I did move... right?

Portland has been in a tizzy this morning thanks to a very small amount of snow last night (so much so that it only stuck on vehicles) and some intermittent black ice (more of an issue out here since you don't see it until it's too late). My sister-in-law, a high school English teacher, sat dutifully in front of the TV hoping for a 2 hour delay this morning. She was left disappointed (she works in Tigard, a Portland suburb) however the Portland city schools were two hours late. As I watched the whole thing unfold I was amused at the huge deal Portland makes over the temperature gauge hitting freezing and the mere threat of snow.

Well, they're going to have fun now!

(The Great Blizzard of '07)

As of about 8am here it start coming down heavily; still not enough to put more than a half inch to an inch on the ground but I'm predicting gridlock and general hysteria the rest of the day. And here I though by moving from Minnesota I was running away from the snow. Instead I suppose Mother Nature is just gradually weaning me off the white stuff.

Just as I'm being weaned off one thing, I'm slowly getting addicted to another. Unfortunately that addiction is school. The first week of class is in the books and I'm a bit on the overwhelmed side. It's not a case of subject matter; if anything I find that both my Marketing Strategies and Finance are both things that I have a little bit of experience in so I'm able to comfortably add to the discussion. In addition both professors have strong personalities and have a very good understanding of how to teach to us "mature learners" (our MarkStrat prof's term).

Instead for me it's more the issue of the workload outside of class. Suddenly there are cases to read, chapters to highlight and all these other things that come with being a student. Unfortunately it's been 10 years so I'm a wee bit rusty. I'm hoping my ability to learn new concepts quickly will bail me out but as of now I see my social life for the next two years quickly shrinking. In the meantime, I am getting very familiar as to the locations and business hours of our local libraries and coffee shops. And Becca is getting very familiar with me having my head buried in a book and cursing under my breath.

It's 9am now, the snow has stopped (in fact it looks like it might even be melting), the sun is out and for me, my work day has officially started. Time to go find a job.

Brian