Loud Noises!

OK, so just to warn you right off the bat, I'm in a bit of an irritable mood today. So if I sound unusually angry, well, I'm sorry. Maybe it's because of my irrational hatred of the Red Sox. Why do I hate the Red Sox? I don't know, maybe it's because after October 2004 they went from lovable losers to another Yankees, with bloated budget and insufferable fans and all the rest. Not that I'm particularly a fan of the Rockies, but come on, the Sox' best hitter is a DH, the biggest abomination since Scream 3. Sorry, I'm an old-school baseball fan. Or if it's not the success of the Sox, it's knowing that this weekend is going to be annoying enough for me to miss my classes and beg for Monday to come sooner rather than later.

First of all, I have to go to a wedding. I hate weddings. I haven't even met any of the people involved. Worst of all, since I've been down here, my wardrobe hasn't drifted out of the t-shirt and shorts genre, and I'm really not looking forward to wearing a tie. I hate wearing a tie (and a jacket and a dress shirt for that matter) almost as much as I hate the Red Sox. Don't get me wrong, I'm not angry about having to go; it means a lot to my mother, and I owe her a lot for the support I've gotten in recent years (or for my whole life for that matter). So, I'm happy to do this for her, since it's really the least that I could do. If I can get my brownie points all in one day's work, that's much better than years of small favors. So I'm not angry about Saturday, not at all. I'm just not looking forward to it.

Not to mention I have an essay due on Monday. And I like to have all weekend to procrastinate over finishing a paper. With this wedding on Saturday, I lose one very valuable day of squandering time I should spend working.

Oh well, really, I guess things could be a lot worse. I could be a Rockies fan. Or even worse, a Notre Dame fan. I guess you have to take the good with the bad. And overall, my life's going pretty well. My classes are going well, my mood's up, and my job is a whole lot less painful than working in a mailroom. And, in the realm of fortuitous timing, on this busy weekend there are really no good movies coming out, so I won't be missing much. I mean, when the two releases I'm most excited about on a weekend are Dan in Real Life and Lars and the Real Girl, there's something seriously wrong. I mean, there were five movies last weekend that I was more excited than any of the movies this weekend. That's poor scheduling. And no, I'm not pumped for Saw IV. Until next week, when hopefully I'll be in a better mood.

OK, I'm Back

Wow, three-day weekends can do wonders for the psyche. If you didn't notice in the one ridiculously short and useless post I put up last week, I was burned out with a capital B. So I guess that would be Burned out. And that was on Monday. Three days of rest later, and I'm a little bit recharged at least. I'll probably be burned out again in a few weeks, but by then it'll be time for Thanksgiving break. Hopefully. I'd be doing even better if I hadn't had a killer headache last night that kept me from getting much sleep, but still, I'm more rested today than I have been in quite some time.

I wish I could tell you about all of the wonderful and exciting things I did on my break, but I'm just not that kind of guy. If you really want to know what I did on my break, I slept, ate, and went to the movies. Read a little bit. Listened to some music. Went to the grocery store. Slept some more. Sound boring? Well for me, it's about the best break possible. Just a chance to not really have to do much of anything. I saw four movies this weekend, one great (The Darjeeling Limited), one very good (Gone Baby Gone), one exceedingly mediocre (Things We Lost in the Fire), and one that was a waste of time and almost put me to sleep (Rendition). To recap, go see Darjeeling. Especially if you like Wes Anderson movies at all. It's brilliant. Gone Baby Gone is worth the trip, and the other two should most likely be avoided unless you're really bored and want to waste your money.

Let's see, what else is going on in my life? Well, it's getting close to time to pick my classes for next semester, which is always a stressful time. I mean, I don't like to think about what I'm doing tomorrow, much less in 2008. How do I even know I'll be here in 2008? I mean, I think I will be; I'm pretty much positive I will be, but I wouldn't bet my life savings on it or anything. How can I really be sure enough about anything to plan that far ahead. To make matters worse, I've got three semesters left at this school, God willing (or whatever supernatural force there is, if there is one, I've still got half a semester of Intro to Religion to figure that one out), and I think it might be about time to settle on a minor. I obviously know I'm majoring in English, but I don't exactly have huge numbers of credits in any other subject, so choosing a minor is pretty much a priority at this point. Anybody have any ideas? I'm open to any suggestions. My guess is it won't be astronomy. Or biology. Or math. But beyond that, I'm pretty much completely clueless. I mean, French is always a possibility, but I'm just not sure it's the right choice at this point. Oh well, I have a little time left to choose. Wish me luck.

Short Week

You have no idea how glad I am to have a four-day week this week. I need a break. It's Monday, and I already feel like I need a break. I just have to make it through three more days, and then I have a nice long weekend. On the more positive side, I really should just stop worrying. Remember that test I thought I did so poorly on? I got an A. Now I'm really starting to think my teacher grades too leniently. Regardless, I'll take the A and be happy with it. Now I've just got one more paper grade to stress over. I'll probably get that grade back just in time to take another test or turn in another essay, and the stress cycle will start all over again. Such is life. Wow, for once I really don't have a whole lot on my mind today. I haven't posted since Wednesday, so I figured I would have plenty to talk about, but I'm a bit of a blank slate today. We're discussing a great film, The Battle of Algiers, in my English class. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. OK, I guess that's about it. I'll try to prepare my thoughts a bit before my post later this week.

A Weight Has Been Lifted

OK, I mentioned last week that I am extremely neurotic when it comes to waiting on grades. I also said that after a year and a half out of school, I was terrified that I wouldn't remember how to write a good essay. This was compounded by the fact that the first of the two essays I wrote for Monday of last week was a real struggle. The words didn't come to me the way they used to, as if by magic. I had to fight my mind for every sentence, even every word. The second essay was significantly easier, but I was still concerned.

Well, I got that first paper back, and I got an A. It is so good to know that I'm still capable of writing a decent essay, and that I am still my own worst critic. I really thought it was probably a B paper. A solid B paper, maybe a B+, but I thought an A was out of reach. Fortunately, as usual, I either undervalued my work or overestimated the harshness of my teacher's grading. Impossible to know which, but I think I'll just assume I undervalued my work. That way I can revel in the moment. Well, now I still have a quiz, another essay, and a test to wait for. If those come back with decent grades, then maybe I'll start to have an iota of confidence in my ability to succeed in my second attempt at college. Fingers crossed.

Let's see, is there anything else to talk about? Not really, I guess. Well, I could talk a little about what I've been reading in my English classes, since I am really enjoying both classes right now. In one we are currently reading some works by Jorge Luis Borges. If you haven't heard of Borges or have heard of him but never checked him out, you really should give him a shot. His "stories" (and I use that term in the loosest sense possible) are most likely very different from anything you've ever read. Very metaphorical, very metatextual, and some of the most dense reading I've ever had the pleaure of experiencing. Every sentence has layers upon layers of meaning. It seems pointless to only have one fifty minute period to discuss each story; we are missing so much of the meat of the work. Oh well, at least I'm getting to read it. In my other class, we just finished The Youngest Doll, a collection of stories by Rosario Ferré. Ferré's work is also very dense and can be difficult at first. Once I really got accustomed to her style, I fell in love with her work. It is bitingly ironic and satirical, and some of the angriest writing I have ever read. To some extent it defies description, so you'll have to take my word for it. We've just started reading stories by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. So far, I can say that his writing is absolutely beautiful prose and his stories are very interesting. I think I'm a couple of steps away from understanding any of it, but hopefully that will come. It usually does.

Alright, I've kept you too long. I can't wait for the baseball championship series to start. Can you believe there still are 12,000 seats available for game one at the BOB? Come on, people, your team is one of four left in the playoffs! Get out there and support them. If I could get there, I would so buy a ticket. But I'm in Florida, not Arizona, so I don't think it's going to happen. Although what I'm really looking forward to is the Beckett/Sabathia game one of the ALCS. And the Carmona/Schilling game two. OK, even I, the staunchest proponent of national league baseball, have to admit that all of the best teams are in the AL this year, for about the third year in a row. It pains me to say so, but it's true. Sure, the Cards won last year, but were they the best team? Or even one of the four best teams? Absolutely not.

That's it now. Really, I promise.

And Now, Back to Normal

Well, first off, I must say, thank God the Falcons are terrible. The Titans played about the worst game imaginable and still pulled out a seven-point victory. 3-1's not a bad start.

Now that my parents are back in Nashville, I can get back to the grind. There's something really strange about the first couple of days after any kind of special occasion. (I know my parents coming to town is stretching it as a special occasion, but you understand.) Whether it's an occasion you've been really excited about, or really dreading, or whatever, there's a let-down when it passes. I mean, what now? Normalcy is always a little jarring.

That being said, my visit with my parents went about as well as is physically possible. A weekend is really the perfect amount of time. If they were here for a week, or if they lived here, I would get really tired of them. Believe me, I know; I lived with them for the last year and a half. Space is necessary. But a weekend is good. You can enjoy each other's company and have a good time without getting too much on each other's nerves. I'll admit, by Sunday I was glad they were headed back to Nashville, but that was more about me being spent and ready to have some time to be lazy than it was about being desperate for them to leave.

There are definitely perks to the parent visit, as well. I was really in a tight spot financially going into Friday. Then, I got my first paycheck on Friday and my parents were in town for the weekend, so now I'm rolling in it. Having your meals paid for for a few days, and getting your fridge stocked for free really helps. It's also nice to have parents who are really into good food and wine, because it means you get to eat at great restaurants for far too much money and drink fine wine. Quite a change from the normal quesadilla/pizza diet. For any of you who like sushi and have parents willing to pay far too much for a good meal, I cannot recommend the restaurant we went to Saturday night highly enough. It's a sushi restaurant in South Beach called Nobu, and we had one of the best meals I can remember. Granted, my memory isn't any good. But let's just say it was a great meal. For once I have a full, satisfied stomach. And that makes me happy. Later.

Is it Really Just Thursday?

My God, this has been the longest week ever. Well, that's not really true. It's not as long as the many, many weeks I spent working 8-5 in a mailroom. Those were longer weeks. But we as human beings have short attention spans, and that was all the way back in July. So as far as I can remember, this has been the longest week ever. Thursday. And not even the end of the day on Thursday either. It's not even noon.

Well, at least I'm finally done with the bulk of my work for the week. In the last two and a half weeks I've had four tests and two papers. As I said earlier, midterm is a terrible time of year. On the bright side, the last of those tests and papers was yesterday, so now I'm pretty much smooth sailing until the end of the semester, which will be even more cluttered, of course.

I must say, the test yesterday was surprisingly difficult. Well, I guess difficult's not really the right word. I knew the material and could answer any of the questions with my eyes closed. Well, as long as someone read the questions to me, that is. The problem was, we were expected to write two essays in fifty minutes. This is why I think it's ridiculous to have tests in English courses. Really English courses should be all paper-based. It's impossible to write two decent, insightful papers about five authors in fifty minutes. It simply cannot be done. I write ridiculously fast (and this is not idle boasting, I always finish tests early) and I found myself struggling to squeeze in a second essay. So, of course, my first essay was good but overly general, and my second essay was crap. Fortunately, I'm my worst critic, so there's still a chance that I'll get a good grade. In English courses, I always get better grades than I would give myself. So I've got my fingers crossed. My hope hinges on the fact that if I, writing as fast as I do, couldn't write a decent test in the period, the rest of the class's tests couldn't have been any better. Hopefully, my teacher will be reasonable enough not to give us all bad grades because the period was too short and his questions were (ridiculously) general.

I won't go in to any more specifics, because I guess that would be cheating or something, I think. Not that I think anyone reading this will be taking that test in the near future, but the last thing I need is to be kicked out of school for not being careful. Let's just leave it at this: how specific and insightful can you be about a story/book if you have ten minutes to write by hand about it?

Keep in mind, I'm completely insane when it comes to anxiety about test results. Until I get these two papers and one test back, I'll be freaking out twenty-four-seven. Which is funny, because usually I have nothing to worry about. I'm even more frantic right now because I also am still waiting on a major quiz score from two weeks ago. I must say, I like multiple choice tests; you get the results back much faster.

Good news, though, is that the baseball playoffs have started. Even if my beloved Braves booted their chances to get in for the second year in a row due to a terrible bullpen and mediocre starting pitching, I still get excited when the second season starts. And I must say, Beckett was ridiculous for the BoSox last night. I hate the Sox, but I love great pitching. It'll be interesting to see what Dice-K has in game two. If he pitches like he did in the first half of the season and not like he did in the second half, the Sox'll be hard to beat. Tonight'll be great, though, to see Sabathia go up against that Yankees lineup. OK, I'll let ya'll go now. Go Titans. If we can't beat Atlanta this weekend, then we should be kicked out of the NFL.

A Frustrating Weekend

Wow, isn't the weekend supposed to be an opportunity to relax and recharge your batteries? To get ready for the coming week? Yeah, that didn't happen this past weekend. At all. As I mentioned in my last post, I had two essays due yesterday and I have a test tomorrow. One of the problems with college, and in my experience this isn't at all specific to UM, as I had the same problem at Wesleyan and my friends at other schools have complained of the same thing, is that all of the major work is clustered around midterm and end-of-term. So you end up with week after week with no significant tests or papers, and then you have fifteen in two weeks. An exaggeration, of course, but you know what I mean.

This would have been frustrating enough of a weekend, but that's not all. Starting Saturday night and lasting through yesterday, the weather has been real ugly here. I'm sure that people used to Miami, who have lived through hurricanes and all that, weren't impressed by the weather at all, but I'm not used to it, so sue me. Saturday night the storm was loud enough that I couldn't sleep much at all. And then Monday, when I was trying to put finishing touches on my work, the power goes out. Then comes back on about five minutes later, then goes out for another two minutes, then comes on for another two minutes, then goes off for an hour. Fun. Oh well, I'm done with the papers now, so I can relax a little bit. Well, not that much, because now I just have to stress about what my grades will be. My first two papers in a year and a half plus, so I'm not entirely sure I still have it. We'll see. And then, my parents are coming to town this weekend. No offense to my parents, but it just means I have to clean up my apartment this week, and I'll actually have to do things this weekend instead of what I really want to do, which is just crash and not speak to anyone or do anything from 5:00 on Friday until 9:00 Monday morning. Once again, oh well.