By the time this posts (time delay is kind of awesome, isn’t it?), I will ideally be on my way home after a month living in this damned hotel room. It’s all done except for the last exam, and to pass this course and earn my certification, I need to earn 30 of 125 available points on the exam. If I’d had a better solo brief (I though I did damned well, but apparently it was only worth an 86%) and hit one or two other questions on a couple of the exams, I’d be in the company of a couple of my teammates who literally only have to show up and sign their name on the test paper, having already earned the requisite 800 of 1000 points necessary.

Oh well, I think I’m in pretty damned good shape – I’ll land somewhere in the low 90s for the course, which is well better than good enough. I’m hitting consistent 100%s on my online practice exams; I think I can hit seven of thirty correct in the morning.

It’s been, shall we say, a month. There’ll be some stuff I miss: The Royal Farms convenience store chain. The taproom at Independent Brewing Company. The trails at Otter Point Creek. The daily ten-to-eight fire alarms for week 4 (seriously, I’m going to be upset if the don’t go off Friday morning). My teammates in the class and our private jokes. Being within 20 miles of my friends Andrea and Eric. The T-Rex.

I won’t miss the general shittiness of Aberdeen, Maryland. Nor will I miss the totally inaccurate temperature control mechanism in this damned hotel room or the lengths one has to go to buy a six-pack of beer in this state. I will never look fondly on the whole being away from my family for most of a month thing.

But, I’ll be done in about fourteen hours from when I type this, with a shiny new certification in my HR folder, and the potential for better opportunities such a possession might provide.

I can only hope anyway.

Anyway, here are some tunes off my hard drive. Pretty eclectic this week, honestly, with several friends and acquaintances who are rocking the Deadpool costumes off of the attendant throng at Dragon Con this weekend.

1. “Whispers in the Dark” – Mumford and Sons
2. “Anastasia” – Voltaire
3. “Cover of the Rolling Stone” – Poison
4. “Shock & Awe” – Neil Young
5. “Trek Girl” – Nick Edelstein
6. “Infinite Space” – Rusted Root
7. “Old Folk Roam” – Jonh Knight
8. “Sexxx Dreams” – Lady Gaga
9. “Don’t Stand So Close To Me ’86” – Police
10. “Jackson Cage (live)” – Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band
11. “Follow You Follow Me” – Genesis
12. “Warriors” – Imagine Dragons
13. “Watcha Eatin’?” – Bitey Little Blighters
14. “Human” – Of Monsters and Men