If you’re curious…

We took group photos this morning – the morning where I decided it would not be a good idea to bring my camera to class. Go me.

Fortunately someone else has posted the pictures, so if you want to see my instructors and my group, just click here.

Random Bits

So before I sit down and compose a post about today’s proceedings, I wanted to add some stuff to yesterday’s post that I forgot.

* As we approached campus yesterday, Jenn turned to me and said, “See that? That’s the new Engineering Library. They hired Illinois grads to design and build it. Guess what? They can’t put books on the 4th floor because if they do, the building will collapse. It’s the joke of the University.”
* Bunny rabbits frolic in front of my dorm. And they’re big bunnies too.
* I went exploring in my building last night. I discovered that Wardall laundry facilities include ironing boards and irons! They also have what appears to be a very nice exercise room. I say “appears” because I discovered this morning that only one out of 3 stationary bikes work.

A Monster Thank You

I woke up today feeling a little less panicked about school. While I’m still excited and nervous, I’m also eager to just get this started.

I wanna thank those of you who have been so awesome and supportive of me – especially y’all who sent me nice little notes of encouragement:

Sarah and Phil – who had to deal with my “ack!”s in person and keep telling me that I’ll be the best librarian ever.

Dad, Mom and Stephen – I can’t believe y’all posted comments. Thank you so much! I love y’all, and I’ll see y’all at the end of the month. Tell baby Tre that when he gets older, his super nice librarian auntie will help him do research for his schoolwork.

Deborah – thanks for your really nice email today. Knowing that everyone else will probably have pasty thighs helps. Words of encouragement from someone who has already done grad school help too.

Melanie – My librarian hero. Thank you for writing yet another letter of recommendation for me (on top of the 6,000 you already wrote) and for giving me my new mantra: “I am better than everyone else.”

And to all of you who read this silly blog and think kind thoughts, thank you too.

Panic update

I have finished ALL – yes ALL – of my reading for school. It helps that doing my laundry took for-frickin’-ever, but I slaved through all those articles. Whether or not I retain the content in those articles remains to be seen.

My new panic is that I’m not going to be able to fit all my stuff into my monster suitcase and that I’ll starve during the 10 days. Being out of my element and being forced to forage for food in a town without a Trader Joe’s or Ralphs strikes fear in my heart. Thankfully Sarah is sending me off with 20 granola bars and 4 packs of vacuum-packed olives.

Oh, I’m still panicking about writing a paper again after all these years. I didn’t want you to think that I’ve let that one slip.

The mild panic attack continues….

So I’m still struggling to get through a 47 page article and I have 9 more after that to read after I’m done with that one.

I’m worried that I won’t pack enough or I’ll pack too much.

I’m vaguely disturbed by the fact that the two week thingie I’m going to is affectionately called “Bootcamp” all over the school’s internal web site.

In a weird, stupid moment where I worried that I wouldn’t know how to write a research paper anymore, I cracked open my new MLA Handbook and highlighted sections of it and even put post-it flags on chapters I felt were important. Sarah and Phil should be relieved to know that the chapter on commas and comma usage was one of them.

Shortly I’m going to Phil’s house to do laundry and attempt to finish the monster article.

Yeah, I know I’ll be fine: this is just the standard, pre-trip Lynn freak-out that I get. I just had to share.

The Lead Up

I leave for Champaign-Urbana on Wednesday morning – a week from today. It’s kinda freaking me out.

During 10 days in CU, I will go through an orientation and fit in my first, complete, 2-unit class – paper, project and final. Needless to say, in order to pull this all off we students are expected to have all our reading done before we arrive. This is library school: there’s a lot of reading.

I’m slightly wigged about completing all my reading. I’m very wigged about writing a real, non-“please admit me” essay for the first time in 10 years. I’m also mildly wigged about the fact that I still haven’t dropped the 10lbs I’ve gained since last year and that the weather in CU will demand shorts. Everyone will see my thighs – my white, pasty, jiggly thighs. Okay, that’s a very non-scholarly fear, but I have it nonetheless.

I’ll also be staying in a dorm room while I’m at school. They’ll be supplying me with a pillow, but that’s about it. I’m having to gather sheets, a blanket, “shower shoes,” a towel and a bunch of other crap I haven’t had to pack since college. Sarah is making me pack granola bars so she’ll “know that I’ll eat breakfast.”

It’s all so familiar yet strange, ya know?

So just in case you thought I was just hanging out, waiting for school to start, there you go. There’s a lot of crap to be done. Now it’s back to my digital library article.

The Wind Beneath My Wings…

As stated in a previous post, my bestest friend, Sarah, and dearest boyfriend, Phil, read many the long, dull grad school application essay for me. Without their support, I probably would not have gotten in or at least had the nerve to go through with taking the GRE. Because seriously, folks, I was a wreck studying for that dumbass test.

Anyway the support has not stopped. Phil has helped me with this blog and now Sarah, eager to help me make this new blog house a home, has created an image for me:

Note especially the beer and the sassy top with coordinating skirt. Sarah is definitely one for detail. Thanks, Sarah.

The Background Story

So I had to write a lot of essays this winter about why I wanted to be a librarian while I was applying to schools. I will not subject you to those essays. I imagine, however, if you’ve managed to find this blog and you aren’t my roommate or my boyfriend (the ever patient editors of those countless essays), you might wonder why I’d want to be a librarian.

First, I’m a nerd. I like nerdy and academic things. I love school and I love finding, learning and retaining even the most useless bits of information. This is evidenced by my near-obsessive love for Trivial Pursuit. The idea of going to school and learning how to help people learn and find facts just sounds so up my alley.

Secondly, I really believe, having worked in the computing and academic environments so long, in freedom of information, freedom of expression and freedom of learning. These are all things that librarians hold dear. Again, right up my alley.

Thirdly, it’s time for a career update/change. I’ve realized, nearly 10 years after graduating from college, that I really do like working in academia. Yes, the politics and, yes, the students can be really annoying, but I like working in an environment where learning and research are the primary goals at the end of the day. What I don’t like is that in my current job, I’m not very closely attached to that learning and research. I want to be closer to them, more supportive of them and even participate in them. Librarianship would let me do that.

Fourthly, I would become a Classicist, but I enjoy eating (I left this part out of all my grad school apps).

Lastly, I really dig it. I know librarians and work with them. While I don’t like all the librarians I’ve met personally, I do like what they do.

So there. I hope that answers your questions.

Hi.

Hi.

So, um, yeah. My dear, darling boyfriend set this up for me long, long ago (okay, it was November), but I didn’t use it. Because I’m bad. And sorta lazy. Fortunately, he still loves me.

Anyway, I’m using it now to document my 6 semester journey through library school. Hopefully it will only take 6 semesters. Gosh. I really, really hope it only takes 6 semesters.

I start this month by flying out to glamorous Champaign-Urbana for 10 days. If all goes well, you can expect some posts and pictures from that trip as well as posts over the next two years about how I’m surviving the distance-ed program I’m enrolled in. Then you can celebrate with me when (if?) I get my Masters in Library and Information Science in August of 2007.

Yeah. So. Um. Here’s to Library School, y’all.