The Official Bane of My Existence

I have referred to many things in the past as being, "the bane of my existence." It is a great phrase. It is descriptive. There are many things that fit the description: things which are, in fact, the bane of my existence. Things like technology. Packing for trips. Paying bills. Yapping dogs. People who drive slowly in the left lane, or who walk slowly in front of me. These things all drive me crazy. But these things are all minor banes.

Do you want to know the most baneful of the banes? The most banefully baney bane of them ALL?

Keeping track of my online learning assignments.

Four classes: I'm taking FOUR classes over the internet right now. Each class has its own site, and each site has the assignments posted in various links, none of which match the other classes' links. A smart person would take the time to sit down at the beginning of the semester, root out all the assignments, and put them in one easily viewed calendar.

I am a smart person. I am SO smart, in fact, that I thought I could remember them all in my head.

I am now smart enough to realize that I was an idiot for thinking so.

I have now forgotten four, FOUR FOUR FOUR assignments for these classes. I have had to beg for forgiveness from each of my four professors. I found out about two of these assignments when talking with my other classmates at our class last night-- the one on-campus class we have. You know those nightmares where you think you have a huge paper due, or a test you didn't study for? You know that HUGE feeling of relief when you wake up, and realize it was just a dream? Yeah. The first part. But not the second. The second part never came.

"Wait-- WHAT is due today? Oh my gosh-- I'm going to have to go home and do that. CRAP!"
"Greta, don't worry-- it happens to all of us. I'm still working on the Glasser paper! Dan had to give me an extension on that!"
"The what?"
"The Glasser paper."
"The WHAT?"
"...The Glasser paper. It was due a couple weeks ago."
"I thought we just had to do a discussion post for that!"
My classmates looked at me in horrified sympathy. "We did... But we had to write a 4-5 page paper too..."

I literally keeled over. You guys. I have had enough stress. I am tired of feeling so stressed. I have been stressed about family. I have been stressed about relationships. I have been stressed about friends. And I am SO, SO STRESSED about this grad school stuff. The pressure is back on my chest. The breathing has once more gotten shallow. My appetite has once more disappeared. I am so tired of feeling this way.

And I'm EXHAUSTED. Almost too exhausted to go look through these syllabi, one by one, and FINALLY root out all the assignments due-- both those overlooked and those still impending.

But I am a smart person. And even though I am weighed down by fatigue, a smart person puts her assignments in her calendar. Better late than never, right?

I just hope my professors feel the same way...