Category: School

Humor, Husband, Life, School, Work

Praise Jupiter, Odin, and Quetzalcoatl!

“If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.”
– Woody Allen

Oh, C., you and your plans! So droll!

Ever feel like God/the Universe/Fate/Whatever is doing that thing when you make plans and They laugh at you?  Well, recently it’s felt like God/the Universe/Fate/Whatever has been having a benevolent but enthusiastic chuckle at our expense.  Plans that we make, good plans, solid plans, with all necessary effort behind them to accomplish them, have just…not been happening.

Not to sound vain, but this is really the first time in my life that I’ve come up against so many game-changers (not counting my university’s Football team).  I don’t know if that means I’ve been extremely clever, extremely lucky, or more than extremely pig-headed about getting what I plan on…but likely some combination of the latter two.

But I digress.  Yesterday, the God/the Universe/Fate/Whatever decided that It had had enough of yanking our chains and allowed our hard work and single minded effort to pay off.  Wiping the last of laughter tears from Its eyes, It gave a last little sigh of amusement and waved Its finger benevolently at us.

J. has an internship!

Granted it’s not the one we’d thought he’d have, but that’s not a bad thing.  If he’d gotten the one we originally wanted, he’d have been shipped off somewhere for 6-8 weeks and I’d have stayed behind holding down the home front.  Perfectly doable, but not at all fun (and the amount of Netflix I’d have consumed would have been perfectly shocking by any standards).  But now he’s got an internship with a Fortune 500 company, local, that pays very  well, and adds additional sparkle to his resume.

Collective sigh of relief.

Humor, School, University, Work

In Which C. and J. Get Wined, Dined, and Lei-d

“We are each of an unsocial, taciturn disposition, unwilling to speak, unless we expect to say something that will amaze the whole room, and be handed down to posterity with all the eclat of a proverb.”
– Jane Austen

So, we are right in the middle of what could be arguably one of the most important weeks of our lives.  Certainly at least one of the most stressful for J..

He is interviewing for internships with the Big Four accounting firms this week, he also has two major tests, and tomorrow we’re flying out to California to celebrate the finalization of my brother and sister-in-law’s adoption of our little nephew.

Felt a bit like this, actually.

We went to Firm #1’s reception the other night and I had an interesting time.  Early in the evening the spouses of the interview candidates were shunted off to a different room, meaning that about 99% of the women there were removed.  We all filed into a conference room where a string of partner’s wives were sitting at the front, looking very like the parish’s women’s organization presidency.  And the whole hour continued very much in that vein, which was slightly uncomfortable for everyone concerned.

Then at dinner we were seated at an awkward table, people were either trying to say something extremely clever or were absolutely silent.  However J. got to meet and ask the interviewer some questions and all indications so far are that his interview went well.

ACCOUNTING!

Firm #2’s reception was last night and was luau themed.  Points for food and entertainment as they had Polynesian dancers and pyrotechnics.  There was much fewer awkward silences, and the women weren’t kicked out which was a huge plus as far as I was concerned.  This time we weren’t seated and got to jostle for position to meet with the representatives, again with the requisite attempts to be memorable.  J. interviewed with them this morning, also went well.

Firm #3’s reception is tonight but I will be cleaning our house and packing for California so I won’t be able to report on that, ducklings.

However, a few thoughts!  Last year when they first started recruiting overtures, we were introduced to The Swag.  Sweatshirts, bags, all manner of stationary.  This year Firm #1 gave us a canvas tote and an aluminum water bottle, as opposed to the rather cheapish, fall-apart-as-soon-as-look-at-it ones we got from Firm #2.  But!  Firm #2 pulled ahead when won a raffle prize at their reception, styled as a collapsible cooler, actually more like an over sized lunch box, and we also got real orchid leis as opposed to the cheap plastic kind you normally get at parties.  However due to sheer bitterness, they dropped below pre-reception rankings when the guy called after us won an iPad.  Firms #3 and #4 have only given pens, a shameful showing.

Humor, School, Weekend, Work

A New Week and…GAH!

“Alright, just stop panicking.”
“Who said anything about panicking?  This is still just the culture shock.”
– The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

Last week was a trial, kittens.  No question of it.  But J., perhaps sensing my deep inner need to hurt something, wisely diffused me by taking me out twice, once to my favorite restaurant and to see a movie (Easy A. Quite funny.  Go see it).  And so, having lost my initial hatred for humanity, I had very little choice but to be happy and content over the weekend.

This week is going to be much calmer and less interesting…

Oh wait.  J. has three interviews with Big Four firms, we have three business receptions to go to pre-interviews, he’s got two major tests, and we’re flying out to California to celebrate the adoption of our little nephew being finalized.  So, with the exception of that happy last item on the list, this week is going to largely impact the rest of our professional lives.  And of course, J. and I are both coming down with something.

Shut up.

*Breathes into paper bag*

Humor, School, University, Work

The Freshman’s Lot

“Of course there’s a lot of knowledge in universities: the freshman bring a little in, the seniors don’t take much away, so knowledge sort of accumulates.”
– Abbott Lawrence Lowell

It's alright, dears. This feeling of being overwhelmed is entirely normal. And here's a tip, it doesn't really ever go away.

I swear, every year the Freshmen get younger!  It’s orientation time/first week of school so herds of these infants are roaming across campus with dazed and confused looks on their faces, prodded along by overbearing parents.

These parents are walking their “children” (who are usually 18 and above) to classes, arguing that their little darlings should be able to park in the Provost’s parking space because it’s closer and widdle babykins can’t possibly be expected to walk all the way from the dorms to class, and if they are out of state, calling us in a state of panic because they their kids didn’t answer the phone when they called, and can we send out a search party now?!

We at the University Police department, hate such parents.  We hate even more explaining to them, that if their child has been robbed, accosted, or got a splinter, we actually have to work with the child (who again, is over 18) and not the parents themselves, as said child is a legal adult.  Ooh, they hate that.

All I’m saying is, my parents dropped me in middle America somewhere and bunked off to Belgium.  I got myself to school, into a dorm, registered for classes, text books and supplies , and off to classes in two days, requiring only a ride from Fairy from the airport to campus.

Family, Humor, Husband, School, University, Work

I Need a Weekend…

“It’s a sin to be tired.”
-Kate Moss

Round about finals, we all get a little loopy.  J.’s schedule affects me just as much as it does him because we only have one car so where one goes, the other must follow.  Meaning, that because J.’s exams start at 7am, guess who also gets to come into work an hour early?

The disruption to our sleep schedule means that C. becomes a walking zombie of ludicrousness.

Our flat hasn’t been cleaned in over a week, I reach a point of exhausted hysteria by 9pm every night, I can’t speak properly, the smallest and most basic tasks become incomprehensible, and I have a perma-migraine raging behind my right eye.

Pictured: J.'s friends Tim and Heidi. As seen by C. at 10pm.

But I knew I’d reached critical mass last night when driving home from my sister-in-law’s (Milly) bridal shower (her fiance spent his evening with the future-brothers-in-law and assorted children), J. was talking about his friends, “Tim and Heidi,” and I furrowed my brow in tired confusion.
“Wait?  Tim and Heidi?  As in Gunn and Klum?”

Sidenote: do they not (his friends, I mean) have the potentially most awesome Halloween costume?

Humor, School

Creative. Writing.

“And by the way, everything is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it and the imagination to improvise.  The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.”
– Slyvia Platt

I’m in a bit of a bind, darlings.  I signed up for a creative writing class this semester(after work hours so Chief can’t quash it) both to get me back into the school mindset and to make me start writing again.  I’ve lapsed of late, so I thought this would be a great way to spur me on a bit.  I got good and excited for the class and then I walked in on the first day and immediately realized Creative Writing was not going to be a comfortable class for me.

See, I want to be a writer.  Most of the (mostly freshman) class want to be creative. 

This is not the same thing at all.  When we shared what our favorite books are most of the class said Twilight (blech and sigh) or named a fantasy series of some type or another.  Then when we went around talking of what we wanted to do with our writing almost everyone said poetry, a couple said songwriting.  

Appropriately artistic and moody writer.

My teacher is a poet as well, but talking about “snow melting like a woman crying” and trying to bring “the magic and mysteries of the cosmos to the page” is not really…what I do.  He gave a long, rambling lecture about how he wants us to create art, ART (said in a rolling voice with a dramatic fist shake towards the skies), and that’s what he expects.  I immediately blanched.

Inappropriately chipper and fairly happy C.

Now, I think I may be a talented writer  but by no means do I think I’m a Great Writer (I’d paraphrase an evaluation of someone I heard once and say that I’m mediocre with flashes of brilliance).  Mostly I just like to tell a good story.  To be honest, I’d have to say that my sense of humor is probably what makes my writing at all readable, but I have a feeling that humor in this class would not go over well.  So, whilst I was floundering in this sea of doubt, my teacher volunteered me to write a piece for class this coming tuesday.  I have to submit it by email tonight to be ripped to bloody shreds by the rest of my artistic and suffering classmates in peer evaluation. 

Of course, I probably shouldn’t tease them so much because this assignment plunged me into a pit of despair and I wandered about in a pretty artistic slump of my own for a couple days as I was seized with Writer’s Block and whined about the lack of poetry in my soul.  Not that I’d ever want to write it, but that I’m shallow enough to want to impress my teacher.

Quick, someone tell me to suck it up and get to work!  I’ve been telling myself for three days but my inner wanna-be-writer is actually pretty fragile and seems to be ignoring me out of fear of scathing peer reviews.  Or the realization that I’m not actually any good.  Yikes.

Humor, Life, School, Snark, University, Work

Thwarted

“I don’t need to compromise my principles because they don’t have the slightest bearing on what happens to me anyway.”
– Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

Chief has squashed my plan of taking a class this coming semester to prep for grad school.  The reason given is that Wise (who is enrolled in the very program I’m after) has a lot more leeway to take classes since she doesn’t have a front desk position and work with the public as I do.  A decision that makes sense on paper, and which I can grudgingly understand…if it were not for the fact that several police officers and other supervisors for the department take classes very frequently, often for multiple semesters in a row (and shouldn’t police officers deal with the public just as much, if not more than me?).  AND if it were also not for the department history and manifesto I retyped and edited four days ago, containing an entire paragraph about how the department strongly encourages and accommodates the further education of its employees through university classes. 

Although I find the logic painfully baffling, I also understand that it’s an executive decision on the Chief’s part which, in all fairness, he did mull over for several days (before crushing it into tiny, tiny pieces).  And though I admit I wish I could throw my level-headed acceptance of this ruling out the window and throw a (mild) tantrum, that’s not really my style.

I prefer weaseling around the problem.  I’ve enrolled in some independent study courses and am looking into evening classes as well, which fall outside supervisor oversight.  It’s annoying to try to get into them at this late date, but I have at least three terms between now and when my application would be turned in so I have plenty of time to formulate a new plan of attack!

Small Dog is feeling, er...bulldogish.

I could switch departments (unlikely with the hiring freeze, but I won’t rule it out).  My French course, offered through independent study, could potentially count as my final language requirement and remove all obstacles.  I could say, “To Hades with it all!” and become a full-time student again (plunging us back into poverty, but only for a year or couple of semesters towards the end of J.s degree – very unlikely, but still possible depending on my level of desperation).  I could stage a coup and overthrow the school, take the president hostage, and demand he let me take my one single class (extremely unlikely). 

There are options, my darlings.

Drama, Humor, School, Stupid People, University, Work

Typical Thursday, Part I

 “Angry people are not always wise.”
-Jane Austen

A law student came into the office today, demanding more parking for graduate students.  With the new parking system, still not completely patched and just limping along, lots of students have been taking advantage of the absence of usual oversight by parking wherever they want: handicapped stalls, dean and administrator lots, etc.  Which means that when (and if) this new system starts functioning properly, a whole lot of people are in for a nasty surprise.  I forsee the university setting up a new scholarship fund out of the proceeds, but I digress.

We apologized for the inconvenience and said it should be corrected in a month, but that did no good.  As Lt. Figaro explained the policy regarding each of her complaints, she kept changing her argument and problem until she was eventually asking for us to build new parking, or take parking away from other people to give to graduate students.
“We already have about one parking space per three grad students and special lots for you,” Figaro said, wearily, “as opposed to one in five for the rest of our students.”
“But we need more!”

“Ma’am,” I said, “we have thousands of students currently attending, plus several thousand more faculty, staff, administrative, service personnel, and contractors who come to this school everyday.  Plus there is another university in the next city over.  This area was never meant to accomodate nearly XXX thousand extra people, city planning hasn’t kept up with it in the past two generations.  You’re asking us for space that we cannot give you, because it literally does not exist.”
“But I spent forty-five minutes circling that parking lot to find a space yesterday!”
“Well,” offered Figaro, “did you try parking at the basketball arena or football stadium and walking?”
She gasped in outrage, “All that way?!”

Drama, Humor, School, Stupid People, University, Work

The American School System Has Failed When…

“These are not spirit fingers.  These are spirit fingers!”
-Bring It On (one of them.  This franchise seems to be doing the Land Before Time thing…what number are we on now?)

Go TEAM! (Not our school, PS)
Go TEAM! (Not our school, PS)

A request for privileged parking came through to Red and the girls at parking (still muddling through a hopelessly ridiculous new system) written thus:
“I am a cheerleader and therefore require parking closer to campus.  Shouldn’t I be able to park in [names area reserved for administrators and faculty]?  It’s really important for me to be able to get to school easily.”

Diagnosis – left secondary education with tragically skewed self perception, grossly underdeveloped logic faculties, and gravitional-force-altering sense of self importance.  Good job tired cliches and cliques.

There’s a whole website devoted to such mayhem, here it is for your viewing pleasure!

Humor, School

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

“Sharks are as tough as those football fans who take off their shirts in Chicago in January, only more intelligent.”
-Dave Barry

funny-pictures-cat-interceptsHaving grown up in places where “football” meant something very different from it does here, as well as having parents that never really followed sports, meant I was unprepared for American Football when I came to the western United States for university.  Jane, my first roommate in the dorms, convinced me to by a student all season ticket so that I could go to the games with her, but I wasn’t thrilled at the prospect.
“It’s the stupidest concept,” I whined, “a bunch of guys get into lines and run into each other on purpose!  What’s the point?”
Nevertheless Jane painted my face, made me buy the appropriately colored tee shirt, and on game day we hiked to the university stadium.  Half an hour later I was screaming just as loudly as anyone else.

I’ll never be converted to the NFL (although I’ve developed a taste for Superbowl parties…or maybe just the snacks…) because I think that people who get paid obscene amounts of money to get a ball from Point A to Point B, the methods vary, have a severely warped sense of reality.  But I have grown to love collegiate sports for the rivalries, the solidarity, and the love of the game.

The only problem I have with my university’s football games is that my favorite coat is the color of our fiercest rivals.  So I do the logical thing.  Freeze.  I’m officially one of the faithful.