calm before the storm

I HEAR THUNDERSTORM APPROACHING AND DO NOT WANT TO DO WORK. ...It's not actually raining. But there is a persistent rumble of thunder (or, I don't know, a hungry giant in the sky or something) and it makes me so pumped for notstudying. Cries.

Hey look, we're down to single-digits in the pre-paper-1 countdown WOOOO. In roughly three weeks it'll be over. For me. Heh. Woooooo.

Comicrastination: visual proof

this is what I'm doing with my time now, whhyyyyyyy--

sooooo studious...

Essay scaffoldy things I should/need to do:
1. causes of Détente
2. causes of Great Depression
3. something on US foreign policy
4. assessment of New Deal
5. ...multiple disgusting Gorby Part B questions...
6. origins of Cold War
7. reasons for end of Cold War

so glad Mod is on 1 November.

-
13:40 I am finding it difficult to write the Great Depression scaffold. Am doing causes of détente scaffold instead.
1:45 started drawing a comic this morning. it's fun. ...best timing ever, right? it's... experimental. i haven't got a plot outline or character profiles or anything written out, i don't know where the story's going ... only vague ideas in my head. but it's fun! ...and will hopefully trigger an improvement in drawing skills / diversification in subject matter, e.g. backgrounds/architecture
1:47 it's 1:47 now and ... eurgh scaffold. eurgh work.
1:50 -yawn- i have an intro. like, a longhand intro.
1:51 it's amazing/expected/awesome how much better songs sound when sung in their original languages ahhh ~
2:02 two out of five dotpoints scaffolded
2:55 Treaty of Moscow was between West Germany and USSR... essentially a non-aggression pact which recognised the Oder-Neisse Line as the border between Germany and Poland
3:01 buhhhhh tired.

hey 3-4 outta 5 ain't all bad...

So my last post had that to-do list which I was meant to do in the 5 remaining days of September or something. LET US EXAMINE HOW SUCCESSFUL I HAVE BEEN because I really have such an exciting life that I blog about revision goals.

1. CW: Détente notes
I did ... most of this. Didn't do reasons for failure / consequences for Cold War. What WERE the consequences of détente for the Cold War? ...a bunch of arms control agreements? Supposedly allowed Soviets to keep arms parity with US? .'. engendered upsurge of bitterness/conservatism in the US which led to start of 'Second Cold War'? ...oh yeah END OF BIPOLARITY for good ... or something. Bc a feature of détente was the US/China rapprochement ... or something.

2. CW: Renewal/End notes
SUCCESS! ...reading about the end of the Cold War and all those agreements between Gorby and Reagan/Bush actually makes me happy. Yes, disarmament agreements make me happy. The Treaty of Paris and START I makes me happy.

3. Bio: complete all syllabus notes
SUCCESSSSS WOOOOO. ...I only had to do like 8 dotpoint notes in order to achieve this. Because I had most of my notes already. ...However there are maybe 2 dotpoints or so that require elaboration ... and/or completion I think. Something about ... linked genes ... I hate linked genes.

4. read TJG Afterword [+notes?]
Read the afterword, didn't make notes on it. Heh.

5. Gorby: Historical Context
Didn't really do this at all but I suppose by making détente and renewal/end notes I kiiiinda did this already. Sorta. Maybe. Heh.

-
I will now write an essay scaffold for causes of the Great Depression and I will have it completed by 2PM. Yes. Totally.

Wake me up when September ends (:

Not wake up. But whatever.
A'RIGHT here's a list of things which I would ideally like to complete before September ends and there is a high chance I won't be able to do it all but there is also the chance that the imminence of this self-set deadline will result in a mad burst of productivity. So here goes ...

1. CW: Détente notes
2. CW: Renewal/End notes
3. Bio: complete all syllabus notes
4. read TJG Afterword [+notes?]
5. Gorby: Historical Context

Okay that's it for definite things that can easily be put into clear-cut to-do-list dotpoints... but there is other important stuff! ...that will probably/definitely not all get done this September. But anyway..

English Advanced
- find another Mod C related text
- detailed notes on 3 TJG chapters, sparse stuff on others
- a couple really really good supplementary texts ... GAHHHH still do not have any rocksolid ones what IS THIS
- reread The Namesake + notes
- reread Hamlet + notes
- reread Donne + notes
- reread W;t + notes

English Extension 1
- rewatch Lost in Translation + notes
- refamiliarise self with The Shipping News / notes
- lolololol figure out how to connect Heaney with NavGlob? HAHAHA
- ...creatives, CRAPPPP


THINGS THAT I MUST DO
- at least 2 ModHist past papers in exam conditions
- ditto Modules
- ditto Extension German!!
- and Continuers German.

...okay gonna stop writing this before it gets way too overly-ambitious hahahha

you saw this cominggg... well, you should've

WOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
-spins around in circles-
-crashes into something-
-falls, cursing violently-
-gets back up-

WOOOOOOOO FOUR UNIT IS OVER HAHAHAHHAAAAAA

-

Funnily enough though that's not my dominant/only emotion about the thing. I kinda feel like I've let my baby out into the big bad world ... of some BoS marking centre. Yes I have actually grown attached to my 4U Eng major work in these past few days, despite going through massive periods of hate/etc.

HEHEEE

-

Okay okay focus, do work, etc. Also, gotten 3 out of my 9 trial exams back.

So focussed ... just not on the HSC

I'm really really good at spending time/effort on productive tasks that would be awesome [e.g. drawing] if I didn't have FAR MORE PRESSING TASKS that I had to do [e.g. FREAKING FOUR UNIT ENGLISH]. And yes, post-trials bludge time officially over. The nail in the coffin of détente fun bludgery that I could undertake without feeling too guilty ... the nail being the ... four-unit lesson yesterday. Not that that's a bad thing. Just that, like, now I need to start doing work again and it's ...


not as fun as vegetating? Actually, I don't think the immediate post-trials vegetating was actually that good because I was still in a slump from trials-induced-exhaustion/lethargy or something. But yeah.

Thirsty.

US foreign policy woooooot

D:
OKAY LET US BEGIN

isolationist thingers
- refusal to ratify Treaty of Versailles; refusal to join League of Nations (Congress pwns Wilson)
- refusal to join World Court throughout 20s and 30s (despite having lots of support from Coolidge/FDR/mostofthepress/unions - blocked by Senate Foreign Relations Committee; influence of strongly isolationist Senators such as Huey Long, as well as Hearst-owned press)
- 1921 Emergency Tariff Act (resp to domestic pressures from ailing ag industry)
- 1922 Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act (ditto above)
- 1930 Hawley-Smoot Tariff which was part of ...
- retreat from world during Great Depression (screw off, we have our own domestic problems to deal with)
- 1933 World Economic Conference: FDR 'no we're not cooperating with you we're doing our own thing'
- 1935 Neutrality Act banned sale of munitions to belligerent nations
- 1936 Neutrality Act banned loans to belligerents
- 1937 Neutrality Act expanded previous acts' provisions to include civil war (thanks to Spanish Civil War, which started in 1936??); banned US citizens from travelling on belligerent ships; cash and carry
- 1937 Gallup poll shows that 97% of USians think foreing policy should be geared toward staying out of wars instead of helping them break out in first place
- 1938 Ludlow Amendment ALMOST PASSED in Congress (decision to participate in war decided by popular referendem instead of by president)

not isolationist! ish
- 1921-22 Washington Disarmament Conferences ... OMFG
---four power treaty (us/uk/brit/jap); maintain status quo in pacific, confer with other nations in event of one nation being aggressive in that area
---five power treaty (us/uk/brit/jap/ita); limit tonnage of navies
---nine power treaty; established open door policies RE China as international law; USA worried about China being colonised; but recognised Japan's particular interest in Manchuria
------ BUT these treaties were all toothless with no power of sanctions against defaulting signatories, so ner. evidence of vaguely isolationist thing still? and this goes also for:
- 1928 Kellogg-Briand Pact: renounced war as method of settling international disputes, tis for self-defence only - toothless, shown by US lack of action when Japan invaded Manchuria 1931
- 1924 Dawes Plan and 1929 Young Plan; reparations repayment plans for Germany offering scaled down reps and a $250m loan??? in Dawes; Young got killed by Great Crash/Depression
- 1934 Import-Export Bank providing loans to foreigners wishing to buy US products
- 1934 Reciprocal Trade Agreements whereby tariffs are reduced 50% for 'most favoured nations'
---above two: Cordell Hull recognising crappiness of tariffs, thinks trade = good
- 1937 Cash and Carry Act designed to help Britain
- 1937 FDR's quarantine speech; trying to push people toward accepting involvement in upcoming war; he was highly aware of isolationist sentiment, vaguely distanced himself from contents of speech when asked about it the next day
- 1939 renewal of '37 CC Act
- repeal of 1935 and 1937 Neutrality Acts
- 1940 ARSENAL OF DEMOCRACY fireside chat
- 1941 Lend Lease Act; allows lending of war materials to Britain
- 1941 Atlantic Charter; joint declaration with Churchill after meeting with Britain and other Allies about vision for post-war world (international peace, self-determination etc.); essentially statement of US war plans; had to ease concerns of Americans anxious of fighting a war with USSR as ally, so be like 'post-war won't involve trading away democracy/freedom', justified helping USSR
---HOWEVER FDR refuses to declare war, but says he'll look for an 'incident' to allow him to do so or something aaaaaaand he extends Lend Lease to USSR ... and is reluctant to commit to international organisation to promote peace in post-war world
- 1941 undeclared naval war with Germany in Atlantic; escorting British ships to midpoint of Atlantic, patrolling for U-boats, occupying Greenland and Iceland bases to stop them becoming German U-boat harbours
- 1941 attempts to limit Japanese expansion; Hull meets with Ambassador Kichisaburo and tries to get Japan to withdraw from China and leave European colonies in SE Asia alone; later Congress limits supplies of oil, scrap iron and machine tools to Japan, eventually issuing an oil embargo and freezing Japanese assets in USA
- Japan dependent on US oil so... problem. decides to knock USA out of war in Pacific so it can't stop Japan from taking SE Asia and its oil supplies
- 7 January 1941 - PEARL HARBOUR ATTACK; USA declares war on Japan the following day



FRIGGING HELL
oh yeah and like by 1933 all the Allies but Finland had stopped paying their war debts due to the Great Depression; USA angry, passed 1934 Johnson Act which forbade the granting of govt loans to foreign govts who were in default for their debts

gorby gorby gorby, part A spam and sort of a tiny bit of part-B-relevant stuff

MIKHAIL SERGEYEVICH GORBACHEV
- born 1931 in North Caucasian village of Privolnoye in the Krasnogvardeysk region of Stavropol Krai to a Russian-Ukrainian farming family
- like many other Russian viallages, Privolnoye experienced the hardships/costs of Stalin's collectivisation regime; by Gorby's own estimate, half his extended family died in the artificially created famine of 1931-32
- personally affected by purges; paternal grandfather Andrei sent to Irkutsk, Siberia to chop wood; maternal grandfather Pantelei Gopkolo arrested, imprisoned and interrogated for 14 months; when he returned, Gorby's house was a 'plague house' avoided by others in the village as a house of an 'enemy of the people'
- worked in the fields with his mother; villagers ascribe Gorby's confident/outspoken manner to influence of mother's personality
- attended high school in town of Krasnogvardeiskoye, 10 miles walk away; high achiever, would correct teachers in Russian history classes; grades were all 5 (equiv of A) except for 4 in German
- worked in the fields with combines during his teenage years
- 1949 he and comrades at the tractor-machine station awarded Order of the Red Banner of Labour for their part in that year's awesome harvest
- during high school he joined the Komsomol (Communist youth league for 14-28yo)
- after high school, won a place at Moscow State University studying law

- 1950 became candidate member of CPSU
- 1955 graduated with law degree; returned to Stavropol with wife Raisa, whom he'd met and married during uni; short stint at state prosecutor's office before returning to politics, quickly becoming leader of the Stavropol City Komsomol
- 1961 becomes leader of Stavropol Krai Komsomol
- 1962 becomes organiser for Stavropol Agricultural Unit; around this time forms a mentoring relationship under the wing of Fyodor Kulakov (friend in high place); is a delegate to 22nd Communist Party Congress
- 1962-68 earns agricultural economics degree
- 1970 becomes First Secretary of the Stavropol Regional Committee; head of entire Stavropol Krai; with help of Kulakov, at this time the national head of agriculture
- 1971 elected to Central Committee
- 1975 we see Gorby's influence growing; leads delegation to West Germany at the invitation of a local communist group
- 1978 Kulakov dies, Gorby replaces him as Central Committee Secretary for Agriculture?
- 1980 becomes member of Politburo
- 1982 Andropov becomes General Secretary of CPSU, makes Gorby his personal assistant (Gorby had rep for incorruptibility), grooms him to be his successor
- 1984 Andropov dies, is replaced by Chernenko; Gorby personally recommends Chernenko instead of trying to take power himself, looks good in eyes of Old Guard
- 1985 Chernenko dies, Gorbachev chosen as General Secretary of CPSU



FFFFFFFFF
- 1985 summit in Geneva with Ronald Reagan; the start of their wonderful friendship nice relatively peaceful-ish and cooperative relationship (which is full like <3333 compared with previous superpower leader relations... sort of...); not much is achieved though, mainly talked about nonmilitary matters... BUT good sign of talking!
- 1986 Reykjavik, Iceland; another Reagan/Gorby summit; humanises the leaders in each others' eyes
- 1988 Reagan visits Moscow, when asked by journalist if he still considers USSR to be an 'evil empire' he says no, that was 'another time'; when asked who deserved credit for perestroika/glasnost/changesinUSSR, he replied that Gorby did (Matlock says this contributed to Gorby's popularity more than any other single event)

blahhhhhh.
Gorby was apparently idolised in the West, especially in USA, media called it 'Gorbymania'
1987 TIME Man of the Year
compared with previous Soviet leaders, Gorby appears friendly/trustworthy/cooperative; the average American citizen saw him as dismantling communism, ending Cold War, and as ultimate proof that US democracy and capitalism wins over communism ... OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT

Andrey Grachev: 'the end of the Cold War is justly associated with the name of Mikhail Gorbachev'

Glasnost/opennness: reduced censorship, encourage open discussion that would hopefully lead to reform that would improve/perfect Soviet system - originally intended to be an economic policy?????? Gorby thought that the open discussion would allow Soviet economy to be fixed, or something??? BUT the people interpreted it as freedom of speech/discussion, as a social policy. People criticised Stalin's regime, talked openly of purges/gulags/collectivisation. Once-banned literature was circulated.

Perestroika: 'restrucuturing' of economy; attempt to introduce some market features ... but this didn't work. Opposition from above: nomenklatura (ruling class) didn't like it ... specific reason why: [I can't remember] ... so they just didn't implement his reforms and carried on with old command system???? Opposition from below: people had gotten used to the old system, didn't want to have to deal with price rises (improved services, sure... but market prices! nooo!) or something ... generally believed that perestroika failed because it 'didn't go far enough' so you got this awkward part-market part-command economy that flailed. And to deal with this flailing/inefficiency, people turned to old methods like ... barter/black market ... and people were unhappy ... which probably led to the whole 'GORBY SUCKS' thing ...


Eastern Europe: repudiation of Brezhnev Doctrine, let them do their own thing; largely contributed to collapse of USSR/end of Cold War? - Gorby didn't intervene due to economic reasons (USSR's own problems so great he wasn't able to do much??? idk) and foreign policy reasons (he wouldn't be able to maintain the :D relationship with the West if he went all Brezhnev and used force to keep communist regimes in Eastern Europe in power)

Nice relations w/US also contributed to end of Cold War

Glasnost and perestroika also contributed to collapse of USSR, but unlike the nice relations with USA/West ... this wasn't deliberate. He didn't meant to kill USSR, he wanted to perfect it, was a true believer in socialism, etc. ... attempted to be a reformer, became an accidental revolutionary. Or something.

Glasnost/perestroika = example of the events running away from him, sweeping him along... he had no control over... glasnost, at least. Unleashed a democratic flood! A flood of criticism from the people of the USSR/Gorby himself...


Relations with USA: apparently they were good because he acquiesced/cooperated/agreed with Reagan a lot of the time, so it's arguable if Gorby did anything. Or something. The awesomeness was that he allowed himself to be acted upon, the fact that he cooperated, rather than him actually actively doing stuff in their dealings... ish. Idk.

Bad for USSR, good for world? xD
Deserves credit for allowing USSR to collapse in a peaceful way / overseeing Cold War's end in a peaceful way

Huge polarised opinions about him show that significance of individuals in history / their being remembered depends not on judging how good their deeds were, just how big the impact they had was ... or something??? Couuld be 'bad' impact, could be 'good' ... ?

Eeeeeeeeee part B.




//disclaimer: don't take any of this as accurate, it's panicked revision spam (:

Trials are ideologically painful. i.e. don't procrastinate

Lolololololol Cold War dev to 1968 syllabus area completed in two hours? Sure I can do that. Sure. Sure. Or attempt to, anyway. Lol trials.

The penultimate day of the holidays before trials begin

...is when I actually start studying properly and being productive for most of the day as opposed to spending it procrastinating, or sitting around trying to do work and just complaining instead...yep. I did sleep in for a bit, however the rest of the day was spent reading roughly half of the USA textbook which is actually pretty awesome, just as a certain Xerxes promised.

^ That's such an interesting paragraph, ffff.

Anyone heard Avril's song "Smile"?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqCj9a_DSBc

Lyrics-wise, I only like the chorus. Everything else pisses me off because it sounds bratty and spoilt in a non-good way (man I'm such an excellent critic, look at that shining example of eloquence right there). When I first heard the song, I was just like '...' at the first verse.

HOWEVER. The chorus is nice. I like it. Not amazing words, but they're cute/nice.

Sound-wise ... I pretty much like the whole song, hahahahhaa. IT SOUNDS GOOD! ...To me. And that is why I on the whole really like this song and have been somewhat addicted to it for the past couple of days, despite the kinda brainless "rargh i'm a crazy bitch whatever" lyrics.

And despite the fact that the bridge is just a recycling of the first verse. Which... I don't know. Not a bad thing per se but I just don't like the first verse. The second verse is a bit more bearable, and it's kind of funny. ...It just wouldn't be funny if it actually happened, waking up with a random tattoo...

you-ess-ay legislation from 1920s RE $$$

Okay okay holy crap quarter-way through holidays, though essentially half I guess because no way I'm going to be studying properly EVERY SINGLE DAY soooooo sdlkffjfffffffffff

US's agriculture problem, something like... during WWI, govt guaranteed high prices for farmers and gave them loans for them to produce more and modernise their methods...? Then the price guarantees ended with the end of the war and the farmers had ... surplus produce ... and needed to pay off their loans? ... once upon a time I knew this properly.

1921 Emergency Tariff Act
Farm Bloc lobbied govt to impose tariffs to help US farmers, this was the result - tariffs on what 28 agricultural products? Yes 28 wooo historical detail.

1930 Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act
Hoover! ...attempting to deal with Great Depression. Implemented high tariffs on foreign imports in attempt to protect US economy from ze Great Depression... I think what happened was ... this choked off foreign economies, who then retaliated with tariffs of their own, thus further spreading Depression around the world??

1921 Revenue Act
Reduced income tax, especially for the wealthy. Highest tax = 65% down to 50% ... example of Republican belief in Hamiltonian trickle-down principles? Wealth in hands of those at the top - the rich - will be spent and thus stimulate economy and further the wellbeing of everyone else or something like that. But the rich used the money to invest, instead of spending so...

1926 Revenue Act
Reduced in heritance tax and lowered max rate of income tax to 20%

1921 Budget and Accounting Act
essentially forced Treasury Dept to balance budget; trad Republican economic ideal of balanced budget???

1922 Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act
...more tariffs. Highest tariffs in history on manufactured goods + preserved the tariffs of the 1921 Emergency Tariff Act ... choked European markets! tariffs had an adverse effect because ... it robbed the farmers of a market with which they could get rid of their surplus produce, it caused other countries to retaliate with tariffs of their own and thus spread effects of Depression and ... something ...

So. Not checking notes...
1921 Emergency Tariff Act
1930 Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act (Hoover trying to deal with Depression)
1921 Revenue Act - lowered income tax, esp for rich, 65% down to 50%
1926 Revenue Act - lowered in heritance tax and income tax, max rate was 20%
1922 Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act - historically amazingly  high tariffs on manufactured goods and kept tariff levels of the 1921 Emergency Tariff Act ...
YEAH OKAY I CAN REMEMBER THAT.[/memoryspew]

Oh right yeah 1921... Budget and Accounting Act. Budget and Accounting Act of 1921 made Treas Dept balance budget. Okaaaaay...


oh yeah also these are talking-to-self study blogposts from someone who ... just ... okay you can tell how reliable these notes are by the sheer number of ellipses that appear here so yes //disclaimer

English

This is the part of the stupid stamina run where I slow to an almost-halt, lungs burning, and keep stumbling along at a zombie-walk ... oh it is so tempting to just collapse on the track right here. The finish line is RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME and yet ...

//brainshuttingdowninprotest

x_X

Frigging ... stupid ... extended stamina run for English ...

Do not say anything

ENGLISH ENGLISH ENGLISH ENGLISH I LOVE YOU SO MUCH ENGLISH, TILL DEATH DO US PART, EITHER YOUR DETERMINED DEATH ON HALLOWEEN OR MY DEATH AT YOUR LOVING HANDS BEFORE THAT DATE OMG ENGLISH /stake

Guys...

I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u 
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u 
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u 
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u 
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u 
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u
I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u I have a plot for 4u 

!!!!!!!!


in other news, http://youknowyouareaustralianwhen.tumblr.com
now, it's not weird at all that things like this make me feel all Aussie-pride-y, is it? i'm getting this feeling of belonging/vaguenostalgia when reading this blog. because i'm just so cool like that.

ENGLISH

Hello English. I love you. So so much.
Yeah. This weekend with you is going to be so much fun ♥

Hello I talk to myself

AHAHAHAHAHHHAHAH
I FINISHED A COLOSSAL PIECE OF HOMEWORK WHICH I SHOULD HAVE FINISHED TWO DAYS AGO, ARE YOU NOT SO FRIGGING PROUD OF ME

Note to self:
STUDY FOR BIO
STUDY FOR BIO
STUDY FOR BIO
I DON'T CARE IF YOU HAVE A HEADACHE
or are feeling dead or some crap
I DON'T CARE
get that syllabus, crack open your textbook and GET TO WORK, THE EXAM IS IN FRIGGING LIKE 72 HOURS AS OF RIGHT NOW. LESS, ACTUALLY.


Yeah. C'mon. You revised the Year 11 course in 4 days. This is just two topics.
DO IT
DO IT
FRIGGING HELL


...stop reading your own post, you egocentric procrastinator, GO STUDY BIOLOGYYYYY

In which I egocentrically bloviate about school and languages... sort of

I like learning smatterings of skills that are vaguely obscure/apparentlyuseless.
I've also lately developed a thing for certain fonts in 10.5pt.
Also, at the moment, for all intents and purposes, I do no subjects other than 3U and 4U English. As in, I do, obviously, but at the moment, work for those two subjects is dominating my life.

I think I am now actually constantly thinking of / aware of school. Like aaaall the time, thinking things like "I should do work" and "I could be doing work right now" and "it's my own fault I wasted so much time earlier" and "oh look, I'm doing the procrastinating thing agian..."

Okay, those last three were just particularly prevalent today because I tend to be extra-procrastinatey on Saturdays. And whiny.

Also, I've added German and Russian keyboard layouts to my language bar thingy. I've more-or-less mastered the former, and I can roughly remember the locations of about four keys in the latter. Because I'm just so cool/pro like that. German keyboard's actually quite easy, seeing as it's just Z and Y swapping places and some shifting around of symbols and handy additions of the umlauted letters and ß. I added Russian when I was procrastinating working on my Belonging speech last week, and I added German a couple days ago when I was working on a mini-essay piece of homework for Extension German, a 300-word thing that took me an extremely long time to write... and I used a dictionary heeeeaps because the topics/etc. in ExtGerman are rather different/moreserious than what you get in Continuers. At this moment in time I could write a fairly decent typical writing task for Continuers without using a dictionary at all, but if you chucked me into a typical EXTENSION writing task without a dictionary ==> EEEEEEEEEEK

...Which is why I really really need to do more practice for Extension.

Oh, Extension subjects. Why are you so annoying? /obviousquestion
But seriously, 3U+4U Eng and ExtGerman are my most challenging subjects atm... I think. Actually, I'm fairly lost in Mod, too, atm, due to my very poor grasp of economics which is basically what the majority of our current topic is composed of.

ACTUALLY, I think I'm okay for 4U right now but...

Yeah, you know what, I'll just stop talking and go do work now.

PAWD

Post-Assessment Withdrawal Disorder.

That's right, I just diagnosed myself and made up a disease OH SNAP.
Meaning, I've noticed that in the immediate 24 hours or so after a major-ish assessment that has caused me distress, I go into this... assessment withdrawal. Symptoms -

- do not want to do any work
- dazed. what is this, no urgent work to do?!
- sitting in front of computer doing nothing productive
- in need of eargasm-inducing music and unable to find any

...Or maybe that's just what it's like today. Yeah.
This only applies to assessments that have made me angry for longer than a day or so. Also, they have to be HSC-counting assessments. I think.

But sometimes HSC-counting assessments don't cause me to stress/procrastinatehorribly beforehand, and those are okay.


WHAT A FRIGGING DISJOINTED/RANDOM POST. Okay maybe not that bad compared to others, but for some reason I feel like my ability to articulate has been... forced to run a four-minute mile, briefly experienced a spasm of victory/relief, collapsed into a state of restful quiescence, then extremely suddenly roused from its catatonic pseudo-hibernation and IMMEDIATELY DEFENESTRATED (from a vertigo-inducing height)

And yeah I do occasionally like using unnecessarily sesquipedalian words. Not otiose at all. This is kind of fun, acting like a vocab-tard. Maybe I should play FreeRice now. GETTING PAST LEVEL 50 = SO FRIGGING HARD --


-
Oh, look, I have homework to do.