DITL of a Bible Bee Senior

 

6:00 am

wrench myself out of warm and comfortable bed to a joltingly sudden and extremely annoying BLARING alarm

get out of bed like an elephant, almost falling on my sister's head while trying to silence that exasperating alarm before my two sisters that I share a room with wake up

rustle way too loudly around my helplessly messy desk for my memory box which is never where I sleengrily (sleepily + angrily) think it should be

go down the hall to my brother's room and hiss at him so that he wakes up: "Joshua!  Time to recite!"

walk downstairs, maintaining the undeniable grace and stealth of an overweight elephant, memory box in hand

6:05 am

depending on the day, start with—

Day A: slouch majestically in my chair at the bottom right corner of the dining room table, with Joshua's tealish green memory cards spread out in front of eyes that wanna stay shut, me rather a bedraggled lifeless mess only occasionally reviving to mark mistakes or tally perfect recitations

Day B: slouch impressively on a stool, still in pajamas, not bothering to open my refractory eyes for a lovely long while, mumbling passages in an indistinct, foggy morning voice, making atrocious errors such as, "For a wicked man may fall seven times and rise again, But the righteous shall fall by calamity"

Side note: Even in a groggy state, it is incredible to see the progress of the sunrise, which is always beautiful, even when obscured by the numerous trees and homes in our Sugar Land neighborhood.

7:00 am

on Day A, go to Day B

on Day B, go to Day A

(the pajamas and the bedraggledness carry over/apply on all days, regardless of order of occurrence of A and B)

often on Day B when going to Day A will get breakfast while hearing Joshua recite—my noisy cereal crunching certainly does not help his concentration especially when I take extra bites during pauses because I know I can get some more food into the hatch before I have to say another reference

8:00 am

visually evaluate large stack of passages, mentally bemoaning the fact that I didn't get more of them perfect in order to reduce the number I must review (I review the passages I make mistakes in, and the passages I didn't have time to recite)

decide to put away the MPs for now and eat breakfast instead

8:45 am

emerge no longer garbed in pajamas

ready to conquer the MP review

well, maybe not "ready to conquer"—just ready to have it over and done with would be more accurate

depending on the day—

Type A: methodical, attempt to mostly recite minus looking at the cards, enjoy being pseudo-expressive/wanna-be-dramatic, savor the words, speak clearly

Type B: rushed, tend to revert to following the cards visually to (1) stay focused and (2) go faster, rather stumble over the words, run out of breath

10:40 am

after some stop-and-start traffic while traveling down the long MP highway, a short break in which I enjoy the relief of finally being done with passages for the day, and do random scattered things

11:20 am

(break isn't always this long, but today I had a little more to do in this time than usual)

refreshed from a break involving scantily little to absolutely no Bible Bee, time to start my hour of reading

reading includes, but is not irretrievably confined to

daily Bible reading (currently reading through Acts to Revelation for the fall)

extra CR reading for BB

Ephesians commentaries + theological papers

as well as not-reading-but-writing-Bible-trivia-or-BB-review-questions-about-what-I-read

reading in this pleasantly multi-tasking fashion for an hour was instituted partly to facilitate daily non-BB Bible reading and BB commentary reading which would otherwise be mauled and left to perish by the other tasks—it needed to be safely imprisoned in its own jail cell in Time Penitentiary, safe from the other inmates

secondarily, the read-interesting-stuff-for-an-hour-part-of-my-day was established to speed on the hands of the clock towards the much-looked-for consumption of daily noontime nutrition

(in case you were not previously informed, the clock walks on his hands in one complete circle each day, except at meals, when he refuels—hence the expression, "the hands of the clock")

12:20 pm

usually come out of the reading hour time cell with a terrific overload of freight for the Leechewtinides Email Railroad Line

(how can you NOT tell others about cool things like how the only times ευλογια [eulogia] is used in the LXX ]Septuagint] are Neh 9:5 [MP!] and 2 Chron 20:26 [MP context!]? whether these fascinating tidbits appear in NBBC rounds or not, I'm glad I learned 'em)

mobilize the mental motorcade into memorizing and reviewing the study passage till the rumblingly voiced desire of my inmost soul stomach shall be satiated

12:45ish pm

go to lunch (finally!), devour whatever happens to be set forth on that particular day

lunch chore (today sweeping the dining room and kitchen)

2 pm

start computer studying

levels of productivity vary greatly, all hovering between Almost-As-Productive-As-I'd-Like and Extremely-Not-Productive-Because-Joshua-And-Abby-Were-Distracting-Me-Simultaneously

today was the latter

at this point I'm almost concerned we have too much good study material, from the sheer volume and magnitude of the review/quiz questions Joshua comes up with

computer studying includes:

compiling vast amounts of MP study galore

working methodically through the SP finding CRs, background, and Interesting-Things-To-Note-Whether-They're-Likely-To-Get-Asked-Or-Not

learning said voluminous MP study by writing multitudinous review questions and repeating them on Quizlet

today because of Joshua royally diverting my already wavering attention, and Abby constantly consulting me, computer studying was spectacularly slow

4:45ish pm

done with computer studying

this is where it gets hazily obscure

do random things I have left over

some of the things I do after this time include

biking around the neighborhood under slightly-less-hot-than-usual conditions only

inscribing Greek words over my increasingly battered Eph 1-6 study text

playing or recording hymns or other simple pieces on the piano

lying languidly on the couch rather unsuccessfully attempting to process what I should be doing next

eating dinner and doing dinner chores (today it was stowing the leftover food in the refrigerating receptacle; other days it is often washing magnificent amounts of dishes, sweeping tirelessly dirty floors, or clearing and cleaning the illustriously large dining room table)

8:15 pm

after dinner, generally relax in decided rebellion against all the other work I could be doing

do luxurious non-studying, such as

writing, when I have the all-necessary inspiration and enlightenment

reading, when I have the all-necessary absorbing and quality literature

knitting, following fun patterns of varying levels of difficulty, or inventing my own unprecedented creations (which, DISCLAIMER, probably only evolve satisfactorily 50% or less of the time)

10 pm

everything after this is sleep or dreams (which, by the way, happen when you're awake, not when you're asleep, in case you were not aware of that)

Notes: The times in this spiel are decidedly approximate.  They swing hugely from day to day.  Furthermore, this is a description of a day in the life of this Bible Bee Senior.  It is not a typical day, because there are no typical days in my life.  Each day is belovedly unique and carries its own trials, tribulations, and treasures.  Also, this day is simply a day at a certain point in Nationals season.  Different points in Nationals season look highly distinct, and are characterized by many aspects not mentioned here.  It is simply a sample, and a good thing too, since the full show might be too much for our viewers!  Thank you for your unfailing courage to reach the end of this horribly jargonic and deliberately wordy tale.

As always,

Your fellow BBer,

Hannah