Gruel

Besides the lack of vegetarian-friendly food, the training has been pretty exhausting.  We've been going from 8 am to 7 pm every day, with a 1-hour break for lunch and ten minute breaks every hour or so.  Then it's back to the hotel room for more homework and studying.  Today we finally completed the curriculum; tomorrow is all review, and Sunday is the exam.  Although this exam has actual consequences for my career, I actually feel less stressed about it than about my quarterly Japanese exams.  I suppose it's because I'm spending so much time studying for it, as opposed to my Japanese tests, where I mostly stress about how little I've studied for them.  I hope it's also because I feel like I'm actually prepared for this one.  

I still find myself uncertain about many of the review questions they provide, but the instructor also says that these questions are not anywhere near the quality of the actual exam questions.  Which is reassuring in the sense that the exam questions will hopefully be less ambiguous, but also makes me wonder how I'll know if I actually am well-prepared.  Still, a 70% is all that's required to pass, and I feel pretty confident that I can beat that.  I'd better -- I would be incredibly pissed at myself if I went through this grueling week, and put the E-i-C through her own super-grueling week, and didn't get certified at the end of it.  Despite the cranial force-feeding and homesickness, I'm sure I've been getting much better sleep, and undergoing much less stress, than she has been.  

The weather news predicts that Sunday will be be hot - as much as 78 degrees, though I confess that I'm not sure what location that prediction was for.  I hope the examination room's air conditioning stands up to it.

I bit my tongue really hard eating my exciting salad at lunch today.  Nothing like a painful, swollen bump on one's tongue to really focus the mind.