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For my senior year of high school, I'm doing American History and Lit, since with of all the history I've had, I hadn't yet studied that of America. For curriculum, I'm using lectures and notes by Dr. George Grant. (I've used his stuff for all of my junior high/high school history.) He is, to put it simply, a brilliant genius, and I haven't listened to a single lecture of his this year without coming away completely fired up for life. So inspiring.

My lit is all combined and correlates to what I'm learning in history at the moment. The first assigned book to read was The Last Crusader, written by Dr. Grant himself. It was a really thought-provoking and eye-opening book about "The Untold Story of Christopher Columbus." It gives an in-depth account of Columbus's life, worldviews, and the dreams that ultimately drove him to undertake the journey that resulted in the discovery of America. I would definitely recommend it.

Next I'm reading Longitude by Dava Sobel, "the true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest problem of his time." Parts of it have been dull and slow, but against my instincts I'm finding it intriguing. It covers lots about navigation and clockwork and mechanical stuff . . . not exactly the type of things I normally find interesting, but I'm glad to have read the book. (I'm not quite finished yet, though.)

Oh, and I just started Paul Johnson's A History of the American People. A thousand pages of tiny words. *sigh* But I have to admit, the depth of knowledge that the author possesses is pretty amazing!

Yesterday and today have been rainy and cloudy, and it all around feels much more like fall than a week ago (90's weather) did. I love the feeling of fall, and I love school - because I love learning. I want to know everything.