"Everybody, I know you can believe in yourself!"

Tomorrow I'm taking the GRE. I'm feeling uneasy about it, which is strange considering how much I actually enjoy standardized testing. No, you didn't read that wrong. I enjoy standardized testing. Favorite week of school in elementary and middle school (omitting Catholic Schools' Week, of course, oh you poor souls who never experienced that joy) was the week we took our standardized tests. We were allowed to have snacks in our classrooms and there was no homework! All week long! And in seventh grade I volunteered to take the ACT for some Duke TIP thing. But then for some reason, once I got to high school, we no longer had specific standardized testing, no TAKS or whatever. I'm not really sure why. Instead, my beloved standardized tests came by taking the PSAT freshman through junior year. And then, just for fun, I took the SAT my sophomore year with a friend who was taking it for college applications. Because I just couldn't get enough of my standardized testing. I ended up taking the SAT a total of three times and the ACT once (unless you count that time in seventh grade.)

And then the testing stopped. At least until about a month and a half ago when I decided I was going to give myself a month to prepare for the GRE (there was no way I was going to study while I was in Hawaii for a week and a half.) Right after I signed up for the exam Brenden and I headed out to Barnes and Noble, seeing as we now had a good excuse to spend money there (I always feel guilty buying new books knowing I have unread novels, memoirs, poetry, drama lining my shelves already), and bought a GRE prep book. I've had great fun with this prep book- learning clever ways to outsmart ETS (the evil testmakers of the GRE) and, you know, figuring out more of those standardized test questions. I even signed up for a free practice test with Kaplan which I took on the computer, simulating the actual test day procedures (though getting the program to work on the computer took awhile which frustrated me to no end. I actually gave up and took a shower to get ready to go shopping instead while Brenden fixed the problem and got it up and working. What a good husband supporting me in my love of standardized tests.) I did fairly well on the practice exam and was so pleased with my score I didn't study at all the next week. Overconfidence, much? BAD. I did pick up the prep book again, I mean, come on! I paid twenty bucks for this soon-to-be-absolutely-useless-to-me practice book, I needed to at least get my money's worth out of it. I studied some more. Did a little better on the book's practice exam. I'll probably review some more stuff tomorrow and then I'll take the test at 1pm.

And then it will be over. And I won't have to worry about it anymore. And I will be FREE of the GRE! (I said that in a sing-song voice in my head, so that's how you should read it. I wasn't quite sure how else to convey those directions except by explicitly stating them.)

Thank you for letting me rant. This was a post to calm my nerves and remember that, HEY! I CAN DO THIS! And because you actually read through all of that, you deserve something nice. So here's a cute boy who's inspired me and given me confidence in myself. Enjoy!