Stars

I am pleased and a little surprised to report that the coursework is going ok. There's still a month until deadlines and I've made a good dent. Surely no last minute panic and annoyance. I will, of course, leave the referencing 'til the last day, about 10 minutes before it's due to be handed in, just so I can inflict some uneccesary stress on my heart. Just so it feels like I've really accomplished something.

In my first year at uni I took an elective module called 'Stars'. It was about famous people, actors and suchlike. The essay was a critique of a stars perfromance in a movie and I chose to do it on Courtney Love's role in The People Vs Larry Flynt. To be perfectly honest, I was out of my depth. I just liked her but I hadn't a damned notion about her acting abilities. It was a 3000 word essay and it caused me pull my hair out and curse the tutor who took the class. I handed it in the day I was flying back home for Christmas. It was a mess but it was done. I then complained about the ridiculous word count to a fellow student in the union about half an hour later. He informed me that the essay was only meant to be 1000 words. The tutor probably wouldn't even mark it.

I ran to the admissions desk and asked for my essay back. I sat in the union and scribbled out paragraph after paragraph. The sweet and kind Dirt Bird offered to retype it for me and hand it in on my behalf. Disaster was avoided. After Christmas I went to collect my work. I was amazed to see one of the best marks I have ever received for an assignment. The tutors comments started off "Hannah, I liked your essay!" So, when it came to editing out all the waffle I actually had some good thoughts. Which was to question how much Courtney Love was actually "acting" in the movie and how much she was just playing herself. I don't care. I'm glad she's not my mum but I still think she's cool.