1. I'm constantly behind on work. I'm behind on readings and studying. I mean, just in my freshman seminar class alone, there's so much to fucking read. Last week it was Dracula (which was fun!) and this week it's The Scientific Revolution, which, hey, I find it really hard to care about the difference between anthropomorphism and Aristotelian science and, like, Boyle's air pumps when I'm lying in bed with a headache. The last time I felt good about myself and totally caught up with schoolwork was when I was staying in the library every night till 1 and pulling all-nighters just to get everything done.

2. Speaking of my freshman seminar (Gods and Monsters, which covers the history of science as well as contemporary reactions to science, which means one week we're reading dense material of blah blah blah (one week we had Darwin) and the next we're reading Frankenstein and discussing what kind of eighteenth century scientist was Victor Frankenstein, and then watching Nosferatu, the 20s silent film of Dracula and shrieking at the homosexual subtext that is, strangely, popping up in almost all our readings...), we have the best conversations in class. The best.

Or more like we learn the most random things. Like there was an eighteenth/nineteenth century club of scientists (who didn't call themselves scientists until the 1830s, really, and it was a pretty diverse group) who called themselves "The Lunar Society" because they'd meet in bars/clubs at the full moon, and then they'd proceed to get so drunk that they needed the full moon to get home. I think Darwin's granddad was in that group.

And Robert Boyle-- a famous chemist/natural philosopher-- didn't buy this one mirror because he thought it was haunted by a demon who would give him all the chemical knowledge in the world. He was tempted to but he was afraid it would put his soul at risk. I mean. He really believed it. So he didn't buy the mirror. And our teacher said Jonathan Swift wrote a "gut-burstingly hysterical" satire of Robert Boyle which he'll show us after we read Boyle's The Christian Virtuoso next week so now I'm all excited...!

I always drift off in the class though. The exciting bits are when we talk about Victorian fears of evolutionary regression. Like in Dracula!

THESE ARE THE FUNNEST PARTS OF MY DAYS.

I also totally think my teacher likes me. :) Not in a sexual way because he's def. gay, but as a student/person! There are only about 12 kids in our class and the last time I scheduled a writing conference with him we chatted for almost 2 hours and I told him I wanted him to be my advisor. And he wants me to be in charge of the student evaluation papers-- just to bring them to class. But still. I feel so special and loved because he ran me down after class to ask me. :)))

3. My next-door neighbor is also taking a beginning riding class, and she got a "new" horse who was skittish and that THREW HER OFF and she stopped me in the bathroom to show me her butt which was all bruised and dark. OH GOD, LIKE I DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH TO BE AFRAID OF IN THAT CLASS.

Last week I had Victor who, I don't care what anyone says, he is a mean horse. He would pull his head down--to the ground! why, Victor, why?!-- and I would jerk forward because hey, I'm holding his reins, and I KNEW I was going to fall off. I was so shaky by the end, I was begging my TA to let me get off. He kept doing it and at one point I dropped the reins and got scolded. What am I supposed to do? I need the reins short to steer him, but when he drags his head down I'm dragged forward and off-balance. One girl actually fell off. There was another who also had a "new" horse and she was also afraid to fall. I was so pissed off by the end of class.

4. My history 151 group made a beautiful powerpoint about the Industrial Revolution on Sunday, in the library, that took us 3 hours to make. Then we e-mailed it to everyone and somehow the e-mail disappeared, no one got it, and the attachment was stripped from the one copy of mail we had in the sent-box.

So we had to do it again today.

I love our group though, I enjoy talking to everyone and they're all really intelligent. We have a Chinese national (my neighbor who fell off her horse), an Ethiopian, a Russian, Eliza from Vermont (who's in my freshman seminar), and me. We totally side-tracked into an argument about globalization.

The Russian is also called Arina. She's pretty cool but not as cool as Airy. :)


4. I want to blog more about my life. I want to take the time to step back and look at my life.