autumn into summer

well, its been 2 months since ive last written in here. ouch. ive been very busy with school .. i really accomplished and learned a lot this quarter. i took two upper level french courses, and we read the following books/poems:
Honore de Balzac - Le Pere Goriot
Charles Baudelaires - les Fleurs du mal
Francoise-Rene de Chateaubriand - Atala-Rene
Marceline Desbordes-Valmore - Misc. poetry
Gustave Flaubert - Madame Bovary, Un Coeur Simple
Alphone de Lamartine - Le Lac
Stephane Malarme - L'apres midi d'un faune
Prosper Merimee - Carmen
Albert Vigny - La mort du loup
Emile Zola - Germinal
Michel de Montaigne - Extraits des essais
Madame de Lafayette - La Princesse des cleves
LaRochefoucault - Maximes
Abbe Prevost - Manon Lescaut
Jean Anouilh - Medee

basically, a pretty extensive list of french novels and poems. i learned a lot about different thinkers, history, social changes, literary schools, philosophical trends, many ideas in a rich survey of french literary from the 1600s to today. i also took an extensive class on historical/comparative linguistics -- right up my alley! i learned a lot about language change, growth, death, political and social factors that influence these fields. yes! ive been playing drums everyday, realistically, a lot more than i play guitar these days. its strange to play rhythm instead of lead .. at first in a negative way, but its grown on me. its really interesting to experience the differences between playing bass, guitar, or drums (or ukelele for that matter) in a band. each has a different purpose in a band, and its really enlightening to partake in each one in a musical endeavor. winter's here, i think, the temperature is in the 10s and 20s, and its been snowing a bit. its very relaxing and pretty, i really enjoy walking in the snow or watching it fall from inside the house. im finally slowing down enough to appreciate walking and reflecting, or in french, flaner. we keep our thermostat in the house on 47, but i feel pretty well adapted to it. rewilding? haha, we just got a wood burning stove that we are hopefully installign soon .. anyways, the quarter is now over, and i finally have free time to focus on some personal projects. im going to be working as much as possible to save up money for the next two quarters .. my goal is to pay for tuition out of pocket, which is pretty ambitious. i feel confident that i can do it. i also plan on reviewing my arabic grammar and expanding my grammar to be prepared for the arabic grammar class im taking in the winter. there are also a few spanish novels id like to read, and a memoir about the community i lived in in spain the summer of 2007. the book is about communal living, poverty, globalization, capitalism, early christian sentiment, and modern, healthful living. thats what i gather from the table of contents at least. i know that one chapter is "gente privilegiada que intenta ir contre corriente. es decir, inadaptes sociales" which means, "privileged persons who wish to go against the flow, that is to say, the socially unadapted." perfect! im also kicking around picking up a russian or mandarin chinese grammar. id really like to start one of them, im leaning more towards russian due to peace corps ambitions, since a lot of countries im looking at are former soviet, thus maintaing the cyrilic alphabet and a potential generation of russian speakers. which brings me to my last goal for winter break, which is to finish my application to peace corps. kenton moved back into the house from the beet harvest in minnesota .. its great to see him again, we've been playing music a lot. i made a new friend ana, she is from mexico and traveling through ohio for a bit. shes very nice and has some really powerful, inspiring perspectives. i feel ive definitely learned a lot from her -- positive changes in my life. plus i get to speak spanish with her! que mas? i was originally going to spend a week in atlanta at my dads with my sisters, but scheduling issues came up, so it looks like ill be spending the winter in columbus. disappointing, but there are of course projects and meaningful endeavors here as well. i picked up an accordeon at uncle sam's pawn shop in mid september, and id like to learn some christmas songs .. definitely corny, but its right up my alley. all of my friends tell me i act like an uncle .. halloween, i dressed up as an alien baby:and in late september/early october i noticed a small lump on my face. it grew really fast, became very painful, spread to my lymph nodes, my whole right side of my face sorta blew up, and it hurt to eat. after 2 weeks of antibiotics and no change, i had it drained, via 12 needles to the face and neck, pulling out 2 teaspoons of gunk. i feel normal now, but theres still a noticeable lump. im going back to the doctor on the 12th to see whats going on. i did get it tested for cancer, and im negative. :P you can see it in this picture, though i mainly posted it to show that my dreadlocks are getting longer and longer ..


i look really blase here because school was consuming my life. maybe i was reading baudelaire.

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Listening to: mewithoutYou - Cure For Pain
via FoxyTunes