Category Archive: School

Jan 14

School only has my soul for 1 more semester

So, this is a picture of my school.

I’m about to go into my last semester of it! In May, I will finally be graduating! It’s kinda exciting, but scary at the same time.

I have some writing from last semester that I’ve put under the current collection, Tastes Like Forever. It’s all still rough and in the original form, but it’s something. ^o^

This coming semester actually appears as though it will be easier and less hectic, so I’m hoping to get the time to go through and edit these. Make them beautiful like I have for Fall(ing/en) Leaves. Still super proud of those.

Until later/sooner,
g

edit: it helps if i know some grammar…

May 18

Spain Finals

So, in 15 minutes I’ll be heading off to the graduation ceremony, officially closing my time in Spain. It’s been an amazing 5 months, something that I’ll never be able to repeat again.

It’s kinda crazy how fast (but, at the same time, slow) the time has done.

For anyone interested, here’s the final grades I got:

Culture: 9 (A)

Grammar: 8.2 (B+)

History: 7.6 (B)

Geography: 9.3 (A)

Literature: 8.8 (A-)

Art: 7.3 (B-)

Oral Expression: 8 (B+)

Monograph: 10 (A)

 

Not a bad semester, if I do say so myself. :)

May 14

Monograph

As is well known, I am currently (almost done!) studying in Spain. Well, our capstone project was a long paper, written (obviously) entirely in Spanish.

I did mine on the first novels in Spain, and how they developed. It was titled “The Birth of the Novel”. I wrote it kinda strangely, because I wanted to try and make it original. I wrote it ~kinda~ like a story itself. The headings of the paper were called “Prologue” and “Chapter 1″ and “Epilogue” and stuff… and it was kinda fun.

My prologue was written in verse (read: a poem) because prose (and thus the novel) was a step further down the line than verse… eh, I dunno. It was kinda fun to write, if nothing else.

 

Anyways, I was in McDonald’s in Paris (Don’t laugh) and I checked my e-mail and I got this:

Hola, Greg:
Ya he terminado de corregir todos los trabajos.
Me alegra decirte que tu nota es 10.
Además de la originalidad del tema, la originalidad al presentar el trabajo han hecho que sea muy fácil de leer.
El contenido está muy bien: has desarrollado el tema de forma estupenda y muy bien redactado.
Bueno, espero que esto te anime a seguir con la creatividad y la
literatura.
Un saludo, Monse.
Hi Greg:
I’ve finished correcting all the papers.
I’m happy to tell you that your grade is 10.
In addition to the originality of the theme, the originality of the presentation made it really easy to read.
The content was really good: you developed the topic stupendously and very well written.
Great, I hope that this will encourage you to continue with the creativity and literature.
Salutations, Monse

 

10, by the way, is the highest possible, and apparently supposed to be really hard to get.

 

My day was MADE! :)

Oct 30

School

Very imaginative title, eh? But that’s what this post is, I guess, as I kinda just feel like talking about my classes…

Right now, I’m taking five English courses, and one Spanish one. Which equates to eighteen credits. A full load, and I’ll tell ya – I’m having a blast.

My Mondays start out with The Short Story, an English literature class that focuses on – guess what? – the short story format. We’ve read a bunch of Anton Chekhov, Raymond Carver, and we’re in the middle of our horror unit, where we’re reading a variety of horror stories. We have a few more authors that we’ll focus on later in the course. It’s a discussion based course… meaning that we read a few stories every night, and then there are class discussions about them. It’s relatively disorganized, I feel, but it works for me. I tend to do Spanish homework during it >_>

Our big assignments have been writing stories in the “style”. I posted my Carver story up here (a few posts down) but I wasn’t really pleased with my Chekhov one. I should just post it anyways, it’s interesting if nothing else. :3 I have two more stories to write as the semester wanes on… a horror one (O_o) and then one in the style of Joyce Oates. Sounds like fun, eh?

After that class, my Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays continue with Phonetics & Pronunciation, Spanish 325. It is just as it sounds – a Spanish class based in linguistics. Which makes it pretty much amazing. :) Though it’s a LOT of busy work… we’re basically transcribing how real pronunciation works, with words all melding together and stuff…

On Fridays, that’s the end. However, Mondays and Wednesdays, I have a 75 minute class Introduction to Theory and Criticism or something like that. It’s part of the “core” English program. To be honest, I don’t really know what the class is about. We’ve looked at a variety of critical viewpoints and written some short assignments… not really sure what the overall point of the class is, though. It’s okay though. We have read some interesting books, which is good! We read a Walt Disney biography, which was helluva interesting, and just recently we went through a memoir, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls. Both very good & interesting books. But like I said, I fail to see the overall arching themes in the class.

My Tuesdays and Thursdays have similar structures. They both start with my English linguistics class, Topics in the Structure of English which this semester is focusing on Semantics & Pragmatics. It’s pretty cool, though a lot of the material has been going about ten feet above my head. It’s okay though, I get it at a basic level… after we’ve discussed it in detail. :P I also really like my prof. I took her for a class last semester, and she’s really smart and knows what she’s talking about.

After that, I always have a ~3 hour break. On Tuesdays, it’s 2 hours and 45 minutes, and Thursdays it’s 3 hours and 15 minutes long. After these breaks are my two workshop courses. Remember, I’m undecided between doing a Creative Writing emphasis or a Linguistic one.

Tuesdays, I have Intermediate Story Writing. It’s a workshop class… for writing stories. Yar. I’ve had two go through workshop now, and now it’s a matter of fixing them up. The first one, you should be familiar with, it’s the Airplane House one. ~_~ The second is a ghost story, which I need to really work on before doing anything with it…

And on Thursdays, I have Intermediate Poetry Writing. I know, poetry. Urgh. But that’s been the source of all the poetry I’ve been posting up, so I guess it’s not bad. Just not my favorite thing to write…

 

All in all, my semester has been going pretty good. It’s 18 credits, and there sure can seem to be a lot of work at times, especially when profs seem to get together and decide that EVERYTHING will be due the same week… I had one of those weeks two weeks ago. I was ready to ~die~ during that, but made it out okay afterwards.

But this is all leading up to next semester… when I shall be in SPAIN!!!! :D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

Feb 04

Schooling

So I feel like making a personal blog. DEAL WITH IT. :-)

I am in my second (third, if you count summer) semester at the University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire. And I am enjoying this far more than I did last semester. To recap…

CJ222 – News Writing & Reporting (C+)
The professor was a bitch. She was about as hardass on us as you can be, and wouldn’t move for anything. Couple this with really stupid assignments, and you have a major turn off. When I went into this class, I was a Print Journalism major. When I finished this class, I finished my stint in journalism.

Lat101 – Beginning Latin (B+)
Best class of my semester. The language is enthralling, if difficult, and I love languages. The professor is hilarious, and he keeps us on our toes. Yes, there was a lot of work – but GASP – I learned something. There is nothing cooler than looking at something in Latin and having a guess at what it means. :) Carpe diem! “Diem” is an accusative noun, meaning “day” – accusative puts it as kinda a direct object. “Carpe” is the command version of the verb “carpere” which means to “seize”… so “Seize the day!” ;D

Psyc 378 – Psychology of Language (B)
Zzzz. She was… nice enough, and the material, interesting enough. But the presentation of it was zzz uh zzz oh, right, trying to stay…zzzz
The entire semester, I think I managed to stay awake the entire class period (only an hour and 15 minutes!) ONCE. And only once…

Span 202 – Intermediate Spanish II (B)
Uh. Prof was kinda… meh. She was nice enough, but she was late pretty much every day (Class was scheduled to start at 8am, we would normally start by like 8:10…) and didn’t really talk to us much in Spanish. Most of our lessons were in English, and we would have discussions in English. Granted, she went over the material, but I don’t feel as though I pulled very much out of it.

…and so that brings us to this semester!

Thea 101 – Introduction to Theatre (MWF 9:00-9:50)
So it’s taught by this rather cute guy in this decripit old art room. It’s a very bleh room. The material is pretty bleh too, but it’s easy. So far we’ve just been going over basics of what makes theatre theatre, which isn’t all that exciting. We have to read one play a week and take quizzes on it, with questions that you actually have to pay attention to to get. =o= I got 12/20 on the first one. This is likely my least favorite class.

Span 301 – Advanced Composition (MWF 10:00-10:50)
So, in my last Spanish class, she really never talked to us in Spanish. The COMPLETE opposite here. O_O The class is entirely in Spanish, and I feel as though I’ve learned more this semester (two weeks in!) than I did all of last semester. We’ve just been going over the basics right now of review, but instead of it being “This is this, so do it.” she gives us reasons of WHY to do it. Like when we went over the present tense, she had a list of times that you DO use it, and why. It was like “:O” and we’re all amazed.

And it’s so nice, being taught in Spanish. I can already tell you I will be much better at it by the end of the semester.

Engl 210 – Introduction to Texts (TR 3:30-5:45)
My midday/night class. Ergh. This is one that I am still not sure on. At first, it seemed really interesting. I was going to have an ENGLISH CLASS again :-D I was super excited. However…

Well, we’re doing a lot of the same stuff over and over. Granted, it’s practice for an assignment, but it’s getting repetitive. Our current unit is “Anecdotes” so she’s having us tell our groups (more on that in a bit) stories, and then we write them down! =o= For Tuesday, we have to have a 3 page anecdote. It’s starting to feel more like an Introduction to Storytelling. =\

And as for the groups… we completely demolish the room at the beginning of class and set it up in a weird semi-circle. There are 6 groups of 4 people, and we sit in clusters. There is a lot “Okay, face your groups and tell stories.” and then “Turn around and face the front.” and “Face your group and tell another story :D” And so on…

Each class we’ve also had to do a “reading response”… she has yet to really say what she wants in them, so I’ve just been writing my thoughts. And I get a checkmark… but yet she doesn’t grade them? I am confused.

So the class could go either way. It’s the first English major/minor class that you have to take, so that’s why I’m taking in. :) Annnnnd it has eye candy in it. ;D

Engl 221 – The English Language (TR 11:00-12:15)
A… linguistics class. It is kinda between “Oooh.” and “Ehhh.” right now. I’m assuming we’ll get more interesting as we go in! :) Over the past week, we learned the English sounds in the IPA, and we have a test on that come Tuesday. Eeeeep. But it’s cool, I’ll do fine :)

We’re also in teams for this class, but it’s not as silly as for my other English.

Lat 102 – Beginning Latin II (MTWR 1:00-1:50)
Save the best for last, right? <3 We had two sections last semester, and we've joined together this time. Waters (the prof) is SO much fun, and we're just chugging along. I sit in a corner, and around me are people that I kinda knew from my section last semester. We've ended up joining up as a team-like thing, and every time we do group work, we work together and we own it. Our translations are like A+ quality, yo. Though I still think we should use fuckwad at some point. Hehehe.

We’re also doing “Latin Study Group” Wednesdays after class. We’ve done it once and it was kinda fun. So we’ll see if that continues. :)

Yep, that’s my schedule so far. So if I were to sum it up, I would have to order my classes in such a fashion:
1) Latin
2) Spanish
3) Linguistics
4) Intro to Texts
5) Theatre

3/4/5 could kinda be swapped around, depending on the day. Theatre is a 100 level class and shows it. Very little to do. But then again, my Intro to Texts is a 5 credit course, and it’s beginning to rear it’s ugly head as well. So as the days go on, they’ll flip around, I’m sure. But Spanish and Latin? GOD do I love ‘em <3 So. Yeah, I ain’t got nothing more. And I have to pick up my #1 Stalker (according to a recent facebook app) Priscilla in a few minutes anyways…

Sep 06

The Question Is…

So, my Currently Reading.

I am (procrastinating) working on my Spanish homework.

So should I put “501 Spanish Verbs” as my Currently Reading?

lol

May 10

Fall 2010

So I realized I never posted this…

Monday
8:00 – 8:50 Intermediate Spanish II
9:00 – 9:50 News Reporting & Writing (Lecture)
10:00 – 11:50 News Reporting & Writing (Lab)
12:00 – 12:50 Introduction to Mathematical Thinking
1:00 – 1:50 Introduction to Archeology
2:00 – 2:50 Archeology of the Northeast Woodlands

Tuesday
8:00 – 8:50 Intermediate Spanish II
12:00 – 12:50 Introduction to Mathematical Thinking

Wednesday
8:00 – 8:50 Intermediate Spanish II
9:00 – 9:50 News Reporting & Writing (Lecture)
12:00 – 12:50 Introduction to Mathematical Thinking
1:00 – 1:50 Introduction to Archeology
2:00 – 2:50 Archeology of the Northeast Woodlands

Thursday
Free!

Friday
8:00 – 8:50 Intermediate Spanish II
12:00 – 12:50 Introduction to Mathematical Thinking
1:00 – 1:50 Introduction to Archeology
2:00 – 2:50 Archeology of the Northeast Woodlands