Ode to the fx-991MS

A dog may be a shepherd’s best companion, a wallet is a bankers best friend, and a pen is a writer’s best tool. To an engineering student the calculator is what the dog, wallet, and pen are to their respective owners.

The journey began sometime late in high school when I needed a new calculator. I was having trouble with statistics and noticed a new calculator on the shelves that promised to do statistics, matrices, and much more. It was the Casio fx-991MS, and it was love at first sight.

The Casio promised to be a lot more that what was mentioned on the box. It made my test, and exams easier in high school, and it proved to be just as effective during university.

I clearly remember an electrical circuits course we had during first year. Imaginary numbers were a pain in the ass to do arithmetic with, and phasors were things we had to deal with in physics and circuits. Of course I didn’t have a problem with all those imaginary numbers thanks to my Casio. When the class discovered the abilities of the Casio, I estimate over 80% of the class trashed their Sharp, Texas Instruments, and whatever other crappy calculator they had and made the move to the fx-991MS… doesn’t that just roll off the tongue?

The Casio became the talk of the class (I’m not kidding) and those with Casios would show off the abilities of the calculator to the non-believers. I have to say that the non-believers truly missed out on many time saving tricks including:

• Solving equations with 2 and 3 unknowns
• Solving order 2 and 3 equations
• Imbedded BEDMAS rules
• Calculating the inverse of a 3X3 matrix
• Conversion between base 10, binary, hex, and oct
• Tons of statistical functions
• Ability to type equations and quickly perform iterations
• Integration using Simpson’s rule (although this one take about a minute to process)

There are other features of course, but the first few are by far the most time saving, especially in an exam situation.

My Casio will travel to work with me, and the second one (I have 3..you know, for emergencies and such) will stay on my desk. Every now and then I plan on giving it a little work out, so it stays sharp, so to speak.

For the makers of the fx-991MS I say thank you, using the calculator has been a pleasure. The Casio fx-991MS will always be my favourite calculator.

I know I know, but let me explain

It’s been a while, but let me explain. The past two months have been, by far, the busiest I have ever been. Partly due to school, partly due to life, more school than life though. As some may know this is my last term at UW, and unlike people say, the last term was a BITCH. Particularly 2 weeks ago when I had to hand in about 300% worth of marks for 4 courses, and somehow keep my sanity while preparing for finals. The biggest pain in the ass was getting the 4^th year project done, which involved long hours behind the computer and in the shop, but at the end things worked out and I survived. Today I wrote my final engineering exam. I must admit that my mind was half gone through the exam, I just couldn’t focus anymore. My last exam ever is on the 22^nd, after which I will finished and the celebrations will begin.

The design project

Other than school, my involvement with an activist group on campus kept me super busy for the first 3 quarters of the term. Through my activity with the group I met Ali Abunema, co-founder of Electronic Intifada, organized and ran a very successful Palestinian culture night, raising over 3000 dollars for infrastructure building in Khan Younis, and had a sit down with the great Israeli historian Illan Pappe. Our work was featured in several newspapers, and may reach Arabic media soon. It was certainly a fulfilling experience, with a great group of dedicated people and great friends.

Between all of that I was searching for a full time job. I had a bunch of interviews and finally found a job that seems very challenging in a great company. I’m not going to go further into it, as I’m going to be writing more about my job in the future once I start work.

Lastly, and most interesting is my plan for immediately after graduation. Fully knowing that once I start a fulltime job I’m going to be stuck with a 2-3 week vacations for a good portion of my life, I decided to do what a lot of people do nowadays after graduation… backpack through Europe. The tickets are booked the route is being finalized, and details are being discussed now that finals are almost done. More on the Euro trip later. Of course no after graduation trip is complete without a trip home to the beloved Syria. I should be in Syria for the month of July, Syrian bloggers take note.