Overwhelmed, Party Of One: Your Table Is Ready

Wow... so much time has passed since my last post, there's no possible way for me to catch up and revisit all those days. I need to be better at jumping on here every night... any suggestions?

Anyways, today is Thursday, and I've - for the most part - survived the first two weeks of doc school. I feel like I've already learned a ton, and read even more, but I'm enjoying it so far. I was just wholly unprepared for the amount of work I'd have to do. SO. MUCH. READING! Most of the material has been pretty interesting so far; if you haven't read Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions of Walter Ong's Orality and Literacy, both are great books. : ) If you are into the whole reading-to-expand-your-horizons thing, those are great books to check out.

That said... I can honestly say I've never read a whole book (for class, that is) in one week before, and now I've done it twice. : ) In addition, I had to grapple with some paradigmatic issues in regards to my own research preferences, which is something I feel like I do every time I take a methods class. I used to consider myself super anti-post-positivist (meaning I don't like the whole sweeping generalization/applicable to everyone mentality), but I'm reconciling it as more and more of an acceptable paradigm the more we read. : ) I hadn't expected that, especially not in my qualitative research methods class.

All this said, it's been tough to maintain the same kind of social life I had going on during orientation. I was talking with a bunch of my cohort yesterday, and we all commented on how we haven't seen much of each other anymore compared to before classes started. :\ I think we might try to make a little more effort in that regard, but I guess we'll see... we do have to read a ton for methods on Monday, so it's going to be another busy weekend.

Teaching has been great, though - I have an awesome group of students in my Public Speaking class, and they all seem pretty engaged and with it. It's been fun to try new approaches to teaching the concepts, and to see how well they respond to things. Overall, I think this class is going to be a good one. : ) I'm excited to see where it goes.

Alright. I have much to do and little time to do it, so it's off to other things.

Lesson Planning Is Harder Than I Remembered

Today I pulled another late-rise, and got out of bed around 11:30am. I don't know what I'm going to do tomorrow when I have to wake up early again... but we'll tackle that when the time is right.

I had a pretty uneventful day today; once I got up I meandered around the apartment... I think I did somoe dishes... made lunch... and then had to work on lesson plans.

I struggled with this a lot today, and I'm not sure why. I've taught public speaking before, but coming up with what to teach was really difficult! I have a suspicion that part of the difficulty had to do with my not being busy or overwhelmed yet. This was the only job I had to get done today, and I had a lot of time to do it, so I thought a little too hard about it. I think when I'm busier, and have a more intimidating to-do list, my brain works in hyperdrive, and I'm just super efficient.

At least I freakin' hope so... or this year is going to suck like WOAH.

I did two lesson plans today; one for the first day of class (which I hate) and one for the day we teach Informative Speaking (which I like). Everyone in my cohort was assigned a day to do lesson plans, and tomorrow afternoon we each present part of our lesson plan and then share notes, so in theory we'll all have the first third of the semester all planned out before school even starts. I think this is a WONDERFUL idea, because it gives me some wiggle room once classes start. It's a lot easier to make minor modifications to an already-made lesson plan than it is to start from scratch, so a lot of work will be done for me after tomorrow. I can definitely live with that.

Friendship Is Best Served With Lots Of Booze

So... it looks like I forgot to jump on here for a couple days. I'm not going to try to remember 4 days worth of blog material... so this is the best I can do. This is what I would have wrote yesterday (Saturday, August 18th).

***

Today was a great day. Being Saturday, I allowed myself to sleep in... which meant Pickles (my kitty) and I didn't get out of bed until 12:30 this afternoon.

My life is SO hard. :P

I made some lunch (I don't think I'll ever get sick of venison summer sausage sandwiches!), and then drove into town to swap out my smart phone for another smart phone. Here's the backstory:

I had ordered an HTC Rhyme through Verizon online for a number of reasons: 1) the phone I had was over 3 years old and a piece of crap; 2) I got no service in my apartment with said piece-of-crap phone; 3) I am already paying for a data plan in order to get wireless internets for my computer, so I might as well have a phone that can share the same data plan; and 4) I really wanted a smart phone to be able to check my calendar everywhere I am. Anywho... so this phone that I got was AH-MAY-ZING! I loved everything about it... except that I still couldn't get reception in my apartment... which was the biggest reason I upgraded in the first place. I went to the Verizon store in town and asked about it, and apparently HTC is known for getting the worst reception. Too bad the online reviews didn't mention that. So today I went in to upgrade (again) to the iPhone. I didn't think I'd like it, but I love it. The system is simpler than android, but does everything that I need it to... so I'm pleased. Plus, I can talk on the phone upstairs and not get cut off! The basement is a different story... but beggers can't be choosers in Athens, OH.

Sorry for the phone rant. Anywho... after taking care of that, I met up with some of my cohort (classmates) at Casa Nueva (which I love). One of our faculty members and a 4th year doc student play in a local band, and they were performing at Casa tonight, so I figured it would be a fun way to unwind from a week of orientation and still get involved with the department. I was right. :) It was fun.

Afterwards, Andrea (classmate) and I went to Val's (classmate) house just to hang out... and I was immediately jealous of her place. It was gorgeous! A beautiful 2-story, 2-bedroom, 2.5-bath house with a 1-car garage and stellar features. Now I just need to find a roommate to split the $1000 rent bill, and I know where I want to live next year! Once we got there, we had some drinks, munched a little, and pretty much just gossipped about our lives and attractive celebrities. Then we went home.

Moral of the story: friendship. :)

Birthdays Are The Best

I think this might be the first (or one of the first) times I've posted a blog about the current day. Hooray!

Today was just another day of orientation. Panels, discussion, questions, etc. My Outlook crapped out on me again, but I think I fixed it for good this time. Cross your fingers.

In other news, we went out to this place called Jackie O's. It's a pub/brewery place about a block from my office, and it's becoming my favorite place to go out. For one thing, they have deep-fried pickles. So good. Also... Val and I were each able to get 2 long islands for $7. :) It's good to know that I'll be able to exercise my liver without going bankrupt here!

A few of us went to Jackie O's for Val's birthday tonight, which was fun. It's been kinda interesting to see how we all seem to click and socialize so easily after having been together for such a short amount of time. I always hate having to meet new people and figure out how they interact and how I'm supposed to navigate conversations with them, but I think this group has been the easiest to do that with. :) It's kind of wonderful, because so far I feel like I haven't had to try too hard here. I'm sure that will change very quickly... but for now it's nice to be able to just kinda fit in to a place and group without it being too taxing.

Cheers!

Sometimes A Lot Of Good Information Can Hurt You

I swear one of these days I'll get into a routine where I write about the day at the end of that day. As it stands... here is another retroactive post about what happened yesterday.

***

Nothing really new to report today. Orientation was what it was. I talked to my mom on the phone today about how all the panels we have coming in to talk to us during orientation have kind of shaken my confidence in teaching Public Speaking. I'm kind of over it now... after hashing it out I'm in a good zen place. But here was my thought process:

I taught Public Speaking for two semesters, which by no means makes me an expert... but all the panels we've had during orientation kind of bombarded me with ideas. Of course, since I assume that everyone presenting has more teaching experience than I do, I just automatically deduce that their ideas are better than what I've done, and I start to second-guess my own experiences. It took me a little moment of self-reflection (I think we call it reflexivity when we want to be smart about it) to realize that all the great ideas I've been presented with don't negate the awesomeness of my own ideas.

I know... it's not rocket science. But we're all our own worst critic, right? I just had to work through some things.

In other news, I went to the grocery store (we have a Kroger) for the first time since moving here. I thought it was odd that when I walked into the store, it seemed... darker than I would have expected. At first I assumed this was some kind of weird hippie thing related to conserving energy and whatnot (apparently Athens has a lot of hippies), but it wasn't until I reached the frozen food section and saw the yellow crime-scene caution tape roped through the freezer handles that I realized there must have been some kind of weird power outage. I didn't think much of it, since Athens was hit with a pretty bad power outage during the freak storms this summer, but I had to admit that I found it incredibly hilarious when they announced over the intercom that theyr rotisserie chickens were now 1/2 off. :) Capitalism at its finest: our chicken might not be warm anymore, but we'll only charge you half the cost to make sure we still get money for it!

I can only imagine what I'll see in 4 more years. :P

Computer Trouble Might Be The Death Of Me

Oops... another late post. This is my life... yesterday. :P

***

I swear to the goddess that Microsoft Outlook wants me to die.

So... I got a new computer before I moved to Athens, because I wasn't sure the one I had would survive my PhD program. Anywho, I needed to get myself a copy of Microsoft Office because, let's face it, I would die without it. Especially Outlook - without that calendar, I don't think I'd function.

So I get my software (super cheap, too - ALWAYS buy from your school Tech depot, you get CRAZY discounts!) and install it, and I'm pretty sure I set up my Outlook correctly (I mean, I'm not an idiot), and of course I was wrong. So after getting out of orientation at 4, I spent between 3-4 hours in my stupid office trying to get my stupid software to sync with my email/calendar, and I couldn't do it from home because my stupid internet there is too stupid slow. Ugh.

Anyways... I got it all figured out, and all is well... but if this is the trouble I'm having already, I'm concerned for how I'll make it through the next 4 years of grad school. :\

Don't Let Your Liver Take A Break

Aaand... again, had I remembered to write yesterday, this is what I would have said. :)

***

Remember that time I used to be able to process alcohol through my system at a respectable rate? Yeah... pretty sure that was back when I was an undergrad. I don't really remember how many drinks I had last night during that whole awful-date-turned-fun-hangout-with-new-friend escapade, but I didn't think I had that many. Turns out, I should have just taken my self-prescribed hangover medication (3 ibuprofen tabs + 1 glass of water) instead of just assuming I'd be fine.

My head hurt me until 2:30 this afternoon... which sounds less severe once you find out that I slept unitl 12:30. :P I didn't have much reason to get out of bed, and I figured today was one of the last chances I had to sleep in before my life took over again, so I took the opportunity. Once my nausea subsided enough for me to choke down some ibuprofen and some chicken nuggets (my new favorite hangover food, by the way), though, I felt pretty good. There's nothing some fake chicken and Vampire Diaries won't cure!

I think there are some really important lessons to be learned through all this. 1) ALWAYS take the hangover prescription (unless you have some medical reason not to take ibuprofen... that could be bad). 2) Don't give your liver a break. EVER. It will just give you the middle finger when you need it to work again.

I'm glad I figured this out now, though. It means that I need to regularly exercise my organs to make sure that when I DO need a night with some friendly spirits, I don't pay for it too dearly the next day. :) Lesson #1 of doc school.