Back to School

The Anchorage School District has announced that school will begin tomorrow; but for me, school began on Sunday. That’s when I finally cracked open the text book my cousin Chris gave me: Principles of Anatomy and Physiology, 11th edition.

So far, I have tackled the first chapter: reading the pages in the book, reviewing the on-line materials, and referring to the supplemental booklet that came with the textbook. Last night, I took the test: I got a 78%, which is fairly typical for me. Not a bad grade, but not the best either.

Also this semester, I have signed up for a class from UAA relating to work: Construction Materials, Methods, and Techniques. I have been trying to get into this class since I started working at kpb 3 years ago, but it’s always been full up. This year I decided to simply buy the book and take the class on my own.

Yesterday was the day that the entire student body enrolled at UAA goes to the bookstore to pick up their textbooks for the coming semester.

You can imagine the line.

Actually, it really wasn’t that bad. They had a good system in place, and everybody was pleasant and cheerful. I guess the excitement of new school supplies still gets to you, even at our age! I can remember being so thrilled with my new pencils and paper in grade school.

I did encounter a slight problem: apparently they changed the course material at the last minute and so cancelled my order because it was for “the wrong book.” What they didn’t do, however, was TELL anybody they’d done that. So, when I showed up with my receipt in hand, they couldn’t fine my name on the list.

This list was about 10 pages long, double-sided, and small print. They’d organized it alphabetically by the last name, which normally helps to make things go quickly – but if they should have to look things up by the order number, that gets a little more tricky.

Jenna, the Admin Assistant, came down from the offices upstairs to help me out personally. She was finally able to figure out what was going on, and was even able to find me a book once I assured her I really didn’t care if it was exactly the book I was supposed to have.

So, now I am lugging around two very large, heavy text books. My intention is to alternate between the two of them. I’ll do one chapter from one book, then one chapter from the other book, and so on.

And during the weekend, I can tackle my birthday book = Sustaining Life: How Human Health Depends on Biodiversity.