Almost Finals Week

Today is the last day of classes this semester. Next week is finals, and then it's winter break. That's so hard to believe. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited for winter break, but this semester flew by. It honestly doesn't feel like it should be this late in the year, but the fact that it's supposed to snow tonight has me convinced that it really is.

Tomorrow is what my university calls reading day where we get a day off from classes in order to study before finals. Maybe other colleges and universities have it too, but I don't think it's a universal thing from talking to my friends. It's nice though because a lot of people use it as a day to relax before starting the studying and final madness. I usually study but not the whole day, so I still get some time to relax before everything becomes about finals.

I honestly don't think my finals will be too bad this year. For one of my classes, we're just turning in a portfolio and not even having an actual test for a final. I don't have a ton of work in order to complete the portfolio (our professor purposefully made it a somewhat easier portfolio since it's finals time), so that shouldn't take too much time. Other than that, I have three other finals. Two of them I'm not really worried about at all, although I know one of them will kill my hands. Our adolescent literature final is entirely essays. Our midterm was five essays, so I'm assuming this one will be too. I'm not really worried about writing the essays, but I'm sure my hand will be aching just like last time.

The only final that I'm a bit worried about is humanities. I've done well in that class all year, but each test has been a ton of information to remember. Now I have to remember the information from every single test for the final. The music and art professor always want us to remember composers and artists names, and I'm always struggling with that. I can remember information fine, but I need context or something. I don't have that with artists or composers names. It's even worse when it's the Greek or Roman names. The vast majority of the time I just cannot remember them, and those are typically the questions that I get wrong on tests. Now I'm expected to remember the names from the entire semester, and I can tell you right now that it's going to be a disaster. I'm just hoping that it's not a huge portion of the test or that I can remember enough to make up for it.

Seeing One Direction in Chicago and Finals

I got One Direction tickets yesterday! I'm officially seeing them in Chicago with my sister Regina and best friend Haley. I've actually never been to Chicago before. Regina and I are both going to school in Indianapolis, so Chicago was the closest show to us. However, we're from southern Indiana, which is relatively far away from Indianapolis, let alone Chicago. It'll be fun to finally see Chicago, especially since it will be the largest city I've ever been to. That doesn't overshadow the fact that I will be seeing One Direction though! That's still what I'm the most excited for above everything else.

School is less stressful than you would expect the week before finals. My professors made the large majority of our papers and projects due before Thanksgiving, so nothing huge is happening now other than studying for next week. I also have a humanities test today, although I'm not really sure why they want to give us a test in our last class before our final. Nothing I can do about it though. It shouldn't be that bad.

Overall, I don't think the remainder of the semester will get that stressful. Maybe I'll change my mind next week, but there's really only one final that I'm worried about at all. For the most part, I'm pretty confident that I'll do decently, so I don't really feel stressed. I hope it stays that way.

HIMYM Review: Season 9 Episodes 10, 11, and 12

It's been far too long since I last reviewed How I Met Your Mother, so I'm just going to review three episodes as once. We're at the midseason break though, so by the time episodes come back, I should be all caught up again.

I'll start with episode ten "Mom and Dad." This episode was basically Barney and James each trying to get their mom back together with their dads. I honestly wasn't a big fan of how that played out to be quite honest. I got why James and Barney were both trying, and I liked that Barney had to learn how to deal with the fact that his parents weren't getting back together. I'm just not sure if I liked the fact that James' dad really did get back together with their mom. I think I would have prefered if both James and Barney had to deal with the fact that their mom and dads had moved on. Still, overall I thought it was a fun storyline, and I liked Barney coming to terms with it.

Billy Zabka also tries to "sabotage" Ted as best man in this episode. I thought it was amusing when he went on about how everyone always viewed him as a villain. It was a bit exaggerated, but amusing all the same. I thought it was nice how Ted felt sorry for him and let him take credit for getting the signed picture, but I'm also happy that Barney didn't make Billy his best man again.

I thought it was absolutely adorable how Marshall convinced Daphne to go see her daughter speak. I loved that storyline. This episode also marked the end of their road trip together. Now let's see how many episodes it takes Marshall to actually get there from here.

I was really interested in seeing "Bedtime Stories" before it aired since the episode was going to be all in rhyme. It was really cool to see them pull it off too, and I thought it was done very well. Not much really happened in this episode, but I feel as if the rhyming itself made it worth watching. It was a fun thing to do. I liked how they did it through Marshall telling Marvin a bedtime story, and then we got various flashbacks that made up the episode. Even if not much happened, I enjoyed the episode.

I loved the episode "Rehearsal Dinner" overall. Barney is really good at pulling tricks on people, and while I don't really like it a lot of the time, I also thought the end of this one was cute. It would probably annoy me more if he hadn't told Robin that he would lie to her sometimes but only to surprise her (only worded better than that). It kind of bugs me that he got her to the point of tears before revealing the truth to her, but I'll look past that.

Lily also reveals that Marshall took the judgeship to Ted and Robin, and I'm happy that Robin stops then to tell Lily that she has time for her drama. I enjoy little friendship moments like that. The issue still wasn't really addressed, but I'm glad that it was at least mentioned.

The Canada praise at the end of this episode also made me really happy. HIMYM has made fun of Canada for basically the entire course of the show, and it always made me feel a little uncomfortable. Not because I have any particular attachment to Canada, but just because I felt it was unnecessary a lot of the time. It was nice to see them turn that around in the last season and have Barney praising Canada for a change. That along with the entire cuteness of the ending made the episode a good one in my opinion.

I'm not really sure when new episodes start again, but whenever that is, I will see you guys again with HIMYM reviews.

Buying One Direction TIckets

Today is the day I buy One Direction tickets, and I currently have a little more than half an hour. I'm freaking out so much. I'm scared the site will crash because so many people are on or they'll sell out or who knows what else. I seriously can't do anything else because that's all I can think about. It's a miracle I'm even writing this. I'm freaking out so much that typing is hard.

Hopefully buying them goes smoothly, and I have them before my first class. Then I can go through the rest of the day on a high of knowing I have One Direction tickets and my stress will finally be gone. Seriously. Finals are next week, and I haven't thought about those at all because these tickets have taken up every ounce of stress that I possess. I don't think I can focus on studying until I've bought tickets. So here's hoping for the best.

A Late Start Throws Me Off

The first day of classes after a break always feel a bit off. Today was even worse because I forgot to reset my alarm clock and woke up an hour later than normal. Somehow I managed to get dressed in seven minutes and make it to class on time, but I was still half asleep when I got there. It wasn't the ideal way to start a day.

It's also weird coming back and having one week of lectures before finals. It also feels right though because I can definitely tell that it's the end of the semester. I'm excited to get through it and get to winter break. At this point, I'm done with basically every project, and I just have a lot of studying to do for finals. Right now though I have less than half an hour before the new episode of How I Met Your Mother comes on, and I want to go finish up editing my last paper of the semester.