Tuesday, June 19, 2012

January 2012

I can't believe it's been several months since I last posted.  But when I look back on my semester, I'm also not surprised.  It was crazy busy.  It was my first 'official' semester as a PhD student, even though I had taken some doctorate level courses previously.  I guess it was just a whole new level of work, though.  I had many papers and projects, plus four different jobs.  Although each job was only 5 hours a week, it was tough to remember what I was supposed to do and when.  Anyhow, here are a few highlights from January.

I was able to spend New Years and New Year's Eve with my brother Bryan and his family in Gillette.  I always enjoy spending time with them.  The kiddos are always entertaining and I have a difficult time leaving when my time is up.  On New Year's Eve, I was walking down their stairs to their basement where I sleep in a tent on a blow-up air mattress.  (Back story is that their basement flooded last summer and they are in the process of remodeling and don't have a room to put me in.)  As I was walking down, I reached to turn on the light and twisted my ankle.  I tried to catch myself on the other foot, but twisted that ankle, too.  I guess I yelled pretty loudly and Bryan came running down the stairs quickly.  I felt bad because my 5 year old niece saw the whole thing.  Hopefully she wasn't too traumatized.  The result of twisting both ankles: major sprains.  It wasn't until March that my ankles started feeling normal again.  (A picture of one ankle is shown below.)  I could walk up stairs a lot easier than I walked down then.  When it gets cold, they still ache pretty bad.



I defended my thesis in December, just in time to technically graduate in December (even though I walked in May).  It was a bit nerve wracking, but it went well.  I finished all my rewrites and edits in 2 days (didn't sleep much during those days).  It was so nice to get it done and over with.  I had to walk across campus a bazillion times (not really exaggerating here) to get all my signatures and copies in, but I did it.  Yay!  Following is a picture of the cover. and the inside.  It still seems surreal that I'm this far into my education.  I don't feel much smarter.  If anything, I have learned how to write 20 pages papers in less than a week and how to give presentations on said papers.  I also have learned to exist on little to no sleep for about a week.  (As I am typing this, I am up at 4 a.m.......not to work on anything, but because my brain won't turn off.)  Anyhow, I earned my Masters of Science in Human Development.  That means I'm qualified to....um, still thinking.....oh, still not sure......continue on in grad school!  Really, I could teach at a junior college, but they often prefer people with PhD's.  So, here I go!