Battleship
Hey, all! A quick update on what I mentioned in the last email: I am fine as far as health goes. I know a couple of you were worried from what I said, but I misspoke. I was not spontaneously “crying,” per say, but rather my eyes were spontaneously watering. I used those terms interchangeably and I should not have. I went by the nurse, got some eye drops, and feel just fine.
Next! I met with my group this week to decide what we are going to do for our freshman design class, and we decided to make a game of Battleship out of aluminum (and using a 3D printer for the tacks). I have been spending some time trying to create some 3D models of the ships, and I should have my individual part of the project done by Wednesday or so. Then we have to make the model of the board (This will be the most difficult part) and send them to the CNC Mill. This machine is basically magic. We can feed it a 3D model (similar to what you would send to a 3D printer), and feed it a block of aluminum. The machine works like a standard tool, by removing material. However, it is all fully automated and precise to .005 inches. And it works faster than you could believe. It will accept our model, shred off any material in the block we gave it that it doesn’t need, and add every little detail we could possibly come up with. It then kindly vacuums out the dust, gives us back the spare metal parts that it didn’t use, as well as a completed part(s). I haven’t used it yet, as I have been working entirely on manual machines, but the section of my group that decided to go through the 3D printer/CNC path for my class knows what they are doing, and I enjoy making the models, so it will work out just fine. Big project and lots of pieces, but I am looking forward to the challenge.
I am doing a leadership class through the school next weekend, spending a couple days off campus. I don’t really know too much of what it is going to be like, but ASME agreed to sponsor me to participate, so it is not costing me a cent. I also was picked out by Jonathon Ross, a leader in InterVarsity as well as the Hall Director for the two primary freshmen dorms, to take a leadership class through InterVarsity, which I will be doing on Wednesdays for the rest of the semester (I think). This is awesome, because it will let me be even more involved in InterVarsity as well as potentially land me an RA role for next school year (definitely something I want).
This week, bugs have overrun the school. I got off “easy” by only having my room populated by stink bugs. I take out 10-15 of them a day, and I am only bothering getting the ones that wander onto my desk. If I attempted to get all of the bugs…I wouldn’t get much done. They are not too obnoxious, as they are very slow moving and don’t fly too much, though they do have wings, so it is easy to catch them and it is not as if they are flying into my face or anything, but they definitely do not smell good. I may make some nice hot apple cider and just keep the pot in my room for a while to ease up the smell. I got the idea from InterVarsity a few days ago, when we were all invited to go over to one of the leader’s house for smores. There was apple cider there, and it smelled amazing! The mother of the house gave me a small bag of spices to use for the apple cider, and it should be great.
Other people have had more serious bug issues. Some people cannot even sleep in their rooms anymore because of them. I have yet to see any of them as high as my bed, so that doesn’t worry me, and even now looking around I don’t see any. It is just late morning and early afternoon that they come by. Other people have also had wasp problems, but luckily have have seen none of them in my room. Apparently this whole bud situation is very, very unusual. I don’t know if it was just a wetter spring than normal this year or what, but it is certainly unpleasant. I have plugged up every crevice I can see in my window, so I don’t really know where they are coming in now. Though, perhaps the fact that I can see none right now means that my solution did work, and it just took a few days to get the stragglers. I don’t know.
We are finishing Henry V in my BritLit class on Monday, and we passed the climax of the movie yesterday. It centers around the Battle of Agincourt, in which a British army outnumbered 10-1 manages to defeat the opposing French army. It is a brutal scene, but then at the end there was a very beautiful song. It starts with one man singing, then more join in, and by the end it is a full orchestra and there are amazing variations and an excellent violin part…yeah. It is great. You can see it here if you would like, but I will warn you that the actual movie is still rather graphic there. There is no more fighting, but there is a lot of blood and a lot of bodies. Very, very intense scene showing Henry carrying the body of one of the young men who died in the battle across the field. Extraordinarily well done movie and music!
My flyers advertising bass lessons are up all around the middle school and high school in town, and they have been distributed to all of the string teachers in the area as well, so hopefully I will have a few students before too long! I was able to get permission to have keys to the music building so I can go in and teach lessons on weekends when other people will not be in there. I have gotten no responses yet, but hopefully I will soon!
I got 100% on my Intro ME midterm! I will get results for others soon, so I will definitely share them (at least if they are that good, haha). I have also finished an individual design project that isn’t due until the end of the semester (the endpin for my bass) and hopefully will get the go-ahead to build that soon. I am a week ahead in Geography and Politics homework, and two weeks ahead in Calc. I got to go on a hike last Monday on my day off out by Mount Rushmore, and have been spending a lot of time with a few friends I have made around campus. I have spent a lot of time with Ezra especially, and I seem him at least a few times a week in the music building.
It is starting to get chilly here! I really like the drop in temperature. Breathing cold air again really makes me happy. Nothing quite like it. I have been happily keeping up my 8 hours of sleep per night, and feel fantastic.
I hope you all are enjoy life as well! Talk to you soon!
-Christopher