between the rock and the cold, cold sea

The computer program that assigned my Thursday classes is a sadistic piece of shit.

(And after the five lectures were done, I had to trail up to a hospital, wait to see a doctor, and trail back down to a train station in order to - on the seven twenty train! - stand all the way home. Damnit.)

I'm not looking forward to having to get up in the morning. I am, in fact, so tired that I don't want to go to bed - although this may be a function of the chocolate and crisps I had for tea, and the warm weather - and I'm seriously considering blowing off my (one, single) nine o'clock lecture tomorrow.

One single nine o'clock lecture on a Friday? Is cruel by anyone's measure. (And the work that was assigned this morning for tomorrow's class, you tell me when I was supposed to get that done.) It's Greek, and I like Greek, but... there were three people in class this morning. If there are twice as many in tomorrow, Himself is probably going to spend most of the class covering stuff we did today, and that's no fun at all.

Virtue will not out. I think I will blow off Greek, get some rest at least once this week, do some running, clean house, and hack out a thousand words of Qum'ran essay. I should have brain for it, if I actually get eight-ten hours sleep beforehand.

#

Ah, my essay. I need to put Qum'ran in context with the other developments of Second Temple Judaism. Which means I need to construct a timeline, to put things in order, and correlate [as much as we know about dates and] political development to [as much as we know about dates and] the development of apocalyptic and other literature. Thereafter, I need to assess whether Qum'ran can be properly described as an 'apocalyptic community', and on the basis of what evidence.

Which means, I suppose, I should have a look through 7-9 Daniel, [the development of] 1 Enoch, the Temple Scroll, the Community Rule, the Damascus Document, and the War Scroll. What else? Ben Sira, 2 Maccabees, and Koheleth for non-apocalyptic evidence of the Second Temple Period. Josephus? Maybe. Wisdom literature?

Hellenism vs. 'traditional' Judaism? Opposition vs. adoption of new elements? Influence of wider Canaanite/Babylonian cultural contexts? Power struggles/economic rivalry/factional strife within the Jerusalem priesthood? Competing ideologies, or ideological borrowing? Concepts of purity - sanctity/legitimacy of the rebuilt temple and its priesthood? Genealogy and legitimacy of priesthood?

The Qum'ran community - how do we understand it? Our evidence? Who were they? Josephus mentions Essenes? Variety of groups within Second Temple? Scholarly opinions on Qum'ran?

...Yeah, I guess I actually can write this essay. Who'd've thought?

No writing today, and no essay, either.

But, then, I knew that going in.

Mission:Impossible season two is, if anything, more fantastically, dreadfully entertaining than season one. (Nazis! Communists! Made-up Eastern European/South American countries! Barbara Bain and Martin Landau and Greg Morris!)

I have shoved CDs into racks, and books onto shelves, rendering this place slightly less cluttered than heretofore. I suspect I need more shelves, though. The problem? Where do I put the shelves?

There really isn't that much space left.

Tomorrow, early start, late homecoming. Not my very favourite kind of day.

Tired now.

Ah. The back-to-termtime wibbles, right on schedule.

*curls up with fire and cat*

It's okay to doubt myself. That's natural. It's not okay to let myself be crippled by it. Or by perfectionism. Or by body-image issues. Or by abandonment issues. Or any other type of damned issue at all.

I can deal. Thanks to the year from hell (and the better year that followed it), I even have tools for dealing.

Right. Now we have that out of the way, I should probably write, and then think about what I should put on my CV. Because really, with the price of bread and milk, I should really try for a weekend job.

Provided I can find one that doesn't try to suck out my energy along with my soul, of course.