I am annoyed with myself. Today, after procrastinating for a few hours, getting various menial work out of the way before staring on my history paper, I thought I’d check what, exactly, I’m supposed to write about, and write this down on a piece of paper to have in front of me while reading. To help me keep focus, kinda.

And so I discover that I’m not only supposed to describe how the gold standard functioned prior to World War I, I’m also supposed to explain why the same system collapsed after the victorious nations attempted to reestablish it, during the interwar years.

Which basically means that the number of pages I have to read just doubled.

I’ve only been reading for three hours, and I’m so dizzy I almost think I’m drunk. My head hurts worse than it did after I ran straight into the loading ramp of a truck when I was 11. And I estimate that I’ll be at this for at least 10-15 hours more. Today, and tonight. No rest for the lazy, it seems.

And so I am once again reminded of the refrain of Radiohead’s “Just“:

You do it to yourself, you do
And that’s what really hurts
Is that you do it to yourself
Just you and no-one else
You do it to yourself
You do it to yourself

(And why haven’t I made a Radiohead category before? Weird.)

Luckily, though, I still have all my books from HIST1200, “introduction to modern history”, and even though these are a little less specialized than the ones used in 2410 (”economic history: the political economy of globalization”, by the way, in case I haven’t mentioned it), they serve the purpose of supplementing sources well enough, as the page requirement of this paper is 6-7.

Another good thing is that after reading two pages, I already knew how I’d structure the paper, and how I’d argument for democracy and lack of trust in the system as the main reasons why the gold standard failed in the interwar years.

On a slightly less good note, relatively (depending on how you see it), I’m unable to stop thinking of “Angel”, and that I’ll start reviewing AS1 while eating dinner tonight. Hard to focus on monetary policies and trade issues of the 1920s when Angel, Cordy and Doyle are constantly hovering in the back of my head.

Ah, well, I’m off to play some Delta Force Land Warrior in order to clear my head. Laterz.