Gots a Full Mouth

Well...I believe I may have bitten off a tad more than I can chew. Months and months ago at a community watch meeting, I'd volunteered for a CERT program training session. This stands for Citizens Emergency Response Team and is where if there's a disaster (natural or otherwise) in your neighborhood, you can help "bridge the gap" between when it happens and when the professional emergency team can reach you and your neighbors. Turns out (of course) that it started about a month ago. Classes are every Tuesday from 6 to 9 pm. Well, I missed one week because of my boo-boo (some of you know that story...not to worry, I'm all better now--insert big fat smiley face here) and now I've missed tonight as well. I'm not a skipper. I attend every single class that I am physically able to attend. I rarely missed in school. I feel horrible about missing tonight, but work is my priority and we had a small emergency situation. Not a true "emergency" but we are under a lot of pressure since about a month ago, we found out that another team is trying to solve the structure we're in the process of solving. Well, the last couple of weeks our structure expert is taking some time off to study for a test which ultimately decides whether he stays in graduate school (and in this country!) so it's been up to me and me alone to try to refine the structure.

Well, this past week, I had to take a day to get all the software back on my computer at work (we upgraded to Windows XP-oh joy) and my boss went on a two-week vacation. So...also had to take a couple of days to train our new undergraduate researchers. So...also had to leave work early last week for a doctor's appointment. So...also have to miss work every other Friday to get to my graduate class. (Are you getting the picture yet?) Yesterday, our structure calculation program decided to not work anymore so I've spent the last two days trying to get the mother-humping thing to work. Still no juice. I was at work until 9 pm trying tonight. No dice, baby. Hopefully, my narrowing the problem down and at least identifying where it was at will help me figure it out tomorrow (insert multiple cuss words here). If not, I may go on a hammer rampage. Or just get really freakin drunk. Anyway, long frustrating day and now I can't sleep. Sigh. The life of the stress insomniac. If that isn't a diagnosis, dammit, it should be.

I'm off to try to get some sleep, but the whole point of this blog is that I think I'm going to become a CERT dropout. I just can't see it realistically fitting into my schedule right now. I still have three chapters to read for real school and I have to get a paper written by the 10th of Sept. which is creeping up on me. Oh, did I mention trying to plan my parent's anniversary party? Heh. Shit.

Love,
B