Summer. A bright, hot time of year where, no matter what your status in life, you feel a change. Summer always feels like it's an entirely detached part of the year. There are people out there who backpack through Europe, do physically and mentally challenging things like join the Peace Corps, have a torrid love affair, live at the beach or take up a summery type job. Oh not me. Oh...not me.
School let out in May and all of the kids 10 years younger than me were giddy to be drunk for 3 months straight and sleep with as many people as possible. Ah, youth. I was excited for them, but not jealous. I have lived it up in my day, and I am quite resigned to my choice to be a responsible adult, mostly dedicated to the pursuit of some kind of success. At the end of my first semester I found myself with 18 credits and a 4.0 GPA. This was an awesome way to kick off my summer. My first credits ever after so many failed attempts at this crazy college thang! AND a 4.0! Success was going to be mine and I knew it. My head grew 4 sizes that day. I walked around in my bra, made a cape out of my blanket, and called myself "Super Student."
I had signed up for 2 summer courses, but I had a 3 week break before the first one started. Oh the plans I had. I wanted to visit some friends who had moved out of state, I wanted beach it up everyday, go to Six Flags, bask in the sun. I wanted to write some killer blogs....
But Sims 3 came out the first week of June. Now, I am not a gigantic video game freak or anything, but I am a control freak with a God complex. Sims 3 is awesome. You create people, you control their lives. Every aspect. There is nothing in this world as satisfying, I don't care what you think.
So I SIMed it up for 3 weeks straight. At some point I remembered I was supposed to be dieting, because I'm getting married and all... I kept telling myself that I could start dieting when my class started, AND, since I was going to be dieting soon, I should really eat everything I saw.
So Summer Phase 1 recap: Sims 3 and Preparational Eating
Then I started my first Summer course. Horror Literature with Professor Shaw. Sigh. Professor Shaw. Let's just say that if I were single, and Professor Shaw were single, and I was a little older, and he weren't my professor...... well... still nothing would happened, but I'd still be having fantasies about it. This man was pure golden brilliance and inspiration. I am a total horror buff to the max, and when I walked out of this class the last day, Shaw had me believing I could be the next Mary Shelley.
Speaking of Mary Shelley, we read Frankenstein in the class. I had an absolute love affair with this book. Everything about the book was perfect. I was riveted through and through. 2 thumbs up.
The class was at 8p at night. So my schedule turned into one of the strangest schedules I have ever put myself through. Class at 8p. Home around 10:30-11p. Sims 3 and soap operas until 5-6am. Sleep until 1-2p. Homework until class time. My whole life was kind of backwards. I kinda loved it.
My fiance... we'll call him "Guy." Guy was very busy during this time. He had stupidly loaded up his summer schedule with multiple classes and a 30 hour work week. Sigh. Poor Guy. His life will be more cohesive after the wedding. I'm the brains of the operation.
I remembered that I was supposed to start dieting for this pesky wedding, but with this unusual schedule I had created for myself, it was very challenging to maintain a healthy eating schedule. Besides that, Guy says it's ok to cheat on a diet if you are celebrating something. So we had huge dinners to celebrate the beginning of Summer, the beginning of the Summer semester, Father's day, my 4.0 GPA, booking the venue for our wedding, a belated birthday dinner for me, a day that ends in "y" dinner, tracked down some old friends with summer birthdays........you get the idea.
So, Summer Phase 2 recap: Horror Lit and Celebratory Eating.
The sun set on Horror Lit and and rose on....Biology. Biology? Really, I signed up for Bio? Oh yes I remember now. Biology for Non Science majors. I double check my schedule, because I didn't really pay attention when I registered. This should have been my first omen.
The course was Monday and Wednesday 9am - 12p AND Tue and Thurs 9am-12p AND 1p-4:30p. WHAT....THE...FUDGEPOP. What the hell could I have possibly been thinking?? First, to get to a 9am class, I need to wake up at 7am. This is never a smart thing for me to attempt. Not to mention I'd spent the last month getting up between 1p-2p. Now, forget all that. 20 HOURS A WEEK? 20 hours of BIOLOGY a week??? I must have been smoking incredible crack when I decided to take this class. Oh wait...wait.. I remember... My mother is a High School biology teacher. My reasoning was: I should take bio during the summer (its a required course) because my wonderfully knowledgeable mother will be off from school and will totally be able to help me with (do all of) my assignments. More on that in a bit.
I remember thinking this would be easy breezy because having a mother for a biology teacher, biology is something that has been discussed in my home often since my childhood. I thought by taking it over the summer a lot of the more difficult topics would be edited out, and we'd mostly just skim over stuff in a general kind of way. I never thought in a million years they would take a normal 3 months course load and squish it into 4 weeks. But...guess....what...
It might have been 20 hours of class time a week, but in order to keep your head above water in that devil class you have to put an additional 40 hours into assignments and studying. The low light of the class was when they put a dead pig in front of me and had me slice the thing open and play with its insides. Really? REALLY? In 2009 there isn't some program we can pull up on the computer that will show us piggy insides nice and clear? I was told "Dissection is an experience every person should have." Yes. Yes, its VERY important for every human being on this planet to know the feeling of slicing through flesh. Let's desensitize the youth of America so when they have to cut a bitch they know just how deep to go, and where the jugular is.
Oh and my wonderfully brilliant mom? Yeah. Well, she dissapeared on various vacations most of the time. Wonderful magical places like Oregon, Massachusettes, and Salamanca, NY. (WTF???) And for the second she was home and edited my lab report for me, she got me a 75, which was the lowest grade I have ever recieved in my college career. THANKS MA!
The stress and pressure from this class caused me to do some mega eating. At some point I remembered I was supposed to be dieting, but, now now knowing which part of the brain controls remembering stuff, I ripped out my own cerebrum, slapped it around, screamed "WHEN I'M STRESSED OUT I EAT!" and crammed it down my throat. And then was able to trace its path from bolus to fecal matter. In excruciating detail.
**I'm pretty sure I can also do open heart surgery and decode a strand of DNA in 23.4 seconds.
SO. Summer Phase 3 recap: Why God why?? and Stress Eating
Finally the last week of Summer came. Guy and I decided to get away a bit and went to the house his family owns in PeacefulTown, USA. We relaxed, we slept, and we ate. ALOT. We were celebrating the end of summer.
Summer Phase 4: Too Fast.
So now I'm back in school, and from what I can tell it's going to be an interesting semester. I'm excited to finally be back to a normal routine. I never saw a beach. I never went to an amusement park. I never even really saw the sun.
BUT: I walked away from summer having added 8 more credits towards my degree, 2 MORE A's, AND somehow...SOMEHOW.... I lost 18LBS. I'll call that a successful summer!
