ghettoperson wrote:
Computer Science.
ok now you are speaking my language. check it out. first few years of CS are what some people think of as drudgery since you are learning syntax and various languages and taking math, physics, and chem classes etc. you have little time to think of actual applications where you will apply all this knowledge. this is not a fault of the material itself but rather the way it is presented. later in junior and senior years, you will have classes that stress more medium scale projects. this is where you will shine since you can apply all those various algorithms and data structure knowledge into a real 'thing' that does something rather than simplistic toy test cases in the more rudimentary classes.
algorithms and data structures themself are kind of abstract until you use them practically to solve a problem. So is language parsing and compiler writing. honestly i find the compiler bits fascinating since you really get down to the fundamentals of language itself. then you start thinking about how non-computer languages work (like comparing spanish vs english and even chinese or other non-western languages in terms of grammar). it depends on your interests.
if you like gaming, try grabbing a copy of a 3d gaming engine like Torque or the Quake3 engine and trying to figure out how the classes work. once you have interst in an area, you will get the drive to learn more.
how about writing your own java based IM client? or, itunes clone. or, join some open source software project (look on sourceforge.net).
getting a job working at the computer labs on campus can also help pique interest in some things. i did this. i worked in the main engineering lab filing output and answering user questions. people interaction skills i learned here i use today and are very valuable. Further, i got promoted to a sysadmin so i was 'root' on some machines and was allowed to patch OS images and so on. here too, the unix skills i learned i carried with me to my present job and i feel i was ahead of the curve when i started. was it boring? not for me - i was working with people all the time and had a blast. again, it's what you make of it.
exactly what kinds of material are you considering boring? what year are you?