Spring break is coming up, and I’ve just booked a ticket to the place I miss as if it were home: Washington, DC. I’ll be there from March 27th to April 4th and hope to see you, particularly those of you I managed to miss in January!
This week, I am in midterm hell. On Thursday I will take a mystery economics exam written by an eccentric visiting professor from the island of Cyprus. He delivers bombastic, semi-coherent lectures that include such gems as, “We will use calculus here the way a drunk uses a lampost: for support, not illumination!” Who else’s indifference curves always juxtapose “guns” and “butter?” I should recommend “bread” and “circuses” for a change of pace.
The exam is a mystery due to our professor’s eccentric nature, his lack of teaching experience, our lack of old examples, and the fact that he casually mentioned in class this morning that it’ll be completely closed book. I predict:
a) Harvard’s first ever essay exam for a quantitative micro class;
b) questions demanding hellish partial derivatives and equations I haven’t time to memorize; or, most likely
c) some of each of the above.
I may soon come to appreciate the, er, “grading” system we have here, which was summarized by the title of a recent student article on internet grade access: “New System Gives Students Instant Access To Random Sample of A Minuses and B Pluses.”
Addendum: Go figure; I inexplicably managed the highest midterm score in my econ class. I suppose that accent isn’t so difficult after all.
Posted by Marie Gryphon on March 9, 2004Best of luck on your midterm. Remember, as supply goes up, prices decrease. The rest you can just wing.
Posted by: Lane on March 10, 2004 10:26 AMOh, and I promise not to flake like last time you were in D.C. Let's get together the 29th or 30th.
Posted by: Lane on March 10, 2004 10:27 AMDefinately! My number's the same. See you in a couple of weeks.
Posted by: Marie on March 11, 2004 7:33 AM