Monday, December 7, 2009

The Adventures of the Psychology Project

The Psychology Fair for my class was last Thursday and everything had to be done by 4th period including a presentation board and a 3 page essay. I had yet to start on this project until Wednesday night. That was probably one of the stupidest things I have ever done considering we had a whole semester to work on it and it had to be done in 12 hours. On my way home from basketball practice I got prepared for my all nighter by stopping by the gas station and getting a red bull, a bottle of sierra mist, some gummies, and some sweet tarts. The lady at the register looked at me like I was crazy. I finally got home and started working on my project at about 7. I seemed to be getting nowhere with the essay so I decided to print some things off.

I found the pictures that I needed to go along with my information, but I couldn't figure out how to copy and paste it. This is not because I am totally clueless with computers. Microsoft Word just wasn't working. It wouldn't even let me type. I was so mad at the computer but I didn't have any time to waste so I called my dad and asked him what to do. He was in town and told me he would fix it when he got home. Waiting until late wasn't really an option for me so I told him I would figure it out and when I hung up the phone I threw it across the room into the kitchen counter. Red paint no longer exists on the top of my phone.

Lucky for me, my sister came to the rescue and informed me that we didn't even have Microsoft Word. We had Open Office instead. I was relieved beyond belief. Finally, I printed off some pictures and placed them on my board to see how it looked. It was about 2% covered. Looking at the sad board kind of depressed me so I moved on to the essay again. I wrote about the different lobes in the brain and finally seemed to be finished with the writing. Now all I had to do was transfer my information to my presentation board.


My parents got home pretty late that night as I was making my brain. I had everything out all I had to do was look at the instructions. When I found the paper that told me how to make the brain I realized that I was missing a crucial ingredient. I didn't have any fat free condensed milk. That is what makes the brain look solid and it helps it stay together. My mom was so mad at me because she was at Wal-Mart before she came home. She wouldn't even talk to me for a while. So at 11:15 PM I drove out to Wal-Mart to buy some milk for my brain. I decided that it was a good time for some extra energy so I had my Red Bull on the way. I got in and out of that place as fast as I could and returned home around midnight. I had to make the brain quick because it took all night to form in the fridge.

I continued working on my project for a couple of hours and at about 2 I tried to find a suitable outfit for the fair. I found some black slacks and a pretty top. This was exciting because I had it all picked out and I didn't even have to wash it. The final step to being finished was very near. I had to print of a few more pictures and paragraphs and then paste them onto my board. Unfortunately, everything that could go wrong...did. My papers were printing out real funky looking. The black ink was messing up. I didn't understand how that was possible because my dad had just changed the ink cartridge not too long ago. I didn't know what else to do and I couldn't wait until the morning so I slowly walked into my parents room and woke my father up. He didn't seem to happy to be up at 3 in the morning to fix the printer. He spent around 30 minutes staring at the printer with a puzzled look on his face, but finally succeeded in getting it to print correctly.

For the next hour I cut paper and stuck it to my board with double sided sticky tape. My back began to hurt so bad. Ethan texted me and told me about his progress which actually made me feel a lot better. He didn't have much done and I was almost finished.

I believe I finally got to go to sleep at 4:30 but it didn't really matter because all I was going to get was an hour of sleep. The next day we had the fair and everything was a success. People liked my brain and were impressed with the color and organization of my board even though information kept falling off. I was so proud of myself for finishing this daunting task and never again will I wait until the day before to start on a project of this magnitude.

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