Wow I haven't posted in a long time. For those of you that may actually still check this page, here's an update:

My classes are going well this semester... I'm actually doing really well in Italian, The American West, and The American South. Econ is a different story, but life goes on. :-)
My Danish studies are also really starting to pay off. My teacher is really starting to push me to the limits during our sessions by making me speak as sophisticated as possible. Instead of asking simple questions, he'll have a conversation with me about complex issues that in turn require an in-depth usage of the language. It's hard work and tiring, but really helpful.

I guess my Italian studies are about to pay off in a small way - Thursday I am going to Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library to do research on a series of volumes published by an Italian thinker in the late 1500's. He made some pretty ridiculous (and intellectually stimulating) drawings of what he thought native americans in the New World would look like. My roommate, who is from Milan, Italy is also going with me to help translate since this is complex 16th century Italian (not exactly something in level 1 Italian is fully up to reading). Check one of the pictures out:

I'm really excited to head home for Thanksgiving in a couple weeks. I'm also knee-deep in research for a 25 page term paper for my American South class in which I am writing on the post-World War II economic globalization and technological progress as it pertained to the Atlanta Fulton Bag and Cotton Mills and their decline then ultimately the shut-down in the 1970's. It's a mix of economics and history, and it's really neat because nobody has ever really written on the Southern textile industry in the post-war years. I'm using mostly primary documents too, so it's original research. 

I promise to post more often!