Tales of a Meh Girl

My British Literature class was interesting. We're going through The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Marlowe, which is fun--not because it's new, but because the people in my class provide a refreshingly modern take on it.

I'll give you an example. This one guy started off class by saying, "Yeah, I was really pulling for him."

He sold his soul to the devil--but this guy was pulling for him!

"You had no idea which way it was going to go," he continued.

A hint: any story that starts out with the main character declaring he wants to be better than God? Is not going to end well.

Anyway, later my teacher was asking us about the time period, and what aspects of the Renaissance and Reformation show up in the play, and whether Marlowe was a closet Catholic and such. Anyway, my teacher was talking about Calvinism. The thing is, I'm a Calvinist and people tend to have some really wonky ideas about Calvinism and they're not afraid to share because most everyone thinks it went the way of the Puritans.

"So you have this idea of predestination, which is a problem, because you have people like the Puritans. If you're saved, then you wonder, 'Well, am I doing enough? Am I being holy?' so you're nervous. Or you're not saved, so you wonder, 'Am I not saved? What if I can't be saved, what if I'm doomed to hell?' and you're really nervous. So basically our country was founded by some very nervous, depressed people."

Which is scarily accurate.

My TA is so adorkable. He showed up to class today with his orange plaid shirt, then proceeded to cover up with a black sweater with a camouflage pattern of teal, red, and an olive yellow.

When writing on the board, he wrote "eqt" for "equation" and "chng" for "change".

"I try not to write the--ah, what is the word? A, I, E?"

"Vowels?" someone in the front row suggested.

"Yes!" he said triumphantly. "Wowels."

It's oddly endearing.

Though he insists on eschewing equations in favor of long, complicated steps that no one understands (I am perfectly okay doing things by rote, thank you very much), I feel a strange affection for him.

Yes, he's hard to understand. No, he doesn't know what a vertex of a quadratic graph is. Yes, he wears awful sweaters.

But dammit, he's my TA!

In other news, in BritLit today, we watched a clip from Monty Python's Meaning of Life and I managed to think the right answer to a question for ten minutes and not open my mouth because I was scared I would get it wrong. Way to go me.

My schedule is the following thus far and hopefully from now on.

Mondays:

9:00-10:00 "Gods and the Good Life" - Sociology class taught by Michael, the doctoral candidate with "two very cute kids", according to him. Laid back, smallish class, filled with annoying frosh. We spent the first day listing words about what "health", "well-being", and "religion" meant to us before I blinked and went, "Wait. This is just Maslow's hierarchy of needs," and promptly stopped paying attention.

10:00-11:00 "Differential Calculus" - Hell in an auditorium. As you might have noticed, not a lot of time to get from my first class to this one, so by the time I got there, it was filled in front. Seriously, who sits in the front of the class? Everyone knows you filter in, sit in the middle-ish backish and hope someone tall doesn't sit in front of you. I couldn't see the board at all.

Tuesdays:

8:00-9:30 "British Literature" - Also taught by a doctoral candidate, this one named Paul. I actually went to this class, with about ten classmates, freaked because I realized that I really don't like British literature that much, snatched up a chance to switch to American literature, went to the American literature class immediately after going to this one, ended up in an auditorium with about 300 other people and read a syllabus entirely composed of poems. Freaked again and pressed refresh obsessively and now I'm back in the exact same class I started out in. Jane Austen, anyone?

5:00-6:00 "Differential Calculus" - Discussion group. Ick. 6:00 at night.

Wednesdays:

Wash, rinse, repeat with Monday's.

Thursdays:

Ditto with Tuesdays.

Fridays:

Same as Monday and Wednesday.


The astute among you might have noticed, "Hark! She's only taking 10 hours this semester!" You want to know why? Because I received a bill for ten hours that was $828.

"My, that's cheap!" said I. "I shall pay the entire sum now!"

My loan still hasn't come through, so I really can't afford to pay actual tuition, so I had to drop my psychology class but still got a bill saying that I owe $2000 more for tuition, even after paying the $828. I can't win for losing, apparently.

So that's it! Screaming, crying, and railing against God and humanity to follow.