Tearjerker moments that shouldn't have been

Warning: this is going to be more like a journal entry than any of the previous posts (except the very last paragraph - if all you want is what I usually write, skip to that) - an opportunity to vent more than anything. No complaints - remember - you have been forewarned; and forewarned is forearmed.

Today is one of those days, when coupled with yesterday, that proves the old saying about life being full of hills and valleys. For the most part. Allow me to explain. Yesterday was a day of good news and great energy, etc. Today, on the other hand, was one of the most frustrating, tear inducing days I've experienced in awhile.

The day started off fine, I got up early and made it to work on time and really had an uneventful first couple of hours. However, in the middle of the morning, I got an email that changed the entire tenor of the day. This email announced that one of my classes would no longer be taught by the same professor as scheduled. This change caused a change in syllabus and a change in textbook, not to mention rendering moot the two hours last night I spent reading the assignment in the other book. The bookstore is supposed to get the new books in by Monday (a good thing since the class is Monday afternoon, wouldn't you say?), and someone has provided photocopies of the first two weeks assignments just in case. Unfortunately, there are no photocopies of the supplement to the textbook readings (I don't know if they just hadn't created them or if they were just all gone), and so I will have to scramble around between classes on Monday to get everything done before that class. Fine and dandy - although, inexplicably, frustrating enough to make a person cry.

Then, on my big project for the afternoon - preparing jury instructions for a trial in September - I couldn't get the formatting to cooperate. Raise your hand if you hate wordperfect as much as I do. That program never cooperates with me when I need it to. I'd rather use Word any day of the week and twice on Mondays. Another aggravating moment that, once again, inexplicably induced tears of frustration.

Orientation was running rather late this evening, so I sat through a couple of boring speeches I didn't intend to sit through. Even the professors got to leave early from that! Also, grades from the summer semester were supposed to be posted by 5:00 this evening, but guess what was occurring around that time? Yes - the administrative confusion that is system maintenance. Why any sane person would schedule system maintenance at the same time that a few scores of students were wanting to check their grades is beyond me.

To top the evening off, once I returned home, I got stuck on a website because I couldn't find the answer for which I was looking. Is it really so difficult to answer a simple question about how much a computer costs? Apparently, unbeknownst to me, it is. All they really want to tell you is how much you would have to pay per month. They don't want to tell you how much you would end up paying for the computer if you actually took them up on the monthly payment option - I guess it's the same when buying a car. Stupid interest rates and my seeming inability to do simple math in my head combined to make that another near teary experience.

Probably what I need is a couple of hours around people so that I can recharge my cheerful batteries. I know this sounds weird to some people - but being around people usually energizes me - it's certainly better than sitting around and reading my law school assignments!

On the bright side, though, grades were finally viewable and I did pretty well in a class I thought I had failed (shush all you people who keep telling me I'll do fine - this means you, Kevin and Nicole). So, I suppose I should have written this post before I checked that grade so the frustrating moments (which also included reading a confusing case about enemy combatants and my second legal profession assignment - the details of which I have spared you) would have been fresher in mind than the recent elation at the sight of another grade.

On a completely unrelated note, I am going to steal a page from Holly's book and point everyone to a couple of new links on the sidebar of this blog. First, Miss Mandy Kay - Mandy - if you're reading this, I promise I'll email back soon, and I too am unfortunately apparently addicted to this whole blogging thing. Everyone check out her livejournal - she puts some pretty insightful stuff on there. (Mandy, I especially liked "The List" - I laughed and thought it was pretty good) Second, I'd like to point out the link to Richard Posner and Gary Becker's blog. If you don't know who Posner is, he's an appellate judge on the 7th circuit and writes some very good opinions - if he weren't too old, he probably would have made a good addition to the Supreme Court - he's usually very logical and clear. As far as Becker goes, I don't really know who he is, but he writes some pretty good stuff on that blog. They always incite interesting commentary. And, my final pointer is to check out this article by Cal Thomas, always an insightful commentator. I don't have it linked on the sidebar, but you could get to it through two different links that I do have on the sidebar, so I think it should be part of this paragraph.
Alrighty then, everyone have a wonderful weekend, I'm still singing Green Day songs!