I didn't sleep again last night. It must be all the studying and stress that's getting to me. I always dream of whatever I spent my day working on. Once I had a dream about a big mac due to a theory I had to learn for class. Did I tell you this story already? Well, anyway. I couldn't sleep last night so this morning I was in no mood to get up for class before the sun. I finally got out of bed after letting my alarm ring for awhile. I checked facebook, saw a message from my darling Elizabeth, and decided to save it for later. I made my coffee and got to work beautifying myself. I had no inspiration this morning so I put on my fleece tights with leggings over them, my black sweater, and topped the whole look off with my favorite tan sweater. I wore my gray scarf today because I just rediscovered it in the back of my closet. Does gray go with tan? Who cares, I'm tired.
I heated up an entire bowl of pasta and then sat down to check facebook. In the blink of an eye it was 8:14 and I had to leave for school; I wasn't even done getting dressed yet. I finished getting dressed and grabbing my things calmly (I could never be late to French) and left the house. I walked to school and went upstairs. Kate was just unlocking the door. I figured that I had some spare time so I went downstairs to mess around. When I came back upstairs I had just enough time to prepare myself for class before my professor was handing out the quiz. While getting myself prepared for class, I heard Nora say that she has the intro done...for her 12 page paper...that was due 15 minutes after our French class was over. These kids! Anyhow, I think I failed my French quiz. I got so confused as to which subject I was supposed to be conjugating for. Her underlining the first part of the sentence really threw me off. I'm sure that I did fine as long as I conjugated for the right subject.....cross your fingers.
Next up was our presentations on friendship. Guess who had to be called out for mispronouncing a word again. I really suck at speaking in French. During Kristina's presentation, she said that a friend is someone to go shopping with. I was going to be friends with that girl! How shallow. After the presentations we took our break. I went downstairs and reread my histories paper before printing it out. I then printed out my pop outline for tomorrow. I overheard the kids talking about the same paper that Nora was "working" on. I guess they got an extension until Friday and just found out about it. I heard Hanna say about another paper (or that paper, who knows) that she has nine pages but "does he want 12 pages of crap or 9 pages of content" and Talia respond that she has 12 pages that are all crap. Seriously!? I'm trying to write a paper. Stop distracting me with your immaturity. I went upstairs and saw that only one student was there. I went back downstairs to go to the bathroom just as our professor was coming upstairs. I didn't care if I was late going back to class. When I went back inside Nora was giving her presentation. Right in the middle of her speaking, my professor told me to close the door. I tramped over there in my heavy boots just to have Irene come through the door and close it before I got get to it. Sorry, Nora. For the rest of class we learned about how to use the subjunctive when talking about emotions and doubts. We were all very confused.
After French my stomach was seriously growling. I heard Sierra talking to Kristina about the nearest boulangerie. I asked her where it was, and she said it was near McDos. I always thought that it was a patisserie because that's what's displayed in the window. I've looked in a few times but didn't see any bread. I walked to the boulangerie and saw the bread displayed across a long hallway from the entrance. I asked the woman for a baguette, and she asked me if I wanted it cut in half to fit into the sleeve. After some miscommunication I told her that I did want the bread cut. I then slipped my euro into the automatic change machine (just like in Nice!) and left.
I was munching on my delicious bread (it was perfectly crusty on the outside and fluffy on the inside) when I saw Christina in the courtyard. I went up to her and asked her if she had seen my email. She said that she had responded and given me comments about each item that was on my list of suggested alternative sites for me to visit. She had emailed me?! I told her that I've never received any of her emails and just thought that she was a meanie who didn't respond to emails (I really didn't mean it to come out that way. I'm sorry, Christina). She had the worried Christina look on her face, and told me that they probably went to spam. I went straight inside the Accent center to check my email. Sure enough I saw the email in my spam folder. I didn't get to read it because class was about to start.
I went upstairs to class and the room was totally packed. I'm glad that I left my stuff on a chair, however, I was not so glad about the girl who sat next to me. The girl is good friends with Callie, but she seems kinda dumb. She has sat next to me before but it hasn't been a problem. Today she drove me nuts. She was sitting really close to my desk so my elbow ended up brushing her a few times. Worse that than was her loud, disgusting sniffing that lasted for the entire class period. Holy shit. At one point I almost put my hand out and told her to stop in frustration. I couldn't take it anymore!
Class finally ended and Christina handed back the stack of monument papers that she had to grade. My paper received an "!, yes, good!, yes, aha, voilà, ooh!, aaa" with a final comment of "most sophisticated and forceful, Michaela! A". Is it weird that I'm sad that I only got an A and not an A+? That actually is weird. I'm ashamed of my greedy ways. I left my synecdoche paper on Christina's desk and walked home with Tatiana.
I came upstairs and started eating the rest of my bread while I searched for the rest of Christina's emails. I accidentally deleted her email about my alternative excursion locations so I emailed her to ask her to forward it again. I found out that my spam folder deletes spam after 30 days, but I found this little gem that was in response to me asking if I could have an extension for my Sacré Coeur paper:
Oh, Michaela, take your time and just be brilliant, as usual.
Sigh and smile,
Christina
I love the sigh and smile; like she's shaking her head at me but still likes me. I was sad that I couldn't read the rest of her emails to me. Oh well.
I settled in for the long road of homework ahead. I started off by starting my french composition number four. I have to write a retelling of a class tale. I don't know any fairy tales, and the example in the book was Little Red Riding Hood (the only tale I actually know) so I couldn't use that. I'm rewriting Rapunzel. Here's what I have so far:
Si je voulais situer Raiponce dans un contexte contemporain, l'histoire serait très différente. Raiponce serait une fille de seize ans. Raiponce serait piégé dans une communauté fermée au lieu d'un tour dans ma version de l'histoire contemporaine. Elle aurait été envoyé dans sa chambre pendant une semaine pour se faufiler hors d'aller à une fête. Le prince serait qui sauve Raiponce serait un homme de dix-huit ans que les parents de Raiponce n'aiment pas. Au lieu de cheveux longs, Raiponce appellerait son sauveur sur son Iphone. Une fois que le prince sauve Raiponce, ils auraient à se faufiler hors de la fenêtre pour éviter d'être détectés par ses parents.
I tried to go super modern. Hopefully my professor enjoys it. Next up was outlining the rest of my day and trying to set limits on how long I would spend on each item. I figured that an hour and a half was enough to start mediating about my histories essays. Christina passed out the list of questions today, and I was immediately sure of which ones I would be doing. However, while I was working on my outlines I figured out that the two essays would end up being the same thing. I was left confused about which essay I would choose to replace it. I quickly decided that I didn't like any of the other questions and figured that I'd start doing to reading for next week on which the 7th question was based. I started reading it, but was distracted by one of the other questions. Is it wrong for the state to finance art and culture and what is the role of art and culture in national life. Is it wrong. That stuck with me. The phrase kept repeating in my head, and I knew that I was hooked. I guess I'll be doing that essay.
I outlined the essays and only used an hour and 16 minutes of my allotted time. Next I did a practice run of my pop presentation. It wasn't perfect, but no amount of practice is going to make me perfect. I wasn't even bothered by the fact that it only took me 10 minutes and 11 seconds to do it. Moving on.
Next up was dreaded pop. I figured that three hours of studying would suffice for today. I decided to only write down the biographical information for each song and then only jot down the key words from my notes while listening to the songs. I still have so much to learn! How can I forget that chanson is about live, unmediated performances and that the break beat is important to hip hop?! What about the five important points of techno: 1. drum machine 2. human voice 3. synthesizers/electronic sounds 4. four on the floor 5. sampling?!!!!!! What about its connection to rap and chanson?! Ahhhhhh!!!!!
I studied the new material for pop before starting to study for French. I was going to study for a whole hour as usual, but it was already five and I still had a lot of work to do. I only studied what we went over today. I understand it a lot more, but I still feel guilty for shortchanging my french studying. Being a nerd is so hard. Is it weird that I don't care about my French final, and my justification for not putting in a lot of work for it is that it's only 20 percent of my grade. The UC system has tarnished my thinking. 20% is nothing compared to what I'm used to a final being worth. Oh whatever.
I got some coffee and went back to studying for pop. Did I mention that chanson is about live performances? What about the emphasis on sexuality in yé-yé? Have we talked about the anti-capitalist stance of Dominique Grange and rock alternatif? So. much. information. so. little. time. I was getting so tired that I had to take a break to take a shower. A little bit of Black Keys makes everything slightly better. I finished my pop studying over some pasta. I'm really in love with the pasta I made. I'm super proud of myself (and no, Lauren, it's not gross like it sounds).
After I finished studying for pop I took a one second break before rereading my pop essay. I'm going to finish it tomorrow at the UC center so that I can add in the footnotes. I'm determined to not read the paper again (even though I found typos today; surely a grade killer), but I know that I'll probably crack and read it tomorrow. At least tomorrow is the last day that I'm torturing myself. While reading my pop paper, I got an email from Christina. I actually got it in my inbox! I emailed her back saying that I was interested in the other emails that she had sent to me. She said:
Good lord. Well, whenever you wrote me, I answered...
If I have time, I will take a look.
C.
Mindy signed an email the other day "m". What is with my professors? I was brought up in university to always be professional no matter what, and now I have professors doing exactly what I was told not to do! Oh the irony.
It's 9:35 now. I'm going to bed at 10 so I can wake up at seven to study all day tomorrow. Since I'm not going to the excursion I will have plenty of time to do my work. I've decided to go to the Cluny museum (as suggested by Christina) on Sunday or Monday. I'm always so busy on Tuesday-Thursday that I just can't bear the idea of going tomorrow with all that I've got going on. At least during the weekend I can budget my time better without having to go to school.
On a side note. I was thinking about what I have to do this weekend/next week and the item "start packing" came to mind. The end is almost here. I'm not ready.
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