Days left: 63

Now that we've hit the 60s mark, meaning there are just about two months between now and graduation, it's starting to feel real. Two months can pass exceptionally quickly, especially if one is consumed by senior projects and other things.

In any case, I'm glad that I finished the first stage of testing for my senior project. If I didn't stay over campus and run people, I would be even more behind than I am.

So to analyze what my progress was like over break:

1. Submit applications to jobs and internships
2. Have an outline of senior paper by the end of break

2a. preliminary literature review

2b. run 15 subjects
3. Finish a rough draft of my directed research paper
4. Feel prepared for my programming midterm
5. Make serious headway on programming pset 6
6. Work out every day as if it were a class (reward is watching the last episode of Coffee Prince!)
7. Feel like I've made it to beginner status on the guitar
8. Read article, Frederick
9. Read chapters 71-80 of SOTS
10. Write up bibliography of 5-6 books or sources/text for SOTS paper
11. Read Furth, Blood, Body, and Gender

Interestingly, the things that I didn't get to were the things that are more long-term projects. Perhaps this has to do with the stressfulness of long-term, large projects? I realize that for such large projects, they seem like they loom over you especially if you think of them as One Large Monstrosity. It's beginning, taking the first step, that's daunting. Maybe it will be helpful if I break them down into piece-wise steps. I think it would feel much better.

Days left: 66

Writing from Bethesda, MD, about 10 mi outside of D.C. Thankfully the weather was quite nice today and should be tomorrow as well. And the surrounding downtown area is really nice--a shopping center nearby and lots of businesses and restaurants. Should be a pretty convenient place to live, and you can do so without a car which is great.

Days left: 76

So how did I do today in terms of things I wanted to get done?

Days left: 80

Today is the start of Spring Break. After wishing-washing for nearly four months or so, I have finally decided that it would be in my best interest to use the event sounds project I was put on by Brent. Sadly, there's nothing time-perception related about it, but perhaps that's fine, given the short time frame I have left. If I just work on it and write it up, I can't see how I won't pass and do fine on my senior project. But it's sad because I wanted to do a really good job...must work hard, clearly.

Goals for spring break:
1. Submit 10 applications a week for jobs or applications
2. Have a preliminary draft of my senior project by the end of break
3. Feel prepared for my programming midterm
4. Feel like I've made it to beginner status on the guitar

It's sunny outside and glorious, but I've been feeling tired. Clearly I've been watching too much Coffee Prince and need to not go to bed at 6am.

But it's so hard to say no to such adorableness!

Days left: 82

I'm looking forward to Spring Break: peace and some relaxation. Although, I really shouldn't be complaining since I very intentionally created a relaxing, low-key last semester for myself course-wise. Either way, the quiet and a chance to do what I want whenever I want is appealing. (One thing: must remember to take a loaf of bread from the dining hall one of these days, and get some peanut butter from Durfees).

Just recovered for an awful awful flu this weekend. It hit me hard starting Saturday night, and by Sunday I was useless. By Monday, I was so incredibly woozy (still am today, in fact), but I forced myself to go to Programming at 11:35, which is ironic because all those days that I wasn't sick I sicked several classes in a row, and now that I am sick and have a very valid reason not to go, I go. Well, I never said I was a rational person, right?

Kitten with (empty) tissue box bc of snuffles

By that night, I was really regretting my decision, and my fever of over 100 degrees was simply not reducing. All I could think about was how in Laura Ingall Wilder's books, Little House on the Prairie, her older sister, Mary I think her name is, loses her sight because of a really high fever. And then that got me thinking about how for that to happen, the fever must have denatured the proteins in the eyes, or maybe the synaptic connections, and all that got me really depressed, because the Tylenol sure wasn't working and my fever was still really high, and even in this day and age, if your fever doesn't go down, flu can still due you in.

Apparently, all semblance of rationality and all kinds of melodrama emerges when your head is overheated past the boiling point of water.

Luckily, by Tuesday morning, thanks to my immune system and the generous company of P. on the preceding few days, I was feeling much better and not like I was going to melt in my own skin into a heap of denatured proteins. Unfortunately, my pset for programming was due at 9:55pm (random time, seriously) and I had been too sick the last few days to have been working on it or even think about going to any of the office hours. Somehow I cranked through it, and churned out a passable version, though not without the details smoothed out as I usually did, only to get an email from Professor Yang after the 9:55 deadline saying that they were extending the deadline. Wish they had let us know sooner, but I guess this way I was incentivized to be further along than I otherwise would have been?

In any case, still have a bit of a fever, but incredibly glad to be feeling better, and looking forward to the break. Would really love to go somewhere, but where?

EDIT: Also, not just me, but apparently a large number of the Seat Yourself cast came down with flu, thanks to Max. WHAT!