I wasn't planning on saying anything about this until December or January, but I don't see any reason not to mention it now. I've been attending a university full time for the past year and a half, and am set to finish my long-abandoned degree when I graduate after this semester. In like, 6 weeks. This is the primary reason I've been too busy to blog since the summer ended.
I've not mentioned my college return until now since I don't want to start talking about it until I can... talk about it. I've got a lot of amusing and absurd stories to tell about the experience, most of them written down when the events were fresh in my mind, but I can't start on that until I'm free and clear, since I don't want to
Dooce myself. I'm not saying now, and I probably won't then, which school I'm attending, but as there aren't
that many universities in the Bay Area, and as other details to be revealed later this year will narrow the geographic region, those of you with curiosity and any ability to use google will probably be able to find out. Not that that information will be of any value to you whatsoever.
I bring this up now as an extended apologetic, for my recent (months) of non-blogging. I'm zooming through 2.5 years of college in 1.5 years, and this, my last semester, is kind of insane. I'm taking 20 units, comprised of 5 3-unit classes, a 2-unit senior project, and 3 1-unit filler classes which were necessitated by an anticipated 3-unit summer class being canceled at the last minute. Of my 9 classes this semester, 7 have final papers of some sort, and the 8th class is senior project workshop, the entire purpose of which is constructing a research paper of approximately the size of any 4 others combined. All but one of these papers is due around the last week of November, immediately before or during finals. I've not done the tally lately, but I've got something like 7 research papers due, plus 5 final exams, in the 10 days immediately following the Thanksgiving holiday.
Needless to say, I'm kind of busy preparing for that, and am diligently trying to get papers done now, since it's not humanly possible to wrap up half a dozen research papers, all on different subjects, in a week, while attending a normal, rather busy class schedule, and preparing for final exams a few days later. Also needless to say, if you think the blogging here has been light for the past month, you're not going to see much improvement on that score until mid-December. Or possibly later, since I'm hoping to travel a bit and hopefully not spend any time thinking or reading anything that requires note-taking until after Xmas.
My main priority once the semester ends is going to be work on getting my fantasy novel(s) finished/edited/published, and I'm also going to be making up for the neglect I've shown to the HGL site, but I'm also going to be overhauling BlackChampagne.com. I won't promise an entirely new layout and improved function, but that's the plan at this point. I'm also planning to start more wisely embracing the Internet truth that most bloggers know; "People will line up for spam five times a day and ignore steak once a week." In other words, more frequent updates, several a day if possible, but since I'm not
PZ they'll probably be shorter and smaller and less verbose. Which might well be a good thing. I'll still write longer discussions of things I want to discuss, but I doubt I'll ever return to the glory days of 2002-2004, when I was posting 30 or 40k updates almost every day. Not unless someone starts paying me a living wage to do it, and even then, I think I could find more productive uses for my time, and I'm sure you guys reading this could too. (Of your time. Not mine. Though probably that too.)
I mention this now since I had a brief anecdote/joke from this evening, that wouldn't have made much sense without the context. Earlier this evening I was sitting in bed doing some reading for a World Religions class. We've surveyed every major faith, Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, and Christianity, along with primal religions and some other early goddess and cult stuff. We're on Christianity now, and I was sitting in bed (where I often retreat to read in peace and relative quiet) and going through the two course texts on world religions and filling out the reading question forms when I felt the need to stretch out. The early years of Jesus and the principle tenants of that particular monotheism were as exciting to me as you might imagine, and after stretching I pulled the comforter over my shoulder and closed my eyes. Just for a minute, mind you.
An hour later I blinked back into consciousness, my right ankle numbed by Jinx's furry, sprawling form, my neck kinked almost to the point of immobility. As I sat up and yawned and stretched, moving carefully to avoid dislodging the companionable feline, I found myself chuckling at the irony. Think of the millions of hours of slumber humans been been spurred into by the very topic that had lullabyed me, and think how few of those dozing individuals were fortunate enough to have a soft bed beneath them? I woke up with a sore neck, but it certainly beat a pew-numbed ass, or a glaring reverend breathing down my proverbial neck.
Labels: blackchampagne.com, college, religion
