It's midnight and I need to distract myself from reading...

So I think I should maybe resurrect this blog. Although I guess it can't really be classed as a resurrection as it never really got written in to begin with...

Well... you know, I've been busy. Lots of exciting things happened. I worked in a hospital. I went to university. I came home and worked in a hospital. I went back to university.

Which is where I am now, and also why I'm here, looking for any distraction.

I'm supposed to be reading If This Is A Man, by Primo Levi. I have 75 pages left. I can't cope anymore, I've had to take a a break.

(I've been on this break since 2pm.)

It's not that it's badly written... although it is badly translated. It's just that Levi's account of his time in Auschwitz is never really going to be 'enjoyable' reading, and I'm kind of in the mindset where I'd rather read Are You Dave Gorman? again instead.

Which is bad. Because I have to read this for my seminar on Tuesday morning. And also because it feels morally wrong to skim-read, or skip bits, or give up altogether and just go to bed.

Sigh.

Today I've been very productive. I read a bit. I went to tri club and did a swimming session. I got back and cooked enough food for either four people or four days. I observed my friend Lord D. (who is not really a Lord, but we never talk about that) try and break into our block. I made hot chocolate for him, our Cat Rob (who also isn't a cat, but we never talk about that, either) and my two neighbours. We watched an episode of Jeremy Kyle on youtube because the Cat mentioned the Westboro Baptist Church and we rushed to see Mr Kyle take them on, which basically seemed to consist of Shirley Phelps saying 'WE ADHERE TO THE STANDARDS OF GOD' and Jeremy Kyle saying 'You're DERANGED!'.

Okay, I just clicked on another page that was up and someone appears to have googled 'screwdriver in head x-ray' on my laptop. Bit concerned.



I would imagine this came up following more talk of how my neighbour, the Actor, stabbed the Cat in the eye with a plastic sword on Friday night. We never talk about that incident.

Right. I've now finished my hot milk... I've watched an interview with Louis Theroux on youtube... I've opened a word document to start drafting up a script that Lord D. and I have to have done by Thursday night... and I've typed nothing in it thus far.

I should probably go to bed.

Although I am totally going to come here more often. It's the last place anybody would think to look for me.

They'll never find me here, I laughed, eyes streaming with plastic swords.

You know when you feel like you've had a really good idea and then you, like, wake up and realise that you have absolutely nothing to say?

Well, I think I just had one of those moments.

I'm not totally sure what to say on this thing. In fact, I don't really feel like I should be here. I've kept a blog on a website for runners (www.fetcheveryone.com) for over a year, and I'm still keeping it. This feels like cheating on it. I feel dirty.

And I think about six months before that I got an account on LiveJournal, and I think I only ever put one entry in there and that was about this dream I had in which me and some friends ended up in the Maritime Museum and then I think we were at some football match where the stadium kept moving like some kind of radical fairground ride. No wonder THAT blog never took off.

I think that maybe this blog should try and be a bit more serious, but, er, I kind of don't like being serious about anything, ever. I mean... Well, I mean if it ever comes down to either jeans or a suit, it's a pretty obvious choice, isn't it?

Anyway. At the moment I'm trying to keep my eyes open after downing a load of Piriton to counteract the Penicillin the doctor gave me this week when I was ill. Turns out I'm actually allergic to Penicillin, and, also, it turns out that 'drowsy' is an amazingly fun word but really not a fun thing to be when you're desperately trying to revise for your French exam next Wednesday.

So in the end I spent the afternoon kind of collapsed on the sofa watching Amelie. Which counts, right?

It's also really windy outside and the windows are starting to sound strained. Also, one of the plants in the front garden just flung itself rather strongly against the double glazing. That's not so good.

That means the cat will be sleeping in the all-new dip in the flowerbed tomorrow. Ugh.

Also, my parents are now arguing about their seating arrangement in the next room:

MUM: YOU have the big chair!

DAD: I don't WANT the big chair, YOU have it!

MUM: *I* want the SOFA!

DAD: Well, *I* want the sofa!

I mean, I kind of thought the point of sofas was that more than one person could sit on them at a time? But apparently not.

But, yeah, basically, I'm eighteen, I live in Swansea and do the International Baccalaureate. I'm in the middle of my final exams and relying quite heavily on the healing powers of cocoa to get me through them. In the time I've been writing this, I've forgotten the first three paragraphs of a French essay I tried to memorise this morning so that I might be able to do the writing paper next week.

That's some achievement.

Anyway, because I feel I should put SOMETHING serious in here, and because I've just worked out how to copy and paste using the shortcuts on an Apple keyboard:

PERFECT DAY
Kathleen Jamie


I am just a woman of the shore
wearing your coat against the snow
that falls on the oyster-catcher's tracks
and on our own; falls
on the still grey waters
of Loch Morar, and on our shoulders
gentle as restraint: a perfect weight
of snow as tree-boughs
and fences bear against a loaded sky:
one flake more, they'd break.