Snowdogs and Schoolwork

And then I blinked, and December was nearly halfway over.

I think I just need to get a handle on my schedule, because I will sit down and type if someone reminds me to do it, but if I get distracted, then, well... I tend to lose focus completely. With so much going on (getting excited about the holidays, having your teachers drown you in homework before said holidays, etc.), it's really hard to keep a straight head. However, we are entering the last week of school before break (!!!), and even our teachers are starting to have a hard time keeping it together. Cases in point: Spanish teacher, who, after our presentations are turned in on Wednesday, is going to let us watch Toy Story 3 (in Spanish), and Journalism teacher, who, after our newspaper goes out on Wednesday, has pretty much said we could do whatever we want for the rest of the week. Granted, the rest of the week is onlly 1.5 days, but still. We'll take freedom whenever we can get it.

Speaking of freedom, I'm practically loose of the first Reading Assignment (Book) of the year: after 24 dialectic journal book logs, four papers, and two in-class timed essays, I am only one peer-edit away from the Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Not that it was terrible, or anything, but I just really didn't enjoy it as much as I have enjoyed other school-mandated books. I was especially surprised to hear that some of my classmates enjoyed this book more than Jane Eyre, seeing as though Jane Eyre is one of my favorite books ever, and this one barely piqued my interest. I really didn't enjoy having to mark out every inch of symbolism, rhetoric, and progression of character for every single plot point for either of them, but with the Scarlet Letter, it was just a little more... irritating, I guess. At any rate, I scored better on all of my papers for the Scarlet Letter than for Jane Eyre, so while it did nothing for my soul, it did improve my grade, for which I am thankful. :)

While school has inspired me to avoid Puritan villages (c.1800s) at all cost, our current weather statuses have inspired me to read a little about the Klondike. The snow we experienced late last month gave me reason to read Call of the Wild by Jack London. This book, I really loved. I don't usually like animal books (except for The Jungle Book, by Rudyard Kipling), so the fact that I found this tale of a family dog's kidnapping, and immersion into the hard snowdog life, inspiring, is surprising. I liked how Buck's sort of final transformation into a creature of the wild, and reversion into his natural self, is triumphant and celebrated, when in society, acting "like an animal" is frowned upon. Buck was once a family dog, petted, pampered, and pretty tame, but all of a sudden, he is thrust into this world he knows nothing about, and he has to learn all the new rules to survival, the Laws of Club and Fang. However, instead of his growing aggressive nature and strength attracting negative light, he is viewed heroically, and all he does is viewed sympathetically. I really liked this book, and I'm going to read White Fang soon.

And so the Christmas season is upon us. I finally finished my Wish List, and holiday cookies are baking in the oven. The candy cane trees are in full bloom, and sugarplum fairies are beginning to swarm. :) Only 4.5 days until I get out of school for break, but hey, who's counting?