Following instructions

M and I are going away this weekend, and he has instructed me to bring the cane with me.

I shall now pause and look about hopefully for some expressions of sympathy.

It's not that I've been naughty and deserve a thrashing, I have and I do. It's that I'm going to have to carry the cane on public transport.

"But what if a security guard decides to ask me what it is?" I texted frantically.

"Then show it to them. And then they'll blush and show you on your way," was the not-at-all-reassuring reply I received.

Firstly I would just die of embarrassment, and secondly what if they don't?!

I hope I'm going to get some points for obedience and trust and so forth, here - I'm hating this enough to seriously consider deliberately defying him.

Statistics

Statistics was the one thing about this course that I was nervous about before I started. I'm not good at maths and I'm even less good at the theory behind the maths, but I knew I would have to thoroughly understand statistics in order to do a good job on this course. It was almost enough to make me decide not to apply.

To help the students assess their progress, we were provided with an online multiple choice test. It doesn't count for anything and the staff won't know our marks, it's purely to help us see how well we've understood the material.

I just took it and got 8/10.

I know, I know, I haven't posted anything for ages. But that's what happens when you start an MSc, you get really busy.

There hasn't been much discpline related to the MSc either, when I was worrying about my work ethic before I started the course, I forgot that my peerless skills of procrastination are matched by my perfectionism. Heh :-) Also, M's been pretty happy to leave me to it, trusting me to know what needs doing and then to do it, rather than checking up on every little thing. I'm glad, because that level of control would get frustrating pretty quickly, but on the other hand it does mean I haven't been putting in as many hours of study as I should. In fact last week a combination of procrastination and illness meant I very nearly didn't manage to get even the essential readings done before my seminars... It's now reading week though and while again I haven't spent 7 hours a day in the library, I do feel I've done some fairly solid pieces of work.

There has been discipline though, unrelated to school. I've a junk food restriction and a bed time, and other things to help structure my week. Like restricted internet use during the working day. That one really hurts. Some days I'm better than others - there was a bad patch a couple of weeks ago where by the end of the week M had to call me to account for breaking three of my rules. And because I'm supposed to know better than to break them willy-nilly, he also thrashed me for breaking them. Ow...

This week's been difficult on several levels, and I have a feeling I'll be asking this weekend for some hard, scorching stripes from the tawse. I don't know why I respond so well to this kind of catharsis, I'm just glad that we recognise that I do.