Wie, in the world, melde ich mich für Kurse an?

Ich habe heute schon drei oder vier Stunden vor meinem Computer gesessen, um interessante Kurse zu finden und meinen Stundenplan zusammenzustellen. Das System hier ist sehr kompliziert...oder vielleicht einfach anders. Ich bin noch nicht daran gewöhnt....

Oh well. Today was a really nice day! I had a relaxed morning: woke up and drank tea and had time to myself; vacuumed the downstairs--which I do on Saturday mornings--but this time I faced my fear of the spider-infested bathroom. Ok, maybe it's not completely spider-infested...let me explain:

There is this shower downstairs that really nobody uses. It works and I'm going to start using it, but that's beside the point. I thought that maybe when Kati was I could maybe use it and wouldn't have to go all the way to the second floor to shower where everyone else was showering.
Story begins: We open the door and proceed back down the short hall that leads to the shower room. All is fine. Phew, still alive. I'm so brave. I inch into the bathroom...still good, no problems--my heart is beating heavily but I managed to retain my composure. Ah, the shower looks pretty nice, shiny shower-head....this isn't too bad. Oh yeah, it's pretty clean, nice.
As I pear into the shower stall, quite delighted with my discovery, I completely, completely lose it for about .276 seconds, scream, and go tearing out of the bathroom--I saw like the biggest, meanest looking spider I've ever seen indoors--and maybe outdoors too. (besides Tyler Goss's pet tarantula, but that's a different story). Brown, hairy, very large. I immediately begin comforting myself with the fact that there aren't poisonous spiders in Germany--at this point in time it doesn't matter that I never checked to varify if that was true when I heard it...
After we calm down for a few minutes Katelyn tells me that she'll be brave and go conquer the spider. Ok, ok--she tells me I can't come with her because I make her more nervous. Fine, no problem. But she seems to be gone for a long time--only armed with a hard-sole slipper--I begin to be concerned for her safety. I hear a rustling "it wasn't that big" I say to myself....it was smaller than the shoe. I hear a scream and see Kati running perhaps faster than I've ever seen before--it is more than a few seconds before she can completely tell me what happened. It...yes...Ok...uh huh....IT WHAT???? Yes, my friends, as she went to squish the small beast (after seeing how slow it ran) it caught itself up on it's web and flung itself towards her face. Mission aborted.
Christoph heard us and took care of the spider. I am so grateful.
Then, as we were relaying this somewhat-traumatic event later that evening I made a hand gesture of how big I thought the spider was. Sometimes, I must admit, this is not the most reliable source of how big a spider actually is--not that I necessarily try to exaggerate, but sometimes I remember the spider in terms of how much it scared me, rather than in terms of milimeters, centimeters, or other standard forms of measurement. To my relief, Christoph varified my representation of the enormity of the spider...it was over.
Facing my fear of that room this morning was good...
I was able to take a walk today in the sun! It wasn't really warm today, but compared to the last few weeks it was fantastic.
I've spent pretty much the entire afternoon on the internet, trying to figure out what classes to take at the university and how it will work into my schedule for next semester back at WSU. It is complicated stuff.
And, as some of you already know, I--along with the whole group I am in--was placed beyond the need for intensive German this semester. This means that I can attend the university directly and choose classes that are outside the international department! That was exciting.
Plus, as some of you already know too, I finished reading my first full book in German (a real book). It was I Dared to Call Him Father but in German it is Allah-mein Vater?

Here are a couple of pictures from Aachen, where we went yesterday with a huge crowd of exchange students.

This is the throne where Charlemagne (Karl der Große) was crowned in the year 800. It's made from stones out of the temple of Jerusalem...

I didn't have my camera, because Amelie has it with her in Italy right now, so I haven't been taking very many pictures. We just thought that this was a pretty funny name for a store, and sounds like some sort of midieval ruler or something....