What could be worse than Walmart?

Most know I am not a fan of Wal-mart. As an old professor once quipped, it makes me fell like I am part of the world's problems. While in Denver I avoided it, save the annual trip to make a last minute lab purchase before school started in the morning--balloons, rubbing alcohol, string, that sort of list only a science teacher can appreciate. Aside from the few odds and ends I'd need to purchase for the classroom, I avoided it like I avoid McDonalds.

I've been posed with a dilemma. I hate Walmart, but it is only five minutes from my apartment. Time is really a commodity in grad school and I don't have the time to travel to Target or K-mart. I want to support my local store owners, but I'm a grad student and the budget allows for little wiggle room. I hate Walmart, but I admit, I shop there on occasion.

Last year, I was disappointed by my local eye doctor, he was insensitive and tried to sell me services I didn't need and then charged me a ridiculous price for a contact fitting. I swore I wouldn't go back. My eyes are not bad, I just need the annual check up and so... guess who has an optical center.

I had to go back today for a follow-up on my contacts and to get my eyes dilated. The thought of this made me burst out laughing in the car this morning. Not only was I going to a place I hate, a place that makes me feel like I'm part of the world's problems, I was going to endure the chaos with dilated eyes! How do I do this to myself?

After the dilation I had to wait. A friendly man with thick gold chain and chest hair approached me smiled and complained that there wasn't even coffee around. My eyes felt like they had been glazed with Elmer's glue and I didn't want to talk to anyone. I wanted to say, look around, this is not Starbucks! But I knew he was just trying to be friendly, I smiled and nodded. For the record, everything is dandy with my eyes.

I forgot my sunglasses in my car and so I left the store to be blinded by the only sunny day we've had in a week. To Walmart's defense, they did offer me some fashionable glasses that resembled 3D punch-out glassess one might find in a Happy Meal. I declined and opted for the vampire-blocking-the-sun look.

Somehow it is legal to drive with your eyes dilated and so I actually headed to the grocery store where I became that weird woman who shops with her sunglasses on. I'm now at home typing and doing laundry...sporting my sunglasses. This day is so bright...I gotta wear shades.

Mid-way

The mid-term came and went uneventfully. The "five hour" take home exam was humbling. When classmates ask how it went I reply, "It is probably an accurate measure of what I learned in the class." Which implies, "I left a lot blank." It is doubtful that I will fail, afterall, no one has had to retake it and I'm sure I'm not the only one with poor achievement in this class. Besides, I calculated my credits and I am sitting pretty if I really need to take it again. Besides, I'm supposed to comp in this class (Hahahaha!) and I figured I might be sitting in on it again next Fall anyway.

But it is done. That is all that really matters, and what actually matters more is that I have a dear friend to cook dinner for me tonight and celebrate a milestone of the program.

Mid-terms

A week from tomorrow is the midterm exam in my challenging class. At this point all of my understandings of the concepts are riddled with misconceptions or shaky at best. What is most frustrating is that this class has consumed my life. This weekend consisted of studying. Today...studying. I am becoming resentful of this class. I've attended office hours, I've asked questions of veteran grad students, I've done the practice test and still feel shaky. The only consolation I have is knowing that others feel the same way and that there is still time. If I don't do well, it isn't because I was lazy.

TGIF

Tuesday morning I woke up at 5:00A.M. and wondered how I was really going to get everything done. This has been one of those weeks that pushed my limits and showed me what I am and am not capable of. Let me recap what has happened in the last week.

Read a 300 page book cover to cover and wrote a summary paper about it
Wrote and submitted two proposals for two different conferences
Studied for and took a 2.5 hour stats test
Tutored intermediate stats for four hours
Worked
Studied for my hard class for five hours in one day (this was approximately one weeks worth of material)
Attended a First Day School Meeting
Attended an R workshop

Thursday night came and I completed my stats test at 9:30 at night. (It was no surprise to me that I missed the last two...I was exhausted) Afterword, I came home and didn't really know what to do with myself. I had plenty I COULD do, but nothing I needed to do. The inertia of this past week and those leading up to it were hard to overcome. I felt restless and anxious, like I was wasting valuable time by relaxing...which I am fairly certain is a sign that one NEEDS to relax. Today helped.

I went out to lunch with a friend from the program. We bemoaned the test, gripped about work, aired our insecurities and reminded each other that we have strengths that are not accentuated by our classes. I am thankful for this conversation. It is as if talking about grades, failings and disappointments is taboo in grad school. This silence leads to further insecurities because you perceive you are the only one struggling, the only one "not getting it." But when you start talking candidly, you realize everyone is insecure, everyone struggles with something. It reveals truths about the limits of human ability, the desire for a balanced life and an awareness of knowing when enough is enough. Those conversations reveal truths and those truths help ameliorate the feelings of inadequacy. I'm pretty certain everyone feels inadequate at something here, and if not, they are super-human... or lying.

What I Learned

For a policy class I am taking, I have to read Sources of Power by... I don't remember and I'm too lazy to go look. But I learned something new, something that, for better or worse, expanded my world. I've always been interested in intuition and feel that I have a strong intuition about certain people, decisions or events. As it turns out, the book suggests intuition is an emotional response, not a "sixth sense" as people often like to attribute it to. It is an emotional response to the consequences of good or bad choices.

morning calisthenics

My hard class is still hard. Much to my chagrin, I started making note cards to help me learn/ review/ memorize. My wonderful friend, whom deserves the Gold Star Friend Award (there are several of you who deserve this award) volunteered to listen to me talk through my flash cards as we walked to school today. Not only did she volunteer to do it, it was her idea. Bless her heart! What kind of an amazing friend actually says, "You know if you just want to talk through things on our walk, you can totally do that, I'll listen." An amazing one. Not only did she listen, she asked questions. Not once did she seem bored to learn about covariance, correlations or reliability!

Funny thing was, when we both sat in statistics this morning we were both at the top of our game. It was as if our academic walk in primed us for the day. Our minds had performed morning calisthenics and we were tracking through the entire class. I don't know if J- is such a good friend as to let me ramble about theory every morning on our way to school, but it helped and I am thankful for friends who listen (even to seemingly boring crap I'm trying to learn.)

Lecture

Professor:
Why would you choose an alpha level of .5? You might as well flip a coin to reject your hypothesis.

Class: [Chuckles]

Wow...that was nerdy.