I have lived through the ultimate amount of "humps" you can experience all at once: middle of the school year, middle of the quarter, worst middle of the week to date. Thank goodness I can't say midlife crisis or, honestly, I may have thrown my hands up and said "forget it!" I already knew it was going to be a bad week last weekend, but I didn't realize HOW bad of a week it was going to be. I'm just stressed out of my mind so even the little things I try to shove in the back of my mind (e.g., loans piling up) surfaced. When you have troubles going to bed because you feel guilty about it because you have so much work to do, you know your life is really messed up too.
So, my week, I had 3 extra hours of class because 206A's last week was this week and 241 was starting this week. So Mon and Wed I had to attend class during the normal "lunch" 1:15 hours we get. Monday isn't so bad because I only have 2 classes with 4.5 hours in between them, but Wednesday was really bad. I had 7.5 hours of class straight that day from 8am to 3:20pm (I was in 4 different rooms too). On top of it, I was seeing Neil Gaiman speak at 8pm. I also had two homework assignments due this week that were tough and took me the entire week to complete (turned one in late last night and one this morning). I was hitting office hours to complete them. Then there's the stress of next week is midterms and I have a 10-page paper due in 2 weeks for another class. Also, it occurred to me that I have a presentation the same week my 10-page paper is due. Then I had to think about getting my program of study approved, signed, and turned in by next Monday and I spent a week trying to set-up an appointment with my advisor (finally happened yesterday). I also have taxes and FAFSA to deal with (FAFSA is due March 2nd if I want any school help consideration). I'm also starting to "e-mail nag" potential internship people because they didn't respond the first time and summer isn't getting farther away! I also had some Leaky work hovering over my head. My housing application opened this week so I had to turn that in and Jane is thinking of maybe not doing San Clemente next year so now I'm trying to not think about getting a new roommate and hoping if I do that it's a good rommate. Plus, rent fees are going up next year, which puts me at around $900/month for rent next year and that's high enough that I could move off campus and still pay that amount in rent or possibly even less. I keep telling myself that I'd have to move my furniture down for less than a year, but it's tempting. I have a friend whose roommates are moving out too...more tempting...I constantly worry about money too, spending too much, and having no inflow of cash. Though, I'm glad I didn't get the TA for this quarter. I don't think I could have handled the oceanography class with my class load. I do still wish I could have gotten the RA (research assistant, not residential advisor :P) position, but oh well. And now I'm watching my loans pile up, especially with fee increases, and I try not to worry about it, but it worries me. Having never had a loan before it's intimidating knowing it's there. *sigh* It just doesn't end!
Next week is better because I don't have 3 extra hours of class. Instead, I actually have 1 hour less than normal, but it also means I start having class at 8:30am on Tues (so, basically, I have a schedule change mid-quarter -- no class from 10:30-12:20 on W and class at 8:30-9:20 on Tues). I also only have one midterm next week because one other class moved it to the following Tuesday, but that means it prolongs the agony of waiting to take the midterm/stress of the need to study and I have a hw assignment due that same day.
Anyway, it just keeps going. I don't understand why people gave us 1st years the impression that the 1st quarter was the hardest because this 2nd quarter is just the pits. We have infinitely more hw to do than last quarter and at least we had some classes last quarter where we felt like they didn't take a great deal of brain power. This quarter...not the case! I guess my elective is kind of brainless, but it's also interesting for me so I sit there paying attention, which is brain power. This is one of those quarters where I have to constantly think about why I'm here and the end goal because, honestly, if it weren't for the fact it'd look bad for dropping out of grad school 1.5 quarters in, I'd do it this minute. LoL
Oh, yeah, I went and saw a group project (GP) presentation today. Today was the start of the defenses so I trucked through the blowing rain (wet feet once again...My pants were soaked too. Someone needs to invent an umbrella that doesn't let your thighs get wet...) to go see the presentation of a second year friend. I almost didn't go, but I'm glad I went. It was good to see what a presentation looks like. Bren has this rule that when you do your GP presentations you have to dress in formal business attire (guys in button-up shirts with a tie, girls in dress slacks/skirt with nice shirt) so that was interesting to see too! The presentation I saw was REALLY professional. Honestly, I can only dream of creating a presentation that nice (if that was ppt, there are some very obvious tricks I don't know how to do). It was interesting to see the work that goes into the project though. This group created their own program to help cities look at greenhouse gas emissions and if they can reach the Federal and/or California GHG goals. I guess that's one thing I have to "look forward" to -- GP. We start them next quarter and work on them for a year.
Oh, Neil Gaiman. I should mention the highlight of my week, month, quarter, etc. It chopped out 4 hours of my life on Wednesday on a day that already had me in class by 8am, back at 4pm, and I left again at 7:20 and didn't get back again till 11:30pm. Did I want to kill myself by 2am when I finally got to go to bed? Probably, but I still don't regret seeing Neil Gaiman and spending the money to see him. (If I didn't pay money to see him, I would have skipped it.) He was everything you'd like to see in an author: charismatic, witty, friendly, etc. I've met and seen a lot of authors speak in the last few years and he ranks pretty high up there for me. He's English so it was nice hearing his accent, though he does live in the U.S. now. He read us two stories that have not been published and they were fantastic. He likes to read his own works for audiobooks so he's an amazing reader.
One was more of a poem-prose scary story. It wasn't really prose, but it wasn't really a poem so he said it was like a conversation with some "poem-y" tendencies (he made a joke about his technical term usage). The second thing he read, which took about 45 minutes to read, was a short story (it's been submitted for a short story collection George R. R. Martin and either someone else or it was a publisher (didn't catch it).
The poem-prose took place at a small English village along the shoreline and is meant to be a "scary story." It was written from the perspective of a tenant of a B&B who had been there for some time looking for a place of his own. The tenant talked about the landlady and how it was to live there. The landlady would be like "you can't stare out the window at the ocean you have to go outside. You stare at the ocean if you want to get away from your past -- like killing a banker or your wife, etc" (summarizing). Anyway, it goes on about the tenant and has a twist ending at the end.
The short story is called "The Thing About Cassandra." That story was amazing. It took him about 45 minutes to read and he said it was the first time he's ever read it out loud (other than to his fiancee). So he made some jokes about if he suddenly had to stop and scribble down something new or a change. It was funny, touched on identity and growing up, and had a really interesting twist/flop at the end of it. When it occurred to me the story got turned upside down I almost bugged out. LoL It was SUCH a smooth transaction and really cool that I'm reading it in print when it comes out because I need to reread it after knowing the end.
Other than him being an amazing reader, he told stories in such a way that always got you to laugh. And he would answer questions that always ended with a witty answer to get us to laugh. In fact, one answer was a simple "yes." He paused after it and said, "I can't think up a witty follow-up to that." We all laughed. It was just great.
He made this really funny point about The Graveyard Book (his Newbery Award book) and he told a funny story about how he got the call for winning, but someone asked the question did the book get criticized for (minor, minor spoiler that happens in the first 2 pages of the book LoL) opening with a murder scene because one of the past Newbery Award winners got criticized for saying "scrotum" in the first page. He said he didn't and it's because a murder didn't happen in the book at all. The book takes place right after it happens. He says the knife is "wet" and says where the bodies are lying, but he never says "murder," "blood," etc anywhere in the book at all. (That really surprised me because it's totally true thinking about it.) Then, at the end, he says, "So if a murder happened -- you did it!" That got us all to laugh because it's true!
I did get my copy of The Graveyard Book signed. It took me almost 1.5 hours in line to get it signed and he still had at least 1.5 more hours to go before he was finished. It was a cool signing because he drew pictures when he signed your book! Unless you had two, he had a certain thing he'd draw for each kind of book. I had The Graveyard Book so he drew a tombstone with your name, a crescent moon, some grass on the side of the tombstone and signed it below. I couldn't tell what Coraline was, but it looked like a baby that was swaddled up. Never saw what he did in Sandman or some of the others. That's probably one reason why it took him so long, but it was a nice gesture and made the signing more fun.
Well...with that...I either need to go to bed or study some more. I'll probably hit the bed early (for once!) and pleasure read a little (I haven't done that in ages...) to relax. I am very thankful the week is over and if I have been a grouch to you, I am sorry. :)
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