School began a month ago and it has been so hectic that I lost myself in it.  I stopped blogging.  I stopped playing video games.  I stopped volunteering for things.   I've just been learning, learning, learning.

Yay for the skills I've been plugging into my brain.  Boo for the things I've left fall to the wayside.

I haven't had time for Austin Pets Alive!  I haven't had time to websling in "Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions" or go blasting people in "Unreal Tournament."

I haven't even had time really to look for part-time work.

There is a lot that goes into Television Production and Television Technology and I am the sponge that must absorb it.  I'm excited though that I have learned so much in the past month, more than I feel like I've learned in years.

I have participated in just about every aspect of television production from Direction to Technical Direction to Lighting Director to Camera operation on various types of cameras, to Audio control, CG, VTR, CCU and lighting boards.

I have written scripts, made story boards and lighting schemes for those scripts and now have to wait my turn for production time to produce these projects.  It's very exciting.  I feel so industrious in the TV field and there's three months left in the semester.  How big will my brain be when the semester ends and next semester takes me in to TV Field Production.  JUICY!!!

I feel like I've been walking through a dense jungle and stumbled upon well-paved road.  My future is opening up and the light is shining.

Wow.  I did not expect this semester to be such a mad reading frenzy.

But yegads!  It's like one of those movies where the guy goes back to school and discovers if he wants to succeed he must apply himself and there's a montage of him studying.  Well, the montage of reading would be more fun if it went by as fast in reality as in the movies.

There's a lot of reading.

But I love class.  We get to control different types of cameras and backstage tv and sound equipment and perform different crew positions.  Yesterday, I was a PA (production assistant).

We have to bring in our project ideas for the thirty second show we're each going to produce. 

It must be simple, yet fun, Rated G and no guns.
Computer.  Squeeze good story into thirty seconds.
Make it so.

It's the second day of school, and I'm beginning to understand that sometimes you drop a class not because you dislike the class, but because the class is at an extremely inconvenient time.

I like Copy Editing so far, after only one class, but I do not like the four hour wait after Copy Editing ends and TV Production begins.  I'm certainly not dropping my TV Editing class.  Copy Editing is more of a print journalism class and while its concepts are useful, and I wanted to get a detailed grasp on them, I must confess that my patience will not allow for a daily extended wait on hard benches in a loud corridor.

I tried to make the wait less interminable by visiting a nearby cafe and working on my laptop and going through my textbooks, but that only lasted for about an hour before I couldn't abide sitting there any longer.  Over the course of a semester, that would get expensive.

No.  Logic suggests that I needs must drop my Copy Editing class.  My worry is that I will not be able to find something to replace it.  All of the classes I want to take are full.  I can only hope that someone drops a class I want making room for me.

Either way, my decision has been made.  Say goodbye to Copy Editing.  What would be juicy is if I could replace that class with something like After Effects.

I sit in a corridor on a bench.  I am between classes.  There is a giant gap in the middle of my day to which I must become accustomed.  I have already had my first class of the day, Copy Editing, followed by a pizza buffet at Double Dave's.

Now, I fill the time with projects and homework.  Today is one of my days for editing the Austin Pets Alive! No-Kill Handbill.  I have reading to accomplish for Thursday.  As I sit on this bench, and time progresses, I become more unpleasantly aware of how comfortable my chair is at home.  I will ahve to find someplace else to sit besides this bench. 

But I am enjoying the people watching as I sit in the hallway.  Students bustle by, intent on their direction, and quite often misdirection.

I have already done my meandering and have found my classrooms and know where I'm supposed to be and when I'm supposed to be there.  Now, I need to wander around and find the secret comfy spots.  Every school has them.  Some place with a nice chair and decent wi-fi and if I'm lucky, a nice view.  Because this bench ain't cutting it.  Seriously.  The bench is bad.