wSep 5, 2006


Potpourri II: A Much More Coherent Emo Post

So today was the fullest day ever, and I already had a blog post half-written. So, I will intersperse the exciting things with the shitty things and hopefully everything will balance out somehow. I just....feel like dying right now. I can't think of an area of my life that isn't experiencing a massive freaking-out sensation right now. I think I'll get a handle on some of this by tomorrow.

Classes
So I had all of these anecdotes about my class forming in my head, but for now I'll just write about my Poli Sci class. It seems cool for the most part.....but mountains of readings and etc. That doesn't bother me too much, but part of the class is these 3 oral exams we'll be having, in which the professor made it clear he would grill us for 15 minutes straight individually. We have to know the ins and outs of every article, who wrote it, when it was published, and all of the history of theory leading up to it and what precise political moments it was making vague references to. The professor said that if we gave an ambiguous answer, he would zero in on the weak spot and keep asking questions until it was painfully obvious to both the student and the professor whether or not we knew what we were talking about. The professor said at least 10 times that if this was a problem, we should drop the class.
And that's exactly what my only friend in the class and her cousin did. It's a pretty small class, too. There were probably 25-30 of us in there.
So I really don't know what I should do. The oral exam idea makes me really nervous and the class sounds like an ass-ton of work. Part of it entails a paper we'll start writing as soon as the mid-term elections are over with, but only have a week to write. Since you don't know how the elections will turn out, you can't have anything pre-planned.
We also have to send in 3-5 sentences per week that pull something out of our travels through assignments/print media that is this like, amazing and provocative insight into political science. If we simply restate the event, that's not okay. I don't even know how one goes about doing that.
Part of me wants to take the class to prove it to myself that I can do it.
Most of me wants to die just thinking about it.
The problem is that I'm not taking enough credits to just drop it - I need to find another class. And they're probably all full/in time slots that are already taken.
There's also kind of a time-limit on this. If I swap it for another class, then the sooner I do it, the better - I really don't want to fall behind.
Any advice anybody has on this would be gladly taken, as soon as possible!

WTF
I am constantly amazed at how often I run into people I know whenever I'm downtown/on campus. UW-Madison has about 40,000 enrolled students. So, you would think that you wouldn't often run into people you know. However, I run into at least 3 people I know from class/extra curriculars/through friends every time I go anywhere.
Now, those of you who know me in person are fairly aware that my facial expression about 85% of the time, for whatever reason, can be described as "angry, "unpleasant," or "intimidating." Despite this, when I see people I know, even if we're not particularly close/talk EVER, I make an effort to smile.
So, understably, it really pisses me off when people I DO know and have had conversations with don't smile back! When I was walking around buying books last week, I wanted to scream at least 8 times, "Don't pretend you don't know me! You're the one who friended me on Facebook!"

Speaking of Facebook....
Okay, could Facebook come up with any more useless features? It’s getting to the point where it’s creepy and wrong. Now, Facebook profiles have a “Facebook Feed.” This is similar to an RSS news feed, in which a person can updates from websites and blogs they like as they happen.
Except that in Facebook’s case, it’s useless.
Here is what my “Facebook Feed” reads right now (sans the small icons that illustrate your every move, in case people need a pictoral reference):
*Jackie edited Movies on her profile. 11:50 pm
*Jackie is in a relationship. 11:15 pm
* August 31 Jackie and (random person from high school) are now friends. 12:22 pm
*August 28 Jackie wrote on (random person from Shopko)’s wall. 7:44 pm
* August 28 Jackie and X are now friends. 7:42 pm
* August 21 Jackie wrote on Kristy’s wall. 10:27 pm

I mean, if I could edit what each things says, it might be cool. Like, “August 21: Jackie wrote on Kristy’s wall to wish her a Happy Birthday, while simultaneously being profane.” That MIGHT be cool.
But you can’t. All you can do is click the ‘x’ that deletes them from the list. So, say, if you edit your movies list and don’t want anybody to know about it, you can delete it from your list. The best part is, I can log in to my Facebook profile and look at my “Facebook Feed” for not only myself, but for all of the 200+ friends I have on Facebook.

So, my bigass feed says:
*Kristy tagged you in a photo. 1:12 pm
*Eunice posted on your wall. 11:26 pm
*Random person from high school joined a user group. 7:46 pm
*Random person from high school is now single.
*Random person from the Cardinal removed something from her favorite interests.

Seriously? SERIOUSLY?

Of course, all of this literally occurred within hours of Kristy posting the following message on my Facebook wall: “Change your relationship status!”
So, when I changed it from “Single” to “In a relationship,” my profile updated. And now there’s this new feature that everybody’s looking at. And now everybody and their mother is sending me messages via Facebook, IM, blog comments, and emails saying: “WTF, when did you get into a relationship and why didn’t you tell me?!” I just feel really overwhelmed by over them. I mean, not too annoyed, because a lot of these people are people I'm close to and people I care about. But like, what are you supposed to do when you start dating someone? Call everybody ever and tell them? I don't know. That seems intense.
Is it weird to just type something up and then copy and paste it to everybody who asks? Because if this continues, it might just be what I end up doing.
Also: The new Facebook layout looks like ass. And the feed feature is really lame and over-reaching.

What else?
I still haven't had time to call my godmother/cousin and wish her Happy Birthday, I haven't had a decent conversation with my mother since I got here, the Central Reservations Office screwed Anime Club over with the rooms so Gordon, Antoine, and I are going tomorrow morning to try and get a room big enough to accomodate all of us, I still have boxes I haven't unpacked, and my back hurts like a mother from carrying around a huge bag of laptop, DVD cases, and manga from the Student Organization Fair for the latter-half of the day.

So....yeah. I guess I'll try to close with something a little more calming...Obviously this was from the blog post that was already half-written. You know, because it's not whiney and ready to die.

Dragons know their shit
One of the books I acquired during one of my many trips to Half Price Books since returning to Madison is St. George and the Dragon and the Quest for the Holy Grail by Edward Hays. I read it at some point in high school because my Youth Minister lent it to me. Reading it now, or at least judging from the first 20 pages, it's not exceedingly well-written. But it was loaned to me when I was going through a pretty rough time during senior year, and I remembered it helping me. I read a lot of books, but it's rare that I find one that's able to make a significant impact.
So, anyway. I just wanted to share some of page 14 with you. Normally, I'd given some background for context, but I don't feel that that's very necessary.

"But," I said, "your wounds glow with great beauty, and you said they are the source of your power and magic. How can my wounds become a source of power?"
"First," replied the dragon, "you must not give in to the voice of your scars, the voice of the times you trusted and were betrayed, loved and were rejected, did your best and were laughed at. Do not give weight to the scars left because you were slighted or were made to feel less than others. Instead, when those voices call to you to react with envious or jealous feelings, do exactly the opposite. When they say, 'run away,' you must stay. When they whisper, 'distance yourself,' then come all the closer. You must transform their power, not destroy it!"


Wow. If I could actually do that.

Current Music: the online video tour of Gordon's new personal business
scribbled mystickeeper at 10:46 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:

Ryan: I'm taking it anyway, and yeah, Facebook is definitely a whore. I've found it useful for looking shit up on other people, though, so I figure I should return the favor, :)

Rodia: Yeah, I'm going to stay in the class.

It doesn't replace Shakespeare, though. I *like* Shakespeare!!

By Blogger mystickeeper, at 11:34 PM, September 07, 2006  

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