(no subject)

I was thinking that, perhaps, I might have more time to write while I'm here. However, apart from an hour long break for lunch earlier today, I've been here since 8 o' clock this morning with about ten minutes an hour to walk around and stretch, and I'll probably be here 'till ten o' clock tonight. The days may stretch out pretty late the whole week, so rileybear67, I'll have to let you know whether I'm actually going to have time to see you on Wednesday. You know I'd really like to, but if I don't, I apologize. Maybe I can give you a call when I know more what my schedule's going to be like?

We've had free soda (I've found a couple of 7-ups necessary to continue paying attention this afternoon. Alas, all non-diet, non-caffeinated soda has been depleted.) warm cookies from somewhere, and a free lunch. The lunch was interesting; we got little cards with listings of things like 'pizza', 'sandwich', soup (large) (small), soda, and other things that we filled out or put checkmarks by and gave to the little cafeteria on the second floor (an Elliot's Off-Broadway franchise) and they made our lunches for us. They must be hanging on to the forms to bill the training company.

It's been nothing but lecture so far today and we've covered basic networking, router config, the CDP protocol, and configuring interfaces on a router. I'm told that, after one last lecture segment about switched networks, we're going to do labs, which will run through about ten o' clock. I think we're getting served dinner too. At least, I sure hope so. Otherwise doggy will go flop on the desk.

It looks like this is going to be pretty intense training, but at the same time, I am thoroughly enjoying myself. Most of this has been review from my Michigan class, but that's good 'cause it's been a while. There are a few new things too. I never learned about CDP (Cisco Discovery Protocol) before. And even with the accelerated nature of the course, I'm having as good a time as I did in Michigan and am looking very much forward to the labs. There's one cert test on Wednesday and another on Friday. With lots of work and a little bit of luck, I'll leave here with my CCNA on Friday.

(no subject)

Though we haven't covered subnetting yet, there are a number of questions on it (of course) on the practice test that we all started working on after finishing the router labs we were given to go through. And, though the instructor told us not to worry about them yet and go on with the other test questions, I found myself spending lots of time on them anyway. It's because I know that, while remembering theory and terms is second nature to me (I love learning new words and fitting my head around the way things work), the math involved in subnetting is going to take me some practice hours to twist around in my brain until it's natural. In my last Cisco class too, I found it really fascinating, but not quite intuitive.

So, though we had the room at the practice center through ten o' clock, I'm back in the hotel room sprawled out in bed with my laptop and a notebook, waiting for the rather nasty looking frozen spaghetti and meatball dinner to cook (moiracoon, I so miss your cooking!!). I could have stayed there and worked with the instructor, but I know that this is the sort of thing I just have to sit and graph out in every possible way 'till I find one that fits into a slot in my brain just right. And really, if I'm going to be sitting and doing binary math in my head and scratching in a notebook for an undetermined period of time, you can be sure that, the option being there, I'm going to do it stark naked in an air-conditioned hotel room with a comfy bed.