New Beginnings...

I've been horrible about updating this.

With that said, I thought I'd give all two of your readers out there an update on what has been going on in my life recently. As of a week ago Thursday, I became a graduate student at the University of Kansas. I've yet to be converted into a Jayhawks fan, but I can already feel the pull of the dark side. Classes have been going pretty well so far, but it's just been really time consuming. On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, I leave the house around 10:15 and get home at 9:45 - 10:00. No, I don't go back in time, I'm really either on my way, at, or coming home from school for close to twelve hours. Then, when I get home, I try to straighten up the house, take care of whatever I have to get done that night, and read for another hour or two. Thursday I leave at 9:15 and get home around 7:30, so that's a little better, and I only have one class that day, which is at the Edwards campus in Overland Park. I've also been working at my usual stint for my Godfather at Oak Park Mall on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. What do I do in my free time? Ha ha ha...you're funny.

I am very excited that I've been able to get a head start on my thesis planning. I don't actually have to have a thesis to graduate since I'm already going to have to take the comprehensive exam , get 20 more hours of practicum, and take 15 more credit hours to gain licensure in the state of Kansas, but I'm an overachiever, what can I say? The reason I'm doing a thesis is because it will theoretically be impressive to the individuals that will someday be looking at my doctoral degree application...and because I'm absolutely fascinated with the subject that I'm planning to do my thesis on. I am so thankful for the professor that took the time on Wednesday to sit down with me and discuss the potential in the topic I had picked. He wasn't a professor of mine, and he's not my adviser...just an awesome guy and a really smart professor. He helped me sketch out a plan for data collection on my subject as well as to roughly work out how and where I'd collect the data. So, now that I know it's doable, I can start working on lit. review research to get that all lined up. I can get that part almost totally done before I collect the research, so that is nice.

Other than that, the bright light of my week has been the KU fencing club. I went to my first session on Wednesday and thought I was gong to be able to fence a bit. That didn't end up to be the case, except for a quick couple of points with Foster, another person that also had fencing experience. Instead, we did footwork, footwork, and more footwork. It wasn't as bad as it sounds, though. They were down an instructor, so even though it was my first time at the club, I was actually leading the footwork and teaching the newbies with Foster. It was an awesome experience, and I was really excited to be able to encourage some of the newbies like my instructor encouraged me when I was a newbie. The fact that he encouraged me is one of the big reasons I stuck with it, and I hope that my encouragement will do the same for others.

As for other things that are going on, I think some things are going to change within the very new future with me. I'll have to wait and see what happens and I'll post another update to let you know what happens!!! :-)

Everything else is truckin' right along - David's been getting in some extra hours since I'm never home, which is good because the deadline to bring a brand-new gigantic million-dollar company into existence got moved up by two months. So, essentially, we're both workaholics.

That's really all I have to update you guys on for now. I'll try to post some more pictures and stuff up soon!