In the joyous rush of schoolwork that has surrounded me these past few days, I've conspired to blow my mental circuits with long stints in the computer lab. It's a frickin' riot I assure you. I remember thinking while at Macalester that I liked the finals period in a certain sense because it afforded me a chance to commune with my fellow students, all of whom were stressed to a similar degree as me. Well, graduate school is affording the same communal feelings of stress, impending doom and hopefully catharsis, only here it's hitting pretty hard about 4 weeks in. I'm prepping for 3 tests, 2 papers, 1 mapping project and an undiminished reading load. Yikes. Thank god my department gives out free beer every Friday in its attempt to reduce the dropout rate and forge community bonds. I only have to drink approximately $350 worth of alchohol every Friday for my education to virtually pay for itself. My liver can't thank me enough.