Microwaves the Problem

There is a issue with community microwaves and that is that there are People who are careless. I personally hate these people because last night the Fire alarm went off at 1:30am, the reason was that someone Violated the first Commandment of Microwaves. Thou Shalt Monitor the food constantly. Seriously the thing got so damaged they had to remove it and next thing that I would probably expect is that there will be no community microwave in the dormitory. All ready the fire marshal as dammed that due to the age of the buildings that microwaves are not allowed in the rooms ( What a load of BS). Grrrr. Now if I want popcorn I will have to go to the cafe. The ironic part is that every time the microwave has caught fire careless popcorn cookers while I haven't had any issues using the microwave and none of my room mates or friends have either.

Textbooks the Most Expensive Book You Are Ever Going to Buy

     There is nothing that can be so expensive in college other than the textbook. Every class requires them and typically they are over $80.00 a piece. I know that many college students who are reading this are thinking "Damn I wish that mine costed that much"
 
    There are many ways to get textbooks and a few ways to knock down the price, I got mine down to about $50:

One: Go up to your Financial Aid/ Bursars Office and see if any of the loans or aid given is to cover your books. If this is the case they might hand you a certificate to go to the schools bookstore. The advantage is that you aren't paying that much out of pocket but you will have to pay off that debt when you graduate.

Two: Go on to a site like Amazon and buy it offline they usually have a good price on them.

Three: Go to a Site like Amazon and Rent the book, the drawback is that like borrowing from the library there can't be any damage or marks in the book when you have to return it.




Four: Go ebook this is the newest medium where for a fee you can have the book on your laptop, smartphone or tablet via an app. The nice thing is that you can either buy the book or rent it. Unlike renting a physical book you can highlight and make printable notes right in the book. I use CourseSmart for this as it has a really nice app for Android, my sister uses my account for one book and she uses the iPad app for it.

There is a difference in cost if you are on the fence of renting or buying the ebook. The price difference for my books was $266.83 for online prices only, if I went with the hard copy there would be a $475ish difference. Now after my subscription is up I will not have access to the book but I will still have my notes that I have taken which is all I really need because I take a ton of notes.




Fifth: Go to your school's library the professors usually have the book on reserve so as long as you are in the library you can use the book or at my school you may borrow the book for one hour only. This is FREE!

Sixth: Schools also tend to have forums or a bulletin board where students can directly sell the book to other students so typically this will be half priced books

Seventh: friends will typically let you share the book if you are in the same class or if they don't have the class anymore they might just give it to you. Just be sure that for option six and seven that the book is the edition that you need.

It Doesn't really matter how you get the book as long as you get it so you don't fail your class or kill your GPA.

Images are taken from stock photo and google image searches, I do not claim ownership of these. If the owners wish to see them removed please message me.

When you think that you trusted your project partner

I dedicate this post to my partner that I was assigned for the Final Project of Front Office Operations


     It is a pain when one must do group projects. It is a known fact that this type of project is the least favorite of students and also the most risky to assign. I have been screwed over before by being the one who does too much of it, Letting some one take charge then not let me work on it/ say I didn't do work on it and take credit for what I have done. This latest atrocity that I have had is the last time I do a group project ever and will fight tooth and nail if this type is assigned again.
     The last project was to do the fallowing: Go to a hotel in Boston, Interview someone who is a Front Deck Manager or someone who works in Human Resources, write a paper on your findings. Easy and takes only twenty minutes for the interviewing and then three or four hours to compile and write. Not a difficult thing to accomplish. My partner and I went and did our hotel visit and conducted our interview with the Front Office Manager. Later we did our paper and the computer died with the paper still on it. Next thing was that Our Professor said on the due date that we needed to give him something before he left to go home and finish his grading. So we went to the Library and I started a Google doc to ensure that if the machine died again that we could go and retrieve it out of the cloud. Turns out that while we were writing my partner had his book out and was plagiarizing from it. It did not occur to me what he was doing because we just came back from class so of course he had his book and I thought that he was relating some of the interview to class discussions, Like a good student would to gain favor points for handing in a late Final Project. That night I received an email explaining why we both got a zero for our work.
     I almost cried. This was more stress than I needed on finals week and I immediately went through and highlighted what it was that I wrote exactly in the paper and sent it off, also requesting a meeting. The reply was swift and was much better than I thought it would be. It said that I should not worry too much as there was a frantic voice in my reply and to meet him in his office so he could give me his solution. My worst fear was that I was to be expelled because my name was on the paper and there fore guilty by association. This was not the case instead I had two weeks to redo the paper using a hotel in my area as I was going home that day. Thank god I am on such good terms with my professor and the dean of academic affairs. I would never steal somebody's work.
     Any how I HATE my partner for this insult and I never want to work with him again. He shouldn't have been that desperate and stupid to plagiarize from a book that the professor would know cover to cover as this is the book that he has used for years, keeping up with the updated version of course but they never change much.

That class where everyone falls asleep

   *THIS IS MY OWN STRATEGY THAT WORKS FOR ME, I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR AND FAILING GRADES OF ANYONE OTHER THAN MYSELF.
 
     So everyone has had a few professors or High School teachers where they have that voice that has the flow and tone of a lullaby. Every book, guidance counselor and especially parents will tell a student " Even if it is the most dry class in the world you still have to pay attention to what they say" I agree that there is some truth to that but from having to be in a class with the white noise professor I find it is difficult to pay attention. The class is not what is boring as I enjoy learning psychology and find it all interesting but if I pay attention to his voice I will doze off in the front row. (Yes I am one of those students who always sits in or as close to the front as I can). So here is what has been working for me to help me pass the class.
    
     What you will need: Slide show, presenter notes if available, text book, some skill in selective deafness, and something to write with ( I have a android tablet that is synced with my phone.

     First off if the professor is going to put you to sleep and you can't switch professors or get out of the class then you can't listen to them constantly cause that would be close to death. Small doses are best, when ever he starts to write on the board or point out something specific on a slide then you tune in. Like skimming but little bit more difficult. Next is to open the textbook to the chapter of discussion and fallow along with what is going on. This will be picked up on and the professor should leave you alone and if a question is directed to you the book is in front of you and you can look it up.  The trick is to not bury your self in the book but rather make it look like your reading and then have the look if intense listening for about thirty seconds to a minute and then go back to reading.
     If you don't need to take notes jot random stuff down: things that you want to do, need to do, movies, reasons why you don't like the class ext. Doodling is OK but don't make it obvious. Faking attention is a difficult skill that I have worked hard on but my grades do not reflect that I haven't been paying attention to the professor. They are slightly above a B average.
     Best of luck and I hope that this post has been a help to you and also has given you some motivation to keep up in that class that is less entertaining than watching paint dry.

Wow

It's been weeks since I have been back and I haven't done a post on food. I need to find something to post about

I'm back!

OK so I'm almost back I still have about a week left of vacation then I'm down to work at orientation at school and finally I'm back to my normal blogging self. I am looking to do some posts on how to effectively critique wait staff, order that substitution whit out sounding like a stuck up jerk and also how to correctly go about complementing food and staff. Currently I am enjoying my oven and actual stove top to the fullest. See you all back on campus :-)