You poor bastard, you have my sympathies.

If you've only done college before, it'll be even harder adjusting to university. Here's some pointers from a guy who went through a similar situation.

1) Throw common sense out of the window. Seriously, just do it. It will only hold you back here. Watch what the other students/teachers are doing and copy them, even if it seems totally arbitrary and stupid- doing it the logical way will not work here.

2) try to find out if you really, actually, truly need those books the professors are telling you to get. Ask students that have taken te class before, because chances are, the books are optional.

3) if you really do need them, see if you can get them on Coursesmart- generally 50% off the cover price, and they're electronic rentals, so if you only need them for 1 semester, you're golden.

4) Get a laptop. If you have a decently working one, great! If its 8 years old and can barely power up Windows, get a new one. It will save you enormous headaches because of step 5.

5) if you don't already, get a Dropbox account and save all your files to it, in a separate folder for each class. If you write faster than you type, then write out your notes, scan them into your comp, and save to your Dropbox. That way, if all else fails, your notes aren't lost.

6) Make friends with the professors if at all possible. They are not like your college professors, who (hopefully) have real-world experience in the industry (or any industry).

They are some of the most arrogant, pompous jerks you will ever hope to never meet again, but you will not change anything by opposing them in private or in public. The reason they are still there is because they are more securely seated than a barnacle in the underside of an oil tanker- you will not make them see reason, no matter what you do.

Think that about covers it- don't let the workload get you down, because there's a lot of it (especially Master's), and you've been out of the game long enough to get rusty.

My account is always open if you need a friend.

Good luck, my friend.

You'll need it.

flaps off into the night