Tests

All my life is composed of tests. I've failed a lot of them, passed some others (and some of those passes were by the skin of my teeth). At the end, I hope I'll have passed more than I flunked. Coming out of life with a C average wouldn't be bad, all in all.

Anyway, enough introspection! I took my first final of college! Yes, I know it is only a touch over two weeks into it but this isn't your regular college. This is online and based on competency units. So, recommendation was to take the tests pretty much cold for two of the classes. Yesterday's test was on Foundations of Communications. Grammar, syntax, outlining, etc. Got a 94.

Now that we know what my strength is (verbal and keyboard diarrhea), I am taking the math exam today. I have been preparing for it and will do a bit of revising for it today. For those of you who don't spend much time speaking to someone from England who is taking classes, that means reviewing. Yeah, SO has affected me more than I usually care to admit. :) So, anyway, this will be on real numbers, slope of a line, graphing, equations, all that kind of stuff. I've been working on it and there is so much I've forgotten in the last too many years since high school. But, looking over it, I found it all coming back pretty quickly. I guess I had stored it all in long term memory.

Took the test at home while being monitored by someone somewhere else. They sent me a webcam to use. It was odd. Very odd. I was totally aware of all my movements and wondered what would happen if I waved to the webcam or stuck out my tongue.

Bird is really struggling in school. She was up until all hours this week finishing homework for end of quarter. She was even working on it until midnight on Friday on the off chance some teachers would take pity on her and count it. If they don't, she'll end up with a 1.9 GPA to start off high school with. I showed her how long it would take her to come back from that and she was horrified. Unfortunately, and I think it is a function of her condition, she has to learn the hard way. I can't smooth the way for her and make it all better. She has to do it. She is resistant to help and things need to be her idea on her initiative. I can't dictate. I can't even suggest. How to cope with this needs to come from within her, on her initiative, or she is closed off. However, I have discovered that if I suggest a course of action and she rejects, I often have to just wait a few days and she will present a course of action to me that is nearly identical to what I suggested but with her own twist on it. So, I've been suggesting how to get the homework done. She was working on homework not for this quarter that she got last week. And she is determined to do every extra credit assignment possible and, even, asking for more. The bad grades scared her. Sometimes, that's a good thing. It just hurts to watch the process.

The itching and bumps are much, much better. It was the chromium picolinate!

My mother is not doing well and is back in a severe depression, so much so that the assisted living facility is recommending admission for a time to try to get some anti-depressants regulated. That or a 24 hour caretaker which we can't afford. We hope to know more on Monday. I couldn't go to see her this weekend. I tried to work it out but finances and time constraints prevented it. In addition to the two tests this weekend, laundry, and cleaning, I also had to add on a trip to Sears to get Bird's glasses adjusted.

She was hit in the face in gym by a foam ball on Friday. Her face is fine but the glasses were knocked a little cattywumpus. With her prescription, even a little out of alignment affects her vision a lot and she was dizzy from trying to focus through them. They're fixed now, thank goodness. I once went to this site to see things the way she does without glasses. I put in her prescription and received the message "beyond simulation range". So, I started reducing the spherical measurement by .5 each time until I got to where it would show. It goes to +5. One eye is a +6 and the other is a +5.5 and we aren't done getting her eyes adjusted to what she really needs...which is a +7 or +8. Now you know why I sometimes use her glasses as magnifying lenses.

But, it's all good. Glasses are now fixed. I'll call my mother later today and talk to her. Bird wants to talk to her and see if she can cheer her up, too.

Oh! And while at Sears I used a $25 gift card from my Secret Pal to buy a pair of pants. Found a pair that fit (a little snug but they are the tummy slimming ones and it will give me incentive to get back into weight loss mode) that were on sale for $24.99, down from $40. When I checked out, there was a special sale thing going on where, if you spent more than $20, you got $10 off. So, I got my $40 pants for $16! Whoo hoo!!!! Then I stopped by the year round farmer's market and bought some eggs and fruit. When I checked out, the eggs (free range, thank you very much) were 40 cents off. I was afraid to try another store...my luck might not hold!

Okay, enough of this. Time to go solve some equations! Wish me luck on my test this afternoon!