Too Much Weight on My Shoulders

Today I finished the second, and final, part of my very first IB examination-- Economics. I feel as though a weight has been lifted off my shoulders... The only problem is that there are still twenty-thousand more pounds of junk still there.

I am so stressed. School is stressful. But the good news is that I only have a mere thirteen days left until exam week when I will, hopefully, be allowed to skip class due to exemptions!

Until now and May 27th, though, I still have quite a few things to accomplish:

1. I have captain auditions for my choir, Madrigals, next Wednesday and there's a bunch of requirements that I must attend to between now and then. (For one, I have to teach a song to eight people and then conduct said song in front of the rest of the choir/directors. FUN.)

2. My English IOC is scheduled to take place Friday, May 25 at like 9am. In case I haven't already complained about the IOC is before, it's this thing where we are given a short 30-40 line passage from something we've read in class second semester and we have 20 minutes to create an outline and then we give a 15 minute speech during which we analyze the passage we were given. I'm terrified.

3. My mind is so filled with post-exam mush that I can't think of all the other things I still have to do, but I know there are more.

I'm sure, what with most school years coming to a close, that there are many other people who know what I'm currently going through. Sadly, that doesn't make it any easier on me.

Anyhow... I went to the library today to get the next book in the series I am currently reading (the Mortal Instrument series for those curious) and all three copies were checked out. Needless to say, I was very distraught. But thankfully a dear friend from my Economics class has agreed to loan me her copy tomorrow, so I won't have to wait until June 6th (the first day that a copy was due back at the library) to read it!

That's basically all of the exciting (ha.) news about things going on in my life. I hope you enjoyed this litte update!

Wait, it's NOT Mexican Independence Day?

Tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo and my Spanish class is apparently going to do some fun little activities in honor of the day.

I don't know about you, but I really don't know anything about Cinco de Mayo... I know that it's the fifth of May, but the meaning of the date in Mexico's history is completely lost on me. When my teacher asked us in class if we knew what it was in honor of I quickly responded (in Hermione-like fashion) that it was in celebration of Mexican Independence-- I was wrong.

Since I had thoroughly humiliated myself in front of my classmates (which I guess isn't that big of a deal considering there are only seven other people in my class), I decided to do a little research on the topic:

I discovered that, despite popular belief, Cinco de Mayo is in fact not a celebration of independence, but the celebration of an unlikely Mexican victory over the French in the Battle of Pueblo in 1862. And that while in Mexico the celebration really is limited to the battle, in the United States it has become more of a celebration of Mexican pride and heritage. Apparently the first celebration of Cinco de Mayo in the U.S. was credited to some Mexicans in California sometime during the American Civil War. Crazy, right?

Actually... I don't find this extremely fascinating (mainly because History is my least favorite subject after math), but there is never a bad time to learn something new and I just hate answering questions wrong, so I had to learn more, so that when my teacher asks us about it tomorrow I will be able to answer her questions.

I promise I won't bore you with history lessons in the future unless I find them incredibly fascinating.

Have a nice Cinco de Mayo tomorrow!