I need to establish an American Cupcake Day.

I'm not someone who just sits around and writes in LJ all day. Honest. I actually go to university. :P And today I got my 10-question Weather & Climate test back, along with my "midterm" (I guess?) paper on traveling from Crescent City across the state (describing the geographical features we'd seen on our way). I got a 80% on the first one, and a 14.5/15 points on the second. So it's not perfect, but I'm pleased. :)

o_o... would someone please tell me why I have 132 userpics? No, not really-- I only have 81, but there are 132 SLOTS. ;_; That's too many! I NEED MORE ICONS! (I don't have that many lying around... at least, not that many that I haven't used already and WANT to use again)

Too many people have birthdays in March. *shakes fist* And me without my rainbow-colored font colorizer. Maybe I'll take a page from crpsaiyan's book and make a massive monthly-themed birthday image and put everyone's name on it. :P

Speaking of birthdays and birthday-type food, does America have a Cupcake Day? I mean, we have National Craft Month and Hug Your Dog day (maybe?)... every day and every month is something; every color and pattern has some sort of significance. We're holiday-crazy. I want a Cupcake Day. mklutz says she had one on the anniversary of her school (founding, perhaps?) and they actually had a RAINBOW of CUPCAKES. Who the hell wouldn't want one of those? I've actually been (unreasonably) craving cupcakes for a while. Just one, delicious rainbow-cupcake, and I'd be a happy camper. In the meantime, CUPCAKE DAY, DAMMIT! Quite possibly on my birthday.

Hawaiian cupcakes? *shrugs* Why not?

Back to the fun that is Carmen Electra's Aerobic Striptease, I find it incredibly difficult to do that whole "wiggle" thing where you shift the top part of your body to the side, but without moving your hips or feet. As in, moving just your chest using your ribcage. o_o... This makes it harder to do the full body roll, because even though I can do the "Cat Cowl" thing, trying to combine all the moves into one causes me to become really short of breath, for some weird reason. But for everything else, I breathe just fine. I know I'll never be able to do the workout on Mondays, because I'm so busy, but I can do it for the rest of the week.

Scott finally "guessed" (I dropped about 10 tons worth of hints; sometimes that boy is so adorably dense) about what I'd got, and he was pleasantly 'surprised.' He was working out too, to build up his own endurance (and for me, he said. That makes me giggle). So now we're "even." He's definitely coming up here for Passover now, just to see if he can get a sneak preview of me supposedly knowing how to striptease. *laughs* something tells me I'm going to turn into a potted plant and not be able to do it without looking stupid.

When I have some free time:
* Get a wireless card
* Move everything around/clean for Passover (since I won't be here during Spring Break)
* Finish up my scholarship applications
* Finish up my 5 on-hold fics for 30kisses - "Kaiba the Virgin Sacrifice," "Girls' Club", "Sight Unseen," "Voice," and "Someone Else's Wife." Just by looking at the titles, which TWO would you want to read the most? (atlantian_magic, if you read this, your choice is important. It's your birthday coming up, and I wanna give you a fic. :P)
* Layouts? Everywhere (LJ, seventh-star.net, etc). I need to get the site-formerly-known-as-AMC up. I need a new site title. HELP!
* Tax return? Hey, it was $100 I didn't have before. And now the damn school is jumping down my throat over it. So I need a 'dependent' verification form (shiz. Am I still considered a dependent in school/legal/medical terms, even though Mom doesn't financially support me?), her tax return (copy), and my tax return (ugh).

So much for the end of stress. I can't wait until spring break.
19 MORE DAYS!!!

The Bafflement

I was starting to get worried about Takase-sensei never calling on me in class. I was wondering what I was doing wrong, or what she really thought of me. I recall now the fact that she seemed pretty reluctant to even give me another recommendation letter earlier in the semester, even though I impressed on her how important it was to me... if I get the NSEP scholarship, it will pretty much pay for my entire study abroad trip to Japan (if I get in).

Well, so the truth finally came out today... she asked me to stay a bit after class, and she wanted to know what my study methods were. I clammed up immediately. I thought I couldn't possibly tell her that I always do the homework the day that it's due, and I rarely have dialogues memorized until a few hours before we perform. I only try to do the listening comprehension days before class, and last week proved that I didn't even need to do that, because I managed to finish it in under an hour at the library.

She said she noticed how my binder is all highlighted and filled with notes, and I take notes. She said that I always have the answer when she asks questions, and I always get my dialogues and response drills correct. I was standing there in shock -flattered, but unsure of where this was going. I was under the impression that she'd found me out about my procrastinating-but-somehow-still-performing ways. I'd even been having troubles keeping up; 102 is significantly harder than 101, but I'm slowly remembering things from my high school Japanese days. I'm hoping that my translations of Gospel of Truth will help me get even better.

What it boiled down to was that she wants to encourage everyone else to study like me (uh-oh), and even though I "neglected" to mention the last-minute aspect that strangely works for me, she liked how I highlighted portions, wrote the answers down for the response drills, regardless of how many possibilities there are, and how I find the pattern in each of our drills. I also read the grammar patterns, in case I get confused during a situational drill or listening comprehension set, and I romanize all the vocabulary so I'm always sure of how to pronounce something and what it means. I've stopped trying to romanize everything in the listening and situational drills, or the questions in the reading and writing, but I'm always trying to speed up my reading of the kana.

And she wants me to stop participating so eagerly in class. Specifically, she said she wants me (and herself, of course) to be more "patient" with everyone else. She notices that if I volunteer the answers too readily, other people don't seem motivated to answer-- even when she singles people out, or asks the entire class to answer something loudly. She started asking everyone to write their answers for practice and dialogues, and to write their partner's name as well, so she knows everyone worked together, talked, rehearsed, etc.

I didn't even think I *was* participating eagerly -I have my troubles too, even if much of this is familiar to me. But we are starting on informal speech and more complex patterns than I ever learned in high school Japanese, especially considering I chickened out in my junior year of HS and essentially bombed in all my classes. I won't let that happen here, but if Takase-sensei's 'speech' is any indication, it won't happen.

I'm halfway between disappointed and pleased-- I'm glad she thinks I'm such a good student that's doing so well, and willing to help others, but I'm sad that I won't get called on, and will in fact be encouraged NOT to volunteer info. I don't think I was ever doing it excessively anyway, or interupting people when it was their turn, or helping them when someone didn't want me to. If I had been, I wouldn't have thought I was being singled out. My class isn't a "raise your hand to speak" class anyway; she just calls on people by name, and they have to be ready to answer. I was getting upset because she never seemed to call on me, or even look in my direction.

So... that's it.

And today we got our papers/stories back in Journalism. Today was a miracle day in that I felt like I got little sleep, but I'm still awake, not feeling all that tired, and I managed to get EVERYTHING done before it was due. I was a little late to Geography, but considering we were watching "Cadillac Desert" (on William Mulholland and the LA River) rather than getting lectured, it wasn't a horrible deal. I always seem to be late on "shower day." I insist on eating a good breakfast when it's manageable (manageable is 10 minutes or more before I have to leave), so often other things make me late.

In any case, I wasn't expecting a lot out of my article, because I can honestly say I could have tried harder. Once-a-week classes ask for procrastination, because there's not enough regular motivation to get things done. On the flip side, everything has a heavier weight, because you have "all this time" to get things done. Except, I'm a full-time student with 4 other classes and work. It was also a difficult assignment, with a difficult teacher, at the beginning of the semester-- in what was a very difficult time for me, worrying about Japan applications, scholarships, and everything else.

It's slowed down a bit, and it's true that our upcoming personal essay might be easier ('might' is the keyword), but... a C+?

Hm. I guess it's okay. I don't want to be one of those students who whines about something that's average or acceptable. I wouldn't have expected an A. A B- might have been nice, but you can't win them all. I genuinely DID B.S. a lot of the story; I researched where I should have reported, and I'm not proud of the fact. But I don't want to get USED to being okay with C+s, though.