Yesterday was laundry day. Yeah. There were two laundromats reasonably close; I choose the one slightly farther but without the incline. Unfortunately, this laundromat had a resident “special” person. He asked everyone’s name when they came in, pointed to the machines they should use, told them what buttons to push, notified everyone when the buzzer went off (which was evident to all those who could hear) and generally chatted you up the whole time. Fine, whatever. But the problem came when the dryer turned off. He’d jump up to help you take out your laundry. Well, my laundry was still damp, but he pulled it all out. First of all, a person’s laundry is their own business; you shouldn’t be rummaging through it, even if you are trying to be friendly. But insisting it was dry when the pants and towels were obviously damp, that’s downright annoying. Nevertheless, I left with mildly damp pants just because I was tired of the guy. I hung up the pants in my assigned closet. I will use the other laundromat next time.
Today was our first exam for class. Though we have quizzes everyday, this was our first “test”. The day started out with putting on cold, damp pants (they hadn’t dried). At the train station, two people clogged the escalator and made a large group of people (including me) miss the train, setting me back 15 minutes. Then, I got on the wrong train, setting me back another 10 minutes. So, I got to class with no time for extra studying. Fortunately, the test wasn’t too bad. I’d be surprised if I didn’t do well on it.
Just so you all understand how much we are expected to memorize…
For each verb there is an active and a passive voice; there are five verb groupings; there are six indicative cases and four subjunctive cases; there are six conjugations based on person and number; there are three infinitives for each voice. This ultimately adds up to 630 verb forms (126 forms per verb) that we have learned so far. Obviously, there a some patterns involved. Still, it is mind-numbing. And that’s just the verbs.