elanya

Me, I'd go with the course load you've got planned out, unless, as you say, there's some very good reason to increase it (immigration or money, basically). I know that when I was writing my thesis, all I wanted to do was concentrate on that, and having assignments and readings for unrelated classes was a major annoyance. Plus, a bit of spare time prevents one from going insane. And the Reformation isn't all that interesting anyway ;)