I whined. I cried. I acted like a baby for most of the semester. The day of reckoning has arrived. My final grade is in for my History course last semester. I’m not sure how I pulled it off – but my final grade is a nice, respectable 3.7 (A-). Considering how much of a struggle it was to get through without pulling all my hair out I’ll happily take the grade and move on to the next course.

Oh. Wait. I already did move on to the next courses. And somehow, unbeknownst to me, between this past weekend and today I’ve managed to get behind on my papers. One minute you’re ahead and the next you’re desperately scrambling to keep up. Seems almost like work…

As for last semester’s Psych class – since writing the exam last month I haven’t heard anything from my prof. But I’m still going to remain confident that I did well in it. I actually had a clue what I was babbling about in that exam. Keep your fingers and toes crossed.

As for your question yesterday Joy – No, there is no end in sight in the foreseeable future. Once I’m finished this degree I’m off to beg and plead for admittance into grad school. However, I will be throwing a massive party once I’m finished at RMC.

As much as I’d like to, I can’t even pretend that I’m procrastinating today. Once again I have been locked in my basement and am diligently working away at my assignments. Today I’m tackling my Enviro Chem assignment that is due next week. Tomorrow I return to the Psych assignment I spent a good chunk of Saturday working on.

Despite my natural tendency to avoid anything school related to the last minute, I’m on track to get everything in on time this week. It’s a bit scary. Of course this new found dedication to working hard on my assignments actually means that – other than our short break out last evening – I really haven’t done anything fun over the long weekend. While everyone else is out camping, gardening or relaxing, I’m busy trying not to pull my hair out.

Too bad I can’t say the same about work. I’m still plodding through building my database and I’m not sure it’ll be ready for beta testing at the end of the day Tuesday. It’ll depend mostly on whether or not I can manage to avoid all interruptions and spend a solid 8 hours working on it.

Quite often I sit around ranting about how annoying it is to have to return to university in pursuit of a degree. Don’t get me wrong – I love learning and spend a significant amount of time digging around in libraries and bookstores reading anything I can get my hands on (based on my sphere of interest). I’ve just never been a fan of formal education. It’s too constraining. While you can still follow your own interests on your own time, I find there’s less room for debate in many courses. Some (not all) instructors seem to believe that there is only “one true way” of interpreting information. Their way. As someone who likes to sit back and review multiple sides to the story and multiple layers of context, I find this increasingly frustrating. Funny, in the corporate world, it made me a good go-to person for risk mitigation strategy development. In school it makes me the annoying kid at the back of the cyber class contantly asking the prof and fellow students “…but what if…?” Oddly enough, I’m working in an academic environment. Which means that additional formal education is required to move anywhere within the college. Which puts me in mind of a very infamous quote.

Might have been the losing side, still not convinced it was the wrong one.
– Mal, Firefly

I’m off to do my homework.

Juggling has begun again.  My new classes started yesterday and I’m busy trying to get over the cold crappiness whatever that I’m suffering from again.  I need to keep on top of my classes this semester since I’m planning on picking up a third part way through the semester.  I haven’t decided if that makes me crazy or not.  Perhaps I should start reading my textbooks rather than the ones that interest me.  I just finished Christie Blatchford’s 15 days (again) and have moved on to Carol Off’s Ghosts of Medak Pocket this week.

I received my contract renewal offer letter today and have 3 days to decide if I’ll be accepting it.  Since my position is a bit in limbo, I think I’m the only one who’s received a job offer with no position title, rate of pay, etc.  I need to meet with HR to confirm – if nothing else – that I’ll continue at my same rate of pay until they sort out my (6 months and counting) job reclassification.

We’ve pretty much decided I’ll be accepting it though.  I like the people I work with and it’ll stop me from becoming too isolated while Drew’s away.  We did consider my taking a year off to finish my degree – what takes forever part-time is very quick if I were to attend full-time – but decided that with Drew gone I might become too much of a hermit if I wasn’t working and seeing people everyday. We can always revisit my taking time off to finish school when he gets back in Feb ’09.

At least I’ll get to do fun things at work this week.  I’m building a new database with multiple reporting capabilities based on individualized front ends.  Each person will have different options for data entry and/or reporting based on their needs.  I’m pretty excited about it.  Since I’m not the most experienced database designer out there, I figure it’ll take me a while to get it all sorted out.  Tomorrow I’m starting the main design/mapping phase and am pretty stoked.

It’s O dark 30 and I’m just getting my butt in gear to toddle off to bed.  I’ve spent the last 6 hours taking online quizzes posted by the textbook publisher for my Psych text.  It’s supposed to help me self-check my knowledge and determine where my weaknesses lie so I can focus my studies.  With only one day left to cram for exams, I’m not sure how useful the process was.  I now know – and did before I began this journey – that I have a horrible memory for terms, names, and dates but no problems identifying elements of theories.  I guess I spend tomorrow playing with flashcards in the hopes that some of this sticks on Friday morning…

At least I have more fun to look forward to after my exam.  Return trip #1 to the dentist should cap off the day nicely.