What I learned at Grad School this week...

Well, it's been one long and ridiculous beginning week for a new life and new school. So, what did I learn from this week? Well, here's a few thoughts:

• Wear comfortable shoes. You can always change into more professional-looking footwear upon arriving to the office.
• Find more than 5 affordable foods from the grocery store (I should know this by now, having lived in an apt. for the last 2-3 years). You'll grow tired of your choices after the first week.
• Do something that has NOTHING to do with music, the music building, and your apartment. I enjoyed walking around Brandywine Gorge and NOT being in Kent on Saturday morning.
• Skyline is NEVER too far away. There was one in Findlay when I lived in BG, and there's one in Cuyahoga Falls that I discovered this weekend. Hooray for a taste of home!
• ALWAYS expect those in the administration at KSU to not know the correct contact people. You can be sure you will contact at least 5 different people before getting to the right person, because people don't really know who you're supposed to contact.
• Take a jacket to the office! It's like the Polar ice caps in there!
• Put off rejoicing because you don't have to write a research paper in one class. Chances are, you'll probably have to write 2 more in the other classes you have.
• Statistics IS actually useful somewhere in music; thus, I am retracting the statement I made sophomore year of undergraduate. Hello, research.
• Always check to make sure that you are actually driving in the direction you want to go, i.e. if you want to go west to Starbucks, make sure you're driving on the westbound portion of the road, otherwise you'll end up in Ravenna.
• No matter how hard to try to take the semi-sophisticated suburbanite-city dweller out and place her into the hicksville po-dunk towns of NE Ohio... it just won't work.
• The age gap doesn't get any smaller as you get older, only bigger.
• Just because rent is cheap, doesn't mean it's a great place to live.
• Banging on the walls and floors is still an effective way to get obnoxious neighbors to shut up.
• Watching movies is a great alternative to watching TV, especially when they're movies you haven't seen before (suggestions for movies to see are still open and welcome)
• Highlighting your textbook is a great way to remember and reference material.
• If you're going to live 3/4 of your life in an office, you may as well make it inspiring and aesthetically pleasing.
• Don't ask for a first violin part unless you're prepared to play in the stratosphere for 2 hours at a time, and if you are, make sure you can read that many ledger lines. Being a second violin for 4 years in the Philharmonia, I forgot how to read those.
• Always remember that even if you bought the textbook for $108, you can always sell it back to amazon.com for $88... thus only paying $20 for the book. Think of it as a deposit for the book, not a payment.
• Force yourself to get up when the alarm goes off. You'll regret it later if you don't.
• Make friends with the local music office staff. You'll probably be seeing a lot of them.
• Blogs are a great way to grade student assignments. They reduce the amount of paper you have to carry around, and make it easy to keep track of all their work and grade.
• Keep your desk clean and organized. Cleanliness and organization helps to keep your focus on the task at hand and can reduce procrastination.
• Last but not least.... breakfast really is important. Eat it.

My desk at the School of Music. Check out the organization/inspiration combo goin' on there!
No room for procrastination!