The much-anticipated AP European History exam was yesterday. I prepared by eating an uncharacteristically good breakfast (courtesy of my mom) and by do some last-minute studying on writing essays for the test. I arrived at school at 11:30 so that testing could begin at noon. It was good to see my classmates there; I figured that we could provide support to one another. We were supposed to take the test in the cramped internal suspension room (if you get suspended but they still make you go to school, that's where you have to stay). At the last minute they decided to let us use the more spacious library media center, so that was a relief.

The test consisted of two parts: a multiple choice section and an essay section. For the multiple choice, we had to answer 80 questions in 60 minutes (though I think they only gave 55; I don't know why there's a discrepancy, but no one can seem to agree on it). I'm not allowed to give specific details about the content of the questions -- ever -- but I can probably tell you about one question in vague terms. It was about science -- specifically, a scientific topic we had never read about or discussed in class. Luckily, my knowledge from a previous science class gave me the answer. Also, toward the end of the multiple choice questions, I had to erase a few answers when I realized to my horror that the pencil markings only smudged. I erased as hard as I could, but the smudges were indelible. I really hope I don't get a few questions wrong for some stupid reason like that; it really could impact my score. Overall, I think I did fairly well, but not as well as I hoped I would do.

After a short break, we had the essay section, which took a lot more time. I'll be able to discuss the content of the essay questions 48 hours after the test, but till then I have to keep quiet. (These rules are really, really stupid, I know.) You probably wouldn't be interested in specifics anyway. I had been worried about the document-based question (DBQ), the one essay that everyone has to write. Fortunately, it was very easy compared to some of the DBQs I had practiced writing. Reading examples of high-scoring DBQs helped also. In fact, I felt that I had enough time to write it without much of a rush. After the DBQ we had to choose one essay topic out of three from the Renaissance to the Napoleonic era and another topic out of three that covered the post-Napoleonic period. I tried to put effort into the two essays I chose, but I probably didn't provide enough historical evidence to back up my theses. We'll see, I guess.

So that was the AP European History test I've spent months preparing for. It was a major relief not to have to worry about it anymore (though the worry didn't pick up until a few weeks ago). I'll receive my results the third week of July. On July 1, however, the scores will by available by phone at a rate of something like $8 a minute. It's going to be a long wait till the third week of July.

Last night I went to school again to see the school play, "Alice in Wonderland." I was pretty excited by the idea of having a school play because the school has never had one as long as I've been there. The year before last, they were going to do "Peter Pan," but it was postponed to last year, when it never materialized. Anyway, I had no idea who I was going to hang out with because my sister didn't want to go. Luckily, I found Justin and Jonathan from Programming class. We enjoyed the play; well, I did, anyway. I knew some of the people in the play, but it seemed that all of them were well-suited to their parts, especially the girl who played Alice. I don't know her, but she was good at the whole "Gosh golly gee, mister" thing (and she looked good in that old-fashioned, little-girl-type dress). Of course, the play was filled with popular music and other sorts of zany things. It was a lot of fun; I'm glad I went.

Guess who foolishly scheduled his second SAT the day after his first-ever AP exam? That's right: meeee. My first SAT turned out to be pretty good, but I felt that I should improve my math score. That took my mind off the stress of the reading and writing sections because people don't look at the scores you got on each SAT you took; they look at the highest score you ever got on each section of the test. So it doesn't really matter that I wrote a really vague and unfinished essay in the 25 minutes they gave. (The topic was harder than last time, in my opinion.) Anyway, I think I did better on the math section because I probably skipped fewer questions than I did last time, so that's good. And since I don't think I guessed on any of the ones I actually answered, I should (theoretically) have gotten all of those right. But I probably didn't. We shall see.

After taking a three-hour test and a three-and-half-hour test on consecutive days, my brain has turned into a warm pudding, and I look forward to relaxing to the fullest tomorrow. I was supposed to meet up with Nick, Mark, and Kim so that we could start our band today -- today is also Nick's birthday -- but I don't think that's happening. Maybe tomorrow. Music and friends count as relaxation.

Coincidentally, here's a European-history-related link. How many Kings of France were named Louis? Well, not counting Louis XVII, who never reigned, you might think there were 17, the last being Louis XVIII. But apparently Louis XIX reigned for 20 minutes on August 2, 1830.

Airchive.com is "the Webseum of Commercial Aviation." Yeah, "webseum." I guess it's a web museum. It's probably not a web mausoleum. That would be cool, though. If a little creepy.