Wir Lieben Schadenfreude!

For all the Germans that read my blog, you’re probably wondering why I am loving a subject that involves the pleasure of other people’s torture. I'm not psychotic- I am simply referring to my presentation that I did a couple of weeks ago, which was about schadenfreude’s presence in reality television. Our group got a 90- that’s just TEN marks off perfection! So of course I'm going to love the concept of schadenfreude, especially since it got me my first 90...EVER! I have to admit that pronouncing the word was hilarious. We used an online dictionary that pronounces the word to help our group out. I told my German friend, Jasmina, about learning a German word, and when I told her it was schadenfreude, she laughed her head off! I surely impressed with my vast grasp of the German language! :P

Now that the presentation is over, I’m finding myself swamped with work that...to put it nicely, isn’t enjoyable. Did you know you can relate culture to FURNITURE? For a topic that I enjoy so much, my course leader managed to find a way to make it boring! I am also plowing my way through a Value Chain assignment which is 4000 words, but that’s going better than expected. MIS (Management of Information Systems) is driving me nuts with the amount of presentations we have to do alongside our individual report. A group presentation a week is making me go more crazy than what I was like in my last blog! My evidence for this is the fact that there was a PELICAN on my roof this morning. Yes...a PELICAN.

In addition to this, Frugal February is in full swing. I’m halfway through, but  I have been an incredibly good scrounger and not spent on anything other than travel...and a present for my sister. But otherwise, I’m doing well! I think I’ll have enough in time for Miami (once my mobile phone bill is paid). I found out that you can get money in such stupid ways. For example, on my website, I got asked if I wanted to advertise FoxyBingo.Com. Thinking it was spam, I initially ignored it, but then I found out you could get money for it. I decided to go for it to see what would happen, and I got $170 for subliminally advertising an online bingo company! Don’t believe me?

Talk about a result! That roughly translated to £105.45 for me to have for Miami. I will give a progress report at the end of the month, and hope that I have the $1400 that I need in order to go. Wish me luck!

Image Credit: http://pixar.wikia.com/File:Finding_Nemo_Nigel.png

What to Do When Work Sends You into Crazy Town

It’s officially February, which for me means it is Frugal February. I have banned myself from spending my money on anything other than travel to and from places. February is also my deadline month- in March I am going away to Miami for two weeks, which means I need to bury my head in assignments in February to make up for the fact that I’m going to be sunbathing on South Beach during Deadline Week...dun dun dun....

This blog is going to do exactly what it says in the title. When you get into a world whereby work work work is all you have on the agenda, I’ll show you how to make it interesting...

 

To the left is a slide from my recent Organisational Behaviour- Managing Groups & Teams presentation. I’ve been working with my friends on this, but the problem we faced was how to make the topic of Group Influences on Behaviour interesting. This is why I have a picture from the Disney film, Peter Pan, to explain what the concept means. I showed this to my friends, and they said that I am officially crazy- why didn’t they know this before?! The coolest part of this slide is that it plays the “We’re following the leader” song! Some may say that is creative- others might say it’s a sign of insanity. Either way, it’s going to count for a whopping 10% of my final grade in this course. Might as well make it interesting right?!

If you feel like your assignments are driving you loca, make them interesting. With my assignments, there is a lot of flexibility in terms of what I can talk about, but I have to ensure that it relates to the topic. If there is a chance that I can talk about television or Disney in my assignments, I will use it and make it work. Last year, I had 10 options for an assignment in Context & Regulatory Framework, and I picked the culture option. Why? Because it meant I could research by watching foreign films and other films that I felt related to my question. It worked because I got a first in the assignment! Can I do this in 2012? Maybe, but one of my assignments is about furniture...

I shall leave you with this image which also provides some good advice for you...and me. Happy Frugal February!