The graduation day marks the completion of 2 years of living hell of 36 miserable software engineers from various companies. We have finally completed the Master of Science in Software Engineering (MSSE) at the University of Minnesota… alive, eyes swollen, much higher blood pressure and half-sane. This is an intense program, and all students in the class both work professionally and study full time. I applauded those who have toddlers and families that completed this program… as the Chunky Baconettes from the Bacon World would say, “I don’t know how you do it, but you did it!!!”. <sea lion clap> <sea lion clap>
My overall GPA is 3.967… a stupid A- ruined my perfect 4.0. Regardless of what several professors have said to me, it was critical for me to obtain excellent grades because I had been waking up at 5:30 am on alternate Friday and Saturday to attend the class and drank numerous cups of gasoline-flavored coffee (provided by the program) for 2 years to earn these grades. Further, I had spent too much time, having one-way expletive-laden conversations with MacBook Pro, Dell Dimension and Dell Optiplex when my code failed to compile. As you can see, these 3 friends of mine are not human.
The graduation day was truly a special day… a special BORING day that is! No disrespect to other graduates and family members, but my butt was hurting, glued to the chair for long hours. Even Rammstein and Aerosmith from my trusted iPod failed to rock my world. I finally sneaked out from the commencement at about 3:15 pm so that I could make it to the MSSE graduation party at Calhoun Beach Club. Missing out from the commencement is one thing, but missing out from getting free booze would be a disaster.
- Chicken Feet!
- Chunky Bacon rules!
- JSF sucks! The decision is unanimous. I truly pity those who are still using it. May GOD may mercy on their souls.
- Something that I learned from Nate’s class: LOFT = Lack of F*cking Talent.
- Weekly lunch with Dave, Pravesh, Shan Pin and Asif. Having awesome lunch is particular important for me since we Rochester folks are so deprived of good non-Americanized Chinese food. Whatever food ordered by Asif, it has to be suffixed with the word “extra spicy”. He has personally brought the meaning of “spicy” to a whole new level.
- Illegal highway racing with Sean from Rochester to the campus in the morning.
- The iBurger team – a team of four IBM students and two Mayo students, where six over-ambitious individuals can indeed work as a team without slaughtering each other. Obviously, the Mayo students were outnumbered from the start.
- Every student is executive-summary phobia by now.
- The MacBook Pro owners grew like mushrooms by the final semester.
Throughout this program, I have been taught by some of the best professors. These professors have taught me several key concepts that make me immediately remind of them whenever I encounter these concepts at work. If your name is not mentioned here, it is not because you are not cool; it is just that they are cooler. 🙂
- John Carlis, the inventor of Chicken Feet – You scared the crap out of me when you gave me a 47 on my very first exam at U of M. Thankfully, I still aced your class. 🙂
- John Collins – I enjoyed arguing with you about design patterns throughout the semester.
- Nate Schutta – Chunky Bacon rocks! MacBook Pro rules! Certainly one of the most entertaining classes… hands down. See you in NFJS conference.
- Mike Calvo – While I had so much trouble resolving the Spring/class loader issues and colliding jars from Maven, whatever you taught is very applicable to my current work.
Finally, I want to mention a few persons that certainly helped me to succeed in this program. Dawn, thank you for proof-reading my research papers and being my English teacher. By now, you have become an extremely IT-savvy person. A special thanks to Angelina for being extremely patience with me and for doing most of the housework in these 2 years. Life without you would truly suck… 3 times more suck than JSF and Maven combined together.
