Midterms. I'd forgotten what they were like. Now I remember--lots of late nights, counting down the days and hours until each assignment is done, and then the next one. I've programmed my body to think that 2 am is a normal time to go to bed, and that getting up 6 hours later to start working again is perfectly reasonable. This sleep deprivation obviously can't last, but I just have to get through Friday. Two more days, two more days.
What else is new.
Ooh, I'm learning to play the banjo! I'm loathe to commit this to blog, since last time I did that--with the juggling--I promptly lost all ambition. But this is fun, so I'll tell you anyway.
On Sunday, we were listening to that Feist song from the iPod commercial, and I said something like, "That part with the banjo is cool."
To which Stephen replied, "Yeah."
"I'd like to play the banjo."
"You can use mine if you want."
[dumbfounded silence]
"You have a banjo?"
"Um, yeah."
"Where is it?"
"In the other room."
"HERE? Like, in the apartment?!"
"Well, what do you think is in that banjo-shaped case?"
[more stunned silence]
"I don't know. You have a lot of instruments in a lot of cases."
I mean, in my defense, the guy owns four different stringed instruments. I knew about the guitar, the mandolin, and the ukulele, but apparently I never noticed the banjo.
So we got it out and he tuned it a little and I tried on the fingerpicks. I learned the G, C and D7 chords, and a little ditty called Boil Down Them Cabbage. I'm very excited about it, so much so that I think Stephen might be getting a little sick of hearing Boil Down Them Cabbage. But he's been an extremely patient teacher, enduring the occasional pathetic outburst ("Why isn't it working? I am pressing down on the second string! Whine whine whine!") and tolerating my habit of wrapping my fingertips in band-aids before playing, even though real banjo players just build up calluses.
