Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Smile.

Hello Readers,

Life is pretty busy right now.  We are in the midst of what I like to call two weeks of hell or midterms.  I think midterms are worse than finals, because I still have to attend class and have other homework on top of the studying I need to accomplish.  I thought midterms would not be that bad this semester because I am only taking 12 credits hours, but I am taking some classes I really do not enjoy - ethics and history - so studying for these classes is a bit difficult.  Tomorrow I have my EAS midterm (which I am not that worried about - I am going to run through the PowerPoint slides one more time tonight and then glance over them tomorrow after I volunteer) and I have a history quiz.  I have not had a quiz in history yet, this is a reading quiz.  On Monday no one was able to answer the questions my professor was asking AKA none of us had read before coming to class, therefore my professor thought it would be a good idea to give us a reading quiz tomorrow on 32 pages of reading on the French Revolution. I read the material once and highlighted the important parts and then read it again taking notes on it - and I feel like I still don't know what the French Revolution was all about.  I have the general understanding, but for some reason the details and the background knowledge I am never able to grasp when it comes to history.  My history midterm is greatly placed on the day after I get back from Morocco.  Luckily I don't have class on Friday so I will be studying all day for my history and ethics midterms that are next week on Thursday night and all day Friday and then it is off to Africa!!! :)

I have been receiving emails with packing lists and carious information regarding the trip this weekend. I am going to try and attach two different links about my trip. One is the packing list which I find a little funny and the other is what I will be doing each day.  Please let me know if they work or not.  And if they don't work I will be more than happy to forward you the email.  Just kidding you can't see the links so I am not going to upload them... Let me know if you want me to send any of the information to you or if you want to be surprised when I come back and blog about my adventure. :)

There has been a lot of my mind lately, but to be honest I am so tired I don't really even want to vent about it so I will try to keep it short and sweet.  First I am having very little patience with my ethics teacher - most of the class never understands the readings we do and I can't really understand what she is trying to say - not just because of her accent but because she talks fast and jumps around.  I am really not a fan of ethics and I am going to have to study my butt off for the midterm to pull out some sort of decent grade.  I have also been thinking a lot about internships vs summer classes.  Applying for internships has been putting so my pressure and stress on me that I really don't know if it is the best option for me this summer.  I really don't want to come home for like two weeks and then have to leave again.  I don't know how well I would be able to handle that.  I am still going to finish all the applications I have started and see what happens.  There is actually an internships through UW-Milwaukee that would be a nice fit.  I could have an internship without being far from home.  But as of right now I want to look into summer classes and get physics and calculus out of the way.  Tomorrow I was thinking about skipping volunteering at the soup kitchen to study, but I think going to the soup kitchen is a better idea - it will help me relax and take my mind off all the stress.  Tomorrow night is the first meeting for the other volunteer site - Bokatas?  I have to go to this meeting if I want to particapate in the program - I have an Art History midterm on Thursday, but I should be okay with studying for that.  I have read through my notes a couple of times and I will have some time tomorrow to look over things.  I just need to remember to Breathe. Relax. Accomplish.  Today I went to talk to my history teacher - we have to select a book to write a book review on it instead of a second midterm. I had no idea where to even begin looking at books so that was my main purpose of the meeting.  I told him I was an Evironmental Science major and would like the book to have a basis regarding the environment.  Basically he had no idea how to help me and told me to just pick a book, but my grade would probably reflect me not having an interest in the book, because I am not interested in history.  Well I didn't let that fly - I kept trying to get him to give me examples of books and told him even though I am not a history major or have that much interest in history I don't want to do poorly on a paper.  Finally he gave me a recommendation for a book on the importance of the sugar plant.  I said it sounded interested and I would give it a try - well I have to order the book of amazon because the SLU - Madrid library doesn't have it. Great. I wanted it for my long bus ride this weekend, but I guess that is not happening.  Way to go SLU.  I think that is all for my rant tonight.

Tonight we turned off the lights for 5 minutes in protest of the high cost of electricity in Spain.  While Gloria was explaining this to Maya and me she told us want Earth Hour - something we actually do on the Saint Louis campus.  I didn't know it was world wide - it is great to see that other people care about the Earth too. Well I need to get back to studying and I am getting tired. Hope everyone had a great Valentines day.

Paz y Amor. God Bless.

P.S. Sunshine no more - today it rained all day and it is suppose to continue raining the rest of the week and it might even rain in Morocco... But don't you worry rain will not get me down.  The past couple of days life was kicking my butt, but it is time for me to kick life's butt now.

2 comments:

  1. Go kick life's butt...and your history teacher's butt too by the sounds of it! You can do it!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good luck on your midterms! And believe me, thinking about the future can be stressful. I know its hard, but don't freak out about the future when you are in SPAIN! Enjoy it! Love you!
    Ciara

    ReplyDelete