How Much Studying is Too Much Studying?

My WSET Diploma Case Study exam on the South African wine industry is tomorrow morning.  Save for my daughter’s indoor soccer game on Saturday night, I spent the entire weekend sequestered inside, studying.  And I’ve officially reached my saturation point.  Even if I wanted to, I cannot absorb one more statistic about the South African wine industry.  My brain is mush.

A good way to tell you’ve reached your saturation point is when you have the dream.  You know, the classic unprepared-for-an-exam dream.  Every once in a while, I still have the dream about college (which makes me wonder if college scarred me on some subliminal level).  My favorite dream is always the one where I arrive to take an exam for a class that I never attended.  Good times.

So, my wine dream.

I arrived to take my case study exam, and discovered that instead of South Africa, we would be taking a practical exam on (wait for it) . . . home economics.

What in the wide world of hell?

I looked around, expecting everyone else to be as stupefied as I was.  But I was the only one who was unprepared.  Shocker, right?

Our first challenge was jewelry making.  We had to refashion a coin ring using nothing but rocks.  Do I at least get a chisel?

Then there was the cut and carve candle making challenge.  Do you remember these candles?  That’s what we were supposed to be making.  I made a gray blob with a wick.

Next, we had to break down and identify all of the olfactory components of Old Spice cologne,  Swagger flavor.  Cinnamon with a hint of frankincense, thankyouverymuch.  Nailed it.

But perhaps the best and weirdest part of the whole dream was the absence of a blind wine tasting . . . in favor of a blind cheese tasting.  Yes, cheese.  We had to identify the variety of each cheese, the country of origin, and method of production.  Ready, set . . . GO!!

Yep, I’m losing it.

I’d better go study some more.

Cheers!