I found a semi-controversial article on USA Today. Well, we all know that college campuses are very big on the illegal “studying” drugs like Ritalin that helps students focus and stimulates their memory. This article argues that these drugs should be legalized for everyone because similar drugs to Ritalin are already legal for hyperactive children or memory-challenged elderly people. Therefore, these scientists are making a comparison to other legal over the counter stimulants saying:  ”pills are no more morally objectionable than eating right or getting a good night’s sleep.” Meaning that these brain stimulants are as harmless as purchasing dietary supplements or sleeping pills.

I know I am big fan of those 5-hour energy boster shots they sell at every CVS. They give me the energy I need to maintain to stay awake in the library and the focus I need to understand what I’m studying. Overall, these things really work! But like anything else, there are extremes to everything and control limits to be upheld. So in my opinion, I believe these “brain drugs” should be legalized for the use of any common person but the dosage should be extremely monitored before releasing it to the public. If there aren’t any fatal or permanent side effects, I would probably purchase them.

Now I know that the opposing opinion would say that it wouldn’t be fair for students that choose to add external “aids” to their system to get a better grade than the student who resorts to old-fashioned 10 hour days in the library. Although this is a disadvantage to those students, they must also consider the fact that there are many students who physically cannot spend 10-hour days in the library, but their case may not be serious enough to have these stimulators prescribed to them. So what should those students do?

I think “brain drugs” should definitely be legalized at the risk of those who choose to purchase them.

There’s always something interesting going on in the Discovery Channel. So I decided to check out their website and see what are some of the news regarding planet earth. I actually found a very important article about a company working on a nightclub that would be environmentally friendly. (That phrase is still annoying since the innovation expo)

Now this idea would have been amazing at the expo, if of course presented well. This eco-friendly night club is not “green” because it uses recyclable/biodegradable shot glasses, napkins, etc. etc. Although maybe they might since that’s the whole point of their design. This club is said to use people’s dance moves as an emission of energy that would power the whole nightclub. For instance, if there are only two people on the dance floor, or walking around, they would emit enough energy for say one or two lights to come on. So the point of this is to have as many people in this club dancing and moving around to release all the energy needed to light the entire club.

I know it may sound kinda goofy at first, but if you think about it it’s actually a really smart idea. Now I’m not very clear about how the energy from humans will translate into electrical energy to light the club, but as far as being environmentally friendly, this is one of the most unique ideas I’ve heard about so far.

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/subjects/earth/earth.html

Lately, it seems like all I do is complain and complain about school. IT”S TRUE. I’m about to graduate in two weeks and my entire life has been consumed by school. I have no time for anything, sometimes I even forget I haven’t eaten in the past 9 hours. I’m honeslty just sooo sick ofit. Sick of homework, weekly lab reports that are over 10 pages lolng, professors who don’t give a S*%! and group members who don’t carry their weight. And I know that people who have been trhough it say that when you get out to the real world, you will want to go back to school and go through all the bulls$%!! all over again to have a week off from your everyday routine.

Well I tell those people that they must’ve been either terrible students in college or they must be ungodly smart to be willing to wiz through this again. I would neevr want to go through this, because as hard my job is going to be, wherever I end up working, at least I will be getting a paycheck at the end of the week, driving a nice car and actually relax on the weekends instead of rushing to the computer labs on sundays, being contantly stressed out about what else is due for what class, for what group, etc. etc.

Sick of the dumb assignments and all the stupid projects I’ve absolutely NOTHING from. I probably already blogged about this but as the semester progressed it only kept getting worse and worse. Between this week and next week I’ll have given 5 presentations, turned in four final projects, not mention last labs and homeworks. Sometimes I feel like proffesors do it on purpose to put us through TRIPLE what they went through in college.

But if I were them… I’d probably do it too!

Well, the first thing I have to say about Tuesday’s innovation expo is that it was the most intense presentation I’ve given in my entire college career. That was also the weirdest lecture hall I’ve been in! I’ve never had to talk to so many people while competing at the same time. I’ve never sat through so many student presentations either!

Clearly, it was well beyond my scope for any presentation and boggled my mind beyond belief. BUT… I actually prepared a lot for it (believe it or not) I practiced my slides, memorized some side notes, even presented to my roommates! I was actually ready for this! Then I was taught a lifelong lesson that I had to learn the hard way as soon as I stood up in front of everyone.

To give some background, one of my partners had uploaded the wrong version of our presentation. The version that was up on the big screen had a completely different agenda, different animation schemes, content, etc. etc. As soon as I noticed this was the worng version of our presentation … I panicked! Everything I had so diligently prepared for went out the window, and I could not recover. Damn those technical difficulties!!

I can’t blame anyone else but myself for not being able to adjust to the “wrong” version of our presentation. I could’ve done the right version by memory! But it goes to show that the most minor of technical difficulties could break anybody down. If you asked around, you would learn that I’m very comfortable talking in front of people, in a classroom, etc. but it was because I’ve never had such a technical difficulty happen to me, let alone in a very weird-shaped room with A LOT of people in it.

So the moral of the story is…no matter the types of difficulties there’s no need to panic! They’re not lying when they say “the show must go on!” So now that I’ve had a technical difficulty occur to me (at the worst time ever!) I will know how to handle it much better next time …

BTW: I DO NOT AGREE WITH THE JUDGES’ DECISIONS…. AT ALL (my blog = I could say so)

This blog is a continuation from my last blog. To summarize, I want to live in france maybe for a few months, or even live there for a few years; depending how much I like it and how much I get accustumed to it. So I realized other poeple, especially graduating students looking for a break from school and the “real world” have the same question and concerns as to how easy it is to just pick up and move to another country! I’ve done some research and the following are all the necessities needed to cross oceans and stay there!

First, of course, you need a passport to exti the U.S. with your identity, and take it elsewhere. In the interest of my personal country of choice, I will base this on moving to France, but most of the requirements for moving to France should be the same or similar for one moving to any other place in the world outside the U.S. Anyway, if you don’t have your passport, you’ll need a copy of your birth certificate. You can obtain your passport online at http://www.passportvisasexpress.com/index.xml, but if you’re a first-time applicant, then you will need to get your passport in person. To apply in person you can follow the steps at http://travel.state.gov/passport/get/first/first_830.html. You may need a visa (a sticker placed in your passport) from the country you’re going to either before or after you arrive. If you need it before, then you need to apply for it at the nearest embassy or consulate of the country you’re going to. Embassies and cosulates of many countries are found in big cities such as Manhattan (NYC). Otherwise, the country itself will give you your visa upon your arrival. Be sure to check the expiration date of your passport and/or visas before you leave the U.S.

After all administrative issues are taken care of, you need to research at least the culture of the town or city where you will be arriving. Once you conceptually understan the place where you will be residing, your expectations are more realistic and you’ll at least have some background knowledge aboout the “tourist” things to do there. You can search for other internet blogs and find different groups of people who experienced the same move. For example, I want to move to France so I found some interesting groups at http://www.travelblogs.com and great tips at http://www.lost-in-france.com/living-in-france/moving/151-essential-tips, http://www.usainternationalmovers.com/?gclid=CM67kuHfo5cCFQhMGgodJikocQ, http://www.findingdulcinea.com/guides/Travel/France-Travel.topic__ss_categories_ss_travel_ss_france-travel.pg_04.html,  and moving quotes at http://www.usainternationalmovers.com/?gclid=CM67kuHfo5cCFQhMGgodJikocQ.

You have the option to learn the language before or after you move. Shushil from our class informed me that he lived in France this past summer and without knowing any French, he was able to pick up some of the language very quickly and easily. He also encountered many English-speaking people during his visit. So learning the language is not as crucial as I thought it would be, as many bloggers tend to agree with Shushil.

After learning about the local area, talking to people through joining groups or browsing through blogs, you will need to get yourself accomodated in an apartment, make sure you have an accessible bank where you might need to traansfer your funds onto. First you need to find an apartment, which you can find tips for at http://www-evasion.imag.fr/CommentVenir/JamesStewart-renting.html, http://ydelta.free.fr/living.htm, http://www.rentapart.com/, http://www.my-apartment-in-paris.com/en/apartments.php?gclid=CIePqenjo5cCFQKaFQodz1DsIw, and many more. Once you have your apartment set up, you need to transfer your funds onto an accessible bank account BEFORE you leave. According to a response at answers.yahoo.com, someone suggested: 

“Call some of the banks over in Paris and see if they accept PUPID. PAY UPON PROPER ID. I am sure the big banks like BNP Paribas accept pupid’s but you need to contact the banks.”

I would talk to a representative at my bank in the U.S. first to allow them to tell me if they have offices in France, if not, they should be able to tell me what I will need to make the transfer. Then I would research banks in France and open an account with the optimal one. Next, you will need to figure out how to ship your stuff over to France: Since I personally trust FedEx with anything, they can provide rates at http://www.fedex.com/ratefinder/standalone?method=destinationCountryChange.

I believe I have covered the basics as to what it takes to move to any country, in my case FRANCE! I’m not sure if I will actually go through with it… I really want to. To tell you the truth, doing all this research has actually made it a lot more realistic than what I initially thought. So remeber to get your passports ready, do some research, contact people who have gone throught eh same thing, don’t worry about learning the language, pack your stuff but don’t ship all of it on the first move, find a new apartment and a new bank, then figure out how you will ship your stuff over to your new place. Once you get there, some bloggers say to be financially set for two months upon your arrival (have rent/utilities money) to give yourself two months to find a job, move in and settle down. To plan everything before you move, it is safe to start around five months before the plane takes off. After the two months, you will figure out the longterm stuff such as tax rates, health insurance, purchase a car, etc.

The rest is history…

So I’ve never studied abroad but I was born and raised in Bolivia, South America, until the age of 10. Although I know how to live in a different culture other than the U.S, such adapting to different climates, foods, people, etc. I still want to live in yet another country and be able to adopt another culture. However, this time around I don’t think I will be able to do it. As a kid, I lived in Bolivia but nobody remembers much of their childhood as they do from their teenage years and up. So spending my transitional stages in the U.S has made me very comfortable and settled into my own ways.

After I graduate, I would like to travel and live in another country for about a year. In particular, I would like to live in France long enough to know the language and settle down for a bit. But where do I start? And here come all the questions:

Do i learn the language before I go there or just wing it and hope I run into english-speaking people? Where will I live? Will I need roommates? How much will rent be? Can I have a job waiting for me over there? How will I transport all my belongings accross the sea? Is there a specific group of people who help incoming people like me to settle down and get to know the area? So the main question is: HOW DO I MOVE TO FRANCE?

I will answer all these questions in my next blog after having done some research. If you want to know how to move not only to France, but any other country… stay tuned!

As I sit here thinking of a new topic to write about, I can’t help but to write about the most relevant topic in my everyday life…STRESS

Why is it that the longer we stay in school, the more stressful it gets?! One would think that about 15 years of knowledge would be suffice to handle the last year of college. I mean, by now we should all know how to apporach different types of classes, how to study for them, how much effort is needed for each and basically how to multi task…right? NO. You would be surprised how many seniors there are who still don’t know how to study for particular classes. There are seniors out there who still donn’t have a full grasp on their own studying regime. Some people need to put in hours and hours of library time (me) and others can just sit at home, with TV in the background and read through the notes once and be just as prepared for the same test I would take.

In particular, there are seniors in college who still have a hard time multi tasking after years and years of training.  I will be graduating this December and  am having by far, the most stressful semester I’ve ever had. Not to mention the quick hospital pit stop I made for about a week…but regardless of that situation, I still find myself having a hard time devoting chunks of my time to several activities. I am currently working on four projects, I am responsible for hading in two lab reports every week, not to mention homeworks/case studies and exams. Eevrything has a pertinent group of people whom I have to work with and meet with to comply with all these requirements.

I know this blog may sound whiny, but c’mon! It’s even more frustrating that some professors swear that their class is above all others, and so they take it upon themselves to pile on all this work…due next week. I don’t know if there is some way that schools like Penn State can quantify the amount of time a student should put into school work while still maintaining a healthy lifestyle. I mean, sometimes I seriously forget that I haven’t eaten anything literally all day! If Penn State can come up with an allotted amount of school work time (including weekends) and somehow base the curriculum off of that optimal time, it would give professors and students a clear idea of how much students can handle and what is expected from new, incoming students into Penn State.

Any takers?

Yup! It’s about that time every senior attempting to graduate encounters: THE final project…

I am an Industrial Engineering major working on a project that’s about detecting water inside army shelters. You see, this company has these shelters made of aluminum and foam inside, and somehow the aluminum is coming apart from the foam and water pockets are developing inside, making the shelter weak and unsafe.

The question is: How do we detect the water inside, and how do we prevent the water from coming in? So far, we’ve planned to soak the shelter, let it get wet until we can use either an ultrasonic or an infrared device to graphically show us where the water is at (the company is willing to spend up to $10,000 on a devicce).

Finding the device is not hard…we call some companies, get quotes, get them to do a demo…blah blah blah. BUT how do we prevent water from penetrating in the first place? What kind of tests should we do? In general, we are just having a tough time coming up with different methods to study the shelter in order to determine ways to prevent water from coming in.

Got any ideas?

So this past weekend I was very excited because I went home to NY to celebrate a good friend’s birthday. Thinking my boyfriend and I were about to have a fun saturday night, club hopping until 6am in five inch heels and aviators, I was ready to look hot and dance all night right? NO.

My kidneys decided to ruin everything by telling me my body was severely dehydrated. I got to my boyfriend’s house that Friday afternoon and I felt a bit light headed, but I thought it was because of the 4 1/2 hour drive over there, so I paid no mind to it. Saturday comes and I’m feeling chills, fevers and hot flashes. I did not wake up so well, but we figured to give it until 6PM or 7PM to see if I’m feeling better but… as the evening came about, I couldn’t even stand up straight because of the quivering and temperature fluctuations in my body temperature.

By 9PM we made the call to  our friends to inform them that we weren’t coming. As I scrunched into a ball on the bed, I couldn’t help but to look at the super cute shoes that would not pinch my feet that night, and the dress that woulnd’t get to disable my breathing abiities that night.

By 6AM that Sunday morning, I was in an ambulance after blacking out, and having cold sweats under 10 blankets all night. The next thing I know, I’m laying on a hospital bed with IV’s and a doctor with two nurses giving me a shot in each arm. 

I was released Wednesday afternoon and back in state college by Thursday. After all the medical attention, the ”severe kidney infection,” the extreme dehydration and surgery threats from two doctors, I’m all better now and still wating to wear that dress and those shoes. But I am a full believer now more than ever that kidneys are extremely overrated.