Bit of Ivory

That’s what this week has felt like. Just keep swimming, it’ll all be over eventually. What I really need is a nice vacation, but it ain’t happening. BYU, for some reason I will never fully fathom, does not have spring break. The only holidays we get in winter semester are for Martin Luther King day and President’s Day. True, we get out for the summer earlier than all the other schools in Utah, but in most cases I’d rather have the mid-semester break. Oh, well.

In any case, between school and work and root canals, I became overwhelmed last week. I was assigned another 1000-page novel in my Victorian lit class (The Pillars of the House by Charlotte Yonge), 4 chapters of The Road to Middle Earth for my Arthurian Tolkien class, and had a paper due in said Tolkien class on Friday. I’d done my best to budget my time to accomplish all of these, but There ended up being simply too little time in the week. With almost no dilly-dallying other than a couple of odd half-hours, I still managed not to finish the novel though I stayed up till 2:30 the night before it was due in the attempt, and had to get an extension on my paper. I hate getting extensions; I hadn’t had to ask for one since I was in high school and got bronchitis over spring break when I’d planned on writing a research paper. There was no other choice, however; it was Friday, that paper hadn’t even been started, and my teeth hurt.

They still do, actually. I think if the root canal had been anywhere but on my front tooth that serves as one end of a bridge, it would have felt better by now. As it is, it gets bothered too much. I’ve been popping ibuprofen along with my antibiotic. If it doesn’t improve by Wednesday I’m going to call again. It’s quite annoying. The root canal was supposed to make it stop hurting, not the other way around.

Friday night we had a family Looney Tunes party at my uncle’s. It’s always more fun to watch cartoons with a large group of people who have the same twisted sense of humor. We saw lots of good ones– “Rabbit Seasoning” (would you like to shoot me now, or wait till you get home?), and “The Rabbit of Seville” (Don’t look so perplexed, why must you be vexed, can’t you see you’re next?) and “One Froggy Evening” (Hello my baby, hello my honey, hello my ragtime gal) and “A Bear for Punishment” (G-U-N P-O-W-D-E-R. Duh. . . tobacco! I am a good speller, I am! C-A-T: dog. B-A-T: Rhode Island) and many more. Much fun was had by all. My stomach hurt the next day from laughing too hard. We watched cartoons for a good 3 hours and didn’t get to half the good cartoons. It’s obvious we must have another installment.

Another great thing to happen this weekend: I have the new Real Group CD!!

*dances*

I know I’ve raved about The Real Group before, but really, folks, you’ll never hear anything like these 5 Swedish singers. Their newest album, The Middle of Life is one of their best yet. I’m completely in love with several tracks. Like Words. And Spring is Coming. And Are You Coming to Me?. And The Grass is Greener. And The Perfect Life. And. . . oh, heck. The whole CD is amazing. And best of all, it’s all in English. Not that I don’t like their Swedish stuff, even though I can’t understand a word. I could listen to R??ster all day, especially as it was my very first introduction to The Real Group, even though I have no better idea of what they’re saying now than I did when I first heard Pippi Langstrump-Potpurri (other thn the fact that it’s about Pippi Longstocking) back when I was 16. Maybe I could get to teach me Swedish.

Anyway, if you ever feel like broadening your musical horizons, check out The Real Group. You can order all their CD’s (except the Asian imports)through Primarily A Capella here in the states, or some of their stuff is available on Amazon.

*walks away singing “words, a letter and a letter on a string”*