go see the foreman, go see the profiteer
The final season of Festival du Bloquetestes is upon us!!! O my self-respect! already it drains from my insidey bits! O my ability to express myself with any degree of clarity i.e. not write a three-side answer for a short-answer critical thinking question (hahaha I know right it was really like a trainwreck)!!! already it flows away in a stream of verbal diarrhoea! O my ability to rest easy at night without reflecting endlessly on my many inadequacies!!! oh wait no I had that problem before the block tests anyway
Bad things that have happened so far this week:
1. KI block test*
2. Broke my favourite hairclip**
3. Econs block test***
* Shit. Okay seriously I just want to say like ... not that I believe in pleading temporary insanity but ugh I came home and looked at my KI paper and suddenly it hit me that oh my god, I somehow managed to critically misunderstand the entire conclusion of one of the short answer critical thinking passages. Bad on the scale of, like, if I were marking it, I would fail myself straight off??? (admittedly I have felt this way about a whole lot of my papers. BUT THIS TIME IT'S DIFFERENT) In short I think I'm fucked. As in ... I DON'T REALLY HAVE A LOT TO SAY. I can't like DESCRIBE the sensation of looking over the question paper it was maybe like being hit very hard over the head with a blunt object e.g. a chair and suddenly realising that I had (honestly) entirely misunderstood the whole passage. This isn't like ... losing my touch, it's more like on the scale of, full frontal lobotomy. Complete brain removal.
I remember I was doing the question and I was like oh uh how curious, this passage makes less sense than they usually do, how strange; but STUPIDLY I CONTINUED NONETHELESS, never considering for a moment that MAYBE IT MAKES NO SENSE BECAUSE I'VE TOTALLY IGNORED THE ENTIRE SECOND HALF OF IT oh godddddd so basically it was arguing INDIGENOUS PEOPLES SHOULDN'T BE GETTING SPECIAL TREATMENT JUST BECAUSE THEY'RE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES, ALL POOR PEOPLES SHOULD BE GETTING ATTENTION REGARDLESS OF RACE and ugggh how did I not see it? I was like UH THIS GUY THINKS INDIGENOUS PEOPLES SHOULDN'T GET SPECIAL TREATMENT. JUST BECAUSE. (HE IS CLEARLY NUTS) AND 'ASSAULT' ISN'T A HEALTH PROBLEM!! AHA! I'VE GOT YOU NOW except obviously I hadn't, oh god, so all my zhams were like grazing the periphery as I had totally missed the MAIN POINT the argument was making. Uh. MOAN
I really ... have nothing to say about this. No wait I do I always have something to say about everything. but like I cannot even TRACE THE CAUSE of this screwup. Because as we learn in Economics, you need to know the CAUSE before you can CURE anything. Or any CURE will only serve to OFFSET the problem without addressing the ROOT CAUSE, or whatever. WELL I DON'T KNOW WHY THIS HAPPENED, did I get too complacent, was the goat I sacrificed the night before not satisfactory or something, what? Actually former option is quite palatable (the goat was delicious) I think maybe if I were MORE INSECURE (though potential for me to get any more insecure is limited, I think, I am at like Yf on my insecurity graph, resources of my economy are fully employed in the creation of insecurity already, any attempt to increase insecurity will only lead to a rise in inflation, and I am already eating way too much chocolate ice cream, seriously by the time these block tests are over I won't be able to put on my jeans, kind of thing) uh anyway maybe if I were MORE INSECURE and LESS COMPLACENT I would have TAKEN THE TIME to go over the argument again. And spot its GIGANTIC MAIN POINT, I guess, rather than assuming I knew what it was talking about and I am smart and he is dumb and then just going on with my (misdirected) zhamming. okay! not bad. Screwups aren't screwups without like a deep moral lesson arising from them. NOW I WILL GO AWAY AND ENTIRELY RE-EVALUATE MY WHOLE LIFE AND PRIORITIES AND COME BACK A BETTER, PURER, MORE HUMBLE PERSON. ok but I really needed that A for KI uh aw fuck
Long answer was a masterpiece of hysterical organisation, by which I mean, I'd be like ... these guys say this: [long list of claims] but they's wrong!! I say this!: [long list of zhams] ... and on we went. What happened to claim-zham claim-zham claim-zham? I don't know either. It has left me, like so many other things of my youth. WITH RUE MY HEART IS LADEN. I was counting on the short answer passages to pull up the grade for this, but see above. Let us remember that the long answer question is marked by God himself, who let us be frank, is niggardly with his critical thinking marks. SHIT.
Okay seriously I guess really all I want to say is like ... next time I have tests or exams or whatever instead of looking for my previous exam script with the vague hope of recapturing its fleeting genius (a dubious proposition at best) I think instead of reading the scripts from my old tests I should instead read the Livejournal entries from them 'cause ... I think every single KI test I've ever taken it's been like DEAR FUTURE SELF, YOU WILL RUN OUT OF TIME IF YOU DON'T WATCH IT, SO PLEASE WATCH IT. Well I forgot to watch it, okay, no one's heart is perfect, in a two hour paper (theoretical time allocation: 1 hour to first, long answer; half an hour to each of the 2 short answer questions) I was like ... 45 minutes for first short answer (WHICH I THEN BOMBED ANYWAY). 30 minutes for second short answer. freaking 45 minutes for long answer question, which is why it sucked. SHIT. anyway man, I don't care any more, someone else can get full marks, if I get an A I will weep with gratitude and turn into a dugong. THIS HAS NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE. I guess I should be like I'M GLAD THEREFORE THAT IT HAPPENED NOW RATHER THAN LATER but to be frank I'm not, it's more like WHY DID THIS HAVE TO HAPPEN AT ALL??? WAS THE GOAT I SACRIFICED UNSATISFACTORY???
** must stop developing emotional attachments to cheap low-quality shit (alternatively must stop hurling my hair accessories across the room and expecting them to survive the impact)
***
Uh I really needed an A or a B or like some extremely respectable non-C grade for this block test, having bombed the March blocks, which engendered suffering with which you are probably well acquainted. MY PROSPECTS. THEY DWINDLE. Truth: I swear I really mugged for this paper. Mugged as I have never mugged before. Like, I was all, I am a reformed character, I will never be zhammed again, tomorrow is another day, [mugs like a bitch] but uh ... SERIOUSLY the night before the test I was telling Acey wow so if I bomb this one it's seriously natural factor endowment differences (i.e. learning disability) because I have mugged to the fullest of my not inconsiderable ability (I didn't say this bit, primarily 'cause Acey doesn't hold with such nonsense) like there is literally nothing else I could mug even if I wanted to. So it wasn't a case of like I DIDN'T PUT THAT STUFF IN MY BRAIN it was more like I STUFFED IT INTO MY BRAIN BUT IT SUBSEQUENTLY FELL OUT (AND NOT ONTO MY ANSWER SHEET EITHER).
Uh - I think for Economics and KI any respectability of gradeness will depend on a marker who expects to see a (correct) point then, because of this EXPECTATION (because expectations are super important, as Keynes or someone said) therefore SEES the correct point (even though it's only tenously there) and ... gives me the mark for it. I think I am seeing a TREND in these two papers of my blithering along the wrong lines and making a number of points that would be correct ... HAD THEY BEEN USED IN THE CORRECT ARGUMENT. But the correct points are there if not in spirit, then in keywords. So I guess my future depends on my walking around looking conspicuously confident and learned, rather than like a freak with no clue.
Case study was okay, actually, I felt good for like ... two questions. Then stuff started to look a little grim for our hero, and then uh, I don't know, I guess something to be thankful for is that whereas in March I literally had nothing to write (as in, I had written half a page and was staring at the ceiling when everyone else was on their next sheet, kind of thing) this time I had a whole lot to write but uh ... didn't write it, or wrote all the wrong stuff; also, I had this NAGGING FEELING that MY OLD NEMESIS, the PHILLIPS CURVE, figured somewhere in the analysis, and I was like, god damn, if I don't put it in somewhere I'm going to regret it, aren't I, so I artfully inserted it in my last answer. WRONG. Should have put it for question 4 instead. I think I also drew in a totally misguided AS/AD diagram because I was like ... my spidey sense says I need to write about EXPECTATIONS. But I couldn't think of anything. So I drew an AS/AD diagram 'cause ... you can never have too many of those, I reasoned (plus they're easy to draw and quite attractive to look at). Shit! Neglected also to mention anything about import cost push. Suspect there was kind of a lot more to say about implications for government policy. It was really great actually, the import cost push thing, I was like puzzling over that question ('cause Mr B was like ... THIS QUESTION IS A LOT MORE SUBTLE THAN YOU MIGHT THINK!!) and lol I was like huh looks pretty straightforward to me (writes a whole lot of obvious crap) then literally as I handed in my answer it suddenly hit me what I should have written!!! oh well C'EST LA FREAKING VIE
Anyway so I was okay about my case study, I was like, so far so good, this is a huge improvement on March (arguably anything would be a huge improvement on March), a little tenuous but on the whole not appalling, I hope my MCQ pulls this up to something less tenuous and more respectable; WRONG, MCQ was fucked up, like, not to use these unpleasant terms freely!!! but ... actually, the best thing about MCQ was that it was so whacked out, as in, comparative advantage calculations that I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams, that I can't even tell whether it was genuinely the holocaust that CONTEMPORARY INDICATIONS would ... indicate ... or whether I miraculously hit on the right answers entirely by fortunate coincidence? It would have to be fortunate coincidence, at any rate, because I certainly didn't know what was going on. Like you know you are in bad shape when you're like ... LET ME INVENT COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE CALCULATIONS TO SOLVE THESE QUESTIONS ... FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES. Similarly when you are looking at the multiple choice options in the hopes that you will be able to tyco the right one by a process of elimination. Anyway man. As before. IT'S ALL IN BOG'S HANDS NOW. I think I will devote myself to a life of quiet prayer and meditation, specifically, prayer for selective blindness in those who mark the KI and Economics scripts. ok. my new plan!!!
Bad things that have happened so far this week:
1. KI block test*
2. Broke my favourite hairclip**
3. Econs block test***
* Shit. Okay seriously I just want to say like ... not that I believe in pleading temporary insanity but ugh I came home and looked at my KI paper and suddenly it hit me that oh my god, I somehow managed to critically misunderstand the entire conclusion of one of the short answer critical thinking passages. Bad on the scale of, like, if I were marking it, I would fail myself straight off??? (admittedly I have felt this way about a whole lot of my papers. BUT THIS TIME IT'S DIFFERENT) In short I think I'm fucked. As in ... I DON'T REALLY HAVE A LOT TO SAY. I can't like DESCRIBE the sensation of looking over the question paper it was maybe like being hit very hard over the head with a blunt object e.g. a chair and suddenly realising that I had (honestly) entirely misunderstood the whole passage. This isn't like ... losing my touch, it's more like on the scale of, full frontal lobotomy. Complete brain removal.
I remember I was doing the question and I was like oh uh how curious, this passage makes less sense than they usually do, how strange; but STUPIDLY I CONTINUED NONETHELESS, never considering for a moment that MAYBE IT MAKES NO SENSE BECAUSE I'VE TOTALLY IGNORED THE ENTIRE SECOND HALF OF IT oh godddddd so basically it was arguing INDIGENOUS PEOPLES SHOULDN'T BE GETTING SPECIAL TREATMENT JUST BECAUSE THEY'RE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES, ALL POOR PEOPLES SHOULD BE GETTING ATTENTION REGARDLESS OF RACE and ugggh how did I not see it? I was like UH THIS GUY THINKS INDIGENOUS PEOPLES SHOULDN'T GET SPECIAL TREATMENT. JUST BECAUSE. (HE IS CLEARLY NUTS) AND 'ASSAULT' ISN'T A HEALTH PROBLEM!! AHA! I'VE GOT YOU NOW except obviously I hadn't, oh god, so all my zhams were like grazing the periphery as I had totally missed the MAIN POINT the argument was making. Uh. MOAN
I really ... have nothing to say about this. No wait I do I always have something to say about everything. but like I cannot even TRACE THE CAUSE of this screwup. Because as we learn in Economics, you need to know the CAUSE before you can CURE anything. Or any CURE will only serve to OFFSET the problem without addressing the ROOT CAUSE, or whatever. WELL I DON'T KNOW WHY THIS HAPPENED, did I get too complacent, was the goat I sacrificed the night before not satisfactory or something, what? Actually former option is quite palatable (the goat was delicious) I think maybe if I were MORE INSECURE (though potential for me to get any more insecure is limited, I think, I am at like Yf on my insecurity graph, resources of my economy are fully employed in the creation of insecurity already, any attempt to increase insecurity will only lead to a rise in inflation, and I am already eating way too much chocolate ice cream, seriously by the time these block tests are over I won't be able to put on my jeans, kind of thing) uh anyway maybe if I were MORE INSECURE and LESS COMPLACENT I would have TAKEN THE TIME to go over the argument again. And spot its GIGANTIC MAIN POINT, I guess, rather than assuming I knew what it was talking about and I am smart and he is dumb and then just going on with my (misdirected) zhamming. okay! not bad. Screwups aren't screwups without like a deep moral lesson arising from them. NOW I WILL GO AWAY AND ENTIRELY RE-EVALUATE MY WHOLE LIFE AND PRIORITIES AND COME BACK A BETTER, PURER, MORE HUMBLE PERSON. ok but I really needed that A for KI uh aw fuck
Long answer was a masterpiece of hysterical organisation, by which I mean, I'd be like ... these guys say this: [long list of claims] but they's wrong!! I say this!: [long list of zhams] ... and on we went. What happened to claim-zham claim-zham claim-zham? I don't know either. It has left me, like so many other things of my youth. WITH RUE MY HEART IS LADEN. I was counting on the short answer passages to pull up the grade for this, but see above. Let us remember that the long answer question is marked by God himself, who let us be frank, is niggardly with his critical thinking marks. SHIT.
Okay seriously I guess really all I want to say is like ... next time I have tests or exams or whatever instead of looking for my previous exam script with the vague hope of recapturing its fleeting genius (a dubious proposition at best) I think instead of reading the scripts from my old tests I should instead read the Livejournal entries from them 'cause ... I think every single KI test I've ever taken it's been like DEAR FUTURE SELF, YOU WILL RUN OUT OF TIME IF YOU DON'T WATCH IT, SO PLEASE WATCH IT. Well I forgot to watch it, okay, no one's heart is perfect, in a two hour paper (theoretical time allocation: 1 hour to first, long answer; half an hour to each of the 2 short answer questions) I was like ... 45 minutes for first short answer (WHICH I THEN BOMBED ANYWAY). 30 minutes for second short answer. freaking 45 minutes for long answer question, which is why it sucked. SHIT. anyway man, I don't care any more, someone else can get full marks, if I get an A I will weep with gratitude and turn into a dugong. THIS HAS NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE. I guess I should be like I'M GLAD THEREFORE THAT IT HAPPENED NOW RATHER THAN LATER but to be frank I'm not, it's more like WHY DID THIS HAVE TO HAPPEN AT ALL??? WAS THE GOAT I SACRIFICED UNSATISFACTORY???
** must stop developing emotional attachments to cheap low-quality shit (alternatively must stop hurling my hair accessories across the room and expecting them to survive the impact)
***
Uh I really needed an A or a B or like some extremely respectable non-C grade for this block test, having bombed the March blocks, which engendered suffering with which you are probably well acquainted. MY PROSPECTS. THEY DWINDLE. Truth: I swear I really mugged for this paper. Mugged as I have never mugged before. Like, I was all, I am a reformed character, I will never be zhammed again, tomorrow is another day, [mugs like a bitch] but uh ... SERIOUSLY the night before the test I was telling Acey wow so if I bomb this one it's seriously natural factor endowment differences (i.e. learning disability) because I have mugged to the fullest of my not inconsiderable ability (I didn't say this bit, primarily 'cause Acey doesn't hold with such nonsense) like there is literally nothing else I could mug even if I wanted to. So it wasn't a case of like I DIDN'T PUT THAT STUFF IN MY BRAIN it was more like I STUFFED IT INTO MY BRAIN BUT IT SUBSEQUENTLY FELL OUT (AND NOT ONTO MY ANSWER SHEET EITHER).
Uh - I think for Economics and KI any respectability of gradeness will depend on a marker who expects to see a (correct) point then, because of this EXPECTATION (because expectations are super important, as Keynes or someone said) therefore SEES the correct point (even though it's only tenously there) and ... gives me the mark for it. I think I am seeing a TREND in these two papers of my blithering along the wrong lines and making a number of points that would be correct ... HAD THEY BEEN USED IN THE CORRECT ARGUMENT. But the correct points are there if not in spirit, then in keywords. So I guess my future depends on my walking around looking conspicuously confident and learned, rather than like a freak with no clue.
Case study was okay, actually, I felt good for like ... two questions. Then stuff started to look a little grim for our hero, and then uh, I don't know, I guess something to be thankful for is that whereas in March I literally had nothing to write (as in, I had written half a page and was staring at the ceiling when everyone else was on their next sheet, kind of thing) this time I had a whole lot to write but uh ... didn't write it, or wrote all the wrong stuff; also, I had this NAGGING FEELING that MY OLD NEMESIS, the PHILLIPS CURVE, figured somewhere in the analysis, and I was like, god damn, if I don't put it in somewhere I'm going to regret it, aren't I, so I artfully inserted it in my last answer. WRONG. Should have put it for question 4 instead. I think I also drew in a totally misguided AS/AD diagram because I was like ... my spidey sense says I need to write about EXPECTATIONS. But I couldn't think of anything. So I drew an AS/AD diagram 'cause ... you can never have too many of those, I reasoned (plus they're easy to draw and quite attractive to look at). Shit! Neglected also to mention anything about import cost push. Suspect there was kind of a lot more to say about implications for government policy. It was really great actually, the import cost push thing, I was like puzzling over that question ('cause Mr B was like ... THIS QUESTION IS A LOT MORE SUBTLE THAN YOU MIGHT THINK!!) and lol I was like huh looks pretty straightforward to me (writes a whole lot of obvious crap) then literally as I handed in my answer it suddenly hit me what I should have written!!! oh well C'EST LA FREAKING VIE
Anyway so I was okay about my case study, I was like, so far so good, this is a huge improvement on March (arguably anything would be a huge improvement on March), a little tenuous but on the whole not appalling, I hope my MCQ pulls this up to something less tenuous and more respectable; WRONG, MCQ was fucked up, like, not to use these unpleasant terms freely!!! but ... actually, the best thing about MCQ was that it was so whacked out, as in, comparative advantage calculations that I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams, that I can't even tell whether it was genuinely the holocaust that CONTEMPORARY INDICATIONS would ... indicate ... or whether I miraculously hit on the right answers entirely by fortunate coincidence? It would have to be fortunate coincidence, at any rate, because I certainly didn't know what was going on. Like you know you are in bad shape when you're like ... LET ME INVENT COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE CALCULATIONS TO SOLVE THESE QUESTIONS ... FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES. Similarly when you are looking at the multiple choice options in the hopes that you will be able to tyco the right one by a process of elimination. Anyway man. As before. IT'S ALL IN BOG'S HANDS NOW. I think I will devote myself to a life of quiet prayer and meditation, specifically, prayer for selective blindness in those who mark the KI and Economics scripts. ok. my new plan!!!