First Days of School Review

[sincere]

gatafairy came over yesterday and we had dinner~~ Yay for meeting people. We spent the evening telling her horror stories about elevators and fire alarms, so naturally, the gods of vengeance were watching us and laughing, and that night at 3:30am we had a fire alarm and had to vacate the tower for over an hour, with me only in a nightshirt. I think Brian's pissed at us because we woke him up so we could huddle in his suite room, but fortunately, George was apparently more than a little drunk and thought it was great -- if mildly terrifying -- that he should head out to take a late-night piss and find the four of us in pajamas huddling out in the common room, so we hid from Brian in his room.

Yeah, yeah, we know. Thanks God.


MWF
10:25-11:15 ...... Literature of the Early Renaissance, English period course credit
Taught by a frizzy pink-haired woman who should be the next side character on Will and Grace. The class requires lots of reading and 2-3 page journal entries about each reading, every day, and although it only had one book, I wasn't looking forward to the journals for some reason, and nobody in the reading compelled me. I was taking it with Val, but she's not taking it. Dropped.

11:25-12:15 ...... Planet Earth, natural science gen ed
Taught by a VERY EXCITED man who is PROUD to be a dork. He also loves border collies, and thinks they are smarter than we are, which is probably true. Three exams, lecture, no big deal... He claims to take attendance, but he has not done so yet, and there are at least 200 people in that class. He seems like he'll be able to keep my attention, so I'll actually take notes and do not badly in that class. I'm in it with Val; we're splitting the price of the $80 textbook.

4:15-5:35 ...... Study of an American Author: Walt Whitman, English author course credit (MW only)
Taught by the gayest gay man who ever gayed, and he's also the stereotype artiste, with his all-black clothes and his black hair and his little black triangular lip-goatee and his little emo glasses and his little cup of Ritazza coffee. Mostly seems to be reading and analysis, with some emphasis on Whitman as a democrat and/or gay dude. The professor is okay with eating in class as long as you don't make a lot of noise with crinkling or chewing or the like, because, "If you disturb me, I will throw a hissy fit, or roll my eyes, and someone will say 'You're scary,' and, so, whatever." I'm in it with Alicia and Jess, and we're splitting the cost of the SIX books he wants us to buy.

TTh
11:45-12:05 ...... The Jew Course because I have no idea what its name actually is, something long and complicated, European region gen ed
Taught by a very stereotypical Jewish professor type, the man is practically Ben Stein, except his voice isn't nasal enough to grate, it just puts you to sleep. A very boring history course such that I thought I was going to stab myself in the eye on the first day. Two books, nobody else in it but me. Dropped. Replaced with...

11:45-12:05 ...... World War II: the Japanese view, Japanese elective credit
Taught by Fessler, the woman who more or less owns the Japanese department. I've been in her classes before; she gives the occasional really stupidly easy quiz to see if you're paying attention -- all multiple-choice, all very obvious answers if you've actually read the assignments -- and only one exam, the midterm. The final is the paper, which is an annotated bibliography, and believe me, an annotated bibliography is far superior to an actual paper. I haven't been to this class yet, but I'm in it with Jess, and we're sharing the book.

12:15-2:35 ...... Introduction to Logic, mathematics gen ed
Taught by Arnold Schwazenegger Klaus Laedensetter, a very large and scary Austrian man with a pronounced accent who earnestly believes (although this is not the case) that he speaks loud enough that people in the back of the lecture hall can hear him. He doesn't know how to operate the machinery in the room, and he assures us we will spend six to eight hours on one homework assignment. I very politely laugh in his face. Taking the course with Val; one textbook.

So I won't have to go in before 11am, and none of my courses really run too late. (The hours between Planet Earth and Whitman make me feel better about the fact that the latter doesn't end until 5:30.) Good deal.

Except for the fire alarms.

Star Ocean 3 is sitting in Crossgates, waiting for me...