Week Forty-Two: The Circus!

Week Forty-Two

Oh the things I have seen! Oh wait. You want me to tell you astounding things now? You're so silly! I've been doing semi-midterms.

I say semi-midterms, because my classes all calls them the 'First Summative Exam' and the middle of the term is six weeks, not four, or five. Two classes had multiple choice questions, and the final had a paper, that could be on any one learning objective, but had to display information from previous chapters. I think I did okay, over all.

All three had them around the same time however. Is it, or is it not a midterm?

I have no clue.

Maybe its a third term? Four weeks is a third, so it's possible? Who knows!

All I know is that my books are FINALLY all in, so studying got so much easier. It's so much easier understanding what's going on when you have the correct source material.

Then this week, I had some mid-terms and in one course I have a mid-term and a first summative exam? So. Confused. And in one course I had neither, and the other just the first summative nonsense. My spell checker doesn't even count summative as a word! Good Lord.

Oh Lordy, Valentine's Day was this past week wasn't it? Yes, it was, on Tuesday. I could go on and on about Valentine's Day...but I won't. It's a silly thing to do. I received chocolates and candies from my family. The next day (because I really don't celebrate the holiday) I bought them chocolates.

Plus, it was already on sale, so they could get more than a chocolate bar, and yes, otherwise they would have all gotten chocolate bars.

It's just not a big holiday to me. Sorry.

Anyway, this Monday was President's Day! Or some form of national holiday where in everyone gets the day off but minimum wage workers who work regardless. To celebrate, we were going to go skiing, but the night before, the decision was made to nix the skiing and go to the parade. Then is was determined that the parade was too early in the day and too far away to be worth it.

We really should have stuck to the skiing. Instead, we went to a carnival. Why the parade and carnival? The words Rose and Fasching get passed around a lot, but the sum of it was that Monday and Tuesday were both German holidays of some sort, though not state holidays, so far as I could tell.

Oh, oh, but the really super exciting thing that happened was seeing Cirque Du Soliel's Jungle Dreams!

Okay, I know it's just a circus, but this was Cirque Du Soliel, and it's so amazing watching them perform. I'm so glad we got the chance! There were clowns of course, and they were hilarious. They had a lot of audience participation in their acts, but we were all too far back to be chosen.

There were acrobats, and so much spinning going on. My favorite act was when this man was in mid air, holding onto fabric attached to the chain that pulled him up. He was going up and down the fabric, and he started and ended the act with the fabric flowing behind him. The pattern on it was reminiscent of a dragonfly's wings and it was gorgeous and awe inspiring. He had the fabric wrapped around his arms at one point, and then tumbled down it rapidly. My heart was in my chest, convinced that he was going to fall. He caught himself though.

Then there was the act where this man tumbled about in, no joke, a giant hoop, moving around the stage through the power of momentum alone it seemed. It was amazing, because he used the hoop to do tricks in, and somehow stayed in it. I have no clue how he managed it.

There was a contortionist too, and this lady with a slinky worth of hula hoops. Oh, and there was this lady singing who was the ring master and she had the prettiest voice. It was a beautiful act, I don't think I can quite convey it in words. The colors, the sights, the sounds!

The only problem I had was that people in the audience down front kept standing up. I ended up standing up on the side the entire time so I could see. I mean, I understand your toddler standing, but you? So rude!

Most of the kids I saw there weren't very interested in the show besides. Some of them were, but most seemed bored. Not bright enough, colorful enough or silly enough for them I suppose. It was more of a stage show with circus acts than what most consider a traditional circus anyway.

Amusingly enough, I must have good timing on ordering glasses. While my new glasses are still processing, I managed to chip the lens on one and break the arm of my glasses. Then on Tuesday, I chipped the bottom of the other lens, and the arm broke off...again.

Phooey. Absolutely phooey. I really hope the new glasses come in soon. Having broken lenses is very distracting, even if the chip is at the very bottom. I might just order another pair of glasses, specifically for work, since they are so inexpensive.

Either way, considering how quickly I scratched up my last pair, I'm surprised this pair lasted so long!

Also, apparently the technology of our menu screens at work isn't perfect. It went down last night! We did figure it out though, and it got back up. The problem was, I believe, finding out the controls to restart the 'movie' of our menu.

One Final Byte: Plans seem to change an awful lot here.