'll check my Wikispaces inbox to see if Mr. Arkin replied to my message. I'll also update my Index page so it links to my Super-hero assignment (validated or not!). Then, of course, I'll have to revalidate it. I pray that it doesn't fail!

Oh, yes, another thing I have to do...is learn how to center images in CSS. I wonder when Mr. Arkin will teach us that...I hate how unruly the pictures look when they're not centered...

Time for some serious work!

Ah, there's not much to say today.
We continued working on our Super-power assignment. Since I was fooling around with different colour schemes yesterday, I didn't really decide on one. So, today, I looked up a list of HTML colour codes to create a design that I was happy with, yet still professional. I stuck with my original idea - using analogous colours. I just needed to figure out which ones! I actually wanted to use pink, blue and purple; but when I tried it out, it didn't look as good as it did in my head. I'm not a big fan of red, yellow, or green; so I decided to use blue as a base colour. I ended up using different shades of blue and purple. I'm glad I didn't stray too far away from my original idea.

Last night I typed about half of my essay out, so I copied the text into my HTML file (Index.html) in class. When I previewed my web page, it looked really nice! (Well, in my opinion, at least)
Then I checked the marking scheme to see if I needed to include anything else. And...surprise, surprise! Apparently we need to add in links and image(s) as well! I groaned, but eventually accepted this and moved on to find a decent picture for my super-power, teleportation. When I did, I saved it to my Home Drive and worked on creating internal links. I managed to get quite a lot done!

Tonight I will finish typing out my Super-power essay, and then apply it to the HTML spreadsheet I wrote. Then I will add external links and an image (or maybe more than one, if I can find another good picture). Hopefully it's not too late when I finish this. If it isn't, then I'll download Filezilla so I can upload my work onto the class website. (Argh! I better not forget the password!)

On a side note, the supply teacher for yesterday and today, Ms. Ecker, was incredibly friendly and kind. Although she didn't do much except supervise our class, I really enjoyed her presence. She had a great sense of humour!