Whoops.

Apparently my last post was a month an a half ago...oops. I apologize for this, especially for you multitudes that hang on my every word. How have you survived?

I actually see this as a good thing, because I seem to write and ponder more when I have less to do; reciprocally, when my life speeds up, I don't spend so much time whining into the endless echoing chambers of the Internet. What I'm trying to say is...I've kind of actually been busy. Yay!

So, we have a few things to catch up on. First, you haven't heard at all about Amsterdam, which was the first weekend in March; I'll try to get some pictures and a summary up soon. Also, the Berlin conference and our weekend out in Leipzig/Dresden, two weekends later. I've made new friends, started new classes, enjoyed new weather patterns, and sunk deeper into a rut of agonizing indecision about what to do with my life...but more on that later.

For now, I'll talk about the last couple weeks, which have been wonderfully exciting. This is mainly because classes at Jena have started up again after a long month of nothingness. As usual, I was overambitious and tried to take too many, but now I've settled on four: Language and Cognition; Spanish, second year; a Tolkien seminar; and Sociolinguistics.

If any of you just went "LOL, Tolkien seminar," you should know there is an epic story behind this, and it goes back to two years ago in Marburg. I studied for half a year in Marburg as an exchange student, and while I was there, I took a delightful seminar about Lord of the Rings with a wonderful professor named Alan Turner. Dr Turner is one of those people who is just so English--he and Stephen Fry are my archetypes of well-spoken Englishmen. Anyway, the seminar was great, but as Shannon or other people who knew me after I got back from Marburg can tell you, it took me ages to finish writing the paper from that class.

Last week, I had my first class in Spanish. I mentioned that I was American (always a useful thing to do) and one of my classmates invited me to the English conversation group that evening. I met her and her sister for dinner--two very kind young ladies who have both spent time as au pairs in the US--and we went to a small bar to meet a surprising number of enthusiastically chattering students and professors. As a side note, it's such a relief to meet students who are enthusiastic and excited about speaking English; I feel like the apathy in Stadtroda is sinking into my bones. Anyway, imagine my surprise as I'm sitting there enjoying speaking with my new friends when Alan Turner comes in the door! I couldn't help bursting out with "I know you!" in sheer excitement, which I think startled him a bit, but he told me he was giving another Tolkien seminar, and of course I couldn't resist. We're doing The Hobbit and some of Tolkien's minor works, which is a nice change.

As I mentioned, I've started with Spanish again, at least a bit. I feel bad that I've abandoned my Spanish to slowly rot away, so I'm trying to salvage what I can and build it back up again. Although the class is not very helpful--the teacher seems content to just do the textbook exercises, one after another--I have met some new friends, and I get to hear and read and try to speak the language again, which is painful and embarrassing but definitely good for me. The problem is that my brain's default non-English language is now German, so I keep trying to speak Spanish with German grammar...

I mentioned the weather, as well. It's been getting nicer and nicer, warmer and sunnier and brighter, and the flowers are coming up and the wind is warm and it's getting altogether better and more enjoyable to live here. I'm looking forward now, especially that I have only 2-4 classes a week, to exploring more and more of Thüringen's beautiful rolling green hills. We'll see.

Anyway, I'll try to catch up soon. I have so much to acquaint you with!