FE

I just thought I should announce to the world that I successfully took the FE exam (not necessarily meaning I passed it), but I took it and it took me 8 hours and it was long.  Now I can say I have done it and will never do it again (no matter what!, unless I have no option).  Oh and Happy Halloween and Happy Sunday!

Halloween

We're not doing much to celebrate Halloween this year.  I'm taking the FE exam (fundamentals of engineering, it's an 8 hour exam) and then probably going to a friend's party afterward, but look at what my sister and her husband did...

Those are pumpkins...they are amazing.  (And they are innovative, they lit them with a cell phone.)

October

This October has 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays, all in one month. It happens once in 823 years or so I read.  I'm not going to take the time to figure out if it's true, I'll just believe it.  :)

Knowledge vs. Wisdom

I read this today and thought it was funny.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

Following Elder Nelson's Counsel, Part Itnein (2 in Arabic)

I now have a posted foto to new.mormon.org (it's the same as my blogger foto). I was notified that as soon as my profile entries have been approved I will receive an email.

So this is what I've got so far: https://mormonorg.lds.org/profile/preview/eng/

And besides that, Elder Nelson encouraged us to try to meet someone new every time we go to church. Quote: Each Sunday extend a hand of fellowship to at least one person you did not know before. Each day of your life, strive to enlarge your own circle of friendship." (taken from: http://new.lds.org/general-conference/2010/10/be-thou-an-example-of-the-believers?lang=eng). I did this on Sunday, I met my next door neighbor. His name is... Darren Golding I believe. And I met another guy but I can't remember his name. This has been a wonderful week! Obedience is the best!

Please visit mormon.org and do your part in spreading the good news (wonderful news) of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

I add my voice to Paul: "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, for it is the power of salvation unto all that believeth" (Romans 1:16).

So we do not need to be apologetic for the truth. We have been given commandments for our benefit, that we may be truly happy. We are offering people salvation through Jesus Christ; freedom from sin, from hatred, self-loathing, from misery. As we live the commandments we see purpose in our experiences and are better able to comprehend and love ourselves and all others.

Why would we ever apologize for that?

Instead of apologizing, let us have an abundance of charity to all people. Consider these words of Moroni: Moroni 7:

45And charity suffereth long, and is kind, and envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, and rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.

46Wherefore, my beloved brethren, if ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all, for all things must fail—

47But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him. (taken from: http://new.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/moro/7?lang=eng)

When I read these verses I have one response: Sign me up!

Us

Hi.  We're the Armstrongs.  My name is Melissa and I'm in love with Matlab and making beautiful graphs.  My husband's name is Ryan and he's in love with Google docs.

Quizzes

So, usually I really don't like quizzes, but this semester, they've been one of the more enjoyable things in my life for just a couple reasons.

1) I only have quizzes in two of my classes this semester.
2) In one of my classes, it's pretty much impossible to get lower than 90%, which makes quizzes a non-stressful time of life.
3) In my other class where we have quizzes we usually don't have them.  So far there have been somewhere between 4 and 9 scheduled quizzes of which one actually happened.
4) Everytime anything happens in my class that has scheduled quizzes that frequently don't happen, everyone freaks out.  Ok, not everyone, but a lot of people and it's very amusing to me that they all care so much.
5) The teacher of the class mentioned in points 3 and 4 is super amusing to me (making my last semester in all  its shameless trunky-ness a little less painful).  This has to do with quizzes because I received the following email (3rd email) from my professor following two other emails.

Email 1:
Please note the new Assignment under the Assignments tab. Economist: Paul Krugman article.

Also, there will be a quiz tomorrow.

Your humble servant,
X X (I decided not to let his name appear on my public blog, although I don't think it would bother him.)


Email 2:
The Quiz will cover Chapter 8


Email 3:
A final few notes concerning the quiz in order to clarify any mis-understandings:

1. Quiz tomorrow
2. In class
3. Not on Blackboard
4. Chapter 8
5. 8 Multiple Choice
6. 2 True/False
7. You may use a pencil
8. You may use a pen
9. You may use blood (but it might not get graded)
10. I will give you 10 minutes
11. That is 1 minute per question
12. The quiz is closed book
13. You may not cheat
14. You are allowed to guess
15. One point will count for 1/100th of your total class points
16. You may not use notes
17. You may use a dictionary but there will not be much time
18. If you must stress, I suppose you can go ahead and do so, but I wouldn't
19. We will grade the quiz in class
20. You will pass it to the row forward to be graded
21. The front row will pass it to the back row to be graded
22. Because there are more people in the back row than the front row, there will need to be some adjustment about who grades which row's quiz
23. Questions were taken from the test bank
24. Test bank used was for edition 13
25. I created the Quiz about 4:30p PST
26. I was really hungry afterward and had a yogurt to sate my cravings
27. The current moon phase in the Northern Hemisphere is a waxing crescent (23% of full)
28. The average weight of a Barbary Macaque is 15-26 pounds (7-12 kg)
29. All the gold ever mined in the world would only fill 2 olympic size swimming pools
30. I received numerous email asking questions about the quiz
31. I responded to those email in a bulk communique
32. I received numerous more email asking me about the quiz
33. I responded to those email in a bulk communique
34. I realized I must not be a good communicator
35. I have accepted the fact that I am now a good communicator because I have said everything that you may want to know concerning the quiz

I look forward to seeing you tomorrow!

Most kind regards.

X X

Trying to follow Elder Nelson's counsel.

In the priesthood session, Elder Nelson counseled those of us with blogs to make a profile on new.mormon.org and post a link on our blog.
Well, the website won't let me share my profile until I upload a picture. I have tried several times to do that but this error message appears:
"
Image upload service
temporarily unavailable.
Please try again later.

When later? Another week? Oh well.
Well that is as far as I can get.

p.s. Melissa suggested maybe my other entries have to be approved before I am permitted to upload a picture. That seems fair. Entries should be screened to make sure they comply with the teachings of The Church Of Jesus-Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I am grateful that they are reviewed.

Engineering

Something I like about engineering (and dare I even say tests) is that I actually wrote this on the test I took yesterday.

"I assumed [these things], but note that I'm no watermelon expert."

The best part about that is that it will be read by my professor and taken into consideration.  Funny!

Circular Thinking

This is how mine goes lately....

I hate school!  Okay, no, that's a lie.  I don't hate school, but I really wish I weren't a student.

A little while later

I hate school!  Actually, that's a lie.  I do hate homework though.  Actually, that's a lie too.  I do hate having to do homework though.

A little while later

Finally today is over...except for all that homework I still have to do...I hate school!  We've already established that's not true.  Man, am I sure I don't hate school?

Things I learned from my circular thinking


1) I don't hate school.
2) I frequently lie to myself.

Lillianne Moment of the Day

This is a common post title for my sister's blog. This little girl tends to say and do noteworthy things. Well this time her uncle gets to report on it. :) I called my mom (known as Grammy to Lillianne) to tell her the good news. She couldn't talk at that exact moment so she put the phone down. Lillie picked it up and told me a long sentence ending in "having a baby!"
I replied "yes, we are having a baby!" Melissa then asked "Are you having a baby Lillie?" to which Lillie replied "I'm all done having babies."

Today

something super exciting and fabulous happened.  Yep, it's true and we're so excited about it!

OCTOBER!!!

I'm so glad it is October because October has always been my absolute most favorite month in the whole year.  I don't know why I just love it!  In fact, I have loved it for so long and so much that when I was 13 or 14 I decided I was going to get married on Thursday October 9, 2008.  (I have lots of favorite things and three of them all occurred in that date...Thursdays, Octobers, and the number 9.  2008 just happened to be a realistic year for me to get married when they all lined up.)  I know, obviously I didn't get married in October, since our first anniversary was in August, but I did get married on a Thursday and if the 9th had been a Thursday, it would have been the 9th, but the 9th of August (2009) was a Sunday.  That's just a no go as far as weddings are concerned.  Not to mention Thursdays trump nines, as far as dates are concerned.  Ryan thinks it's weird that I have favorite months and days and numbers and even colors.  I think he's weird that he doesn't.  Sometimes you just see a number and then you have to love it!

Anyhow, so the good news is that on October 9, 2008, I was on a date with my now husband, so I'll settle for that.

P.S.  Gestational Diabetes = negative!  Yay!!!
P.P.S. I really just like October and wanted to say it again.

Important Milestone

Right then. It's exciting for me to realize that of all the phases of our relationship, Melissa and I have now been married longer than any other!
Let me explain. As I see it, these are the phases of our relationship:

Acquaintances: August 28, 2008-September 25, 2008 (1 month)
Dating: September 26, 2008-March 11, 2009 (5 1/2 months)
Engagement: March 12, 2009-August 12, 2009 (5 months exactly)
Marriage: August 13, 2009-Present and Eternity (13 1/2 months)

Now Melissa maintains a valid point of view that we didn't ever stop dating or getting acquainted. We're still learning about each other and ourselves. We are still very much in love.
What a wonderful, delightful, beautiful, charming, spiritual, kind, witty, amusing, cute, amazing (I could go on and on) wife I have!!

I love her!