It's been a week

It's been a very long week. I'm very glad that it's Friday.

I've been at our training academy (at least I was there Monday through Thursday). I sat in the back of the classroom and when I found myself nodding off or being distracted from the lecturer due to my brain wandering or other classmates side conversations, I would grab a knitting project.

It was amazing how much this helped my mind focus on the lectures! Once in a while, the speaker would make a point that needed to be jotted down and I could just lay the knitting in my lap and take some notes. But over all, I found that knitting in the classroom to be a very good thing to be doing.

On the other hand, I'm still not sure I was able to regurgitate the material on the test. I made the mistake of staying with friends in city instead of living at the academy. Had I stayed at the academy, I most likely would have had time (made time) to review the lectures for the day with my classmates and when it came time for the test on Thursday afternoon, I might have done better.

I am totally convinced now that the Lyme Disease from a few years ago really and truly fried my brain. I did fine on the multiple choice questions because there was a little reminder tickler there (the right answer was there shining out at me) but when it came to the fill-in-the-blank questions... well, my old brain interpreted that to mean it was supposed to "go blank." And it did. I could not bring to my mind, despite much gnashing of teeth and biting of nail, a single answer for the blanks. It was horrible! Really, truly humiliating.

I will probably have to repeat the first week. I'm so upset about it!

Anyway, I've decided to make flash cards for myself from my notes and from the class materials and drill myself every night until I have all those statute numbers and terms and the alphabet soup down pat. If I didn't pass, perhaps they will be willing to re-test me when I come back on the 18th. In any case, I will be ready.

I did get a lot done on the hat for Allison (red, of course), the tea cozy for my mother-in-law, and the red sock. I did not take the lace projects as I figured that trying to follow a chart or count stitches would just be too much while trying to pay attention. Everything I worked on was plain old stockinette.