More a yardstone than a mile

Today I came to the realisation that in less than a month I'll be 16 and under two months from now I'll have finished all my GCSE exams for ever. But, as has been the case for around 5 years now, I'm not at all excited for my birthday because:

• It's going to be revision-filled. I have exams the next day and in the following weeks. There's really no time to celebrate.
• As usual, I plan to postpone my birthday. I haven't even received my main presents for my 15th birthday because I postponed it and then never really got back into the birthday mood.
• I don't really feel like having a party or anything of the sort. Of course, I want to spend time with friends and family to mark the occasion.
• Although 16 is considered quite a milestone birthday, I don't really have anything to look forward to. I just want to make this a fulfilling year of life.
• The idea of buying lottery tickets, sex and being able to drink one glass of beer or cider with a meal in a licensed pub accompanied by an adult does not excite me.

What a sensible (boring) and mature (disdainful) 16-year-old I'm going to be.

Disregarding pretension

No matter how pretentious it may sound to burst into a foreign language unannounced...

Mon examen oral de français est fini - comme c'est marveilleux!/Mi examen oral de español es terminado - ¡Qué maravilla!

Which translates as 'My French/Spanish oral exam is finished - how marvellous!' Of course, it's a big relief - I've been preparing for these exams for months and had to learn many pages of answers for both exams which were within a week of each other. This weekend I became quite ill with some kind of flu/cold/sore throat combination, thus making the Spanish oral of today even more difficult. But both are done now and I can resume revision for the written exams.

Provisions, projects, planning

A brief plan of the near future, without too much thinking involved.

March - Finish French and Spanish Oral Booklets, learn them, begin to make notes of other subjects to revise, perform final Drama exam piece.

April - Focus on revision for French and Spanish Orals, do the exams, build up revision of other subjects.

May - Continue to revise, do some of my GCSE exams, maybe think about the fact that I turn 16.

June - Finish revision, do the rest of my GCSE exams.

July - Get over the shock of (temporarily) having no more coursework/homework/revision to do, have fun, go to London and Glasgow.

August - More of the same, maybe go to Somerset, Bristol and Paris, receive my GCSE results and (hopefully) rejoice.

September - Start sixth-form, work very hard again, make some new friends (while keeping in touch with old ones), establish myself as a new person.

October - Continue to work hard, begin revision for any upcoming January exams, go to an expensive hotel.

December - Revise for my January exams, celebrate Christmas.

So, that might be my year, if things go to plan.

Ploughing trhough with rigor

Well, by next Thursday afternoon exams will be over for now (but only for now). I probably digest more information than I do food on an average day, and that's a substantial amount because I do like to eat.

I've noticed that recently my dreams have been deeper, possibly having new meanings. A particular example of this was Wednesday night's dream - my first dream-falling experience. It could symbolise an overload of pressure or stress, but my life wouldn't be complete without either of those things I suppose.

Anyway, something else kind of coinciding with this is the fact that I don't seem to talk much to people anymore. Not that I don't physically talk much, but that I haven't expressed any particular feelings or emotions for a while. I have a lot to discuss, it's just I'm rarely in the right place to discuss it. Oh, and further identity crises ensue.

Teacher Abby

(If you're Sara, there's a post dedicated to you after this one)

In Maths today everyone was asking me for help with surds at once so I ended up teaching the class on the interactive white board. It was quite fun, actually. And apparently they understood it so that's great :)

It's half term now, which is rather good but I have loads of work to do. Let's review:
* English Language - second half of the Derek Bentley letter
* Chemistry - some questions which are in my planner but I can't remember them at the moment
* Biology - see above
* Physics - mark homework
* French - write first draft of coursework and fill in Oral booklet
* Spanish - write one minute presentation and fill in Oral booklet
* Drama - roughly devise script
* Revision in general - all three sciences, languages, RS Short Course, possibly History and techniques for answering English Language questions

Oh, and I'll be in Ireland from Tuesday to Friday so my holiday's going to be packed. I'm not going to have a social life but that's fine. The things due in for Monday are the English letter, Physics and French (oh, and I have Drama on Monday so I'll write the script before then), so:
* I'll try to do the English letter this weekend
* I'll at least make a start on the French homework - maybe do the coursework before Ireland and the Oral booklet after
* The Drama script is just to be written whenever I have the ideas - this could be in the middle of the night
* The Physics homework shouldn't take more than half an hour so that can be done next weekend
* I'm going to try to make some revision notes/flash cards so I can revise on holiday, specifically for science

The rest of the homework can be done the week back at school because it's due in at some point in that week and not the Monday back. I can do this.