An amusing... sorta, situation happened today.

I work at a gas station, so I have all sorts of customers comin' and goin'. One of the rules in place to protect the safety of us who work there is that no one is allowed to enter nor shop if they're wearing anything that covers their face, such as biker helmets. Usually, this ain't a big problem. If I ask someone to take of their helmet, they will.

Then there are those who'll make it to a huge problem, making it into a much bigger deal than the ten seconds you spend taking it off, and twenty seconds it takes to put it on. I had such a customer this thursday, who made it into such a big deal, he simply had to call the newspapers.

So this sunday, it's a small deal in the local gossip paper. So it was fun to hear one of my radio co-workers comment on the case... and quickly try to pull her foot from her mouth when I explained to her that, yes, a shop is allowed to place restrictions on who can enter, as long as it isn't based upon ethnicity.

On a more positive note, I had two customers comment positively on the matter today, and no negative comments, so I feel that I did the right thing. So that makes me happy at least.

Eh. Unfortunately, there's a night hatch in glass that's usually open. The point of the prohibition on face-covers is because we have security cameras all over, so if someone does go in to try and rob us, we'll have his face on tape.

And we'll have on tape those who didn't do it as well. It really is a win win situation for those with enough wit to not start threathening and yelling about going to fetch a shotgun.

I hate that I went into my graphics class all excited to be learning something new. Instead I come out feeling like I reviewed middle school and early high school math, and read a wikipedia article. You'd think eventually I'd give up on thinking I might get something out of a class. Even in grad school, my strategy of ignore everything in class, then read the power points afterwards is working way better than it should. Oh well, at least its not my money paying for it But the more time I spend plodding through the pointless busywork math homework (that of course somehow managed to avoid any computer use at all), the more frustrated I get that I could educate myself better, faster, and cheaper, but I'm forced to jump through the hoops if I want to go far in my career.

I used to be fluent in French but now every time I try to think of a French sentence I get either Japanese or Latin (!?). Do not recommend.

Wish I could afford Rosetta Stone.

For me computer graphics was among one of the harder courses that I have taken and I'm glad I had the guidance of a professor and teaching assistant who knew what they were doing. It's a good blend of mathematics, programming, physics and art and I don't think many people can do it. I easily put in 3 times as many hours into that course compared to anything else I took that semester and it was the undergrad intro course. Many courses were a waste of time but this was not one of them.

It's not worth the money anyway.

I've considered Rosetta Stone, have you had experience with it? Know of anything better?

We have Rosetta Stone on campus. While it's certainly more fun to use than cheaper language learning software, and fun makes it easier to stick with, on an hour-by-hour basis, I learn about the same with Rosetta Stone as compared to one of those $20 programs you can grab off the shelf. No software is as good as a class you take seriously. You won't become fluent from Rosetta Stone.