I haven't blogged in ages, and I'm not sure why...I suppose it's because little of interest has been going on these days. I think today marks the beginning of the Hellhole that will be the rest of my semester. All my work is either going to be given the same usual marks it always is, even though it's BS, or it's going to be a complete shitshow, since I've all but stopped caring. Academia has begun to legitimately depress me. I found out today that my 2,000-word essay for Contemporary Fiction, which was never going to be strong in the first place, has to include a significant bibliography with reference to established literary theory. My first reaction was to have my stomach sink. My second reaction is EFF THAT. I've never read concrete literary theory in my life, let alone in this class. I don't think my first experience with it is going to be using it to support my point in a short paper that doesn't need it anyway. I'll talk to my professor and let her know that I've never really done proper literary analysis outside of high school before (my Dickinson Contemporary Fiction class was completely different than this one, and therefore much more enjoyable. Good old SOB would shake up this class and blow it and everyone out of the water). Anyway, enough whining. My point is, I'm going to do my best, but I'm not working myself into the ground, for this round of papers or for exams (which the English take ridiculously seriously. You're expected to freak out and feel unworthy. I expect to treat them like I've treated all of my other exams throughout my life, and I am OK with feeling unworthy. I think half of my classes are unworthy).

UPDATES:
-I'm going to Iceland in 22 days, but alone.
-I went to Ireland this weekend, and it was lovely.
-Wafflestomper has stomped its last upon my arrival back home tonight. Though I think my knee is now jacked from walking with a cast for three entire months.
-I actually quite like two of my classes, just for the record. The other two could fail me and I probably wouldn't care. At least not for longer than a day or two.
-I cooked for the first time in my life a week ago, and it was fabulous. Sarah, Alli, and I made pierogies/pedoheh (40 of them in 2 hours, whereas it apparently takes my mom two days), and it was the best day I'd had in a long time. I plan to do it again for Easter, when Alex and/or Emma may be visiting.
-I bought a ticket to see Jonsi in London on May 26. It is inevitable that I will have an exam conflicting with this. I'm prepared to get very annoyed with UEA and their ridiculous delays with the exam schedule.
-Coldplay played a brand-new song in Argentina this weekend, and it's absolutely incredible. I can't get enough of it. Chris has said they plan to release an album by THIS Christmas, but I don't believe it for a second, even before EMI refuted it. Chris has a notoriously big mouth, and he's also a good-natured, humorous liar. He doesn't realize that fangirls hang on his every word. I would too if I wasn't seasoned to his hopeless optimisim and childlike excitement that never comes to pass. If we listened to him, we'd have seven albums by now, he'd be fat and bald, the band would be broken up, he'd be a racist, gun-toting asshole (but the media thinks he's the last part regardless).

Ireland was lovely, though I had a hard time remembering I technically wasn't in the UK anymore. It was like England, but with deliberate mistakes: different accents, different money, different shops, different language, different history. Kelley did a great job of showing us around (though she walked a bit fast for my liking). I discovered I love Irish whiskey. The sound of the Dublin crosswalk signals were endlessly amusing. We seem to have a knack for picking particularly disappointing and smelly hostels, though this one was a mark better than the one we stayed in in Scotland. I was colder than I've ever been in a long time, and I usually don't get cold very easily. Our tourguide on our daytrip was perhaps the most hilarious person I've ever met, and I think we'll all be quoting him for a long time to come. All in all, I had a great weekend, though I think culturally and visually, Scotland may be more my jam for some inexplicable reason. I also wish all of our little clan came: at some points, I think we could have used Alli's gigglyness, Henry's logic and decision making, and Brandon's goofyness to break up some of the more trying moments due to tiredness, since we tended to get a bit more short with each other than usual at points (and I try to never let my mood dictate how I treat other people, which requires more effort sometimes, which made me more tired on occasions). It was almost weird how much I thought of them or something made me think of them (and I think everyone else thought of them on occasion too: a Leap Year ad on a bus, a statue of a man pointing, a weird noise, a period costume), and I think I'm slowly beginning to not only realize how much I'm going to miss everyone next year, but I'm beginning to feel it as well. I'm a sap, but I don't care. I've never felt more at home than I have with this group since leaving Wooster, and I'm reluctant to let it go.

Anyway, I probably shouldn't blog on Monday nights after my hell-day, since it makes me sound cranky, but there's my first update in a while. I'll get back on track if I have time and something actually happens around here until Easter break and the globetrekking begins.