The Perkins Report

Its been unbelievably cold here in Phoenix. Sunday and Monday mornings were the coldest two consecutive mornings on record for Phoenix in 30 years. There was FROST if you can believe it. December was apparently wonderful with temperatures well into the 70's, but its just plummeted lately, and it sounds like we're getting away light down here compared with the rest of the United States.

My action items aren't acting very quickly. I still need an apartment, car, job, cat, and laptop. In the apartment department, one of my friend's friends needs a roommate and he lives relatively close to campus and is willing to take on a cat as well, so I'm going to check out his place tomorrow morning. Ideally, I'll be mostly moved in by this weekend although I'm not sure that's going to happen.

Today was the first day of school. My last undergraduate semester at ASU. It was a cold walk to school in the early morning since I have some serious issues to work out with the advising staff, so I was there early at 8 AM to hop in the long line. 4 basic problems:
1) I never got credit for my minor in design for a class I took a year and a half ago, so I needed to figure out how to get credit for it (turns out I need to petition for it by (SURPRISE) filling out some forms.)
2) Somehow I was signed up for two sections of the same class, one in Argentina which I took and got a grade for and the other which was in Tempe, which for obvious reasons, I couldn't attend, so I got a 0.0 INCOMPLETE mark on my records for it, which is equally obviously killing my GPA.
3) One of the classes I took in Argentina was a studio on Latin American design, which I realized that I was never signed up for, so it was ANOTHER form to take to my old professor, then to the faculty assistant chair, and then back to advising for approval. At least I got this issue resolved today.
4) My minor in design studies was relegated to back burner for Argentina, so I'm a bit behind. As far as I can tell, if I can get Issue 1 resolved, then all I need is two more design classes. One I'm already signed up for and the other I need to get approval for.

My options for these classes are somewhat not fun. I took "Human Behavior and Design" this afternoon along with 240 other students in a massive lecture hall. The teacher of this course is a postgrad student researching at ASU, and seems to be completely uninterested in making this course interesting or worthwhile. "I would really like for this course to be interactive," she told us, inferring that she would also really like a free ticket to Tahiti as well. I cringed a bit on the inside when she told us that most of what we would be studying would seem extremely transparent and obvious. Oh well, I could use some relaxation time. At least its supposed to get better as the class wears on.

The other class, which I havn't signed up for yet but seems to be the only class I CAN take to finish off my minor, is "Textiles in Interior Design" a small, upper division course with less than 30 people in it. While the human behavior class I can safely file under Mediocre, this textile class I think will be either really good or really bad. I'm actually a bit intrigued.

Ultimately these other classes mean I'll probably end up dropping the sketching class I'm currently signed up for, especially as its a late night class and apparently has a work load like another studio. El grand total course load would then be 14 hours.

One of the best things about today was seeing my old friends again, both those from Buenos Aires, and those who I've not seen in seven months. It was really cool to be back, to touch base, see how thier semester went, share anxieties over studio, and just to stand around and talk.

When I left for Abu Dhabi, I abandoned a beat up woman's mountain bike since I didn't have room in the storage unit and I'd gotten the $35 I'd paid for it out of it. Unwilling to let the loathsome bike thieves get it without a fight, I left it U-locked to a bike rack at my old apartment complex. Seven months later, I'm completely shocked by the fact that its still there, a little more rusty and dusty, but still with all parts intact. All that remained was to add some air to the tires and I was back in business. I think I've found a bike thats both really undesirable and difficult to steal- a good combination.

The other class I had today was taught by an extremely stiff man whose nationality stumped me until he revealed he was from Bavaria. Systems II is going to be extremely rigid with the first part focusing on lighting design, which seems to be our professor's forte who has a doctorate on the subject. Very clear and nearly metronomic diction, but we had no clue what he was talking about for most of the class. He danced around the questions so well, and seemed exasperated that he had to spell out what he wanted specifically for next class. This does not bode well. We're also expected to learn from scratch a new rendering program ("industry standard for lighting designers!") which I've never even heard of.

I'll get into changes in Tempe later. Its been a long first day.