I got in to Berkeley! :D Just got the email. Wooooooo!!!!!!

*squeals a whole lot*

Hurrah! It's in! *squeals*

This is your confirmation that your online application has been submitted. Please print this page for your records.

Submission Date: January 06, 2008 09:53 PM

Name: Pakrul, Stephanie

Program: Information Management and Systems

Degree: M.I.M.S.

Term and Year: Fall 2008

Now to wait to hear back... which should be between mid-March and early April.

Well, I'm mildly confused :) My quantitative score was somehow a 780, but my verbal dropped to a 590 (which is still 82nd percentile, but lower than average scores for Berkeley). Nailed the essays, but I have to wait for those scores. And those BASTARDS gave me a second experimental math section. And no, they don't tell you which one it is. Too. Much. Math.

So yeah... this leaves me really torn. If my verbal had been just a wee bit higher, I'd be ecstatic. I'm gonna mull it over for a bit before deciding if I'll take it again. I really don't want to go through another month of studying, ugh. Nor risk seriously dropping that high quant score :)

Either way, yay, it's over and I did well!

So tired, tense, sore... time to unwind tonight and then on to more important things in life than analogies and geometry :)

(PS. felt the San Jose earthquake while we were in the theatre at a family friend's film screening.... looooong rumble, very cool!)

Last practice test has me sitting at a 650 verbal (92nd percentile) and 680 quantitative (70th percentile). Gotta remember not to freak out when I get verbal questions where I don't know half the words in the answers, since that means I'm getting most of them right and getting the hardest questions :)

Guh my math still sucks though! I have a hell of a time figuring out the "trick" to these word questions that you have to translate into algebra. Basically, all the math questions can be answered in like under 30 seconds if you see the way to do it. But half the time I don't have that AHA! moment and end up having to try and calculate some crazy ass answer and guess. Or I make a careless mistake, but I've been better about writing stuff down. Berkeley wants quantitative at 80th percentile or higher. Gonna try and cram another hour or so of word problem wrangling into my brain and then get a good night's sleep.

Wish me luck!

(also I keep telling myself that I can do the test again in November if I need to... I really feel like I left re-learning high school math a little late in the game...)

but this GRE prep is kicking my ass so far :(

I think I'm going to be seeing analogies in my sleep...

EQUIVOCATION : PRECISION

magnanimity : generosity
voracity : nebulosity
approbation : delight
chicanery : ethnicity
duplicity : candor

Raaaaarrrr!

My algebra is better than I expected though...

Just when the Berkeley iSchool couldn't possibly have me any more excited, they come out with a new course like this.

I'm nearly squealing by the time I get to the syllabus page and see things like this: "Lab 9 - Synthesis: Invent a music instrument (group work)"

Then nearly fall out of my chair when I see the footer: "Powered by Drupal"

*faints with happiness*

Been a busy grad school prep beaver today -- starting my statement of purpose, writing my last (hopefully) reference-letter-writer, reading up on the wonderful world of NSF grants (no way I have the time/background to apply this year, but I will for next year!), and making notes on four professors I'm dying to meet at the open house.

~~~

Both our huge work projects are in their biggest crunch time at the same time this week. IE6 must die. This makes Steph crazy. This makes Steph crazy. This makes Steph crazy.

Ok, so I'm not a globe-trotter :) Travelling just takes too much out of me, coming and going. But it was an amazing trip. So freaking packed. I barely had time to breathe the second week, with the retreat and DrupalCon. I have so much to say and so little energy to say it with right now. Our two huge projects with CivicActions are launching this month. And I just booked my GRE exam for October 30th. This month is going to be insaaaaane.

I posted the few photos I actually took in Barcelona, and here are many more from various coworkers.

It's so hard to see myself slipping away from my online life right now, but I don't want to let it get to me. I miss you all and I'm not going anywhere far, just trying to take care of the big stuff :)

I'm really psyched about StG.TV right now.  We went to the iSchool Master's project showcase yesterday, and although there weren't many projects directly related to things I want to do, most were at least interesting.  Even the paper on the history of trademarks was intriguing.  I found that the things that were more like what I did in undergrad, ie. implementing systems in business, much less interesting.

This was my first actual interaction with the school/people in the program I really want to get into.  I talked with the team who did their project on managing multiple online identities, which was interesting, although not exactly revolutionary, technologically speaking.  But they gave me some good comments on the program (very multidisciplinary, need to know what you want to do and be self-motivated) and also pointed me at their advisor, who looks like the person I really want to be talking with about what I want to do.  I mean, hello, this guy has a grant for a "Large-Scale Analysis of Computer-Mediated Social Relationships"! 

Funny how this whole journey started off in 2000 on a whim ("hey look, a free webcam!") then turned into technological masturbation ("mmmm CMSes and integration") and is now arriving at much more of a sociological perspective.  I realized yesterday that what I really need to do is stop focusing on the pieces of technology and look at the human side.  Of course, Chris laughed when I turned to him yesterday as we were walking back from the presentations and said, "What I think I really need is a sociologist!".  Chris nearly having his PhD in sociology and all :P

My blessing and curse is having always arrived at things as an intuitive.  I have no idea why the hell I want to pursue something, or even what it means, just that I want to.  So when I get all up in arms about needing a way to have my own little real-life Sims-esque indicators for things like Hunger and Availability, I don't think about the deep ramifications of being able to widely broadcast personal state in a quantitative way.  But that is starting to change and now I am getting very excited about the big picture as I begin to see it for the first time...

Welllll a long tangent tonight started with looking for my CD of album recordings without vocals as requested by Jay to include in the CamGirls documentary (by god they actually got an editor a couple of weeks ago -- updates in the blog there).  Which I still haven't found yet.

Which DID lead me to discover my grade nine CD-ROM yearbook (yep, that's 1998 folks).  Which, as you can imagine, led onto a massive tangent giggling at old photos (good lord Meagan, you really haven't changed much in a decade... well, except for the boobs... and your group with Martine!  And the squish-in-a-bug contest!  And Grease!  And old boyfriends!  And and... is that Candice in a Xena costume??) and hunting down people online.  I think that needs to be a post of its own.  Lurid stories and huge crushes and reminiscing, oh my.  In my photo I'm even wearing what I still call my favourite shirt to this day!

Which then led to looking for more album stuff, and remembering to check CDBaby, and discovering I have over $100 sitting in there that I hadn't cashed out.  Woohoo!

It's nifty to see my album's digital sales stats:

 

Anthem for the Perverted has the highest number of sales.  Pervs  ;) 

Oh and we spent five hours (!!) today re-running cables, including our new 5' power strip and big, sexy UPS.

 

The back of my desktop area now.  I swear it looked a lot worse before.

And Spaz, proving once again that he is my web god and I must one day clone and steal him, is writing a wonderful picture rotating script that will clinch my victory for having all the pieces necessary for a harmonious Flickr/Gallery/StephTheGeek.com integration for images.  I guess now I just have to implement it.  Pesky details.  Go admire his large DVD collection.

I don't think I realized what an emotional burden it was to feel unable to support myself.  It's one thing to know you're headed in the right direction, but it's another thing entirely to be doing work that society is willing to actually pay you for.

Not out of the woods yet, but it really feels great to be working these Drupal jobs, and getting the new site up and running.  It's been a real financial struggle, since we're not only incurring housing/food/etc. costs, but the site runs me a few hundred bucks into the ground every month its not earning income.  The thought of having a balance on credit cards makes me slightly nauseous.  It will take a few weeks before the money actually ends up in an account, but I think we will make it  :)  I don't have to pay the final immigration fees until the interview date (March 15th), so that should be just enough time.

~~ 

I spent some time thinking about grad school stuff again yesterday, and I think I will be applying to both UC Berkeley and a Ryerson/York program back in Toronto.  Honestly, I'd rather do the Berkeley program and stay down here a bit longer, but the Ryerson/York one is great too, and it wouldn't be for another year and a half anyway.

~~ 

In other news, GTD rocks my socks. I've been very good about putting things on my calendar/task list right away. It's quite freeing. You need to be sort of obsessive about it, but I can't remember how many times in the past I'll be like, "oh yeah, I read about that weeks ago!" for something that it's now too late to go to. 

Soooo many conferences I want to go to! I seriously need to either be a student again or work for a company that pays my way.

~~

One more plea -- bookkeepers out there?

My accountant does corporate taxes for a pretty reasonable fee, but I'm kinda lost in QuickBooks...