~New(er) Technologies~

Going to school and juggling studies in multiple different places with flash drives, email, and other means of saving my research and information to continue to work on later, proved to be a frustrating and difficult means of production.

I toted my (huge) laptop around in a (huge) rolling briefcase type roller bag that ended up being cumbersome at best, in order to keep up with my homework and research papers and the like.

I broke down and bought an iPad, but I did it in a really cool and convenient way.

Scottsdale Healthcare has a program that after being employed for a year, based on your gross pay, you can purchase items through them without interest and pay for it through payroll deduction over a year. It proved to be an option that we felt we could handle so we did it.  I have to say, it's been one of the best purchases, ever.

Yesterday Josh let me go find a keyboard/case so that I can type (I'm WAY faster at typing than the 'hunt and peck' method) and it's been the second best purchase, ever.  I'm currently in Apple heaven.

This begs a propositional question, I'm up for an renewal of my phone. iPhone or Samsung III... that is the question.

What are your thoughts?


 

~Summer School~

Most of you have heard me stressing out or posting random blurbs during my summer school adventure and I wanted to kind of explain myself a little... maybe you would understand why I am so STINKIN' HAPPY that I survived!!

About my summer school adventure...

I have never taken summer school before. Ever.  Being a newbie, I scheduled a normal load of classes, in the shorter amount of time, without even considering any other reasons why it wouldn't be a good idea.  I thought it was what I should do and wanted to take full advantage of moving my schedule around and having Monday through Thursday off to do it all.  I took a math class (for 5 weeks), anatomy and physiology (for 8 weeks) and a pharmacology class (for 8 weeks).  When I started, it seemed doable... until my biology class took ALL of my time to do.  I was so frustrated with myself because my other 2 classes were on the back burner, and all I could do is stay in the game.  I did ok in my math, not as good as I could have, and my pharmacology mid term was a whopping 66%.  Thankfully I had like a 99.6% going into the mid-term. 

After the first 5 weeks, my math class finished and my chemistry class started (another 5 week class).  I found that while trying to juggle a new class and facing finals in my 2 other classes, all I could focus on was staying above the grade in bio and worry about chemistry later.  I considered dropping it but decided that I wasn't a failure and that to me was taking the easy way out. Then my first chem test score was a 68%!!  Unfortunately, at this point, I could no longer drop the class without paying for it as well.  I had no time to study anything other than my biology and certainly had no time for the chemistry class. 


Today is a good day!  I just received my biology final grade and was pleasantly surprised that I maintained my grade.  Well, I struggled at first and brought it up but thankfully, it didn't drop any further after the middle of the semester.

I'm happy to say that all in all, my math, pharmacology, and A&P classes all have B's, and I'm currently at an A in chemistry!

Hard work and perseverance (as well as an incredibly supportive husband and family) REALLY pays off!!
  
Note to self: Never, ever, ever, EVER take summer classes like that, AGAIN!!