Haven’t been doing much lately except focus on the upcoming holidays. My very favorite time of year, with my birthday (on Jan 5) being the icing on the cake… It just means a lot to me, because I’m a Christian but also because I love the whole atmosphere of it. I know a lot of people are stressed out by it – and so am I, sometimes, when I think about how many cards I promised to write – but for me, it’s just… magical, I guess. Love it!

Have also been trying to be good about my social life, getting in touch with people and meeting them. Still quite bad about answering my email sometimes (as well as updating here, as you might have noticed *g*), but I’ve really been doing my best and enjoyed seeing some people I hadn’t seen in a while as well as just hanging out with closer friends.

I’m still doing much, much better emotionally than last year, yet doing all of this holiday stuff does take more out of me than it usually would, so I spend hours every day on the couch, just watching TV or reading. But I also go outside every day, for at least ten, fifteen minutes and do my best to keep up with uni.

Only thing I’m not satisfied with myself about is that darn German Lit paper – it’s been hanging over my head for a year now, and I just can’t seem to make myself start it. Right now my excuse is Christmas, but my goal is to start it during Christmas break.

And that’s enough rambling for today! 🙂

I didn’t even notice, but it’s been ten days since my last update here. In that time I’ve come to some decisions regarding my studies – mainly that it’s high time that I take them seriously and start thinking about more than the next homework, the next paper.

I want to start my thesis and then do my exams in a year (which means that I’ll finish in two years), and I’ve suddenly realized that that’s not such a long time. I have finally found a suitable subject for my thesis (Maori landrights), and that gave me the kick in the ass I needed. There’s so much I have to do and read in order to be able to finish my studies – and I won’t be able to cram that all into the months that are officially allotted for writing the thesis and studying for the exams. It’s time to be realistic and get to work.

But these last couple of days, although I was quite prolific working on my fieldwork paper (finally – it’s only taken me half a year…) and doing homework, have been a bit rough for me. I’ve been pretty stable emotionally in the past weeks, but that balance was shaken and I’ve been going through ups and downs. I know it will pass, it always does, but at the moment I feel quite vulnerable and don’t quite know where (who) to turn to, what to do, to overcome it.

But as always, I’m an optimist at heart and always hoping that tomorrow will be better. There’s so much to be done, after all, no time to hang around and feel sorry for myself.

This week has been pretty emotionally draining. Obviously I have to find something in addition to my daily light-therapy, because it really can’t go on like this. So I called first the hospital where I was diagnosed, which was not very helpful, because I’m not quite ready for anti-depressiva yet. Then I called my doctor, and he recommended a shrink to me. I guess I’ll call him on Monday and see what he has to say…

That is, if he’s open on Monday – it’s carnival time here in Basel, die drey scheenste Dääg (the three most beautiful days) are starting Monday morning at 4am. And I’ll be there, together with Adrian, for who I’ll play Fasnacht guide. Is going to be fun – freezing, though.

More about Fasnacht (hopefully with pics) later. Have a good Oscars weekend everyone! 🙂