sambear needs loving not-sick thoughts. He has food poisoning. He dragged himself out of bed long enough to call UHaul to check on our reservation, and it’s a good thing he did—they thought we were coming to get a truck today. No, that was never in the plan. He had to explain things to seven different people before it was supposedly set straight, and I stress the “supposedly” there.
Why do professors hand you a printed copy of an assignment or other material, then read it out loud? I find it an annoying waste of time. And I absolutely HATE it when anyone reads out loud to me unless it’s the kind of thing that is well-suited to such delivery and it’s done well. There is nothing on a syllabus or most assignment sheets that falls into that category. In all my years of attending varying kinds of classes, I’ve only had one teacher whose delivery was worth listening to—Rosemarie Mason. The woman was incredible. She read “Sinners In the Hands of an Angry God” to our 9th-grade class and I’m certain there were some conversions right then and there.
It feels a bit odd to be one of only two (I believe) technical communications majors in a technical communications class. It’s the very first one, which happens to be required for every engineering/computer major, too. It is full of people who don’t seem to really want to be there, many of them seniors who left it ’til last. I keep feeling like I talk too much. I don’t like group projects at any time, but I’m really dreading them in this class.
Anyway, another day, another class, another bureaucratic snafu. I got home and had a phone message from my advisor, who is a wonderful man. My name was on a list of students whose classes would be dropped by the end of the day if tuition wasn’t paid. The tuition hasn’t been paid because of the financial aid department’s delays. The financial aid director had promised me that she would personally make sure that my classes were NOT dropped due to their delays. I still haven’t reached her, but I managed to speak with the assistant registrar and all is supposedly well for the moment.
I called the federal student aid people since SPSU continues to insist that the delay is there. Nope, they finished everything on 4/23. I can’t get hold of anyone in the financial aid office today—apparently, they do not communicate with the outside world on Thursdays. They hide in the back offices, because they’re technically there and not closed, but they don’t answer their phones and there’s nobody at the front desk.
Mercer faxed a copy of the course description for my “interpersonal communications” course to SPSU. I’m hoping to use that and “life experience” to get credit for a “small group interactions” course that’s required for technical communications majors at SPSU.
Agnes Scott hasn’t faxed descriptions of my math and English courses yet because nobody can find any record of Math 109 ever existing. Yes, it’s on my official transcript from them. Yes, they have a grade of A for me for that course from a Professor Leslie, but they can’t find Math 109 in the catalog for that year—or any other. So the assistant registrar there is trying to find someone in the math department who was there in 1984 to see if maybe they remember something or have a syllabus hanging around in some forgotten drawer.
The math course was called “Precalculus and Intro Calculus I.” If I can get credit for Precalculus for it, I’m done with math—unless I try to do a dual major with something technical. The English course was English 102, but not the one most people assume that would be (basic composition class). It was an honors composition and American literature course. I already have credit for the normal English 102 from Mercer University, so I’m hoping to get American literature credit for the ASC course. Really, really hoping.
The Ancient World History professor reminds me so much of someone from the local filk group that it’s very distracting. I’m looking forward to that class, though it’s a lot of reading. In fact, if I can manage it, I may take the Medieval World History course just because I want to do it.
I did my first TCOM homework assignment last night. We have another “real” assignment today, due next Wednesday—one of the seven that actually make up the total grade for the course. I want to work on it instead of reading my history text, but that’s a bad idea since history class is tomorrow and that reading is due then.
