It's been a busy semester! Recently, especially, I've been so swamped with project deadlines from multiple classes that I haven't had that much time to have fun or even sleep. I've had papers to write for my psych class, Adobe After Effects to learn for a design class, and scholarly journal articles to read and analyze for another class. Everything seemed to zoom by at breakneck speed, and it felt like I really couldn't keep up! Things have since settled down a bit, so I'm relaxing just a bit and trying hard to
not think about the not one but at least
four upcoming projects that have just been introduced, yup, right after we just finished all these other long and difficult projects.
Even though I do just want to relax and play games, I also strongly feel the need to
rant while frothing at the mouth write about some of the things that have been bothering me. Like I said, I had lots of projects to complete all around the same time, but the main assignment that was really the biggest problem for me was the one for my design class. :/ We had to make a
kinetic typography video that accompanied a song of our choice, and we had only specific programs that we were allowed to use, including Flash and After Effects. Also, we had to
work with a classmate for the entire project, and honestly, this was the worst part of the project guidelines and the thing that caused this entire assignment to leave a really bad and stupid taste in my mouth. IDC if that makes me sound like a hermit; I do not like working in pairs or groups for school projects, work projects, anykindofprojects, because I know from experience that 110% of people have a strong tendency to either
slack off or
do a crappy/ugly/disgusting/pathetic job of whatever little you ask them to do. (Yes, I'm bitter and overgeneralizing, and no, IDC.) This case was no different, of course.
From the beginning of the project to its end, my group partner (whom I'll simply refer to as C) did next to
nothing. Early on, when we ventured a look at Flash and AE and saw how difficult they were, C pretty much did nothing but
hover and
hover and watch
me figure out how to work the basic controls of the programs. Whenever I'd get really stuck and kind of hint
"Hmm, would you kindly like to take a stab at this daunting program?", she was just either incredibly oblivious and didn't catch it, or chose to ignore me and have me figure it all out -- I don't know which one it is, but all she did was hover hover HOVER.
So I just thought "w/e" and ended up making and finishing the entire video by myself, with like next to no input from C, besides the occasional groundbreaking, earth-shattering idea like,
"Oh! We should make the word color
explode into a bunch of colors!" Like honestly, I don't know
how I would have gotten by without such valuable input.
A few days and three group meetings later (in which C contributed by hovering some more), just when I had
stupidly thought I could, at the very least, trust C with writing the measly, BS-ridden reflection document for our project, she emails me at 1 AM the
day the project is due and tells me that she won't have the document ready until, say, 11 AM that morning, and is that alright with me?
...
........
..............................
Given that the design class in which all of it is DUE is at 2 PM, and that I have classes back-to-back until 2, then uh, no, it's not alright with me. I wouldn't be able to submit it to the class's online website on time. So I just didn't say anything to her and ended up doing
that part of the assignment, too. And it's soo funny because at the end of this all, after everything had been submitted and printed and whatnot, C sent me a cheery text that was like "It was great working with you, thanks!"
Words cannot describe how long and hard I sat there just...
So in conclusion, what was meant to be a
group project really ended up being a SOLO, INDIVIDUAL project with the added bonus of a hovering parasite. Like wao! You should get an iHover, too~ ♥
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