Photonics.

I'm tired of class already.  At least I am doing my homework, though.  After language classes start, elective classes will be cut down to meeting only once a week (for two and a half hours), so I'm not sure if I want language classes to start or not. I don't know if the classes I am supposed to be in will be grammar-focused or not. I like grammar. So I'm hoping they are.


We also have these phonetics sessions (which James calls photonics and it drives me nuts but I'm not going to correct him. Someone else can). Some are one-on-one and some are group sessions.  I kind of liked the one-on-one session that I had. My next and last one-on-one session is tomorrow.  And then we have a total of 5 group sessions, three of which have already passed.  I guess they should be helpful, but when I go to speak I'm too busy trying to think of something to say to apply any phonetics knowledge to it. These phonetics classes would have been helpful 4 years ago right after I started.


I made my host mom feel bad last night. She made me cry. It probably wasn't really anything to cry over, I'm just weak and cry over stupid things. She basically asked me why I came to France and why I chose to live with a host family. And if my reasons for doing those things was to learn the language better, why do I stay in my room all the time? I understand where she's coming from, but it's extremely hard for me to go downstairs and strike up conversation in French with someone I don't know, when I can't even do that in English with someone I do know.  I'm just in general not very good at talking to people.  I figured if I just eat dinner with them every night, and let myself grow a little more accustomed to them, then maybe I'll be a little more comfortable talking to them. I've only been here for a week...  I go down there for dinner, I listen to them talk to each other, and when they talk to me I talk to them too. And I go down and ask them for the things I need (for example yesterday afternoon I had to go ask where the broom is because I have a hardwood floor in my room and I shed like a dog).  


I guess it wasn't really her or her questions that made me cry, it was my attempt to answer. Mainly because I know these are problems that I've always had and they are part of what I was hoping to change in myself by coming here.  But they're not going to change on their own and I guess I'm not really doing my part in working towards that...  I told her I was sorry (for being unsociable) and she said no she is sorry, because she had just assumed I was unhappy in their home.  I'm not sure I understand. I don't know. I'm trying, and that's about as good as it gets for now.


My host mom also told me that I should go out with friends at night, to bars or parties or something. I just don't want to. I don't want to go sit at a bar where nearly everyone will be drinking except me and maybe a couple others just because I'm not interested in beer and that's all they have (or I don't know how to order anything else because I don't know what names of drinks are in French). Not to mention that the friends that I'd prefer to go out with don't go out at night either. (There are others who do go out at night but I'm not interested in hanging out with people who are using illegal drugs...)  I don't know, maybe the next day off that I have, I'll go for a nice long walk or something. But I'm usually exhausted when I get home from spending the entire day walking around town, I don't feel like going out at night.  Not to mention the bus stops at 8pm, and I don't know how to call a taxi.  I guess I'll look it up... They're probably not cheap...


Don't... get all worried reading this. I'm doing fine and I'm working on the things I need to work on, I'm just a little frustrated at the moment.  On a lighter note, it's been raining on-and-off for the past two days and Friday night we had the most awesome thunderstorm.  The window on my bedroom is the kind that is right on the roof and so it's at an angle, and the rain hits it and sounds really cool.