My Triumphal Return to Blogging!!

You see, during the summer, I deliver my life up to the educational gods that I might be saved from starvation for the duration of the school year. Ironically, I have more time when I'm in school than when I'm working. Anyway, more of my blog moods hit near midnight and during the summer at midnight I'm already two hours into my beauty sleep with only four or five to go. This summer was no exception. Despite the fact that my blog atrophies during this time, that lifestyle is very satisfying for me. The whole go to bed early and get up early and work a full day concept works for me.

But summer is done, and its back to school. First I had to cough up $2200 of the money I made this year for tuition, but that's another story for another day. Next I made the customary trip to the bookstore, which was not bad this year. And now I'm in the full swing of things--ready or not.

This year is not shaping up to be terrible. I have a new job. Changing jobs was a challenge of its own. I had been with Amec for a year and a half and had developed good relationships there, but leaving was not a spur of the moment thing. It was calculated before the summer even started. Now I work for Wasatch Pizza as a driver. The nice thing about working at night is that I have more motivation for doing my homework during the day and so far I'm doing better than ever at keeping on top of it. I don't have class until 10:45 am and I get lots of good studying done before school and that helps a lot.

By brother Shaun and I are starting to work on microcontrollers. Basically, these are little microchips that can be imprinted with a certain routine or computer program and installed in machinery or robotics (anything that uses electronic controls for mechanical systems) to make it do what you want it to. This year one of my classes is mechatronics which is a fancy way of saying that we will combine electronics and mechanical systems. Right now we are doing the mechanical parts (gear trains, cams, linkages, etc.) and next semester we will do the controls and that is the part that will involve microcontrollers. At any rate, being versed in the application of microcontrollers is a marketable skill in and of itself.

Anyway, I should hit the sack. I have an early problem session tomorrow.