Day in the Life by Gloria Z. '26
But make it four
This blog was inspired by those day-in-the-life (DITL) videos people make on TikTok/Instagram where they film hour-by-hour snippets and then put them side by side with their friends’ clips! The result is a fun little montage where you get to see the live comparison of how each person spends their day. My roommates and I wanted to do the same thing but in blog form, so instead of filming clips, we went through our days and did our best to snap a picture every hour of what we were doing at the moment.
As a disclaimer, we wanted to make the DITL as interesting and varied as possible, so we each selected a different day to document based on what would be the most engaging or jam-packed or productive. Thus, the events depicted below are definitely not *the norm* — you can consider this an editorialized or ideal “day in the life at MIT.” Of course, there are days that are simply filled with rest, sleeping in, frolicking, etc., those just aren’t as represented in this blog.
Also, the idea is to view these four sequences as if they were occurring on the same day. However, if you really focus on the events described in the captions, there may be some narrative inconsistencies, because we (as roommates) saw each other throughout the different days… so just don’t think too much about it 😁.
Special thanks to Teresa, Sabine, and Jinhee for creating the Content for this blog!
The image grids will be formatted like below:
For times of day that were missing images, I took some creative liberties and made inspirational clipart representations of what I imagine must have been going down. Additionally, basically all of the text captions are embedded in the images, so I’ve included a text-only version at the end for accessibility. Ok! Without further ado, let’s rise and shine…
Text-only version:
8:00 AM:
J: Woke up at 8:30 (~hour earlier than usual) to get ready for FDOC (First Day of Classes)!
G: Taking out my contacts in the morning #vision. [First-person shot of a sink with contact lenses]
T: I have a 9:30 AM on wednesdays and fridays… otherwise I would not be awake. Fit check! [Mirror selfie with outfit]
S: Waking up to get groceries… hi deflated balloon. [Picture of a deflated silver balloon in a kitchen]
9:00 AM:
J: Heading to lab to do some work.
G: Walking to my first class – 4.501 (Tiny Fab: Advancements in Rapid Design and Fabrication of Small Homes), instant coffee in tow.
T: Taking the elevator up to 4.032 (Information Design and Visualization).
S: Cheesy egg bagel and coffee for breakfast.
10:00 AM:
J: Work time :).
G: Section drawings I made for 4.501 (basically recreations of the building’s original drawings to practice making them). [Screenshot of vector drawings of buildings]
T: Today was my first day of 4.032! We got to explore some of the projects my prof has worked on.
S: Currently in my Modern Feminist Short Stories class at Harvard, so this is from the walk there — did you know they have a “dome” as well?
11:00 AM:
J: Found a phone booth to have my staff meeting for the class I’m TAing (working as a teaching assistant) for (6.8300 – Advances in Computer Vision).
G: We ended early so I’m going to 6.9000 (Engineering for Impact)!
T: 4.032 ended a little early, so I had time to grab food from Flour before going to my Design Thesis class.
S: Still in class, now discussing self-translation and bilingual writing, so here’s Harvard’s Science Center.
12:00 PM:
J: Heading to Alumni Wang to do Group Dance Fitness – MIT offers free fitness classes from noon to one that are super fun and cutie.
G: Sneaky 6.9000 pic. My team’s project this semester is an occupancy tracker for a Cambridge park to help the municipality understand how the space is being used. [Picture of a professor lecturing in front of slides]
T: Had to run from Lobby 7 to Sloan… this was 15.076 (Analytics for a Better World). Peep the remnants of my Flour kouign amann [a buttery pastry]. [Picture of a classroom and a laptop]
S: A gift from my sister, who’s a freshman at Harvard. [Picture of two postcards being held]
1:00 PM:
J: Eating lunch at lab (I was too lazy to chop the cucumber) and planning for our bean-themed house party. [Picture of a tupperware lunch with a whole cucumber]
G: Prepping a bit for a thesis meeting…
T: My next class is CMS.594 (Education Technology Studio). I took the theory-based version (CMS.595) last year, and I decided to take this one to complete my Comparative Media Studies (CMS) minor.
S: My setup for my thesis grind (free pizza from math department). Literature majors may (but aren’t required to) write a senior thesis as a culmination of their studies at MIT! Mine focuses on 2666 by Roberto Bolaño and incorporates ideas from math and urban planning. [Picture of a laptop and a slice of pizza]
2:00 PM:
J: More work time :).
G: Thesis meeting done – now heading to Stata to shop a class (spoiler I ended up dropping it). With my tupperware with two boiled eggs!
T: In class we did a few design exercises to get used to the concepts of user research and iteration with respect to education technologies.
S: Still thesising, but now with tea from Teresa :).
3:00 PM:
J: Last FDOC photos! It’s crazy how time flies..
G: Now at 4.110 (Design Across Scales)… [Picture of two people lecturing at a podium with slides]
T: Headed to the Breakerspace to make myself a latte after class! These are my friends from Latte Lab, a coffee science club + student run cafe I’m a part of.
S: Walk with a friend next to the river. [Picture of the icy Charles River]
4:00 PM:
J: Waiting for elevator to go to a thesis defense for my labmate!
G: Still in 4.110… prof and TA are showing us some of their previous work.
T: A few friends joined me to lock in at the Breakerspace! My awesome latte art is pictured…
S: Class on Eliot and Auden — here are some of my illegible notes on Prufrock. [Picture of handwritten notes]
5:00 PM:
J: She passed! + celebrating
G: Disassembling and saying goodbye to the gingerbread Stat we built in my last blog! She was on display for a few weeks, not a bad run.
T: Now I’m at the Welcome Center for an MIT Admissions Blogger meeting!
S: Thesising to my February playlist (in formation). [Screenshot of a Spotify playlist]
6:00 PM:
J: Cooking dinner with a friend.
G: Back on campus and taking a power nap in Hayden library before my last class at 7 PM.
T: Still in the meeting… say hi to the bloggers who were sitting behind me :).
S: Getting dinner with my sorority great grandbig!
7:00 PM:
J: Eating said cooked dinner with friend.
G: Heading to class – CMS.609 (Computational and Experimental Writing Workshop)! Fellow blogger Janet is taking this as well.
T: Wednesdays are my only days where I don’t have climbing or badminton practice, so I’m gonna knock some errands out in the evening.
S: Talking about Bleak House in another class… the sky is a lot prettier than a foggy “London particular”.
8:00 PM:
J: Work time (normally I don’t really work in the evenings but I was pretty busy today).
G: Going over the class syllabus… [Picture of someone lecturing in front of slides]
T: Quick trip to CVS… look at this egg shaped spam. [Picture of spam shaped like an egg]
S: Again, still in class… here’s a “patriotic” picture to celebrate Dickens as social reformer. [Picture of a bus displaying the message “Go Patriots”]
9:00 PM:
J: Work time.
G: Still in class… #notes. [Picture of handwritten notes]
T: Made myself a matcha. Angel emoji.
S: Treadmill trot at the Z. [Picture of the screen of a treadmill]
10:00 PM:
J: Watching a Kdrama that I started over IAP (Spring Fever).
G: Finally walking home!! It was so cold.
T: Roommate is helping me construct a dresser from IKEA that I’ve been putting off assembling for a week.
S: Thesising in living room as my roommate makes bread for our upcoming house party.
11:00 PM:
J: Called parents.
G: Submitted my CMS minor completion form so I don’t get fined. [First-person picture of a digital form being submitted]
T: Me and the roomies watching Singles Inferno 5 lol.
S: Still thesising, still in the living room… found this piece of paper in our couch (but it’s not 10 it’s 11). [Picture of a slip of paper with “10” written on it]
12:00 AM:
J: Getting ready to sleep.
G: Doing some more work.
T: Working on some drawings for 4.501 (Tiny Fab: Advancements in Rapid Design and Fabrication of Small Homes).
S: More thesis in living room, art courtesy of the MIT List Center’s lending program! [Picture of the wall with a couple pieces of art in frame]
1:00 AM:
J: Good night!
G: Laying down to sleep. [Picture of a dark room]
T: Folded my laundry and put it into my new dresser.
S: My roommate’s baking more! [Picture of a lump of dough]
2:00 AM:
J: Sleeping.
G: Sleeping.
T: Sleepy time U_U.
S: Buns baked!!! [Picture of freshly baked golden buns]
3:00 AM:
J: Sleeping.
G: Sleeping.
T: Sleeping.
S: Thesis again, then sleep :).
Thanks for coming along with us on this day! <3