Our season of discontent begins. In any endeavour as challenging as training to become an officer in the USN, there will be those who fall out because it just isn't worth their time. 4th class began the year as one of, if not the biggest batch of recruits that our unit had ever seen, and there's been a slow trickle of kids who've left ever since. Many are expressing dissatisfaction with what they've been required to do thus far, still others are simply pissed that all these extra courses they're taking won't count for bubkiss when it comes to their degree. And who can blame them? This isn't a club or an intramural sport, it's a profession and there's a fuck-ton of responsibility that comes with it. You gots to crave responsibility as though you were some sort of zombie seeking the sweet blood-candy of deadlines and missions and authority and accountability and a host of other synonyms. There are times when I question my sanity, but in my darkest heart of hearts I know that I possess this quality, for good or ill.

Which means that I have to start digging myself out of this soul-sucking pit that Calculus has become. Some of the people in my class are doing all right, but a lot of us aren't, and the dividing line seems to be between those who have had calculus before and those who are new to it, as I am. I know that I can pull a C in that class, which will be just barely acceptable to the Navy, but the most frustrating thing about it is the idea that what's been up until now nothing more than an inconvinience (my aforementioned mathematical idiocy) is turning into a real handicap. Curse you, numbers!