Program Rush

Haha, these days have been amusing, to say the least.

I don't think I mentioned it before, but the student partitions of the server computers in the network went down for a few days recently, leading to Suzy Jagger telling us all that out Computing coursework deadlines had been extended by a week.

Finding out yesterday that Jim, our Programming Fundamentals lecturer had decided against this, we found out one day prior that it was not the case for out Programming Assignment 2, and resultantly, while we were relaxing, it was due in in about 24 hours, rather than the eight days we thought. So needless to say, a bustle and rustle of speed was ushered in for all the unlucky people who had left it until the last minute. Which included me, and most of my friends. One of whom actually started roughly 12 hours before the deadline, the deadline being 2PM earlier today.

Essentially, I wrote the whole program from 1PM yesterday to 3:30AM today, with a brief 4PM to 9PM break for a meet with friends, Pirates of the Caribbean and free pizza. In that time I also watched Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers, which seriously took me back, but enough on that.

So that's quite a few hours programming. I also wrote up test data and annotated it, and even a scrambled structure chart. It was all going swimmingly until not only did I fall short on printer credit by one penny, but the Microsoft Visio chart object completely failed to use correct fonts and gave me rubbish. This meant I had to get two prints with only about 10 minutes to go before the deadline. That gave me no time to run to the LRC to top up my printer credit, which allowed 5 of my 6 pages printing. Luckily, Dan had some credit, and went to print off my last page, returning with not the last page but page 3, meaning he'd wasted a credit on nothing. Printing my last page, we saw he only had enough for one more print, meaning my Visio chart had to be corrected by hand. The only real victims of this day were the shocked Taiwanese guy who was in the small room while I screamed obscenities, and the recycling bin that now has a new hole at foot level.

Luckily, a handwritten (scrawled) flow diagram and a beautiful program made their way into the letterbox roughly eight seconds before the deadline. The bewildered people, who saw a black blur flying up two flights of stairs towards the assignment letterboxes probably knew what was going on, which is more than I can say for my Business Skills lecturer, who saw my lying in the floor in a heap near the letterboxes at 2:01PM.

But I handed it in on time. That's a real high marker there, I can feel it. Which is better than I expect most people got, considering I needed to write most of their work before it was even near completion. And Snowman Helgi was late. My eightysomething percent for the last assignment handed it in late. Woo!

Well, I have one more episode of 24 left to watch with my sister before it's time for Season 2, and she's loving it. I can't wait to watch the end again.

And you remember Derren Brown? Of course. Dan was invited to go and be on his show, and while he wants to take his girlfriend, she doesn't want to go, and he'll probably take me, so things are working out.

And I'm getting the template for this website is about to get an overhaul. Should be good. Should be.