Just thought I would start posting again. Emerald & I had a baby boy as of April 21st 2013. His name is Akash James Mansfield. We liked this name because it is Sanskrit word for "the space between" or "aether" or according to wikipedia "In Hinduism, Akasha means the basis and essence of all things in the material world; the first material element created from the astral world (Air, Fire, Water, Earth are the other four in sequence). It is one of the Panchamahabhuta, or "five elements"; its main characteristic is Shabda (sound). In Sanskrit the word means "space", the very first element in creation. In Hindi,Marathi and Gujarati, and many other Indian languages, the meaning of Akasha has been accepted as sky.<sup>[1]" 

I am attending Portland State University, but don't like it very much right now. I've had some poor experiences with the products they offer. Education is totally screwed around the wrong way. i.e. the student takes out a loan from the government, and often a bank, in order to buy a product. That product is education. This educational institution treats it as a required commodity, as if it were their graciousness to allow you to drink of the fountain of knowledge, they don't treat it as a product which should be held to the consumer's standards or better. Everyone that is there is paying for a product and ANY company that seeks to retain it's customer base should RESPECT their customers. This is not the case in the modern institutions, and it doesn't seem to be something they are trying to accomplish. More often students are continually disrespected in many ways while instructors are wasting student customer's money and time. 
Examples would be an instructor who I paid the school to retain in good faith of ability and level of knowledge and capability to portray that knowledge effectively to an audience of appropriate size to retain effective knowledge sharing. After I did my research on who was going to be teaching the class and what times were available for accommodating other class schedules in the quarter, at the last minute the instructor was swapped for a drastically under-qualified instructor. When the class started I found I was duped into an instructor who didn't understand the subject and had no experience with it, as opposed to the instructor I signed up for who is considered world class leader in the subject. I see that as a bait and switch, that if it were to be dealt with properly would have at least included the decency of emailing the students signed up for the class to notify them of the change WHEN IT WAS DECIDED. [ECE 271 Winter 2013 Instructor Mark Faust to Donald Dunkin]
Many more examples to go with that one (effectively stated "your son's birth is not a legitimate reason to miss a class quiz... but sporting events are" [Stats. & Prob. 243 Spring 2013 w/Kruti Pandya]). The list goes on to include the work-study program, advising (advisor said "join Engineering Economics class on the last day to add/drop, you will catch up" I could not catch up & could not drop without serious consequences. The advisor should carry the burden for his extremely poor advice.)
I'm just sick of supporting this drastically inferior 'service' with borrowed money and wasted time. I'm ready to start sitting in on all of the classes with ONLY the instructors who actually CAN teach, whether or not the class schedules have a 5 minute overlap... At least then I can learn the material I am seeking from the people with the knowledge and experience that I can actually benefit from, instead of WASTING MY TIME with an incompetent goober while spending borrowed capitol to pay tricky bait & switch swindlers.  
The phrase that fits this situation quite well is "never pay the band until the gig is over"</sup>

Ok, so on a better note, Emerald (and I) bought a house in Portland and I have been working on it. Not because it really needs much work, but there is always room for improvements. I've already mostly finished adding a bedroom in the basement... more later... oh, and we got chickens! :)