ALPSaguado.com » Random

A Short Update

Alps — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 02:25:53 +0000

I’m currently underground to do my thesis. I’ll resurrect my blogging self soon. :)

Thesis, bring it on.

Prolificacy

Alps — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 09:40:44 +0000

Observant people tell me that I blog more often than before. Well, I think it’s even an understatement. I rarely blog every day, or even every week–I think I blog only twice or thrice a month. And this is a justifiable excuse because of the different justifiable forces that prevent me to do so. If something justifiable inhibited you to do something, then the direct causes of inhibition would also be as justifiable. This is the kind of logic I sustain in my values stream that kept me breathing. But I guess this won’t work in the crazily fast-paced lifestyle of the 21st century.

My boss during my first internship tells me this before an actual work: I trust you, you know what to do. Beyond that bragging smile I pose to exhibit a sugar-free confidence, I was actually telling myself: WTF. What are those things I know? The society is becoming less of a rational organization because contemporary norms standardize trivial knowledge–making it automatic. Okay, I actually didn’t get what I just said. Haha. The point is this, people become automatic due to their struggle for rationality. This is bit of an irony but it’s something I can observe–with myself at least. I am rational but my generated rationalities become an involuntary pool of knowledge, ready to spill anytime it needs to. This kind of philosophical inquiry might piss you off because you can’t understand the ultimate point of this. My Philosophy professor told us before: Philosophers and social scientists are the worst writers. Richard Rorty and Ludwig Wittgenstein would the best examples to prove such point. And I’m a bad writer when I’m writing about philosophy–or some sort of it. Actually, this blog entry is supposed to tackle about my new planner. As you can see, the original plan isn’t fulfilled. Haha.

Wish against the heavens

To compensate for my bad writing style amidst philosophical inquiry, I will make an effort to link what I said in the previous paragraphs and buying (or obtaining, since I didn’t buy mine) a planner. For a twenty year old kid like me, it is expected that I will act in the most ideal forms of maturity. I have concrete sets of values which were made through a complex mixture of experiences and rationalities. But some point in my life as a mature person, I realized that I have to reformulate those sets of values to allow more room for rationality. A nice planner/journal helps me to do so. I just scanned over my three journals (for the last three years) and I saw myself as someone who knows everything and someone who won’t jerk a tear for something I don’t know. I want to strive to do something even if something justifiable inhibits me to do so. I want to grow. Wish me luck. Yes, even a excessively rational person like me believes in luck. Gotta start planning now. :)

GWA to GPA%

Alps — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 11:51:34 +0000

If you are about to have your internship or post-graduation job hunt, one of the things you do is create an account in some popular job search engines such as Jobstreet and JobsDB. These two services ask for your Grade Point Average or your GPA in percentage. You would be then disappointed that our Grade Weighted Average (UP, UST, etc) is of a different form (1.00 highest possible and 3.00 lowest possible passing grade). You would realize too that you are so lazy to do some math magic to convert your GWA to GPA Percentage. Fret not, here is a conversion table that would prevent you from wasting pencil lead and scratch paper in finding and computing for a solution.

This table has three assumptions:

Only a flat 1.00 GWA could yield a 100% GPA.

1.75 GWA (The lowest possible cum laude standing grade) yields an 85% GPA.

3.00 GWA (The lowest possible grade to graduate) yields 60% GPA.

Possible FAQs:

Why do you use whole numbers for GPA% in your conversion table?

Base on experience, most job search engines and corporate application forms ask for whole number GPAs

Why do you assume that 60% yields 3.00? Some subjects have lower standards i.e. 3.00 yields 50%.

True, there are some subjects that the passing grade is 50%=3.00. But the reference point of this conversion table is this: 1.75 GWA yields 85%. The rationale behind this is most companies regard 85% as the lowest possible GWA with honors i.e. 85%=1.75.

Why are you doing this?

During my pre-internship period, several of my classmates ask me to convert their currrent GWA to GPA percentage. Now that we are graduating next year, the same friends could ask me again about it so I am making a convenient tool for everyone in general. :)

DISCLAIMER:

You cannot blame this table (and me at that) if your prospective employer says that your GPA isn’t reflective of your GWA because you used this. However, I assure everyone that this is based on basic mathematical logic.

If you are about to have your internship or post-graduation job hunt, one of the things you do is creating an account in some popular job search engines such as Jobstreet and JobsDB. These two services ask for your Grade Point Average or your GPA in percentage. You would be then disappointed that our Grade Weighted Average (UP, UST, etc) is of a different form (1.00 highest possible and 3.00 lowest possible passing grade). You would realize too that you are so lazy to do some math magic to convert your GWA to GPA Percentage. Fret not, here is a conversion table that would prevent you from wasting pencil lead and scratch paper in finding and computing for a solution.

This table has three assumptions:

Only a flat 1.00 GWA could yield a 100% GPA.
1.75 GWA (The lowest possible cum laude standing grade) yields an 85% GPA.
3.00 GWA (The lowest possible grade to graduate) yields 60% GPA.

Possible FAQs:

Why do you use whole numbers for GPA% in your conversion table?

Based on experience, most job search engines and corporate application forms ask for whole number GPAs

Why do you assume that 60% yields 3.00? Some subjects have lower standards i.e. 3.00 yields 50%.

Why are you doing this?

During my pre-internship period, several of my classmates asked me to convert their currrent GWA to GPA percentage. Now that we are graduating next year, the same friends could ask me again about it so I am making a convenient tool for everyone in general. :)

DISCLAIMER:

GWA - GPA%

Face(book) Value

Alps — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 07:51:40 +0000

Last Saturday, we presented a case documentation that exhibits the use of new social media by different Philippine-based organizations to promote their products and services or to perform their functions in general. One of the organizations we interviewed has been using Facebook to screen and hire prospective employees. Now that’s a wake-up call for me to do a Facebook general cleaning. Haha. But I do have rather civil and cultured content on my social networking accounts so the article doesn’t pose so much threat to me. :D Anyway, I was browsing Yahoo! News when I stumbled upon this article:

Job hunting? Take those wild party pics off Facebook

Read the rest of this post »

http://vinculum.alpsaguado.com/2009/08/social-media-marketing/

The Most Activist Statement Yet

Alps — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 15:15:06 +0000

Sagot sa kahirapan: Digmaang Bayan.

When we went to UP Diliman for the Philippine Intercollegiate Debate Championship, my teammates and I saw this activist vandalism written on the chalkboard of one of the classrooms in Palma Hall. :o

Chicken Dog

Alps — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 04:34:40 +0000

I spent a few hours staying at my best friend’s crib last week. I also met his dog for the second time (the first one was when his girlfriend bought this dog somewhere near my place). There is something peculiar about this dog. Guess what?

Got it?

He sits like a chicken! Well, actually, he lies down like a (roasted) chicken Haha!

Meet Singles(?) and Swingers(?)

Alps — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 04:39:12 +0000

I was reading some of my Friendster private messages when I encountered a spam message containing a link to a scam-porn site. Nah, I’m not inventing this reason to justify my accidental landing to that porn-ish site. I don’t browse porn. Err, I used to. No, I haven’t seen any porn all my life. HAHA. Anyway, there was this intriguing advertisement I have seen on the said site:

Now tell me I’m wrong on saying that this is a spam site. :/

Energy-consuming Linguistics

Alps — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 08:44:47 +0000

ksali aqowh z gangsters, jejeje! jowk lng powh, bka mnwla keo!!!!!!

aq un tao nah mabaet zah taong mabet dn zken!!
sveh ni aque adik daw aqowh!!
mnzan emotera nah dn!!
an dmi kazeng problema!!
nd aq kuripot..as long as my ena aq!!
nd aq suplada!!
shy type aq!!
kpg my kgalet,,.
okei ln khit one year na nd mgpanznan
nahi2yah kazeh aqoh!!
kn mron pah kaung guztong mlaman ,,
pntah kau zmen!!

….mmmmm….
aq un tao nah mabaet zah taong mabet dn zken!!
sveh ni aque adik daw aqowh!!
mnzan emotera nah dn!!
an dmi kazeng problema!!
nd aq kuripot..as long as my ena aq!!
nd aq suplada!!
shy type aq!!
kpg my kgalet,,.
okei ln khit one year na nd mgpanznan
nahi2yah kazeh aqoh!!
kn mron pah kaung guztong mlaman ,,
pntah kau zmen!!

..why!!
,.unbelievable vah un..
,.pd nman un ahh!!
,.hehe!!

,.joke lmang!!
,.naiz lmang ktang mgin frend!!

I get anonymous comments from anonymous people in Friendster. Several of them use a kind of language that is very popular (I guess) among some youth. I respect people who use this kind of language but it makes me tired reading such. :/

Pwet

Alps — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:53:14 +0000

My friends and I went to National Bookstore a few days ago to purchase some notepads which we will use as corporate giveaways. These will be given away for a min-seminar this week. After some searching and comparing, we found the best pad with the best price:

With the most random writings inside:

“Pwet mo ang baho. Hehehe.”

Now I truly know that there is at least one person in this world who has nothing to do with his life. Hehe.

British English

Alps — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 08:53:35 +0000

Microsoft Word 2007 has this nifty feature of asking what kind of English a user’s country is using before the installation proper. And I am suprised that there is an English: Republic of the Philippines option. Wow, Microsoft recognized our own branding of English. For a moment, I hoped and prayed to God that this isn’t Carabao English Microsoft is referring to. But I’m just a paranoid. *Continue-Install-Button clicked*

And this is what I have noticed:

As far as I know, we adopted American English as our English. Well, our English accepts both versions but I don’t know why the Microsoft nerds assumed we are using British English. Hmm.