Fall Term 2010 or How I've Been Driving Myself Nuts For 3 Months

First, to catch you up, Thursday (the 12th) marked the last day of Summer term. The last two classes I needed to complete my Pre-Management associate's degree from CNM are finished. Grades haven't posted yet, but I'll be shocked if I didn't get A's in both. I've also been accepted at Anderson School of Management at UNM. Needless to say I'm registered and ready to go, though I'll only have a week off before I start on the 23rd. This will be my first official term as a full-time student (I took one term with four classes before, but one was only one credit hour so I only had ten credit hours instead of twelve). I've been working out child care (Gabe starts kindergarten this year so I'm mostly worrying about Val) and pricing books and I was simply amazed at what I discovered even though I've been doing this for a few terms now.

My first term back at school I spent around $300 for two textbooks. Seems like an awful lot of money, right? A few terms ago, Dan spotted an ad for a textbook rental site: Chegg.com. I priced my textbooks that term and found a pretty good savings. I honestly can't remember how much though which is why I'm sending this out now. So you can know, as I know, exactly how much.

My textbook options this term are as follows:

1. $747.25 new
2. $560.75 used (assuming I can find them)
3. $217.99 rented from Chegg

What choice to you think I should choose?

Now keep in mind this is base price. I also have a promo code! Those of you who are or know students pass along promo code CC106269 along with the website. And if you find that you'll want to keep the book (which I have with a couple), you can always pay a little more before you have to return the book to buy it.

So.... I think what makes me most nervous about this coming term is that I'm not just changing schools, I'm changing just about everything about this term:

• University instead of community college
• Four 3 credit hour classes instead of two or three
• Monday/Wednesday schedule (with Thursday night at a different campus) instead of Tuesday/Thursday
• Public transportation instead of my own car (parking permits, gas, and wear & tear are costly)
• Scheduling around Gabe's school hours instead of just available child care (Thank you so much Tony & Lucynthia for your help so far and continuing help in this area & thank you to Meri for your help when my parents aren't available)
• Working at least once every 1-2 weeks instead of the occasional day now and then
• Big outside the classroom group projects in addition to the normal personally done homework

As I write this and wonder to myself "Is this something I can do? Will I really make it?" I glance up and see a candy wrapper I saved for just this occasion.... it says, "Believe in yourself!"

Bring it on....