Comebacks and Back-Ups

Today ended as any good fall Monday should: Gossip Girl (Tivo-ed, and viewed in a room of ten women and three - yes, three - men...oddly, approximately the same gender breakdown was evident at last night's viewing of the season premier of Entourage) sandwiched between snippets of the season's first edition of Monday Night Football. [Blissfully, three of my professors have deigned it appropriate to regularly assign what seems to be comparatively minimal reading assignments, and I don't have the other class on Tuesdays...plus, after six hours in class today topped off with two hellish hours on the phone with the internet so-called "provider" that refuses to provide till SATURDAY -- even though we called to set up service two WEEKS ago -- I felt some relaxing was appropriate...]

Biggest news of the day comes from the NFL, as two of the off-season's top stories - one of which is quite close to my heart - played out. Tom Brady, the Pats' fearless leader in the face of a crushing Super Bowl defeat, is missing the rest of the season due to a knee injury suffered in yesterday's season opener. I can't say I'm *too* sorry for him, as he's got nurse Gisele to tend to his health...likely after extensive ACL surgery. His back-up did well enough on the radio show, so who knows how the rest of the season will play out? As a transplanted New Englander, I don't really care; as an already-allied fan of another storied team, I hope they lose every game.

Then, after Brett Favre led his new Jet pack [lowercase p] to victory yesterday, Aaron Rodgers turned in an impressive completion rate in his first win of his professional career, four years after becoming Brett's back-up. I couldn't be more proud of the guy - but he could use a good shave along with some training in talking to the press. Still, if you keep beating the Vikings (and Lions, and Bears, and...Cowboys?), you won't hear any complaints from Titletown, Aaron.

***

Brett's got a comeback that seems so far, so good. I can't say my own return to school has been so easygoing. I think I sort of forgot how to be a student. Planning my day [productively...naps may or may not count as productive, as the semester progresses] around huge breaks in class? Reading and underlining? These are skills that I haven't really needed much during the past year, and suddenly we're thrown to the wolves. (Wolves that mercifully don't dole out grades first semester, but still...) Other than a few days in chemistry freshman year, I can't remember the last time when I really had to try hard to keep up with the flow of arguments and information in class; here, though, I can't seem to let my attention drift to Gmail for even a few seconds without losing the professors' momentum. It's an exhilarating feeling, really, to be surrounded with people that know so much more about this stuff than I do, and to be able to listen to their ideas - at some point, though, I'll probably be asked to say something rather than to just sit and absorb.

Technologically, too, I need to get back on the cutting-edge wagon. My Google Calendar has suddenly been called onto the field, and its color-coded appointments and blocks of time are rapidly proliferating across the coming weeks. My adeptness with its integrative functions is growing...if only my internet signal wasn't (gasp!) stolen and (grr!) spotty...so I guess for now I'll also keep a paper copy back-up; there's something so satisfying about physically crossing off a task in a day planner that I don't think I'll ever be able to give up.

One additional accomplishment/recommendation: Got/get an external hard drive. I picked up this super-cute, super-simple one from SimpleTech, and Time Machine has it running flawlessly.

...don't lose all of the work that will seemingly get done once I get back into the swing of things: check.