My accounting teacher - the rather frumpy one that reminds me of Dolores Umbridge - is not a very good teacher. She uses the powerpoint slides provided by the textbook's publisher in her lectures, which is fine, but she doesn't really use them. Sometimes she'll speed through the slides so fast you can't write any of the definitions down - but she quizzes you on the same definitions later. Other times she'll being doing a demonstration problem on the whiteboard when she'll veer off and do all these extra calculations to determine things not required in the problem. For example, the problem might ask what the variable costs per unit is for a certain sales number, but she'll also work the numbers to see what would happen if we increased sales ten percent, or if we started manufacturing a second line of sweaters, or all these other funny details not called for in the original problem. It gets really confusing.

She also seems to have a set number of questions we need to ask her - if we aren't asking questions, we weren't paying enough attention. A few days ago she went off on a little rant that we should be paying attention because she's the "interpreter" of the book. We could just read the textbook, she conceded, but we couldn't understand it without her help so we ought to pay attention to her. But when you do ask a question, she doesn't answer it very well, either pointing at where she's done math on the board and telling you to look there, or referring you to the textbook anyway!

Also, if you're ever late she gives you the stink eye, and continues to glare at you for the rest of the quarter. Seriously. Whenever she looks into my back corner, she looks so angry, like she can't believe I have the audacity to come to class...and that's when I'm on time.

I'm really stumped on one of the chapters - Process Cost Accountings makes absolutely no sense to me. I'm hoping to ask accounting teacher from the summer for help, but I don't know if I'll be able to find him before the next accounting midterm. :-/ At this rate, though, I'm seriously thinking that my best helper will be Dr. Wikipedia. Again.

OK, I know that those of you who live in snowier climes are probably rolling your eyes as I say this, but school was canceled today due to the rain.
I'm very excited. I had a Statistics midterm today, and now I have a whole extra day to Not Study for it!!!

It's utterly wussy not to have class because of rain. I freely admit it. But the power's out and everything in our classrooms now revolves around technology, so if I went out to campus I'd just be sitting on my bum, in the dark, staring at the teacher struggling to demonstrate problems without the aid of powerpoint and projectors. It'd be tragic, so I will kindly spare my teachers the trauma.

So do I buckle down and get caught up on my studies, or spend a restful day off vegging? Decisions, decisions...

Today was Club Day at DeAnza. All the little student organizations and associations get a table at the center of campus and try to recruit members to their group for Christians, Atheists, Chinese, Rock Climbers, etc. Seeing the tables always bums me out a little. I'd love to join one of the groups and be able to play board games during my breaks (yes, there's an International Board Game club) or go on weekend excursions to Yosemite with the Outdoor Club, but where's my time to do this stuff? When I'm not in class, I'm eitehr studying my books or working at one of my jobs. I don't have time to see the friends I already have; is there any point to fostering new relationships I'll never be able to maintain?

Oh well. What else did I do today besides spend ten minutes wallowing in self-pity because I am antisocial? I had a midterm in Archaeology. I think I did very well. I was in and out like lightning, bam bam! 40 questions. Completed in ten minutes. That's what, fifteen seconds a question? It was an open-note exam, but I didn't even need the notebook. I cracked it open once or twice just to double-check an answer, but it was just confirmation. It was a ridiculously easy exam. Heck, I even spotted an error the teacher had made when he set up one of the questions. I rock.

My Accounting midterm from last Tuesday? That one didn't go so well. I got a 74%, which given I had missed at least four class sessions in two weeks is not bad. I mean, not awesome, but passing, which was all I expected. But the teacher grades on a curve, and our class performed so poorly she decided to add ten extra points to every exam. My score went shooting upwards 20% to a comfortable 94%. What's that, an A? Sweet! Of course, the bitch of getting an A is that you have to maintain it, but I'm happy, of course.

Next Tuesday is my next midterm, this time in Statistics. Fun!

One year ago, I fully intended to be at San Jose State University today. I thought I'd be taking the bus downtown every morning, eagerly soaking up knowledge at a 'real' college. I'd have finally moved forward with my life.

Well, a big HA-HA to that. The California budget cuts ripped that goal to shreds, as SJSU closed Fall 2009 admissions early and then refused to even consider taking applications for Spring 2010. So it's September 21st, 2009, and instead of being a month into the semester at SJSU I'm starting a new quarter at DeAnza.

Although I'm not where I wanted to be, I can't complain. My schedule looks pretty good based on what I experienced today.

My first class of the morning is Intro to Archaeology and it is being taught by a Disney Animatronic. The teacher, a highly experienced archeologist who has done excavations all over Santa Clara Valley, is great. I mean, he's entertaining. He speaks clearly and loudly - always a huge bonus in a teacher. But I swear he copied his gestures and facial tics from one of Disney's robots; possibly, the auctioneer on Pirates of the Caribbean. His head swivels, he blinks, his arms move and I think it's just his way of being a dynamic speaker (and don't get me wrong, he is quite good) but all I can think is "Hello, Disney? One of your Haunted Mansion ghosts escaped!" My day is off to a very strong start with this guy, though, whom I shall call Indiana Jones in my journal thanks to Jeannie.

After him, my schedule sags for a couple of hours. My accounting teacher is OK, but she's not who I wanted to take the class from. When I signed up for Managerial Accounting it was taught by Kwak, a teacher I had back in the Spring 2009. I liked his class because I got an A+ even though I only showed up to about half the classes, because almost every assignment is done through the computer. I also liked him because even though the class met five days a week, M-F, Kwak never made us come to school on Friday. That was awesome. But last Friday - the weekend before school started - the accounting classes were all switched around and now Kwak isn't teaching a section of this class, so I have to take it from this lady. DANG IT! I don't think I'll be able to attend the Friday classes, since I work at RHA that day, and I had planned to use my lunch break for my next class, Statistics.

But before I go to Stats, I have an hour break. I went and bought coffee because I was practically falling asleep in Accounting, grabbed a muffin and settled into a shady spot to read.

Statistics is the class I'm most worried about. The teacher for the class was poorly rated on RateMyProfessors.com, but the only Stats teacher ranked highly had his section completely filled up before I had a chance to register. This teacher had two things going for him:
1/ No accent
2/ No homework
so I went with his class. But I've dropped Stats before because it was so incomprehensible, so I'm really, really going to have to apply myself this time around.

Another hour break. I went back to my car to take a nap, but that failed because someone's car alarm went off. But let me take this opportunity to say that I have NEVER seen DeAnza so crowded in all the years I've been going there. Parking's a nightmare; some people were reporting they spent between thirty minutes and an hour trying to find a spot. The sheer mass of people milling around between classes is like fighting your way through the mall on the weekend before Christmas. The news said there was something like 8,000 people trying to add classes; I don't know if that means there were 8,000 people on waitlists who may have other classes or if there were 8,000 people just trying to add something so they can be in school. Either way, it's horrible.

After this break it's time for Art History: Post-Impressionism through Today with a teacher I'm going to call Giles because yes, he is just like Buffy's Watcher. British, bookish, dry humor, and round wire glasses. He seems to be extremely, utterly opposed to cell phones, complaining that whenever we use them we're giving our money away to The Man. He claims that art history is one of the best degrees you can get, because in order to understand art you must have a thoroughly rounded education. You must understand history, philosophy, religion, economics, politics, etc. etc. etc. Oh, and if he had control over these matters he'd make sure that every major world leader had some sort of history degree because MAYBE they would understand cause and effect a little better.
I think his class is going to be great fun.

Another break follows, two hours long this time. I walk over to Whole Foods, decide I'm too cheap to buy food there, and walk down to Target for $3.50 mac-n-cheese with yogurt and milk. Huh. Lots of dairy; never thought of that before.

My last class is going to be the most fun, I think. It's Design and Color which can only be useful, right? But I'm excited because it's another class with Miki, who taught my Design class last quarter and was SUCH a great teacher. Even better, a lot of the students from my Design class are also in this color class, so it will be fun to work with these guys again.

Woke up. I had been smart enough to do most of my major packing the evening before. I rolled out of bed, grabbed my toiletries and hopped in the shower for a quick wash. Everyone else had showered the evening before, so for once there wasn't a line. Once I was dressed and back in the dorm room, I quickly ripped the sheets off the bed and shoved them into the pillowcase, per the dorm's instructions. I added my damp towel on top, and bam! The room was ready to go.

It was a little strange getting breakfast by myself, since Ally and I had eaten every other meal together. But somehow I managed to get chocolate chip pancakes, frozen eggs and the rest onto my plate. Considering our bus left at 8:30, there were very few people eating in the cafeteria, but I found some of the other people from my class and had a lovely time talking about Henry VIII and San Francisco and statistics. Y'know. Grown-up conversation.

After loading the bus with my bags I was chattering away with Nan, one of the women in the group, about canning and fresh food, but I couldn't stop yawning and before we had crossed the Oregon-California border I was already asleep. When I woke up Teacher J was starting a DVD about Shakespeare for us, so and the bus trip seemed to fly by.

Lunch was a turkey sandwich, Capri-Sun, fruit cup and cookie. The cafeteria staff had also kindly provided a pasta salad, but very few people touched it.

We were running ahead of time, and made it back to DeAnza at 4:00 pm, half an hour before our scheduled arrival. Seanie was late, so I watched everyone else leave. There were only a few people left by the time he got there, but I was so happy to see him and be home that it didn't matter. He took me home and my lovely Oregon vacation was officially over.

Banana pancakes in the dorm cafeteria. Cold eggs. I should have stuck the mess into the microwave, but my brain was so foggy I probably wouldn’t have noticed if my pancakes started dancing on my plate. Ally and I ate by ourselves in a booth and discussed what to do when her boyfriend arrived. He couldn’t stay in the dorm room with us; rules aside, logistically there wasn’t really the room for it. Luigi had a spare bed in his dorm, and I suppose if we had asked him he might have been willing to let Ally’s boyfriend crash there. But at the time it didn’t occur to us.

There were fewer students in the classroom than ever before. I’d say a third of the ‘class’ was MIA. Technically, there were only three of us actually taking the class for a grade, so I suppose it didn’t really matter if most of them came in. We talked about Much Ado About Nothing, but we really didn’t have much to discuss. Everyone LOVED Benedick’s water fountain scene, and the staging was spectacular. A couple of people shared my reservations about Beatrice’s casting, but several in the class thought she was perfect. (No one else mentioned the age thing. I guess in a group of over-60s it doesn’t seem as out of place.) Luigi was all smiles and raves for the play, which annoyed me because he hadn’t really been critical of anything the whole trip. I mean, I get that Ashland plays are really great and I enjoyed all of them, but “I loved it I thought it was great everything was wonderful!” isn’t very interesting. But whatever. There were also two older women – I’d say late seventies, maybe even in their eighties? – who complained that they couldn’t hear anything but didn’t want to get the listening devices (which are free) because it’s not authentic theatre or something. Don’t know what to tell you guys…the actors are already shouting, if you can’t hear ‘em there’s not much they can do about it.

Anyway, once we’d gotten through the class discussions it was nap-time. Around noon Ally’s boyfriend got into town, so we met him. He’d been driving all night so he was wiped out. We thought lunch might be a good idea – he was starving – so we started wandering down Main Street looking for a good meal. Outside one of the restaurants we ran into Luigi just as he was entering a restaurant with wine bottles in the window, and had an awkward conversation:

Luigi: Hi guys!
Ally: Hi Luigi.
Me: Hey.
Ally: This is my boyfriend, Georgio. Georgio, this is Luigi.
*guys shake hands*
Luigi: I’m thinking of going to this restaurant for lunch. Their clam chowder is supposed to be amazing.
Me: (thinking) Dude, it’s like 90 degrees. Clam chowder sounds so gross. That sounds...edible. (Yes, I really said that.)
Ally: We’re just looking around for a place to eat.
Georgio: Like a brewery. We need beer!
Me: Beer is so great on a hot day like today.
Ally: So we’re going to check out some of the places up the street.
Luigi: I was actually hoping to grab Suzi for lunch today.
Me: **brain screeches to a stop** So many responses I could make, ranging from polite to cute to ridiculous. No thanks. / No. / The clam chowder is seasonally unsuitable to my palette. / This place looks too classy for me. / Sorry, but I’m too busy being a third wheel to go there with you. / I need a beer. / Also, Suzi is not an entrée to be’ grabbed’ for lunch. / There’s wine in that window. That’s not a beer. / I think you’re creepy and I don’t want to fake enjoying a meal alone with you. / We’ve already made plans, so...bye. None of these replies actually come out of my mouth. I just sorta fake a smile, turn and keep walking. I may have said something, but I don’t remember it. Ally and Georgio walk off with me.
(After we’ve gone a few steps) Georgio: Dude, don’t you want to go to lunch with the big guy?
Me: Ha ha…no.
Georgio: Why not? He sure wants to spend time with you!
Me: I have a boyfriend.
Georgio: Oh, you’re faithful. That’s cool.
Me: Heh heh…[internally] As if I would cheat on my boyfriend with a big lump like that! EEW!

We end up going back to Alex’s, the same place we had lunch the day before, and I had a chicken and fruit salad dish. It was fantastic. The chicken was in this orange citrus sauce and was wonderful, light and cool. A perfect summer lunch. Then Ally glanced at her phone, realized we had to be at the theatre in one minute to see All’s Well That Ends Well, so I gave Georgio all the cash I had and we SPRINTED off to get to the show. Literally. We ran all the way there. The woman at the door saw us coming and shouted “HURRY! THEY’RE CLOSING THE DOORS NOW AND WON’T LET YOU IN!” so we hurried up the stairs of the theatre and, panting, were allowed to our seats just as the lights began to dim. Oh, dignity, I forsook thee.

Just remembering all that makes me feel tired, so if you want to read about All’s Well That Ends Well hop on over to the entry I wrote up on Fashionista Piranha.

After the play ends we head back to the dorm. Ally’s boyfriend was sleeping in his hotel room, so she and I ate dinner at the dorms. My last dinner in the cafeteria; I felt slightly nostalgic. I had fettuccini alfredo and salad and snuck some cookies and a banana back to the room for later. (We always got so hungry after the final play of the evening.) Ally’s boyfriend joins us for our walk back to the theatre grounds. We stop for ice cream - I get lemon curd gelato – but since we only have a few minutes until the play starts, my unfinished cone ends up in the trash. What a sad waste. Although our teacher offers Georgio a ticket to Henry VIII, he opts out of the play and instead goes back to Alex’s to sample the beer menu.

Henry VIII is awesome.
The splendor and pomp of the Tudor court can be found over here.

By the time Henry VIII is over and we’re on the bus heading back to the dorms, it’s obvious that Luigi is not speaking to me, refusing to engage even in polite, bland small talk. I feel bad for a few minutes, but it’s mostly a relief. I help Ally pack up her things (she’s going to spend the night with her boyfriend) and after she’s gone, I stretch out on my bed in relief. It’s the first privacy I’ve really had during the trip, and I’m so happy and relaxed that I instantly fall asleep.

Another 7 am wake-up. I find myself wondering, “Is it REALLY necessary to shower? I mean, will anyone notice if I’m just a little stinky?” The answer, of course, is yes so I drag my lazy bum into the shower stall, but it’s so much harder to be coherent than it was yesterday. Breakfast is blueberry pancakes (hot), scrambled eggs (cold) and coffee (lukewarm).

At 8:30 we gather in Cox classroom for discussion. A few seats are empty as people opted to sleep in rather than join the class. (If I wasn’t taking the class for a grade, I’d probably do the same.) Most of the feedback for Friday’s plays is positive, although resident grump Martin kvetches that The Music Man isn’t a proper play and therefore shouldn’t appear in OSF’s line-up. Several people in the class went to see a new play called Equivocation last night instead of watching Don Quixote with the rest of us, and every single one of them could not stop raving about how wonderful the play was. The description from OSF’s website does sound pretty entertaining:
Truth-telling in dangerous times. What if the government commissioned you to write the definitive history (make that a self-serving lie) of a national crisis? What story would you tell? Welcome to London, 1605, and the world of King James, the Gunpowder Plot, and the Tower dungeons, as William Shakespeare and his theatre company struggle to create a play to please the king and not lose their hearts, souls, or heads in the process. In a world premiere, Bill Rauch directs Bill Cain’s high-stakes political thriller with ties to both Macbeth and Henry VIII. A must-see for Shakespeare lovers.

The discussion was cut short because we had an Actor’s Talk scheduled at 10 am. According to the class syllabus, two of the actors were supposed to meet with us, but in the end we only got one, Gwendolyn Mulamba. She was a pretty fine catch for our group though, since we had seen both of her plays the previous day. (She played Marian Paroo in The Music Man and The Innkeeper’s Wife in Don Quixote.) She was quite interesting! Prior to this season she hadn’t sung professionally since her school days in New York City, so playing a lead in The Music Man was a really rewarding challenge. She talked a bit about the technical side of the theatre, and how each singer is miked so that they can hear themselves when they sing. That was actually pretty neat, since I rarely think about that aspect of a production. Gwendolyn also shared some of her process in learning a role – it takes a lot more studying than I ever would have guessed! She reads up on everything she can find about the writer/creator of the play, since each writer leaves a bit of him/herself in their work, and then deconstructs the play to get into what each character is thinking. She won’t be back with OSF next year, which is too bad. It sounds like she’s heading back to the East Coast to see what she can do there.

After the Actor’s Talk I took the bus back to the dorms and had a nap. (It never guessed it would be so grueling. I mean, all we did was watch plays and maybe walk around a bit?) After a while I woke up, and got ready to head back into town. My roommate was also ready to be active (all the rest of the under-twenties were still napping), so together we started walking on a quest to find lunch. (I keep hoping I lost weight on this trip because I spent so much of my time walking back and forth.) Ally and I ended up getting pizzas at Alex’s Restaurant on Main Street. We sat on the balcony overlooking the street in perfect weather. The food was so good! Pizza was perfectly crisp with gooey cheese. I drool thinking about it.
After lunch we poked our heads into a couple of stores. At one shop I bought a maxi skirt, black with a white skulls print, to wear when I work at Lush. (Very goth.) But other than the single splurge, my wallet stayed firmly in my pocket. Curiously, I didn’t see much in the way of postcards at the shops we went in. *shrug* I wasn’t looking very carefully, though – I always figured I could buy them later.

We had the afternoon free of scheduled activities, so we went hiking in Lithia Park and got quite a workout. The trail we followed just seemed to keep going and going! We passed ponds, amphitheatres, statues, and random monuments. The park just seems like a crazy hodgepodge of ideas cobbled into a single stretch of public land. But the afternoon was beautiful and the exercise tiring, so that my feet ached in that “Good you’ve done some moving for once” way.

Ally’s boyfriend had sent her a text message that he was planning to drive up from Morgan Hill because he missed her. Morgan Hill is back home, so we’re talking an eight hour drive! It seemed a little extreme to me, seeing as she’d be heading home again on Monday anyway but he seemed quite determined to drive up after he got off work that evening.
We walked back to the dorm for dinner. (It’d be easier to stay in town, but we’d technically already paid for the dorm food when we booked the trip so might as well eat it, right?) The food was pretty unexciting, though. I think it was just more pizza? It’s funny. The first night I took great notes of what I did so I could type up the LJ entries later, but as each night wore on and I was just a little more tired, I wrote less and less.

At 8:00 we were back in the Elizabethan Theatre to watch Much Ado About Nothing. On my left sat Ally; on my right sat Luigi. Luigi is a very large person and spilled over out of his seat into my personal space, which made me uncomfortable. He had teased his hair up into a ridiculous pompadour rising six inches off his head, and I was fighting not to stare at it as we made small talk.
My notes on the play can be read this-a-way!

When we got back to the hotel room, I went downstairs for a while with my laptop to give Ally some privacy to talk to her boyfriend. It was nearly midnight, and he had just left Morgan Hill to begin the drive up to Ashland. All I could think was if he was really coming up he was going to be too wiped out on Sunday to do much of anything.

It felt like the crack of dawn when my alarm went off at 7:00 am. At first, I thought I'd ignore my buzzing phone and go back to sleep, but it seemed an inauspicious start to my first morning in Ashland. So I got up and staggered down the hall to the showers.
(Our dorm room was right next to the restrooms. I haven't decided if that was good or bad. On the one hand, it's convenient as heck when you need to go. On the other, it's noisier because you can hear everyone flushing and brushing and splashing all night long.)

Breakfast in the dorm cafeteria was nice. Coffee. Eggs. Yogurt. Pancakes. Juice. Fruit. My roommate and I sat off by ourselves, as we did the night before, but many of the other people in our group sat by together and were chatting away. It was very busy; several sports teams were staying in the same dorm so wrestlers, football players and track team members were constantly filing about. Most of them looked too young (early high school, possibly a few college freshmen-to-be) to be eye candy. Too bad.

At 9:00 we met in the Cox Classroom to discuss Macbeth. Reactions were varied, but as a general rule the over-60 adults didn't care for it, especially if they'd seen the play before. There was too much spectacle, too much shouting, and too much blood. Another popular criticism was that the players didn't interact with the audience and take advantage of the stage's space. The under-20s, on the other hand, generally loved it. For one guy, it was the first play he'd ever seen, and he thought it was great. There was a pretty strong generation gap when it came to appreciating the play, in fact.
There are two teachers on this trip: Teacher J and Teacher B. Teacher B is the more distant of the two; the only time he ever talked to we under-20s was during these class discussions, and even then it wasn't really a conversation. We'd go around in a circle giving our feedback, and he'd often interrupt and start to talk about his thoughts on whatever point was being considered, but before fully expressing himself he'd stop and say "Oh, I don't want to give anything away" or "We shouldn't talk about that yet." It was a bit annoying at times because if you don't want to discuss it, why bring it up? Anyway, Teacher B really liked talking, so he led the discussion for the most part.

The class wrapped up around 10:00 and our first play of the day The Music Man wasn't until 1:30 so we had some time to kill. My roommate wanted to go back to sleep, so she went back to the dorm and I decided to walk downtown.
On the way into town I took a lot of photos of the houses that lined Siskiyou Blvd, Ashland's main strip. (At least, I assume it's the main road. I could be completely wrong on that.) I wonder how the residents feel about that. Strangers taking photos of their homes, I mean. If someone took a picture of my house I'd find that really weird. But our yard is derelict, our paint's peeling, and the house is a cookie-cutter suburban blah house. Most of these little cottages were brightly colored with lovely gardens and were totally cute! So I didn't feel too guilty about it.

Downtown Ashland has lots of cute boutique shops. Unfortunately, most of them target the professional and the mature woman, so there weren't a lot that I wanted to shop in. When I did see something cute, it was always far more than I wanted to spend. There was a bookshop on nearly every corner, though, so I spent a lot of time browsing each one. (Didn't buy any books though. Whew. I have so many to read for Fashionista Piranha Book Blog that I'm on a no-buy restriction for the rest of the year. Well, except for Cleopatra's Daughter. No way I'm missing out on Michelle's newest novel!) A very pleasant morning was spent walking up and down the streets, getting to know the tourist end of the city.

For lunch I bought a blackberry scone and walked over to Lithia Park. It had beautiful green grass and lovely shade trees to sit under as I ate my scone and read an archeology magazine. I hiked around for a little while after eating before heading back to the Festival Grounds for The Music Man.

--

I've never seen The Music Man before. I'm not sure how it escaped me for so long; I go to a lot of musical theatre after all! I knew that the song "Trouble" was from the show, since I've heard parodies of it on The Simpsons and probably a few more places. But I had no idea that the song "Till There Was You" was from the musical. I've loved that song for years; Paul McCartney did a beautiful cover of it back when he was in the Beatles. I was so surprised when Marian started singing it!

Director Bill Rauche (who is also Artistic Director of the entire Festival) believes in colorblind, non-discriminating casting. Most of the time, this isn't a problem, but every once in a while somethign'll crop up that makes you go "Huh?" For example, Marian lives with her mother and her younger brother, right? In this production, Marian is African-American and speaks with a muted-but-present Southern accent. Her mother, speaking in a fine Irish accent, was white. So was little Winthrop, who looked like the poster child of Caucasian middle America. So as I'm watching I keep thinking, "So...is Mariam adopted or what?" but of course you're supposed to suspend belief and just roll with it. I'm bad at that, so I get distracted. If the family had "matched" in appearance or even if their accents would have matched, I think it wouldn't have been a problem. But there just wasn't a familial thread to connect the actors together.

There was also a deaf person in the cast, the first time I've ever seen something like that. (I mean, deaf in a musical? You'd expect there to be some sort of problem...) Marcellus, Harold Hill's reformed friend, communicated exclusively in American sign language, with the other actors interpreting what he 'said' for the audience. In this play, it actually worked pretty well, sometimes making for some very humorous moments. Marcellus' big song in Act II, "Shipoopi" was sung by Ethel Toffelmier, I think (it's hard to tell since the ensemble characters don't really distinguish themselves) and the director made it seem like this character was Marcellus' wife.

The Music Man was really, really fun. Classic Americana, right? I really liked the costumes in this play. At the beginning, all the townspeople are dressed in black and white, but as Harold Hill spreads his music throughout patches of color begin to appear, until by the end everyone's wearing brightly colored clothes. It was inspired by the movie Pleasantville, I think, and was a very effective device in the show.

--

After the play, we went back to the dorms to eat. Tacos and pizza were on the menu, which was yummy, and the ice cream machines were all broken, which was disappointing because it was HOT.
In the evening we saw the play Don Quixote, which was premiering at Ashland, and was pretty darn entertaining. I raved about it all over the place here:
Don Quixote, Man of La Mancha! Windmill Slayer!

Good times. I did spend part of the day dodging Luigi. He was just a little too friendly, and it was off-putting. He kept mentioning that he wanted to do lunch together, but I have no idea what my schedule for the next few days will be so I didn't commit to anything. I tried really hard not to be rude, but I don't know that I pulled it off effectively. There were a lot of conversations like this:
He (after Don Quixote was over: I'm thinking of walking back to the dorms. It's a beautiful night.
Me: It is a beautiful night. I think I'm going to take the bus, though. I'm wiped out after all that hiking today.
He: Hmmmm...
Me (too quickly, I think): But YOU should walk back. It IS a beautiful night.
He: ...I think I will.
Me: Have fun! See ya!

Awkward.

Sean drove me out to DeAnza this morning at 7:30 so I could get on the bus to Ashland. (The trip is actually a class at DeAnza, and I'll have to do a little bit of homework to get an 'A,' but I hope it'll be a really fun way to raise my GPA. Plus, travel!) We left the school promptly at 8. The bus wasn't too crowded, so I was able to get a row to myself. I stretched out and promptly fell asleep. When I wasn't dozing, I was listening to an audio version of Alison Weir's Innocent Traitor, a 16-CD novel about Lady Jane Grey's brief life and nine-day reign as Queen of England.

Looking around the bus at my classmates, I quickly realized that I was surrounded by people over sixty or under twenty. Companionship might be difficult on this trip. Oh well...I'm a loner anyway, it'll be fine.

At the first rest stop, one of the teachers pointed out my roommate, a nineteen year old who was also traveling on her own. I made a mental note to try and eat lunch with her at the next stop, and went back to the bus to sleep some more. (I had been up super late the night before, too hyped up on nerves to settle into bed. I was pretty wiped out.)

Teacher J talked about Ashland and Shakespeare a bit as we continued to drive, but the second half of the morning was mostly sleeping. The seats of the bus were blue, with rainbow-colored fish printed on it. My face rested against a multi-colored flounder.

We stopped in Redding for lunch. We were doing well for time - running about half an hour early to our schedule. I wanted to find my roommate and see if she wanted to eat together, but she'd already disappeared. One of the under-twenties complimented my glasses, which was an interesting if odd way to start a conversation.
He: I love your glasses.
Me: Oh, thanks.
He: I would totally love to have glasses like that. Maybe I'll buy those next time instead of these cheap wire glasses.
Me: That's...great.

He and I ended up eating lunch together at a Japanese restaurant. Let's call him Luigi. It was a little awkward, since I have no social graces whatsoever and he has a habit of staring at you while he eats. This wasn't so bad when I was talking - eye contact lets me know the listener is paying attention, after all - but it was really awkward when I wasn't. A bit uncomfortable. I spent a lot of time with my eyes glued to my bento box. But he seemed nice enough, and we did share some interests. I tried to encourage him to talk as much as possible, and he rambled on about martial arts, gardening, anime and school.
We didn't really discuss literature, which you might expect considering we were going to a Shakespeare festival.
He'd say things like "I've never seen beef teriyaki before. I've never heard of beef teriyaki before. What a great idea!" even though he'd previously been talking about Japanese food like he ate it all the time. It was a little weird. I couldn't tell if he was putting me on, or if he made a habit of exaggerating his knowledge on subjects. He also tended to sneak these awkward little compliments into conversations that made me wary. I can't remember anything specific, but the end result was I was getting the "He's interested in me" vibe, and that was unwelcome because Luigi was not my type at all.
Anyway.
I bitch, but it was nice to have someone to eat with. We went back to the bus chatting.
For the remainder of the trip, Teacher J put a DVD of The Reduced Shakespeare Company on for us to watch. That was funny. Luigi invited me to sit next to him, so I did. Our humor didn't line up very well. He laughed at things I didn't find especially funny, and he was silent when I snickered at something I found clever.
This will sound harsh and mean, but by the end of the bus ride I had downgraded him to "back-up friend" and decided I probably wouldn't hang out with him much during the trip, preferring to spend time alone if necessary.

But Ashland!
We arrived around 4 and it was beautiful and sunny. We were staying at Cox Hall on the Southern Oregon University campus, and I was excited to see the dorm rooms because I didn't get the dorm experience in college. My roommate Ally and I started chatting and it looked like we'd get along just fine. After a quick orientation the teachers handed us our theatre tickets and meal voucher, and we were free to find our rooms on the second story.
My room, 202, was right next to the stairs. Very convenient. We each had a narrow little bed, a desk, and a wardrobe. I have to admit, I can't imagine living in such a room for a whole semester. It was tiny. But for five days it would be just fine!

Dinner and breakfast were included in the trip - thus the meal voucher ticket. We went down to dinner and there was a salad bar, dessert bar, ice cream machine, sandwich bar, pizza station and a hot entree area. You could get as much food as you wanted, but you only got one trip through the cafeteria, so Ally and I loaded up our trays with as much as possible. (It's a wasteful system, because everyone grabs too much food and so much of it gets thrown away.) The food wasn't exciting, but it filled me up.

When we finished eating, it was barely 6:30 and our first play, Macbeth, wasn't until 8. Ally and I decided to walk the mile and a half from the dorm down to the theatres. If we had walked briskly, I imagine the trip would have taken no more than forty minutes, but we dawdled so much that it took over an hour. We were constantly stopping to take photos of houses and admire gardens and look in shop windows.
(The houses in Ashland are really, really cute. I took a lot of photos of the cottages we passed but I'm not sure I'll post them because it's not that exciting.)

We caught the tail end of the evening's Green Show, a free performance sponsored by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. I don't know who the singer was, but she was singing "Taylor the Latte Boy" which I have heard Kristin Chenowyth perform. Then we shuffled into the Bowmer Theatre to watch Macbeth.

I wrote a LOT about Macbeth in my book blog, Fashionista Piranha, so since this entry's already pretty long I will recommend you click on over there if you want to hear about hte play.
COMMENTARY ON THE SCOTTISH PLAY IS THIS-A-WAY.

The bus was waiting to take us back to the dorm after the play ended. My roommate went back out with some of the other under-twenties to get Taco Bell (the only food place still open) so I wrote some notes down for Macbeth, since there would be a discussion about the play the next day. Then off to sleep - I was just wiped out, even though I'd spent much of the day snoozing on the bus.

Co-Worker Drama: Maria phoned in yesterday and e-mailed today. She's OK! Relatively speaking, anyway. Somehow she got a nasty rash earlier this week. At first the doctor said it was shingles, but now he's saying it isn't shingles but is something else. Scarlet fever, he thinks? (Who gets that anymore?) Maria didn't come to work yesterday or today, because she thought she might be contagious, so I am picking up some extra hours. She'll come tomorrow, since we have a special event that night and my boss wanted both of us to be at the Clubhouse. (I'm supposed to be at a class meeting at that time, so I'm not sure how I'm going to manage the evening yet. Hopefully I can duck in and out.)
Maria wants to take a vacation before her sons are back in school. Originally, we thought she'd be taking it in mid- to late July, but due to layoffs at her other job and then this rash business it hasn't happened. So she wants to take it now, which would normally not be an issue but I'm leaving for a school trip to Ashland, Oregon this Thursday and won't be back until Monday evening. So I can't work for her, and in fact was relying on her to cover the shifts I'm missing. (I first told her about the Ashland trip in late May/early June, and have brought it up every few weeks since so she knows that it's coming.) So I'm not sure what we'll be doing there. Our back-up worker had a heart attack last month so she's outof commission as well.

--

School drama: I don't have any school drama, exactly. I just thought I'd post my current schedule for Fall 2009:
ANTH 003. 01 INTRO TO ARCHEOLOGY M-Th 9:30AM - 10:20AM
ACCT 001C 03 MANAG ACCOUNTG M-F 10:30AM - 11:20AM
MATH 010. 11 ELEM STATS/PROBABILITY M-F 12:30PM - 1:20PM
(annoying break)
ARTS 002D 01 HIST OF ART/EUROPE & US 4.0 MW 2:30PM - 4:10PM
(annoying break)
ARTS 012. 61 DESIGN AND COLOR 3.0 MW 6:30PM - 9:10PM

I might have to drop either Design & Color or Intro to Archeology, just because that's going to be a REALLY LONG DAY otherwise. But Design & Color has Miki, one of my favorite teachers from the previous year at DeAnza, and archeology is just too damn cool. So we'll see. I toughed my way through 21 units last fall; I can totally do it again.

--

Tomorrow Sean and I will hopefully go see the 'Lords of the Samurai' exhibit at the Asian Art Museum. We've meant to do it at least once before, but laziness kicked in and we stayed home that day.

--

Shakespeare Festival, here I come! Can't wait to go to Ashland this week!

Oh happy day!

Design - A
Arts 2C Honors - A
Accounting - A+

How the heck did I get an A+ in accounting when I showed up for less than half the classes?
Who cares?
4.0!
(Also, passing accounting this time around clears the 'F' from last quarter, so my transcript now claims 4.0 for winter AND spring!!!)

Hopefully after summer session, my cumulative GPA will be over a 3.0 again. It was down to a 1.9 last summer. What can I say? I'm a friggin' lousy student.

I'm slowly getting used to wearing contacts again. It's not great, because I'm still getting headaches, but they aren't appearing as quickly. Maybe after another week they won't show up at all. That would be swell.

Summer quarter's going to be busy, but I think I'll be OK. I've got the next section of Accounting and a Pilates class; I decided I didn't want to go hardcore and take a math class too. Mr. Ellis, my accounting teacher, seems nice enough. He isn't giving us homework, a midterm or a final, just several quizzes. I hope that's a good thing.

I used up the last of my BPAL Lady Macbeth perfume. I haven't been wearing BPAL that much in the past year, but I'm trying to start it up daily again, because:
A/ I get stinky in the summer (especially if I'm doing 2 hours of Pilates!!)
B/ I spent a lot of money to get that perfume, so I should enjoy it!!
Lady Macbeth has always been one of my favorites; I'm going to miss it until I am allowed to reorder it, several years from now at the rate I go through my perfume :-p

Uploaded a bunch of family photos to Facebook today. Just random things I found here and there.

At Rinconada right now. Heading to Lush next for inventory.

It's the last week of school and everything is RUSH RUSH RUSH before finals. I have to finish a paper for Art History, as well as an extra credit project or two. Design has a few final projects; accounting has a fussy midterm.

Rush rush rush. One more week and it's over!

--

On the bad news front, SJSU is not taking transfers for Spring 2010. So I gotta figure out what I'm gonna do. Hold on until Fall 2010? (That would be horrible.) Go to a different school? Try to crash classes this fall?
It's a bit too much to think about right now. I'll deal with it after finals.

Nope!
I am far too foolish to worry about catching diseases.  My friend Amanda says today she has flu-like symptoms and the first thing I say is "Great!  Hey, let's hang out!" so clearly, avoiding the virus is something I can't be counted on to do.  I think antibacterial hand gels are silly.  If I drop food on the floor, I firmly believe in the 5-second rule.  I don't always wash my hands before eating.  I am exposed to new people on a daily basis at work or at school.  I keep hoping that someone at DeAnza will get a the flu so classes will be suspended for a week, just like they were at Branham High School after a teenager was diagnosed on Tuesday.  Oh, alma mater.  A week off of school is sweet.

 

Clearly, I'm going to get swine flu.  I accept this.  I figure I'll get it when I fly to Boston, or fly back; everyone knows that an airplane flight is a disease waiting to happen.   I just hope I get one of the mild cases; it would not be a terribly impressive way to die.

It's the third day of classes for the spring quarter, and I'm feeling exhausted. I have two "daily" classes that mean Monday through Thursday, and it's just exhausting having to go every day. I'm spoiled; I've avoided them for years but Mjelde and her art history class ruined it last quarter, and now in addition to her class I'm also in a daily accounting class. Argh. The good news for the accounting class is that DeAnza calls it a "blended" course, which apparently means you get several Monday sessions off. *shrug* So I can sleep in on those days, at least.

I've got some strict teachers for attendance this quarter, which is bad news. Mjelde toughened up her participation/attendance policy, so it now affects the class grade. My design teacher's an absolute Nazi about attendance, and my accounting teacher locks the door a few minutes into class so you can't even be late. (Tardiness has never been a real problem for me; if I'm running late I just don't go. Looks like that policy won't work anymore.)

But I gripe for no real reason. My teachers all seem good. I already know Mjelde's great. I didn't get into the Intermediate Drawing class, which was frustrating, but I think it's probably a blessing because realistically I'm going to be quite busy this quarter at 16 units; adding another class to my load would probably kill me.

So my classes:
Statistics - I hope to tame this wild beast this quarter! I withdrew from it in the Winter.
Accounting - It pains me to admit it, but I failed this last quarter, so I'm retaking it. At least I don't have to repay the fees for using the online homework program!
Art History III: Europe from Baroque to Impressionism - Should be a blast.
Design - Basic art class. Required for art history major. I'm glad to take it to 'ease' back into daily art, I hope!

My first Art of Asia test is tomorrow and I still don't have the slides memorized. In fact, I can't even tell you the time frames of any major dynasty, culture or Neolithic movement.

I AM SO SCREWED.

Now the question is...should I stay up late trying to cram as much info down as possible and spend tomorrow in a sleep-deprived bubble state? Or should I just shout "SCREW IT!" to the world, skip out on studying any more tonight and hope for the best?

--

It is always when I am feeling increased stress re: academics that my mind begins to contemplate conquering the uglies instead of the stupids. That is to say, I suddenly need to give myself that manicure I have been putting off. Use a face mask. Shave my legs. Pop in some contacts and start playing with make-up. I mean, when was the last time I really painted up my eyes? (Answer: The last time I had a major exam to avoid preparing for.)