Jasper Jones

What should have been a quiet night at the hospital emergency room turned into a bad time for me tonight. Usually midweek is not much going on unless there is a car wreck or something unusual. But tonight the ambulance brought in someone I really didn’t expet nor want to see. My roommate, Alex.

We play softball in a recreational league and as much as I love to lay, if they have games that conflict with my work schedule, then I can’t play that game. So I missed tonight’s game and Alex went without me. He was running to third base toward the end of a close game, and slid into the base to avoid being tagged out. Well, something went terribly wrong in that slide and he ended up breaking a his leg. So they hauled him here.

Alex is in the back getting x-rays and I’m waiting to see what’s next. I get off work in a few minutes, but I can’t leave Alex here by himself.

I’ve lived on campus in the dorms the entire time I’ve been going to school. It is convenient to the classes and a cheap way to have some place to sleep. Sure, it gets a little noisy and there’s not much privacy, but the noise doesn’t both me unless I’m trying to study and I don’t really study that much here in my room.

Today we went over to Kelly’s place for lunch and to work on our group presentation for Economics. Kelly and I have already done the grunt work and just need to get the presentation organized. Pretty sure we’ll be ready in plenty of time.

Kelly has a nice condo over in the Garden District that her dad bought as an investment and he lets her live there for school. After she graduates he’ll probably rent it out to more students. It’s really nice - large rooms, quiet neighborhood, plenty of parking.

She has a nice living room with a sleeper sofa and a really nice entertainment center along one wall. It’s real furniture - nice wood and lots of shelves and cabinet doors. Beats the heck out of my little TV Stand in my dorm room!

She wasn’t shy about showing me around. I even got a peek into her bedroom, which was fixed up really nice with a four poster bed and a large dresser-like piece that had a spot for a small TV in the bedroom. I don’t know much about armoires so I asked her what to call that, because it really is nice. She didn’t even make me feel stupid for asking.

Alex has a younger brother back in California. I met him last year when the whole family came out here for spring break to pick up Alex and then they all went on down to Orlando and spent the week at Universal Studios. His brother is a senior this year and called tonight about getting some help with his college applications.

Alex had a great high school counselor who helped him with most of his applications and although this school was not his first pick, he liked this one the best of which ones accepted him. But Lil Bro isn’t getting much help from his school counselor and Alex is trying to help him get things moving by talking on the phone and sending him instant messages, texting, emails, etc. The boy is not dumb but I don’t see why he needs so much help from Alex. It’s not that hard, especially if you go to the web site called Collegezaps and get help with the college application process from CollegeZapps.

There’s a link for students, a different links for parents and a third link for counselors. The link for students is totally easy to work through. You choose your schools, you fill in their online questionnaire, print the documents and proof them for spelling and grammar, and then you send them in. I mean, how hard is THAT?

I told Alex to make sure his brother applies to multiple schools and gets a new email address to use with just his name and not a silly gamer or hiphop name that he uses in the chat rooms. Other than that, the rest is just common sense and getting help from the right people or places.

Labor Day for most people means they get a day off from work and have have with their family and friends, celebrating the end of summer.

For me, it was the first day of work. The irony was not lost on me.

I gave up a huge party at the river with a bunch of kids. I know they all had a kickass time while I was slaving away at a computer in a room full of sick and hurt people. But at the end of the day I banked some cash and they just came home with sunburn. So I’m ahead of them already!

After class this afternoon I headed to the hospital for my second interview. This time I met with the doctor in charge of the Emergency Room. I think I got about 6 minutes of face time with him. He’s very busy and very stressed and very distracted. Although technically he would be the boss, I would report directly to an administrator and he would be the one who handles serious issues. I don’t plan on having any serious issues, but I respected the way he wants to meet each prospect and have a say in the people who work under him in the ER.

The HR Manager says that I can start next week and gave me an example of a work shift schedule to make sure I can work my shifts around my class schedule. All my classes are early in the mornings so there’s no conflict with second and third shift work. All I have to worry about is making time for homework, a couple of labs, and enough sleep. A little party time, too.

So far it all looks good and I’m ready to jump in.