Fieldwork Blog

I do not like to wait. I am impatient and I don't like waiting in lines,
I don't like waiting at stoplights, I don't even like when people step on
their brakes. I guess you could say I live a hurried life but it all
comes down to the fact that the time I save on traveling from place to
place gives me extra time for other things such as sleep or food. When
doing this fieldwork assignment, I compared two different ways of getting
to school. I compared driving directly onto campus to a parking lot that
is very close to my class to parking on a public street where I have to
walk to a shuttle stop and then take the shuttle to campus and then
proceed to walk to my class which is farther from the shuttle stop than it
is when I park on campus. I found some pros and cons. Pro: it seems that
parking on the street and taking the shuttle would pretty much cost me
nothing. However, parking on campus at the place I choose to park costs
six dollars every day. I would use the same amount of gas to get to the
spot where I park on campus, as I would use to get to where I park to wait
for a shuttle. Con: when I drive directly to campus, I only have to leave
my house 10-15 minutes before my class starts. By doing the shuttle
route, I would have to leave my house up to an hour in advance to give
cushion time for several factors. These factors include the time it would
take to find a free parking spot in the street, the time it takes to walk
down the street to the shuttle stop, the time it takes for the shuttle to
arrive, the time it takes for the shuttle to travel to campus, and the
time it takes to walk to where my classroom is. To take the shuttle
route, I have to wake up earlier so I can have enough time just to get to
campus. If I take the driving route, I can wake up at the same time, but
I would then have additional time to eat breakfast or go to Starbucks or I
can sleep in for a couple extra minutes. Being that I am an impatient and
hurried person, I can't decide if it is worth it for me to pay all that
money to park conveniently or if I should lose out on some sleep so that I
can get to school for free. What would you do?
--Megan T.