statics anyone?

mike started his first day of grad school yesterday. he left portland about 6am to get down to corvallis for his 8am class. it's not a two hour drive, but being the new kid on the block he gave himself plenty of time.

here are excerpts from an email he sent out to family this morning:

my 8:00 class started with my professor saying ' i assume youve all taken Statics. it is a prerequisite for this class. if you havent, i wont kick you out, but if you stay, you might struggle '. i have not taken Statics.

then at 10:00 in my next class, it was pointed out that everything we would be studying this term would be based on....drum roll....Statics.
My advisor teaches that class so i spoke with him after class thinking i would drop one of the 2 classes. Instead, he recommended that I...drumroll...take Statics. So instead of dropping a class, im picking one up ( actually just sitting in on it ).

He was actually very encouraging and said it would be rough but better to try to do them all at once rather than put my entire sequence of courses back 1 year. he seems to understand where Im at and thinks i can do it...so im doing it. i was pretty nervous until i spoke with him so now i just have to learn Statics before Wednesday and ill be ok.

i knew it would be tough at first and im sure the worst is yet to come in some ways but im still very excited about the material believe it or not. i think if i can get through this first term everything will be more manageable.

so that is the life of a new grad student...learning things you never knew, go figure! i'm in portland spending time with family & friends. i'll head down this weekend. still haven't heard about the job and still am not sure how to get our pictures online so pictures will wait until next week, when we're in our house & i have our computer back! :)