Scraped through Maths with a Pass(noone could get a lower score and still Pass!). Worse was a Pass for the Structural Geology subject, crashing the exam. Serves me right for walking out after an hour without reviewing the answers. Good result for Hydrogeology. Have rejigged my course plan to a strict 2 courses per semester, part-time plan. It would be too much of a strain to squeeze in enough courses to shave off another year from the 8 years projected. As it stands, 6 years including a full-time honours year.

[Darnspacebar rarely works now] Actually, it is not that bad, I have merged the words for effect. Anyway, my University studies hit a wall a while ago as life and work and study collided. I am now slowly regrouping. Hope to get back on trackbefore the end of semester. The Maths is not too difficult, it is a matter of staying on track for long enough for it to sink in. I am getting too easily distracted at the moment.

Doing Mathematics and Applications - Honours Stream, Intro to Structural Geology and Field Mapping and Hydrogeology this semester. Biggest workload ever. Running as fast as I can, going to bed around 2am plus at least once a week, stopped watching TV and playing angband at all. Rarely read the paper. It is good to see how far I can push myself.

Had a scare with the maths competency exam. Had the distinction of being the only person in my stream to fail the test 14/30. I had to leave it early as my wife was not well and she had to pick me up. Didn't even review the answers. When the answers were posted on the course website, much slapping of the forehead ensued. Anyway, got to re-sit it the next week and got the stream average of 24/30, so much happier.

The workload will ease off a couple of weeks after the mid-semester break when the exam and the field mapping (7 day field trip) are over. Handing in up to 4 pieces of assessable work a week and have only been happy with the Maths Assignment.

All the rest could have had a lot more work on them. This is not a whinge. I am following the consequences of my choices.

After 20-odd years, decided to go back to Uni last year. Got to a stage in my life where I didn't want to be chained to a desk for the rest of my career. The mere fact that I get out and walk across to the ANU a few times a week has also energised the time I do spend at work. Average billable hours per month actually rose despite the impost of part-time study. Last semester I got a tad carried away and took on 5 courses (4 is a full-time workload) though the actual contact hours per week weren't too onerous. My approach to selecting subjects is not to do any subjects I did last time at Uni (Botany, Zoology and Computer Science) and concentrate on the stuff I avoided, ignored or did not really grasp (except Physics - still trying to figure out how to squeeze some of that in).

The degree is a BSc(Resources and Environmental Management). I planned to do a lot more Geography initially, but have discovered the wonders of Geology and have crammed quite a lot of it in. Starting Maths this year and will complete a 6-week intensive bridging course this week. I wasn't sure if my previous maths results were due to stupidity, ignorance or laziness. Thankfully it was mostly laziness, so I have been able to do quite well this time.