My brain feels like a sponge that has been squeezed dry too many times, and is about to fall apart.

Every time before an exam, my brain tries to soak up as much information as it can, and it gets squeezed dry during the paper. Every bit of relevant information that I can recall goes into my answer. How many more cycles of these soak-and-squeeze can it take? My brain is protesting whenever it sees the lecture notes.

Tomorrow’s paper is a crazy one… It’s like a test of how well you know the details more than anything else. I just can’t remember which cell induces which cell to form what, and what factors are involved. Either I get it messed up, or I can’t remember the names, which is very frustrating. Suddenly, even studying for neurobio feels less tough that studying for developmental bio! I hope everything I’ve tried to stick into my brain today doesn’t fly out before tomorrow.

It’s the season where everyone’s busy mugging; where 24 hours in a day is simply not enough and everyone hopes that the exams will be over soon so that life can go back to normal.

Given that my first paper is still 2 days away, I’m not too stressed right now, but I just know that my stress levels will increase exponentially as the exams go on. I have 4 papers on the last week of the exams, and on the Sunday after the exams end I have to take JLPT as well. It doesn’t help that practically all my papers are in the afternoon, because I feel that I end up losing a lot of time when I have afternoon papers. At least if my papers are in the morning I can spend the rest of the day studying for the next paper. If I have an afternoon paper, by the time I go home and take a nap, the day is practically gone already. Not good at all when the next paper is just 2 days later - it’s impossible to finish studying within that short period of time! Right now I’m just taking things one step at a time… holidays please come soon!

If you’re tired from studying or whatsoever, here’s a lively song to (hopefully) cheer you up!

ºC-ute - めぐる恋の季節 (Meguru Koi no Kisetsu, The Season of Returning Love)

Dance shot version of the same song: here (Love the dresses!)
Translation: here

皆、頑張れ！

Chika Umino’s popular “Honey and Clover” is the latest manga series to be adapted to television. It was turned into a movie in 2006, starring Aoi Yuu (蒼井優). This time, 15-year-old actress Narumi Riko (成海璃子) will be taking over as the lead character, Hagumi Hanamoto.

“Honey and Clover” follows the lives of five college students and their love triangles. Hagumi is a talented artist in her first year, even though she appears to be much younger. Ikuta Toma (生田斗真) has been cast as Yuta Takemoto, the lead male character. The remaining main cast members have not yet been announced.

The drama will air on Fuji TV at 9:00pm every Tuesday, starting on January 8. Filming starts near the end of this month.

Source: 1 2

This is certainly good news for a Hachikuro fan! I’m surprised that both the leads were changed though. Aoi Yuu did a very good portrayal Hagu in the movie, and I got used to seeing Sho as Takemoto. Much as I loved Toma in HanaKimi, I can’t imagine him as Takemoto. But we shall see! Hopefully the script for the drama will be much better than the one in the movie and do better justice to the manga.