God created the world in 7 days...

... and me, I got trained! I swear, I could have been trained to be an astronaut faster than I was trained to be a TA (well, maybe not an astronaut, but Steve's airborne school was just about as long as my TA training...). In case you're curious, it takes about a week and a half to train a bunch of new TA's and convince them that sleeping with their students is a bad idea (I heard that one about 20 times!). But the training is finished, as are the first few days of school.

I made my syllabus on Tuesday (with some input from Maria... Thanks!). It was kind of wild to be writing my own syllabus after being handed so many in the past. It was also kind of funny how in depth mine was in comparison to the ones my profs handed out this semester. I guess we grad students are just supposed to know all of the additional stuff, eh?

Anyhow, I survived my first day as a TA... in fact, I think I did pretty well. There wasn't really much to teach, since the students had only been to their lecture once, but I got all the usual first day stuff done and had everyone do a review worksheet to see where we might run into some complications (dastardly negative numbers!).

I also started my classes this week. It's kind of crazy having three math classes and nothing else. I think my profs will be keeping me pretty busy this semester. I mean, they were all nice enough to give me something to do over the weekend. =) Actually, I don't think the classes are going to be impossible or anything. Challenging, for sure, but my instructors all seem really nice. And my Linear Algebra prof is amazing! He comes in with no notes and just does the whole lecture like he was born talking about vector spaces and fields! He actually reminds me a bit of Hayden Smith, and how I used to be so awestruck that he could do physics problems in pen.

In less math-y areas of my existence, my parents came down for a week, which was really neat. We went to all sorts of places: Kentucky Horse Park, Fort Boonesborough, and a reenactment of the battle of Blue Lick (yep... real place, but the Americans lost the battle in about 15 minutes, and we were a bit late, so we mostly just toured the exhibits they had set out). My folks also did a whole bunch of touring on their motorcycle while I was in school during the day. If you want to find all of the incredibly twisty roads in Kentucky, I think they're now experts (and my dad's arms may never recover... hee hee).

Well, I guess I've dawdled long enough. I should really get back to my homework.

~mighty meg

The first post

So, Maria (the new queen of bloggy-ness) suggested I should create a blog to keep the Michigan crew updated on my whereabouts and whatchadoings. Well, ask and ye shall receive...



And here's the update on the goings-on so far:



Steve and I moved in sometime in mid-July (if you ever decide to move to Kentucky, I highly recommend not doing it in the middle of the summer... it gets HOT and HUMID here!). We managed to get everything moved in, and now it's all unpacked and a bit cluttered.

Aahhh... home sweet home!

Since then, I'm almost done with my training for being a grad student and a TA, and Steve has found a job. Speaking of Steve, last I heard he was stuck in the Dallas airport... I sure wish he would call to let me know he made it out of Texas alright (since there's a hurricane headed that way and all...).

In the time I've been here, I've also learned some cool stuff:

1. Air conditioning rocks!
2. Louisville is not pronounced Lou-iss-ville nor Lewy-ville. It's Luah-vull.
3. The sky lift is a must-see.

4. Evidently hockey does not exist in Kentucky.
5. Chuck E. Cheese's is far cooler than Gatti-town (for skeeball fans, anyway). Gatti-town is like a Chuck E. Cheese idea, but with mostly electronic video games and gambling type games for kids. But their Gatti-ball is a poor imitation of Skee-ball.
6. University of Kentucky campus is ginormous, and if you are looking for something besides the two buildings I'm ever in, I don't have the faintest idea where it is.
7. According to my observations, no one in Lexington has good cellphone service.
8. Movie Tavern is fabulous! No longer do you have to decide whether to eat dinner before or after you go to the movies!
9. Horse farms are not like normal farms... they tend to have multimillion dollar mansions and BMWs in the drive, rather than rickety barns and Ford trucks.
10. Kentucky rocks... and it's especially going to rock when Michigan is covered with 3 feet of snow!!! Hee hee hee... =)

Well, my parents are coming for a visit and they should be here soon-ish. So I guess it is time to cut this short. 'Till next time, keep your stick on the ice!