Four and a Half Weeks

That's all I have left in this summer break, and very little academic work to show for it. Yes, I spent a lot of time recovering my good health. Yes, I needed to relax. But it's probably time to kick my own butt again.

I started by ridding myself of Tumblr and Twitter. I did so because I realized two things in relation to those media sites.

Twitter realization: no one cares what's happening to me in 140 characters or less. If Tina Fey doesn't tweet, neither should I.

Tumblr realization: I realized instead of spending so much time re-blogging quotes about how I love to read, I should probably just be reading instead.

With those distractions out of the way,  my academic goals for the next month are:

1. Read all of "Will in the World". Take notes.
2. Read "Love's Labour's Lost". Take notes.
3. Read all of "A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599". Take notes.
4. Work on my "Cuddleslut" piece.
5. Pour over Aristotle's Poetics again. Take more notes.
6. Read a couple more Marjorie Garber essays.

These are modest goals, I just need to take them as seriously as the movies we've been making at camp. Considering most of the movies involve cows, this shouldn't be too hard.

But alack, it's always harder than it should be. Especially if your boyfriend just got a Hulu Plus account, and all you want to do is watch the first season of Once Upon a Time.

...And it's now been a month. Excellent.

Oops.

I've been meaning to write in this thing for a month straight - but lots of things got in the way.

First, I was reading. I finished a book recommended by one of my Plan sponsors - "The Tragedy of Arthur". I found it quite enjoyable except for the actual play it contained, which was just really boring, if authentic. It was helpful because it told me what NOT to do when I write my Shakespeare/reality crossover piece: don't try to write a fake Shakespeare play. Even if it's accurate, it probably won't be as good as Shakespeare's. Now I'm reading a couple things at once, which is a terrible idea.

Health stuff. I don't even want to think about how many times I've been to the doctor's in the last month. During my last visit, I joked to my regular M. D. that I might be becoming a hypochondriac. He replied, very seriously, "Well, that could be a possibility." I felt shame.

Tower. Even working half-day, it's still a tough job teaching Video to kids. Hopefully the next four weeks won't be as time-consuming, as they'll be specialty camp and won't require as much editing.

Boyfriend. He's across the country. He should just hurry up and get back here, because it's distracting to miss him.

Gym. Despite the health problems, I can FINALLY RUN AGAIN!!!!!!!! It's only about a mile a day right now, but it still feels amazing.

Cats. Cats take up so much of my time. I don't know why, but it seems to be an all-consuming thing.

So my Plan update is this -

I finished Tragedy of Arthur. I watched a movie called "Stage Beauty" about the first woman actor who played Desdemona. I've read bits and pieces of "Will in the World" and "A Year in Life of William Shakespeare, 1599". I've stared at my fiction writing from last semester, terrified myself, and closed the document. I contacted my interim fiction writing Plan sponsor for next year.

AKA, not nearly enough. Ugh. I miss Marlboro and the focus it provides.