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Exams for S383 and MST326

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Exams are coming up. 

And not too soon, I can tell you. 

I have five days to organise myself for the S383 The Relativistic Universe exam, which I will open at twelve midnight on Tuesday night. There are things for which I am prepared, things for which I am not prepared, and things for which I will never be prepared even if I studied for another year. 

I hope to pass; I am desperate to pass. But I will never get a distinction - I'm not clever enough. And people say, "You're only as clever as you think you are!" But I don't think that's true. I know I have my limitations. I wish I were special at these things, but I'm not. There are people who are special; but I'm just not one of them. So I hope to pass, and I hope that we are given the questions which I can happily answer, such as those about tensors, and those about Schwarzschild metric, and those with simple plug and play equations. If I were keen (which I guess I am, but need motivation and inspiration to come from somewhere right now), then I'd sit down and work through the following: 

  • Special relativity - I'd work through several past paper question ones. 
  • Connection coefficients - I'd work out how many some metric or other contains - I'd work out why they equal zero in flat spacetime metrics. 
  • Riemann curvature tensor - I'd work out the derivation - I'd work out the manipulation. 
  • Einstein field equations - I'd work out some manipulations of these. 
  • Accretions discs - I'd brush up on knowledge about these.
  • Gamma ray bursts - I'd brush up on knowledge about these. 

I suppose that's only six things to work on. When it comes to actually doing the past paper exams, I know that this is what most students are doing: They are working through questions and honing their knowledge. I have not done as much. But nevertheless I feel almost ready. I feel that my mind will change, and my motivation will kick in the second I click onto the iCME81 link. I do feel ready, in a way, but I must take heed of these things I have written above, and spend Sunday, Monday and Tuesday thinking about these things. 

But this evening (Thursday 1 June), and Friday and Saturday, I must do my utmost to get on with writing down some equations for the MST326 exam which takes place in exactly one week. I must work through: 

  • Statics - by doing some past paper questions, or understanding their answers. 
  • The Chain rule - there's a section of a question, a step that I know I'll have difficulty with. 
  • Navier-Stokes equations. 
  • Div, grad and Curl. 
  • Some water waves. 
  • some other things. 
  • Mainly the chain rule...!!
  • Separation of variables and Fourier series. 
  • Fourier series actually!

Those are the main things to work on. Actually, as long as I have down the chain rule step that's been bothering me, I think I'll be alright. 

I have a revision session tomorrow in town, with two students from the module. We're meant to meet at Foyles in Charing Cross. But I'm not sure I'll make it. I woke up at eight o'clock this morning, had a cup of coffee, some breakfast and a cigarette, then fell back asleep until four o'clock in the afternoon. If I don't sleep tonight, there's no way I can wake up to go there tomorrow, now is there? But I do want to go. I want to ask them about these steps. 

So that's it then! This evening, and Friday, and Saturday, I will work through some past papers, writing down some answers, getting a feel for the questions, then Sunday to Tuesday I'll work through some Relativity, and that's that. 

There! What's to worry about!? 

Daniel
x

Permalink 3 comments (latest comment by Daniel Frederick Best, Sunday, 4 June 2023, 04:21)
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It's go time!

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Hello all, 

It will soon be exam time for me. I'm really nervous and a little stress and anxious, so I thought I'd smash out a little blog to calm the nerves, boring as it is! 

I'm not 100% ready, I'll be honest. Some subjects I hardly touched. But then others I feel very confident with. I'll get no distinction, but I'll aim for high marks and hope to pass fingers crossed! 

It feels good to write at the moment. It's currently 22:15, and the exam opens at midnight. I'm all prepared, I've had a shower, I've rolled some smokes, I've got my energy drinks ready. It just remains for me to run through a couple of equations, and make some toast at eleven thirty, and I'm good to go! 

I am good to go! 

Some people will get distinctions. I'm sooo jealous! 

I hope we get good questions. 

I don't think I've ever been this nervous for an exam. I wonder if this feeling is preparing me for my other exam on Friday morning? 

I would like to write some more, but the truth is I've nothing left to say. 

Wish me luck! And good luck to you all! 

Daniel 

xx

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I'll be fine

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Edited by Daniel Frederick Best, Sunday, 5 June 2022, 23:52

Hello, and blogging to de-stress. 

I want high marks for these exams, I really do. In reality, though, I'll be happy, nay amazed, if I pass. 

I'm thinking that the Quantum exam will be ten times harder than the mathematics. That's okay - it gets the hard stuff out of the way. 

My God, I cannot wait until it's all over. I cannot wait until next week. My sweet Lord! 

There's things I need to revise. I need to do some spin equations, and do some entanglement equations. The only thing I'm really confident in is the normalization equations. Some of the short questions I'll be alright. But mostly, I think I'm going to have to bullshit through! 

That's fine. I can only do as good as I can. I'm not distinction level. But some students are, and I guess I'm wracked with jealousy about them. But as Lee says, that idea, that people are in some kind of competition about who is the cleverest, is an illusion. 

I wonder if I'll be happy to study next year? The thing is that doing the actual course, doing the TMAs and reading the books, that's fine. When it comes to exams, there's nothing more stressful. 

Do you feel the same? 

In any case, I'm not trying to relate to people. 

I think, in these final few hours, where I have a little time to revise and refresh my mind, that I'm a bit fatigued. In fact, I feel like if I don't know this stuff by now, then I never will. And doing revision right now is making me mad and mentally ill. So I've decided to relax. I've been playing some guitar. I've been meditating. 

What I should really be doing is going through the parts I don't understand. 

I think I'll do that. 

In these final few hours, all I'm going to do is look through some of the past papers, and write down some solutions, and then that's it. 

I'm good to go. 

...

What if I fail? 

Well, I will be embarrassed. I've made a big deal of this course to people. People will be very disappointed. My brother will laugh at my low scores. My friends will laugh, my family will laugh. Anyway, I don't really care about that. But I'd like to pass. 

I just need to look through some old papers, write down some solutions, and I'm good to go. I'm sure the questions will be fine. 

I'll be alright. 

I'll be fine. 

Thanks guys.

Daniel

xxx

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Stressed out blethering

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Hello, 

I don't know what I have to say, but the stress is creeping up, and I don't know why. So the best thing to do is to tap some keys and see what happens. 

I must say, my dream last night was really particularly stunning, and I've never experienced anything quite like it. I've told you about it, so there's nothing more to say, but I suppose I would like to have more dreams like it. 

I said that it was a lucid dream, but in fact it wasn't quite lucid - although that doesn't detract from its clarity. I've never seen anything more clear. When I saw those spaceships shooting across the sky... I said to Joan, "I've had dreams like this, but nothing as clear as this!" I thought the dream was real, and God forbid it was a lucid dream!! Actually, I've not had a lucid dream for a very long time. I've forgotten how to access them. #

I'm watching The Sopranos - the final show of series five. There's one more series left to watch. I've enjoyed it. 

I've been recommended to watch Nathan For You, a comedy show. I will watch it - it sounds hilarious. It's about a guy who goes to businesses to offer help, under the guise of being a "help" show! Anyway, that's for next week. 

Charlie's ill. He has some kind of cold or flu. So it means we can't go to our recording session on Sunday...

We've recorded an album. It's called Prefrontal Vortex - by Two Five Burn. It's alternative rock, well, grunge really. Although it's more just hard rock. I sing on it, and play guitar. Actually, I wrote all the songs, and play most of the instruments. Rob played drums on half of it, and Mass played bass on half of it. Thank God for Charlie, who will be playing all of the synthesisers. Anyway, it sounds quite good. We've just got to record the synths and backing vocals and the mix it and master it. I'm paying Rob a hundred quid, provided I can afford it. But I think he deserves it. I'll pay Charlie fifty quid too. I was going to pay Mass fifty quid, but only played half the bass tracks. I'll pay him thirty. I can't wait to release it. We'll have to do a live show. 

Anyway, you're all up to date. I'm still a bit stressed; that didn't really work!

See you later. 

Daniel. 

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