3 songs...

One day last week I drove to work instead of taking the train and on the way home I was listening to my favorite station: NPR (psst! Have you made a pledge to your local station yet?). The 'California Report" was on and while I don't remember the name of the guy whose story I was listening to, his story goes something like this: because he works for iTunes, he was put in charge of putting together a CD of songs to be played at his aunt's funeral. He talked about what to choose and why and the clash of religious beliefs between family members and what the deceased would have wanted. And then he mentioned the 3 songs he knew he wanted played at his funeral and listeners were invited to submit their 3 songs.

I've been thinking about this for a week now and it's been hard to decide which 3 songs but today's list is as follows: Elton John's "Your Song," Elvis's "Blue Christmas" and Louis Armstrong's "La Vie en Rose." I'm sure tomorrow's list would look different, as would one from next week, next, year, etc. But today, here's my list. What's yours?

Wait-Listed...

I got my letter this week (finally) and found out that I've been wait-listed. I suppose I should be pleased to be wait-listed (I'm 5th out of 10) when 22 people didn't get that option at all. There were 80 applicants for 48 slots for the January cohort and while I'm disappointed that I didn't get in I'm hoping that I'll get accepted for the June cohort. In the meantime, I'll be waiting to hear back from admissions re: whether I should retake the NET (god, I hope not) and resubmit everything or what. It's not like I can make my grades any higher and I know my letters of rec were solid. What's left? Those stupid essays they make you write? Maybe that's why I didn't get in...

Anyway, life goes on and I'll just do what I can do to get in for the June cohort. If I still don't get in then I'll need to consider something else. Blarg. I've been thinking about this since I was a senior in college and felt like I was so close this time. Oh well, it gives me time to paint my living room and dining room and take more tennis lessons and do more cooking. And do more fun stuff with Michael and Esme...maybe a trip to Tahoe? Or Yosemite? And another trip to Sonoma? How about all 3? Lots of fun stuff to do and no homework to hold me back.

What they don't tell you about taking public transportation...

Is that sometimes people purposely or accidentally jump or walk in front of said transportation and get themselves killed. I'm not trying to make light of this because it's a horrible thing. And while it is frustrating to be waiting for the train and wondering why it's late, mostly I'm just thinking about those poor people being killed by an oncoming train. Yesterday's accident was the 2nd one in the past 30 days and the 10th for the year.

I'm sure that most of these deaths are intentional but surely some are accidents...but then I wonder how that is even possible. If you're deaf, you can certainly see the trains and feel the vibration and if you're blind you can hear them and feel the vibration but...I don't know. Are these people zoned out and don't realize what they're doing? I just can't wrap my mind around this. According to C@ltrain spokespeople, at least 5 this year were suicides, 1 was an accident and 2 unknown. No word on the last 2 fatalities.

I realize that things like this happen everywhere but it makes me sad. Sad for those who are killed, sad for their families, sad for the train engineer and conductors and sad for the commuters who try to stop people from going out on the tracks. It's a sad day indeed here in sunny California...

When the only thing that makes you feel better is a bag of Doritos...

That's where I am right now. School has taken over almost every waking moment of my life that is not spent at work, commuting to and from work, bathing, walking the dog and cooking/eating. And still I struggle. Online classes seemed so ideal in some ways and now...not so much. It's the method of testing. In one class, we're told to read 36 chapters and then take a 25-question MC exam in 50 minutes. 36 chapters. Seriously? Now, to be fair, they're not all really long chapters but you can't even ask one question per chapter.

In the other class, we take weekly 10-question MC quizzes and those are better. We don't cover as much material but the questions are still hard. If you're taking an open-book and open-note test then the questions get much trickier. Not fun. It's doable, of course, but I'm not a good test taker within this format so it makes it worse. But now I'm down to the last 3 and 4 weeks of classes. I know I'm looking forward to a little time off between the end of October and the holidays. Then I'll have time for leisurely reading and baking and painting. Did I just say that? Painting? Am I crazy?