Tuesday, August 26, 2008

2nd Day Catharsis?

Today was supposed to start at a nice leisurely pace. A morning of morning things including cinnamon rolls. It was going to be a splendid luxury thing indeed before the hustle bustle of school. Plans worked well, I was up at 6:30 preheating the oven. Snooze. 7 brought the buns in the oven. Snooze. Take out and glaze buns. Drool slightly. Seriously, those things are freaking sinful when they are all hot and gooey. Breakfast porn and whatnot. So then there was the wake up officially at 7:30 and get dressed, munch the buns and head off to the school type area.

This is about where I actually reawaken at 7:50 and panic. I'm running around the apartment throwing clothes on and grabbing everything I need for the first class. Out the door in five minutes and down the street to school in another flourish. Running through the campus and skidding into class just in time to not be late. Exhale.

So, there are cinnamon sticky buns waiting for me patiently on the boy's counter in his kitchen. Along with all my dreams of happy lazy morning before class.

Other than that, the first few classes went off without a hitch. Philosophy was interesting, even if it had ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with the assigned reading and more with the teacher wandering around sort of lecturing at us about whatever struck his fancy at the moment.

English was the worst. He went over the syllabus. Again. It was painful. Then there was the detailed droning description of just what a PARAGRAPH was. Dear god, I thought my eyes would bleed. Seriously. This is college. Please do not treat us like idiots. I really dislike this man and it's taking a force of will previously undefined to not use the in class papers to lambaste his ambivalent teaching style of apathy. Note to self: Insulting in a sarc 3 fashion is not a way to ingratiate yourself to the faculty.

Western Civ ruled. Again. In a way that I look forward to learning more about it every time I'm in the room and am interested in the way my philosophy class and western civ class are going to sort of coincide. I like that at least in Civ I get a more comprehensive picture of what was going on in the world and WHY these particular schools of thought were cropping up in the different areas of the Western world. I don't know how he did it, but he made me sit up and take notice in a history class that I would have been sleeping through at any other time. I'm going to try and take more and more classes with this professor.

Also, going to get started on Journal assignment 2 for Philosophy and start looking into possible research projects for the Western Civ class. English is going to be kind of my slacker class, so I guess I should start working on the journal assignments which add up to be an annotated bibliography of 9 different journal readings. There are also a couple of papers but only one is over 500 words. I'm a little taken aback by the word counts for that class. It seems like something I could do in my sleep.

Took my break in between classes and had lunch with the irrepressible Kate Monster. We chattered about work and she let me bitch for awhile about the different things that were bothering me about school and work. There was gossiping and the largest dude ever. No, seriously, he had to duck to walk in the automatic doors. HUGE, I SAY.

Then we went and smoked with the chain smoking neuro science professor and he attempted again to corral me into the sublimely complicated world of working in the human brain. It actually is tempting, but I have no idea if I'd even like that stuff. His second option for me to pursue was astro physicist. I about snorted iced coffee out my nose. I think the scariest part was he was utterly serious.

Had to take off around then to speak with someone about a Math lab. My options were, stay later and take a different math class or drop Civ. So, I am now staying later on Tuesdays (about 5.30) and thur I get out around 4.30. Longer break in the middle of the day, but I figure I can parlay that into working in the ARC (academic resource center) on my homework. Or the library... well, and then most likely hitting the library at least on Tuesdays until close. (This is either going to make the boy hate me or make him happy that he's got a heck of a lot more time with me really nearby.)

Overall, second day of class in over a decade and everything seems to be falling into place. I hope that I can keep up with the work and the school and not drop any of the important things I'm attempting to juggle.

wow. I feel vaguely like I just vomited all over the keyboard. Ah, cathartic.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Caution: Do Not Panic.

So, I have officially returned to the world of academia. It is both thrilling and rather annoying. My English teacher blows. He expects mediocrity and therefore sort of radiates this feeling of pathos. Lovely. My goal is to get all A's.

My philosophy teacher rules, but in a completely different way from how my western civ prof. rules.

I have way more homework than I ever remember doing, but this might only be because I never DID homework before. Stupid ambitions and wanting to excel. *snicker*

Overall, just really busy and trying to find my footing so that I can start sleeping more than five hours a night.

Thursday, August 14, 2008

WHERE IS MY RED PEN!!

So, sitting across from this gentleman who is in the process of writing his paper, I realize just how much I have my work cut out for me.

Given free rein I think he would write sixty pages in nothing but quotes. Oh dear lord grant me patience. I just had to explain for twenty minutes that he needed to write without looking every two seconds at his material and just give me SOMETHING to work with. He doesn't understand conjugation or tense and has some of the most convoluted sentence structure I've ever seen in a person who is just speaking.

This should be interesting, but at least the paper is on something kinda cool. Effecting positive change through leadership during a crisis.

ok, going to stop bitching now and attempt to get back to work.

Tired.

I'm tired today, like my head is stuffed with cotton balls. Gotta wake up and go help someone write a sixty page paper.

Mostly I just want to curl up in bed and do nothing. Probably not the most useful thing to do on my day off, but my life is about to get a hell of a lot more complicated in the next couple of weeks.

Things I need to do:

Sell my car. (it doesn't work anymore, completely dead)
Read: Stranger in a Strange Land, Brave New World, Ishmael, and The Other Boleyn Girl.
Call my sponsor.

GET COFFEE. Jesus. The headache is probably just caffeine related.

Clean my apartment and maybe do some laundry.


Things that I will probably do?

Work on my 4th step and flop around uselessly.

Whee.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Step One

Today I woke up around 10:30 (before the alarm and gloriously later than usual) overly hot in my bed and draped with boy and cats. The computer was on my nightstand and I waited the appropriate thirty seconds before turning it on. This is progress.

I've been without internet for months, stealing it surreptitiously from libraries, landlords, and unsuspecting friends. It's a little bit like guerrilla warfare without the guns, unless pellet guns count. It was probably for the best as I find the internet utterly distracting.

And I've had a lot to do the last ten months.

So, here is the state of my life from the last ten months:

I was bitten by a spider as the universe's way of telling me that I have a drinking problem. Peter Parker turned into a super hero, I turned from a party girl into a traditional run of the mill alcoholic. WHEE!

Finding out I was an alcoholic was a lot like going to sleep at 18 and waking up 30. I was blinking and grudgingly climbing out of a hole and into the super bright world of responsibility and real relationships with people. There were weeks of shaking and at least a month of being absolutely certain I was brain damaged because I had the attention span of a gnat. Then things started making more sense. There was laughing and alot of learning. There was some interesting revelations marked mainly by:

What the hell dude. I'm thirty and I live in a falling down house with a twenty year old stoner who can't pick up after himself with no hot water cause I can't pay rent and bills and other stuff. I've been dating people a decade younger than me and showing up for my life hungover.

Now however, I've got a little over ten months without a drink under my belt and here's what's going on now.

I start school again for the first time in over a decade on tuesday. HOLY SHIT. I work thirty plus hours a week slinging coffee. I'm in a book club. I've learned to speak with telemarketers and debt collectors without swearing and getting results. I've paid off one credit card. I've been in a healthy relationship that I learned alot about boundaries and open honest communication and am now putting those things to use in a relationship with a boy I'm pretty sure I'm going to marry one day. I've been to disney world and Key West. I've moved. I've lost my license and had my car break down without freaking out over it. I've got a plan to buy a scooter in the near future or at least some strange beater car that can get me back and forth to Bradenton and St Pete.

I'm in love with my life again, but I'm not expecting to be retardedly happy all the time. I'm content and I'm grateful.

And now I'm going to shut up and try and get this thing working so I can keep my friends up with my current activities.