I had actually underestimated how difficult these two things were going to be.  Things change in the span of a couple of years.  It was an interesting struggle to get contact information for some and balance exciting new schedules for others.  I am now following up to ensure that those hard fought letters reach their final destination.  Now I am as much of a control freak as the next person, but I am far too bashful to want to know what will be the contents of these letters.  For some this is a key step.  You don’t ever want a nasty surprise when following up on your application.  My letters aren’t in yet, so I will worry about that issue when it arises.

My second success was the completion of my statement.  Now I am pretty sure that I said it was near complete the last time I wrote.  Well, I also underestimated my own writing style.  I typically need a couple of re-writes or thorough edits before the first draft capturing my ideas reflects the style and quality of message I want to pass on.  I now have something that I would fee confident putting my name on.  It does not bear much resemblance to the statement I started with two weeks ago.

My next task will be to tackle the rest of my online application.  I don’t think that I can completely articulate how much I hate that system.  It is causing me to duplicate so much work fighting with
that darn site.  Don’t even get me started on the difficulty tracking down individuals who can verify each item added.  It may be a project for next week.

In the mean time, the key to perfect crepes is to let your batter set overnight.  You achieve a much smoother texture that results in crepes that are thinner and easier to keep even.  I still need to work on my mousse technique.  That is a lot of chocolate required to get the execution right.  What a shame!

I can say that part of my excuse was a great vacation. Time on the beach, TIFF and all things not involving work were wonderful.  Now, the three weeks prior to my vacation I can’t really account for.  However, I have made progress on the application front.  Prior to going on vacation I started my application process by putting together an application CV.  It contains all of my education, awards, employment positions and volunteer contributions since graduating high school.  It took almost two days to put together and has saved countless amounts of time since.  I even plan to include the orderly version of this master list with any application I can, just so I don’t miss anything.  If only that worked with OLSAS.  Once that application is complete, I think I will have to post a rant about how much that system irritates me

Second thing I crossed off of my list was the first of my personal statements.  I am currently focusing on three schools: University of Toronto, Osgoode Hall and University of Calgary.  Of the three, UofC seems to place the most emphasis on their statement, so that has been one of my early priorities.  Once I am satisfied with that statement, I can rework pieces of it to fit the requirements of UofT and Osgoode as needed.  The biggest hurdle with this piece is the editing process.  It is sometimes hard to find someone with a few hours they can spare to humble you completely.  An honestly critical opinion is sometimes very hard to find, but worth it based on the improvements it yields.  If the horror stories on the discussion boards are true, then it will need to be a winning piece of prose to do the job.

Since returning from vacation, my focus has been securing my references.  I always find this a little difficult.  I hate asking someone to produce an honest, yet glowing discussion of my qualities (which I don’t always have complete confidence in) on a deadline.  I am working with about a one month window for my gracious letter-writers to work with.  I don’t want to have to apply pressure on my former professors during the start of midterms because I didn’t ask early enough.  I have found two out of my required three and hope to connect with the final one sometime next week.

Hopefully by the weekend I may have something more interesting to comment on.  I should by that time have decompressed from work sufficiently to get a little personality back.

As a result of this realization, I want to share my experience. Perhaps by following my journey into this new phase of my life, it will help others to keep their calm in knowing that they are going through the same process as everyone else.  I am also looking to add a little insight into my life along the way.  What is a new career without a little balanced life to go along with it.  It will propably aid in your understanding of where I stand on the more relevant school and legal issues.

It is my greatest hope that those of you who read this will find it helpful and interesting.  On that note, here we go…