hell week

So this week is my first week of school.  I'm a proud student of the California State University system.  I'm only taking 3 classes - one of which is a math class.  College Algebra, to be exact.  And yes, it's scary.

It's been at least 10 years since I took a math class, and at the time, it was statistics because I just couldn't get the college level mathematics.  College algebra is a prerequisite to accounting which is required for my major, and it wouldn't hurt to brush up on my math in any case.

I enrolled in a T-Th night class just so that I wouldn't have to be going to school 4 or 5 days a week.  Tuesdays daytime classes were easy-peasy... Tai Chi and Physical Conditioning, both of which made me real excited about the idea of losing weight being mandatory in my life.  Then I get to the math class at night.

The instructor seems college student age and he talks pretty fast.  He admits that he's a math guy all the way, so please excuse his misspellings... already something to bug me about, for all of you who know how I like to correct grammar and spelling.  Then he pretty much whizzes by the exercises since it's all supposed to be review anyway... you know, y=mx+b type of stuff... and that kinda stuff is supposed to be flying out of my butt already.  He briefly asks if he's going too fast, then says, "I don't like to repeat myself so if you don't know it, just read it in the workbook."  "You guys get this, right?  Ok, I'll keep on going."

Oh. My. God.  Scary shit.  I'm thinking, I'm the only idiot here who cannot follow this dude.  This is a nightmare.  I'm completely screwed for the semester.  Then today, I have a revelation.  I can look for another section!  Find a different teacher!  And I found one. :)  She may teach Mondays and Wednesdays, but if she's easy going enough, I am willing to go to school every day of the week since it would be worth it.  Anything's gotta be better than speed-talker.

So I attend class tonight with hopes and dreams.  I ask questions about the instructor to the early students waiting to get in.  Already they were responsive and definitely willing to help... unlike the dudes in last night's class.  I mean, they might've been helpful had I shown up to class early or on time... but there was no way to tell last night.  But the students tonight were conversational and more than willing... definitely more easy going.  That's the vibe I got from them.

Then there's the teacher.  Accented from eastern Europe... a woman... and in the beginning, she's very scary.  Strict, and insistent upon convincing me and another adder that we will not pass the class since she spent an hour and a half on Monday telling everyone that if one person spends more hours doing homework, that person will fail.  Yeah, scary.  But as time passed, she actually was very funny.  Sarcastic. Typical European humor.  Gotta be able to catch it quickly.  I got her.  And I loved her.   She took the time to review EVERYTHING, not asking whether we were familiar with it or not.  And she gave little personal anecdotes, just enough time for me to catch up on my note-taking or to understand what I was jotting down.  Yeah, she's the College Algebra teacher for me.

Did my first homework assignment tonight.  Took a while, and I'm beat.  In the next entry, I'll talk about how I rode 9 miles today.  Yay me!