I live by the eleventh of Peter's Laws. This isn't necessarily by choice, or on purpose, but it happens with damning frequency. Case in point: this semester. Five or six months ago I wrote a heart-felt journal entry about how last semester was a do-or-die prospect.

It has NOTHING on this one, and I have no one to blame but myself. I built this catastrophe.

Last semester I had five classes, two with lab components, and an eight-week unpaid practicum. Not only did I survive, but at the cost of my sanity, sleep schedule & hobbies, I rose to the challenge: I got a paying on-campus job as a tutor and a competitive GPA.

This semester I have five classes, three of which are 400-levels, two of which have labs, one of which is a studio art course, and a part-time job. I considered dropping a class, but my application for graduate school depends on the GPA I achieve in my last 60 undergrad credits, which will be this year and next year if I take five classes both years. I can't go without a job; I would work more hours if I could fit them into my schedule.

One of the things that kept me going last semester was looking forward to travelling Tanzania with my BFF. This semester, I have the Calgary Comic Expo to look forward to. (Which I may or may not be attending dressed as 'Gothic Deathmetal Sailor Saturn'.)

Despite the stress of this semester (and my likely-imminent death by liver failure due to over-consumption of energy drinks), my professor for Paleobiology (the only prof I've met with his own Wikipedia entry) has done a radical and wonderful thing: instead of assigning a gargantuan research paper, our term project is motherfucking scientific illustration!!!

Him assigning this term project is the first time someone has acknowledged my intended career as a legitimate scientific arena. (Not only that, but my TA for the Paleo lab was kind enough to tell me what I could charge as a professional and I just about died of shock.)

In the meantime, I apologize to everyone who won't hear a peep out of me, see a single sketch, or read a new fanfic chapter for an unknown quantity of time. I like to think that all of this insanity makes me not just a more focused, productive student but a better writer and artist as well.

Now, my next challenge: find a summer job that doesn't involve wearing a tacky uniform and taking other people's bullshit...