![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
uni, classes, life update
It's such a gorgeous day outside. The wind is blowing in strong gusts, sending the trees and leaves flying, and thick, white clouds scuttling across the blue sky. It really feels like autumn even if the leaves are only just turning. I was so entranced by the weather that I decided to walk the couple of miles from the campus where I park to the campus where I have classes, and I didn't regret it. The view out over the Raritan river was gorgeous, though I got a lot of weird looks from bikers who'd apparently never seen anyone walking the paths (I don't see why. it's not that long a walk).
I gave two weeks notice on my job on Monday, pointing out that spending 4 hours commuting (plus extra hours sleeping to make up for my early shift on monday) for only 6 hours of work was not time efficient especially now that I have to start phd applications. It was accepted and I think he appreciated that I gave him notice and didn't just quit without warning. I'm counting down the hours, but first have to suffer through waking up at 5am on Monday cause the shift has been changed to 6:20am from 7 (gah!). I'm glad this is the only time I'm ever going to have to do it. Meanwhile, I've been trying to figure out how to get a paycheck for the work I've done, and will hopefully get a check on Fri. *fingers crossed*
Currently, my Spanish 101 grade is 100% cause I aced the quizzes and tests. I'm trying not to let it make me cocky since I'm sure the tests will eventually get harder (it helps that he forgives a few grammar/spelling mistakes whereas I get penalized for every one in Japanese). Japanese, I've been working on drilling te form into my head since that seems to be the root of about half of my spelling problems. I'm using online quizzes to constantly drill them in the hopes that it will just become automatic. Can't do anything about the dyslexia or the katakana words I don't know, but I can fix the te form problem. I was so tired for the lesson test on Tuesday that I just wrote nearly everything in hiragana (the teacher doesn't care, but I try to write all the kanji I know whenever possible), then went home and took a nap. Monday was really tiring for me even if I didn't go to bujinkan. I had a one time class on how to learn accents for stage and theatre. She taught us the tools, ie, what to listen and feel for if you wanted to learn or imitate an accent. It was really interesting and the time just flew by, but that was probably because I'd given in and had a cup of tea with caffeine earlier (and suffered the headache for it later). The teacher said she rarely met anyone who pronounces all their 't's like I do. Belly dancing is also going well, but I'm going to have to skip it next week if I want to survive since the earlier wake up time that day will kill me. We've already learnt every basic and quite a few advanced steps in belly dancing anyway since we learn a lot faster than the teacher's adult classes. I can't say I look all that good belly dancing, but it's damn good exercise. It's a pity it really seems to put a strain on my already strained knee ligament *sigh*
My book got rejected by an agent again. Same story really. The writing's fine, but they didn't fall in love with it. This one in particular didn't think it was that funny, but considering how subjective that is and that he's american, it doesn't really surprise me. I wish there were a way of checking what sort of sense of humour an agent has before you send something cause I don't think I'm going to get evil overlord accepted by anyone who doesn't have a British/morbid sense of humour. Looks like it's time to start submitting the book in the UK. You guys wouldn't happen to have any suggestions for agents or agencies in the UK, would you?
Meanwhile, I finally finished the third chapter of Uric, and all the main characters have been introduced and are tentative friends at this point. The next couple of chapters deal with bullying, classes, Uric being weird, and subtle killing/kidnapping attempts. I'm just not sure in which order I should throw them all together. I'm being rather free form at this point.
Reading wise, I'm reading Daemons are Forever (the sequel to The Man with the Golden Torc) by Simon R. Green, though it reads less like a Bond fantasy novel and more like a Hellblazer/Lovecraft story that drags on a bit. What it's really done is driven me to consider rereading the Dresden Files. It's a pity I don't own all the books though cause reading them on my comp isn't half as much fun as taking them with me places.
And that's it for this update. I'm going to enjoy my pumpkin spice creme (courtesy of a gift card to starbucks from a grateful mother of a kid I taught over the summer) and do the million other things I need to do before I leave for bujinkan. Ja ne!
I gave two weeks notice on my job on Monday, pointing out that spending 4 hours commuting (plus extra hours sleeping to make up for my early shift on monday) for only 6 hours of work was not time efficient especially now that I have to start phd applications. It was accepted and I think he appreciated that I gave him notice and didn't just quit without warning. I'm counting down the hours, but first have to suffer through waking up at 5am on Monday cause the shift has been changed to 6:20am from 7 (gah!). I'm glad this is the only time I'm ever going to have to do it. Meanwhile, I've been trying to figure out how to get a paycheck for the work I've done, and will hopefully get a check on Fri. *fingers crossed*
Currently, my Spanish 101 grade is 100% cause I aced the quizzes and tests. I'm trying not to let it make me cocky since I'm sure the tests will eventually get harder (it helps that he forgives a few grammar/spelling mistakes whereas I get penalized for every one in Japanese). Japanese, I've been working on drilling te form into my head since that seems to be the root of about half of my spelling problems. I'm using online quizzes to constantly drill them in the hopes that it will just become automatic. Can't do anything about the dyslexia or the katakana words I don't know, but I can fix the te form problem. I was so tired for the lesson test on Tuesday that I just wrote nearly everything in hiragana (the teacher doesn't care, but I try to write all the kanji I know whenever possible), then went home and took a nap. Monday was really tiring for me even if I didn't go to bujinkan. I had a one time class on how to learn accents for stage and theatre. She taught us the tools, ie, what to listen and feel for if you wanted to learn or imitate an accent. It was really interesting and the time just flew by, but that was probably because I'd given in and had a cup of tea with caffeine earlier (and suffered the headache for it later). The teacher said she rarely met anyone who pronounces all their 't's like I do. Belly dancing is also going well, but I'm going to have to skip it next week if I want to survive since the earlier wake up time that day will kill me. We've already learnt every basic and quite a few advanced steps in belly dancing anyway since we learn a lot faster than the teacher's adult classes. I can't say I look all that good belly dancing, but it's damn good exercise. It's a pity it really seems to put a strain on my already strained knee ligament *sigh*
My book got rejected by an agent again. Same story really. The writing's fine, but they didn't fall in love with it. This one in particular didn't think it was that funny, but considering how subjective that is and that he's american, it doesn't really surprise me. I wish there were a way of checking what sort of sense of humour an agent has before you send something cause I don't think I'm going to get evil overlord accepted by anyone who doesn't have a British/morbid sense of humour. Looks like it's time to start submitting the book in the UK. You guys wouldn't happen to have any suggestions for agents or agencies in the UK, would you?
Meanwhile, I finally finished the third chapter of Uric, and all the main characters have been introduced and are tentative friends at this point. The next couple of chapters deal with bullying, classes, Uric being weird, and subtle killing/kidnapping attempts. I'm just not sure in which order I should throw them all together. I'm being rather free form at this point.
Reading wise, I'm reading Daemons are Forever (the sequel to The Man with the Golden Torc) by Simon R. Green, though it reads less like a Bond fantasy novel and more like a Hellblazer/Lovecraft story that drags on a bit. What it's really done is driven me to consider rereading the Dresden Files. It's a pity I don't own all the books though cause reading them on my comp isn't half as much fun as taking them with me places.
And that's it for this update. I'm going to enjoy my pumpkin spice creme (courtesy of a gift card to starbucks from a grateful mother of a kid I taught over the summer) and do the million other things I need to do before I leave for bujinkan. Ja ne!