Ok, so I’m doing a lot better than I thought I was in the last post. Here’s a quick update and some other cool stuff…
So I’ve started writing this paper for my poli sci 310 class. The class is incredible and the teacher is brilliant, but that also means that it’s extremely hard, possibly even more than poli sci 200, and this final paper counts for 25% of the total grade.
I’m writing about the Mormon feminist blogging community, whose main flagship is Feminist Mormon Housewives. Basically, I want to explain, analyze, and predict that social movement through the eyes of three of the political scientists we’ve studied this year: Allen (a feminist who proposes a new definition of power), Olsen (a rational choice theorist who explains how organizations that don’t offer selective incentives fail to actually accomplish anything), and Teske (an interpretive theorist who focuses on how activist identity frames activists’ decisions). It’s been really interesting so far, and I know exactly what I want to say, but the trouble is actually sitting down and writing it.
However, I don’t think that all of this stress is coming just from the assignment. Earlier today I was stressing out a ton about it, but then I went to Arabic class, where we talked all about our study abroad trip and things to do to prepare for it, and the stress was gone after that (or at least significantly reduced). After the IAS class (the official study abroad class), I was even less stressed.
So I think that this stress is actually coming from the fact that in a few weeks I’m going to be leaving the United States and living in Jordan for four months. Crazy! I’ve been getting really excited for this trip, but apparently not all of that has been positive.
I’m going to have to figure out some new writing goals and plans for when I’m over there. Obviously, I won’t be writing quite as much as I am now. I’ll be focusing on learning Arabic and figuring out the culture. However, I’m hoping that the experience will give me all kinds of new ideas for my writing, so I’ll definitely keep my eyes posted. And I’ll probably keep up at least a weekly word count goal. Brandon suggests 2,000 per week, and that sounds like a piece of cake. I’ll figure something out.
As for the last couple of days, I’ve been doing about 600 words a day consistently. Since I’m in the middle of the crunch, I haven’t had too much time to work out a game plan for finishing this novel, but I think that I’m roughly two chapters and an epilogue from finishing, and I do have the reading days before finals. I hope to be done with this chapter by the middle of next week, approximately, and finish things up just before finals. I’ve also got a lot of rewriting to do–the first chapter all over again, and several other things.
And it’s getting late, so I’ll cut this short and finish up my night. See you!
