The strongest features of this course were:
the strongest feature of this course was the inexcusably terrible and incomplete teaching of the instructor.  [teacher] clearly did not understand the material comprehensively enough to help us understand it.  it is a wonder that he was considered competent to teach this course.

The best way to increase learning in this course would be to:
the best way to increase learning in this course would be to replace [teacher] with a youtube video tutorial.  this is how i learned everything i did in this class.  the only thing i learned from [teacher] is that sometimes life gives you shitty teachers and you need to make the best of it because no one is going to fix it for you.

Please describe the strengths of the instructor:
capable of tying his own shoes.

Please describe areas in which this instructor could improve as a teacher:
the area in which this instructor could improve as a teacher is the writing of his letter of resignation.

Please offer additional comments on the relationship of the instructor and the student.:
[teacher] did a poor job of explaining basic concepts and ideas.  students had questions.  [teacher] usually became irritated that students were not understanding the material and continued to repeat his previous, incomplete, explanation ad nauseum until students became aware that he had only a limited understanding of the concepts himself, and thus could not explain it to us.  eventually students stopped asking questions.

once we got closer, about 50 feet from the intersection it went through, the police had the area taped off.  we stayed down there for only a few minutes before they started to clear that area, too, telling us that they were roping off the whole street.  this was understandable because there were fresh skid marks from the truck near the top of the hill, apparently the last place the truck had brakes.

i was able to take numerous pictures while we were down at the intersection, and the Huntington News, our school newspaper, actually used one of the pictures on its front page this morning.  i also posted the photos on flickr.  on friday there were 400 views and on saturday, another 950.

Public and private debt, global warming, dependence on foreign oil and capital, drugs, the brain drain, bankrupt social security, decaying bridges and roadways, war in strange lands for confused purposes, hungry children and abandoned veterans? We are definitely not our parents or anything like the Greatest Generation.

The best and the brightest in a dozen fields point their fingers and say we better duck — we have changed the world. A world built on previous generations whose selfless nature valued independence, self-reliance, and the kind of clear thought, hard work, generous spirit and devotion to responsibility that made our nation so great.

Like a nightmare in blinding daylight, our heads jerk from the pillow, as an apparition says, “You Suck.” We see ourselves, as no Americans have ever seen themselves before.

And I noticed that there were no comments on that post.  So I felt compelled to share my thoughts on the matter with him.

I hate to say it, but your generation definitely does suck.  You (and not personally, mind you.  I like what you do very much) took an unbelievably strong country given to you by your selfless and honest and hard-working parents who started with nothing, literally nothing, during the Great Depression and went on to claim the world as theirs to protect.  And your generation took nothing away from them but the desire for more and the means to get it through greed, selfishness and self-centeredness.  You’ve put my generation (those still in college and high school) in the distinct position to repeat what our grandparents had done years ago and drag this country back up by its bootstraps through hard work, discipline and the ability to see a greater good than the volume of our bank accounts.  I hope and pray that my generation learns more from your generation than yours did from the one before you, and, more importantly, that we have the sense not to repeat the mistakes you made.

The failure of the previous generation is crashing down around us all daily.  I hope there are still a few of us standing when all is said and done.

once i washed out the gray, it looked like i had a blowout.

hey no big deal but if you happen to find an inhaler please let me know. in the mean time, i’ll be passed out on my steering wheel with the horn blaring. no rush, enjoy your weekend if i don’t hear from you.

had no idea who it was from. turns out it was one of my coworkers. man was that funny.

so i got home about 6:45, met kay at there, made a quick pb&j sandwich and off to hockey we went. there were some new people there, which was cool, and we had a good time. but kay caught a puck to the knuckles while playing goalie. so i made her come back to my house and ice it for like 30 minutes before going home.

my room is still a mess and i need to clean it. but i really want to just wait until i move out in july. that way i will have less stuff stored in my room and won’t have to go through it all right now. plus i need to start putting things aside (which in my room means in the middle of the floor) for moving back to boston so if i organize and clean it all now, it’ll just get messy again in a few weeks.

peace

when the pile of rocks was cleared, we were feeling accomplished and energized so we started to vacuum and wash our cars. but, like with me and the stone wall, we ran out or time and had to get ready to go to will’s graduation dinner.

i guess will had invited a bunch of his family to a graduation dinner at a hall but then like half the family couldn’t come. so he invited a bunch of us to the hall to help eat the food and celebrate his graduation 6 months late. food was good and we had a good time, but had to get going early to help my dad build a porch on the new concrete patio.

my dad, corey and i worked on the patio for a few hours then my nana and papa, uncle doug and cousin kerri came over and he had grinders for dinner. after dinner we went back out and worked on the porch until dark. it’s coming along faster than i expected and we only messed up a little bit so far and that was easily fixed. no harm, no foul, right?

peace