Body confusion, a healthy dose of selfishness, perfective verbs, Master and Margarita

Jet lag is a funny thing. The first day I got back (Friday) I slept from 9:30 PM to 9:30 AM. Saturday from 11 PM to 11 AM. No jet lag here, but on Sunday night (the night before school started up again) it began to rear its ugly head and I couldn't sleep at all. I went to school rather dazed (fortunately or unfortunately no one seemed to notice) on Monday. I returned from school determined not to take a nap and tough it out until the evening. I made it until 9:30 PM and then let myself go to bed. I wake up convinced it's time to get up and get ready for school. It's 11:45 PM. After some period of time, I go back to sleep. I wake up again. 2:45 AM this time. Unable to go back to sleep, I start getting my stuff ready for class. Finally, at 4 AM I'm able to get back to sleep. I wake up again at 8:15 AM (15 minutes after I am supposed to be at work). Fortunately, on Tuesday chapel is first period, so there weren't any problems. I am just confused as to why my body wants to sleep all the time, but won't allow me to sleep ever. 

 While I was in California for Christmas, I was hoping that I wouldn't have too many negative feelings once I got back. But, since I've returned to St. Pete, I've noticed how nice it is to be back. Surprisingly nice. I've tried to figure out and dissect why. I believe part of it is that I've gotten myself settled here. It might be for selfish reasons: Russia, St. Petersburg, more specifically, is mine. While I was back, that was something, an experience, that was definitively MINE. No one else had it. I have all but committed to  second year here. I'm beginning to wonder a little bit; if I'm still enjoying it so much could I be here for longer than 2 years? 

This brings me to my next topic of consideration: the language. If I am planning on even just a second year, I want my Russian to be much better than what it is. I live with 2 other Americans, work at an English speaking school, and spend time with Russians who speak very good English, so I could go days or weeks without speaking ANY Russian. This may be comfortable, but I really want to pick up as much language as I can during my time here. So, I'm wondering if I should think about looking for a living situation with some nationals. I'm not thinking about this until next year, so in the meantime I've decided to be more disciplined about spending time outside of class working on a few things. Call it a New Year's Resolution, if you will (I won't).

I started watching this Russian adaptation of Mikhail Bulgakov's Master and Margarita Youtube. I read it a few years ago in college (mainly on the bus going to away games, so I think I missed a few of the finer points of the novel). It was alright; it didn't thrill my soul, so to speak. However, I am really enjoying this mini-series a lot. I found this channel that has a lot of Russian movies and TV with subtitles. If you are feeling yourself Russian (a little joke about how Russians use reflexives, often to humorous effect when they speak English), you can mosey on over to:

http://www.youtube.com/user/GalaBiR