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Month: February 2014 Page 1 of 2
Day 921 of 1000
Christian is at UCSD again today. He likened the “recruiting event” to the freshman orientation he and Kelly attended when they started at NCSU. The school plans a series of events that are supposed to be fun–mixers, dinners, hikes, etc. The problem is that those kinds of things cant get to be pretty forced and phony, especially if it is with a bunch of kids whose only government/private high school followed by the typical undergraduate indoctrination. That probably gets multiplied if you are an 18 year old teetotaler while everyone else is drinking, posturing, and trying to act grown up. Today he is scueduled to get some one-on-one time with some professors, so hopefully it will get a lot better. He made the comment that he is sure the school is a lot better than is being demonstrated by the artifcial circumstances of the recruiting event.
Update: Life got dramatically better when Christian talked to the professor who is trying to recruit him. It sounds like there is a very good much and Christian is pretty excited. Now the decision to go to UCSD or ASU will be harder to make.
Betty Blonde #82 – 11/07/2008
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Some have argued that the Geisel Library (named after Dr. Suess and his wife, Theodor and Audrey Geisel) is the ugliest library and in the top ten ugliest buildings in the world. I kind of like it. Here is Christian’s snap:
Day 920 of 1000
Christian flew to San Diego yesterday for a recruiting event put on by the University of California San Diego. Our good friends, Al and Michele and their whole family picked him up at the airport and will drop him off at UCSD this afternoon. They will pick him up again tomorrow night after the recruiting dinner (We owe them big time!). He will fly to Phoenix early Saturday morning where I will pick him up to take him for a visit with a professor in the Electrical Engineering department at Arizona State University. Then we hang out the rest of the day Sunday and he takes the red-eye home Sunday night. Good times.
Betty Blonde #81 – 11/06/2008
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Day 918 of 1000
After two hard exams today, Christian flies to San Diego to visit University of California San Diego tomorrow for a recruiting event. This is the first time he will fly on his own based on something he did himself. We are very excited for him. He has promised to send us some photos to post of the events he attends. Our friends, Al and Michele are scheduled to pick him up at the airport tomorrow night and drop him off again Saturday morning to fly to Arizona for a visit with a professor at Arizona State.
More on a possible new blog owner soon…
Betty Blonde #80 – 11/05/2008
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Day 917 of 1000
In the last post, I suggested that I might shut the blog down after the kids leave home and go off to graduate school because neither of the kids was interested in taking it on. Well, Kelly commented that she was interested. We are in negotiations at this writing. I have conceded to a complete new blog design if she continues to put up the Betty Blonde comics (she is against it).
It would be great if both Kelly and Christian took this on at least through grad school. Eric had a great comment about that idea. I even offered to write a post every now and then, but they were a little suspicious about that. Rightly so.
Betty Blonde #79 – 11/04/2008
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Day 916 of 1000
I started this blog about ten years ago. It was the summer before Kelly’s fith and Christian’s third grade years of school. The purpose of the blog has been to document the kids path through homeschool. Since Christian never made it to high school, we decided to keep on writing through college. Well, that time is almost here. Kelly and Christian are both scheduled to earn their Bachelors degrees on May 10, 2014. We have talked about this quite a lot. After that point, we believe what they do, whether it be graduate school or a job, is “getting on with life.”
The upshot is that the purpose of this blog will have been fulfilled when we get to the end of our 1000 day count, now only 84 days in the future. I have enjoyed this blog a lot, but have pretty much run out of things to say about the topics for which we get most of our hits, namely how did we did our homeschooling. I enjoy blogging too much to give it up entirely so I am thinking of starting a new blog if and when I give up this. I plan to just leave the blog here for posterity and a pointer to my new blog (if I get one). I hope to download the whole thing and print it out as a hardcover book for each of the kids, the grandparents, and us.
Any thoughts on this topic are very much welcome.
Betty Blonde #78 – 11/03/2008
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Day 914 of 1000
There is very little downside to living in North Carolina. We love living here. Now, though, we have some hard decisions to make. My current job is in Arizona. Both the kids plan to go to California, Arizona, and/or Washington. They are both in programs that will keep them out west for at least four or five years. Still, we love our house, we love the weather, and we love the culture. It is hard to know what to do.
Betty Blonde #77 – 10/31/2008
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We got Christian a sports jacket, some shirts, and a couple of suits for his PhD interviews. He is picking them up from the tailor this morning.
Day 913 of 1000
Kelly and Christian have each received verbal commitments for funded PhD’s from top-tier universities–actually Christian has the received formal acceptance at one of the schools. They each applied at six schools and each of them have also been rejected by two schools. The website at Kelly’s current top opportunity says 15 candidates are accepted out of a pool of about 500 who apply. Christian was one of 15 out of a pool of 303 applicants who was invited to a recruiting event. He has been offered plane tickets to fly out to two schools so far. It took a little bit of finagling, but he is going to visit both schools.
The funny deal is the kids had personal and/or email contact with professors at most of the schools before they applied, but none for their current top choices. In both cases, a specific professor identified something he liked about their applications and made direct contact. I think that is probably the big key to this whole thing: to have something specific you want to do backed up with experience, classes, and skills that allows you to hit the ground running. There are still visits and communications and a bunch of other things to do before either Kelly or Christian will be ready to commit, but at least now they have a choice.
Betty Blonde #76 – 10/30/2008
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Day 912 of 1000
I am writing this post for fellow Math aficionado, Math educator, and Sonlight blogger, Luke Holzmann. I am not sure if he has seen it yet, but Kelly found a great article on math and math learning titled How I Faced My Fears and Learned to be Good at Math by a guy named Matt Waite. It makes many of us sad when we hear people say they hate math. The article is by and about one of those guys. The difference is that he had an epiphany as a professor of Journalism in his mid-thirties and started over with Intermediate Algebra. He is now in the middle of his first Calculus class. Here is his epiphany:
The only advantage I have over my classmates? I know exactly how to fail at math: Don’t put any effort in. Blow it off. Do something else. A glass of wine and a rerun of Big Bang Theory kicks the crap out of applications of extrema using derivatives, even if you hate wine and loathe Big Bang Theory.
But that’s the lesson I’ve learned: The difference between good at math and bad at math is hard work. It’s trying. It’s trying hard. It’s trying harder than you’ve ever tried before. That’s it.
It is all true. There is a price to pay if you want to learn math, but it is worth it. You can feel the joy of his accomplishment in the article. If you are a math hater please read the article.
Other posts about our math experience:
- Why we switched from Singapore Math to Teaching Textbooks
- Precalculus: Teaching Textbooks or Thinkwell?
- Our Homeschool Story: What Kind of Homeschool Did We Want to Be? (5.5) Math
- Math Help: What to do when Thinkwell and Teaching Textbooks explanations are not enough
Betty Blonde #75 – 10/29/2008
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I bought access to the internet on the flight from Charlotte to Phoenix today. This is a novelty for me. It is actually not too bad. I needed to download some files so I could work on the airplane. It is, of course, way to expensive, but every now and then it will almost certainly be worth it.
Day 911 of 1000
Living in Raleigh and working in Prescott is not an easy proposition. I have been doing it for over a year now and am not excited about leaving the family behind and getting on an airplane this afternoon to head back to work. Living out of a suitcase and eating out all the time is not so good for the health either. It takes a lot of discipline to eat right and exercise on the road, especially when there are work deadlines to hit. We are getting closer to hitting the first product delivery, but it feels like it is always just three months away. Of course this is all normal so I should not complain. I have been through it before.
Betty Blonde #74 – 10/28/2008
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Day 910 of 1000
President’s Day is celebrated in the United States today. We have the day off from my work. In typical start-up fashion, the technical staff and most of the management plans to work today, me included. We are closing in on our first product, but it requires a ton of minute details to be wrestled to completion. So that is what I am doing today. It is not a holiday for the kids at NCSU. Maybe Lorena and I will run down to KFC for some grilled chicken at lunch to celebrate.
Betty Blonde #73 – 10/27/2008
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Day 909 of 1000
The last several weeks have tried our patience. The early graduate school communications have started. There is both joy and disappointment. There are emails, phone calls, and letters flowing between the kids and potential professors, those professors’ graduate students, and school administrators. We have seen the great importance of talking to current and past graduate students. Both kids have great opportunities–not just pretty good, but great.
It is interesting that their graduate school opportunities are NOT what they might have expected when they started the process. Everyone told them that the school they attend is important, but not even remotely as important as the professor they get. That has been true in spades. It looks like both kids will have choices to make both in the location and content of their graduate degree.
The decisions will almost certainly be made well before the end of April. I am dying to say something about it all, but even though hard offers have been extended, we are still in the middle of the process. …tribulation worketh patience
Betty Blonde #72 – 10/24/2008
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In my normal read through the Bible, I just happened to be on I Corinthians 13 the day after Valentine’s Day. It talks about charity or love and is some of the most profound prose ever written or translated into the English language. It is nice to be reminded that there are different kinds of love. The love in this chapter is not romantic love. The Greek word agápe is translated to the English word “charity” in the King James Version of the Bible and refers to the unconditional love of God. It is good for me to be reminded of this frequently. There is nothing more important.
1 Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.
3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
10 But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.
Day 908 of 1000
Who knew homeschool would lead to something like this? My Dad bought me two brand new suits when I was about 30. I needed them when I moved from an engineering function to a sales function in my first “real” job that was something that more than just a way to earn money to get by. Neither he nor I could afford it at the time, but he did it anyway. Now, I get to return the favor.
Christian is heading out to two interviews at University of California at San Diego and Arizona State University. Both schools are considering him for full fellowships (not Teaching nor Research Assistantships, full blown fellowships). He needs to look his best. Lorena took him down to the Men’s Warehouse and they bought two suits, a blazer, and two, 100% cotton, white dress shirts. 
I am dying to see how he looks, but the suits are currently with the tailor and will not be available until I leave on my next trip to Arizona.
The Men’s Warehouse gave him a $50 gift certificate for the stuff that he bought. If we spend another $5-10, they will give him a second $50 gift certificate. I did not like the ties and socks they picked out for him so he and I are going to run down there again tomorrow to spend the extra $100. We might even add some clips (collar, tie, and money), a belt and some cologne. I do not want Lorena to have all the fun. The problem with Lorena is that she leans toward effiminate European style suits and they just will not do for an interview suit in the United States. Christian needs a man’s suit!
I would love to buy some of this same stuff for myself, but I am still holding on to the illusion that I might lose some weight some day before too long. Well, that and the fact that I do not have any mone left after making all these big expenditures. I called my Dad and had a nice talk with him about it. I do not think he even remembered that he had done it nor how much it meant to me. He just always did whatever he could to help us. I really hope that Christian gets to do this for one or two of his own sons someday.
Betty Blonde #71 – 10/23/2008
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We were all stuck in the house over the last several days, but that did not stop us from finding a way to celebrate Valentine’s Day eating fattening stuff! Actually this was quite nice. We sat on the couch and ate it all.
Day 907 of 1000
I have a great appreciation for cinnamon rolls, but Lorena likes to make them whenever we have a snow day. When it snows in most of the places we have lived, there is not infrastructure in place to remove the snow quickly (not enough snow plows) so we end up stuck in the house for two or three days. It is a perfect storm (no pun intended) of really fatting foods combined with no access to exercise equipment nor any good way to even go for a walk outside. This is a very bad combination. I think I am going to have to buy new pants.
Betty Blonde #70 – 10/22/2008
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Day 906 of 1000
We laughed ourselves sick when we saw this because these people are us. Notice the commentary below the picture. That is us, too.
Betty Blonde #69 – 10/21/2008
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