Upon reading my last blog post the Queen decreed that somehow I had managed to slip through the grips of the English educational system and that in semester two they should reestablish their chokehold. Their official royal mandate read something to the effect of: “this term should kick his cocky Yankee bum!”

And hence semester two was wrought in full swing. On the first day alone it was clear that this second semester would surpass the first in difficulty. I typically expect the first day of a new class to be one of those uneventful “lets get to know one another, I’ll cover the rules, what the course will cover, and this is me, your professor, trying desperately hard to get you to either like me or fear me within the first 10 minutes.” However this semester the first days of class were straight into lectures and assignments. In fact on day one I was given a 1000 word essay assignment to be finished by the following week.

But day one wasn’t all ominous doom and gloom; in fact I had something kind of cool happen. I was wondering around campus in the rat race maze of find-out-where-your-lecture- is-5-minutes-before-it-begins-madness that the University of Hull thinks is the most logical way of notifying students of where to go. (Personally I think an email the week before would be handy, but who am I to make waves). Anyway, I was in this mess of people trying desperately hard to find out where my timetable was posted. As hard as I looked I couldn’t find it. So I thought I’d go to the History Department office to ask for some assistance.

Upon getting to the office I found it locked and closed for lunch. BUT, I could hear people inside of it. I quickly considered my options, I could continue to wander aimlessly hoping for divine inspiration and run the risk of missing my first lecture, OR I could knock on the door, and interrupt their lunch for a 30 second question. I decided to go with the latter; feeling a bit less sympathetic upon seeing that they get a 2-hour lunch break.

I locked loudly twice before anyone came and when she did it was apparent that she didn’t like the interruption. She pointed to the sign on the door and said they would be open again later that day. I humbled myself and quickly explained my plight. To which she sighed and told me the board in which the timetable would be posted. I thanked her and set off to find it.

The board was right where she said it would be, but the timetable was not. I looked thoroughly then I looked again. Then I looked on every board in the vicinity of it. And then I looked again. Still nothing. I walked back to the office and contemplated knocking but thought I should do one last through look. STILL nothing. I had no other choice but to interrupt the office again.

So I made my way there in a somewhat tail-between-the-legs fashion, knowing she wasn’t going to be happy to see me. But as perturbed as I knew she would be, I didn’t want to miss my lecture if it was avoidable. So I knocked again, long and loud. I could hear her footsteps approaching heatedly. She flung open the door and in a hissed tone said: “When I get cross I get really cross.” And this time I really was sympathetic, I felt bad for interrupting her twice but I tried to explain my position. After all, what could I do?

With a heavy sign, she said she’d look it up for me and asked my name. And upon giving it to her a strange change occurred. Her whole demeanor altered and she said: “I saw your film.” I was shocked for a few reasons, one that she saw my film, and two that she remembered my name from it. Even more shocking was how she was now reacting. Her furrowed brow was exchanged for a smile and jovial attitude. She began to joke around with me a bit, calling to her assistant: “Deb, have you seen the timetable for History 241? Brandon here couldn’t find it but bear in mind that he is a filmmaker…”

It was awesome. I went from feeling like the lunch-interrupting-jerk to the cool indie-film-kid on campus whose actions could be justified as merely being a part of my “arty nature.” I basked in the recognition for a bit then parted ways. Seeing how she knew who I was I now felt like I should butter her up a bit and apologize with a small box of chocolates or something to that effect. But even here she beat me to the punch and tracked down two of my email address to send a quick apology for her being a bit irate. It was such a strange feeling, she was totally justified in being cantankerous with me, but here she was apologizing…

The experience went to my head and I spent the next few days feeling like a C-list celebrity,

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