What a day!

This is officially the best example of a great school day.

It began by waking up at 9:30am (sleeping in, yay!) with my hubby and MoMo. John and I went to breakfast at a cute hippie foods place (I had the best muffin I've ever tasted in my life, and John ate a salad) and hung out at a table outside, chatting while the birds sang, the sun streaming through leaves. At noon, he dropped me off at school where I attended my Public Speaking class. My energetic and hilariously fun professor ran around the room "lecturing" (I say with quotes, because her lectures are quite fun, and lecturing doesn't normally involve me laughing, nodding, and speaking out in class). I then spent an hour laying on a bench in between some trees reading A Clash of Kings and listening to the water fountain. It was 75 and sunny today. Is it seriously January? My Northern Minnesota mind is laughing hysterically. Then I went to my first Video Production 1 session. My professor is only a part time teacher at Armstrong because she is a full time teacher at SCAD. And you can tell. My whole semester will be made up of blogging, filming, picture taking, and editing. We'll be doing group projects all semester not just learning the THEORY of directing, producing, editing, and writing-- we'll actually be going out and DOING it. Actually running around Savannah, if need be, on whatever project we have given ourselves. Holy. Crap.

My only worry is just this: group projects. This is actually a required class for Theater majors. There is only one other English major in there with me, who is focusing on Film Studies as a part of her Communications degree, so it's required for her too. I think I'm the only one there because it sounded fun. And every student who spoke in class sounded...well... like a theater major. My coworker, Jessica, who is also a theater major, knows exactly what I'm talking about. She doesn't like the other people in her major either. Ha. It's hard to describe exactly what is so unattractive about this group in particular. It could be the inability to understand when it is appropriate to interrupt in class (and saying things in ways that suggest even though they desire to work Broadway, they have no actual people skills)...or maybe it's because no one seemed to understand the simplest requests of our professor. I think most of the 2 hour class was spent with our VERY patient professor repeating instructions several times over.  But anyway, aside from the students, the assignments are brilliant. There are supposed to be 15 people in the class, and because we are going to be working in groups, we have to pitch our work to see who has the best ideas for assignments. The first pitch I have to do is for a documentary assignment. I'm going to try selling the idea of following John's editors and their story: they just started up their own magazine. Their launch party is next Saturday (which is going to be so amazing, I can't wait to report on it). I'm going to take a camera (hopefully my boss will let me use a camera from work, my own digital isn't working) and photograph the party. Not only do they have a number of local bands performing, there will be an art show, hoopers and fire poi (you know those guys who light sticks on fire and do crazy tricks with them? Yeah. That's those guys.). Not to mention the free food and the selling of the first edition of their magazine. I'll talk more about it later as I work on the assignment.

I've never been so excited for school. Not only do I have a blog in my Video Productions class, but I had to make one for my Freelance Writing and Publishing class. I have to think up a theme for that one. I considered 'technology in the classroom,' but for each post (there will be three) I have to do interviews with professionals...and I think calling up an old high school teacher is considered more 'available' than 'appropriate.' For example, if I did a cooking theme, I'd try to call up Paula Dean's restaurant here in Savannah and see if I could talk to their chef. Or Paula herself. I'd do that if I didn't hate cooking so much. Food I love. Cooking, not so much.

I've never been so excited, and I've never felt more inspired. Through my classes today I kept hearing the words "be creative, don't just do something because it will get you by." And my brain ran with it. My first informal speech in Speech Communications is talking about three personal things I bring to class. The first thing I thought of was my pencil--I'd talk about the hundreds of lives its created, a mother like no other (it's pushed out lead like hundreds of children on to paper). Should be fun, though nerve wracking. I hate public speaking.

I'll post more as the semester progresses, and include links once I get the other two blogs going. I hope things just keep getting better!