Small Claims Fun

I'm still working 2 mornings a week at the Small Claims Advisory Office. I love it, even though it is totally unpredictable. Yesterday, we had a grand total of TWO phone calls (both in the last 20 minutes of the shift), and NO walk ins. At least I had brought my CrimLaw book with me, and was able to read all 36 pages for next week.

Today, I brought in my laptop, intending to organize my class notes, which I had been typing in separate documents. I also needed to type in my notes from the very first Property class, which I hand wrote my notes. I did manage to type in 2 pages of those notes, but that is all I did. We were SWAMPED today. It was basically non stop clients, in person and on the phone. Of course, being that busy made the shift go by SO quickly!

We had a funny message on our machine today. (Since we are constantly taking in walk in clients, all our calls go directly to an answering machine. In our time in between walk ins, we return those calls.) An old, fiesty woman left us a message expressing her displeasure that we were not answering the phone, and informing us that she was a taxpayer! LOL! We actually listened to it several times, in between clients, to give us a chuckle and spur us onward.

I've come to the realization that my life is going to be crazy this year. I'm just not going to have the luxury of as much free time as I did last year. I'm going to be up late (because of 3 night classes) and up early (working 2 morning shifts, and driving son to school everyday). The good thing is I'm not taking a writing class this year, and if I get my reading done during the weeks, I won't have to spend my entire weekends researching and writing.

I've also come to the conclusion that I really don't care about competing. I've proved I'm a good student. I don't need to kill myself to be a certain ranking. I'm obviously going to end up in the top 50% (more likely, the top 20%) and what difference is it going to make if I'm ranked #3 or #10? I don't know, I guess I just feel like my priorities are different. It's not that I don't want to do well, but my life is not that of a single, non-parent student. I have a husband and kids, and they are important to me. Because my daughter is on the opposite side of the country, when she calls or is available to chat online, I AM going to be there and drop whatever else I'm doing. I want her to know she can ALWAY come to me, and ALWAYS count on me. If you aren't married and don't have kids, I suppose it is easier to get caught up in the "competition", but frankly, I have a life and don't need to do that. The people in my life are more important to me than a number.

Speaking of my kids, my daughter had her first day of actual classes today at MIT. She is taking Physics, Chemistry, Calculus (I think it is actually Differential Equations?) , Art History, plus a PE class. Her schedule is worse than mine, except she doesn't have any night classes. Every day her schedule is different, but in general, she has classes from 9a-5pm. MIT has both "lecture" and "recitation" sections for each class she has (other than PE). The lectures are the big group classes and the recitations are the small groups, often with a TA. She has 19 class sessions that she has to attend each week. She is going to be as busy, or moreso, than I am!