Back to School Special

How’s it going? It’s been a very, very busy week for me. I’m already pretty desperate for the weekend, but it seems to still be several days away. Funny, that. I figure the last thing someone wants to read about is a laundry list of the things a person does in the day, but for some reason I’m compelled to write about it. So, without further ado, here’s a little glimpse of how a day in the life of me typically goes:

I try to get up at 5:30am every day. Sometimes it’s just like magic. I wake up a few minutes before my alarm goes off, stretch out my legs a little bit (I seem to have a nagging bout of plantar fasciitis — or some other such stiffness of the arches), and just lay there, slowly waking up. Then my phone goes off (I’ve been using this as my alarm for the past several months — much more pleasant awakening than the raging, incessant scream that most alarm clocks put out these days), I sit up and take a big swallow of water (supposedly this wakes up your insides — seems to work for me) and away I go.

Next it’s time to exercise. I’ve recently begun down a path towards total wellness. I’m not exactly sure what incited this change in me, but I seem to be driven to get on track toward being healthy — not the least of which means being physically fit and eating right. I started out with a yoga DVD and have since progressed to a more intense workout DVD (more on this stuff in a future post). I spend 30 minutes to 1 hour exercising as soon as I get up, 6 days a week.

Once that’s out of the way, it’s time to fuel up for the day with a healthy breakfast. For the past couple of weeks my breakfast of choice has been homemade breakfast burritos (follow the link for more info). After my workout, I put one of these babies in the microwave and enjoy a tasty, protein-packed breakfast (much needed after the workout). I typically have this with a cup (~8oz) of orange juice and a cup of milk, sometimes a banana also. This gets my day off on the right foot, I think.

After showering and getting dressed, it’s off to work for 9 hours. I won’t go into the details of my job, but suffice it to say, I’m going to college for good reason: I’m not exactly thrilled with my work. I don’t think it’s beneath me in the slightest, but I do think at least 80% of the time I find it boring, unchallenging, and unfulfilling. I suppose most people can relate. :)

School is back in session now, so my day doesn’t end there. I’m currently dual-enrolled at a local community college and a large, further away university (as a distance student). Here’s how that plays out:

• On Monday nights I have a physical speech class (Intro to Communication) for 3 hours. Needless to say, I’m terrified of this course. I’ve never been terribly outgoing or personable right off the bat (though I’m finding this has changed drastically in recent years for a plethora of reasons), and the thought of standing in front of a room of 20 people with all eyes on me as my knees knock and voice quivers doesn’t exactly sound like a night of fun. However, I want to excel in this course — I’m bound and determined to — and so I’m rewiring some circuits in my brain and doing everything I can to ensure an ‘A’.
• The rest of my evenings are “free”, insomuch as I don’t have to go to school, but I am enrolled in 3 more online courses:
  1. Philosophy: I really enjoy this course, but it’s terribly heavy time-wise due to vast amounts of reading and writing. I enjoy both, so naturally I enjoy the course — I just wish it weren’t quite so time intensive (there’s so many other things I want to read and write about). It’s great stuff, though, and obviously quite thought-provoking.
  2. Pre-Calculus II: I have enrolled and withdrawn from this course so many times it’s not funny. I enjoy math, and I’m pretty good at it, I just have a hell of time getting motivated to do it. This is my last chance to finish this course (I also must finish Calculus with Analytic Geometry in the Spring if I hope to graduate then).
  3. Discrete Mathematics: Yes… another math course. This is my university course for this semester. I don’t know a terrible amount about it, just that it mainly deals in Computer Science related areas (logic and sets and such).

As if that weren’t enough, I still have chores to do when I’m finished. Yesterday, I didn’t complete anything school-wise. After work, I had to pick up some food for our kitties, which meant driving about 20min to the only pet store in the area that caries the food we chose for them (Natural Balance). After that, I had to run by the school to get the books I paid cash for flipped over on to my financial aid bill. Once I got home, I had to mow the yard, which had somehow turned into a forest of dense jungle overnight. Around 8:30-ish, just as it was getting dark, I finished up the mowing and came in to make dinner (my first attempt at preparing — and eating — veggie burgers ; they were quite good). I think it was about 9:45pm when we actually sat down to eat.

So, when 10pm rolled around, I pretty much collapsed into a pile of human flesh and bone on my bed and instantly fell asleep — zero school work or pleasurable reading completed. Days like this are pretty exhausting. It’s a good thing I get the exercise out of the way early on, because I would never have the time or energy to do so later in the day (I may prattle on about the benefits of early rising in a future article).

Despite the hardships, I’m a happy person — happier than I’ve ever been. After all of the work of the day has been done, I go to sleep looking forward: planning for tomorrow, today. 5:30am rolls around again, and I rise to the occasion once more. :)

- Drew