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• Back to school

Oh man… It’s August now and the University will start spinning its gears full speed again in just two more weeks. Am I the only one that feels like the last days of summer are the most intense time of the year? Now is the time to get a firm footing and prepare for the flood of work, tests, e-mails and everything else that makes us feel as far away from a vacation as possible.

But it’s not all bad. As much as I am stressed out about adding a full load of classes to my already full schedule, the fall can be a pretty action-packed season. What’s more exciting than packed MTD buses, Quad Day, shopping for school supplies at Walgreens and Twitter updates from all the University libraries? Well, it will be nice to have people around town again for starters. Not that there haven’t been any, but when you’re looking to get some quick grub on campus and the three places you try to go to are closed, it can get a little discouraging. Of course, the grass is always greener on the other side and once the school year starts up again, the streets will be lined with all of us backpacked, cell phone gabbing students trying to get a quick bite between classes.

Something else to look forward to despite all the hustle and bustle is the town’s own busy agenda for the upcoming month. With the Champaign-Champagne Festival and Urbana’s Sweetcorn Festival well on their way, the upcoming weekends will turn out to be either be a nice break from preparing for the school year or an irresistible excuse to procrastinate. I’m looking forward to normal business hours, booked venues and some sense of rhythm back in CU.

Or maybe I’m just trying to make the best out of a busy situation. Either way, back-to-school sales are inevitably here to wake us up from the lackadaisical groove of summer, so brace yourself as it’s time to get back to the old grindstone.