Exam Time-Day 124-May 14th, 2018

Today is the first day of exams. Usually these days are more stressful at BU, but I was feeling pretty prepared this morning. I got up at 8:15 and spent a little too long looking at my phone before getting up. The schedule for today was differential equations at 9:30 and quantum mechanics at 1:30. Wanting to get to my first exam early, I left for school right after finishing breakfast.

I got to the exam twenty minutes early, which is somewhat of a tradition of mine. At BU, I always try to get to exams really early and grab a seat in the first row. I don’t have any real reasons for doing this, but I think it helps me get into the exam mindset.

The exam ended up being tough but doable. It was comprised of two main questions. I felt pretty good for most of the first question and about half of the second. Our professor was also kind and gave us an extra half hour, which was really needed by everyone. Right after finishing, Nick, Harry and I rushed to the office to pick up our stipends and head to La Nat’ for lunch. We didn’t have a ton of time before physics and needed to be quick.

La Nat’ was crowded as usual, but were able to get a table. After all, we are regulars. Our orders were simple as well, “trois plats du jour s’il vous plait”. The plate of the day was some pork, fries and salad. I forgot to take pictures today, but the plat du jour is always somewhat similar. They always give a salad with dijon mustard dressing. Dijon mustard is obviously very popular in France, it is where it comes from after all. Despite this popularity, I hate it. It’s not even the taste, I just hate what it does to my sinuses. I happily let Nick eat my salad today.

After a quick lunch, Harry and I headed back to campus. When we arrived, we had to pick up a slip of paper out of a basket. These slips each contained one of the five labs. There was two left when we arrived and I picked mine first. It must be my lucky day because I got atomic spectrum, which is the easiest lab in my opinion. I felt bad for Harry because he got the compton effect, which is a difficult lab.

Today I would be working alone at my lab setup. We were given two pages with questions. The first part was all theoretical, the second was experimental. I have probably explained this before, but I will quickly sum up the experiment I did today.

Every atom has something called an atomic spectrum. Atoms can enter an excited state where one of their electrons temporarily moves up to a higher energy level. When it comes back down, a photon is given off creating light. The wavelength of all the photons given off differs for every element and sources. This range of photons is called an atomic spectrum.

Here are some examples

For this lab, this spectrum was displayed slightly differently in the form of a graph.

The graph looked like this

I was given two atomic lamps at the start of the lab. Atomic lamps look like neon signs, but only contain one atom. The atom constantly goes into excited states when the lamp is turned off giving light. One of my lamps was sodium, the other was unknown. Next to the lamp was a fiber optic cable which sent the photons into a device called a spectrometer. This device is connected to the computer and separates the photons by wavelength. These are then converted into electrical signals and graphed on the computer as seen above.

The main objective of this lab exam was to identify what element the unknown atomic lamp contained. To do this I had to find the wavelengths of all the peaks on the graphs. Using giant data tables for a bunch of different elements, I had to find the one that matched my data. This ended up being cesium. There were a lot of other parts too, but I have probably bored you enough.

Overall I thought the lab exam went very well, which I mostly attribute to me getting lucky with my pick. I checked over my work a bunch, but still was one of the first to leave. I got home and watched an episode of White Collar to celebrate. After that, I changed and headed to the gym.

When I was saying hi to my friend who works there, he introduced me to someone who was signing up for the gym. He was American and from New York. I only talked to him for a minute, but he seemed nice. Nick and I are the only Americans at Moana as I know of, so it’s nice to have another one. It’s too bad he just got to France and we are leaving soon. I had a nice back and triceps day at the gym followed by a core workout.

When I got home, I hopped in the shower. To my surprise, the dinner bell rang early and during my shower! I had to quickly hop out, dry off, and throw on clothes super quickly. Anne Marie must have not realized that I was showering. I arrived at the dinner table a few minutes late.

The appetizer was some toast thing that had mushrooms and melted cheese on it. This was really good. The main course was farfalle with shredded cheese, creamed spinach, and chicken cutlets. Minus the creamed spinach part, the plain pasta and chicken cutlets reminded me of dinners I have at my real home. I had some nice conversations with everyone at dinner too. Jessica leaves on Saturday, and tomorrow is my last day with her due to my London trip. I will miss our super close friendship we have developed.

After dinner I had no plans. Well I did have to put away my laundry. And I guess write this blog post too. The rest of night is mine though. It is not finished yet, but it seems very likely that I will watch Netflix and stay up late. Let’s find out!