Per Request

My classes this semester are all so very fun. Honestly, I am so glad that I switched my major from Business to English. If nothing else, I will simply be having lots of fun in college and I can worry about a job later. =)

I am currently taking World Lit II, Understanding Drama, Beginning Acting, and Elementary German I.

World Lit II isn't nearly as straight forward as I thought it would be. Instead of teaching it like other professors - the most popular books from around 17th and 18th centuries to present - Dr. Pettruci has narrowed it down to only female writers between the 18th and 20th centuries. It's very interesting, but a lot of reading. We began the class with a little poetry, mostly written by Elizabeth I, and then went on to ficiton, Maria Edgeworth's Castle Rackwrent and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Tonight, we finished going over Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, although I have yet to finish reading it. People have continually told me what a wonderful book The Bell Jar is, but whenever I start reading it, I just fall asleep. I don't know what it is, perhaps it's the simple fact that I expected to like it. However, even though this class is very interesting, it's also difficult. His quiz questions are always on the most random things he has talked about in class. They aren't essay, which I like, or multiple choice. You just have to remember pretty much word for word what he said. Plus, he's a history buff so many of his questions have to do with the time period of the novel rather than the actual novel. Being a history hater, this isn't so good for me. I'm horrible at remembering dates and names and such, so needless to say I have an average of about a C, possibly a low B, in this class.

Understanding Drama is very interesting. It's taught by Dr. Silverstein, a man who is legally blind. This is highly interesting to me, for some reason. He's a very interesting man, but we've recently begun delving into plays involving fantasy and things that are difficult to understand if you are unable to actual watch the play. I'm very excited though to have more of an education is plays instead of just musicals. It is greatly widening my outlook when it comes to theatre.

Beginning Acting is perhaps my favorite class. It's rarely a lecture class. The first day we played freeze tag and the majority of the time it's as if we are simply playing games. I get to really know the majority of my classmates. We had our midterm project a few weeks ago where we had to take a set of meaningless lines and make it into a scene. We were divided into groups of three and we were to have three different scenes: we each were to act in two and direct one scene. My directed scene was two girls in a basement playing with a Ouija board. I don't really know where that came from, but it was really interesting to see the scene evolve from a simple idea to a full-fledged scene with lights, sound effects, and set. My acting scenes were difficult because the people in my group weren't very good at memorizing their lines. However, as difficult as the whole thing was, I came out with a respectable grade. The week after, we had the written midterm exam that I made a 94 on! I was very excited about this because the professor, Daydrie Hague, does not give out a grade above a 92 if she can help it.

This past week, we have been assigned our final scenes. I was paired with a guy, Blake Burgess. I have recently found out that Blake is a football player and also the son of Rick from Rick and Bubba. This makes me laugh. A lot. He's really very good though, so I was excited that we got paired together. Our scene is between a married couple who has just lost a child. It's from a play call Rabbit Hole. Basically, their three year old son got hit by a car when he was chasing after the family dog. The scene is specifically when Becca (the wife) accidentally tapes over a home video of Danny (their son). I'm looking forward to getting into it. Blake and I have yet to be able to start practicing.

And finally, I have Elementary German I. This class is also one of my favorites, but it is mostly because of the people who are in it. We have so much fun, which is wonderful since it is my eight o'clock class. I am learning a lot, surprisingly, since I have never been one for languages. I am doing the best in the class, making 102s and 106s on her tests. I have another test tomorrow that I'm nervous about though, because I haven't been able to keep up with very much of the homework over the past week.

I registered for my classes for next semester today. There are two classes that I really need that I am trying to get the professor's permission to enroll in (Advanced Composition and Theatre History II), but if I can't get into those, my schedule will look like this:

Monday, Wednesday, Friday: 9-10am - Biology, 10-11 - Chaucer, 12-1 - German
Tuesday, Thursday: 8-9am - Computer, 9:30-11 - Understanding Fiction, 11-2 - Science Lab

It wasn't quite what I expected, but it is much better than this fall's schedule. However, if I can get into the other two classes, I will be dropping Chaucer and the Biology. I really hope I can do that!

Auburn Visits

This blog is mostly created due to the fact that I becoming increasingly horrible as keeping up with people, even family members. Scratch that: especially family members. I'm hoping that I will keep this blog posted about once a week.

In the past month or so, I have gotten visit from several friends from home. These visits have been much looked forward to. I miss Atmore so much and have yet to be able to go back this semester. Perry came to visit me the weekend of the West Virginia game and we had a blast. So much of the social life here in Auburn during football season is centered around The Game. It stormed for about an hour that game, but we were still able to tailgate, catch up, and scream myself hoarse.

Last Saturday, I was initiated into Kappa Alpha Theta. I'm officially a sister! While I am not at liberty to discuss anything that happened in initiation, I can say this: it was extremely special, somewhat scary, and slightly disgusting.

After initiation, I left Auburn to go to Alexander City to meet up with Ellen. We desperately searched for something interesting to do there, but we failed miserably. We spent some time in Walmart and Zaxby's, but we did get a chance to talk for several hours and it was the first time we were able to see each other since I left for school! When I got back into Auburn, Stephen came to visit me for the night! We went to Mellow Mushroom and took a nice walk around campus.

Melissa came to visit last week too! I was really excited to be able to see her. I hadn't seen her in so long and I really missed her. We went to several places to eat in Auburn that I had been telling her about and got to see Whip It, the Ellen Page movie. I missed doing sisterly things with my sister.

I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving when Sarah's coming to Auburn!