Yep. Completely buried here. We are one-third of the way through the semester and things are starting to really heat up in all my classes. Unfortunately, mother nature is not cooperating. All the snow days - ie. kids home from school unexpectedly, going in late, coming home early - are really throwing a wrench in my study schedule. We've also had a round of some sort of fever/stomach virus running through the household in the past week. It has been hard to carve out time to get my school work done.

One of my courses this semester focuses on how public policy is enacted by the Maryland General Assembly. It's a very interesting course, studying the social worker in the the role of public interest advocate. I see some clear cross-over with my legal background, without the adversarial context. In conjunction with the course requirements, I am working with a Montgomery County coalition that is advocating the $1 per pack tax increase on cigarettes; the additional tax revenue would fund a number of health care initiatives, including an expansion of Medicaid. This is a controversial measure and there are a number of related health care bills that the General Assembly is also considering. I chose this course because I also have a class this semester in substance abuse policy; I thought working on the tobacco tax bill would connect these two courses. I always like it when I can see a relationship like that between my classes. Anyway, the bill is scheduled for committee hearings this week and next, so I have been quite busy using my "legal brain" to analyze all the proposed legislation that will be heard with my coalition's bill for use in the drafting of testimony for the committees. I am looking forward to seeing what happens in the coming weeks, now that I have some sense of what options have been presented to the legislators.

That's about it from here. I can see the tidal wave headed for me and am having trouble getting out of the way.