Friday is wonderful

Because I can find a nice warm cafe, sip tea, read xkcd.

* * *

There are two weeks until the halfway point of the semester. I have gone into a very machine like mode of studying again. Reading, writing, and reading some more in an attempt to make everything stick. I occasionally get bouts of annoying discouragement (like today, when I pronounced like 10 things incorrectly in my speaking exam), but I will endure (忍住 ). It just feels so different than the latter part of the summer in which i felt so, for the lack of my ability to pump out better words, free and happy. I had time to think, I had time to run, I was at my peak physical condition, and had all the comforts of Seattle. Now, I'm afraid to exercise too much for fear of inhaling too much pollution, I don't have time to think, and I'm starting to fear the idea that I like sitting and studying characters. Economists weren't lying about opportunity cost. I hate having to believe them though, but the results are showing. I've lost all the muscle that I gained this summer, and now my clothes are slightly baggy. I actually feel like I'm in high school again--doing repetitive assignments late into the night and waking up early. 

I'm sure if I watch some cheesy disney film I'll be inspired again. Thats why I keep Mulan on my computer. It's not so I can have 1 gig of my hard drive taken up, but it's supposed to remind me of my need to uphold my family honor despite whatever odds may face me. Okay, so maybe I'm dramatizing this situation a little too much, but Mulan is a good movie, and if I can trick myself into believing that my working hard will somehow bring such honor to my family in the most Confucian of ways, then I will live in this fictional reality until I learn Chinese, and then watch some other cheesy movie to remind me of what the real world is like. 

This will be a very restful weekend.

I'm excited. I'm going to buy a fancy electronic dictionary that allows me to write characters into it and maybe save me a few hours of sleep every night. I've never been so thrilled to get a dictionary before.

thrilled.