I can't think of a title...

I have successfully survived the second week of classes, which actually is probably more like a first week of classes because in the technical first week of classes everyone is just signing up for stuff and seeing what they actually want to take. Regardless, I survived and am even feeling as though I am on top of my work. (That really is a new feeling for me because at WashU I am perpetually behind.)

I wrote my first "paper" for a college class in German this week.  Every week for my lit class we have to write an expose about a certain passage from the book and explain the deeper meaning that it is talking about.  Normally not my strong point.  But this week we had to explain the chemical analogy and how it fits with the entire theme of the book "Elective Affinities".  A) I am a chemist and understand the chemical example and am therefore able to come up with smaller similarities that non-science people can't come up with and B) I wrote a paper about this exact thing last semester in my German Lit class.  

I sent my expose to the TA for my class and asked her to read through it and check for grammar, word choice, sentence structure etc.  She said she would do it this week but from now on she isn't going to. I am not so thrilled about that.  I guess I will have to make a German friend to help me out.  Oh well, after reading it and correcting it she emailed me back and told me that I had a good job and I should be "maechtig Stolz" (powerfully proud) of my work.  

I also had to translate a text from English into German for one of my classes.  It is really cool to have to think about English in such a methodical and analytical way.  At the same time it is really obnoxious to have to think so hard about your native language.  

After a "week" (I only have class three days) of classes, I am ready for the weekend.  I am going to Karlsruhe today.  Pia, my TA from Deutsch Kompakt invited me to go with her and some of her friends because there is a "free festival-thing" and they want to go camping.  So we are going to Karlsruhe to camp, but don't have tents, or sleeping bags.  Sounds more like we are going to play I'm homeless.  It should be fun anyway.