Just Another Cottage in Blogville

College

Super, super tired. Not even sure why I'm still up typing. I got up at the same time as my roommate, who has early morning practices for the rowing team, and pushed my nose to the grindstone as they say. All that Harry Potter had its real-world applications - thanks to JK Rowling, I officially dominated 70 - yep, count 'em, SEVENTY - pages of the Odyssey in time for my class, on top of finishing reading essays for two other classes, plus an essay due in precisely two hours. Not bad considering I was in bed at eleven after yesterday's onslaught of homework. Never ending. But I love it.

And thank God for that - loving English, reading and writing is the only thing that sustains me through all of this workload.

And thank God for the pure silence of the deep recesses of the library, AKA the Quiet Floors. I discovered a perfect place deep in the bowels of the library where I am virtually out of sight of anyone who has found the place, and can still plug in the good ol' lappy to work for several hours. About forty-five minutes til I couldn't focus for hunger (breakfast at seven - while still reading Homer - and no lunch other than a fruit smoothie), noshed with my roommate, friend, and his friend, returned to our room and found I couldn't focus there - too tempting to chat with Roomie - so I returned to the library, where I completed two essays and a reading for tomorrow's Creative Writing class all in the span of two-and-a-half hours. I retired to the dorm around ten, and headed downstairs till eleven or so.

Anyway, around three, exhausted, I couldn't even sleep when I tried to nap after my final class this afternoon. I wound up texting my friend, who he himself was sleeping. His floor is known for its madness - it has a campus-wide reputation for its parties, X Box, widescreen TV, and diet staple of pizza and (buffalo) wings. At breakfast he normally comes totally worn, saying, 'Everything shuts down at four-thirty and gets back up again at seven.'

Luckily our floor is relatively calm. Our RA is one of the few who will show up at your door if you are too loud. Although my roommate heard - at five on her way to practice - a few girls three doors down playing Catch Phrase, not because they were early-risers, but because sleep is out the window. It's fun time to them, I suppose.

Here, in these past two plus weeks, I have met some of the kindest, most fascinating and admirable people I have ever come across. Sure, there are girls who haven't left high school and whom I won't go near with a ten foot pole if I can help it, but I genuinely enjoy my new friends' company, and now that I have situated myself so that socializing with them is a break from homework, and not vice versa, the time is even more enjoyable. Sometimes things just get so completely stressful and wearing that trying to continue studying without a total break is counterproductive - textbooks become even less soaking and essays lose all sense of word-power. And forget Homer.

My dad, the engineer grad of U Toronto, told me that every hour or so take a fifteen minute break, 'Or you'll go crazy.' True indeed.

Yes, it is past midnight, but I need a mental break from everything. I had a good time tonight chilling with some friends downstairs, but my long day has caught up with me, and it's been eighteen hours since I've last had sleep. Doesn't sound bad, but considering the brainwork I've put myself through today - it's well deserved and much needed.

Hope all is well with you and yours. I LOVE college.