Exams - yuk

Had the horrendous experience of my Spanish AS level speaking exam today - what a complete disaster!! I had a mock exam with my tutor last Thursday which, to my immense surprise, went quite well. I felt quite optimistic about today - which lasted until I walked into the exam room, realised that the examiner was a native Spanish speaker and felt immediately intimidated, wondering if I should apologise in advance for murdering her language. Well, all the carefully studied words, phrases and stuff went completely out of my head and I felt like a complete lemon. I know that I haven't done very well at all - but why am I getting so bothered about it when I am just doing this because it's part of the course that I signed up for. I just need to get the next exam on 19 May out of the way and then I'm free of all this. I'm not going back to do the A2 part next year - I'm going to look for a course which will bring back the fun of learning, not the stress of exams.

On a much nicer note, I was trying to revise this afternoon and kept getting distracted by watching the birds in the garden. I kept seeing a robin, with his beak full of nest building materials, perched in our cherry tree. He would stay there for a while until he was sure the coast was clear and then fly towards the house, where I lost track of him. Eventually I sussed out where he was going and it turns out that he and his partner are nesting in the roof of our porch (which is due for replacement this summer). There is a gap where the original bay and porch were separated when we had the new windows put in, which the robins have obviously decided is a des res. So, the porch redevelopment is on hold until they have, hopefully, raised their brood and departed. What a nature reserve our garden is turning into - tadpoles and nesting birds - Springwatch eat your heart out ;-)