HaHA!

For some reason, whenever I'm bored, I never think to post to this thing. Except for right now. Right now I just remembered.

Dave sold Derek and I some cards for a nursing thing fundraiser. Last night we went to Trafalga with them and each got two free games of mini golf. We didn't play our games sequentially, we played six balls at the same time. These were the rules:

1. If you were playing on an odd-numbered hole, you shot one ball, then the other. After you, somebody else did the same thing and the hole was played in this fashion.
2. If you were playing an even-numbered hole, you shot one ball, then the next player went, and the loop continued in that fashion.
3. If you were playing a prime-numbered hole (and later perfect squares as well) you had to shoot both balls at the same time. This rule supersedes the previous rules when determining the style of hole.
4. If somebody gets a hole-in-one on a prime-numbered hole, they got to shoot all six balls simultaneously on the next prime-numbered hole.
5. Bad-Ass points are awarded for doing something awesome.
6. Dumb-Ass points are awarded for doing something stupid.
7. Dick Treason can be called if you rob somebody of a shot within 6 inches of the hole.
8. The 18th hole is treated as prime if a hole-in-one is made on the 17th hole.

It seems like there were a few more rules that were made up, but you get the idea. Also, if you're reading this, you were also likely there...

This semester sucks. Capstone needs to go away. It is one semester too long. I've been spending a lot of time down at USS and we had a design review last week where we were told "you should be afraid of not finishing." I don't really care.

Geophysics isn't too bad. The teacher isn't too spectacular, but she does try to make it interesting. The class's redeeming quality is that the class number isn't preceded by "ME EN" making it a change from the standard I've been experiencing for the past four years.

Tonight, Dave is hosting "Geektober" which is odd, because it is February. "Geekuary" really doesn't have the same feel to it though.

The distributor that I use for my weaponry is currently out of stock of anything and everything that interests me. It is a bit of a pain in the ass. I can't say that I am overly pleased with the fact that I have no guns to sell right now. I have my AK, but as indicated, it is mine and I won't be selling it anytime soon.

I have posted a picture of a magazine that I created. The last gun that I sold initially came with two mags and a hard case. I sold it with one mag and no case, but for less than I initially intended. I did this to one of the mags and quite enjoyed the project.

Yes, you could hide amongst a herd of zebras and nobody would even know you were there...

Also, I've decided to post a picture from last September, when Derek and I went off on a grand adventure around the world. It is entitled "Derek Picked Horrible Breakfast, So He Can't Criticize Brian For Horrible Dinner"

This was at breakfast. Derek carried a similar expression at dinner.

Bombachus

• I'm gonna live forever!

The Final Stretch

So I'm simply going to give a rundown of what happened last semester with the classes. If you need to brush up on what the predictions were, you can read about them here. <- You can click on that...

• Capstone: Sucked. My group was pretty horrible. I've learned that MET's for the most part are useless. There is nothing that they can do that a mechanical engineer can't do better, faster, and more efficiently. I thought it was going to be fun, but I was very, very wrong.
• System Dynamics: Wasn't too bad. I understood the material for the most part and did fairly well in the class overall. I didn't necessarily enjoy it, but I had a really good professor.
• Fluid Systems: Great professor, loved the material, got destroyed on the tests. I felt like a hero walking into the exams, and felt like the stupidest peasant walking out of them. I still did alright in the class.
• MEMS: Didn't enjoy the class as much as I thought I was going to. I really had a lot of fun and learned a lot in the weekly labs, but the coursework was less than pleasurable. I threw a hail-mary on the final which worked out and got me a good final grade.

Now for this semester...

• Capstone: Crappy as crap could be. I can't wait for this to be over.
• Geophysics: Supposedly the biggest fluff class you can take as a mech. I'm taking this just to be able to get an A in...
• Heat Transfer: One of the hardest required classes for a mech. I'm not actually too worried about it.
• Gas Turbine and Jet Engine Design: This class has a 99.8% chance of getting dropped. I will keep it as long as I need 12 credits. If I don't, goodbye. I would really enjoy the class and the material, but I am ready to be done and want to wash my hands of this degree.

Christmas was really fun. I got a remote helicopter which as been more fun than ever imagined. Derek and I have played a week's worth of Donkey Kong. I went out shooting with a bunch of friends on my birthday (Mark, Grant, Brent, Derek, Dave) and did basically nothing for New Year's. Oh, and I got a new calling at church. I'm an assistant ward clerk. I deal with money. Simple enough.

Also, I'm buying an annual pass to Disneyland this year.

Chop Chop

As school is now upon us, I feel it obligatory to do a blog post about my classes and predict their outcomes.

Capstone: Today we submitted our bids for which projects we want to work on. Our choices were

1. US Synthetic: Create a machine that reduces die-swapping time from 30 minutes to 2 minutes.
2. Union Pacific: Design a cover for coal cars that can be used when the car is full or empty, as to reduce the amount of coal lost from the car and reduce drag
3. Panasonic: Create a device and automate a system that measures the amount of lubricant on a battery to determine if it needs additional cleansing.

We really think we are going to get our number 1, but who knows. We could get completely shafted and get none of them. Our number 3 is our "lesser of the evils" pick. If we get shafted on our 1 and 2, we want to at least choose how we're gonna get shafted for number 3. Nobody else bid on it, so it is better than getting stuck with one of the really crappy ones.

Outcome: Time consuming, but too early to tell if it is gonna suck.

System Dynamics: Nobody is really sure what this class is actually about. I think we mathematically model physical phenomena so we can work on it.

Outcome: Gonna suck

Applied Fluid Dynamics: I didn't really wanna take this class, but it fit so well in my schedule and I already had the book for it. It is all about fluid flow through turbo-machinery and over airfoils. I'm actually kinda stoked for it.

Outcome: Not gonna suck too bad.

MEMS: Little tiny robots.

Outcome: Awesome.

There you have it. I am doing my best to get ahead with homework, so back to work I go.

Coryphaena hippurus

So this morning as I was walking to class, I was listening to Pandora with Anberlin Radio running. This has been the favorite station since I got the cylon. Anyway, Beck came on. It was the first time I've listened to Beck since he went on tour with Bender.

Once upon a time, I was ambitious. I used to come to school at 7:30 so that I could work on homework and get reading done for my classes. this was short lived this semester. It started up last semester when I had a 5 hour block of classes every day, and had no time during the day to work on homework. I used 3 hours in the morning to do what I needed. Now I have a 3 hour break between classes Aircraft and Thermo which I use for that homework. So I've been sleeping for an extra hour. (Cool story Hansel.) Anyway, so now when I come at 8:20, I have to park in Azerbaijan, which is located by the Bean Museum. I went in the Bean Museum a few days ago, and there was a fish on the wall which was labled Dolphin (Mahi Mahi). Since then, four people have brought up the topic of Mahi Mahi. In each conversation, I said something to the effect of "You know that Mahi Mahi is a dolphin, right?" and everytime, they tried to call BS. Well, thanks to Wikipedia, I proved them wrong. I never said that Mahi Mahi is the dolphin you think it is, just that it is a dolphin. There you go.

Speaking of which, there are free fish tacos today at Rubio's for BYU students. That's right UV(SC)U students. How's your basketball team faring in the NCAA tournament? Oh, that's right... no tacos for you.

I had a stupid meeting for capstone yesterday. Capstone is a class where some company hires BYU to make some B-project for them. It was useless... except for the pizza at the end. See, I've been worried about capstone since I first heard about it. I've asked pretty much everybody I've run into about it, so I already knew pretty much everything about it. We did get pizza. It made the trip to BYU on a Thursday worth the effort. Then I did homework for the rest of the day, and made something awesome for my car. Chinese parts are crap, until you de-crap them.

Here is how Fall 2010 is looking for school:

• Capstone 1: Start up your project and realize you're not much of an actual engineer.
• Heat Transfer: Self-explanitory. I've been told this is the worst class in the BYU undergrad experience. Stoked...
• 335: I've never been too sure what the actual name of this class is. All I know is that it isn't fun, it adds onto 301 and 363, and that I didn't want to take it from The Blotter this semester, so I put it off until then.
• MEMS. Little tiny machines. If you're interested, here is a link. If you want to know what a meme is, here is a different link.

Here is how Winter 2011 looks:

• Capstone 2: Finish your project and hopefully be an actual engineer.
• Another class, which I have to take to qualify for a grant by credit hours.

There is a Switchfoot song called Meant to Live which says,

"we were meant to live for so much more, we lost ourselves, somewhere in Versailles..."

I'm not sure what it actually says, but this is what I want to believe.

Our teacher let us out of Aircraft early today. I think he wanted us to think he was being nice, but I think he had somewhere to be. He also canceled homework over the weekend. I think he was actually being nice there. Apropo de aircraft homework, I spent 30 minutes or so calculating the area of some "weird-ass crap" (<- technical term). Later, I found out he posted the area to said "weird-ass crap" on blackboard. Meh... Time for famed segment of:

What's on Brian's Clipboard?

1. Work problem 10.1 in your text. Treat the handle as a cylinder of length 10 in and diameter
1.25 in (don’t treat it as a truncated cone). This will mean that you won’t get the same answer
as the back of the book, but it will make the problem a lot easier.
2. Using the method of virtual work, add the capability to calculate input torque to your four-bar
program. Plot the input torque required to drive the four-link mechanism from problem 1 in
homework 8 for the first ten seconds of mechanism motion. This mechanism has dimensions
r1 = 15 cm, r2 = 5 cm, r3 = 12 cm, and r4 = 10 cm. The mechanism starts from rest at
an input angle of q2 = 0°, and it has a constant input angular acceleration of 1 rad/s2. In
addition, a constant output force of 1 N acts in the positive y-direction at the coupler point
(with a3 = 4 cm and b3 = ��5 cm). (Note that this output force pulls up on the mechanism
at the coupler point.) Also, m2 = 0:2 kg, m3 = 1:0 kg, m4 = 0:4 kg, I2g = 4:8 10��5 kg m2,
I3g = 1:5 10��3 kg m2, I4g = 3:5 10��4 kg m2, rg2 = 2:5 cm, rg3 = 7 cm, rg4 = 5 cm,
d2 = 0°, d3 = ��30°, and d4 = 0°. Note that I have posted a program performing acceleration
analysis of a four-bar if you would like to use it as a starting point.

Okay, so I copy homework posted on blackboard into a Google doc so that I don't have to access blackboard all the time to see what it was. This is Kinematics for next week. We were promised it would take a long time. Looks like it.

Okay, I've wasted adequate time today. Time to get to work.