Beyond ... Tired ... Must ... Rest .... Wretchedly Tired Body.

Well, the end of last week was crazy, I spent a lot of time at school, and my eyes are tired from reading. Went home for the weekend, and pretty much either couched, or worked on my Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) assignment.

Monday was another busy day, and then on Tuesday, I flew to Calgary at 4:30 to surprise my Mom for her b-day dinner. Then ... at 11:00 PM I flew back to Saskatoon (got home at 2:00 AM this morning). Yup ... living like a rockstar thanks to my Air Canada flight pass (but not thanks to Air Canada ... it's almost cliche to make fun of their customer service, but you always afirm the belief in how bad it is each time you fly with them).

Drawback, of course, is that I'm absolutely bagged today. School was great ... I find the tutorials super useful, and I have a secret about the ADR class today. I'm not sure that I want this one out of the bag. I always pictured myself as a tough fighter chick, I ride a motorcycle, I've taken boxing classes, I'm a fighter ... so I thought. BUT ... today in ADR we did a mock mediation, and I was randomly assigned to act as a co-mediator. Here's the secret ... I LOVED IT. I KNOW! I didn't expect it either.

I loved thinking of myself more as the background organizer ... I loved critically thinking on my feet, and having to read people and adjust what you ask them and how you direct the conversation to draw what you need out of them to make the mediation meeting work. I could see how important the preparation is, you really need to be able to foresee the interests and positions that people bring to the table so that you can make sure that they're all addressed appropriately, especially when not all mediation participants will be able to articulate their issues succinctly. I felt a little manipulative, and I could feel myself doing a little bit of leading ... but not to assert my position, just to make people listen to each other.

It was hard, though, to leave my opinions out of it. I definitely felt a certain way about the dispute at hand, and could see how easy it would be as a mediator to lead the discussion with an agenda.

Anyhow ...

I'm in bed now, and I want to put my ADR assignment to bed ... while in bed ... heh heh heh.

Oh yeah ... AND ... AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL was awesome tonight. 2 hour premiere of cycle 8. Loved it!