Last night on Radio Free Swerve: our heroine was trying to study for a test in her history of photography class when she realized that she could not access the course materials online. She vowed to call the school's help desk in the morning and grovel for a password. Then she did some reading and went to sleep.

Today, we join the drama in progress: I called the help desk. I explained. I pleaded. I begged. And the verdict was: no. They can't give me access. I have to go into the lab and get a new password (which is interesting, as I have no idea what my previous password could possibly have been).

So I'm sitting here with my notebook and my enormous photography book, which, according to my bathroom scale, weighs eight pounds. And I'm trying to decide what to do. The class starts at 1:00 pm. Here are my options:

1. Throw everything into my heavy-duty backpack, go to the school computer lab, get a new password, study the photos online, leave for class at the last minute.
2. Stay here, read notes and sections from the book, Google Image search the photographers we've discussed, leave for class at normal time.
3. Have a complete nervous meltdown and curl up in the corner, sobbing uncontrollably and cursing the Six Degrees of Alfred Stieglitz.

I'm leaning toward my notes and Google. I'd spend so much time getting to school and acquiring a password that I wouldn't have time to study.

Mama said there'd be days like this.

I bombed the test.

Seriously. I'll be lucky to get a D. Too many names, too many groups, too many publications, too many movements, too many details. Too many questions left half-answered or not answered at all. Too much information and not enough structure.

The Bauhaus School. The New Bauhaus School. The Clarence White School. The f/64 group. The Film and Photo League. The surrealist movement. The Dada movement. The avant-garde movement in France. The avant-garde movement in Germany. The photographers working for the FSA. Aperture magazine. The Magnum Photo Agency. Photographers, too many to name.

I can't keep all of this straight in my head, especially when we meet only one day a week.

When everyone had finished the test, the class headed to some galleries on Newbury Street. I can't walk that far with an injured foot, so I skipped it and came home to sulk.

I hate school.