Things which Frustrate Me

I will now present you with a list of my current frustrations (I am pretty sure the etymology of this word is 'frustra' + 'ate', so basically 'to make be in vain' only less awkward and more scholarly. But I digress.), of which there are many. Very many.

1. I only know two languages, Latin and English. I was born into English, so I am pretty sure it does not really count. Mainly I am annoyed that I do not know French. By my logic, French should be easier than Latin: the nouns have only two genders, and only the personal pronouns have cases (and I know nothing about the verb tenses/moods/voices). It is also still spoken by many people. Possible difficulties I can see: there are five variations on e that are all separate letters. That is a lot. Spelling from hearing is also a little bit difficult. But still. French is easier than Latin, by this logic, so I think I should be able to learn it in just a few months. Even though it has taken me about seven years to learn Latin. This is perfectly logical. My lack of knowledge of Russian makes a lot more sense to me, since it is at least as hard as Latin. Reasons: new alphabet (which I have basically gotten down. I could write everything in Cyrillic if I wanted to. Except the sounds that don't exist in that alphabet), three noun genders, at least three noun cases, possibly articles (I don't remember. Latin does not have these), and probably some interesting verb things. Also, Russians speak very quickly, I think. Probably because I don't know Russian. I also don't know Greek. It's kind of overwhelming to begin now, because it is a lot harder than Latin, since it has about a million verb tenses, and three verb voices, and a new alphabet, and probably some more things that make it difficult. Mainly, I think I am frustrated that I didn't go to a school/live in a time where I would by now know five languages: my native English, Latin, ancient Greek, French, and, like, German or something. I kind of want to learn German, to read Zweig and Nietzsche, incidentally. But, yes. That is frustrating to me.

2. I constantly misjudge how much coffee I should drink. Either I drink too little, and am cranky and caffeine-headache filled all day, or I drink too much and move and talk at the speed of light and am also impossibly paranoid. This means that I always miss that amazing coffee-bliss state, where everything in the world is perfect and beautiful and filled with love, because I stop having coffee before I am there, or I am in the middle of a cup of coffee by the time I reach it, and I cannot leave a cup half-full when I could drink it, and also it will be affected by the coffee previously consumed anyway. Also frustrating: this makes me sound like a drug addict, which I guess I am if you count coffee as a drug. In a similar vein (ha), I am annoyed by how long it takes our coffee maker to make coffee.

3. I get distracted all the time. Right now, I have decided I am supposed to be reading, but. No. And when I am done with this, I will probably type some things on my typewriter, instead of reading (I have a typewriter! It is excellent). If this distraction weren't bad enough, I am also a horrible judge of how I should use my time. For instance, I have a précis I should be writing, as well as a paper on the fall of the USSR I should be improving. Instead, I have decided I should be reading, and instead of doing that, I am blogging. I should get an award for this sort of thing, really.

4. I have 307 books. This is not the frustration, really, or I guess if I said "I have only 307 books" that would be a frustration. The frustration here is that my shelves only fit about 250 books, apparently. That's not entirely fair, actually, because I have two shelves devoted to notebooks and whatnot, as well as two shelves for the Great Ideas books that I took from the living room (which do not fit on two shelves, and also are not included in this count), a shelf devoted to reference materials and old binders (some of these are counted; this is where I keep all my grammar books and dictionaries), as well as two shelves I use for library books, of which there are about 40. Basically, there are seven shelves that are not being used to their fullest potential, and I have no idea how to fix this. It also doesn't help that the day after I alphabetized my books, I started getting new ones, from school and other places, and I was far too exhausted from the act of alphabetizing the first time around to even consider attempting again. So there are 50+ books stacked up on my shelves, or in front of other books, because I am too lazy to solve this problem. They'll all be packed up (well, the good ones will be, so most of them) in a few months when I leave for college anyway, so doing anything about this situation seems like far too much work to really be worth it. Also, I am really very lazy.

5. The Postal Service is not instantaneous. Right now, I am waiting for two books and a letter from Colorado College, both of which I feel are very important. Because they are. However, I know that it will take approximately two centuries before either of them gets to me, which is very, very frustrating. I also order things on-line a lot, because it means that I can spend less money and don't have to pretend that I enjoy socialization for the two minutes it takes to ring up a purchase. For some reason, people are unnerved when you don't look them in the eyes while talking to them, and completely ignore the possibility that the only reason you actually came into the store three days before Christmas was because there was a 25% off coupon at stake, that couldn't be used on-line, much to your annoyance. I really don't like having to associate with people, which is kind of unfortunate, because it is expected of me. Curse expectations! (Though I would rather people had expectations of me instead of not, because that means they think I can accomplish things. I only wish these expectations were not social.)

6. When I type "commonapp" in the address bar of my mom's computer, the first link is Facebook, so I have to use arrow keys or the mouse, both of which are inconvenient. Also, college applications are the most annoying thing in the universe. I hate most of all the personal essay. It fills me with a boundless rage: a boundless, impotent, sobbing rage. The brief statement where I had to explain my horrible GPA was equally frustrating, and I hope that it is a one time only thing, because I was terribly annoyed by it.

7. I am not as prepared for the zombie apocalypse as I like to think I am. This actually merits a separate blog post, because it would take as much room as the previous 6 points to fully explain.

Now that I am properly annoyed and angry at the world (and you are hopefully satiated with a ridiculously long blog post [that is incomplete; I am frustrated by many, many more things as well]), I think I will read. Or get distracted again and read things on the Internet, or write about zombies, or apply to a few colleges. There's really no telling with me.