Chrissssss Misssssss

It's no longer Hell Week, obviously. I finished it all, somehow. I stayed up well after 0300 every night, usually after 0400; it's the college student way. There were three main things I had to do: Russian final, calc final, and an English final paper. I did great on the Russian final; I guess I have a good command of what I've learned. The calc final was not so easy, mainly because I did most of my studying for it in the hour and a half before it started - I was too busy with other stuff. An hour and a half was actually a pretty reasonable amount of time, and I managed to figure out most of the questions, including one that a couple people I talked to were clueless on. I only had trouble converting Cartesian equations to polar, and evaluating ∫[0,1]∫[0,sqrt(1–x²)]e^(x²+y²)dydx. Coming out of the testing room, I felt like a new man, someone with no calculus exam in his future, someone in all likelihood done with math classes forever. That was an ideal mindset for finishing the English paper that I had started the previous night. I was writing on Walden and Thoreau's use of anecdotes in it. I managed to come up with an angle - Thoreau used several different kinds of stories for different reasons, and let's examine what those kinds and reasons are - and typed the last sentence on it at about 0300. Then I ate far too many ginger snaps, finishing off the container Grandma had sent me, and went to sleep.
-That morning I woke up at 1000 and tied up all my loose ends: turned in library books, printed my paper and turned that in, and had lunch. I was a free man. I think Ben across the hall embodied it best when he came in as I was working on my paper and started yelling about how great this was, and he could finally read for pleasure, and he finally had free time! Jeremy says that's the happiest he's ever seen Ben. I rode to Ohio with Dan Malarkey again, and this time with two friends of his as well. It was foggy in Grinnell: a dense fog that had been there since the day before. As we drove away from Grinnell, the fog stayed around, a constant. It was like driving through a glass of milk. The road had a shortened memory span and forethought; anything more than a hundred feet or so away was forgotten. We didn't know how much fog there was. As it turned out, there was about the Midwest's worth of it. We hadn't gotten out of it by 1700, or mid-Illinois, when it got dark. Then it dissipated a little. We still ran into some after nightfall. It felt like Waiting for Godot. We pulled in to Dan's house at about 2300, and Mom drove me back to Cincinnati. Then I was home. We played Scrabble, and I won.
-Christmas!* I went shopping the next day for my secret Santa person. WARNING: SPOILER AHEAD IF YOU'RE UNCLE DAN. I didn't know what to get Dan, because if he wants something, he probably already owns the best model there is. I ended up getting him a little assortment: some really thick, warm socks that say they'll last forever; a bucket hat; and a fishing lure.
-Then Christmas was first at Tami & Mike's house. I hadn't seen those guys in so long. Jackie and I traded card tricks. She has a little book of beginner level tricks, which are more cute than anything. She thought mine were pretty good. I taught her one, and it baffled Aunt Tami. (She tried to pull it on Travis, forgetting that he was in the room when I explained it to her.) Travis and I told the rest of the family what we'd been doing in college. Travis, as it turns out, had gone to Europe, and he showed us a slideshow of pictures on the computer. What really struck me was the Sagrada Familia Cathedral in Barcelona. It looked like it was melting, or maybe it looked like it was alive. There's no end to the amount of detail in it. I didn't realize it was even possible to build something like that. In a way, it isn't so far: construction started in 1882, and Wikipedia says it's forecast to end in 2026. Apparently it was originally going to take several hundred years, but we've gotten quicker at architecture since the 1800s. His trip to Marrakesh was similarly incredible in that I saw an exotic place that only exists in pictures in National Geographic as a real thing that can actually happen: going to an airport where cats roam around freely, riding a camel through a sculpted sand dune, taking a series of hairpins down a sheer cliff face to the night's hotel. Studying abroad is looking more and more interesting.
-We opened presents; as I'd hoped, Nana got me some pants. All my khakis had disappeared! I only had jeans, and I like khakis better than jeans. She also gave a flat cap, of which I will post a picture not too far into the future. My flat cap is awesome and makes me look awesome. ...-er. Additionally, I got some mukluks (Tami & Mike, I think) and some peanut butter fudge (Nana of course) and a zip-up sweatshirt (chosen by Jackie). We had Cincinnati chili for dinner, and Micah declared it better than Skyline and Gold Star both. (First time I've had Cincinnati chili in months, and I had it in Dayton. Bizarre!) Eventually, though, we had to go home.
-The next day, the 24th, is Mom's birthday, so Grandma & Grandpa threw her a party with excessive amounts of rib roast, mashed potatoes, and other delicious food. Dave was there too, and Grandma & Grandpa made sure we wouldn't leave hungry. We had some ginger cupcakes for dessert. I, of course, had a black cow also.
-On Christmas we had Christmas. Before we left for Oxford, we opened our intra-family presents. Mom got Micah and me helmets, giving us at once handy protective gear and a lesson in the fine art of subtlety. We also got weird egg-shaped Weeble-type alarm clocks, which are kinda keen. And I got some more pants. Pants! And I got a 15-in-1 board game set. Then we left. It was really weird: we left on time. In fact, we got there slightly before Dave & Cº. Sierra and Jazmin brought some Christmas presents they'd already opened. Sierra had a pink thing where you put fancy dresses on Disney princesses. She showed it to me, and I said that was so great. Cute kids can cause you to lie right through your teeth. Sierra and Jazmin are awfully cute. Without much delay, we started opening presents. Dan & Tracy weren't there, so they didn't get to open theirs. Most of the presents went to the kids - Sierra, Jazmin, Hayden. They got toys. Ah, toys. You know, I never really liked toys all that much. As for the grown-ups, Mom got Dave a travel bag; Dad got Grandma some wine; Grandma got Mom an Amish-made oak cabinet; Maria made everyone spaghetti sauce; Tracy in absentium gave Dad a sensible fishing rod and reel and net, because she was tired of looking at his "oceangoing" assembly; Grandpa got Micah a TV; and Maria made everyone spaghetti sauce. Grandpa drew my name for the secret Santa, so I got lavished with a spectacular Leatherman and a really sturdy and excellent krokay set. This one is going to stand up to much more abuse than the flimsy model I had before. Grandpa liked it so much, he ordered one for himself after looking at it. This means I won't have to wait to start the Grinnell Krokay Contingent until I can get a custom set made. We can just use this one. Now, any wood set is going to eventually wear and need to be replaced, but I think that even if we play ruggedly and frequently, this one can last us at the very least to the end of the year, and probably well into next and perhaps beyond. Eventually, I'll want to get a custom set made, with nylon heads, but this one is probably the best one I could hope for outside of a custom set. It will work just right. I can't wait to try it out, and as I find people, I'm going to gather them together for a breaking-in game at probably Winton Woods, before I leave for Grinnell.
-I'm going to have to get my driver's license before I leave, because I don't think I'll be able to fit this in a car with the rest of everyone's stuff if I'm carpooling home. Hm.

*Most of this section presupposes you know all the names in my family. If not, just go along for the ride, I guess.