"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves..."

Unless you’ve been living under a rock this past week you’re more than aware of the little academic challenge I’ve engaged in. It's centered on a simple premise: Our generations expectancy to be rewarded for doing the bare minimum. Bryson offered to take me out to dinner Friday night, if and only if, I was able to make it to every single class this week. He bet on me. I bet against myself.

I won the bet.

But wait! There was a good reason, bursting with importance and urgency, a reason that left me no choice whatsoever, left me paralyzed this morning on the couch, drinking cup after cup of steaming coffee, glued to the television, eyes like dinner plates, standing up in explosive moments of melodic rapture to perform spiraling pirouettes to imagainary audiences, screaming praises, hands flying majestically into the air, breaking the early morning peaceful quiet with a fiery voice singing “Five Hundred Twenty Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes, How Do You Measure, Measure A Year??”

And really, how do you measure a year? I don’t know, but I am able to measure the importance of watching Rosario Dawson on Regis and Kelly, talking about her upcoming Broadway tour de force against a boring lecture on theatre by my washed up, diluted Shakespearian hack professor.

Who could blame me, picking lovely Mimi, filling our hearts with beauty and joy over Professor Brutus, filling our minds with mundane school facts???

Cold mornings and Broadway musicals, wings of a golden door, lifting me into flight, far from the solemn earth, far from winning the bet with Bryson, far from a free dinner for going to class for one whole week.