The night before Christmas....
I'm spending all by myself. Which is really okay. I've had The Boy all week, and we've spent the past few days blowing stuff up on the Xbox 360. The Girl has spent a good part of that time hanging out with us. We've had roast turkey and ham to munch on. No work or school. The show's over with. A good few days indeed. This night alone is quite nice, actually.
Tomorrow I'll spend a few hours at Ian and his mom's, and on Saturday the whole family gets together, because one of my brothers (along with his wife and two kids) won't be in town until then. And strangely enough, I'm looking forward to it. I seem to be mellowing in my old age.
The semester was... interesting. I got an A in my Arabic class, but it was a a hard A, and I won't be taking the second course. That means I'll need to take an intro class to another language, and I've decided on French. It fits better with my two majors, English and Theatre. Shitloads of literature and plays in French, and practically none in Arabic. Add to that the crossover of similar words between French and English, and it's no contest. The Arabic course was a noble experiment, but in the end, of no real use to me in the long run.
The geometry class REALLY took me by surprise. I got out of it with a B, which blew my mind because I was expecting a C. I scored pretty high on the final, though, which kicked it up a letter grade. It was an interesting class, and I have to say I learned a lot from it, which is something I could never say about any other math class I've ever taken. The teacher was pretty fucking awesome, though, which made it bearable. There have been some English and Lit classes I've taken which I can't say the same about.
The show at UIW was pretty memorable. It was better than a lot of other theatre productions I've done (which again, isn't saying a lot), and the cast kicked ass. A good group of kids, all of whom really stretched as performers. The cast party was a blast, and everyone embraced Kelli, which warmed my heart immeasurably. It wasn't that hard for them to do, though, as she's such a wonderful person - a charmer, damn good-looking, mingles easily, and hasn't embarrassed me once. I got lucky with this one - finally.
Got accepted in to the McNair Scholars program, which means I'm targeted to attend a graduate program in three semesters. I don't think I have a choice, really. I need to go for it now, while I have the youth, energy and impetus to pull it off. It would also be a good example for the boy, to see his dad with a doctorate when he's starting out on his academic career.
I wrote a one-act for one of my classes this semester, which had to be performed for the whole department at the end of the term. Seems it was the talk of the faculty, enough so that there's discussion of starting a new component to the theatre program, a playwrighting workshop. The instructor of the class I wrote it for also wants to submit it to the Samuel French One Act Festival, which is cool but not an entirely new thing to me. The theatre in NYC did the same with "Bones" a couple of years ago, and nothing came of it. I'm not getting my hopes up. Still, it's nice to know they think so highly of my work.
Everything is good. Very good. I shan't complain, not at all.
Merry Christmas, everyone.
Tomorrow I'll spend a few hours at Ian and his mom's, and on Saturday the whole family gets together, because one of my brothers (along with his wife and two kids) won't be in town until then. And strangely enough, I'm looking forward to it. I seem to be mellowing in my old age.
The semester was... interesting. I got an A in my Arabic class, but it was a a hard A, and I won't be taking the second course. That means I'll need to take an intro class to another language, and I've decided on French. It fits better with my two majors, English and Theatre. Shitloads of literature and plays in French, and practically none in Arabic. Add to that the crossover of similar words between French and English, and it's no contest. The Arabic course was a noble experiment, but in the end, of no real use to me in the long run.
The geometry class REALLY took me by surprise. I got out of it with a B, which blew my mind because I was expecting a C. I scored pretty high on the final, though, which kicked it up a letter grade. It was an interesting class, and I have to say I learned a lot from it, which is something I could never say about any other math class I've ever taken. The teacher was pretty fucking awesome, though, which made it bearable. There have been some English and Lit classes I've taken which I can't say the same about.
The show at UIW was pretty memorable. It was better than a lot of other theatre productions I've done (which again, isn't saying a lot), and the cast kicked ass. A good group of kids, all of whom really stretched as performers. The cast party was a blast, and everyone embraced Kelli, which warmed my heart immeasurably. It wasn't that hard for them to do, though, as she's such a wonderful person - a charmer, damn good-looking, mingles easily, and hasn't embarrassed me once. I got lucky with this one - finally.
Got accepted in to the McNair Scholars program, which means I'm targeted to attend a graduate program in three semesters. I don't think I have a choice, really. I need to go for it now, while I have the youth, energy and impetus to pull it off. It would also be a good example for the boy, to see his dad with a doctorate when he's starting out on his academic career.
I wrote a one-act for one of my classes this semester, which had to be performed for the whole department at the end of the term. Seems it was the talk of the faculty, enough so that there's discussion of starting a new component to the theatre program, a playwrighting workshop. The instructor of the class I wrote it for also wants to submit it to the Samuel French One Act Festival, which is cool but not an entirely new thing to me. The theatre in NYC did the same with "Bones" a couple of years ago, and nothing came of it. I'm not getting my hopes up. Still, it's nice to know they think so highly of my work.
Everything is good. Very good. I shan't complain, not at all.
Merry Christmas, everyone.