The Rabenstranger

It’s the season for midterms and school has been providing me with lots of assignments to procrastinate on.

I just got back my paper and my midterm exam from my Chinese History class. I’ve been a bit worried about them because I was unsure how harshly the teacher would be grading and because we’ve covered a huge amount of material in class and I haven’t been able to memorize it all.

Thankfully when I received my results they were much better than I expected. I got an A on my paper and 104 out of 100 possible points on the exam meaning that if all goes well for the rest of the semester (and it should) I’ll only have to get a 76 on the final to get an A in the class. While I don’t expect to score that low, it’s comforting to know I’ve got a head start.

I also turned in my first draft for my second Women in Literature Essay and received almost unanimously positive feedback. Part of that I’m sure is the reluctance of my Japanese classmates to criticize. The teacher has the draft now and I’ll know on Tuesday what she thinks.

Midterm craziness will continue next week. I’ve got exams in Gender and Antiquity and History of Modern Business, a short paper due in Political Science, Journals and the final draft of my essay due in Women in Literature, and a quiz on Thursday in International Monetary Economics. That’s just the stuff I can recall right now; I’m sure there’s more.

My economics capstone paper is also nearing its deadline. While the final submission date isn’t until the eigth of November, the first draft is due on Tuesday and I’m scrambling to get traction on it. It’s become one of those big ominious projects that feels impossible to start. So far my attempts to work on it have mostly disolved into distraction and procrastination. That will change now that I have a deadline coming up. As Johnson once said, “The gallows doth wonderfully concentrate the mind.”

I can’t wait to be done. As of today it is 50 days until I fly home.