september 24, 2001. I'm getting kind of pissed off at some of my peers. There's been a general loosening of standards in this second year: less focus, less seriousness. To a certain extent, this is fine and even acceptable. If I get to claim that cognitive dissonance is keeping me from snapping into school mode, surely the people around me get that excuse as well. But it becomes irritating when I knock myself out for hours in reading the textbooks, reviewing assignments and doing what I'm told, only to arrive in class and do group work with someone who not only hasn't read the chapter, but doesn't care. The message, big & bold, is that I'm a chump for doing homework. Even buying the textbooks themselves is seen as extravagant and unnecessary in some quarters. And like I said, it's pissing me the hell off. The worst thing is that there's no guarantee that I'm right. In my first degree I could get away with a few reading lapses, but there was generally no point in showing up to the lecture if I hadn't read the literature selection, as I just wouldn't understand the discussion. I've watched education students fake their way through hours of instruction and emerge with grades every bit as good as my own. Even if I discarded the idea that grades measure anything worth measuring (and as a future highschool teacher, this is a dangerous proposition to discard!), I'm left with the fact that good teachers are not reliably produced by applying certain pre-service stimuli. I could be wasting my time, deluded by the idea that my extra hours of study are helping my ability to effectively wrangle a herd of youngsters. I just don't know. One of my few consolations is that the Boy & I are getting along a hell of a lot better than we did last year. It seems that most of the initial living-together shocks have passed. Thank frigging God. this time 2 years ago: glorious day