I got dem end time blues

My apologies for caricaturistic language in the subject line. If it offends you, well, I don't care. I'm past giving a shrew's toenail about pretty much everything. Moving on.

You know it's the end of the semester when:

1. Your head has not stopped spinning from exhaustion in the past week and a half. (This is different from being dizzy.)

2. People need to repeat themselves constantly because you "didn't quite catch it" the first, second, or third time around. (This is a problem when part of your job involves answering phones and dealing with customers.)

3. You have four shots of coffee before 9:45am and you still feel below your normal functioning level. (Typically, four shots would have me bouncing off the walls in hyperproductivity.)

4. You suffer from insomnia and rearrange your collection of Christmas song lyrics, misreading "O Holy Night" as "O Holy Shit." (I must attribute this to another unfortunate soul--but it's a fantastic example of how the end of the semester attacks your brain!)

5. You arrange a meeting with the dean of the school of ministry in hopes to do something about that one professor's class. (A perk from making the appointment: hugs from both Luanne and Steve Chandler. Yay for pseudo parents!)

6. You have a perpetual headache clinging to the nerves around your eyes and your left eye has a perpetual twitch from a lack of sleep. (Note: I feel like microscopic gnomes have taken jackhammers to my optical nerves.)

7. Your spinning head develops into a case of dizziness as you type out this blog. (I know that I am stationary, but I feel like my head is turning in circles. Perhaps I should take that nap now...?)

8. You put in two full hours at work and then call it a day because you're so tired that you can hardly move. (Best thing about working in the bookstore, my managers understand about the end of the semester and give me grace on job time commitments.)

9. Everything, and I mean everything, induces hysterical laughter accompanied by tears. I didn't think that the end of last semester would repeat itself, but here I am, Fall '06 take two!

10. A horrible cold is hovering in the wings, waiting to pounce when I least expect it. This will most likely occur once I finish with the semester and have time to sleep again.


And now: to bed.