Eventually,

the final products would look like these. The black one is lacquered, the others coated in sticky rice paste. My teacher wants me to lacquer mine before I leave this summer, but it might be hard to get enough coats done before then b/c of the weather - lacquer dries in hot and humid environments. Plus, I don't want to be the one doing it b/c I suspect I will react badly to it. I've never gotten poison ivy but I'm not interested in finding out if I WOULD (lacquer comes from a similar species).

I took today at home, hoping to get a lot of writing done for my presentations. Instead, I ended up writing a lot in a wildly veering-off-track manner and turned into something completely inappropriate for either lecture. So. I started drawing diagrams and also plugged in vocab and grammar into flashcard software. THEN the internet went out at home so now I'm having ginger tea in a nearby cafe, not wanting to do any work. And staring at the tart menu...dangerous.