I've just completed our lesson nine Russian "test", which is something I've been dreading for about a week. Last night, between 6 and 7 pm, I started studying the chapter and continued to do so, more or less, until around 1 am. I then spent another hour or two studying this morning (sleeping in/skipping honors in the process, for which I was completely unprepared anyway because of Russian studying). We arrive in class, and the professor announces we're going to do the test "in pairs". We do the test together, switch tests, check each others' work, then turn the test in (as an aside, had it been and individual test I knew most of the answers). When I asked if/how it was going to be graded, being, I think, understandably befuddled, our professor said that I was "another one" who was "worried about grades" and that the "important thing is that you're learning." She then said "I know what your grade is." I... think this is good? If this was an in class assignment for participation, why did I spend 8 hours and skip a class to study for it? What... why...
I hate this language.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Friday, March 27, 2009
Running
I really need to do more short, quick updates, so I can keep everyone apprised of what's going on in my life without having to do a 14 paragraph update. It's sort of like laundry- the more it backs up, the more you don't want to do it, the more it... etc. The last 6 weeks of my life, minus anything that happened the first two days of spring break, will be condensed into the following "paragraph":
February: Basically classes. SURF: Got a mentor, the funding disappeared. Room/suitemates: the same (though Mike... well... that's more recent). Friends: Meh. Honors: 3 hour long conversation with Dr. Ahr, with lots of funny stories. My future: Five year plan (no), Grad school (no, yes, no, maybe), Law school (where'd this come from? perhaps/yes), relationships (if somebody asked nicely. maybe. I may be taking a long hiatus.), living arrangements (off campus in New Jersey next summer?). March: see February, only with midterms (which I rocked), until, sort of, last night (which is where our story will resume).
Now that that's out of the way...
Last night was interesting. After getting back home from Slavic club a little after 7:00, I returned to find my room completely trashed. Toilet paper and duct tape everywhere, syrup on the door handle, my toothbrush taped to the wall. My suitemates had done it to play a joke on my roommate Ralph, who had left earlier that day and wouldn't be back until Monday. Morons. As I was leaving to get our RA (not that I was actually going to get her, you know) they both apologized and said they'd clean it all up. I said great, and proceeded to go to the train station, for my first trip into NYC of the semester.
Despite the steady downpour, I had a rather enjoyable time in NYC. I wandered around Times Square, hung out in this 3 story Toys "Я" Us with a Ferris Wheel, went to Borders and got a book (and listened to a woman describe in graphic detail her sexual exploits on the phone to one of her friends an aisle over. She compared her partner, favorably, to a monkey at one point). I returned home, read some of my book, watched some basketball, and generally had a wonderfully relaxing night. I was all set to go a museum in the city with our Honors class at 11:00 this morning.
Things then got progressively worse.
At 11:18, Natalie texted me, asking where I was. This woke me up, as I'd manage to set my alarm for 9:30 PM. I put on pants, literally sprinted across Seton Hall, and end up at the bus station at 11:29, after it had left at 11:27. I then, again, after having just sprinted across campus, without showering or doing anything I normally do upon waking up, proceed to walk down to the train station, get on a train, go into the city, and take a taxi (totally, altogether, about $40 of my own money) to get to the museum at 1:08, just in time for our tour to start at 1:20. You see, the entire reason Ahr was in such a hurry to leave, was that WE HAD TO GET TO THE MUSEUM IN TIME FOR THE 1:20 TOUR. I meet up with everybody (they'd already all gone in) and ask Chris, one of my lunch friends, when they got to the museum. He says about 12:15, and they'd been on the tour for about 50 minutes. Dan: Seriously? Chris: Seriously. Dan: *cursing*. I don't know how, exactly, one can misjudge the time it takes to get somewhere one has been before by 45 minutes on a 45 minute drive, but they'd managed to. This meant I'd managed to make it just in time to see the last 2 pieces of art on the tour. Then it was over, and we had 2.5 hours of "free time" to "hang out" before the bus left at 4:00.
At about 3:00, one other person who had driven there was leaving (Ia), so I grabbed a ride with her instead of wait for the bus to come back. As we were crossing the bridge back into New Jersey, I realized I didn't have my coat with me. After an unsuccessful rescue attempt by Natalie, I'll be going back to the museum next Friday to retrieve my jacket. To recap, at 4:00 I was exhausted, $40 poorer, without a jacket, gross, and had, for my troubles, gained about 10 minutes of guided art-learning. I think I lost.
After sleeping, I managed to actually go eat dinner and go out to see a movie with future roommate/suitemate Mike. This is the first time he's been on campus during the weekend this semester, so we drove a couple towns over and saw I love you, man. If anybody from the Seton Hall administration is listening, for the love of God, LET US HAVE CARS ON CAMPUS. I have two incredible complaints about this university: 1) everybody goes home on the weekends and 2) we can't have cars. Having a car really changes everything. The movie was pretty good, and funny, and vaguely resembled sort of the relationship Mike and I have developed over the past 6 months. Since most of my friends have been primarily female, and certainly those that I talk to on a regular basis (I think all of my blog readers are female, actually), this is sort of... cool. Not like I haven't had guy friends before (Chris Land, Nick Henderson) but, you know, it's nice to have that rapport with somebody you actually live in the same state with. At dinner before the movie, Mike, instead of talking about Monique's ass, talked about how Monique's mother was crazy, which was causing Monique to be crazy, which... it's sort of a long story (and unimportant overall to my blog), but as the semester has gone on, I realize I'm beginning to feel more confident in saying he's actually a legitimately, for the most part, nice individual. Go figure.
That's the fast update. Nothing incredibly profound. I'll try to write more, and about more than just my life play-by-play style, in the future. I love you all.
February: Basically classes. SURF: Got a mentor, the funding disappeared. Room/suitemates: the same (though Mike... well... that's more recent). Friends: Meh. Honors: 3 hour long conversation with Dr. Ahr, with lots of funny stories. My future: Five year plan (no), Grad school (no, yes, no, maybe), Law school (where'd this come from? perhaps/yes), relationships (if somebody asked nicely. maybe. I may be taking a long hiatus.), living arrangements (off campus in New Jersey next summer?). March: see February, only with midterms (which I rocked), until, sort of, last night (which is where our story will resume).
Now that that's out of the way...
Last night was interesting. After getting back home from Slavic club a little after 7:00, I returned to find my room completely trashed. Toilet paper and duct tape everywhere, syrup on the door handle, my toothbrush taped to the wall. My suitemates had done it to play a joke on my roommate Ralph, who had left earlier that day and wouldn't be back until Monday. Morons. As I was leaving to get our RA (not that I was actually going to get her, you know) they both apologized and said they'd clean it all up. I said great, and proceeded to go to the train station, for my first trip into NYC of the semester.
Despite the steady downpour, I had a rather enjoyable time in NYC. I wandered around Times Square, hung out in this 3 story Toys "Я" Us with a Ferris Wheel, went to Borders and got a book (and listened to a woman describe in graphic detail her sexual exploits on the phone to one of her friends an aisle over. She compared her partner, favorably, to a monkey at one point). I returned home, read some of my book, watched some basketball, and generally had a wonderfully relaxing night. I was all set to go a museum in the city with our Honors class at 11:00 this morning.
Things then got progressively worse.
At 11:18, Natalie texted me, asking where I was. This woke me up, as I'd manage to set my alarm for 9:30 PM. I put on pants, literally sprinted across Seton Hall, and end up at the bus station at 11:29, after it had left at 11:27. I then, again, after having just sprinted across campus, without showering or doing anything I normally do upon waking up, proceed to walk down to the train station, get on a train, go into the city, and take a taxi (totally, altogether, about $40 of my own money) to get to the museum at 1:08, just in time for our tour to start at 1:20. You see, the entire reason Ahr was in such a hurry to leave, was that WE HAD TO GET TO THE MUSEUM IN TIME FOR THE 1:20 TOUR. I meet up with everybody (they'd already all gone in) and ask Chris, one of my lunch friends, when they got to the museum. He says about 12:15, and they'd been on the tour for about 50 minutes. Dan: Seriously? Chris: Seriously. Dan: *cursing*. I don't know how, exactly, one can misjudge the time it takes to get somewhere one has been before by 45 minutes on a 45 minute drive, but they'd managed to. This meant I'd managed to make it just in time to see the last 2 pieces of art on the tour. Then it was over, and we had 2.5 hours of "free time" to "hang out" before the bus left at 4:00.
At about 3:00, one other person who had driven there was leaving (Ia), so I grabbed a ride with her instead of wait for the bus to come back. As we were crossing the bridge back into New Jersey, I realized I didn't have my coat with me. After an unsuccessful rescue attempt by Natalie, I'll be going back to the museum next Friday to retrieve my jacket. To recap, at 4:00 I was exhausted, $40 poorer, without a jacket, gross, and had, for my troubles, gained about 10 minutes of guided art-learning. I think I lost.
After sleeping, I managed to actually go eat dinner and go out to see a movie with future roommate/suitemate Mike. This is the first time he's been on campus during the weekend this semester, so we drove a couple towns over and saw I love you, man. If anybody from the Seton Hall administration is listening, for the love of God, LET US HAVE CARS ON CAMPUS. I have two incredible complaints about this university: 1) everybody goes home on the weekends and 2) we can't have cars. Having a car really changes everything. The movie was pretty good, and funny, and vaguely resembled sort of the relationship Mike and I have developed over the past 6 months. Since most of my friends have been primarily female, and certainly those that I talk to on a regular basis (I think all of my blog readers are female, actually), this is sort of... cool. Not like I haven't had guy friends before (Chris Land, Nick Henderson) but, you know, it's nice to have that rapport with somebody you actually live in the same state with. At dinner before the movie, Mike, instead of talking about Monique's ass, talked about how Monique's mother was crazy, which was causing Monique to be crazy, which... it's sort of a long story (and unimportant overall to my blog), but as the semester has gone on, I realize I'm beginning to feel more confident in saying he's actually a legitimately, for the most part, nice individual. Go figure.
That's the fast update. Nothing incredibly profound. I'll try to write more, and about more than just my life play-by-play style, in the future. I love you all.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)