I've been gone a while, haven't I?

Hello, everyone! I have been gone forever, it seems. Since I last posted, I went to Prom, had AP exams, graduated, did a summer program at Virginia Tech, and became a Virginia Tech student. Today was my first day of classes.

I am living in a theme dorm called Hypatia, which is for first- and second-year engineering major women. A similar program, called Gallileo, is available for engineering men. Hypatia is a great group, and I'm really excited about it. One funny thing is that here at Virginia Tech, I have met more Lauras in the past few days than I have met in a LONG time. My roommate (this was not planned, by the way) is named Laura. Sometimes, people will walk into our room and say "Laura" just to watch us both turn around. And there is another Laura down the hall who likes to hang out in our room. Seriously; if you have ANY ideas for nicknames, they would be greatly appreciated.

My first day of classes has been great. I first figured out the situation with my math classes; since I can't take Multivariable Calculus until I take Linear Algebra and Vector Geometry, I will be taking both of those this semester. (I have had several people, including my awesome calculus teacher from last year, that with my AP score, I should just skip out of Calculus 1 and 2.) Then I had German, and though I was a little nervous (I was the only freshman), I enjoyed it, especially when a Mechanical Engineering professor taking the class (I didn't know they could do that, but that's actually really cool that he's taking classes. I probably would as well if I worked at a university.) asked to talk to all the engineering majors (all 3 of us) after class. He told us that there was a program starting that would allow Mechanical Engineers who were sophomores this year who got good grades in certain German classes spend the summer before their senior year in Stockholm, Sweeden and then spend their senior year at the Technische Universität Darmstadt. They would then receive Bachelors degrees in MechE from BOTH Virginia Tech and TU Darmstadt. I think this will be an ongoing program. And one in which I want to get involved. A lot. I have been trying to decide between Electrical Engineering and MechE, and since both could probably lead to the subject in which I am currently interested (designing and building robots), I think this might be worthwhile. And FUN. I have seriously been excited all day. My mood was only slightly dampened with an assignment from my next class, the Hypatia seminar (for first-year Hypatia residents). That assignment: join the newly-created Hypatia group on Facebook. I asked if I could not join facebook, but apparently I have to. I will do my best to not get distracted by it, which basically means that everything on my account will be private and I won't check it much. Is there a way to delete Facebook accounts, by the way? I don't want this sucking me in later on, especially in Junior and Senior years when I'll really need to focus. While the concept of Facebook is brilliant, I think it could be fatefully distracting at inopportune times (finals, projects, etc.) It was kind of weird, though. Once they found out, people who I had told I would never get Facebook unless I was forced came up to me and said "Laura, I'm so proud of you!" Ugh. I was forced; it's a graded assignment. Drop it, people! Anyway, the rest of Hypatia wasn't bad. It doesn't look like a hard class, but it looks like it will be useful at the same time. We already have another assignment to do a presentation about ourselves to get us used to public speaking. (By the way, does anyone know if the (really awesome-sounding) Dale Carnegie Public Speaking Courses can be taken by college students or by people not being forced to go through the course by their employers? I really want to take it. The instructors give only positive feedback to assignments, or so I have heard, so the students build confidence and learn to enjoy speaking in public. I would like that experience.)

And then I had my Vector Geometry class. It is an online class, but it has lectures and recitations (thank goodness!). The professor seems both nice and funny, so I'm looking forward to it. Althouth it took nearly all of the 15 minutes I had between Hypatia and VecGeom to get there, since it's a ways across campus. But it was fun.

Anyway, tomorrow I have my first Linear Algebra class (which is also online, but has no lecture or recitation; it's self taught. Fun, fun fun. Thank you, AP Physics B online for teaching me how to teach myself. But I've heard it isn't hard. But now I'm wondering why I keep making long parenthetical comments. I think I'll end this parenthetical comment now.), followed by Engineering Exploration (it would be followed by VecGeom recitation, but for our section, there's none the first week) and then Chemistry. And there are currently some random guys singing a capella music in the hallway. They actually sound pretty good.


Anyway, (I also start a lot of paragraphs with that word, don't I? Tsk, tsk.) I think I have a way to make myself post more often. I have bought two tiny portable garden gnomes, one of which I try to have in my purse at all times. I want to make a habit of taking pictures of it in random places and posting them. I already have some pictures, but I won't post them tonight. But soon. Hopefully.

I'm gonna get off now. My first class tomorrow is at 9 am. (Which means I should change the alarm clock, since I thought it started at 11... I'll figure this out. Hopefully soon. And someday, I won't feel compelled to write overly long parenthetical comments about everything. That's bad form, isn't it? Oops. It's fun, since I can make jokes about it. w00t.)