Getting used to It Again

After two full years in the DL program, which has consisted of four...let's see now, is it four? Let me count...yep four on campus intensives, you'd think that I'd be pretty well used to it by now.

You'd think that wouldn't you?

However, after said years in the program, I have learned that intensives are anything but predictable. This is true enough when I'm doing an intensive in the normal fashion. That being said, things are certainly different now as I'm adjusting to living in the Cities and commuting to campus.

In the "normal" scenario, I arrive on campus sometime on Sunday before class starts and other than little trips around the area, I don't really leave campus. I stay in the dorms and so I'm always right in the vicinity when its time for class to start.

Its different now.

Monday was the first day of class but cohort two didn't have morning class. Therefore, I hung around the house over on the west side of town till it was time for my son to go to school. Once I dropped him off I headed over to campus. However, it was late enough that rush hour was over. So I got to campus without much trouble. Likewise at the end of the day, I stuck around for a cohort welcome meal and so didn't leave campus until a little after 6. Rush hour was pretty well wrapped up by that time.

Long story short. Rush hour didn't effect me Monday.

Yesterday was a different story. Now for starters, we got about an inch of snow over night and if there is one thing that I learned yesterday, it is that snow seems to make commuters loose their minds and all ability to drive.

I thought that I would leave the house at 7am because an hour would be more than enough time to make the trip (its normally about 25 minutes). However, this was not the case. After averaging approximately 17 miles an hour for about 75 minutes, I ran into class huffing and puffing and 20 minutes late.

Fortunately, my professor was good natured and I hadn't missed much other than discussion of the syllabus. After class, it was about the same. I hit rush hour going home as well, though it only took me an hour that time.

Things have changed.

This morning I tried to adapt. I left the house at 6:15am...yes that's in the morning. Rush hour hadn't really kicked in yet. Plus the roads were cleared off...I arrived on campus at 6:45. It would seem that I still need to tweak things just a touch.

The one good part, other than not being late for class today, was that I discovered the Caf is a really great place to finish up the reading that I decided not to finish last night.

This is gonna take some getting used to.