Like a Deer Caught in Headlights

So at precisely 11:55 pm PDT, I walked into 4428 Boelter Hall and turned in Project 2 for Computer Science 111, the most time-intensive programming course in the whole damn university. And as I walked away, a combination of relief, disgust, and a strong desire to forget came over me.

I'm reminded with the session with my TA just a few days ago concerning this project, which was just like most other sessions with TAs in my Computer Science classes. He'd say something, and I'd just kinda stand there. And any question I thought I could ask, and there were many, didn't feel like I'd get a response that I could understand. It was that sense that disaster was coming, but all my escape routes were confusing and disorienting.

So you are probably wondering why I'm still in this major of Computer Science & Engineering. Previous me's would address that question with "oh, I just loved the thrill of actually completing a project" and "there is a system of thinking that engineers have that I enjoy". And while those things still ring true, there's a third reason. Over the past four years, I hoped that over the course of taking these Computer Science classes that there would be that one professor, or that one piece of information, that would make the whole programming aspect make sense, and just have all the theory just fall into place with the vocabulary, kinda like in Tetris when you build with no gaps, save for one side, where a properly placed line would give you that epileptic celebration of a quad-killer. But employing that "good things happen to those that wait" philosophy has kinda grown old; the line never seems to come, and doesn't feel like ever will, and programming language, especially C, feels just as foreign as it did three years ago.

So what do I do in the meantime? Well I need to email my professor and make sure I'm in the best position to not fail, bust my ass on the final test and project, and after all that, take my programming partner out to lunch (Dan has really been a good sport and has been awesome working around my programming deficiencies. You're the best, Dan!). Thank God for Samahang and Asian Am, my ego saviors.