30 May, 2011 in University by Aonghas

One Week Left

I can’t believe it’s that time again. That time when all the lectures are winding down and everyone starts transforming into their study modes. This week is our last week of classes before we break for study leave. Luckily (or unluckily?) for me, my first exam is two weeks after my last lecture, but it means my three exams are quite close together. The annoying thing is that I can’t really get into full study mode just yet because I have a big 50% project due this Friday. After that I’ll have to cram 12 weeks of material into two weeks and it’s going to be quite a hefty challenge.

During this coming week I’m going to aim to achieve a few things. Firstly, I want to have a proper study plan all done so that I’m ready to get straight into study after I’ve finished my project. I also want to wake up earlier in the morning so that I can make my days more productive. I can do it, I know I can. It’s all just about self-discipline I keep telling myself. Let’s do this!

29 May, 2011 in Personal by Aonghas

Burger Fuel Treat

In March this year the website Treat Me was launched by the same company that runs Trade Me and planned to run daily discount deals online, similar to existing websites like 1-Day and Deal-a-Day. When we heard that their first deal was going to be $1 burgers at Burger Fuel, we jumped at the chance to get in on the action. It wasn’t until yesterday that I actually used my voucher though, because it was expiring on the 29th of May so I didn’t have much time.

The Hashius Clay caught my eye.

Yesterday after class I walked down to Burger Fuel on Queen Street and had a look at burger choices on the menu. It was my first time eating at Burger Fuel, and after looking at the original prices I could see why. $10+ for a single burger?! cRaZy. Thank goodness I had my voucher, I thought to myself. The most expensive burger on the menu was the wagyu beef burger at $14.90, but there was a special (maybe for a limited time only?) burger called the Cashius Clay that attracted my attention. Piled with two pieces of chicken, two hash browns, bacon, egg and lettece, the burger looked like a beast! The guy at the counter told me the waiting time would be 8 minutes so I sat patiently and enjoyed the free water that was on offer.

Shortly after, my order number was called out and I was given a brown paper bag that contained my mammoth meal. I unwrapped the bag to find a larger-than-usual bun that was struggling to stay upright without spilling all its contents out. I had high expectations. For a regular price tag of $13.50, you’d expect to be satisfied. And satisfied I was! I could barely open my mouth wide enough to take a bite out of the burger, but by the time it was finished, I wished there was more! Not because I was particularly hungry, but because it tasted pretty good! If only they cost $1 every day, I’m sure I’d be their #1 customer. For now though, I think I’ll stick with my mum’s sandwiches if I want my bank balance to stay positive.

27 May, 2011 in Personal, Thoughts and Reflections by Aonghas

Winter Weather

It's hard getting up in the winter.

For the last couple of weeks it has been increasingly more difficult to get out of bed in the morning. Whenever that starts happening, it’s usually a sign that winter is on its way back. Usually I set my phone alarm to ring at 6:30am every morning (except on the weekends!) but to be honest, I usually sleep right through it. I’ve tried different approaches to waking myself up, like having my phone just out of arm’s reach so I have to turn it off by getting up, setting multiple alarms at random intervals after the first alarm and having my phone close to me so it’s louder. Although some of these methods work at times, I find myself becoming used to the same routine until it’s ineffective. For example, when I tried to set multiple alarms, I’d start half-waking up just to turn off the alarm subconsciously before going back to sleep. All of this is made harder during the winter months when it gets colder! I like to blame my reluctance to get up out of bed in the morning on the fact that our house isn’t insulated enough, but I probably shouldn’t be making excuses for what ultimately is more likely just laziness.

Once I pull myself out of bed to get ready for uni, there usually isn’t enough time to eat a proper breakfast (terrible, I know!) so I’m out the door and on the bus in a matter of minutes. Waiting at bus stops in the rain can be annoying too, depending on the wind direction. If the wind blows the rain towards the bus stop, I’m left huddling to the back wall of the bus stop because I’d get wet if I stepped out any further – not to mention that the seats would be all wet too. Luckily most of the time, my bag is packed with an umbrella so it keeps my head dry. What I always worry about though is that when I am holding my umbrella, all the rain will run off the back of my umbrella and on to my bag that’s sticking out the back! I usually feel safer strapping my bag to the front of my body so that I can see if it gets wet or not, but then I end up looking like a weirdo. In the rain.

I never know what to do with a wet umbrella when I finally reach uni because I can’t exactly put it back in my bag, but I don’t want to have to carry it around all day either. Thankfully most of our lecture rooms have air-conditioning so I try to find a position in the lecture theatre that has a bit of air flow so that my umbrella can dry as it lies by my feet on the floor.

Puddles forming everywhere is another product of rainy winter weather. Especially those massive ones on the curb near intersections. Whenever I approach a large puddle, I make mental calculations in my head as to whether or not I think I can jump it. Usually I chicken out at the last minute, mainly because of the embarrassment I’d bring myself if there were others around who saw my failed attempt at jumping over a puddle.

Ironically, as I’ve been typing this post, the weather has gone from being overcast to being somewhat sunny and clear. Good one, God. I like Your style!

24 May, 2011 in Engineering, University by Aonghas

Hungry Paddle

For the last few weeks we’ve been working on a paired miniproject for our hardware design paper. We were asked to use a development board (kinda like a mini motherboard) to create a basic game where a paddle on the bottom of the screen catches falling balls/eggs. As easy as it might sound, we actually had to write the hardware description code to make everything work. If you don’t know what that means, basically we had to write code that turns pixels on and off at certain times to display animating objects on the screen. The development board we’re using operates at 25MHz and the whole screen refreshes 60 times per second. We worked a lot with binary numbers so we become pretty familiar with representing information in arrays of 1s and 0s. After a lengthy process of coding, we finally completed a functional game which, in my opinion, is pretty addictive!

We gave our game the title “Hungry Paddle” which is shown on the menu screen when it is first loaded. There are two modes of the game – training and the actual game. When the training mode is selected, the user has to catch 10 balls (or “cookies”) at the slowest speed to complete the training level. Next, the user can choose to play the game and has to progress through the levels as the balls get faster and more balls appear on the screen at the same time. In order to move to the next level, the user must collect the required number of balls before the countdown timer reaches 0 seconds. If the user succeeds in all four levels, the game is won. Otherwise if the time runs out, the user loses and can choose to try again from level one.

We have our interview/presentation for our project tomorrow at 2pm so I’m hoping that it will go smoothly. Afterwards we have a six page report due on Thursday and then another project due next week. Pretty hectic times till the end of the semester but I’m sure I’ll get there in the end!

17 May, 2011 in Personal by Aonghas

Daily Doodling

Late last week I was at the Engineering cafe while staff and students were getting their heads shaved to help fundraise for leukaemia. Although I wasn’t brave enough to do it myself, I watched on as the students and staff sacrificed their hair for a worthy cause. I was clutching my iPad at the time so I thought I would take the opportunity to try out one of the drawing apps on it. Ten minutes later I had drawn my first masterpiece. That’s when I got the sudden idea to do daily doodles and post them online. AonghyDoodle was the result of this initiative! For the record, I have never claimed to be a good artist even in the slightest, so please excuse the poor skill and just try to appreciate the sentiment

Enjoy!