Return to what passes for normal around here... I think

So NaNo is over, graduate exam is over, November is over. After the graduate exam yesterday, I spent the rest of the day in a recovery fog that still hasn't lifted completely.

Oh and just because I can.


One thing I learned that I didn't put on my list at Discipline Under Fire--my writing is more important than graduating. I didn't get my reading materials together until Sunday afternoon November 30th. And instead of stopping and reading for the test, I finished NaNo and then read. I didn't finish all the articles and there was no memory of titles or authors when it came to the exam itself. But then I NEVER remember titles and authors, I have to constantly refer to the source material when I write. :p

It did strike me that I was nuts to bounce between the two at some point that night (because I would spend fifteen minutes writing and then fifteen minutes writing), and I went straight back to writing. And it's true what I told my fellow exam takers, I want the Masters' but my career doesn't depend on it. I'm not continuing for a Ph.D., I'm not leaving state employment unless they make me and they don't care what I have degree-wise, and nobody in the publishing industry is going to care either.

And if you think this realization helped my stress levels at all, you are sadly mistaken.

That aside, I still want to wear the goofy robe and march down the aisle. I want to give my coworkers an announcement and hopefully get paid back for what I've given to their kids graduations. I've put in some hard work and I will enjoy it.

We all came out of the exam feeling we had been set up for a massive fail. If we do fail, we have another shot at it in the spring semester with the same reading material. Granted, I accept the fact that I handicapped myself in the reading. But that's not why I feel like I burned. I blame that on the methodology of the exam. You have to read the chosen novel and a dozen chosen critical articles about the novel. Then they ask you an essay question about the novel and you need to support your answer with at least three critical articles. But you can't bring any materials in with you. No copies of the articles are provided either. You have to remember everything about them to answer a question that you had no idea about when you read the material. After spending so many years writing papers with everything in front of you.

Epic fail might be a stress-induced exaggeration, but unfairly slanted isn't. I wouldn't have been able to remember names and titles, even if I could recite the articles. I find out what the outcome is next week. How I would fix it. Give us all semester to read the materials. A week before the exam, okay here's the question now chose your supporting articles, but no pre-writing. Then you can bring in the bibliography with your articles marked off and that's it for the two hours of exam writing time.

So now is the time to pull together all the other projects and figure out what to do when.

Websites need to be updated. Writing projects need to moved on to. House projects need to be budgeted for. ... I'm exhausted just thinking about that little bit. *Sigh*

Read Free!
The BookWorm