GRE's are G-R-E-AT!

Soon, I will hit play on the DVD remote and sink into the world of Star Wars: Episode III. It's a little weird to admit that this will be the first time that I've seen it since I saw it in the theater when it came out.

The question is, though, why would I spend two and half hours doing nothing but watching a movie when there is so much else in my life to do? I need to finish my application to grad school, research other grad schools because I'm nervous now that maybe I don't want to be limited to just one school, exercise after a cheesy, creamy Christmas, make presents for my extended family who are coming to visit at the end of this week, unpack from several days spent at my parents' house and just general life stuff like cleaning up around here. So, the question remains, why waste the time on a movie?

Because I did a great job on the GRE! [picture me smiling, squealing and shaking my little fists in pent-up excitement] Since you take the test on computer, they tell you your score before you go and I did way better than I worried I would. Yay! I've been so nervous that a year spent on the island with all that smoke hanging in omnipresent clouds around me actually might have made me dumber. (Who knows which of the scare tactics used on me in school were actually right?) This was made worse when I took a second sample test and fell 13 percentage points on the verbal section. If I had lost my edge, where would my identity be?

I know that humility is a virtue and that there is definitely something to be said for not crowing about one's successes because others might feel bad, but really folks, bein' smart is all I got. Most of you socialize better than I do, are prettier than I am, are more athletically powerful and coordinated than I am, cook better than I do, keep cleaner domiciles than I do, are just generally nicer than I am, and probably have a few less nueroses than I do. But, today I proved to myself that I might just be a little bit smarter than some of you. :-) At least, I may be a little bit more versatile in manipulating and understanding English than you. Or, I guess maybe I just know some obscure vocabulary. And, now that I think about it, most of my friends tend to be pretty verbal too.

OKAY! So maybe it's not that big of a deal after all. I'm still watching the movie!

As a final note, last night when I was worrying about the test, my friend Elena told me facetiously, "Don't worry, you love taking tests like this." The truth of this statement hit me so hard that I totally missed the sarcasm and said, "You're right, I do love taking tests like this!" I can remember being so happy in the third grade because the Iowa Test of Basic Skills was so much fun. I mean, here was something I was good at! I could even read my book during the time that was left after I finished each section! They wouldn't let me do that in spelling tests.

Elena just looked at me and said, "I was kidding. You're weird."