New Setting, New Life

Hey all, since the last time I wrote I have been completely busy making a new life for myself!  By that I mean I have finally began the graduate school that I have been alluding to for a few months now!  It has certainly been a different kind of world for me these last few weeks and I was thinking that instead of writing another piece about Dan Uggla's arms (which are still huge), I should actually tell you all about how I feel about this new life.  First of all, being a graduate student is fantastic.  You get to kind of live like an undergraduate except with more work and responsibilities, which is fine because in my case I have been given an office to share, so rather than kill time between classes and during the day, I have a place to return to and do some of my work.  I have also been notably more of an adult, going to bed before midnight and waking up in time to go to my office early and get my mind sorted out before classes start.  One thing that has really surprised me is that I have been consistently spending most of my weekdays in the math department for regular working hours, yet by doing this I have been able to have free weekends and am even going to be traveling over this coming weekend to hopefully see one of my favorite pitchers become the MLB's first 20 game winner!  I'm sure these free weekends will become a luxury in due time as classes start to pick up and homework becomes abundant, but I have been enjoying the ones I have had thus far.  

Nobody talked about this trade enough...

To deserve my office, I have been given the responsibility of being a Teaching Assistant (or TA for you folk who love their acronyms) for a class in the department.  For obvious reasons I am not going to mention the school name, class name, student names, my name nor anything vaguely identifiable about this course.  All I will let you know is that so far I have loved having this responsibility and have enjoyed every interaction with my students.  I guess I can also use this time to brag about how good I look in a blazer, believe me when I say that I am a rather handsome fellow to have teaching you math.  I have found the other people in the department to be welcoming, which I always appreciate seeing that meeting people has always seemed like an odd thing to me.  It is amazing to me to wonder what causes people to meet, since everyone seems to have no interest in other people when you see them walking down the street, and even when meeting someone, what causes you to want to see them again?  Social commentary/awkwardness aside, I've found a solid foundation of people to talk to when I need help or just to entertain myself for a little while without having to stray too far from my office!  But enough about work, how about we discuss a little bit of playtime, because all work and no play makes Chase a dull boy!

Don't forget frozen!  Dull and frozen.

As I mentioned, I have been able to spend a large amount of my weekends worry free, and even some of my weeknights!  For being more or less a stranger to everybody moving into my house a few weeks ago, I have found my living arrangements quite comfortable and don't believe I have a single thing to complain about in that department.  During the weekdays I tend to spend my off time at my house, and have rarely found myself bored.  My small sample size of weekends here has proved to be better than my undergraduate time, where I have yet to end a weekend without something to ponder or a story to tell.  I've had a few former students that I have known come up on the weekend and show me the ropes as well as introduce me to some people whose company I have found to be entertaining.  But even when I am not trying to have fun, I have been able to find enjoyment out here, such as walking from place to place.  As I have noted before my undergraduate school was predominantly male, which may even be an understatement, and this school is a lot closer to 50/50, if not more female!  So when I am walking from place to place as my schedule dictates, I am often presented with something nice to look at as I walk, which I appreciate very much.  I am not even exaggerating that I feel like Psy (watch this video and enjoy it, it is perfection) every time I walk somewhere.

ASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

Unfortunately this great gift is not without it's costs, because on those same walks where I have so much to look at there is one thing I can't help but notice, that being how miserable everybody looks.  Listen here kiddies, I don't care if its 9:00am on a Monday morning, if you are walking around on a college campus in this day and age and you are not even pretending to enjoy yourself, you are a truly sad person.  Maybe it's only because I have been on the other side and seen what it is like to be out of college and then return at a young enough age to be able to take full advantage of returning, but it seems to me these spoiled kids have no idea what a great time of their life they are just moping away!  Ladies and gentlemen, this is what college is, you are a young person in the prime of your life thrown into an environment filled with other people your age, where almost any action you take part in can be rationalized by saying "I'm in college, now is the time to try it," you are physically able to perform nearly any action you will ever be able to do in your life, and if there is anything (no matter how strange) you would ever like to try, you are probably no more than a mile from someone else who shares this desire and would probably partake in it with you.  Reread that last sentence and find any reason to be sad.  I know some of you are thinking "Hey Chase! You are clearly forgetting to mention how hard classes are!"  To those people all I can say is, I'm a grad student, my classes are much more demanding than anything undergrads are doing, and to tell you the truth, it is much much easier and enjoyable than anything you will be doing in the real world.  If you need any more reason to believe that college is the best place on Earth, remember this, Jamarcus Russell was successful in college!

I used this guy and successful in the same sentence, without using "not"!

So long faithful readers, and don't worry undergraduate school, I will always have a soft spot for you and your students, but I'm gonna go have the time of my life now.  More on the way!