moving house

Yes, that's right, I'm moving from these pastures old to pastures new. Pastures new being (whisper) wordpress, and a new name. Goodbye, Somewhere Boring, hello to absolute frankness, and the presser of words.

Just a little change. Mainly just because I prefer working on wordpress's sleek surfaces, and because I think it's finally time to move on from somewhere boring. Maybe time to move somewhere interesting for a while.

Of course, that might all change when I get into college for another year and find myself in a dull and edgeless place again. Then I might be coming back here, you never know.

But for now, I'm flitting off to a place of idle rants/lists/capital letters.

Au revoir, tchuss, tch, tch, tch, follow me at absolute frankness - shiny, new, beautiful.

xx

interjection/hlib!

Hello.

That's an interjection. An interjection is a word expressing emotion. Like this:

uh, eh....

or the aforementioned

Hello.

Grammar is fun. Back to this: a new word that is interjection-worthy because it's got an exclamation mark.

Take note: If you are talking to your chef about making a summer berry pie, chatting to you cat while tending blackberry hedges, having a fight at a family barbecue, giving out to the poor checkout girl for giving you $100 instead of two $50s (Jeez, it's all money, lady, calm down), being given out to for crocheting a sock wrong, muttering abuse while cleaning up after a concert, playing a tree in a play, or addressing parliament (that's for all my politician readers out there), let me Interject momentarily.

Thing is, I've been thinking about my current non-student existence, and I have realised something momentous. I have therefore decided to Interject on your life by declaring it to you.

You're welcome.

This is it:

Hlib!

(it means, Holiday Life Is Boring, condensed for your convenience into an interjection. Now that's what I call something.)

To back up this interjection, look at this. I watched Bridget Jones last night for the 400th time, ate my way through an entire packet of biscuits (almost), and drank like, a bottomless cup of tea. And then I went to bed before 12 because I had an early start. How drab. Also, am reading a book I've already read. Hlib indeed.

That's all. Have a bon something.

(Hey, interjections are meant to be short. I'm also in the middle of a delicious mint-hued sort of caramel confection. I'm a very busy person.)

in praise of boredom

Living too much of an exciting life? Time to unlock your inner potential and get boring

Not everyone leads an exciting life. Then again, exciting lives are not for everyone. Not everyone goes to glitzy 'bashes' (that's what exciting people call parties), or winters in the South Sea (exciting people often take nouns and verbify them up to make them more exciting, too), or flies out to exotic locations for a 'shoot' (exciting people are always doing this kind of thing, I'm told. I'm not 100% sure why). And not everyone wants that kind of excitement. After all, what have exciting people got on a cup of tea and an episode of Downton Abbey? Nothing, that's what.

not even a little bit exciting

 It's easy to be exciting and host dinner parties and work on 'projects' and 'travel' (cough, holiday) and 'winter' and 'do' things all the time. That's what exciting people are always at, whether they're posh and living in a silvery space house, or urban and trendy and living in some 'warehouse' making sculptures. They're always 'doing' things. I say, sod doing, and start doing nothing. 

It takes a special kind of skill to live a boring life. There can be dark days. Dark nights. Dark times when you don't know if you can go on, and are tempted to end your Boring Life by hosting a luncheon and wearing a cocktail suit. Boringness can be difficult to stomach. It can be hard. It is hard. But it's not a choice, rather a calling. To live a boring life is a big ask. But it's a challenge I, as a purveyor of the Boring Life, am willing to rise to.

Tumbleweed: a frequent visitor to somewhere boring

Take a look at some of the signs that you, too, are eligible for the dull/boring life of the do-nothing.

1 Every time you go out you go to the same place, with the same people, drink the same crappy wine, say the same mildly diverting things and go home at the same time. Who needs variation when you can have the same thing every week?

2 You watch the same movies over and over again because of a reluctance to get 'involved' in a storyline that you're not familiar with. That's why I've seen the same five movies way more than five times.

3 You would go to your lectures every week... but staying on the couch is just too much of a Yes.

4 You want to read a book... but magazines are just easier.

5 You look at your cat and envy her easy, warm, and (may I say) boring life. The life of a cat. What's not to like?

This is living

6 You've only got 10 hours a week at college, and already you're fearing the day you'll have to actually do some real work. Shudder. 

7 You go to sleep and look forward to breakfast. I don't know why, but it always strikes me as a clear indication that you are cut out for less-than-exciting times in your life if you look forward to eating cornflakes.

And yes, I do all of the above. It takes a certain kind of verve (I like to call it 'excellence', myself) to be a boring lifestylist. So, go on, embrace your boring side, and bon bore!

And now for another Mildly Interesting Thing You Might Like:

This artist, Oliver Jeffers, writes kids' books but also draws great random pictures which you can see on his website here. Lots of them have the sea and rain and little cute people in them. Well worth a wander over to!

child-lock caps and other irritating inventions

Think twice the next time you recline your seat in economy class while wearing a fringed sweater and clutching a maths trophy. You will feel my wrath. 

Hello loyal someones. During my search for cold cures the other day, I discovered a magical bottle of turquoise blue cough syrup that claimed to be a hybrid of peach and vanilla flavors that I think the entire world should be aware of. I know. A cough syrup that tastes like vanilla and sweet peach. Where has this been all my life? Humph. We shall soon find out.

I took the bottle from its box, set the plastic measuring cup on the tabletop, and twisted the cap. Of course, it was a child-lock cap. That's what this cold-cure confection had been hiding behind.

Which leads me to this list, one of those that goes under the heading of So Angry I Made A List. So here we are. Child-lock caps and Other Inventions I Hate.

trying to trick me by
being smartie-coloured

1. Child-Lock Caps
These are not child-lock caps. I am 19 years old, almost 20, and it takes me ten minutes to remove a 'child-proof' cap with the aid of a toothpick and a teacloth. I have a cousin who has been plucking those lids off Calpol bottles since she was eight. If you don't want your children to run around gulping down copious amounts of golden-tinged Benylin For Dry Cough syrup, then do what it says on the tin: KEEP OUT OF REACH OF CHILDREN. Child-proof bottle-stoppers are not child-proof. They work against certain people (e.g. me) and glide off effortlessly for others (who could easily be your 4-year-old niece). Whoever came up with this sucks. And besides, there are far more dangerous things that kids can get their hands on these days. Like knives (only a drawer handle away!), paperweights, and a copy of Miley Cyrus' latest album.

2. Reclining Seats in Economy Class
The inventor of these was clearly trying to do a good deed, and make Economy class more bearable for you and me and everyone we know (except for that person that we all know who flies first class and then moans about how long the flight was - we've got other things to contend with, lady. Like teeny television screens, people sleeping on top of us, and the fat guy in front of us who reclines his seat and squishes our legs for ten hours). However, he failed, and instead succeeded in making economy class A LIVING NIGHTMARE, where Daniel Radcliffe is right up in your face fighting ghosts.
On top of this, I can never get my seat to recline. Oh, cruel world.

3. School Prize Day
Who enjoys this? Every year on the 24th of May our school had possibly the longest prize day in the country. One one hand, it was the only day in the year when the nerds could finally be recognized. And when they were recognised, they drove us all crazy. Yes, you won a prize for maths. No, I don't particularly care. On the other, our prize day had the added fun of rewarding nobodies. People got prizes for manners. Prizes for neat uniforms. Prizes for shoe-tying. The principal talked about climate change. The RE teachers talked about the 'Living Community' (still unsure what this means. But am intrigued to know about the Dead Community which they never seemed to mention). Sixth years talked about God.
Whoever invented prizes for school should really be noted for being one of the worst inventors in modern history.

4. Fringe
This has been wrong ever since the days of the Wild West Texas Ranger. And it's still wrong. It will never be right. Dangling pieces of faux-suede tacked onto your handbag/jacket/shoe is just never going to be a good look. Ever. Same goes for wrap dresses on the overweight, leggings on the over-forties, and patterned tights on pretty much anyone.

5. 9am Lectures, 2pm Lectures and 5pm Lectures On The Same Day
Yes, I've only got ten hours a week. Yes, I know most people work from nine through two and until five, but that is arguably less irritating than coming in at nine and then either having to go home for half an hour before rushing out the door again, or sticking around and wasting away in some godforsaken corner of the Science Building. What can you do from eleven to two that's in any way productive? Go to the gym? And what are we supposed to do from three until five? Read?
Not cool, college, not cool.

And a Mildly Interesting Thing I found during the week:

This movie, which I saw last year at 2am on some godforsaken channel after an ill-advised night out: The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Le Charme Discret de la Bourgeoisie, if you're being all art house), is being re-released this month (it's from 1972). It's a bit of a gem if you like swish European stuff (sort of), posh people (sort of), intrigue (sort of), missing dinner dates (sort of), hallucinations (sort of), 70s French fashion, and drug mix-ups (sort of). And who doesn't? Come on, it's old and it's French and it doesn't have Kristen Stewart in it.

no K-Stew over there... or over here... 

Check it out! And bon Blog!

bored? well, obviously

Really, what is so interesting about weather? And what weird things are going on now?

I've decided that it's That Time Of Year again - that time of year when the sun shines like a big bowling ball and it's finally warm and picnicky and happy tree weather.
I don't know why I've decided this, because:

1. It is never warm in Ireland. Ever. In June it rains and in July there is usually one day when you can go without a jacket. Maybe.
2. It is winter here. In fact, yesterday was the 2-degree-cold Winter Solstice. It was dark by five.

this is meant to be the winter solstice.
Come on, it's kind of cool.

So, I'm not exactly sure where I was going with the whole Summer thing. Maybe because, strangely enough, it looks like summer outside. And if you wake up at eleven and walk down to the shops, you can wear sunglasses and a shirt and you really don't need a jacket.

And, because of this Winter/Summer weather (wummer? sinter?), weird stuff's been GOING ON.
(Well, it's got something to do with it)
Like this:

1. have started watching reality TV (people who are housewives and like, love it, darling, people who live on Shores, people who date footballers, people who don't date footballers, people who live on farms, people who don't live on farms...)

2. am so confused about the (cold/not cold) weather situation that I've been wearing a conglomeration of weird long-sleeved layers and grandfather jumpers and Christmas socks. Then I heard that this winter only lasts, like, a month. A month! What! What am I going to do with all the ribbed socks I've bought? Throw them away? Save them for real winter?

superfluous socks...
the worst kind of sock

3. I'm drinking Lemsip. In June. I'm drinking Lemsip in June. That is something that is just wrong.

4. I've started running. No, wait, I've started waking up and going I Think I'd Like A Run Today. I'm becoming one of those exercise people I hate.

Maybe it's time to read a self-help book or something. Maybe all this is just me with nothing to do. Or maybe I've actually crossed over into a parallel universe where the weather is weathery, the TV is real, and it looks like summer when, goddammit, it just isn't.

Bon Blog!

And here are some Things That Might Be A Little Bit Interesting:

this cutesy homemade indie mag from Australia called Frankie - there are far worse ways of spending your time than reading about Benedict Cumberbatch and people who draw for a living!

annnndd... because I have been watching so much Australian telly, and because I have realised that said Australian telly is brimmed-full with ads, I have become friendly with some of these ads, such as the ones for Kia (now I can say iPod Connectivity and Big Boot Space and Seats Eight Comfortably in a pretty authentic accent) and the one for South Australia which has this song from Into The Wild called Rise by Eddie Vedder in it. Check it out, it's like going out to the beach and, I don't know, drawing your name in the sand or something.

ufos, veggies, and getting told off by 14-year-olds

since when was not knowing your vegetables a crime? 

stupid evil pear... I'll know your code someday and then YOU WILL BE SORRY

I know lots of things. I know how many times Roger Federer has won the French Open (once). I know what a mohair jumper looks like. I know how to cook a killer carbonara and I know how to order five slices of ham from a deli in German. I know what to do with a long division sum (barely), I know a Robert Frost poem off by heart, and I know what happened in the 2006 World Cup final.

What I don't know, however, is anything about vegetables. Or fruit. Or herbs, for that matter.

this is more like my kind of checkout

And why am I telling you this? Why am I admitting my deep, dark secret? Because it has been cruelly exposed in my current job as a supermarket cashier. Little old ladies with huge bags of some unidentified leafy thing smile at me and ask me how I am. I smile back and say EH, WHAT IS THIS? Their faces fall. What am I, a cave-dweller? A philistine? Or - worse - an American? No, I'm just someone who doesn't know the difference between a head of cabbage and a head of lettuce. Or between a turnip and a swede (that's a hard one, but there's no excuse for mixing up cabbages and lettuces, no excuse AT ALL). 

What all these people don't want to realise/don't actually realise is that they have help when they buy their vegetables. They have little digital signs that say Psst! Pink Ladies!, and I'm A Broccolini, and No, Not Over There, I'm The Fennel Root You Want, and even I'm A Sweetcorn Even Though I Look Like A Leek.
I don't get help like that. When it comes to veggies, I'm all alone. 

The other day I had a particularly vile experience. Two girls came to pay for their basket of Sweets and Other Crap 14-Year-Olds Buy When They're Left In The House For The Weekend. No problem. 14-year-olds aren't going to be buying herbs are they? Or difficult-looking asparagus/bean shoot cross-breeds? Not a bit of it. 14-year-olds like twizzlers (whatever they are), sugar, gum, and coke.

Safe in this knowledge, I was happily scanning through boiled sweets and rubbery dolphins and sugared fish and ready-made pizzas when I saw the unthinkable. I saw the UFOS.

Unidentifiable Fruity Objects. 

WHAT'S THIS? I ask, about a squashed, dry purple thing. 

The girls looked at one another before one said, in a, may I say, utterly disparaging tone, A PASSIONFRUIT?, barely hastening to add YOU IDIOT after it.
Then there were the weird-shaped lemons.
WHAT ARE THESE? I asked again, hoping for a somewhat warmer response.
Are you serious? IT'S A YELLOW SQUASH. Pan-faces. Expressionless, like little middle-school judges. For the record, I have NO IDEA what they were planning on doing to that 'yellow squash' (probably just some made-up Australian thing), but I fear for the poor thing.

is this the lettuce?

.... or is this? Not so easy now, eh?

 By the time they left, with their incorrectly scanned watermelon (stupid thing comes under WATERMELON and not, as I previously believed, MELON, WATER), the only thing going through their heads was, undoubtably, Who is this kid?

I was wondering the same thing. Who is this kid? Who am I? Well, before today, I was someone who thought they knew their parsnips from their peppers, their passionfruits from their beetroot (look the same! No kidding!), their star fruits from their yellow squashes.
Not anymore. Now I was just some rookie checkout girl. And it didn't feel good. It didn't feel good at all.

As if not recognising fruit and veg and herbs wasn't bad enough (smelling a bag to check that it really was basil raised more than a few eyebrows), I also don't know the codes. You know, the ones the suave checkout chick types in with her perfectly manicured finger when you plonk down a load of carrots (carrots: 24), bananas (17), or pears (66 or loads of other unknown numbers. I thought there was only one kind of pear. Wrong again, Shona). Endless sets of 57, 103 (broccoli? God I'm getting good!), 60, 218... (No! Broccoli 107! God DAMN IT! What's 103 then? Leeks?)

I think I should get back to enjoying my time off, to be honest. Next week I'll be back on till, failing to recognise coriander, mixing up ironbarks and butternuts, desperately looking for MELON, WATER, and charging someone $12 for two carrots just out of spite.

I have power too, you know.

OTHER MADE-UP NAMES FOR FRUIT-RELATED ITEMS
zucchini - what the hell happened to a good old courgette?
eggplant - this has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with eggs, or indeed plants. At least aubergine is a colour
capsicum - ? pepper not good enough for you?
rock melon - why does a regular melon deserve a stupid name? Because it looks like a rock? Not buying it, Australia, not buying it
lebanese cucumber - otherwise known as a smallish cucumber
50 types of apple - can't they just all be the same price? No? Unfair world

Bon Blog! (non appetite!)

summer days: accomplishments (part one)

what I've actually been doing in these wintry-sunny climes

not so sunny June: it rained here yesterday... all day 

Since I've been here (a week and a half, now that you ask), I've discovered many things about myself. Not in an Eat, Pray, Love way, or even a Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants way (don't have shared pants/sisterhood, unless you count the pyjama bottoms my friend left in my other friend's flat that everyone wears. Especially me. Why bring pants when you can use pants FOR FREE?).

who doesn't want them?

Anyway. Here's a little bit of what I call What I Did For The First Time On My Working Holiday (bad title)
Behold!

1. went on a plane on my own! (twice)

2. cooked my first fried egg! (and it was good, too)

3. ate dinner with a fork and spoon! (Australians love their spoons, they do)

no room for knives at this table

5. worked at a till! (NOT my best work, dare I say. Turns out I'm not-so-adept at remembering codes for potatoes and runner beans, or packing bags with milk and sugar. But I am good at remembering the banana code: 17, and don't you forget it)

6. used Skype! ('used' = overstatement)

7. bought something in sports shop that wasn't for school! (it was for work)

8. blogged twice in one day! (sorry)

9. went to a Food and Wine festival where there wasn't any food! (but there was plenty of wine)

More updates on WIDFTFTOMWH (definitely need to rethink that) next week/whenever

Bon Blog!

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somewhere out there... but not on Facebook

my unsupportive family, and watch out, there's a Facebook under the bed

you have absolutely no messages... or views

Spoiler Alert: RANT. Proceed with Caution. 
Do I wish that more people read my blog? Yes. Do I promote it to anyone I know? No.
Am beginning to think this is maybe not the best way to go about Blogging. Other people with blogs TELL OTHER PEOPLE about them.
Better. But now I'm in Australia I'm hardly going to ring up everyone I know and say Listen, Read My Blog Bitch, Read It Now! And I'm too self-conscious to establish Somewhere Boring with its own custom made Facebook page. (Stupid shy blog.)
I have gone as far as linking it to people on my Facebook, though, so I'm not a total lost cause, right? WRONG. Linking is not the same as doing something productive. Harumph.

Besides Facebook and All That, the funny thing is, I told my family about it. Now, you would think that of all the people in the universe, they would at least be curious. Nope. Not a bit of it. I emailed my mom the other day with a casual Oh, By The Way, Check Out My Blog. She didn't check it out. All my views that day were from the United States and, unless she's leading some kind of double life, I'm pretty sure she's not in Seattle or something. If she had a blog, I'd read it. God.
Maybe I should publish my diary online: OMG today Dom and Ella broke up! Feeling SAD.
Maybe not.

Back to the days of talking to myself in a rash and inexplicable manner. Back to the drawing board. You're right, it is a bit sad talking to nobody. But Facebook is a big, scary machine that demands its own capital letter before it allows itself to be recognized by my computer's dictionary. I can't deal with that sort of thing. The name of this place doesn't even have a capital letter. But maybe I'll get some gumption somewhere and get Facebooking (yes, yes, the capital letter's there. Sheesh.)
Maybe one day I'll do it, before I've resorted to radio broadcasts, newspaper ads, or, god forbid, flyers with pictures of tumbleweed on them.

(Then again, I could try putting ads in the newspaper. 'WANTED: READERS'. Now that's what I call a good idea.)

the swot, the slacker, and some bad exams

The usual suspects of the exam hall, all compared to the master of brain-related exploits, the Brain from Pinky and the Brain

The more familiar you become with exam halls, the more familiar you become with those that lie within. And who are they? The swot, the overconfident one, and, everyone's favourite, the slacker. Bon appetite.

1. The One Who Thinks They Know Everything

thinks is the Brain. Is not the Brain.

Before:
Ugh. Met her at the start of my first exam. She was chattering away at full speed to a group of vaguely interested onlookers about how she 'read this great book about ha ha Chaucer ha ha'.
This is NOT FUNNY. What is funny about that? We all read a great book about Chaucer. It was on our bloody course.

What not to say: The above two sentences.

During:
You can just see her. Scribbling notes down like the new time. Asking for more paper. Looking anxiously around. Fixing her nails. Going to the bathroom. Asking questions that go unanswered. Taking off her jumper. Putting it on. Scratching her leg. Drinking water. Eating.
Distracting it may be, but it is a bit of a funny meltdown.

After:
Comes out laughing. Chats about how she 'didn't know it but answered it anyway' (followed by an expectant look: what do you want, a round of applause?) then sweeps off to go and get coffee before the next exam.

See Also: don't bother, this one's in a league of her own

2. The One Who 'Doesn't Know Anything' But Actually Knows Everything

is actually the Brain

Before:
'Stressing' about how he doesn't know anything, peering out over his perfectly-ordered folder.
Seriously, he says, I know nothing!

What not to say: 'I know nothing!' - you'll only encourage him.

During:
Scribbling like a madman, scratching tiny, beautiful words into the yellow paper with his one pen. Finishes 10 minutes before the end and spends that time LOOKING OVER IT.
(Who does that?)

After:
Quietly agreeing with everyone who tells him they failed. Definitely, he says, didn't know anything.
But we know. Oh, we know. We see that twinkle in his wily eyes. We know that he knows, well, everything.

See also: the Eager Beaver, the Perfectionist, the Overconfident Achiever


3. The One Who Actually Doesn't Know Anything

is nothing like the Brain

Before:
She's late. She doesn't have her student card but evades a fine like all good slackers.

During:
Writes idly, like she's doing a crossword (I don't think she knows what a crossword is, though). Draws on her arm and is given out to by the supervisor. Goes to the bathroom every 15 minutes before leaving after an hour.

After:
Probably spent the last hour of the exam outside smoking. Because that's where she is when everyone else comes out. Overheard talking about 'some Medieval shit' to a cool friend.

See also: The 'Why Not?' Repeat Student, The Too Cool For School Kid

I haven't planned ahead enough to tell you what I'll be writing about next, but meantime look at these:

http://funnyexam.com/ - as seen on the Graham Norton show and including such gems as this:

And catch up with the Brain again: 

http://www.warnervideo.com/pinkyandthebrain/

Bon Blog!

the return of the boring and somewhere new

New city, new season, new blog post! And it's been a long time, too.

Ok, this is a bit of a scandal. I haven't written in almost two months.

Shock.

Surely that's not how a blogger is meant to roll? A proper blogger is meant to update once a week with witty and/or brilliant observations about life and all its etceteras. A blogger isn't meant to let exams or other trivial pursuits get in the way of a good post. Right? Right. I am now a prime example of a Lazy Blogger.

So, after all this time, what have I got for you today? Mostly nothing, because I do live Somewhere Boring, as you will doubtless remember.

Hah. That's where we're both wrong. I may live somewhere boring for 80% of the year, but for the next two and a half months I am living in the sun-buttered and wholly magnificent city of Perth, Western Australia. I'm working. I'm typing on my new Apple Mac (shiny). And I'm not living up to my blog name because Perth may be quiet and it may be in its own blissful winter, but it is certainly not boring, this shimmering patch thousands of miles away from the crummy reserves of Ireland's east coast. Oh, yes. Australia is so far away from all that boring college nonsense.

where I live now... well, for the next 2 months

However. Before I lose the run of myself in these perpetually sunlit flatlands. I have to remind myself that I have a great, fire-like capacity for being bored. I can be bored almost anywhere. So while I am sitting here watching highlights of the French Open (it's on too late here, I can't deal with that) and skimming away on my new comp, I'm starting to realise that boredom could possibly creep in one of these days.

I am thousands of miles away from the original Boring Somewhere.

I am staring out a winter that averages at around 24 degrees centigrade. But at half three in the afternoon there's still not much on television, there's still much comfort food to be found in the fridge, and nothing can quite cover up the fact that I've finished the only book I brought with me (not such a great idea, in hindsight).

So, yes, boredom will knock at the door and be let in, inevitably. Must find ways to fight it off. Until then, don't despair, readers of the Boring blog. I'll still get bored, especially now that my exams are over, things that prove you can be both bored and bogged down all at the same time. Next post (I'm planning already!), seeing as this one was just a welcome-back update (you're welcome) will be All About Exams and their finicky ins and outs. It's summer, it's Australia, it's damn warm and jumper-cold at night. It's new, it's different, and it's still time to discuss examinations even though the clouds aren't quite filling the skies even in the misty fields of Ireland.

goodnight Dublin

Update over! Here's to not waiting another two months for another Boring blog post.

Here comes a list of ...

What I've Discovered About Winter Summers

1. Always have an electric blanket handy

2. It can be warm during the day AND cold at night! Who knew? Probably my old geography teacher, actually

3. iwastesomuchtime.com can be a real lifesaver for those cold winter nights when the only thing on TV is some tennis chap ranked 500 in the world

4. It gets dark at a quarter to six. Boo

5. ... Note to self, do not wear knitted jumper while sitting on electric blanket.


Bon Blog! No, really.

life, death, and adrienne

Death of a diamond cutter, RIP Rich

I haven't been writing for a while because things have been somewhat less boring recently. And what, dare you ask, could be diverting me? A holiday to New York? (close) A new shiny internship? (closer) That's right, it's Exam Season! And I've got twenty days to do something about a mound of Greek/Roman/art/Chaucer-related exams that are about to come my way. Oh, joy.

But then I realised that Adrienne Rich had died and nobody had told me. Not even the newspapers or the old reliable Yahoo news.

Nope.

On the 27th of March 2012 everybody had more important things to think about than the death of one very influential feminist (yeuk, says everyone, what a dirty word), and National Book Award-winning poet. And it's not as if she isn't known over here. Far from it. Richy is even on the Leaving Cert course - and once you're on exam papers, well, you've really made it. That's when Caesar knew he really made it: when he made it on to every single one of the past papers of the exam I am about to do. Do being an overstatement. Crawl through is more like what'll be happening.

GO AWAY Chaucer... this is why I can't blog when I'm doing
 exams. Smarmy-looking poets on horses always find a way
 to interrupt

Anyway. Despite making it onto the Irish exam papers and doing her thesis on Yeats, there wasn't a sign of any announcement anywhere near me. There might have been in other parts of the world, but here: zilch. I have just read that the New York Times put her obituary on their front page: on the 28th of March the front page here was likely to be something about the Government or the Premier League.

The only way I finally found out was when someone was writing about her as their hero, and managed to mention that the eighty-two-year-old poet had snuffed it in California only a fortnight ago. And yet every day I'm told about Victoria Beckham trying on her clothes and thinking they're for 'everywoman'. How is that news? HOW? Oh, well. I guess that's why people have blogs. So they can write about something other than Victoria Beckham's fashion line. And yet here I am, wasting my blog talking about her. Oh, well.

to blog or not to blog: the perils of decision making in an increasingly decision-orientated world

When starting a blog is more like starting an argument. With yourself.

This is the house I'm going to live in when I stop
procrastinating and  get a real job

Look what I found during my standard I'll-trawl-through-folders-on-my-laptop-and-see-what-hides-therein procrastination technique. This was written when I was about to start blogging. Not just thinking about blogging. Not just signing up to Blogger.com and chickening out before writing anything down. 


No. This time, blogging was about to happen, and it was about to happen to me. Well, that's what I thought. Here's how that Mind Conversation panned out. 


(I'll give you a hint: not very well.) 

I was ready. Boy, was I ready, armed with my cup of tea and my obligatory silver-foil covered biscuit. I had absolutely no messages on my phone. I had no pressing concerns to be concerned about. I had my cardi on. I even had A Place By The Sea on mute in the background. At that moment, you could have accused me of being pathetic. You could have accused me of being overly preoccupied with whether or not a foil-covered biscuit really was the way to go, when an equally tempting Mikado was peering out of the tin. But you could not have accused me of not being what I most certainly was- ready.

And? 


Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I sat in front of my laptop and I realised, not for the first time in my life, that I had nothing to say. 


I sat there for a while. I sat there for another while. And then I started to doubt my very existence. Could it be that I really have no thoughts on anything? Do I not care about something? Is there nothing that I have to say to the world? Nothing at all? 


Apparently not. I officially had no opinions to share with the rest of the world. My blank blog page confirmed it. I was not a blogger. I had no thoughts. I was a failure. 

But I wasn’t going to take that failure lying down. No, son. I decided instead that I would be a Specific Blogger. That is, I would be an expert in some kind of field. 


The only problem was, I wasn’t an expert in any field.  


What could I blog about? What did other people blog about? Other people blogged about fashion, I thought. They write about fashion. You know. Clothes. Glasses. Chanel. Fashion bloggers are cool. They have polaroid cameras and they take pictures of stuff. The last thing I took a photo of was a sign that said GORILLA CORROSION on it. I don’t know what GORILLA CORROSION is, but it was written on a van, and I thought it was funny. 

sleepless? got mail? i know the feeling...

Well, the brilliance of Meg 'n' Tom had to be revealed at some stage in this blog 

You again? Tom and Meg in Sleepless in Seattle

So far, in my many (7) posts, I have discussed King Arthur, Mountains, Goats, and, strangely enough, Football. I haven't asked any tough questions, or asked anybody to choose between two perfect entities.
Until now.

That's right, it's time for an epic, two-dimensional, and frankly, unfair question. This is the real fridge-opener that you've been waiting for. Oh yes, it's time - past time, actually - to discuss the two heavyweights of early 1990s romantic comedy involving Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

Some people may call them the only two romantic comedies that Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan were in together.
These people have obviously not seen Joe versus the Volcano.

Others may call them movies that have an unprecedented amount of brown suits in them.
These people have obviously not seen One Fine Day.

Others still may refer to them as examples of why not to go to internet chat rooms/write people letters because you heard them on the radio.
These people are just wrong.

As you can see, this is a diverse and divisive topic, this You've Got Mail/Sleepless in Seattle (henceforth YGM/SIS) debate.
First, some things to think about.

I've seen you before: Meg and Tom in You've Got Mail

monday knight madness

You know you've hit a low point in your life when you find yourself saying - actually saying, aloud, like talking - 'Mordred is king? Tch, I don't want Mordred to be king! What? Who wrote this? WHO WROTE THIS?'

Welcome to the bottom of the world. The pit, if you will, of doom.

That's the kind of thing I'm saying to myself at 7 o'clock on a Monday night while other people are getting ready to go out, get the shift, get moving, get pizza, or get something. The only thing I'm getting is annoyed because some 15th century dude made Mordred king while Arthur was in France. And then he let him take over and ruin everything. Well, he let the people let him take over. It's a long story.
(Should've said Spoiler Alert there really - sorry for ruining all those surprises.)

The worst part is, I don't even hate Mordred that much. Why am I talking to myself about something I don't even care about? The only reason I even know who he is is because I've got a tutorial on the Death of Arthur in two days. I'm not into the fantasy genre. The only thing I knew about Guinevere before I read it was that her name sounded sort of like Genevieve, and Keira Knightley played her in that crap Clive Owen version. Before last week Mordred wasn't even a thing.

... so that's what was happening in Camelot when Mordred took over

the purpose of mountains

I was bored, so I found this picture of a goat

After I went to Barcelona I came home with a cold and wrote a Really Bad story about a mountain. I wish I had put a bear in the story because then it might have been less bad. I spent the whole day thinking about mountains and weather and what winter is like in the mountains and what birds sound like there (conclusion: they sound the same) and what kind of mountains they have in America - when I was supposed to be doing some Greek - or possibly Roman- related essay thing. Sigh. Boredom leads to a whole new world where mountains are Interesting and Important and bears are simply an afterthought. In the land of boredom, mountains have colours and contours and stretch up to the white sky. That's if they're in Ireland. If they're in America, I figure that they've got houses on them with blue gardens. In Peru they're like orange roads through the desert.

I like them. They're more boring than volcanoes. Volcanoes are always causing havoc and strife and exploding all over the place. Mountains are like, yeah, I've got magma. But I'm old and tired and bored of erupting. I want to stay here and watch Midsomer Murders and possibly have a biscuit and maybe another and then I'll just lie here and sleep for a while.

That's mountains for you.

dr seuss and the art of being un-bored

If only lectures were like this

When I'm not reading books about green knights that say things like 'bi bonnken', or books about people who don't have phones (that's the 18th century for you!), or books about rampaging Macedonians, I'm absorbing college life. And by absorbing I mean sleeping on the couch to the backdrop of Sky News.

All that aside, in my dozy states I've developed a sort of passion for Dr Seuss. First of all,  I'm a girl who understands the meaning of boredom. Well, I like to think I do. Seriously, after an hour in a lecture where the only word you understood was 'neutrally', boredom doesn't even come into it. Boredom is a dodgy pub that you passed 40 miles ago, and you're on the way to becoming an Actual Dead Person, killed by the boredom of your own degree.

Anyway. That has little to do with the supposed topic of this blog post, Mr Dr Seuss. Here is a man who made worlds that were so un-boring it was impossible to be, well, bored. Fluffy trees with fluffier creatures hanging out of them, trying to sleep. Foxes wearing soxes. Jungles of Nool. Landscapes that curved and held no straight lines. Boredom didn't come into it.

bored yet?

I know I am. That's why I thought it was time to recap on My Boring Week.
What happened this week, Shona?
Well, this week was very boring, blog. Let me explain.

Bit of an overstatement

life goals: part one

Right. Let’s get this thing started.
Life Goals:
1 getting it started (see above)
2 getting it done
3 getting it done without getting metaphorically/literally Smushed by something/one.

HOW TO ACHIEVE SAID ‘LIFE GOALS’:

1. Getting It Started.
A vital step in the process of doing Anything.
You see, I find that some people think they have it all sorted. They think they have, if you will, the Fox in the Bag. The course. The job. The girl. The guy. The praise. The glory.
These people are all wrong. You see, the key to having it all sorted, to having, excuse the gesture, the Book on the Shelf, is this: Doing by Undoing.
If you are like me, you have this proverbial Car in the Garage due to an overwhelming ability to be lazy and to also get it done.
Watch and learn...

punctuation lessons

... another Important Thing

Thought punctuation was all about the commas and apostrophes? Think again. As I discovered today, there is a whole other world of punctuation out there that I was horrifically unaware of. The shame! THE SHAME! Oh, it’s horrible, it’s horrible. Not knowing this kind of USEFUL information meant that I would be more suited to giving tours of Machu Piccu than ‘reading’ English. When I lived in those dark times of Not Knowing How To Put A Line Into My Essay, I would have been better at pointing out historical archaeological details about a place that I had never been to than sitting down reading something that had been written in the 1700s by some guy with five slaves and 300 acres. Without even considering the question, To Put In Inverted Commas or Not To Put In Inverted Commas, I was blind to the real study of English. The Real Stuff.

But, all jokes aside, seriously.
Seriously. One day in front of the television and I’d learn what the weather was like in Turin. One day in an English class and I learn that when you use the dash (‘The Hyphen’), you must leave a space either side so that the lecturer correcting your essay won’t have an actual stroke. It transforms this sentence of made-up words that my lecturer likes to pontificate with, from this

Neutrally explicified-

To this:

Neutrally explicified –

I know. Totally different, right?

the questionable land of punctuation marks

transfer deadline day!

Day 1: Important

Why? Because it's Transfer Deadline Day in the Premier League, of course. Almost the most Important day of the Season! Almost.

Hold on to your pants. It’s here. The day that you’ve been waiting for since last year’s transfer market closed. The day that promises everything. 

The day that breaks hearts.
Yes, you guessed it, probably from the name of the blog post, but it’s TRANSFER DEADLINE DAY! And Sky Sports News- SSN to those of us in the know (you know who you are, friends. Do not be afraid. Come into the light, and do not deny your dedication to the cause of bringing sports news to everyone. The rich. The poor. The plebs who lack Sky Sports 1)- has gone all-out. The reporters are out in force. The countdown timer is, well, counting down. That blonde one with the shiny teeth is getting uncharacteristically excited about a possible loan move for someone called Pizarro. The brunette with the square blue dress is overly concerned about Rangers rejecting something (someone?) from Norwich City. And there are many warnings of flash photography. There are important-looking men in suits getting into black cars. There are red-faced reporters standing outside stadiums. There are fans being interviewed. There are yellow bands of BREAKING NEWS looping around the screen. It’s a love-hate situation, and this time, I choose love.