Robo and school

Mood: =/
What's on:"Howl"- Black Rebel Motorcycle Club


It's somewhat hard to believe that school is tomorrow. Winter break has been a pleasantly good experience even with college applications. (But seriously, I will never be done with them) The past week has gone by relatively fast, mostly because my afternoons were nonexistent due to my extensive hours of sleep. Friday was about the first time I've woken up before noon becayse of my doctor's appointment at 1 for sitch removal. The day was also long as I only spent 10% of the day, excluding sleep,at my house. The day included a series of unfortunate and fortunate events. But fortunately, the latter out weighted the former.

Saturday
Oh kick-off. I can't say I was very excited about a new season of Robotics due to my general dissatisfaction with the team--- IT in particular. I left my house around 9:20 AM and spent nearly 30 mins trying to find the CL50 building on campus. But I didn't miss much, since the broadcast didn't commence till 10.
Overall, I came out of it feeling more or less apathetic. Could be because I was tired (excuse for everything), but I do like this year's game more than last year's. After a few hours of discussion, I got home around 1; It was only 1 in the afternoon, but it was feeling like a long day already...sadly.

I was looking through the robotics website today as I spent nearly 7 hours working on a new layout. I found the article I wrote about last year's kick-off. It was not surprisingly apathetic and made some good laugh. As quoted by Emil: "Wow, did I not proof read this? This is definately not in the spirit of FIRST."
Snap, no wonder we didn't win.

The 2005 kick-off: a rookie perspective by Elaine L.
A first-hand account of the robot kickoff

9:00 AM- I woke up this morning to the sound of my usual alarm. It was January eight, the date for the F.I.R.S.T. robotics kick-off of the new season. I was debating whether I should go. After all, was it really necessary for me to attend, considering I’m on IT? Besides, the snowstorm from the night before has left the whole town in a white oblivion. How many people would actually go?
I convinced myself to leave the confinement of my bed and headed to the meeting. This is my first year on team 461, and I wanted to do my best as a rookie.

9:45 AM- There weren’t many people when I arrived at school, but it was still early. Team 1555(North White, Pulse) and Team 1646 (Jefferson, Boiler Precision Guessworks) had arrived to watch the broadcast with us. Our meeting room seemed incredibly crowded as the people filed in around ten o’clock. We tuned in to a local channel, which was suppose to broadcast the kick-off, and waited eagerly for it to start.

10:15 AM- Everyone’s patience was running low; the show had yet to begin. Was this going to be a repeat from last year, when broadcast was delayed and later cut off by another program? Indeed, it was the same this year, except the broadcast never made it into our TV. We resorted to watching the stream video from the FIRST website…

10:30 AM- We tuned in to see Mr. Abele delivering his speech in a high school gymnasium. For me, this was very different from what I had in mind for kick-offs. When I think about the word “kick-off”, I imagine a big celebration party with balloons, ribbons, and cheers. I was also thinking of a sunny outdoors setting, but these imaginings were just the opposite of this kick-off.

Unfortunately, stream video doesn’t have the best graphics. Many times during the broadcast, the video would stalls for as long as half a minute. This became a nuisance after awhile. Unfortunately, the video would often stop right before the speaker announced something important. This always was followed by heavy sighs and jeers from the room. We did get to watch the revealing of this year’s game.

Impressions on the Kick-off

It’s hard to describe my first hand experience. I was somewhat excited to learn what new concept F.I.R.S.T. could come up with, but I’m sure the Tech people were a lot more enthusiastic then I.
We spent the rest of the morning and afternoon discussing the game and dissecting the game play. To be honest, it wasn’t exactly the best three hours talking about something that really doesn’t concern me. So what if I know how the game works? So what if I know our strategies? Does it benefit me to benefit the team later on? I still don’t know the answer, but hopefully it’s there within my grasp once the season ends.

Pretty much. My awesome writting skillz from a year ago.

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So to not elaborate on ranting, school is going to suck.