Senior Slide

Today, I'm officially halfway through my semester, as far as lectures go.  We have a couple of weeks off before exams (big, terrifying, looming exams that count for most of our grades) in order to study, but classes end at the close of November.  So, halfway through the semester, that means.... yes, that's right!  Midterms!  I was up pretty late last night, putting some final effort into one of my essays that was due today.  The other one was finished last week, thankfully - one of the benefits of swine flu, I suppose.  Lots of time where you get bored enough to do schoolwork.  

Anyway, I turned in two essays today, and started my archaeology class.  Out of my four classes, I think this one will turn out to be my favorite.  It's called "Landscapes of Cult and Kingship," and it focuses on the various ancient sites of Ireland that relate to royalty.  The class is perfect for me and my humanities major, because instead of just learning a list of dates and facts like that, we will really be delving into the social construction of "landscape," looking at how the way a culture interacts with the land and their monuments creates a mythology that becomes a part of the reality of a physical structure.  That's not really well-stated, but it lines up perfectly with the paper I'm hoping to write for my capstone.  Maybe my final essay for this class will be a good starting point!

Besides archaeology, Stories of Medieval Wales is entertaining enough, and History of the English Language satisfies my etymological nerdiness.  History of Medieval Ireland ought to be interesting, but in actuality it's a nightmare swarm of annals and geneologies and scholars spending so much time bickering with each other that nobody even looks at the primary evidence.  I would actually welcome something like "This government was established in 835, under the rulership of Brian O'Donnell."  (*made up fact.*)

In the end, though, even if all of my classes were absolutely riveting, it would be hard to focus here.  I would rather spend my time in Ireland exploring towns and learning how to live independently, rather than worry about studying.  Hopefully there's a balance somewhere.  For now, I'm glad to be done with at least two essays, and I'm ready to sit back, make some dinner, and maybe watch an episode of Battlestar Galactica.  Life is pretty good.