Thursday February 5

Today was a good day.

I love my LDS Institute class--Book of Mormon 2. We talked about Ether 3 and the inherent dilemma and how to wrap our heads around it. I love classes where I actually learn something. I didn't ever really want to take a BOM class because I feel like we hear about it all the time, but this is different. I will be taking classes from Brother Patty till I die.

I love my Victorian Literature class (which is really called Period Studies and is based on the professor's expertise, so I'll just call it by what we're studying). I love Dr. McCuskey's engaging lectures and half-serious jokes and half-joking deep thoughts. I even love how he knows my name and usually I prefer to hide somewhere in the middle of the classpeople. I raised my hand today to voice an idea about the topic we're writing our paper on (due in two weeks--aah!) and he held his head with one hand and said, "I'm not holding my head because I'm disappointed--I'm holding it trying to keep the top of my head from coming off." Apparently it was a great idea and he liked it. Yay for voicing comments!! Plus we had a great discussion of possible interpretations of the topic question, and a great discussion of science and religion in Tennyson's "The Kraken". We didn't get to "In Memoriam A.H.H." which is 20 pages long, but we'll talk about that on Tuesday I suppose.

I love my Poetry Writing class--but just for today because WE DIDN'T HAVE CLASS!!!!!! I feel bad that Shanan's grandfather died (she was gone for his funeral) but all I had to do was hand in my assignment to the appropriate person. I got to spend an hour and fifteen minutes talking to my friend Mikey, who's also in my Advanced Fiction Writing class. He is an amazing person, we have a lot in common, and I'm really excited that I'm getting to know more people this semester than I ever have before since leaving home.

So my homework poem for last night was strangely surreal but I just remembered that it was in my notebook, which I had to turn in today, so I can't reproduce it here. Bummer. Here's one that I really like though, written as homework earlier this week:

The Desk

The dull scratched wood had fueled a decade of creativity and academia—
Favorite pens had carved owners’ names on the side
by the wall

Blunt scissors, yellowed paper, bent staples,
and dried-out markers filled
it like dead coals

The sparks of genius once fanned had long since gone out—
In the world they were extinguished
by other flames

And the desk had been smothered—
shoved into an icy corner—
left dark and cold

Let me know what you think.

I also actually enjoyed my Sci/Tech class today. I didn't have a lot of fun actually participating in the debate with my group but listening to debates about human and animal cloning and adult and embryotic stem cell research was tons more interesting than listening to a presentation on one of those topics. My group presents next on Tuesday--blaahh--on technologies of modern society or some broad topic like that. So I'm researching cell phones and teleconferencing/skype stuff. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPzeCcoXZjA&NR=1 is a really funny video about the hands-free while driving law recently passed in California (why does everyone care that it's in California? several other states have passed similar laws). Another funny one is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLCY9eBa5r0&feature=related . If you hurry you can vote for which one you think should be in my mini presentation. Just comment below!

(if someone figures out how to put the actual Youtube video on my blog so you can just hit "play" instead of opening up a new window, would they please let me know so that at some totally random time in the future I can make this easier for my unnumbered readers)