Second midterm down. During the first part of the test I was feeling really weird. It’s sort of like on the outside I was moving with measured precision but on the inside I was going crazy. Almost like I was just going through the physical motions of doing the test while my head was…boy, it’s hard to explain. It's like my inward and outward are going at two incredibly different speeds. The outside deliberate, steady, and rational while the inside is like a machine shop, lots of loud noises and constant motion. Nobody freak out. I think it was the product of not getting enough sleep the night before. This same sort of thing has happened a few times at the mill over the summer. It’s the strangest phenomenon. But it’s a little irrelevant, because it doesn’t adversely affect me, it just feels odd.

I think the test went well too. Traditionally, if you see anyone in your class following a test you gather around and discuss it. I came upon a group like that and I wasn’t following the one guy’s description of his method for solving one of the problems, which does not make you feel peachy. But I discussed it with a couple of guys later, and in everything we discussed my answers seemed to be holding their ground.

When you get into one of those post-test discussions and you realize you messed up, now that’s not a happy feeling at all. You either grasp at straws as to why your answer could be right, or you start tallying up the points you think you probably lost.

What’s really bad is when you come out of a test and realize that the solution to the problem you couldn’t figure out was right under your nose, that it should’ve been elementary because you’d happened to study it in your preparation. I remember doing that once on a Strengths of Materials Final. I figured with the botched problem, I had probably pulled my grade down to a B. I fretted and thought and worried about it, and it turns out I got my A anyway.

Don’t worry, be happy. Look at me, I’m happy.