Well today I woke up at 6am, Im not dorming so I had to leave by 7 to find parking. I got to my math class early and sat and waited. There were only 2 other girls in there waiting. The class starts at 8:10, it comes and goes, now its 8:25 and we're sitting there wondering why no one else is there and where the teacher is. We walk to this advisement building and talk to this guy... he says "your not gonna like this... your the 5th bunch today". He comes back with a schedule that says 8:15 PM!!! I didn't register for night time courses ! Whatever I thought... I ask him where I go to change it; he says some other building.. but it only opens at 9:30. Now I have an hour to kill. So I woke around the campus, walk around the area checking out places to park... keep on walking and somehow I end up in a graveyard and turn back. I get back to campus and still have time so I decide to check out where my music class building is, didn't find it.. yet. 9:30 now, I go to this building and go into another advisement center and ask for a change. The woman says... " Oh go back to the building you were already in and go to the math office and ask them to change it" WHAT!? I go back to the original building and ask this really old woman for a change. She screws around with her computer for about 20 minutes and finally tells me there are no monday and wednesday classes, all booked. She says I could get a 4:30 pm class... By this time I'm just so aggrivated I'll take anything thats not late at night. Done with that. At this time one of my friends classes just finished so I met up with him and found this cool spot with a big pool and fountains shooting water. Sat there and watched people go about their business, that calmed be down after the morning fiasco. Its not 10 am, my friend has to go to his class so we split up. Now I have till 10:50 to find my music class. I walk around for a while and can't find it. My map has it labled only as music building. After searching I gave in and asked someone... I saw a long haired guy witha beastly nordic beard holding a guitar who I felt could be trusted. He was sitting down smoking a ciggerrete in front of a building. I ask him where the music building is he tells me "right in front of you dude!" Wow. So I go into this building... I walk around it in circles about 5 times looking for room 226... I cant find it. I walk upstairs, I walk down stairs. CAN'T FIND IT! Again I give in and ask these 2 guys where it is and a woman overhears me talking to them and shows me right where it is. The music building has trees growing inside of it, I guess it would be called an atrium, one of the trees was blocking the door to my room. I still have about 20 minutes to kill. So I sit on a stone bench in the atrium and listen to my ipod, when the old singer from my band shows up. Apparently hes in the same class with me. So we sit and talk untill the doors for the class open. We go in to a small auditorium type room with stadium seating I guess you could see. There was no black board just a stage with a piano. The teacher shows up, gives us our syllabus, tells us in the class we'll be breaking down music melody, harmony, etc. Then she plays some rag time song, that was pretty cool. After that time to go so I drive my friend and other friends girlfriend home on the way. Get home play some super mario world till 3:20pm lol. I get back to school, and the parking is PACKED. I wasn't given a parking decal for the campus lots since I'm a freshman... I had to park pretty far away, about a 15 minute walk from my car to my class. I run in to some old friends and chat it up for a while, but tell them I have to go to find my room. I'm taking the elevator up to the third floor but there are no classes I cant figure out what the heck is going on... I start thinking the elevator is taking me somewhere wrong, so I start running up the stairs to the fifth flor. NO CLASSES JUST DOORS THAT LEAD TO FILE ROOMS... I'm thinking oh come on not again... Now I'm basically jumping down steps 4-5 at a time from the fifth floor to the ground level (no one uses steps these days!). I rush out and go in a back exit of the same building and find I'm in a whole new area. I go up the stairs, I circle the floor about 4 times going up stair case after stair case. The first one I go up I see a woman coming down it... I had my ipod in one ear so I couldn't hear too good. I heard her mumble something to me and I chuckled cuz I figured she mustve said some sarcastic joke. I continue going up and I'm on the ROOF! Now I realize she must've said "that leads to the roof"! I start bounding down the steps again, I'm sweaty as hell by this time. I run to the first floor and find another stair case... and this time it leads me to my last class of the day. Finally I get to sit. The teacher arrives, tells us the class is gonna be easy math stuff (for idiots), math is not my strong point. She starts teaching us scientific notation, stuff I learned in 7th grade or earlier. I have a 65 year old bald man named terrance sitting next to me who keeps on shouting out the answers, WRONG ANSWERS. Class ends at 5:30, everyone heads to the elevator, I run down the steps and to the car. The car is about 15 minutes away, but since I dont know the campus too well I went the wrong way and it took 30 minutes for me to get there. I get in the car. I'm not familiar with the area so I'm driving around looking for the road I need to get home, two times I end up on this expressway that I could take but its packed. 15 minutes later I find the road and get home and see gas is low... I go buy some, drive home and finally my day is over at 6:40. Longest day I've had in a long time after doing nothing my whole senior year. Aside from a few blisters on my feet today was not that bad.
Haha well that was a lot of writing, I figured I should write something like this to save for myself and read on my senior year; and why not share it. =]
And for those who actually made it through all that- sidenote here: My mom buys redken shampoos and conditioners to keep color treated hair from fading. Is it bad if I use those since there is nothing else around in the house?
Holy cow, what a mess! You know, when I was in college, I would actually have nightmares that things like that would go awry. Fortunately, they never did. Actually, my nightmares were more like, we'd be six weeks into the class already, and I discovered that I hadn't done any of the reading or homework -- nothing! -- and would then have to catch up. I guess that's a reality for some people, but I was always so paranoid about missing something. I think if I had to go through what you did, I would've freaked.
Anyway, I did get all the way through your loooooong story :-) and I don't really have an answer for you about the Redken products. My guess is that they're probably not the best, and I would get some different products.
Good luck in school! Have you chosen a major?
dino
I just got all the syllabuses for all my classes. After a year of no work in highschool going from 8am - 11:30 and hanging out with friends all day... this is going to take some getting used to. After reading your post last night (right about to go to bed didn't have time to respond) I kept thinking of myself falling behind, or missing something on the sheet and coming in to class without the assignment finished.
Getting used to college life is a major adjustment, especially if you really want to do well academically. I was (almost) straight A's through high school, but quickly discovered that I couldn't just "coast" along anymore once I got into college. So, study hard. But don't panic too much; you've got to have fun, too. Sorry if my message scared you!
The forest ranger thing sounds cool. I've actually thought of that myself a few times too, and I'm 40 already -- LOL! It's important to have a connection with the natural world, in one way or another.
dino
Woops didn't see this last part. Thanks and no I haven't chosen a major yet. I don't really know what I want out of life or for a career. I'm going to college because my mom had to work so hard to be able to pay her way through, I doubt I could ever work and go to school. I always saw myself as forest ranger or owner of a sporting goods shop or something like that hahah.
Wow, that sounds like one hell of a day. I just started college a few weeks ago. Thankfully, the university I am going to my first two years is rather small. Plus, I live on campus. Even so, the first few days, I had a bit of a rough time finding classes, but now I know all my class locations by heart. Just out of curiosity, what college are you going to? I'm going to McNeese State University for my first two years, and then I am transfering to UL Monroe for pharmacy school.
I'm actually going to Queens College, its one of the city universities in NYC. I didn't want to go away because I could see myself getting distracted and now doing my work, plus paying off the fee's for years. To be honest, I've lived in the city my entire life... never liked it one bit; all the cars, the noise, the people it drives me nuts. I've tolerated it for all these years but hopefully once college is done and I have some money I'll be able to move away somewhere rural... don't know how good a college education will do me there though.
Ahh that's funny, I hate cities, but NYC is one of my favorite places in the world :) Only behind Iceland and Sweden, so there's some extremes in that spectrum! I was thinking of going to Renssellaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. Something like a 45 minute drive from the big city, right?
I think your right, if I remember correctly, I passed Troy while driving to pennsylvania. Some people who work in manhattan make that commute from troy everyday.
Congrats. Hope all is OK in Lake Charles with Rita aftermath; I'm from South Louisiana also; but went to HS in Monroe; excellent Pharmacy program there. Wise Choise.
hahha, welcome to college! That's a great first day story and reminds me quite a lot of what i went through when I was learning my way around the Universy of Florida campus...
Well, at least now you know where your classes are :)
=] Thanks for reading. I loved my classes so far, aside from an english writing class... reminds me too much of highschool with group discussions... buddying up with someone next to you etc.
I spent my first day (orientation) in college going around the campus and making sure I dont get lost. The place is HUGE. There are campus maps around the place in case someone does get lost. Of course all buildings there have codes so you know where to go when you get to class...
Yea I had an orientation, it was pouring rain so the tour of the campus was cancelled... I didnt wanna give up one of my summer days to check out a school... laziness. I had to find all my classes during the breaks I had between them. Today went better... as far as finding rooms goes.
To give you an idea the size of the university I went to... look at the maps. Usually we look at the maps in quarters cause if you looked at the whole thing, you WILL get lost. But we got used to it... in about a week or so. Most of my classes were in the western half of the unviersity, thank God... except for a music class that is, which is like in the eastern half of the campus, takes like 15-30 minutes of very brisk walk to get there from the west side of the campus.
UT Austin campus map
'beastly nordic beard' - That is hilarious! I did read all that. You know, if you polished it up a little, it would be great short story if you add some more plot to it. Some schools do publications of a volume of student writing that is open to submission from anyone.
I do feel your anxiety. I just started back to college too three weeks ago. After being out for ten years! Luckily, all five classes are in one building. Parking is as chaotic as you describe though. I think I've already lost about 10 lbs. from all the walking. FUN!!!
You might want to get some more shampoo though. Although your hair is short now, that will be the ends in a year or two and you don't want crappy ends.
Thanks for reading I'm glad you liked it! My second day was just as chaotic... I'm don't wanna get into it but I'll say I ended up with 45$ parking ticket for being in a spot that can't be parked in on thursdays at 8-8:30 a.m... I'm gonna hold on to that story and use it if I ever need to write an essay, I'll rework it. Too true about all the walking... my feet are killing me... I either need to stop wearing boots or buy some dr scholls.
Dude... that was a classic story. I read the whole shebang. Sounds like your usual first year student fiasco! Reminds me of when I was first year 3 years ago. What school are you attending anyway, and where is it?? Definitely frustrating at first... but you'll get into the "flow" by next week.
-Ardroth
Thanks... these past two days have been hell... next time I catch you online I'll tell you some more stuff that I'm sure you'll enjoy.
Please keep a copy of that wonderfully written tale !! And Thanks for sharing it !! Someday you will find the right time and campus publication to print it !!
My first day in college (1964...gasp!!) it turned out that the campus was split among two distant sections of a country estate and an office building in another town. No two consecutive classes were in the same location.....the first day, I put over 95 miles on my car BETWEEN classes. I see nothing has changed in 42 years(except maybe the IPOD and 30 cents/gallon gasoline !!).
Good Luck with your studies and enjoy the fun of campus life !!
Walter White Tail
Thanks. Wow 95 miles between classes?! Thats nuts. I had over a half tank of gas when I went to school that morning... but between looking for parking, getting lost, driving to and from school 4 times I had almost nothing left in the tank by the time I got home. I realized then that this was going to be very expensive... I decided I'm gonna take the bus most of the time now... despite my hate for public transportion, it'll save money in the long run and I wont have to dig out the car in snowstorms =]
Hey I go to Queens College too. We should hang out some day.