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