I haven't been a full-time student since the beginning of 2005. And fall 2003 was the last full-time semester that I actually, um, went to my classes regularly. And truly, I had forgotten how exhausting it is. Of course, the last time I was taking a full course load I wasn't working so much--the restaurant I worked at then closed at nine. I also lived closer to campus, so there wasn't all this screwing around with transportation.

Today, for example, I got out of class at 3:15 and was supposed to be to work at 4. I got someone to switch me so I didn't have to be there until 4:30, and it's a good thing, too. I'd driven to school and parked off campus, then taken the bus in. Unfortunately for me, the first bus back was jam-packed and not allowing any more people on, so I had to wait for another one. When I got to my car it was 3:55; I got home at 4:05; I would have had to leave at 4:10 to get to work on time. I ended up being five minutes late. So I'm going to have to figure out an alternate plan for next week. I'm also trying to figure out how I'm going to figure things tomorrow; I have class 11-2, and then I need to go pay my rent. My house is southwest of campus and the drop box is northeast, so it doesn't really make sense to take the bus home and then drive back over there, and then drive past my house to go to my dad's for dinner. So I'm looking at the bus schedules; but would it be more efficient to drive like I did today, or to work the bus system? And if I do the bus, do I walk, which takes longer, or bike, which requires locking the thing up and such. Grr.

It also sucks that I have class Monday through Friday, and then I work Friday through Tuesday. I can't ditch class Wednesday or Thursday to have a day off; I can't afford to give up a Saturday or Sunday shift either. Unless I do one of those things at some point, I'm not going to have a day off until Thanksgiving. But I'll live. It's just a very mentally fatiguing prospect. Add to that the stress of not having enough money, ever, and ... well, it's actually just my regular life with homework. Lots of it.

My world history to 1500 class is interesting enough; the professor's sort of a nut, though. She likes to emphasize stuff by lowering her voice--which does not work well in a room of nearly 100 students, all in creaky chairs, shifting around and whispering to each other and rustling papers. That gets a little annoying.

My world history from 1500 is okay; the professor's a bit dry, but at least he speaks in a normal tone of voice.

My French class is interesting. I'm remembering a lot of bits and pieces from my three years of it in high school, but it's not enough to be moved up to the next class. That's good in that it's easier for me, especially since it's one of those classes that's taught entirely IN French, but bad in that my classmates are driving me crazy. I know it's only the second week of class; I know my own accent is far, far from perfect; I know languages are a bitch to learn for a lot of people. But considering the entire class is in French, and we've gone over the rules of pronunciation, I don't understand how so many of my classmates are so clueless. The girl I was paired with today was pronouncing every single letter. ("Il est minuit" is sort of "eel a minwee", not "ill est (like west) minute (like small)".) I can't imagine how grating and obnoxious is it for the instructor, who's truly fluent.

My last class has ended up being a creative writing class. The Pilates class was just not for me; and I couldn't get an override into the medieval England class I wanted. I don't really want to do the creative writing class; but I need to be full time, and it was the most interesting class that fit my schedule that I could get in to. It's going to be interesting; the resident instructor has a totally hippy name (think Cloud or Sunshine or Breeze sort of crap), is one of those "Oh man, like WOW" people, and everything about her screams lesbian. I mention that only because her email address is something that sounds sort of obscene and like a penis pun.

What's really going to drive me up a wall, though, are my classmates. They're almost all so incredibly pretentious. Just listening to them made me want to laugh in their faces. Especially the guy in the bowler hat.