as my parents watch lord of the rings, i am typing

"And you said something,
You said something stupid like
Love steals us from loneliness,
Happy Birthday.
Are you lonely?"
- Idlewild, Love Steals us from Loneliness.

And so it was that Idlewild released a new single. And so it was that I bought it, put it into my CD player and have listened to it non-stop for several hours. Don't worry, it's not as bad as it sounds, I've been listening to the other two tracks on the single too.

I never buy singles, on principle, I don't like paying 3,4,5 quid for one song (let's face it, B-sides tend to suck), I'd rather wait and get the album or (shock!) download it. Annoyingly enough, since the latter is apparently illegal, most of the time I just never get my mitts on the song. But Idlewild... Oh if there ever was a band worth spending £3 on... I want them to do well, and if my measly contribution to their record sales makes even a smidge of difference, I'll be happy.

Anyway, it's a damn good song. The verses move a bit slowly, the lyrics are vintage vintage Roddy Woomble but that is one hell of a chorus. That's a chorus to belt out in the shower, or at an Idlewild gig (roll on April 8th), or on the toilet. Yeah maybe that's just me. It's good to have you back, boys.

***********

I bought and watched The Ice Storm today. I'd been told it was brilliant, an ancestor of films like American Beauty. Also it has Elijah Wood and Tobey Maguire as 70s teenagers, can you say woohoo?

I have to say, I got a bit bored though. It was a very good film, but it just didn't sit well, there wasn't enough pace in it for me, not enough action. Not in the blood-guts-and-guns sense, in the things-happening sense. Maybe it's me, maybe I'm just not in tune to the subtleties of Ssh Films. It's too minimalist though, it annoys me. These films are supposed to depict real life. Well, it's funny, you know what happens in real life? People talk. All the time, far more than you ever see in any script. People don't speak in contrived riddles and loaded musings. People talk, they try to communicate. Maybe they don't succeed but they try.

Ssh Film - A film in which not much is said, tense silences and "why don't you figure out what they're thinking?" glances abound. Much time is spent with people walking quietly or having silent breakdowns. Conversation, if any, is disjointed and focusses on death and philosophy in the mundane.
Example: Woman is chopping vegetables.
Man comes in.
Man: What are you doing?
Woman: Chopping vegetables.
(tense silence, close up on woman's impassive face)
Woman: Good day?
Man: What is a day anyway?
Woman: What?
Man: Maybe.
Woman: What's this really about?
Man: It's about life.
Woman: You know when I was little, I thought about death a lot. D'you ever notice how carrots are like life?
(close up on man's impassive stare)
Man: I always hated potatoes.

These films tend not to make sense. Admit that you don't understand and you're probably stupid.

********

Jesus said we should pray continually. Just in case you hadn't noticed my shameless 24-7prayer plugging, there's a lovely bunch of people who've dedicated their lives to encouraging people to do just that.

One more shameless plug - read Red Moon Rising by Pete Greig, it's the tale of the 24-7 movement and possibly one of the most inspiring god-stories I've ever heard.

Doing a week of 24-7prayer at St Peter's Church might not work. I am aware of this. There's issues with space, supervision, enthusiasm for the idea, people being wary of such a radical way of praying. On a more straightforward level, people might just not want to pray for that long.

We don't have much time. If we want to do this at Easter, that's about a month of preparation time. Groups usually plan a 24-7 week half a year in advance. Also, what if half the congregation are away over Easter?

What if we can't fill all the slots? What if the prayer room gets vandalised? What if we try to organise it for Easter but it doesn't happen and people get de-motivated?

Nikki's forwarded an email I wrote outlining the idea to the leadership of the church. Here's my main fear - what if they just say no?

I spoke to one of the youth about it, said "do you reckon we could organise a week of non-stop prayer at the church?". She said she thought it was cool idea.
Yeah, but do you really think we could make it work, practically.
She reminded me that with Jesus, anything is possible.

I guess I'm getting so caught up with the practical constraints, the fact that this might be something God-led and I really feel like this is something he wants us to do has kind of been sidelined.

So this is it, the next couple of days are when we'll find it. To 24-7 or not to 24-7. Like they say, his will be done.

today

I worked out (yes, I went through and ticked them off) that I've seen 42 of the 1001 Films You Must See Before You Die. Now, despite what my parents think, I don't accept the opinion of some 60 film buffs as gospel truth. I'm not going to watch 1001 films just because they tell me to.

Instead, I'm going to pick the 200 most interesting ones and attempt to watch them all before I turn twenty. That's much less sad, right? Only 158 to go, right?

i DO blame it on the weatherman

I remember back in Year 11, we had biology on the second floor of A-block and our classroom overlooked the field. It was winter and it was snowing. This one girl in my class had recently moved over from India, she'd never seen snow before. I'd like to say that it made me look a little closer at the white stuff, appreciate it that little bit more now that I'd seen it through someone else's eyes.

Sadly, I still can't stand the stuff. I was always the kid at school who lost at snowball fights, I was never very competitive - meaning I would never fight back. Snowballs down the back, in the face, in my jumper, ice in snowballs, dirt in snowballs, snowbricks, snowboulders. I sucked at snowball fights. I still do. Not that they happen to me so often, now, but it's still a scary thought. If someone were to ambush me in the street with an icy arsenal, I'd be screwed.

As a result, snow just pisses me off. It's like fine art, or sculpture. It's beautiful, sure, so why on earth would you want to throw it at someone? Would you bundle a Jackson Pollock up and shove it in someone's face? Ok, so it's nature, you can't get sued by the Tate Modern for damaging nature, but what's the difference?

Would you chuck a hummingbird at someone?
Or maybe a porpoise?
How about mud? I love mud, but I wouldn't throw it at someone. Actually, that's a lie. I'd much rather have a mud fight than a snowball fight.

Mud is fantastic. Earth, compost, soil, mud... Ah yeah, that's more like it. I love the smell of the soil, in the summer when you're lying on the itchy grass, or in the winter when you're in the woods or something and the air stinks of it. Ok, I have a mud fetish, it's no weirder than appreciating bits of frozen nature by shoving them down people's backs.

And another thing. Biased weather reports. Out of my whole sociology class, only two people agreed with me here (including teacher so that counts as two people), but I think hot weather blows. Mmm, sweaty. You can wrap up against the cold; there's only so many layers you can take off in the heat before you start breaking the law. Or damaging yourself.

Fair enough, it takes all sorts. Some like it hot, some like it grey and rainy (me!), others like it so windy their nostrils shiver. Here's a home truth for you:

WEATHER REPORTING = BRAINWASHING

Weathermen and weathergirls like HEAT. They like SUNSHINE and they HATE RAIN. Why has no one noticed this before? There is a blatant, flagrant and... downright stinking bias towards equator-like weather in our mass media.

"Hey guys, it's 7am and we're set for another day of 30 degree heat! Yeah! So, break out your sweat-patches and get ready for some seriously damaging sunburn!"

Who the hell decided that heatwaves were a good thing?

Don't get me wrong, I like a bit of sunshine as much as the next girl, but there's sunshine and there's ohforcryingoutloudifiwantedtoBURNi'dmovetoHADES sunshine.

Give me summer evenings, when it's warm enough to be comfortable, but your head doesn't feel like it's imploding.

Give me spring, when everything's fresh and beautiful.

Or autumn rain, when everything smells like winter but it's warm enough that you can wander round in your t-shirt, completely drenched, and not care.

Give me anything but interminable summer, droves of girls who look good in bikinis and never, ever sweat.

i could've bombed tonight. sometimes i think, why do i do it?

The buzz is back.

We did the 2005 Black Tie dinner at church tonight, I was the compere for the cabaret section. It was cool, there's so many thoughts going round in my head that might be gone by later this morning but, oh I'm tired.

I'll come back tomorrow, get out my thoughts about compliments and comedy and self-criticism and painful shoes and giving gifts back to God and feeling good about oneself and somehow confused about oneself but...

Mainly. I just want to say that it's back.

The buzz that was missing from the performances I did last term, the gut wrenching fear, the adrenaline, the calm, the hyperactivity - the warm fuzzies that come after. It's back. Arsing around in a fancy dress with a microphone and some awful jokes and IT'S BACK.

Can you hear that thwup thwup sound? That's the blood singing through my buzzing, drama student veins.

S'cuse me, I've gotta go get down on my knees and say thank you.

what's to stop people pushing each other off the platform?

I went to Essex uni today. Upon arriving at the uni we were greeted by the sight of two of the giant, 15 storey accomodation blocks. They were BLACK. In between them was a giant luminous greenhouse.
"Daddy..." I whispered, "It looks like Mordor..."
Then, a few seconds later, my student instinct kicked in.
"Daddy..." I whispered, "They've got a GANJ FARM in there!"

I then proceeded to an audition workshop, where I became 1/4 of a giant spider in an experimental pantomime parody, and went for a tour of the campus. After cramming myself into a lift full of about 8 other people (see the bottom of this post for my feelings on small spaces, including lifts) in one of the Mordor towers, I noticed a sign.

In the event of the lift becoming stuck, press the help button once every thirty seconds. This will alert the caretaking staff and help will soon arrive. DON'T PANIC.

Don't panic? Is this some kind of subtle, ironic Essex humour? I'm panicking already, you swines!

Later, I found out that accomodation in the towers consists of 14 people sharing two kitchens, two showers and two toilets. The lift seemed positively welcoming after that.

*******

I also spent a lot of time observing commuters on the Underground. Rats in drainpipes, army ants, lemmings... Dangerous species, commuters. They power walk and power talk and even power drink their coffee through those stupid beaker things, and they read all the while. I'm amazed. I can only read broadsheets when I spread them out on the living room floor and use all ten fingers AND some toes.

These people read them one handed while they're moving. Last time I read whilst walking, I walked into a lamppost and it HURT.

This one woman was strutting along, book in one hand, coffee in the other, wearing KITTEN HEELS of all things, not looking where she was going. She powered ahead of the crowd, round some corners and got to the platform at Bank just before we did. She then proceeded to power-read her way to within inches of the yellow line of doom, where she stopped dead. When the train pulled in, it turned out that she'd stopped exactly where the doors would be.

That, ladies and gents, was a lady in need of a holiday. And maybe a guide dog. As much faith as I'm sure she has in her abilities to navigate with her nose in a Dan Brown novel, I worry for her. Honestly, who walks towards the edge of a platform without looking where they're going?

You should know that I navigate the Underground the way a guerilla navigates open countryside: furtively, sticking close to the edges. I flinch whenever a train hurtles past, I don't so much stay behind the yellow line as risk sudden death by backing right through the wall and past the yellow line on the opposite platform. And, by sweet Moses, do I mind the gap.

I'm not a big fan of the Underground. I'm mildly scared of trains, intensely wary of the dark and very claustrophobic. I'm also a masochist. What can I say? Lemmings and recycled air just thrill me.

I'm listening to: Take my hand, Dido.
I'm feeling: Ok. I'm good at the mo, but I was very down on Sunday. Thought I should record that for posterity.
Quote of the day: "All the world's a stage" - William Shakespeare (or Webster, he wrote something very similar), painted on the wall of the Lakeside Theatre at Essex.

i wouldn't call it a poem, as such

I wrote this after reading Red Moon Rising, the story of the 24-7 prayer movement. There's a poem in that book that starts, "Hey Freak..." I don't know if there's a version of it on the site but there might be. I'd post it here but I'm not sure if that breaches copyright...

I had this weird dream about an all-night prayer room, painting all over the walls and stuff. I woke up and wrote this. It mixes a couple of the images I've come across in Christianity that have really stuck with me, rain being the gift of the holy spirit, and blood being a symbol of Christ's sacrifice. Whether that comes across or not is anyone's guess. If I tell you it was about 3am at the time, will you let me off?

- hey freak

I say,
"hey freak,
there's blood on the walls.
did you do that?
did you spread red on the floor?
someone's made a mess in here,
they've clogged up the atmosphere,
spread words on the walls but
YOU
have painted the whole room with gore."
you say (breathless):
"I've been here for just an hour, it wasn't me."
so I say
"I don't believe you."
you cut me off:
"well you should, I didn't paint these walls with blood,
some guy walked in and slit his wrists over there."
the world slows down a bit, sort of
lurching like a ferris wheel.
"what?"
"yeah, this guy, talked to me a bit, then
went into the corner and picked up a knife.
I didn't even know there was one.
he carried on, raised it high and smiled at me.
'don't worry, I know it's scary,' he said,
'I love you, y'know that?'
I just sort of nodded, grimaced.
he smiled back, so real I reached out to him.
I sort of saw it before it happened and I
called out.
it hurt because I knew what he would do
and I wanted so badly to stop it.
I jumped forward but he just smiled and
sunk the blade in.
I don't remember much then,
I closed my eyes and prayed.
I felt like something big was changing and then
when I opened my eyes the walls were dripping.
so I've been sitting here, covered in this blood,
trying to figure stuff out."
I stare at you.
"aren't you gonna clean up this mess?"
you smile.

"nah, haven't you heard? It's gonna rain."

- Fiona Kennedy (no shit, sherlock).

monotone

Sometimes it's nice to be indistinct, to blend in. Sometimes I like, at work, the feeling of not really mattering. The whole cog in a machine thing; I'm not really here, I'm just beeping. My favourite customers are the ones who ignore me. The ones who show up with two trolleys worth of shopping that it's gonna take me ten minutes to beep through and pack for themselves, with their spouse or whatever helping them. Customers like that, I don't even have to look at, I just sit there and daydream.

I think a lot about domesticity (one of the best words ever). I want to go shopping with my husband and my kid and buy washing powder and fresh veg and lots of yoghurt and bottles of coke. One of the nicest things I've ever seen were this old couple that came through my till, hugging each other and teasing each other like newlyweds. It was sweet. You get so many depressing people, people who buy meals for one and brocolli one floret at a time. People who buy their milk in one bottle pints. People who make a fuss of counting out their change and making conversation with everyone in the queue because they're lonely. They're the nicest ones, but the saddest ones. But this couple were just super. They came bustling through and bought their meals for the week: toad in the hole for two, haddock and chips for two, spaghetti bolognese for two. That made me smile.

Back in October I got a lot of students coming through. They buy all the cheapo household stuff, wastebins and spoons and mops and cleaning products. They have lists that their mums have written and they giggle when they pay with their Electron cards and double bag their baked beans. I like students, I'm gonna be one next year and I can't wait.

I carry a label which I pulled off a bunch of spring onions in my pocket. I'll stick it over the clock on the screen of the till so the time goes faster. I'll say, right, I'm not gonna check the time until I've served nine customers. I tend to lose count and cheat, so when I look at the clock only 25 minutes has gone by instead of an hour. I hate that.

I repeat song lyrics in my head. One day I got through the whole of Michelle Branch's Spirit Room album, although I did get confused and combine the verse of You Set Me Free with the chorus of If Only She Knew. Today I did Eminem, Lose It, Lose Yourself and Without Me.

I make lists. I write them out (when I can) on bits of till roll: top 5 blokes at college, top 5 books I'll make sure I have visibly displayed in my room at uni, songs which should've been best of the last 25 years instead of Angels.
Things to do, things to buy at the end of my shift, customers to go before I can check the clock again, how much more money I could make if I worked both days of the weekend, how much more money I could make if I was working next door at marks.

Bible quotes, how many do I know off by heart? Words of wisdom, prayers, things I should get involved in.

Top ten things I wish I hadn't done, including entering 500 for a £10 note meaning that (according to the till check reading and the fact that I gave the man the change he should've been given) the till is now a fiver down.

Top 7 complaints I wish I'd have remembered to bring up in my appraisal.

Top ten elaborate and witty ways of telling the girl who didn't cover my shift last Saturday to fuck off and die without actually telling her to fuck off and die because that would be mean.

Top ten female celebrities to add to the Big Brothel experiment (my friend Emilie has decided to write the most sexually eplicit Big Brother parody possible to publish in our creative writing anthology. Emilie, you do know that the anthology will be published in the online magazine for students and teachers to read? Yeah, so?)

Here are the only lists I completed today:

Top 5 cola brands (yes I can distinguish them all).
1) Pepsi
2) Coca Cola
3) Pepsi with Lime
4) Pepsi Max
5) Diet Coke

Top ten things that prove, simply by existing, that we do indeed live in an evil world.
1) 24 - I'm Jack Bauer - shouldn't I be dead by now?
2) Go Ahead yoghurt raisin treat bars (just typing that brings the taste of vomit to my mouth.
3) The Sun, The Daily Star, The Daily Record, The Daily Sport.
4) The Daily Mail, but for very different reasons.
5) Diet Pepsi.
6) The Hamiltons - apparently seen pole dancing in a tv stunt to get us all in the mood for valentine's day. What's more repulsive, the repulsive mixture of blatant commercialism (V.Day) and blatant fame grabbing (the H-tons) or the repulsive mixture of the Hamiltons and ANYTHING TO DO WITH SEX. Eww.
7) The fact that I never got to meet Marilyn Monroe or Arthur Miller.
8) The Terminator Films.
9) J-Lo.
10) People who reply, when asked "Do you have a Clubcard?", with "No thanks".
No thanks? What did I ask?

I'm listening to: Sarah McLachlan, Afterglow.
I'm feeling: Tired. Kind of Celtic. Easily listenable.

phlegm

I never know what I'm going to write about in this thing until I start typing. Sometimes I'll even have to go back and rewrite the first few sentences of the post because they'll have so little relevance to the rest of it. Sometimes I truly can't be bothered.

Had an argument with my parents last night, apparently I need to grow up. I've ditched my plans for a gap year, so in 7 months time I'm going to be living away from home. No parents. It seemed so far away when I had eighteen months to go (maybe because I had eighteen months to go), I feel like I've jumped forwards in time, like maybe I fell asleep for two long and all of a sudden I'm supposed to be moving out and I'm so not ready. 7 months. Maybe I should start a count down, T minus 210 days or something.

It's the financial issue that's the real bitch. Wanna hear a secret? I have £4.96 in my bank account, 60p and £15 of book tokens in my wallet and about £3 in coppers and change in the bank in my room. Oh, and an expired £5 skincare voucher from boots. I owe my best friend £13, my mum £30. There's a sociology trip coming up that's gonna cost me £25, then I have to pay for Soul Survivor, the Reading Festival and a trip to Dublin. I'm also supposed to be saving for university, what with tuition fees.

And on tuition fees, apparently the LEA means test from the previous financial year. That would be the year in which my dad was working. Huh.

*puts down the world's smallest violin*

Seriously, I should stop slagging off my job at Tesco (10% discount will be useful when I'm counting coppers for student fabulous beans on toast). I'm gonna take a deep breath, ignore the fact that I could be earning £1.50 an hour more at Marks and Spencers and get me some soul-enriching overtime. Yeah!!!

This is my issue. I can earn the money, but it's gonna take serious willpower not to spend it as I go. I figure I should learn to save now before I get to uni, get my first student loan installment and spend it all in Topshop within the week. It's gonna happen.

*******

Thing is, it's all very well me saying I need to grow up. My English teacher, Paul, spent ten minutes of our lesson today writing the word PHLEGM on the Smartboard. The English department got a telling off from the IT guys for not using the Smartboards to their full potential ("You can convert handwriting into typed text, dammit, the possibilities are endless!").

It's true enough, they're very expensive learning tools and all we ever use them for is downloading Bjork videos and looking up bits of trivia on Google. Gotta mention the fateful day when someone didn't know what a codpiece was, so Paul entered it into Google image search. In his own words, he's expecting to be fired any day now.

Today though, we got hi-tech. We were talking about the four humours (the liquids that Elizabethan doctors thought made up the human body - an imbalance in the humours created personality or health defects), blood, black bile, yellow bile and phlegm.
"Oh I hate the word phlegm." says Helen.
"It's the fact that it's got a 'g' in it, if you say it like it looks, it sounds like you're hacking something up."
Paul drew the word 'PHLEGM' on the Smartboard, coloured it in luminous green and surrounded it by tiny green bogey dots. He then highlighted the word, selected it with his hands (no mice in our college) and sent it flying round the board. Like Minority Report, he said, how cool is that?

Admittedly, I did almost cry with laughter, but I have to ask: with role models like that, how the hell am I supposed to reach adulthood?

I'm listening to: Idlewild, 100brokenwindows.
I'm feeling: Not too bad, a bit cold. Best mood this week.
Quote of the day:
"Pull, and pull strongly, for your able strength
Must pull down heaven upon me -
Yet stay, heaven gates are not so highly arched
As princes' palaces: they that enter there
Must go upon their knees."
The Duchess of Malfi, John Webster.

saints and valentines

I hate Valentine's day. I think the story of St Valentine is fantastic, the guy who defied the Roman authorities to marry young soldiers and their sweethearts (apparently the emperor thought single men fought better). But I hate this day on principle. I blame Valentine's day for the invention of gift-wrapped romance. Roses and chocolates and "I wuff you" teddy bears and every single other completely meaningless token. It's just such bollocks, it's like the biggest scam that greedy companies have ever pulled and we keep on falling for it! Chocolates and shit like that don't mean anything. How romantic, a present identical to millions of other presents being given to millions of other people across the country, how did you know?!

I think this is why I'm a horrible girlfriend. I love romantic things but I hate meaningless gestures. Last Valentine's day someone bought me roses. It was lovely, I appreciate the sentiment, but I don't like roses. I like tulips. Unfortunately, someone has decided that roses are what you should buy your girlfriend, so that's what girlfriends get.

But... I really don't buy this whole "Valentine's day was just invented to make money and make single people feel like crap". I think the idea of a day when you take a while to make the person you love feel special is ace, we should all be doing stuff like that more often. Maybe it's just me, Valentine's is just another day when I'm single.

One thing I have noticed is that there's a lot more couples around recently. All of a sudden there's couples kissing, everywhere I go. I blame Valentine's day. No one wants to be alone at the time of year when sex and love are the most important things in the world, maybe we're all madly trying to pair off before the big V day. I suppose when the whole developed world is rubbing it in your face that you're single, anyone's better than no one. Maybe musical hearts and anatomical chocolate mints are better than no presents at all.

*****
Drama, Wil looks at my folder and reads out the verse (Isaiah 40:1) that I've written there.
"Are you into the bible?"
"Yeah"
"Are you a bible basher or something?"
"Yeah..."
"I have a question, do you believe in creationism?"
"Um..."
"Do you believe the world was created in 7 days?"
"Er, I believe that those stories are symbolic rather than literal, God's outside time so 7 days is a silly way of putting it... It's just to help us understand how he created the world."
Later today.
"Oh yeah, the bible, that reminds me. Fi, Noah's Ark. How the hell did he fit all those animals in one boat? Do you really believe he did that?"
"I don't know, I haven't really thought about good ol' Noah for quite a while..."
"Because, that must have been a fucking big boat, there's a lot of animals in the world... How did it float? And did he get all of the animals from every continent? How did he do that? How did he get them to his giant boat?"
"I don't know! That's Old Testament, I'm really bad at the Old Testament. I'm a New Testament chick myself."
"True. If you were an Old Testament chick wouldn't you technically be a Jew?"
"Precisely. I'm a Christian. Don't blame us Christians for the Old Testament, we're past it, we've moved on!"
Then someone accused me of anti-semitism and I had to backpedal pretty damn fast.

Seriously though. I think we Christians must be doing something badly wrong, if the first thing people think of when they hear the word 'bible' is Noah and creationism. They don't ask about Jesus or the gospels or the ressurection. They ask about homosexuality and women's rights because as far as the wider world can see, that's all the Bible is - a giant violation of logic and liberal thinking.

It's like we're telling jokes and no one's laughing, they're not even hearing the punchlines. It's not because the jokes aren't funny, it's because we're telling them all wrong.

I'm listening to: Suzanne Vega, Blood Makes Noise
I'm feeling: Slightly gassy, but otherwise good.
I recommend: "The Happiness of the Katakuris" - crazy Japanese people burying bodies in the garden of their hotel, with random sections of animation. The weirdest film I have EVER seen.
I don't recommend: Trusting George Bush. Is it me, or was his last speech exactly the same as one we've heard before, but with the 'q's replaced with 'n's? Deja vu... If that man brings about the end of the world, I'm gonna be distinctly pissed off.

this dream

I forgot, I really want to write this down so I don't forget. This really weird dream I had last night.

My mum was in the shed at the bottom of our garden. It was kind of like a bird-watching shed, kind of like a chapel. It had the floor bench and cushions that you kneel on to pray, except while you prayed you could stare out this slit window. Overlooking the sea. My mum was in there when I went in, looking for my friend Liz. She told me that Liz had gone and as soon as she said that I knew that she was really gone. Like, dead gone. There was this horrible sense of inevitability about it all, I knew straight away that the fact that Liz had already left meant that I wasn't going to see her again. I sort of knew that the reason we were in the hut was because we were going to die.

So, I knelt down the bench and did my praying bit, all Catholic with the rosaries and stuff (I'm Anglican by the way, so don't know where that came from), and I took a moment to look out the window.

I didn't actually see the wave coming, but I knew that it was. There was a phone in the corner and mum was calling people, finding out where everyone was. She said my dad and brother were in another hut, except she called it a shelter, but it was too late for us to go and join them. All of a sudden we only had a few seconds left so we got down on our knees and clung on to each other, knowing we were about to drown.

The wave hit and I held my breath, completely expecting not to get another one. I was getting chucked around in the water, I was still near the surface but the wave was curling over me and my mouth and nose were full of water. I started choking and blacking out, I gasped for air and waited to inhale water and choke to death. That was the scary thing, I was completely aware of what was happening and what it was going to feel like to drown in the wave.

But when I breathed in, I breathed air. My head bobbed up above the water and I realised that I'd ridden it out, I was treading water in what was now a giant lake instead of my garden. Things are always more vivid in dreams but I have never felt anything sweeter than that sense of relief. I've never actually felt so glad to be alive.

Next thing I knew I was with my family, sweeping up water and wrapping blankets round my neighbours' shoulders. Everyone had survived, the whole country had just bobbed up to the surface and breathed air instead of water.

Nice, huh?

All in all, not a bad dream, until I woke up. Normally I feel relieved when I wake up and realise that I'm safe and snug in my cabin bed, but not so with this one. This morning I woke up and realised that the whole thing was real - it did happen, just not to me. And the people it did happen to didn't breathe air.

ABB...should that be ADD?

Note: I've left the other version of this post that I accidentally put up before this one purely to chronicle the freaky-as-shit back end of someone else's post that has been BIRTHED into my webspace. Angelic Fruitcake (the blog, not the person) has been breached. Run. For all that is good and pure, run!

I seem to remember saying a while back that I would probably fall in love with every university I visited... Well, so far I have.

I've just returned from a magical two day interview workshop at Exeter Uni and darned if it wasn't so much better than I thought it would be! The guy who interviewed me was lovely, we discovered a shared hatred of Mel Gibson and got talking about Christianity in films and theatre of all things (woo!). The facilities were bigger and more modern than I thought, the course is broader, the people nicer, the campus prettier... Haha, I thought, well now it doesn't matter that Holloway haven't gotten back to me, because I can come here!

Oh, if God doesn't have a sense of timing.

I log on to UCASTrack and see the two most beautiful words in the English language (except Cellar Door, apparently) next to Royal Holloway. "Conditional Offer".

Once more with feeling: YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!

Now I'm hoping that I don't get into Exeter, or I'm gonna have to make the hardest decision... Good thing I inadvertently showed the staff my knickers during the audition workshop. Maybe they'll think I'm a slapper and an exhibitionist and they won't let me in. But I'm sure I flashed my bum at Holloway too... Maybe they like that kind of thing? Oh no, I'm not even gonna finish that thought. I am starting to regret pretending to poledance on one of the pillars in the Roborough studio at Exeter though.

Only one problem. I now have to get at least ABB in my A-levels. Hum ti tum. My friend Liz (a sickeningly talented design student) has applied for graphic design courses where it's all about the art, love. To get into her first choice, she has to get a D. Poo!

I'm getting a little bit sick of interviews though. Interview friends especially. You latch on to someone and spend the day clinging to them for moral support, then you bugger off home and never see each other again. You never get past the small talk. I gave up a bit today, just sat on my own and chilled. I don't care if it made me look like an anti-social git, I was just so sick of the same conversations on repeat.

"Hi, what's your name, where are you from, how'd you get down here, where did you stay, is this your first choice? Where else have you applied, have you applied for drama school, really, why not?"

"Hi, Fiona, Hampshire, car, Bendene Hotel, here or Holloway, blah blah blah, no I haven't, I'd rather not say. Why? Because you really don't care and, come to think of it, neither do I!"

That's another point to make in this anti-interview rant. Drama school people. It's not people who want to go to drama school, or people who are at drama school (hi Chris, heh, no offence), it's people who want to go to drama school and go to uni interviews with the attitude that says "This is just a back up, really, I'm not expecting to need this place in my life". You can spot them a mile off, they're the ones who haven't read the prospectus and go around giving Oscar winning performances instead of working as a group like you're supposed to in GROUP WORK. They also ask the same question thousands of times in different ways and talk about acting instead of practical or studio work.

"So how much acting will I get to do on this course?"
"Are there any acting modules?"
"What's the balance between acting and writing?"
"How much time a week will I spend ACTING?"
"Are there any exra-curricular activities in which I can ACT?"
"How many of your ex-students go into ACTING?"

Then they ACT all confused and disapproving when told that this is a university, dahling, not RADA.

*represses drama-queen angst*

I've rambled something chronic in this post, never mind. I have to write that on the way back from Exeter this afternoon I got into a weird mood, thinking about how I wasn't gonna get into Exeter, or Holloway for that matter, and how I'd messed it all up. As always, the mood spiralled, and before I knew it I was back in the hole of feeling shite. I got out of it by listening to Delirious and sleeping for a while. I have to record that for posterity, this blog is as much a mood-diary as anything else.

I'm listening to: Suzanne Vega, Marlene on the Wall.
I'm feeling: Damn good at the mo, thanks to Holloway and my second Actimel of the day (yes, that's right, I said second). I don't know if it'll last, I think I'm entering a down phase.
For the record: I met the most beautiful man in the world today. He was a third year drama student at Exeter and rather stonking. He beats the third year student I fancied at Holloway hands down (now there's an image), but I'd really need pictures of them both to compare. If all else fails, I can pick my uni the way I picked my 6th form, by following the good looking guys.

Actually that's a lie. The university I go to will be the one that reminds of Hogwarts the most. The course could be taught by talking goats, but throw in an owlery and a forbidden forest and I'm THERE.

I seem to remember saying a while back that I would probably fall in love with every university I visited... Well, so far I have.

I've just returned from a magical two day interview workshop at Exeter Uni and darned if it wasn't so much better than I thought it would be! The guy who interviewed me was lovely, we discovered a shared hatred of Mel Gibson and got talking about Christianity in films and theatre of all things (woo!). The facilities were bigger and more modern than I thought, the course is broader, the people nicer, the campus prettier... Haha, I thought, well now it doesn't matter that Holloway haven't gotten back to me, because I can come here!

Oh, if God doesn't have a sense of timing.

I log on to UCASTrack and see the two most beautiful words in the English language (except Cellar Door, apparently) next to Royal Holloway. "Conditional Offer".

Once more with feeling: YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!

Now I'm hoping that I don't get into Exeter, or I'm gonna have to make the hardest decision... Good thing I inadvertently showed the staff my knickers during the audition workshop. Maybe they'll think I'm a slapper and an exhibitionist and they won't let me in. But I'm sure I flashed my bum at Holloway too... Maybe they like that kind of thing? Oh no, I'm not even gonna finish that thought. I am starting to regret pretending to poledance on one of the pillars in the Roborough studio at Exeter though.

Only one problem. I now have to get at least ABB in my A-levels. Hum ti tum. My friend Liz (a sickeningly talented design student) has applied for graphic design courses where it's all about the art, love. To get into her first choice, she has to get a D. Poo!

I'm getting a little bit sick of interviews though. Interview friends especially. You latch on to someone and spend the day clinging to them for moral support, then you bugger off home and never see each other again. You never get past the small talk. I gave up a bit today, just sat on my own and chilled. I don't care if it made me look like an anti-social git, I was just so sick of the same conversations on repeat.

"Hi, what's your name, where are you from, how'd you get down here, where did you stay, is this your first choice? Where else have you applied, have you applied for drama school, really, why not?"

"Hi, Fiona, Hampshire, car, Bendene Hotel, here or Holloway, blah blah blah, no I haven't, I'd rather not say. Why? Because you really don't care and, come to think of it, neither do I!"

That's another point to make in this anti-interview rant. Drama school people. It's not people who want to go to drama school, or people who are at drama school (hi Chris, heh, no offence), it's people who want to go to drama school and go to uni interviews with the attitude that says "This is just a back up, really, I'm not expecting to need this place in my life". You can spot them a mile off, they're the ones who haven't read the prospectus and go around giving Oscar winning performances instead of working as a group like you're supposed to in GROUP WORK. They also ask the same question thousands of times in different ways and talk about acting instead of practical or studio work.

"So how much acting will I get to do on this course?"
"Are there any acting modules?"
"What's the balance between acting and writing?"
"How much time a week will I spend ACTING?"
"Are there any exra-curricular activities in which I can ACT?"
"How many of your ex-students go into ACTING?"

Then they ACT all confused and disapproving when told that this is a university, dahling, not RADA.

*represses drama-queen angst*

I've rambled something chronic in this post, never mind. I have to write that on the way back from Exeter this afternoon I got into a weird mood, thinking about how I wasn't gonna get into Exeter, or Holloway for that matter, and how I'd messed it all up. As always, the mood spiralled, and before I knew it I was back in the hole of feeling shite. I got out of it by listening to Delirious and sleeping for a while. I have to record that for posterity, this blog is as much a mood-diary as anything else.

I'm listening to:
Nonetheless I have faith that management will see that cubicle walls create a stagnant space rather than a private one. It's best to find the right fit for the right office, rather than change it for a client that could potentially still say no. Cubicles are so not returning, you already offered people the option to breathe and see windows. They arent about to give that up.e a stagnant space rather than a private one. It's best to find the right fit for the right office, rather than change it for a client that could potentially still say no. Cubicles are so not returning, you already offered people the option to breathe and see windows. They arent about to give that up.

hurt

I hurt myself today

to see if I still feel

I focus on the pain

the only thing that's real.

The needle tears a hole

the old familiar sting

try to kill it all away

but I remember everything.

What have I become?

My sweetest friend,

everyone I know

goes away in the end

and you could have it all

my empire of dirt,

I will let you down,

I will make you hurt.

I wear this crown of thorns

upon my liar's chair

full of broken thoughts

I cannot repair.

Beneath the stains of time

the feelings disappear

you are someone else

I am still right here.

What have I become?

My sweetest friend

everyone I know

goes away in the end

and you could have it all

my empire of dirt,

I will let you down,

I will make you hurt.

If I could start again

a million miles away,

I would keep myself,

I would find a way.

Hurt - Johnny Cash.

Aside from being one of the few songs that actually makes me cry (real crying, not your average tears-in-the-eye stuff), I think that's a beautiful song. My drama teacher thinks it's uplifting. I suppose, it's got that feel to it, major chords and all of that. It's not bleak so much as.. wistful. It's sad, not because the world sucks but because the world's beautiful but we can't stay here forever. I reckon, anyway.

It makes me think of growing old and dying, and everyone around me dying and me being alone. As long as it makes me think of that, it's never going to uplift me. It's good to listen to though, I couldn't say why.

**************

I'm feeling better though. There's far too much fun to be had to go around feeling like shite so I'm getting out of the hole in the ground and starting to appreciate things. I'm enjoying myself. So, yeah, I'm in denial.

*************

I'm listening to: Lucie Silvas, Breathe in.

I'm feeling: Much brighter, much more positive.

Uni stuff: Norwich rejected my application two weeks ago and haven't written to tell me yet. Cowards. If it wasn't for good old UCASTrack I would never have known...

Nothing from Holloway. I'm not worried. I'm not I'm not I'm not... I'm in denial, again.