School is Cool

Today was it was about as hot as it gets in the East Bay, which is around 90 degrees. I’m spoiled by the weather the rest of the year in Oakland (I strongly believe that 75 degrees is the warmest it can get while still being civilized) and I abhor turning on the AC in my car. It’s actually a continuous source of marital strife, believe it or not.

In the midst of this sticky, three-shower day, I met up with my strategic planning group for my Information Organizations and Management class at a cute cafe in Alameda with a patio out back. This was our fourth in-person meeting, and turned out to be a nearly three-hour session to wrap up our 28-page plan and 24-slide Power Point. Luckily we are all on the same page, so to speak, when it comes to being anal retentive about formatting, so none of us minded going through both documents, page by page, aligning bullet points and making sure punctuation was consistent. This must be a common trait among future librarians, because I run across this kind of manic perfectionism a lot in my fellow classmates. We’re not snobs; we just prefer to be correct.

Now that we’ve turned in our strategic plan and I’ve presented on my research paper for another class, it’s smooth sailing for the last few weeks of the semester. I have a twelve-page final for my Info Retrieval class, but that kind of thing is just a matter of doing the reading and coming up with some thoughts about it. I have to finish my 20-page research paper, but luckily I was so freaked out about preparing for the oral presentation aspect of it that I’ve practically written the entire thing already. After that I have one more eight-page paper, and I’m done with my first semester of library school! I’m looking forward to learning some Perl this summer in my Advanced Information Tools class. We’ll see if this English major has a tech side.

I was a little pissed at first that I could only register for one class this summer (due to budget issues, they are offering very few classes). However, I realized that this will be the first summer in FOREVER that Ted and I have both had ‘off.’ After my friend Anna’s wedding in July I’ll be joining Ted in Montana for a few weeks. Hopefully we’ll get to take the dogs on a backpacking trip. Maude’s already got one of these, and she’s dying to pack it with kibble:

At the very least, we’ll have to use it on a hike in one of the many unbelievably scenic locations minutes from my in-laws’ home. Yes, due to unemployment, this will be a ‘real’ summer for me, almost like the early teenage summers before I started working summer jobs. I plan to read, possibly get my old video camera back in commission and make some movies, and get in amazing shape. Hopefully in Montana I can trade my hand weights in for hikes, swimming, backpacking and trail running.

Pretty Much a Full-Time Student

Apparently there was a meeting at work yesterday (I only go in Tuesdays/Thursdays, and it was unnanounced, so I missed it) where some recent events affecting the company were discussed, and my boss essentially said he had no idea when/if funding would come through.  December 15th was our last regular paycheck, and we’ve been paid once since then.  So yeah, we haven’t been paid in a long while, and we probably won’t be paid in the foreseeable future.  Why we haven’t all been fired (why ANY of us haven’t been fired) and instead made to suffer a long slow death of halved pay followed by missing paychecks, is a question I often ponder.  Certainly enough of my co-workers have taken the hint and found employment elsewhere. I should probably go ahead and file for unemployment, as I’m effectively jobless.

The good part is, I can focus a lot of time on school work, which, in the fifth week of the program, is starting to become a major part of my life.  This weekend I have a group project and a six-page paper due, in addition to the billions of pages of reading and research I ought to catch up on.  The good news is, I am totally into it.  One of my assignments had me visiting two different libraries to compare services, facilities, etc.  Since I’ve started this program, every time I visit a library, I am reminded of how much I love libraries and how excited I am by the idea of working in one.  Now if I could just find a part-time library job while I’m in school… Eh, who am I kidding… I’m just crossing my fingers that the petsitting gig I applied for comes through.

Online Learning, Here I Come

I logged in to my San Jose State account this morning and noticed that I’ve been accepted to their Library and Information Science Program! It’s an online course through a state university, so it’s not exactly like being accepted to Princeton (my dad actually asked me if “the Ivies” offer any library programs), but I am happy nonetheless because this means I can start planning for January. I must’ve created some good karma when I went to the Oakland Public Library yesterday and paid off all my late fees from last summer

One Decision Made

I did it!  I actually completed an application for graduate school.  Now I can (almost) join the ranks of my friends, ALL of whom seem to be back in school at this point studying law, education, English, psychology, business, nursing… the list goes on.  As a matter of fact, I can only think of one close friend who is not currently in school.  When I told her my plans, she was happy for me but immediately said she was jealous. HA!  I certainly know how that works.  I’ve spent the last two years wondering how my friends ever decided on anything, and wishing I had their focus and resolve.  I’ve taken a class in interior design, and started applications for grad programs in English, urban planning, and education, and never finished them.  I’ve had sudden revelations and then dismissed them because of detracting information.

If all goes well, I’ll be taking between one and three classes this spring, depending on my employment status.  You see, I work at a startup, and that’s a dicey place to be in a time like this.  But now if I get laid off (and I hope I don’t, because it’s a great company with awesome people and I wish it HUGE success) I will have an alternate plan.  I can try to find a part-time job and take classes full-time.  I can get on my husband’s health insurance plan (one of the first tangible assets of being married!) and we can borrow a bit from ourselves to invest in my education.

Waawooweeewooo!!!! I haven’t felt this good about my career situation in a long, long time.  I’m fully accepting the possibilty that I’ll take a few classes and decide it isn’t for me.  Even so, each experience takes me closer to the final goal (or the next goal, I should say).  It’s like dating – the more you do it, the more you know what you want