An Update On Things

It's been over a month since I last blogged, which is longer than I meant. Needless to say I've been busy.

The biggest of my tasks involved our(my wife and I) move from Muncie to Fishers. Meaning I will have to commute every day to class for the next 9 months. Quite a bummer, but we decided it was easier for her (being the sole bread-winner for the time being) to live closer to her work.

I also started back in with classes this past week. I'm excited for a lot of things about school this semester. This will be the last batch of classroom classes that I'll be taking, as well as the last on-campus classes I'll be taking. In the spring, as I've blogged about, I'll be taking part in a Virginia Ball Center project about the Underground Railroad. It'll take place off-campus, so this is sort of the beginning of the end.

My classes won't be too challenging, I don't think. I'm finishing up a couple requirements: a statistics class, a course on Theory of Computation, a 3D Graphics class, and finally an independent study where I'll be doing some Kinect development.

I'm also planning on attending CCSC programming competition and potentially presenting on something.

I'm enjoying the 2 hours of commuting every day as well as anyone can. I'm looking into some books on tape, since radio gets repetitive quickly. Also, my automobile's A/C went out yesterday, so lets pray for cool weather(!).

My wife and I are really enjoying the area we moved to. The apartment complex is quite a bit nicer than where we lived in Muncie. They also have a pool, a (small) workout facility, and an indoor (carpeted, whaa?) half-court basketball court. My better half has had a bit of time off until she starts working, so she's been enjoying some R&R while I'm away in Muncie.

This past weekend we checked out the local library and we were pleased. They have a lot of books (surprise!), so we were both able to check out something that interested us. I stumbled upon the technical books, so I picked up 97 Things Every Programmer Should Know. It's a decently short book (< 250 pgs), and each "thing" is only 2 pages long. My instincts say that lists of important concepts like this aren't usually objective, so you're taking a risk that the author knows what they're talking about. In this case, the "things" are written by a slew of industry experts. I recognized a few names, so I thought I'd give it a whirl. It's proven to be a good book to pick up for 20 minutes and set down.

So far, I've known just about everything I've read. This is comforting. Sometimes I don't quite know the technical terms the author(s) use, but I know the concepts once they explain them. The fact that I know the majority of what I'm reading is a testament to the education I've received, which I've realized that (like a lot of things in life) it's really what you put into it. If you go to class and that's it, I don't think it'll completely prepare you for the work that awaits you. I've been fortunate to bump into some great people and situations, and I've learned a lot from these experiences.

We'll see how my classes go. I'll definitely blog about the programming competition, as well as the Kinect development if it gets interesting (which I think and hope it will).