Time You Enjoy Wasting Is Not Wasted Time

A student talking to another student: Well, half paying attention while texting is better than sleeping through class. I don’t know what his (*I’m assuming the student’s professor*) problem is anyway.

Apparently just paying attention in class was not an option…..

Before 9/11 became known to the world it held a more personal and happier note to Karen and I. 12 years ago on a Wednesday night on a chilly September 11 was our very first date.

I love you Karen!!!!

(In the picture with Karen and I are my best friend Wil and his wife Jessica from when they visited last Christmas. Hi Wil and Jess, we miss you! That’s how far back I had to go to find a picture with both Karen and I in it. It seems like one of us is always taking the picture, so we are hardly ever in pictures together… )

Personally, that day was a very scary one. I was at work when it happened and one of the guys I worked with was checking a news website when reports of the first plane hit. Soon the report came about the second plane and everyone knew it wasn’t a freak accident. At one point our office manager put her husband on speaker phone so we could hear the news report he was listening to so we could know what was going on.

I remember being panicked because I knew my Dad, Mom, and StepDad were all in the city. I knew my Dad was planning on being at or near the towers (I think he was there the day before) and it turns out my Mom was scheduled for a meeting in one of the towers on the 12th. Creepy. I didn’t know that though. So I am trying to call them frantically, wanting to know if parts of my family were trapped or dead or alive. Eventually I heard from everyone. The waiting was very very nerve-wracking though. Luckily my Mom and Dad weren’t even in the city that day. Unfortunately my StepDad was, his office is very close to the towers. So although he wasn’t injured, he was one of the people who had to walk through the noxious air and deal with the horror first hand. I can’t imagine what that must be like.

It makes me mad when politicians use a horrible event like this as an excuse to do the inexcusable. And it is even worse when they continue to peddle fear and hate to this very day. I believe that is the biggest disrespect to those who lost loved ones on that frightful day.

see Sarah Palin pictures

There have been a few firsts in the past few days that I haven’t mentioned. Gillian had her first day of Pre-K on Friday. Today was her first day to ride the school bus. Isabella had her first class at her new dance studio. Tonight was the official start date of my graduate classes.

Gilli is loving Pre-K! She has the same teachers that Bella did, and is making new friends. I asked her how she liked riding the bus and she said it was “bumpy”.

Bella loves dance, so I’m glad we found a new studio for her to go to. She had a fun time and knew someone in her class.

My classes are all online and I have been able to access them since last Monday, so although today is my first official day I have already been getting things ready. Being organized is essential to fitting my readings and assignments into my nights. I read through all of the mini-lectures for one class and will start on the chapters from my books tomorrow night. So far I am loving my classes (I am taking two). One initially seems a lot harder than the other, but it’s too early to really tell.

more animals

Overheard in the halls:

Student 1: What do you think about the reading assignment?

Student 2: Reading?!? I don’t read!!

So today is Labor Day, “a day off for the working citizens” or the unofficial end of summer. Karen, the girls, and I went to the Crossroads Market on our day off.

I was reading an interesting post on the Get Rich Slowly blog where the author was recounting Every Job I’ve Ever Had and I thought that could be fun. So here I go (I am going to include volunteer work too, since that is work even if there is no pay – I’ll indicate volunteer work with a (V)):

• Assistant Stage Manager, Hello Dolly (Community Theatre, is it really bad that I can’t remember the name of the community or the theatre just that it was in New Jersey?) (V): This was a lot of work, and my first non-school related gig. It made me really want to pursue technical theatre as a possible career.
• Assistant, Staten Island Children’s Museum (V): I worked in various areas, but my favorite was the broadcasting section where the kids could produce a news cast with the weather report and everything.
• Assistant, Children’s Science Program (V): One of my science teachers in high school did a workshop on Saturdays for kids where we did all kinds of fun science projects.
• Environmental Research (V): That same science teacher helped me become interested in the environment. We would go out regularly to take measurements to track the population of the Blue Herons on Staten Island.
• Night Desk Attendant: My first paid job in college. Signing people into the dorm since the doors are all locked over night. I had the 3-7 AM shift, so I didn’t sign too many people in or out. However, I did have to disarm the alarm and unlock all of the external doors. Disarming the alarm wasn’t a simple on/off you had to turn a key in just the right fashion, which is probably easy when you aren’t about to fall asleep. There was many a time I accidentally set the alarm off. Luckily I was usually able to shut it off pretty quickly.
• Dish Washer/Sandwich Preparer, FSA: I had a couple of shifts where I worked the dish room. Loading a giant dishwasher and emptying garbage cans. Hey it’s work. My other shifts were spent making sandwiches. Nothing too intricate although I got in trouble often for putting too much meat on the sandwiches.
• Mathematics/Computer Science Tutor, The Learning Center: My first “knowledge-worker” job. In addition to group tutoring I also did individual tutoring.
• House Painter, College Pro: Believe it or not this was a very enjoyable job. It was a nice feeling to have a physical completed result at the end of the job. I guess I was pretty good at it too, since more often than not I wound up on the clean up crew, where we would fix the mistakes of the previous crew.
• Computer Technician, Performance PC: My first “career” job. I spent five years at this job, learning a lot about computers and customer service. It was a great experience leading up to:
• Instructional Support Technician, Academic Information Technology, Help Desk: My current position. I love it here. My worst day at work is still better than most other days at my previous jobs. I maintain seven labs, five servers, and several campus-wide programs/services among other things. It’s a very interesting job, never a dull moment.