I, Curtis

Category: General Life

  • Helping a Caveman Find His Way

    Just when I thought my father  could not find any more ways to annoy me with technology questions, here comes the newest inquiry, regarding a GPS. Apparently my mother has to go to Charleston, SC for 3 days to work next week and her boss is willing to pay for the Saturday as well, so both parents are going. My father approached me to inquire if I have a Mer Girlin (Magellan) device. After about 4 attempts of him repeating it and him angrily declaring “you know, punch in the address and it tells you where you are”, I was able to translate from his native cave-man to English (or is it Portuguese?) to determine that he was asking about a Magellan GPS device. I showed him my device, and he was not impressed (well duh! Mine doesn’t talk and is for getting my ass out of the woods, not for road trips).

    Now through some weird deduction of his logic he has gotten “Yes I will help you pick one” out of “I might go with you to pick one”, so I guess I am going to go help my father find a suitable GPS device to blow $300 on to help him navigate a 3 hour trip to South Carolina (although, if Gilligan got lost in a storm, my father might get lost on a slightly windy day).

    At the present time the  going recommendation is a Garmin nüvi 205W Navigator.

  • To My Friends

    To be my friend apparently requires a very specialized set of skills and abilities, so much so that only three people in my life fall in to the category of “friend”. Chris, Oscar, Matt; the three of you have consistently shown patience to my moods and have always returned when I have tried to run you off. For this I am very thankful. My self-isolating tendencies make having many friends nearly impossible. I am very happy that the three of you have stayed with me for as long as you have.

  • Major Declared

    48 hours later, it finally took.

    AFA

  • Academic Madness

    Today was fun, I planned to go to Gaston College to pick up my diploma from fall and to go see Mr. Biggers’ new show. I ended up doing a lot more.

    First, stopped in to pick up my diploma. After looking at my ID, the kind gentleman in the registrar’s office dashed over to the diploma bucket to flip through to look for mine. He dug for a while and then asked me to spell my last name again (never a good sign). After an exhaustive dig through the diploma bucket, he asked if I had petitioned in a different semester. I’m guessing from the question that people do not often petition in the semester before they are planning to receive their degrees.  After telling the kind associate registrar that the petition was filed in summer, my diploma was located, but that was not where it ended. I had to talk another associate registrar (one who specializes in degree checkout, and whose initials appear on my initial degree form) to get my degree reconfirmed, since someone majorly screwed up and tried to process my degree for the summer term, and a note of a course substitution was not made properly. Since my degree had not been checked out it was not on the transcript correctly either, therefore the previous transcript I sent to Fayetteville was useless. Also, I inquired if my AFA (Associate in Fine Arts) would become automatically active, I was told that I would have to re-declare it because when she graduated me, the declaration was lost.  

    Per the college’s procedure, for all students without a declared program (I had literally been undeclared for like 5 minutes), I went directly to counseling to re-add my new major. After a 15 minute wait I was seen by Alice Williams, my favorite of the Gaston College counselors (she doesn’t waste time going over information I already know). After a very short time, maybe 5 minutes, I had my new form in hand, and went to drop the form off at admissions (there is something fundamentally wrong with picking up a diploma and visiting admissions on the same day).

    After clearing that issue, I went to the business office to pay for a transcript I was about to request (makes things go faster if you pay first). Went back to the registrar’s office, where there was a short wait (during the wait, I filled out the form).  I turned in my form, picked up my student copy and headed out of the office.

    Finally, on to the other part of what I had planned for the day. Went to the Rauch Gallery to see Mr. Biggers’ show. It was much different than most exhibits I have seen. Art of all media, everything from digital prints to woven fabric was exhibited. The most memorable pieces were a giant chess set and an engraved wooden door. I did not see a public announcement of the opening reception, so therefore, I missed it, and I thought I had missed a chance to see Mr. Biggers, but just as I was finishing my tour of the enclosed gallery space (the gallery is the space as well as the connected hallway), Mr. Biggers came around the corner and saw me. We spoke briefly. It is much more enjoyable to see him to discuss a show after the reception than try to speak to him during it.

    Overall not a bad day, got my diploma and saw Mr. Biggers’ show (and Mr. Biggers).

    NoAFA 
    ex. 1 WebAdvisor Programs list

    dip

    ex. 2 My diploma

  • Erikson’s 8 Stages of Ego Development

    I always find it interesting to read something academically and find relevance to my own life in it. Upon reading about Erik H. Erikson’s 8 stages of ego development (or eight stages of psychosocial development) I found myself identifying areas of my own life where I had not necessarily completed some of the stages with a positive result, mostly the stages involving my parents. I do not trust easily because I never found them to be particularly trustable (stage 1 basic trust/mistrust). During the 2nd stage when I should have been developing autonomy, my parents were always telling me things I should not be doing as opposed to letting me develop normally. I suppose you might say that they were overly controlling. Stage 3 depends soley on a child’s ability to image. This did not involve my parents, so I developed quite at bit in this stage and completed it with positive result. At some point I managed to get through the 4th stage and find useful things to do as well as begin taking control of my own academics and developing intellectual interests. Self-esteem and a circle of peers is not something I developed during this phase, mostly due to parental interference. Parents should never convince children that they do not need friends because they have family.
    This is where the simple answers end. In stage 5 I am supposed to establish a sense of identity. I do not quite feel as though I have completely developed one yet, which according to Erikson, is much better than developing role confusion or negative roles. I should have finished this stage already, but I can not confirm that I have.
    Stage 6 I think I may have entered, but can not be certain. Stage 6 involved self disclosure and the ability to bond to another person and develop and intimate relationship. I’m pretty sure that my present relationship qualifies, and I do not feel as though I am turning towards isolation at all. I am majorly coming out of that possibility.
    Stages 7 and 8 tend to be for later life, but I do see some traits of stage 7 in my life, just not to their most developed aspects. I desire to improve society and certainly have the fear of inactivity and meaninglessness. But, don’t we all?
    This link is not the best resource, but it does give some insight into Erikson’s theories.
    http://www.learningplaceonline.com/stages/organize/Erikson.htm

  • A Few Updated Shots of GITI EDU

    It has been a while since any new screen shots of GITI’s Education module were released, so here is a quick look at some of the newer functionality.

     

    EDU1

    A new menu guides the user into a never before seen world of managing their academic life.

    EDU_class

    The same old class management page has gotten a few new features (upcoming assignments, journal), as well as the ability to control grade calculation based on a weighted or points system, which the user can set up.

     

    EDU_Register 
    And adding those classes has become more streamlined than ever, as it is now possible to insert all of the classes for a semester at one time.

    EDU_Planner 
    Instead of a clunky list of all courses, sorted by status, pending or planned courses now stay out of the way in their own little hide out for planning a semester. From this system, the user can move courses between semesters and even make a complete four year plan if they know what courses will be available. When the time comes, the courses can updated with instructor information and even take the course registration numbers that can be used when the registration window opens. Beats a post-it.

    EDU_Reg2 
    With those numbers, GITI has a handy way to help a user see the numbers and match them up to course information. After this screen (when the user finished registering for courses), the user can input instructors, course description and other pertinent information.

     

    EDU_Activate

    After that long weight between semesters, the courses can be activated in a simple utility, presented here. This activates the courses and will soon move forward to collect more information from the user about the courses that they will find on their syllabus.

     

    EDU_Bulk 
    Once the courses are registered and the semester has begun, the student can visit this little utility to enter all of the predictable repetitive assignments that occur during a semester (or just enter a list of assignments, but thats boring, so its not shown here).

     

    EDU_Close 
    When all of the assignments are complete and the semester is over, it is time to close the semester. This can be done as easily as opening the semester, the student simply visits the Close Semester app and inputs the needed information. This can be done as many times as needed until all courses are finished and all grades are entered.

     

    EDU_School

    Finally, this whopper of a page (which will likely be getting some size controls based on # of schools entered), allows the user to control critical things about their institutions as well as add new institutions when needed. For most users this page should never become this large and unmanageable, but I suppose I personally am the exception.

     

    This has been a tour of the new GITI Education module. Perhaps at another time we will take a closer look at some other aspects of GITI, such as anything related to its namesake module, Scheduler.

  • Cryptic Blog Entry #2

    At times I am a really selfish person. There is an item that was dangled in front of me a few days ago and now that product is only available to a specific group of people. This upset me greatly and I went into a very selfish mood over it, which I suspect bothered some people. I looked at other items of a similar class, but found none to interest me as much as the candy that was dangled in front of my face and then yanked away like yarn from a cat. Life seems like it isn’t fair sometimes. Although, in this case, the group that is so entitled to receive said item technically probably needs the item more than I do, and I could settle for a lesser item, but why would I want to when the superior item is available?

  • Trouble Blogging

    There are topics that do not get mentioned in this blog. That is something that is known to many of my readers. This in the past has never presented to be a problem, until now. There is something going on in my life right now that is very special to me, something marvelously exciting, but I do not feel as though it is appropriate for this blog, however, it does not seem to quite fit my other blogs either. I keep a restricted access journal on the topic, but its not the same as expressing my feelings publicly. This is such a joyous thing, but yet private as well.

    As I mentioned, there are other blogs that might be better suited to this topic, but in other ways, it does not seem to fit there. I am conflicted on my feelings about my own privacy. All of my blogs are public, so why is there really the need for the serpation anyway? No one who does not already know a great deal about me visits this blog, and to top it off, the only real reason for the seperation of blogs is the TMI issues. Should I not be comfortable enough with myself to allow for disclosure of these things that make me feel like I will burst if I do not share them?

  • Personal Time

    I am beginning to realize that I spend a lot of time on academics in my life. I have 18 credit hours this semester. 18 hours does not translate to just 18 hours per week, it is around double that for proper preparation and work on various assignments. I spend more time than I probably should just checking up on my courses and watching for signs of activity in my online courses, and not the mention the amount of time I spend working on GITI.
    I have many times delayed the writing of the code to make my personal portal idea become a reality. I have all but abandoned work on Site Engine itself, and any hope for GITI side management components for it is lost. I have let this type of thing happen to too many of my personal projects. I give more attention to academics than they need. If I can make A’s in all of my courses and pretty much feel like I could do it in my sleep, then there is a problem when I am spending all of my time on it.
    I really want to write my personal portal soon, and am planning to spend time this week working on it, at least to get a moderate level of functionality. I have been using my status page as a test ground for many of the concepts and ideas for the portal. The portal will be a lot more verbose and integrate more of myself into it. Looking back to the original plans for using SiteEngine for the portal (http://curtis.kularski.net/SiteEngine.html) I feel like my goals have changed some, and that my original plans were too wide. I do not want to put EVERYTHING together all at once. I do not know entirely what I really do want to accomplish with it, but I do know that I want to add the authentication functions that I originally planned for. Biographical stuff about myself will come in last for this site. I have given thoughts to doing things like adding the file drop stuff to the site as well.
    In my present vision for the portal, DisturbingThoughts takes center stage, as my primary blog. I have considered the possibility of integrating all of the blogs into a single feed for the site (based on group-authentication). Also in that vision, things like my Flickr feed and Del.icio.us bookmarks will be present. Almost all aspects of my online presence will come together in an overall summary of recent content. However, there will not ever be any complete loss of the site’s original identity and completeness as a result of the portal existing (exception is Status).
    I have a lot of work to do if I want to reclaim my personal desires.

  • Bad Sleeping Pattern

    I do not know how this happened, but I am somehow back on a nocturnal sleep pattern. I recall something over a week ago, where I had to get up at 7 am, and then somehow that has slipped now to being awake during the night and greeting the sun from the wrong side again. I can not stand this pattern, I feel like I am so far off of where I should be, and emotionally I do not handle being awake on this side of things very well. I am awake now and I know its night and it feels like night, like I should be calming down and preparing for bed, even though I just woke up, but I know that if I go to bed now, I will not sleep at all, I will just end up irritated and more awake than I am right now.
    I suppose I could actually try to get all of my tasks for the week completed and try to stay awake until the proper time tomorrow evening, but that will be difficult. I do not easily function for 24 hours at a time, but I suspect that waking up when I did will make that a little easier, since I would theoretically only need about 20 hours of being awake to get started back on the right pattern, which would be a big help.