Blood Sweat and Tears

Last time I wrote seems so long ago. Sometimes, I don't even know where to begin.

I'll start with most recent happenings. Today was T-day. I've been preparing for an exam now for over two weeks. Strategically, I mapped out my time and diligently clarified notes for my open book exam. Please don't presume this test is easy though just because I have access to resources. As a matter of fact, it makes it a challenge in my opinion. Thumbing through notes, books, old notes, old books, searching for a formula , an answer or sign from God becomes exhausting . White noise of fanning pages infiltrated the room and comforted me, I wasn't the only one searching for answers. For two and a half hours my thought process went something like this...

I can do this, I'm prepared, crap, why did he ask this as the first question...seriously, ok, skip, next, skip, its ok, you'll come back, alright, listen to the pages turn, i'm glad everyone else is using their notes, oh i know this, yes, this is good, i know what i'm doing, yep look at me, look at this, i'm so glad i studied so, wait, those aren't the right degrees of freedom and oh crap, i used that number for the last three problems, at least i caught this, i hope i'm making the right correction, you're always supposed to go with your gut, but i'm pretty certain this is wrong, show work, at least get partial credit, i think this is in my notes, (flip pages) crap! PAPER CUT! now i'm bleeding all over my test, i don't have tissues, good grief, ok, forget about it, move on, ok, choices A-H, no measly 4 choices, no sir, this is the big league, 8 choices, this one is closest, ok, good, i still have two hours to go! my finger continues to bleed, this is a really deep cut! how embarrassing, agh. this is hard, we never really did this in class, i'm presuming this is what i'm supposed to do, what am i doing here? everyone else is smarter than i am, i'm going to have to retake this class, no i'm not, you are doing fine, you will be ok,

And that was just a synopsis of the second assessment of the day. The first was my "hard class." Of course, we weren't informed about this quiz until two days ago. I had planned to do some hard-core studying to catch up this weekend, but nope, the profs had other plans. SO, I gathered a friend who, shall I say, is a "peer" of mine in the course and another friend, who should be teaching the class, for a crash course in beta binomial something somethings... I really had little clue going into the quiz.

When I left Colorado, some coworkers called me "Dr." before I left, I told them they couldn't call me that because I would have to experience a lot of "blood, sweat and tears" before I'd earn that title. However, during my first year, I always thought the "blood, sweat and tears" were metaphorical, you know, a lot of hard work. This year though... Tears? Check. Blood? Check. Sweat? I'm still keeping my cool.