Swamped

This past week has been brutal at school. I had to do an annotated bibliography for Humanities that involved TWELVE SOURCES and between a half page and a page of summary for each entry. On top of that, I've had to read two short stories for American Lit, and do Math homework and Statistics homework. This weekend I have a five page Literature paper to write, Math homework, a Statistics quiz to study for, and I still have two short papers for Humanities that I need to write that were due weeks ago!

The coming week doesn't seem like it will let up much, either. Besides the Statistics quiz, I have an Excel project and quiz for Math, I need to prepare a five minute PowerPoint presentation for Lit class, and I may have jury duty Wednesday, which will just throw everything out of whack. I wouldn't have minded jury duty so much had it come over the summer when I wasn't really busy. But during a semester when I'm struggling to make straight A's, and falling slightly short in a couple classes, it just comes as a bothersome and unnecessary distraction.

I am still hoping to get accepted to State soon, but because it is still hanging in the air whether or not my GPA will be sufficient, I am needing to register soon for another semester at Wake Tech, just in case. I have enough credits for an Associates Degree, or I will after this semester, so I am really out of classes that I want or need. I may sign up for a couple Psychology classes, but beyond that I have no clue what to take.

Seeing as I've been a little overwhelmed lately with school -- I'm not used to actually doing work -- I am a little concerned with how I will manage to cope at State when the classes are harder and the professor-to-student ratio is considerably lower. And the cost of school will be higher at State, which means financial aid won't extend as far. Unless my stocks begin to pay off quick, I may be forced to get a job, which will only push my education goals further from my reach.

Right now isn't a good time to look for a girlfriend. At the moment I don't have the time or the money to devote to dating. But lately I've been feeling a little isolated and it would be nice to fill the loneliness. As a result, I've been thinking about Ex again as a sort of self-medication. She has become my latest imaginary girlfriend, filling a space held by so many other girls before her.

Is it bad that I often seem to be walking the fine line between sanity and delusion?

Have fun and keep living life... or some approximation thereof.

The Masks of Halloween Approach

I've never been one for dressing in costumes for Halloween. It probably wouldn't come as a surprise that I only recall trick or treating maybe four times as a kid. Unless I am in a play, in which case my job is to get into character as best I can, I just don't feel comfortable pretending to be something I am not.

Maybe if I attended more Halloween/costume parties I would feel differently, but then it could be a chicken or egg argument. It perplexes me as to how people choose the costumes they decide to wear. Apparently, alot of people keep an abundance of otherwise superfluous clothing in their homes for the sole purpose of assembling a costume once a year! I barely have enough clothing to keep myself covered for a week. And I wear that clothing until it's ragged and not even worthy for costume making.

This is probably a sexist observation, but it also seems as though women are more into dressing up for Halloween than men. I wonder if it has something to do with societal norms pushing women into a wider variety of roles in their daily lives. Women, after all, are expected to be mothers, businesswomen, therapists, chefs, and dirty whores on any given day! Men are only expected to be... present. I think it is no small leap that women are consequently better at dressing up for Halloween.

There is a little bit of irony to my lack of interest in wearing a costume when you consider that most of my life has been spent wishing I was someone or something else. Throughout my life I have, at various times, wished I were a woman, a time traveller, a teacher, a newspaper reporter, a radio DJ (at least I got around to doing that one for a little while!), a film director, an author, a wealthy entrepreneur, a restaurant owner, completely Caucasian, a cat, a penguin, a painter, a dance instructor, President of the United States, and God. I suppose I could cull together a costume related to some of those, but most would be hard for other people to decipher, and it seems that part of the point of the costumes is that they are immediately recognizable.

Most of the time people just dress in archetypes. The typical costumes seem to be monsters (vampires, zombies), movie characters (Harry Potter, Obi-Wan Kenobi), Super Heroes (Superman, Wonder Woman), or famous people in the news (Britney Spears, Sarah Palin). The problem with all of these is you need imagination and skill with makeup, or money for a pre-made, probably ill-fitting, outfit.

Now that I think of it, there is one component to the phenomenon of dressing up that probably compels people more than all others, and somehow makes the time/expense seem worth it. The sense of escapism, even for a brief time, is a thrill with which people have always had a preoccupation. There is probably something of great intrinsic value which comes from shedding the bonds of reality and dressing up as a naughty nurse or Captain Kirk if only for one night. As soon as I can figure out how to dress up as God, I'll work on discovering what that something is, exactly.

Have fun and keep living life... or some approximation thereof.