after 4 hours of class, 3 different professors, 2 bouts of nausea, and 1 exploded soda all over myself in the opening minutes of my first class, i'm kindly reminded of the working life perks we take for granted as professionals.

following the discovery of the open fly on my jeans, i'm also kindly reminded to check my zipper after i pee in the mornings. (i know how to make quite the first-impression.)

indeed, both observations worthy of noting.

given the ungodly hours i've already put in today and the dozen that await me, many questions have besieged me. what the hell is a quick ratio (and how come it's not any faster)? how the hell am i supposed to know the sensitivity points for a napa valley wine maker? who the hell does that kid who keeps shouting out without raising his hand think he is?

and most prominently: what the hell am i doing here?

because here's what my experience has been so far:

the case lesson says: the kettle is black.
the question to answer for class: what color is the kettle?

my answer: the kettle is black.
( i even highlighted the sentence where it said that it's black on page three.)
the correct answer: although the kettle might look black under a certain light -- which it has a .25 chance of being beneath -- the kettle is actually midnight blue. and if you know anything about the industry, you'd be able to project that it's not really a kettle; it's a teapot.

nevermind the four hours i put into studying the kettle ... i mean teapot ... myself and the three invested into the teapot with six far-smarter study partners who at least knew what the thing was called.

how quickly i'm reminded that the admissions committee's gamble on a certain nonprofit communications associate is not looking to turn out in their favor. they should have stuck with 34 red.

albeit only the first day of class and the obvious nature of my inadequacies here, i must admit that i have learned two very important business thingies (thingies being a technical term for we inept):

the smarty-pants pronunciation of finance is not fiiiinance; it's fin-ence.

and

a business doesn't have a strategic praauuu-cess; it's proooo-cess.

everything else they talked about today was overridden by this newfound important knowledge.

and if that's not worthy of my tuition, then the very good-looking israeli i'm assigned to sit next to in class -- who color-codes his notes and unwittingly moves closer to me as the class proooooogresses -- is worth every dollar.