So long, August!

Its almost September! Good riddance, August! It always feels like September heat is much more bearable than August heat, just because it's September. :)

August has been a good month, don't get me wrong... and it has truly flown by. Earlier this month, I was finishing two summer courses, "summering" for two weeks in the middle, and then started back at school. This past week in particular has been challenging to get back into the groove of a hectic schedule.

This past weekend was a little tough because my family and I had to say goodbye to our beloved patriarch. My precious grandpa went home to Jesus. This is comforting for me because I know that he is in a much better place. I can just imagine the joy he has now, probably hiking or fishing in a place even more beautiful than his Colorado. I will always remember his love of the Dallas Cowboys, M&M's and "Circus Peanuts", helping him fold the laundry, going on walks, and the sweet smile on his face. I was blessed to have him in my life this long.

We had such great style back then: My legit Tweety Bird shirt, and Tara's pigtails and Barney shirt!

Well I don't want this post to be sad or depressing, Grandpa definitely wouldn't want that! 

Monday was the first day of school, and it went swimmingly! As "head TA" this year, I had to get preparations in order for the lecture and labs for the week. Thankfully, we didn't run into any hiccups- especially because the bossman decided to cut the syllabus down from 150 pages to 68 pages... 68! He's going soft on these kids... ;-)

Some of my TA duties this week included:

• Making copies of syllabus and other handouts
• Preparing a seating chart
• Taking pictures for said seating chart
• Picking up 90 blue books for the first exam: the second day of school! (Needless to say, I had to fight the crowds of undergrads in the MSC bookstore)

Gosh, when I write this out, it doesn't seem as crazy as it was when I was running around...

On top of being a teaching assistant, I'm taking three classes: back to back to back. YIKES.

• Financial Analysis for Agribusiness Firms: First for the day, thankfully! Looking like this will be the time-consuming, dreadfully boring course this semester.

• Strategic Agribusiness Management: Instantly liked the professor, very laid back and funny.  Although the subject is not my favorite, I think it will be an interesting class.

• Real Property Analysis: My elective! ha! Anything real estate fascinates me, our guest lecturer yesterday gave an entertaining lecture over the history of the real estate financing market. Geez, how nerdy do I sound?

Finally, I wanted to recommend an app that I have been so completely obsessed with since I got it: Living Earth. It shows real-time satellite images of the earth. I took these two screen shots two days ago:

Check out Hurricane Issac!

I just love how you can see the lights at night!

 A new way to have the world at your fingertips! :)