The Finals Countdown

The older boy is smack dab in the middle of finals, and preparing to come home for winter break at the end of the week. He has had a particularly heavy class load in his first semester; none of the class subjects would have been overly difficult for him individually, but these classes grouped together provided a tremendous amount of weekly hours full of papers and projects to complete.

It all exploded yesterday, apparently. He turned in his final art project–an assignment of epic proportions which had him apparently feeling very hostile about the color yellow, as he indicated in a Facebook status–on Monday, and was busily working on the other pending assignments that night.

I chatted with him briefly yesterday, and he told me how he was working on his German paper before bed Monday night when he decided he had been up long enough and went to bed, neglecting to save the paper because “Macs don’t freeze”. When he woke up yesterday morning–guess what?–his Mac was frozen.

“I was SO angry, Mom. I almost started throwing things, including a glass. But instead I just bit down really, really hard on the cord for my phone charger.”

“WHAT? Why would you do that?” I asked.

“You just have no idea how mad I was! I was sooooo mad!”

I said, “It wasn’t plugged in, was it?”

He snorted. “NO. I’m not Roxie*.”

Which, when you think about it, is a really funny way to end a conversation, even if you don’t know the story behind it (below).

(Also, his computer recovered most of his work. Whew.)

*When Roxie was a puppy, she was running around the basement, playing with a toy by tossing it in the air and then running to it, picking it up, and tossing it in the air again. The toy landed near a group of wires, and as she went to grab the toy again, instead grabbed the wires, clamping down on them and electrocuting herself. I saw it happen, and ran to her. I had to unplug the wires from the wall to get her separated from them. It was very traumatic for me and the boys (Jim was on a business trip); we spent several hours in the emergency vet. Of course, she ended up being fine.

E0EBC2C8393DAD4423FE9417A308918D

©2010 Suburban Scrawl

6 Comments

  • Tara R.

    Glad to hear Oldest was able to retrieve most of his paper. I think Macs sometimes act up if they think they are being ignored.

    I know how much you must be looking forward to having him home for a while. My College Kid finished up classes on Friday.

  • kat

    Macs…pfffft. Just kidding. That sounds like a lot of stress he's under. If he ever needs last minute help with his German homework…you know where to find me 🙂

  • NYCPatty

    Interesting anger reaction. I guess owners are a lot like their dogs! LOL!

    Glad her recovered his work. Thanks for the Mac tip too!

  • Michelle

    Oh the poor boy. That has to be rough for him. But biting on an electrical cord? Tell him that I prefer to find a paperback I don't like much and rip out pages 🙂 It's satisfying.

  • Heather

    i bet he is SO excited/ready to be done. i know i am! and to just be home for a month? OH I WAS SO EXCITED FOR THAT PART! 🙂 hope you guys have a great time together!