Amaranthine Forever

Mostly I've been sleeping. The first day back I got 10 hours of sleep and it was maagicaal. I've been going to sleep early and sleeping in every day since then, and taking naps in the middle of the day. I feel like I've been catching up! Our last day at E2 was the symposium and dance. The symposium was really cool, and seeing all the different projects was awesome! It was really long though (from 9-3) and by then everyone was exhausted, so there were always a ton of people asleep during the presentations(including teachers and TAs). We got our little diplomas and class pictures(really cool) but were bummed to find out that our meal cards had expired a day early. I had $20 still left on there! After the symposium we had several hours of free time, which was the first time I had had more than 10 minutes of free time all week. I didn't know what to do with myself! I ended up trying to nap and then giving up and wandering through Simmons with some of my friends. We fo

1:12 AM. Happy late afternoon(for an MIT student) guys. So we finished our project and are presenting it tomorrow.  Here's how it went: Our lab hours to completely build the ROV from scratch were, as usual 1-4:45 and 7-10:30. We have never, ever, ever gotten back before midnight. Except this time, we were being "charged" for every hour we went over planned.  So we were super determined to get it done before then. We organized, planned, and prepared, and at 7 we attacked our pile of materials(which we calculated carefully and "purchased") with great zeal. And we actually did it too! I wired the control box myself, which was cool since on Monday it was driving me crazy and I didn't know anything about it. At around 10:30, we were by far first to finish and fluttering around getting ready to present to Ms. Schroyer. The TAs and instructor don't actually instruct us at all except on the tools the first day. They just answer questions and most of th

First break all day today! Fifteen minutes, let's go. Awesome things about E2: The people. They are incredible. Imagine your typical classroom with average kids, lazy kids, and smart kids who usually answer questions and do their homework and try hard and everyone looks up to and depends on. Then imagine all those kids taken out of their high schools and put into this program. That's how I feel when I talk to the other kids. Every kid here is smart. We work in groups. Normally I worry about being put in groups with "dead weights", lazy kids who rely on me to do all the work and just derp around and let other people decide things. There's nobody like that here. There's no bad groups because everybody here is the kind of person who contributes, who innovates, who goes beyond the expected. It's an electrifying  environment. Everyone works really hard, carefully notates all the steps, and thinks  about what they're doing. Small things. If their work is t

I guess the most important thing is that we finished building our robot! It was a lot of work. My group was the first to be done by far! :D We would have been faster if we hadn't blown a fuse XD. The wiring was the most work. Here are some in progress pics and a demo video I made XD. https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a. akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/ q71/s720x720/73588_ 151474631720026_1740879144_n. jpg https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a. akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/ q71/s720x720/993337_ 151240538410102_1956811971_n. jpg https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a. akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/ q71/s720x720/1150143_ 151240941743395_11336685_n.jpg http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=wW1ST7151OE A picture of Trang and me in front of the dome! :D https://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn. net/hphotos-prn1/q82/s720x720/ 625489_151474858386670_ 387249408_n.jpg Everyone here is very smart and nice and they really encourage us to get to know everybody. Since we were delayed in building the robot we were a lot behind an

THEY DO NOT LIE ABOUT THE WORK HERE. I got up at 6:45 to go running and had one five minute break in the afternoon and then get to write now but the rest of the time I had literally no time to stop or breath or explore MIT or do ANYTHING. These are the two dashed emails I wrote to family and friends: It is 7:03PM :D. This is the first break i have and I actually have to get going in like one minute they just knocked on my door. I got up at 6:45 to run on the track with a group of friends and have been busy with no time to go back to the dorm at all or stop we went to two talks the first was the graduate school dean she talked alot about her research of designing armor based on scales and stuff in nature. Also google center info session and dean of engineering. Underwater robotics is really really really cool we solder and cut pvc pipe and have a lot of wires and batteries and motors pictures maybe too. We are making a underwater robot controlled with a tether. we were in lab

Super exhausted. XD Yesterday we went on the Freedom Trail with Kevin and William from E2 and Rebecca from Girl Scouts. I It was awesome, relaxing, fun, saw many historical sights and a lady playing a glass harmonica and a chocolate making demonstration. E2 is AMAZING already. I met so many people and having a horrible time forgetting faces and names. Simmons is so cool with undulating walls and random colors and a super clean and modern yet earthy aesthetic appeal. They really really really really emphasize that we're going to be doing a LOT of work. They messed up with my course and sent me the electronics email. I was kinda bummed cause underwater robotics was my first choice. When I got here it turned out that I actually was in underwater robotics and they made a mistake. Today I got to Simmons and checked all in. The room was nice and I excitedly ran up and down the hallways and met people. Then we had our orientation and an Engineering Design 101 class, then more orien

Just dropping in to say that I am now in the Boston area(deceptively close sounding, it takes over an hour to drive to and from Boston at any hour of the day because of traffic). I visited Harvard yesterday and MIT today, taking the T. Besides visits, we're basically hanging out, going fishing, playing video games, going on the trampoline, good times, good times. Harvard: Pretty nice campus, PACKED with tourists, most of the people weren't even Harvard students, spread out and urban and kinda small. Not really my thing and  somehow it didn't feel like "Harvard" to me. XD I imagined it to be more like Cornell, big and looming and silent and impressive. The Harvard Natural History museum was amazing , packed to the gills with all sorts of fish and birds and birds and birds and insects and birds and large mammals and displays and AMAZING rocks and geodes and tons and tons of stuffed birds. MIT was...wow. MIT is definitely my top choice and I haven't even do