In Retrospect...

... taking six classes was completely insane. But I survived, so although I will never do that again, all's well that ends well.

My final grades are as follows

Medieval Lit. in Translation: A

290: A

Old Norse: A

Computing for Poets: A

History of England: B+

Latin Love Poetry: B

Not bad for a six class (five-and-a-half credit) overload. And on top of all of that, I did chorale, world music ensemble, was on the Christian Fellowship leadership team AND captained the archery club. I'm surprised I survived at all. 

The only grade I'm really disappointed with is the History of England grade because it was the result of poor writing in two of the papers, and not at all an issue of not understanding the material. The whole semester was so busy, and all my papers were due at the same time at least twice, and oddly enough, I don't think there were enough of them.  I didn't have the chance to regain my writing skills until the last few papers. But other than that, the class was really, really excellent. I loved the class, and especially enjoyed Froissart's Chronicles and, of course, Bede's Ecclesiastical History.  

Latin actually went pretty well - after the abysmal midterm, but since I was able to pull up that grade with some extra credit, I think I got As on all but one paper, and probably a B on the final. I'm still learning at a steady but irritatingly slow rate, and I hope that this summer I'll have a chance to solidify and improve my grammar and vocabulary... 

Old Norse got rough towards the end, not because it was particularly hard, but because the end of the semester was so busy, but we translated parts of Hrafnkell's Saga as well as a very strange version of Tristram and Isolde among other things. 

Computing for Poets went brilliantly well, after those initial difficult weeks, and even though the actual programming was hard, the writing aspects went over well. Because since I was able to do so much work with Anglo-Saxon and Tolkien, things went a lot better than I originally anticipated. 

290 was one of the best classes I had this semester. Professor Krebs is a fantastic teacher, and I learned a lot about literary criticism and can now decide to use it, should I so wish. For the final project, my partner and I wrote a 20 page paper and were told that it was fantastic, which is arguably one of the best moments of this semester! I also made a bunch of friends in the class, which was very nice.  

Medieval Lit went really well, though I wasn't much of a fan of Dante's Inferno in comparison to the other things we read this semester. I got an 100 on the midterm, and probably something in the high 90s on the final, so all in all, a very good semester on that front. 

This summer should be excellent, England is in a little over a month, and I'm on my second day of my work with Professor Drout on Lexomics, which so far has involved working on content for the Wheaton web page for the project. There were several moves in the past two weeks, which was stressful, but things are settling in pretty well. 

I hope to maybe have time to blog this summer, and in England, and there will definitely be pictures once I go. 

The Spring Break Adventures pt. 2

Yesterday I rearranged my room so that in the afternoon the sun now falls on my bed and not on my computer/desk. The only problem with that is that it creates a lethal sun-patch! A nap trap, if you like. Unfortunately it's grey and rainy out, so I won't be able to enjoy it today.

Yes I have a Welsh flag, a map of England, and tons of Arthurian stuff on my walls. 

add to that the pictures from the Lindisfarne gospels

Basically all I did was flip the bed and the desk, and then move the stuff on the walls to go with it. Oh, and get rid of my bedside "table".

After I rearranged my room, I had to watch the rest of the 1995 Pride and Prejudice! It was SO hard! Poor pitiful me, having to watch Jane Austen movies for break! Unfortunately, that bit of fun is only part of a disgusting amount of work to do. Three papers, not counting the take-home essay for Medieval Lit, Latin translation, tons of research for the 290 paper, research for the Old Norse paper, also for Medieval Lit. It's all manageable, but a lot of work when all I want to do is lounge around and read The Hunger Games, which I still have not started...

Culinarily (not a word, I know) yesterday was quiet. I had what I've been having for breakfast (see previous post for picture/description), and Rachel and I had breakfast for lunch because we didn't feel like putting anything complicated together. Dinner was leftover chilli. It was delicious. Even more delicious than yesterday. Or maybe we were just more hungry...

Today's agenda includes reading the three articles and six books I got out for 290 (I won't be reading ALL of all the books, but sections, at least), translating Fortunatus for Latin, and writing my Medieval Lit. take home paper. I'm falling behind my own break schedule. This is not good. But I can't bring myself to care... this is very, very bad... I may also watch "King Arthur" with Rachel for History of England, and we're going grocery shopping at some point too.

In other news, my brother is arriving today, so I'm super excited about that, as he hasn't seen Wheaton yet, and I'm not going to see him again until early June...

The Spring Break Adventures pt. 1

SPRING BREAK IS HERE!!! (And has been since Saturday, but hey!)

My good friend Rachel and I are staying on campus over break, and that means we're having to feed ourselves should we wish to eat. We're doing fairly spectacularly, if I do say so myself. We went food shopping on Friday and got ingredients for Chilli and Udon as well as things like yoghurt and berries etc... for breakfast and lunch meat and sandwich stuff for lunch.

We watched "In Bruges" with a few other friends later in the evening, and while I wasn't crazy about it, it certainly was interesting.

Saturday we went to Boston with Anna, and ate Dim sum and walked around Chinatown and walked over to Copley square mall and then walked around the mall. There was a lot of walking. And a lot of eating. I bought rice crackers with nori, and regular old rice crackers (which I had been CRAVING like CRAZY, so they were a need... :) I also bought a box of strawberry Pocky. I was feeling nostalgic for my childhood in an Asian market. What can I say!

As you can see, the Pocky didn't last very long...
On our way back from Boston, we stopped at Roche Bros to pick up a few more groceries... and a couple of bottles of wine. One white for cooking, and one Merlot... for enjoying. We're also having steak later, so we figured hey... why not! Oh the joys of being 21.

Needless to say, we felt ridiculously grown up the whole way back to school, and felt so accomplished once we sat down to our dinner of Udon and glasses of white wine. The Udon was excellent, comprised of tofu, spinach (the best part, in my opinion), carrots, and red peppers which had been stirred in sesame seeds. Oh. There was broth and Udon noodles too.

Sunday was rather lazy, what with the evil time change and with the plan of sleeping in on top of that. But I read part of Suzanne Keen's book Narrative Form, which is for my 290 paper on Pride and Prejudice and Narratology, took extensive notes, and started an outline for said paper. Lunch was a delicious, but simple meal, we ate sandwiches. Mine was turkey, salami and provolone on peasant bread. It was delicious. But I have no picture. It was just a sandwich.

Here's part of my reading for over break...

At about four, we met a friend of ours who is also staying on campus for break, and threw a Frisbee and ran around the Dimple for a while. Then it was off to CVS and back to cook chilli. It was delicious. And there is no picture. We ate it with guacamole and cheese and sour cream and it was fantastic. And there's at LEAST one more meal to be got out of it! After we washed up, I headed back to my room and watched an hour of the BBC Pride and Prejudice, and then crawled into bed. It was lovely.

This morning I had the luxury of sleeping through BOTH my alarm clocks and getting up at 9:30. This was breakfast.

Raspberries, grapes, cherios and Greek yoghurt. YUM!

There was also tea, of course.

But now I have to go be productive so that I can watch "King Arthur" this afternoon for History of England, and write a paper on it. Then maybe I'll start reading The Hunger Games...

First (half) week of classes

     I have now had all my classes, and I can say that I will enjoy every one of them to some degree or another.

     I have to say that Professor LeBlanc, who teaches Computing for Poets, is now up there in the ranks of favourite professors with Professors Drout and Polanichka. This is after one class. That's how good he is. He explains things very clearly, is incredibly funny (of the brand where he either says something completely straight and keeps going and then you realise that he was completely joking, or he simply comes up with something incredibly understated and incredibly funny. That was a bad description. I'm aware of that fact) and really knows how to keep a class moving. The material in the class is going to be a little bit tough, especially at the beginning, I think, since I have little to no experience with (X)HTML and the programs with which you write HTML, but once I get over the OH-MY-GOSH-I-DON'T-KNOW-WHAT-I'M-DOING stage, I'm sure I'll be fine.

     I thought 290 was going to be the bane of my existence this semester, but I now realise that this is not going to be the case at all. Professor Krebs is fantastic, and I think the way she approaches the class and literary crit. will teach me a lot in a way I can enjoy, understand and apply. I'm super excited. How many classes involve the professor handing out Kindles for the use of the class? Not many. We'll also be blogging about our reading experiences, and I will post links to my posts if you're interested.

     Latin is probably going to be the most frustrating and challenging class, as it always is, but having decided to drop from the 300 level to the 200 level has made the whole situation slightly less intimidating. The professor is very enthusiastic, and I think will make the classes enjoyable. We haven't started with actual translations yet, but will be doing so this weekend.

     History of England is, as I expected, nothing short of fantastic. I'm really excited for a number of reasons, the first being that it's the history of England. Secondly, Professor Polanichka is teaching it, so that's also quite awesome, and the third is that the class spans all of my favourite periods of English history. We're starting with Roman (and a wee bit of pre-Roman) England, then moving on to the Anglo-Saxons, then continuing straight on through to Elizabeth. Epic? Yes, I think so. Unfortunately the class is HUGE. I hope people are intimidated and drop out. (They won't be. This is pure wishful thinking on my part, and I can't help but be pleased that so many people either want to learn about England, or love Prof. P. ... we'll ignore the fact that it might be a requirement for some people...)

     Medieval Lit. is also splendid, how could it be otherwise. Most of the readings are going to be of things I've read before, which is fine. I'm rather fond of most of it. But it does always make me wonder if I should perhaps sit on my hands until people catch up a bit. Needless to say, I'm very excited.

Well, homework and a horribly messy room call, so that'll be all for this time!

Go figure.

I'm on my way up to school, and what does the weather do? Gives us rain. of COURSE. *sigh*

I really don't like all the hassle of  getting to and from Boston, it sets me on edge, and never fails to put me in a bad mood!

I promise I'll write something more interesting next post.

Classes this semester

I have quite a full schedule this semester. I'm taking five and a half courses which are as follows.

1. English 207: Medieval Literature: Beowulf and Others
2. Latin 326: Eros and Erato: Love Poetry
3. History 298: History of England
4. English 290: Approaches to Literature 
5. Comp 131: Computing for Poets
6. Old Norse

In addition, I will be continuing World Music Ensemble and Chorale as well as continuing to lead the Archery Club. Do I have enough on my plate? Nope. Apparently not. :) I'm also taking a slightly more active role in the Christian Fellowship at Wheaton. Am I crazy? Probably. Am I really looking forward to it all? Definitely. 

I am most looking forward to Medieval Lit. and History of England. I'm deathly afraid of Latin, because I'm not great at it, and it's at the 300 level. Up till this point, I've been scraping by in the 200s. I may just die this semester. Sooo we shall see how I fair this semester... 

I'm heading back tomorrow. 

I'm back!

Sneaks in and hopes no one notices the long absence

So this past semester was insane. And amazing. And totally murderous. I survived, with fantastic grades (four As and a B!) but it was insane.

As a recap, I had Arthurian Lit. Senior Seminar, Chaucer, Carolingian History, Latin Epistolography and Old Norse as well as World Music Ensemble and Chorale. Not to mention Christian Fellowship and Archery. I have no idea how I managed all of it.

Sem. was amazing, I read so much and enjoyed most of it, I wrote a nearly twenty page paper on Sir Gawain (which involved reading SO much extra material.  I had an entire SHELF of reading I did for that paper. But it was very well researched, and I knew what I was doing when I wrote it, which meant that I actually KNEW what I was talking about. (There were fifteen books in my bibliography, and I read more books than I included in my paper. What can I say. I was pretty thorough.)
We read SO much for that class. HUNDREDS of pages of homework every week. We read, among other things, Le Mort d'Arthur, Idylls of the King, The Once and Future King, The Lays of Marie d'France, Chretien d Troyes' Arthurian Romances and The Mists of Avalon. Honestly, I didn't enjoy the last one very much, but the others were excellent.

Chaucer was great, I can now read Chaucer's Middle English fairly comfortably and quickly (now to try reading the ME of the Pearl poet...) and the class was really lively and interesting.

Old Norse was really great, VERY time consuming but very cool. I mean, how often do you run into translations that read "Now you shall drink the blood of the beast?"

Latin was its usual difficult self, though I feel as though I'm starting to get the hang of it, FINALY. It took long enough... and though I'm disappointed that I only got a B in the class, I'm glad it wasn't worse!  We had a new professor this year, and while he certainly knew what he was doing and was a good teacher, I missed Professor Schell.

Carolingian History was excellent, as anticipated, and I learned a lot about the Carolingians (also as anticipated).

Over all, this semester was a lot better than last, emotionally. There were still some things I could have done without, but I can't complain. Much.

My break has been really quite but lots of fun (but quiet, and the kind of quiet that isn't particularly interesting to hear about). And with that unsatisfactory comment, I shall include some hopefully more satisfying photos. :)

The more or less usual state of my desk.

Old Norse and Chaucer reading. All in a night's work.

count the languages!

All of my school friends gave me TARDIS related stuff for my birthday :)

I'll be going back to school on Monday, and am having mixed feelings about it. I'm excited for the new classes. I'm excited to see my friends. But I'm not so excited about the amount of work... or Chase food...

An another note, AAAAAAHHHHH SHERLOCK *sob* I have yet to work up the courage to watch the most recent episode... I'm worried. There had better be a season 3...

Hopefully next post will be more interesting. This was mostly to get the blogging juices flowing again.