Another Semester

It's weird, switching from a 40-hour work week in the summer to a much less consistant week when the semester starts. Now my days are organized seemingly at random, starting anywhere between 7:30 and 11:00 and ending anywhere from 3:40 to 8:00. In a way, I have more time to do things, but I also have more to do. It always takes me a while to readjust. Usually I'm used to it right around the end of the semester, when I switch back to working full-time.

I managed to add another semester to my time here at UW-L, pushing my graduation date back from December 2010 to Spring 2011. I [semi-impulsively] decided to take Japanese as my foreign language instead of Spanish, which means I have to start at the 101 level rather than 102, hence the extra semester. But it's been worthwhile so far. The atmosphere of the class is very different--there were 25-30 students in my Spanish class, but most of them were taking it just to fill a language requirement. There are 10 in my Japanese class (20 if you count the River Falls students, as this is a distance learning class) but all of them are in it because they genuinely had an interest in learning Japanese. It becomes a much greater experience when your classmates are actually there to learn, as anyone who has ever taken a required 100-level class can surely attest to.

Now that I'm heading into my fifth year (it's surreal that I've spent more time here than at high school) I feel pretty confident in noticing patterns. The way the freshman take notes religiously the first few weeks, before realizing they don't need to hang on every word. The way groups gather at the clock tower to promote their causes because everyone (especially now, with the construction on campus) passes through there at some point. And more personally, the way I always start the semester with a burst of optimistic motivation that usually falters somewhere around the third week (this is usually when I start posting to this blog again, until the motivation expires).

But I've got a good set of classes this year, and since finally settling in with my English major I've had a much easier time staying focused academically, so I feel pretty good about the coming year. I should be able to ask at least basic questions when we go to Japan next year, and my Creative Writing class will force me to get in gear and write constantly. In short, good times approach.

My summer project, By Riverside, went pretty well until August, at which point time constraints took over and it sort of died. I'm a little disappointed that I didn't do more with it, but it was worthwhile--any web projects I start in the future (and there are ideas already) will be much easier to start now that I know the drill. And I haven't completely killed it off just yet--I hope to keep it alive if only on a once-a-month-or-so basis to comment on local interests and activities--as soon as I actually go do something of interest.

Yesterday I read a quote that said something along the lines of "I don't know what I'm thinking until I say it," and that's pretty much what the point of this post was. I've got some time to kill before my creative writing class and a nice, quiet courtyard all to myself (in the middle of a crowded building, strangely enough) and it seemed like a nice time to write something. We're supposed to write daily for class; who knows? I might just do it this year.