Busy last few days attending cultural events (10-18-08)

In the last two weeks, I have seen Art Spiegelman at the Bagdad Theater, Mike Richardson of Dark Horse Comics at Portland State University, Paul Theroux, also at PSU, and Ralph Nader at a political rally at the Bagdad Theater.
I am going to post my thought about each event, along with the sketches I made, if any, in my sketchbook. Note that if any of the personalities drawn signed the sketchbook, the scanned image will have been doctored in Photoshop to remove said signature, for privacy reasons.

A Weight Off My Shoulders

I finally applied for graduation and signed up for the two 1-credit Education classes to get my diploma. It's funny, but when I initially signed up for distance education courses, I thought it'd be no big deal, quickly over and done with. I had plenty of time, -one year,- to work on them, why rush into it? The year came and went, and I did nothing. True, it wasn't all due to slacking: I was busy; I was under tremendous stress over other issues, etc. So, in January last year, after determining that I didn't even want to bother again with the one class out of three distance education courses I had vaguely look at, I dutifully signed up again (and paid tuition) for the two remaining courses... And now, even though the one-year completion time hasn't elapsed yet, I feel strangely free after deciding that I will not finish this round of courses either... The lesson in all this? Don't choose subjects you have no motivation to investigate, and stay away from distance education courses.
And what after the diploma? Oh, the inner satisfaction... and more.