...And so it Begins

I cautiously look left, right, then left again as I turn onto the seemingly crazy street, catching a glimpse of the street-sign that bears the words "Cisco Networking." Armed with my trusty Acer laptop, 200-page notebook, used 2811 Router, my fair console cable, and the receipt for my CBTNuggets subscription of ~$800 (Yep. No turning back now.), I am ready for anything.

I log on to CBTNuggets and get ready to watch the first video, ready to take notes like it was finals all over again, thinking I'll have to force myself to stay awake through hours of video lessons... but to my surprise, the first video isn't dreadful. It's not totally boring. I didn't have to pull out a 5-hour Energy! I was amazed how the speaker, Jeremy Cioara, actually grabbed my attention and held onto it for the full thirty minutes of a video simply titled "Welcome to Cisco CCENT!"

Before watching, I had an idea of the Cisco certification track and how it worked, but Jeremy did a great job of explaining it, and laying down what to expect out of this video series. Great. It's exactly what I wanted to hear, I'm excited. The thirty minutes I had originally set aside quickly ended up being over an hour and a half... I couldn't wait to ACTUALLY get into working on this Cisco router I had next to me.

Despite the titles that suggested well-known content, I was psyched to continue the series as it was meant to be. I opened up the second video titled "Foundations: What is a Network?" and blazed through it's 35 minutes of content, absorbing the familiar material along with some interesting points of view.

It was time to continue on to video #3, "Foundations: Living in the OSI World." I opened this section with resentment, my idea of the OSI model some obnoxious system crammed into my head back in high school that seemingly served no purpose. Regardless, note after note after note, I filled a few pages of my notebook just like I did years ago... But this time, it made sense. I was actually told WHY this system was important, and HOW to use it. Sweet! It's not just a boring list anymore. I just might want to memorize this and get a full understanding of each layer, but not tonight. I'm already an hour behind and staring at my university homework half-done, just begging to be left incomplete. And with that, I unplug my Cisco router, knowing it's not getting any use just yet.

Wish me luck, Blogger, I'll give it everything I've got and hopefully I'll be signing my posts with "CCNA" by the end of February!

-504Steve