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Monday, September 16, 2002 Sara! Your new blog is situated here! Enjoy! Sara xxx (06:20 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Sunday, September 15, 2002 Le weekend est presque fini mais je ne dois pas aller au college demain. I'm never 100% sure why I drop random French phrases into what I say. Perhaps it helps me babble. But anyway - Le weekend. On Friday, I tried to make plans for Saturday - numerous phone calls later, I was speaking to Joe who was at Tom's house. Plan made - dinner out in our wonderful local nightspot/dive. Alas, Tom was on younger brother babysitting duty and couldn't get out of it... though I'm sure he enjoyed his quiet time dreaming of the elusive (yet ever present in conversation) "Clemmy". Mikey and Nat were also included in said dinner plans, as was Rhian but she too was unable to join us. So Saturday brought tennis (wonderful as all my old friends and I are once more in the same group lesson, taught by Chris, who is one of the most humorous (spelling?) people I know. Then dinner, chez Pizza Express and back to Mikey's house where much giggling ensued. Too much, on my part. Somehow, Joe was able to make me laugh hysterically and compulsively, simply by making a sort of a "Zschum" noise. He did this repeatedly, encouraged by Mikey, until I was convulsing with pain and coughing and unable to breathe. At this point, I tried to get up from the sofa in order to slap Mikey but he tickled me and I fell on the floor, bashing my head on the table in the process. Still it continued. I was a bit irritated when I left at midnight, as my stomach was acheing and my throat was sore. Joe sent me a very apologetic text message and is thus forgiven (I wasn't really angry) but Mikey has said nothing so I believe I shall be childish and ignore him for a while. Bad me. I can't really be angry with Joe, as he is my bitch (according to Tom), my trophy husband (according to many) and a God (according to me)... I'm not going to attempt to describe the insane conversations which led to the above. Suffice to say they were rather uber-insane. Hehe. Now I've convinced you all of my craziness, I shall depart from this blog post to put cling wrap on some fruit. We could go down so low, no-one would ever hear us fall Sara xxx (07:02 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Thursday, September 12, 2002 I didn't go online yesterday. I was here, officially resigning after my year as Vice President of my local chapter. Just now, reading people's blogs, I was reminded of the events of a year ago. It was the end of the school day and I just stopped by in the tech block to say hi to Kate on my way to the bus. The TV was on and everyone was silent, rooted to the spot with confused and shocked expressions on their faces. I watched the news but couldn't believe what I saw. Ten minutes later, I ran to catch my bus and when I stepped off, ran home to watch the news. There was no minute's silence at school yesterday - something which shocked me deeply. I'm not sure why it didn't happen. Silence reigned across the UK at 1.45pm I think, which is midway trhough our lunch break but that is no reason not to pay a gesture of respect. We had two minutes at my youth group in the evening. It was the only time during the three hour meeting that there was any silence at all and it was total. I agree entirely with what Joe says about this. She may not have written in her blog since we had this conversation but Rhian made the point that some people this year have been unable to watch TV or read the papers over the past few days, as all they would see is images of how their loved ones died. A service of memorial and a minutes silence is right and necessary but raking up past pain to such an extent seems cruel to me. What Danny said about it just made a real impression on me too. But I sit here with my cup of tea and it all seems so very far away. All I want is distraction Sara xxx (09:30 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Sunday, September 8, 2002 It has been rather a while since I last wrote here. My time at home before school began was too busy to spend much of it online. Catching up with many people and getting organised for the start of term. Since being back, the UCAS process has baffled me sufficiently as to reduce my internet time due to headaches. My social life, while still active, contains no such significant events as to merit description. (Translation: I've been too lazy to type about it). Shana Tova, as today was the second day of Rosh Hashannah and I spent the morning in synagogue. T'was cold. I have just returned from some much needed driving practice with my father. I drove on main roads, without serious mishap, though I stalled and was reduced to somewhere near hysteria when a queue of people were waiting behind me at a junction and I didn't think I could safely go in the gap that was there but could see that those behind me thought I ought to go. Still, better wait and be hooted at than stall whilst trying to go and end up crashing. It was better than the last time my father took me for practice. We went to some quiet roads, which were steep and had numerous sharp corners. He spent the whole time clutching the door handle and looking utterly terrified, which made me far more nervous than I really needed to be. I don't want to type for the sake of writing something, anything at all as it'll end up being somewhat nonsensical. Alors, c'est tout. All I want is distraction Sara xxx (07:04 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Friday, August 30, 2002 Location: Home I have actually been home since early Tuesday morning, I have just not been motivated enough to type in here. My last post sounded somewhat depressed but it was all really to do with Veida and with over-exposure to my own family. I have since spoken with friends who were on Veida and, whilst it does sound amazing, one of the people I particularly missed by not being there was, in fact, not there himself. So the edge has been taken off the feeling a little. Since I've been back, I have been feeling the jet lag a fair bit which is inevitable and have found out some more people's results. So congratulations to Penny, Meg, Sam, Vicky, Tris, Andrea, Brad and everyone. I have a feeling this post will not contain much deep thought. Oh well. I suppose I will write about the slightly odd dreams I had the past two nights. Last night, I... no, I'll leave that dream out. It's a bit too bizarre. The night before last, I dreamt that I was canoeing on the river in Cambridge with Tom and then he fell in the water. I helped him out and we sat on the bank. I don't remember what we were talking about but I think it was something serious. Random. Today I went over to Rhian's and we had a pretty chilled day, just chatting and watching "Alien" which I hadn't seen before. I gave her the black parasol I bought for her in Japan and, to my delight, she liked it a lot. We ate pizza for lunch, which was really nice. In general it was a really good day - very good to see Rhi after 4 whole weeks. Tomorrow I'm having some catch up time with Hols and Andrea and on Sunday, Rhian, Joe and I are heading in to Covent Garden for the day. In the evening, I expect I shall be dining out with Tom, Joe, Mikey and Natalie, which should also be tres amusant. So I'm relatively busy until school starts again which is Thursday, not Wednesday as I had previously been led to believe. Maybe I might go back on my comment about lack of substance to this post - I find that sometimes, I think of something and I mull it over in my mind almost constantly but it doesn't really become real until I tell someone else about it and they tell me their opinion of it. Other times, I do the same but it is real only until I tell someone and then its meaning and value suddenly vanish. Or occasionally, someone may say something which has never occurred to me before and it will just take root in my mind and will not leave me alone and it grows as a thought until I can't focus on anything else. And so I find myself and my mind rather at the mercy of those around me. I don't think this is a particularly good thing but am unsure just how sinister its implications may be. Can't seem to see the forest from the trees Sara xxx (09:40 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Sunday, August 25, 2002 Location: An internet cafe, Darwin city, Australia I've been on the net a lot this holiday - my father has been much more generous about paying for it than he usually is but then it is a longer holiday than usual. I survived the Outback well enough. I ought to really explain the somewhat depressed mood of my last post though. Basically, I was never keen on the idea of travelling around the Outback for five days in the middle of our holiday but my father was persuaded by the travel agent into taking us all on an "exciting outback adventure" which consisted of driving vast distances in a jeep, staying in random roadside motels which all looked identical, eating pies and chips, sandwiches and chips, fish and chips, burgers and chips or chips and chips in various dives at every midday break in the journey, getting bitten by mosquitoes and irritated by flies and all the while absorbing the beauty of nature in an organised fashion, along with the rest of the intrepid masses. These 5 days, in my opinion, would have been better spent absorbing a bit of culture, fine food and shopping time in a large city environment, or crashing by a large swimming pool on a sunbed with a fruit cocktail by my side. In fact, I would really rather I had travelled home a few days ago. Not to see home again - I'm not a homesick kind of person really, but to allow me to go on Veida. This is an event with BBYO (my youth group). It is the last event of the YO year and is one of the best. It would also be my last event ever as I've reached the end of my time there... well, until I'm about 20 and can be one of the staff on an event. My friends who are on the national executive committee would be standing down and doing their "life" speeches, where they talk about their time in YO and it all gets wonderfully sentimental. It would be my last time to really socialise with many of them, who live all over the country. Needless to say, I was desperate to go. I had, of course, told my parents this before they booked this holiday but because of trying to get flights for us all, I ended up being unable to go. Hence my negative prejudice against aforementioned "Outback Adventure". It wasn't so bad really. I enjoyed bits of it. There were others where I wondered how people managed to distill boredom so completely to its purest form and spread it liberally over nature's beauty. The whole thing was really touristy and while I do appreciate such fabulous scenery (photos to be posted at some point I hope), I think it would have been better without so much organisation and guided tour promotion. Anyway... Back in the city I found to my dismay that the shops here are practically non-existent. I do not understand where people buy their clothes. We watched the Darwin City annual parade yesterday evening. It was very colourful and the atmosphere was most festive. After the parade there was a music concert, which we didn't stick around for but we could here it well enough from our apartment balcony when we got back from dinner (the details of which I shall not go into). The music was of that irritating variety which resembles the repetitive warbling that accompanies the endless circles of a fairground carousel, so I plugged myself into my discman and read. I finished "American Gods", read "South By South East" (a child's book written by Anthony Horowitz). I read it under duress, as my younger sister assured me I would like it. I didn't. I then started "Falling Angels" by Tracy Chevalier, which I am enjoying immensely. It took me a long time to get to sleep. I have a double bed of my own in this apartment, a luxury I was ecstatic about when we first arrived but I quickly realised that a double bed for one may indeed be a luxury if that one is a person who sleeps spread out, arms thrown randomnly across the bed. If, however, one sleeps on ones side, arms wrapped around oneself and legs tucked together, as I am prone to do, a double bed is rather lonely. Said realisation made me think and then my brain went into one of its irritating thought chains which are near impossible to break, tend to be entirely ludicrous and always begin as I am trying to go to sleep. I shan't attempt to translate it into some kind of logical pattern of thought for the world to read on here, though some of it troubled me enough to want to tell it to someone. Here I go sounding all depressed again when really I'm not... Anyway... Congratulations to Joe and Tom for such excellently amazing GCSE results. I assume I must also congratulate Mikey for his but the silly boy has not posted them on his blog... in fact, he has not posted anything on his blog for a rather long time now and I am beginning to wonder why and he hasn't texted or emailed me. *Glares, but hope you're not moping too much with Nat being away* Is it safe inside your head? Sara xxx (02:56 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Wednesday, August 21, 2002 Location: A laundromat/internet cafe (I thought it was odd too, but I'm not complaining), Katherine, the Outback, Australia. I think I must be hearing things, pretty much constantly, the high hum of a mosquito, mid-tone buzz of the flies and low rumbling of... no that'd be the washing machines. The flies here are nothing short of a plague. They seem to follow me wherever I go (though not just me, but anyone) and flit around my face, particularly my ears, giving me the most unpleasant claustrophobic sensation. I wonder how people live out here, 3 hours drive from the nearest large town. I wonder what they find to do, when shops close at 5pm Monday to Friday, 3pm Saturday and all day Sunday, when the "town centre" contains no more than a cafe, post office and a laundromat and all around for miles, you can see trees, grasses, perhaps a river and the main road, which stretches like an insanely long snake, flat out and basking in the hot sun. On my last day in Cairns, before the last post then I think, I saw Yorkey's Knob. It was rather small and unimpressive, the most intriguing thing being the wet spot. In translation: My family and I stopped off at the small town up the coast from Trinity Beach and were amused to find that, not only was it called Yorkey's knob, but that it was small and unimpressive and at it was a laundromat called the Wet Spot. Since, I have stayed in the lap of luxury in Darwin city, visited two art galleries, a shopping mall (I now have only $20 left for the rest of my time here) and eaten a gorgeous meal of chicken fajitas in Kitty O'Shea's Irish pub, advertised as the only Irish pub in Darwin and situated 300m down the road from Shennanigans, the other only Irish pub in Darwin. Yesterday, we all piled into the car, a relatively old and nasty 4 wheel drive hire car, and drove off into the (would say sunset but it was closer to mid-morning than to early evening) middle of nowhere. En route to our lodge at Cooinda, we visited an Aboriginal art site, a wetland lookout post, from which we saw hundreds of birds feeding at the flood plain of the river and a visitors centre, where my parents watched a film about the area, whilst I buried myself in my book. I don't know what I would do without my book. Rhian lent it to me. It's called American Gods and is by Neil Gaiman and is, as well as being one of the weirdest things I've ever read, one of the most absorbing. Every spare moment, I find myself fishing it out of my bag and losing myself in it. I am so far from home and from my friends, most of whom have now returned from their summer excursions, I even left my discman and cd's back in Darwin (we're returning there for our last two days in Aus). After just over two weeks with nobody but my family for company I am, as usual, starting to feel stifled, lonely and have had enough of being away. Last night in the car as we neared Cooinda, I saw a star out of the window and wondered how far away it was. How many thousands of light years but it still appeared a constant dot of white in the navy grey sky. I tried to keep track of it as we drove, craning my head round to peer through the back window of the car but I lost it when my neck began to ache. I felt like crying then because for some reason the distance of the star reminded me of the distance I am from where I would rather be. I saw the star again when we arrived at our lodge which, apart from the saggy mattress on my bad, noisy fan to cool the room and number of mosquitoes (I got bitten), was really quite comfortable. In fact, I enjoyed this morning's boat trip watching the birds and crocodiles a lot. I'm feeling more cheerful about this middle-of-nowhere-situation than I was last night. I'll be back in Darwin on Friday night. Home on Tuesday morning. Until the sky falls down on me Sara xxx (07:05 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Friday, August 16, 2002 Location: Trinity Beach, near Cairns, Australia Today is my last day here and, seeing as time in Darwin is not actually all going to be spent in Darwin (5 days of touring the waterfalls of the outback in a jeep *gulps*), I may not find myself on the net again for a little while. I'm not entirely sure where to start with this entry, as I have rather a lot I would like to say. I'd attempt to put it in some kind of chronological order but I've lost track of which day was which. I know I went snorkelling at the Great Barrier Reef on Sunday, which was certainly an experience. The reef itself is gorgeous and on our guided snorkel with a marine biologist, I saw so many fascinating things - and was told what they all were, so that was incredible. The rest of the trip didn't quite live up to my expectations however. I am not a great one for boats and the fact that the journey was 2 hours in the midst of tropical storm weather didn't help matters. Needless to say, I didn't feel so great. I managed not to actually throw up, but I was almost there and in my mind there is nothing quite so unattractive as seasickness. My legs felt like jelly and my stomach like a washing machine on fast spin. According to my sister my skin went paper white and my lips went grey. I sat staring at the horizon (which was bumping up and down every few seconds) whilst sipping cautiously at a tonic water. Tres unpleasant really. I went up into the mountains the next day, to a village called Kuranda, where I bought myself a rather stunning and classy pair of silver earrings, set with small solid white opals - thus using up a rather large chunk of my holiday money. We travelled up the mountain on a scenic skyrail, which wasn't entirely unscary given the pouring rain and strong winds as we went. The return trip was by scenic railway, which was far slower, bumpier and noisier but it got us down in the end. It poured while we were up in the mountains to the extent that I allowed myself to wear a tourist poncho (otherwise known as a bin bag, of the bottle green and hooded variety). I am still slightly traumatised by the experience. One evening, though I am not sure which, we trusted Tom's recommendation and drove to Port Douglas (45 minutes up a winding coastal highway) for dinner. He was right - the baby octopus salad at On The Inlet is really yummy. And I loved my Morton Bay bugs (type of seafood, not actual bugs). My parents were impressed too and therefore managed to do their usual commenting thing, along the lines of: "Who's Tom then?"... "Is he a good friend?"... "A boy with such good taste in food deserves a nice girl you know"... leaving me in silent hysterical giggles at the ridiculousness of their attitude - they make such comments about any and all of my male friends, with such frequency as to make me feel like Bridget Jones, around 15 years too early. I've bought two cd's out here - "Title of Record" by Filter, which I'd wanted for a while but not bought back home due to insane special import prices, and "New Detention" by an Aussie band called Grinspoon, who (imo) are amazing and should definitely come and tour in the UK. They played a gig in Cairns last night but I couldn't go because we went to the Night Zoo (which was quite fun actually). I saw a 5 metre long reticulated python, various crocodiles (which were fed on chicken heads), koalas, kangaroos, wallabies, spiders, lizards, and a really sweet brushtail possum (though I must admit I was as interested in the possum's keeper as I was in the thing itself). Home from the night zoo, I sat up til midnight, fretting and frowning and trying to read my German book. At midnight, I phoned Rhian to get my AS-level results. She had picked up my envelope for me from school and opened it whilst I was on the phone to her. I am shocked and ecstatic. All A's, French 93%, German and Politics both 98%, Science for Public Understanding 100%!!! What was scary was that my SPU result wasn't in the envelope and I had to call school and get them to fax it through to us here in Aus, so I didn't get that til this morning. And what is annoying is that my worst mark (despite still being very pleasing) is in my supposedly best subject. I lost 22 marks on my French oral exam, which I thought went really well, so I'm puzzled and can't help being a little irritated by the fact. Getting 100% on 9 of my 12 total papers is somewhat of a consolation, so yayayayayayayayay!!! But I don't know anyone elses results (apart from Rhi's, and congrats to her for doing so well! and Hol's, who also needs congratulating!) and I really want to know but I won't for at least another week. Meh! I've been waiting a long time for this moment to come, I'm destined for anything at all Sara xxx (12:54 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Saturday, August 10, 2002 Location: Trinity Beach, near Cairns, Australia. I arrived here yesterday morning, so have had time to sleep of the travel exhaustion brought on by the somewhat crappy 7 hour night flight from Tokyo and also to get used to being one of the crowd again and not (along with my family) the only western faces in an entire city. Tokyo was amazing. I ate sushi at least once a day for four of the five days I was there and I tried some new foods too, some of which I liked rather more than others. Raw scallop, for example, looks a bit like lychee and tastes delicious, though nothing like lychee. Okonomiyaki, which is basically some kind of fish or meat, with spring onion mixed up with egg and a type of batter which you cook yourself on a teppan grill at your table and which tastes like omlette only better. Chicken knee - grilled and served with yakitori sauce - which tasted like the really disgusting part of a chicken drumstick - the cartilage basically. Red bean ice-cream, red beans with dumplings, red bean filled pastries, all of which are truly divine. The shops there are just indescribable (spelling?). The most famous department store, Mitsukoshi, I can only liken to Harrods, especially considering the prices... so maybe also to Harvey Nicholls. It's amazing though. The bottom two floors are the food department and at almost every counter, you can try free tasters of the most amazing things - I tried seaweed salad (rather like sweet & sour version of spinach), dumplings served with sesame powder, an oddlytransparent root vegetable whose name I forget which was covered in a brown powder and tasted slightly klike peanut butter only chewier... And all the girls at the counters wear the cutest uniform of a crisply pressed white shirt which has puffed sleeves, along with a pastel coloured skirt and matching waistcoat and a sailor style hat in the same colour. The design of the clothes is truly beyond comprehension it's just so stunning. At one department store, Marui, I fell in love with three whole floors worth of them but unfortunately, most of the time they have prices to match. Harajuku was like a kind of Camden and Covent Garden rolled into one only better. The street Takeshita-dori was lined with open fronted market stall type shops and then at the end of it was a huge long road of fashion stores. The atmosphere there was very much the bustling covent garden saturday style one and almost everyone there was under the age of 30. They also had photo shops, where fans can buy hundreds upon thousands of shots of their celebrity idols. The subway system is astounding - every train runs on time and even at midnight they are every five minutes. Trains are air conditioned and every hour at least a cleaner walks the length of each one, not only to pick up the rubbish (should there be any, that is) but to rub away fingerprints from windows and polish door handles. It's fast and quiet and not nearly as expensive as in London. Signs at the station don't only tell you its name but also the names of the next and previous stations and, if you can read Japanese, you can even tell what carriage to get in so that you don't have to walk all along the platform when you arrive to find the exit that you want! I'm running fast out of net time, so must leave off now. Will update again at some point I am sure. Half a world away Sara xxx (10:33 a.m.) ------------------------------------------ Thursday, August 1, 2002 Me? Again? Well, what can I say? Oh, I know - evening plans over the past two days have inexplicably disolved. So I have the time to babble. I don't wish to sound like a man hater. On the contrary, I love men - anyone I know can confirm that ;) But I do have another gender based rant: Van drivers. Quite possibly the most irritating species of male that exists. I don't think of myself as an *ugly* person, but nor do I consider myself particularly attractive and I certainly have issues about my figure (ie, I hate it). So why, might I ask, is it impossible for me to walk to or from the train station without some lascivious (spelling?) van driver leaning out of his window and beeping his horn at me as I pass? It happens whether I think I'm looking good that day or not - I can be wearing a skirt and low cut top for an evening out, or baggy trousers and a scruffy t-shirt with a large rucksack on my back as I trudge home from school. It doesn't matter, they still beep at me. It's insane. In my mind, there's nothing whatsoever wrong with giving an attractive person the eye, y'know, looking them up and down, maybe even throwing them a little smile but this beeping thing is totally different. The blokes who do that sort of thing treat women like objects and it's not even like they discriminate between those who are dressed in a way which invites that, and those who evidently are not. It's just as degrading to them as it is to the women they beep at. And it's such a bore to respond to it anymore - I haven't since the time I gave the finger to one such bloke and, when I tried to cross the road, he put his foot to the floor in an attempt to run me over for me attitude. If any blokes read this and are able to explain things on behalf of their gender, I'd be grateful for comments in my g'book. End mini rant. So this really is the last time I'm likely to post before going away. I officially say, therefore, that I am on hiatus til 28th August. I do intend to wangle myself some extensive internet cafe time while I'm away though. In summer, you can taste the rain Sara xxx (07:29 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Wednesday, July 31, 2002 And there I was saying I wouldn't post again. I'll have to make this one a quickie though and I doubt it'll have any real substance to it but hey. So that mini rant? Well it's still true that guys are useless but I've been reliably informed by a friend of the one concerned that I had no reason to question the most innocent of motives. Relief is a strange beast. More shopping today - but no spending. Esther and I toured Knightsbridge and Sloane Street, feeling somewhat intimidated by hair accessories in Harvey Nichols which would have used up a month's clothing allowance per piece. We bus-ed our way to Oxford Street, having first eaten at Wagamama in the basement of HN and, of course, been scared out of the Versace shop by the £2000 red evening dress that we wanted. Esther had to leave early for some family stuff, so I was left in Therapy - one of the most heavenly shops I know - but it was crowded with rabid bargain hunters, so I left soon after. I got to street level to find that Esther had made off with my umberella. Hence a bad-hair-afternoon and a bad mood. Oh well, hair-cut tomorrow. Soleil, all over you Sara xxx (09:19 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Monday, July 29, 2002 Tiredness would prevent me from updating now, but now is the only time I can guarantee myself, properly, on the net before I go away. Saturday I'm off to Japan and Australia, not back til August 27th... woohoo!!! 5 days of sushi in Tokyo, then on to Cairns, Darwin and the Barrier Reef!!! I can't wait... well, perhaps I can. I have a hectic week before I go... Yesterday went to Camden with Mikey. He bought loads. I didn't. T'was a fun day but I used it to guy spot a fair bit, which would have been far more enjoyable had my shopping partner been interested in my various sightings. I am a people watcher by nature- when someone on the street catches my eye, their image is etched into my mind in such detail as to allow me to give paragraph long descriptions of them to anybody I choose. Mikey, as with most boys, has no such descriptive ability or interest. In fact, when I asked him to describe a friend of his, who he's been at school with for 3 years, all he could say was "a bit shorter than me, brown hair, round face". Useless. In fact, I shall use this time and space for a mini-rant about boys, based on one in particular. This boy said something to me yesterday, which I never ever imagined him saying but which could mean everything or nothing as it was specific without being clear. If he meant it as it sounded or not, he probably had no idea of the turmoil he threw me into as I spent last night and today trying to analyse it with the help of two of my friends. It's how I act, how they would act and, in fact, how almost any of my female friends would act in the same situation, but boys just don't have a clue. They say things and are utterly blind to the fact that their words will be subject to a detailed pulling apart session should they seem to contain any hidden meaning at all. Ack! They're so irritating that way! End mini rant Today I went shopping (yes, again) with Penny, to Covent Garden and Oxford Street... summer sales rock my world. £113 worth of clothes (jeans, 2 tops and a belt) for £51!!! I certainly made up for yesterday's lack of purchases. And Penny gave me the grooviest birthday present - a red sleeveless top by Rusty, which says, in really 70's style letters, Rusty Rocks... I now officially do wear red. I am so tired after traipsing the streets of London all day, especially as last night it was so unbelievably hot and I just couldn't sleep til around 1am. I had an electric fan on in my room but the noise kept my brain whirring at me with the same old same old train of thought. *Yawns* So tomorrow I have another driving lesson, then a tennis lesson and possibly out in the evening... oh the disorganised life I lead. Wednesday hitting the shops again with Rhian and Esther, Thursday haircut and a visit from friends of the family who are down from Scotland for the week. Friday packing and Saturday off on holiday. Woohoo!!! Tripping the light fantastic Sara xxx (09:50 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Wednesday, July 24, 2002 Being 17 feels pretty much the same as it felt to be 16.... except that I can drive!!! and I have a car!!! Well, I can't actually drive yet but I can learn. I had my first lesson yesterday - which was also my birthday - and it was so much fun. I actually drove, didn't crash, made loads of left hand turns and only stalled once! My car is so beautiful. It's this dark metallic burgundy red colour and it has a cd player and I love it. Other birthday presents have included a sewing machine, Moulin Rouge on video, the new Red Hot Chili Peppers album (which is amazing and really mellow and relaxing), L plates for my car, a photo album (which I spent today putting two years worth of photos into), £20 music voucher, some Yen to spend when I go to Tokyo and a matching set of tea light, candle holder and photo frame which are red and beaded with a black flower design and now adorn my desk surface in my room. Today I spent doing various minor yet necessary tasks, sorting out piles of papers from under my desk, researching more Gap Year possibilities, making thank you phone calls to relatives etc... People are still away. Mikey gets back later this week, so I may go to Camden with him on Sunday. Joe is away for ages yet and I'll have gone before he gets back, which is annoying as I get withdrawal symptoms of a kind when I go for too long without chatting to him. And countless school people are away. Kate and Winnie in Nepal, Meg and Clare in Norfolk, Penny somewhere else random, Esther in Edinburgh.... and people from out of school too, Anna, Andrea, Sarah... I feel slightly abandoned. It's at times like this that I usually go all reflective and manage to babble away on here until I come out with some bizarre truth about the inner workings of my mind and feel a little more satisfied in myself..... but for some reason, all powers of introspection have deteriorated (spelling?) and I come out with the same stuff about love and life as I have been doing for the past few months. I feel like I am embodying the role of stereotypical troubled teen, moaning when in the bigger picture my problems are nothing and everything is nothing. Saying that makes me sound depressed but I'm not. I'm just in this state of total non-commital nonchalance, sliding through the days slowly, or quicker if I'm occupied with something fun, not really feeling extremes of emotion. Which isn't really like me at all. Odd. Someone on a message board I frequent called themselves "anonymous" and told me it was a pity I'd never considered suicide and I just replied suggesting that they were a necrophiliac in need of some action... In my mind's eye, I, and anyone who's known me for any length of time, would expect to see me in tears, making some kind of uber-emotional reply to the little shit in question... but no... no such effect. Decidedly odd. By the way I tried to say I'd be there, waiting for..... Sara xxx (08:10 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Thursday, July 18, 2002  How random are you? this quiz was made by alanna Wow! It's 5.15pm and I didn't realise - I thought it was around 3pm. I've been online for waaaay too long. I've been looking for possible things to do on my Gap Year. It's so difficult to decide and it wouldn't matter except that universities only make deferred entry offers if they think you'll be doing something "worthwhile" when you take your year out. And people (ie: Rhian, Joe & Mikey) are away on holiday, giving me far fewer blogs to read. As a result, I made a few random mouse clicks and ended up liking what I read here, here and here. Last night I saw Green Day live @ Wembley and they were absolutely bloody amazing!!!!!! Seriously, before the gig, I liked them but they weren't really a favourite of mine. Now - wow. The whole gig was a performance, something to actually entertain, rather than just something to listen to. Before they came on, someone in a bunny costume got us all doing the YMCA. When everyone was too hot, the band sprayed the pit with super soakers, they had 3 people from the audience on stage to play - a bassist, a drummer & a guitarist, who then stage dived and got to keep the instruments! The entire gig was great and I jumped about so much that I probably got the equivlent of a gym workout. I was with Hols, Simon, Anna, Andrea and Sarah and it was so much fun! Yay, happy me! 5 and a bit days til my birthday - so til I have my first driving lesson and til my car arrives!!! woo! I'm tired. I had a tennis lesson today, despite a total of about 7 hours sleep last night. I think I played quite badly but it matters not a lot. My teacher knows I was out last night so I have an excuse... hmm... And in typical me style, I make an error of judgement comparable to Cher in Clueless au sujet des garcons. Relating, in fact, to my previous two cryptic posts, the situation is now officially dead, although in an amusing rather than upsetting way. Even now, I will exclude particulars though if pressed on msn, I may provide them to the more persistent among my readers. (I have readers?) Blinded by the silence of a thousand broken hearts. Sara xxx (05:52 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Monday, July 15, 2002 Ouch. I feel like I have lots of thin silver needles pricking into my back and shoulders. It's entirely my fault though, this evil sunburn I'm suffering from (more later). My last post was... well... quite pathetic now that I think about it. I was upset but I think I made it into too big a deal. Needless to say, it concerned certain corny "happily for the near future" aspirations I had. The situation itself remains unstable and I remain semi-cryptic about it. Monday and Tuesday evening, which seem such a long time ago now, were spent lacing up corsets and curling the hair of the cast of my school's production of "Playhouse Creatures". Much fun, if somewhat tiring work. I love period costume and I really want a proper corset. I also think that guys should wear frock coats, even now, because they're just so amazing. I had a little operation on my leg on tuesday as well. It didn't really hurt, apart from the injection of local anaesthetic beforehand. And I was on antibiotics, which was a bit inconvenient but it's finished now. Wednesday was my last day at school - end of term assembly was a bit odd, as the part taken by the headmistress was all deep and reflective (also known as dull and pretentious) but the part taken by the senior students (head girl and co, among them some of my friends) was really quite amusing. Things to do to keep your brain active over the summer - (1)Approach people on the street and, in the appropriate language, tell them you left your blue leather wallet on the number 6 bus. In it was your identity card, 7 euros and a cd. (2) Write an essay evaluating the merits of wearing socks with sandals. (3) Using sampling methods, calculate the number of grains of sand on the beach as you sunbathe... and so on in a similar fashion. After the picnic (i.e. the thing that starts at 10am and finishes when you choose to leave and consists of consuming anything and everything edible, which is usually chocolatey), I went to Cambridge. There I saw this place and loved it. I have finally decided on a Cambridge college to apply to. Mrs. M will be delighted and I feel so relieved to have made at least one of my many pressing future related decisions. Thursday I saw Tom, Joe and Rhian. Mikey was supposed to come as well but he had gone to cath his plane to America that morning. We met for sushi at one of those funky little conveyor belt places where you pay per plate and you don't realise how much you're spending as you eat. Well, actually, Joe didn't like the sushi, so managed to keep his own total down to a meagre £5.50, Rhian was sensible and monitored the price as she went along, I realised half way through my meal that my taste veered towards the more expensively colour coded plates, so slowed down and spent £14 but Tom paid no heed to price and blew £20, most of which wasn't even on the delicious sushi but on the yakitori chicken plates which are far cheaper at other Japanese places and can be bought in some supermarkets. His expression when he saw his bill was hilarious! We spent a little more money and a lot more time in Starbucks.... mmmm.... double tall latte heaven and then browsed the bookshop in order to part with yet more cash. Tom amsued himself (and us, I admit) by reading out graphic sections of books like "The bitch and the bastard" which he found in the Erotica section of the shop. How juvenile we are. The weekend proved to be absolutely amazing - went down to Bournemouth with BBYO. I was staying at Dani's with Steph, Rachel and Vicky, all of whom are lovely, and Dani's house is absolutely amazing - we were all in this huge room upstairs (loft conversion) which had four beds in, so we didn't even need our sleeping bags the first night. We chatted til about 2am, about BBYO, previous events and blokes.... in fact, mostly about blokes. The Saturday morning service, which required us to get up at 8.30am, was very very long. It started at 9.30, finished at 12.30 and was broken only by a half hour kiddush in the middle where we ate yummy chocolate crosissants for breakfast. After changing out of formal skirts and heels back at Dani's, we went into town. The original plan was shopping but it began to rain, so we chose to go bowling but then changed our minds when the sun came out and went for a milkshake at Legends, which is the most amazing cafe in the world ever! They have every flavour milkshake you can imagine! I had a Kitkat one, which was stunning. Rachel went the whole way, choosing white chocolate with cream and a flake. There are photos of her with her face literally in the cream, looking absolutely ecstatic. Sophie had a Refreshers shake, which must have been possessed. Every time she drunk some, instead of going down, the level of bright orange colour shake rose up the glass. It just kept growing. Insane. We played mini-golf, which all of us were rather bad at, but which was lots of fun. That night was karaoke and a sleepover at the synagogue. I made a total fool of myself doing a duet of Dancing Queen with Amanda but it was too much fun for me to really care. We were by no means the worst anyway. At midnight, I ate cherry ice-cream outside in the freezing cold and at about 3.30am, I stole my pillow back from Bradley, dragged my sleeping bag into a corner and drifted off. My 3 or so hours was not enough and the others had still less than that so back at Dani's we all fell into bed for another couple of hours. Then it was off to the beach. They have sand!!! Lots of it!!! I had forgotten my bikini bottoms so swimming was an impossibility but I played frisbee in bikini top and cropped trousers, sunned myself (hence the incredibly painful back today) and ate a 99 flake ice-cream, which actually cost £1.25 and I felt really old, saying I remembered the good old days of 99 flakes for 99p. Despite my non-swimming, I still managed to get covered in sand and quite wet. The sandy part is obvious, as all I had to do was be there. I got wet because Bradley threw the frisbee at me, right at my chest.... tres painful, so I had to get him back by slapping him but he was of course soaking wet having just been swimming in the sea. The result was rather like a game of mercy, with me giving up because I didn't want to get too soaked for fear that my sand coloured trousers would go see through. I spent much time walking the sea front for little chats about guys with Rachel.... her ongoing crush on one and my two day soft spot for another, which ended abruptly for no apparent reason. So sunburnt, exhausted and too damn hot, we sat in an unventilated over-crowded carriage of a delayed train back to London, from where we had to take the tube back to our respective stations. A cold shower felt wonderful when I finally arrived home around 8.30 last night. And I said what about breakfast at Tiffany's Sara xxx (11.03a.m.) ------------------------------------------ Saturday, July 6, 2002 I suspect it is known to whom it concerned. I am utterly aware that it's probably impossible and that I more than likely imagined anything and everything. Meh. All logic and sensible thought told me the impossibility and sheer unlikeliness anyway but I somehow managed to ignore that side of my brain and the ball seemed to begin rolling, only to seemingly crash right into the imoveable brick wall, as my sensible side had thought it would. I hate when that happens. It's as though one side of my brain says "I told you so" to the other and another sliver of the fairytale is stripped away. End of (slightly) cryptic rant. And as for the rest? I can't be bothered with typing right now. Not that anybody reads this. (I'm not as depressed as I sound, don't worry). And I start my day thinking about what I've thrown away. Sara xxx (07:42 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Monday, July 1, 2002 Again I find it has been a long time between posts - my excuse this time is that I've been travelling the country on England's fabulous trains to visit the various universities I might be applying to. Perhaps some sort of a summary is in order.... Saturday 22 June: Manchester - My first open day and a 3 hour train ride on my own, beginning at the hideously early time of 8am. The journey was boring but over soon enough. The uni a short bus ride from the station has no real campus atmosphere as all the buildings are lined up along the length of a busy road and a few side roads. I went to the talk about law courses at Manchester, which was given by the admissions tutors. It was great - the main law admissions tutor was a good speaker and gave an outline of the course as well as the useful stuff like entry requirements and after that, the tutor for Law with French Law spoke for a bit. She seemed really nice and the course sounds great - in the fourth (final) year, I could take some French modules instead of Law ones for my options... so film, art, politics and suchlike. Then I met Aya and Vicky from school at lunchtime (jacket potato with cheese and beans and a drink just for £2.35!). We went on an accomodation tour together... but it only went to the most basic block, the bathroom of which was a bit minging. Still, others looked very nice in the brochure. So I'll definitely be applying there. Wednesday was Nottingham, to which I went with Rhian. It was unbelievably, ridiculously, absurdly busy and althought I arrived at the talks I wanted to go to at least half an hour before they began, the lecture theatres were already full. The queue for the food court at lunch time stretched out of the door, down the stairs and onto the pavement so my "lunch" was a Magnum ice-cream. Somewhat infuriating was a guy, if it can indeed be given the compliment of being given a gender, who took a fancy to Rhian and latched onto us for the duration of the day. She's said more about it, but the lecherous leech, as I called him, did not add to our enjoyment of the day. The campus is a whole 20 minutes drive from the town centre and is basically a large field, with some buildings dotted about it at random points. I couldn't find a member of the law staff who was able to answer my question about deferred entry, so overall I wasn't too convinced. Thursday was Leeds - it's so lovely. Only ten minutes from the town centre on foot (though admitedly up a rather steep hill) the campus has a real uni atmosphere. The law department is based in some really pretty Victorian terraced houses at one end of the campus and the student's union building is amazing! A huge old style bar, well stocked supermarket, massive games room, cd shop, t-shirt shop... I could go on. Another thing I rather enjoyed at Leeds was that I met people. Rhian, Penny, Clare, Fran, Amy and the others from school were all in subject talks and I went for a wander. My sense of direction and map reading skills being what they are (or aren't), I got rather lost. I must have looked insane/stupid staring at my map and then at the buildings around me and eventually I gave in and asked these two guys who were relaxing in the sun. They weren't sure where we were either but they decided to be nice and help me find my way to the union building where I was due to meet people from school after the talks. We arrived there early and sat and chatted whilst sucking on 5-ice lollys. Their names are Sam and Dan although both are inexplicably nicknamed Hog. They're from Newcastle and are very lovely :) I think I must have been going on about them a bit on the train back, as Rhian was able to determine (accurately) that I like them "rather a lot" although she couldn't tell if I had a preference for either one. Hehehe. Friday was Southampton, which was nice but didn't do my course (an unfortunate slightly wasted day then) but it was fun nonetheless. I met up with Kate and after lunch (jacket potato, cheese and beans plus drink £2.40) we checked out the shopping mall - it's really big and shiny and new. I got some half price Elle cropped trousers (yay!) and a birthday present for my sister. Then stayed the night with Kate at her grandparents bungalow in Brockenhurst, a gorgeous little village near the New Forest. They have ponies in their back garden and a lovely Border Collie dog named Jasper. It was a really relaxing evening. Saturday went to meet my dad in Chichester for the matinee performance of Anouilh's "Wild Orchids" at the Festival Theatre which was excellent. Really amusing as well as containing some semi-deep stuff and having a plot that worked. Yesterday was younger sister's birthday. Her freinds came over to watch the football but ended up (as I had expected) running round playing hide and seek and giving each other make-overs. Then it was make your own pizzas at Pizza Express - so much fun! Mine was rather professional, if I may say so myself. A tad annoying when the 13 of them all decided to sing Abba songs at the tops of their voices. After that was the BBYO social round at David's. A BBQ in the rain - always a great thing. Still, I saw Danica and Jude who had come up from Bournemouth and all the Pinner people of course. T'was relative fun. Today was Pembroke College Cambridge open day. I love the college - so pretty, friendly atmosphere etc but they don't like deferred entry law applicants. Humph. Will have to go back to the prospectuses to select another college. Threw my bad fortune off the top of a tall building, I'd rather done it with you. Sara xxx (09:55 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Friday, June 21, 2002 I didn't realise quite how long it had been since I last wrote otherwise I may have made more of an effort to do this sooner. Given that my computer is currently rather ill (apparently due to a RAM deficiency since it was networked with my dad's to allow me broadband internet) I have been forced to snatch the odd few minutes on my dad's machine to check emails, read blogs and visit the BBYO message board. Today, however, I came home early and when I was sitting on the train I decided that I really wanted to write a nice long entry. So here goes: Starting I suppose with where I left off. Andrea and I went to get our tickets for Monster's Ball when we arrived at the cinema but to our surprise, it had sold out til the really late showing. More surprisingly, Spiderman advance previews had not sold out and, not being ones to pass up a good opportunity, we bought for that instead. Dinner was at Nando's, where Andrea bravely went for the "extra hot" sauce on her chicken. I was rather more cowardly/sensible and chose mild little "Lemon & Herb". Having tried a bit of Andrea's, I got more daring and found a bottle of "Wild hot herb" sauce which I poured liberally over my own food. It was delicious, although I admit that my lips were stinging til at least half way through the film. I really enjoyed the film, probably better than those who knew a lot about the original story in the comics. The only slight criticism I would make is that the end shot, as Spiderman swings away across the New York skyline, is one of a large billowing American flag on top of the Empire State Building. The film itself had plenty of American values in it already and to me the flag was just a teensy bit too much.... but it was still tres fun.
Onwards and upwards to the realm of work experience.... One week at a barrister's chambers, observing conferences, sitting in on court cases of all kinds, eating in barrister's halls and being shown round the barristers of Inner Temple's private garden. It was amazing - like an island in the centre of London, so steeped in tradition that if it weren't for the flashy new cars or internet wired computers, it could still be so many years ago. The High Court building is so beautifully designed, with rich marble pillars and floors of mosaic tiles and wall carvings in enormous detail. The older of the court rooms are really imposing, with ornately carved oak chairs for the judge and court clerks, raised above everyone else, who sit in uncomfortable wooden pews. You hear every footstep coming down the halls and when you see a pair of QC barristers in their gowns and wigs it just makes such an impression on you..... well, it did on me at least. And the cases I sat in on were fascinating - On the wednesday night of that week, I helped my dad to host an event at the Tate Modern, as his firm are sponsors of the Matisse Picasso exhibition there, tickets to which can't be bought "for love nor money" to quote one of the reviews. To my surprise, I managed the dress code of "lounge suit" adequately enough in my black trousers (bought for work experience) and pale pink shirt (with large white retro style cuffs and collar) and had not too much difficulty in chatting to my dad's clients and colleagues. 2 glasses of champagne and a few very artistic canapes later, and I got to wander through the exhibition rooms. There are 10 of them, or perhaps even 12 and it's an amazing collection of paintings, as well as a good few sculptures. I myself have a slight preference for Picasso but there were some Matisse pieces there that I really loved as well. Definitely an exhibition worth seeing! It did of course mean that I couldn't be at BBYO that evening and in a slight panic, I phoned Ben and asked him to go and help out. This he did, being the fabulous person that he is and, to return the favour I managed to pull a few strings *relishes clicheed expression for once* and get him a pair of tickets to the exhibition. His reaction on the phone when I told him I'd got him tickets was astounding. I don't remember it all but it just made the biggest grin break out across my face. I remember being called "a legend". I gave him his tickets on Wednesday and was thinking of hinting that I should go with him, as it'd be great to see the exhibition again and with someone whose company I really enjoy rather than with a group of suits. Today I went in early to school to watch the match - England are out of the World Cup. It's disappointing certainly, but I hadn't expected to win today. The only really bad thing was that even when Brazil were 1 man down, so for much of the second half, England still failed to pull back and equalize. Of course I'll watch the rest of the matches but I don't think I really care who wins. Given how much I love the language, France would've been my second choice but they went out long before. Oh well.... We were given a "real treat" today, in the form of a Life Goals Conference. A man, whose name escapes me, but whose eyebrows were behaving like a pair of demented caterpillars and who couldn't stop bending his body slightly at the stomach avery few seconds so he appeared as though he was about to fall over, gave us a very long day of advice on how to live our dreams. The worst part was most definitely the motivational music. Every song was cheesy beyond belief and all were of the type that get stuck for weeks in your head. Don't get me wrong, I do see the point of setting out goals and focusing on them but to be perfectly honest, the majority of what we were told today was so trite that it was just infuriating. By the end of the day, most of us had grown bored enough to whisper to the person next to us some snide comment or other about the guy's true stories but what really made me laugh was when it was suggested to us that nobody whose ambition was to make a million pounds would want to do so by selling cocaine as it would compromise their morals and values. Kate raised her hand and made the point that some people don't care about morals and values if they get a million from it and that others might actually want to make their fortune selling drugs. I almost feel guilty being so rude about the day but I suspect that Rhian will be far more so if she writes an entry about it. Wow this is a long entry. I began typing it at 4.34pm and there's still more I could add. My fingers are beginning to tire of this though so all other comments will have to be suspended. Are you terrified of waking up too tired to try again? Sara xxx (05:30p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Sunday, June 9, 2002 I've been away - physically and mentally. I meant to write when I got home from Brighton last Monday but there was the street party (see later) and since then I just haven't felt my usual compulsion to tap my life into this machine. I've had a pretty good week, socially speaking, but whenever things haven't been going on and I've just had my own head for company, I've been feeling about as down as I get with no specific reason for it. I can't figure out why. My last exam on Friday went much as I expected it to. SPU for 2 1/2 hours wasn't exactly fun, though some of the questions were a bit of a joke. I had to employ my best bulshitting tactics for the odd one or two and the last ten minutes of each paper I lay my head down on the desk and daydreamed. Brighton was fun. Hollie and I shopped (quite a lot), walked (for bloody ages up hills, down hills but definitely mostly up hills) around the town, eyed up the locals (so ok that was just me because Hollie spent all that time texting Simon - current boyfriend), watched the match on Sunday morning, and all that good stuff. One thing I would have liked to do was sample the coastal nightlife but, in an effort to save cash, I was persuaded out of that plan. Oh well. I arrived home feeling icky from train travel and after my shower was dragged by my family to our local street party. It started *very* slowly but I chatted with Mikey, Nat, Beth and Ellie, Nicole, Harriet and Heather (who I hadn't seen for about 2 years) and also met Dom, who was totally off his face to the extent that he had trouble remembering his name. It was a bring your own booze affair so we spent some time traipsing after wine.... to Ellie's, but her house key wouldn't work so to Nat's where there was no booze but where Mikey successfuly broke Ellie's key with a kitchen knife when trying to fix it. And then to mine where I managed to find a couple of bottles of cheap white wine for us. One of which was hijacked by Matt and Matt (Nat's 12 year old brother and his friend) who had decided to try and get totally pissed whilst riding their bmx bikes around the block. There was a band, the bassist being same "nice arsed" bassist from Charlie's band. This band wasn't as good. For some reason I ended up dancing along with a load of other people holding hands in a circle to Auld Lang Syme. Mikey to my left and a rather stunning guy named Arnie (I think) to my right. Unfortunately, he was 23 and stoned and a childhood friend of Ellie's older brother. Oh well. Towards midnight, we got chatting to the bassist (also rather confusingly named Matt) and his friends. One of them turned out to be Tom N, who I know but hadn't seen for ages. He was as out of it as he usually is but for some reason remembered me, or as he put it "I remember you. I've been to your house. I was scared of your pussy". If you found that at all weird, I can assure you that the literal meaning concerned my cat. Tuesday my family had a day together which was somewhat stifling to say the least. We spent the morning clearing out the garage and after a sandwich lunch continued it. In the evening, we saw the film Time Machine, which officially qualifies as one of the worst I've seen in recent years. Even Guy Pearce couldn't make it worth the price of the ticket and my parents were paying! The chinese meal afterwards at Oriental City was rather yummy though, particularly the deep fried eel in honey sauce. Mmmmm... Wednesday was mediocre, but Thursday was the fair. I went with Emma, Charlie, Adam, Maxine, Alvin, Thom, Alex, David and others who came and went throughout the afternoon. I deliberately avoided the rides as last year I went on the one named Body Count and was made nauseatingly dizzy by it. I bought a toffee apple but could only manage about 1/3 of it before I realised that having a load of crystalised red sugary stuff on my teeth wasn't as delicious as I had expected. I had fun - although some of the time was a bit lost by the conversation as, apart from Alvin, I was the only one of the group who doesn't watch Big Brother. I also met countless people I knew, including many from BBYO, as well as some of the more embarassing ones from my past drunken moments. It was tiring and rainy. Friday was shopping avec Rhian in London, where she bought what she intended to get (a skirt, two tops and two cd's) and I bought yet another Goo Goo Dolls album. It is a good one so the fact that it left me a little short of cash can be overlooked. Yesterday I went over to Carly's for a girly evening with Jenna and Molly, someone else called Sara and someone named Emily. T'was relaxing fun. Off out now to the cinema with Andrea - so you see things never stop. Just in time to see things all come down. Sara xxx (04:24 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Saturday, May 25, 2002 Oh the boredom which permeates my entire being. I am being melodramatic, or something, I know but I am so bored. The Eurovision song contest is on in the background (yes, that bored) and it is utterly dire. Not that I expected anything else. I just assumed people might be online to chat to while the chirpy pop cheeps away behind me. I try to avoid looking at the screen for fear of being Enough of that. Really. Last night was quite fun, even if the last minute-ness of it did induce another outburst from my parents at how irresponsible/forgetful/annoying Hollie is for not telling me about things until 20 minutes before they start. In this case, it was a gig in a dodgy little rugby club house half way between my house and my school. Our friend, Charley was playing with his band, who were absolutely amazing! They were the second band to play. The first, entitled Wasteland, were alright but appealed more to the over-made-up gaggles of giggling 12/13 yr old nu-metallers than anyone else I think. Charley's band, having only been together a couple of months, were... *decides to refrain from listing non-descriptive adjectives*. Suffice to say that aforementioned little people were so blown away that they started *just about literally* getting down on their knees and worshipping (with the whole pow wow type motion) at the foot of the stage. Neil on drums, Charley vocals/guitar, Alvin on guitar and Matt on bass, all were great. I was much amused by Thom, who had told Emma and myself that Matt had a nice arse and we ought to give our opinion on it. He even made Matt turn round on stage so we got a back view. Thom wasn't wrong in his judgement.... I think there was a plan to introduce me to this Matt person. At some point in the evening, Thom apologised that Matt was being so sly about this planned introduction, but I was having so much giggly girly fun that I don't suppose I noticed. I saw my friend Jenna again for the first time in many months - the last time we got high/drunk/hysterical on simple, non-alcoholic, non-anything-really Robinson's fruit squash and an old edition of Cosmo which we spent ages taking the piss out of - so when alcohol was relatively cheaply available, laughter was scarily easily to find. Towards the end of the evening, some panicked looking venue staff came through to the bar and told everyone to stay outside. A rumour of stabbing circulated and the police showed up outside. A little later, a gang of townies were bundled quickly through the back door and told never to come back to the club again, otherwise the police would be out quicker than they could throw a punch. At home again, I realised quite how badly my clothes, hair, body reeked of cigarette smoke and decided that a shower was a necessary plan, despite my relative exhaustion... then I listened to my new Hundred Reasons cd which had arrived in the post that day, finished my book and fell asleep thinking that I'd revise politics in the morning. Did I? Well, I tried. I got a bit more done than I did yesterday but that doesn't say much. My lack of concentration is terrible. I try to read my notes or my text book but then find my mind irresistably drawn elsewhere... a dream land where exams don't exist and I feel beautiful, it's sunny and the things I like remain the same forever.... I blame David Blunkett. Throw me to the skies because I know I'm coming back Sara xxx (09:39 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Thursday, May 23, 2002 Head. Pain. Two words together. French. Listening. Exam. Three causal words. Waiting. While. Chaperoned. That intermediate and painful duration. I'm not making sense. I'll try to but I doubt I will. Today was the French exam day. Reading & writing paper for 2 hours in the morning, having been chaperoned for 40 minutes in a stuffy classroom first so as not to meet any of the group who had just been doing the listening exam. That part wasn't so bad. In fact, I was pretty pleased with the essay topic as it almost rendered my year of studying serious issues and French society worthwhile as I got to include references to les banlieues and other such topics. Then came the 1 1/2 hours more chaperoned time during which I ate my (somewhat soggy) cheese sandwiches and the rest of my packed lunch and chatted and stressed with the other 23 unfortunates. Next was the listening exam. It can only be described as the work of the devil. I understood practically every word that was said on the tape and it was at a nicely slowed down speed for us but the essay questions were simply impossible. I found that I was way over the word limit (40 words per essay for 4 content marks and for quality of language marks each) and still hadn't managed to say enough that answered the question. My paper is covered in crossings out and even I didn't fail to notice the small print on the front page "candidates are reminded of the importance of clear and orderly presentation in their answers." Um... oops. Well, at least the other sections were alright. And there's nothing I can do about it now. I've had all my language exams this week. German writing/listening/reading was fine. A few of the questions were quite random and I had so much time at the end that I erased half my essay and rewrote it... hopefully for the better. And the oral was also ok, if somewhat terrifying. Mrs. C asked me innumerable weird questions - my topic was the history of women's fashion in Germany - for example "how has the church influenced the movement for female emancipation?" Um.... I managed to babble something about the fact that the Church's influence has been declining over the past century because fewer people are religious nowadays. But at the end of it Mrs. C said I'd coped exceedingly well with her mean questions. Yay. So now just politics *eek* and SPU *snore* to go! Then I'm off to Brighton with Hols for the weekend.... roll on Friday the 31st! I noticed today when I got the tube home from school that my ticket had a special Golden Jubilee design background, with 2 crown pictures behind all the ticket pricing information. Bizarre? Excessive? Obsessive? All three? The only way out is through Sara xxx (06:15p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Monday, May 20, 2002 Well well. One down, too many to go. French oral today went surprisingly better than the mock, which inicdentally wasn't too terrible itself. I was less nervous for this one *odd?* but I put this down to the fact that my teacher had hidden the tape recorder and microphone out of sight so I didn't freeze up every five seconds. Fun. The rest of the schedule goes: Other stuff: After a rather tedious morning of being smooth talked by boring car salesmen, we decided that I'm getting a car. :) It's a Ford Ka in a yummy colour called pepper red and is on special offer at the garage we went to. Yay.
Natalie came over on Saturday night.... we ate pizza which was, incidentally, as delicious as the delivery boy who brought it over. If you are the pizza boy who brought a large grand pan 1/2 meat feast, 1/2 country feast pizza and potato wedges with barbecue sauce to two girls on Saturday evening around 8.30pm then look on the Pizza Hut computer and see if my number's still there. Then call me ;) And I spoke to Joe for the first time in ages last night, which managed to put me in greater spirits than previously. :) Further down the river Sara xxx (08:18 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Wednesday, May 15, 2002 Updating whilst in school? Tch tch, naughty me, especially when I really should be doing French or German revision on the Authentik web site as I had planned to do. I just can't concentrate. Today is the last day before study leave anyway and I have a very specific revision schedule planned. 2 weeks friday it will all be over and I shall be off to Brighton for the weekend with Hollie. Said excursion shall be followed by almost 2 more weeks of glorious holiday until, on June 17th, we shall be dragged unwillingly back to school for the start of A-level courses. I've been having a rather reflective time, as often happens when I start getting stressed. Usually, there are only one or two infuriating little worries at any one time but with the exams looming ever nearer, all my petty niggles just seem to roll up into a giant snowball and accost me simultaneously, invariably when I am trying to sleep. So I immerse myself in very trashy fiction for the duration of my stressing time, escaping to worlds where previously pathetic young women end up excelling in their jobs, reconciling their differences with old friends and, of course, meeting the man of their dreams in some hopelessly clicheed situation. Problem this time is that I am fast running out of reading material. I've already re-read Sushi for Beginners and am 3/4 the way through Jemima J. I realised last night that I had got rid of my Lisa Jewel books last time I cleared out my room as I no longer had space for them on the bookshelf. What a mistake. My school library doesn't really boast its small stock of such material and I don't know how I shall last another 2 1/2 weeks. I can't honestly be bothered to go into detail about exactly which worries constitute the present snowball, which perhaps would be a good idea, but perhaps not as I could be here for hours typing them. They're mostly the usual ones at any rate. But I have the irritating feeling that I ought to be working now, and I ought to have been when I got home from school yesterday and the day before and perhaps after tennis on Sunday as well, or instead of spending Saturday evening at Hollie's, or much of the day in the gym/playing tennis. It doesn't help that I didn't find my GCSEs difficult, depsite my relatively minimal revision. It should be reassuring but instead I am terrified of feeling too sure of myself, only to find that in actual fact, the AS levels are totally impossible, especially the politics. Plus I miss people. I must be saying this every time I write on here but Rachel, Ben, Brad, Danica, Kane, the list could go on I haven't seen since February on the last national BBYO event. And then there's Joe, whose computer is still off at the repair place and who, consequently, I haven't spoken to for over a month. Chatting to Joe always cheers me up and I'm really beginning to notice the absence of such conversations because I've been in a bad mood for about the past month. And Mikey who is spending every minute of his free time on Natalie *take that literally and you won't be wrong* meaning that not only does he not update his blog/text me/call me at all, but that she can't spend Saturday at mine to keep me company while I babysit because she's out with him. And Emma, Anna, Sarah, Andrea, Amanda, Tris, David, Adam, Charlie..... again I could list myself into oblivion. My social life, sad though this sounds, seems to have drawn itself to a grinding halt and left me with nothing to do but work, or feel guilty for procrastinating. It's the last laugh of the laughter, c'est la derniere page du chapitre. Sara xxx (11:42 a.m.) ------------------------------------------ Monday, May 6, 2002 I wonder just how difficult it will be to write this entry as I am highly likely to sneeze violently and uncontrollably and unpredictably, much as I have been doing on a regular basis since I got up at 9.30 this morning. Yesterday, I was prefectly well and thought my occasional sneezes were allregy related but I seem to have been proved wrong. Since I last wrote - well, I can't actually even remember when that was, so I fear this will become some kind of unintelligible babble with no chronological order to help anyone understand it but what can I do? The *shudder* exams *shudder* are drawing ever nearer but my teachers do not seem to realise that it is impossible to even begin any serious revision when the normal homework is still being thrown my way on a daily basis. Hence a somewhat high level of stress. My French exchange Berangere was here last week, which experience was an enjoyable one, despite the small disruptions to routine - such as having to wait in school until 5.30pm for her to return from an excursion, despite having been free fromlessons since 2.40pm. She suffered the joy of my grandmother's birthday lunch with much of my family in a quaint little English restaurant *shudder* in Worthing. *Quails at the thought of bread sauce* followed by a highly civilised game of croquet (topping eh what?) School meetings about the UCAS form and suchlike, which I am sure are intended to be highly informative and useful were not only somewhat dull, but have thrown me into a frantic crisis over my future degree, uni choice, career, etc. Law? European studies? I swear I need a brain transplant. My envy of those people who are absolutely certain of what they want to do with their lives just cannot be quantified.
Perhaps it is my stress that has brought on the strnage dreams, although these at least stick to a familiar general subject: Last night was nice - a girly evening at Andrea's spent cooking (then eating) chicken, rice and vegetable stir fry with spicy plum sauce (aptly named 'firecrakcer'), watching Pride and Prejudice and generally moaning about stress, guys, stress, guys.... etc. I spoke to Hollie for the first time in a while today. It was really rather surreal having not spoken to her for so long. From the tales of her projectile vomiting (mmm.... appealing) it sounds as though she had a pretty boozey weekend..... so nothing out of the ordinary then. And I finally spoke to Joe last night. His pc is still off for repairs and I have been feeling very deprived of his conversation for the past month. It was great to know he's alive and well. Mike on the other hand, I haven't had a proper conversation with. I saw him the other day, much in need of a haircut but the last time I spent any substantial amount of time with him was way back in November last year. It's really depressing how there's no time for anything anymore. Living in the big machine Sara xxx (07:51 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Friday, April 19, 2002 Continuation: I was still in Florida (not literally) when I had to cut the last post short and I forget exactly where I'd got to. So I'll cut to the flight home, otherwise known as the point at which panic set in. Panic, of course, because i had done no work at all. This only worsened when, arriving home upon a mere 3 fitful hours of plane sleep, I read Rhian's blog and found out that the mocks were on Tuesday, not Thursday as I had previously imagined. Hence Monday became a day of seven hours politics revision, at the end of which I collapsed into bed. Fortunately for me, the exams weren't too bad in the doing although the most dubious results (politics and the physics side of SPU) are yet to be given back to me. My lower than usual 76% in German is still considered an A grade and I do have to bear in mind the fact that I lost 10 marks automatically on the writing task as I totally forgot to mention aspects of German culture. The essay was about a boat cruise for feck's sake! SPU biology section I got 78% which also constitutes an A and the teacher was certainly pleased enough with it. So not too bad going. My youth group on Wednesday night was good as I hadn't seen anyone for over two weeks, plus it was a great programme about Israeli independence day. And then last night I watched a play called "The Government Inspector" which I had never heard of before but it turned out to be really funny. Three of my friends were in it, all of whom were great: Daniel and Ben both had main parts, which they acted amazingly and I loved Ben's frock coat, and Adam looked bizarrely realistic as an old woman. Today brought my mock French oral exam, which went very much alright considering how worked up and petrified I got before it. Rhian will verify the level of my hysterical behaviour... it went so far as me hitting myself over the head with my file in an effort to literally drum the information in. I get the mark next week. Incidentally, Rhian deserves some congratulations for her astounding mark in the Livy section of her Latin mock and in her English paper. It should be her pleasure to inform people though so I won't steal her thunder *frowns at evil expression*. Speaking of congratulations, many go out to Danny for winning the National cheerleading finals with his college squad.... I watched the video and it looked pretty fabulous stuff. Mikey hasn't blogged or appeared on msn for ages so I'm not sure he's still alive..... though most probably he's too busy *omits description of activities* with Natalie. It would be nice to hear from him, if he has the time. And Joe is having his computer fixed so through nobodies fault another of my wonderful conversators is absent. Alas! I leave you as shuffled as life tonight. Sara xxx (11:05p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Thursday, April 18, 2002 Long time no post but it would be wrong to say no excuse. Florida - oh the sun, the happy Disney atmosphere I may once have felt was magic, the shops where my size was right in the middle of the designer ranges as opposed to the upper reaches and those people who look like they just fell out of the movie set, or others who just look on jealously as they munch on an oversized burger..... a country of extremes, innocence and too much neon lighting.
I won't say much about my time there: Must dash must eat then go out to a play which friends are starring in. Will continue when opportunity arrises. Sara xxx (06:12 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Thursday, March 28, 2002 I suspect this is the last time I will write for a while as I am leaving for Florida at some exceedingly unsociable hour tomorrow morning and am therefore headed straight for bed after Buffy tonight. There is no specific order to this post, apart from (in the main) chronological, beginning I suppose with Tuesday and ending in the present. Whe'ere you walk, cool gales shall fan the glade..... Yes, Tuesday presented me with what was my eighth founders day (tenth year at school but previous obstacles such as holiday or geography field trip have meant that I have not enjoyed my full quota of these miraculous occasions). Deciding not to risk the wrath of our more senior staff, I followed the dress code: smart, no jeans or trainers and made sure that I had a daffodil for the procession (pilfered from one of my good neighbours' gardens on the way to the coach that morning). The main service itself is never that bad - it's almost sweet how the whole school gathers together to belt out psalm after psalm commemorating those long dead. The only really bad part during it is the address, which covers the work of a different past headmistress each year and invariably goes on for what seems like an almostunearable length of time. After a break in which the inevitable excessive chocolate consumption remains incessant, we all congregate again for the aptly named 'entertainment'. That part is actually very enjoyable, so it's a nice end to a half day. Having left school and wished countless people a happy easter, I went for lunch with Vicky. L'artista provided us with rather delicious pizzas and our conversation (sad though this may sound) stuck almost exclusively to the prospect of university applications, open days and the like. Thoroughly stuffed with pizza and desperate to move somewhere far away from the friendly Italian waiters, we shopped awhile in the Broadwalk centre, which is entirely unmarvellous but was a new experience for Vicky. I fell in love with, but did not buy, a gorgeous white shirt with red flowers on it, and Vicky managed to buy some exceedingly nice trousers from Next. 2.50 in the afternoon and time to go home - bus to Harrow, half hour wait there, bus to my house (well, a 3 minute walk).
At home, frantic preparation for family dinner with Grandma (Wendy), Uncle (Will) and his fiancee (Aphrodite). Much gorgeous food... in fact, too much gorgeous food... dinner table discussions were at times a tad unnerving, for example Yesterday (wednesday) I managed to pack most of my things for going to Florida. In the evening, when I was supposed to be having people over here, we realised that it would be more practical to go round to Hollie's, whose parents are away in Greece at the moment. So, I packed up some of the food I was going to give people (2 bottles yummy white wine, packet of Chinese appetiser thingies, 3 tubs ice-cream) and went there. Hollie had tried to make dinner, using potatoes, onion, cheese, tomatoes and mushrooms. It smelt okay but Anna was the only one who liked it enough to eat it.... so she ate all of it. It was quite a fun and relaxing sort of evening, with Hollie, Simon, Natalie, Mikey, Anna, Andrea, Tristan, Rhian, Lindsay and myself all quite tired and generally flopping onto the largest sofas we could find until my mum picked me up at about 11pm. C'est tout really. Today so far isn't even remotely interesting enough to talk about, so I won't. And I don't talk about enough people to do a social blog proper... I often wonder if anyone actually reads this. But Rhian, I hope you feel better/happier/less tired/all of the above very soon and that you have a great holiday. Say hi to Esther and Zi Wei and Vicky for me if you see them before term starts again. *sends electronic happy thought vibes* When I wake up, in my make up, have I ever felt so washed up as this? Sara xxx (12:09p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Saturday, March 23, 2002 I'm not entirely sure of how I ought to begin. Somewhat irritated by a variety of things, however inevitable they all are/were/wouldhavebeen. Haven't spoken to Hollie in a while, so I phoned yesterday - her gran answered the phone, which was really bizarre and slightly perturbing because, well she's Hollie's gran. No comment. I left a message with her (although to be honest, she didn't actually sound like she even knew who Hollie was - as I said: bizarre). My parents got me to ring again later as they wanted to speak to Hollie's parents anyway. I left a message with her sister for her to ring me. Phone call? Nope. Today, well actually about 5 minutes ago, I was bored enough (at home babysitting - oh what a vibrant life I lead) to ring again. Out. Until tomorrow. Partying (was implied). Me not invited (why?). Babysitting nothingness driving self insane. Had nice Chinese dinner takeaway. Watched Road Trip. Am here. Am bored. Am irritated. Second thing would be the one which perhaps was inevitable. I just find it hard to believe, slightly disturbing (but considerably less so than I had expected) and a little bit depressing. I'm being cryptic but it isn't public knowledge and I've been asked to keep it that way. The others invloved can at least take pleasure in their secrecy (no pun intended there if you're reading this). Me, I remain baffled with nobody to bore. I'm tired. Shopping today - what? again? This time, I returned the grey top of two weeks ago due to its moulting fluff all over my t-shirt which I wore under it. I promptly spent the money on a new and entirely unecessary feel good type purchase. Another top. Woohoo. Also finally found a light weight jacket for warmer weather - finally England is being a tad less freezing and my leather coat seems too heavy for the approaching spring. I must say that this is a somewhat unexciting entry. My whole life is somewhat unexciting. School ends Tuesday and that evening is a family over for dinner thing... nice family only so quite looking forward to it. Wednseday is tennis lesson and (hopefully) friends over for the evening... Twister, Ben & Jerry's, wine and other such classy entertainments. But for now, I don't even have any online msn contacts. Everyone else, it seems, is out enjoying their Saturday nights like normal people. Now my only consolation is that this could not last forever even though you're singing and thinking how well you've got it made. Sara xxx (10:09p.m.) ------------------------------------------ Friday, March 22, 2002 Well. It has definitely been a very fun few days. The law conference at Cambridge was absolutely amazing in that I now know I would rather like to go here and almost certainly read law, provided I take a diploma in French on the side one year, and German the next. Particularly, I liked criminal law, tort, constitutional law and family law. We had lectures on each one of those, plus on various other parts of the Cambridge law syllabus. The evenings were cool too.... the first night was a "wine reception" (it was advertised as such) but inevitably it was actually a coca-cola reception. There, I met Emma who had gone on the French exchange I went on back in October, so it was cool to catch up with her and I also met Rob, who she had met because they were staying in the same college. Rob had met this guy named Steven on the train on the way to Cambridge, who invited us all out to a pub. Duly we followed but quickly decided to leave when we saw the rest of the entourage - specifically, 12 tarted up girls who looked ready to follow Steven into any random dive he could find. So Emma, Rob and I selected our own dive, namely the Rat & Parrot. Not actually a dive but not the most wonderful pub I've ever been in. My cider was extortionately priced to say the least. Next morning at breakfast (nicest meal of the day given skankiness of food at college - which I shall discuss in due course) I sat with Fran, Ashley, Amanda and Sarah who I had met briefly the previous evening at the first lecture. Lovely, got to know them over the course of the conference so t'was much fun! Next evening was the debate in the union chamber "This house believes that the Lord Chancellor should not be a part of the government". Tres interessant because it tied in exactly with what I'd been studying in politics. Had a fabulous point to make in floor discussion but wasn't picked by chair. Most annoying. Point "There is a code of conduct for judges which states that they are not permitted to be members of a political party. Surely it is therefore the biggest contradiction in terms for the most senior judge in the country to not only be part of a political party but to actually be a member of cabinet?" After that, Sarah, Amanda, Fran, Ashley and I wandered back to college where we wound up with diet cokes and (in my case, m&m's) watching the second half of Armageddon, showing on Channel 5. Mmmmm, good quality TV. The last evening was perhaps the nicest of all. A mock trial in the union chamber. Written by one of the students who was running the event, it was absolutely hilarious. I have never seen so much sexual inuendo shoved into such a small time frame. I couldn't have written it myself it was that good! After that, Sarah Amanda and myself shared memories of drunken embarassment at Wetherspoons where I got served without a second glance and tried that blue WKD alcopop I've always wondered about. Tastes just like raspberry sluch puppy. And so on to other matters College: must have been Mrs M's evil plot that Anna (other "delegate" from my school) and I were placed at Newnham (all girls... not my cup of tea). The main building and the grounds are beautiful but I was housed in the 1960s architectural mistake. Grey doors weren't dissimilar to those of a prison and while it was comfortable enough (ok, so the bed was as hard as bricks) both my windows looked out onto concrete. The food was even dodgier than that of my school, if that's possible. But the people I made friends with were all sharing the same fate. Ed. Not usually a name I'd associate with utter drop dead gorgeousness but in this instance, my prejudices were wrong. The same guy that wrote the mock trial (and therefore has my utmost respect for having a sicker mind than I do) is called Ed and is nothing short of damn fine! He also had my preivous dilema of whether to do the maitrise double degree but opted for law on its own due to work load fears.... suggests liking for French, plus the fact that he seemed really nice. Certainly looked after the people who were staying at the college he was in charge of throughout the conference. Pity was that I never even got to speak to him. Was considering asking as a question in the "law: the unofficial version" q&a with the committee session "This one's just for Ed - wanna go out for a drink sometime?" I'm sure the 200 people there would have laughed but I chickened out. Probably a good thing. Anything else really? Hum - I have very deliberately neglected the details surrounding the other girl from my school. Curiosity can be satisfied if you ask me. And the words are the letters of the words. Sara xxx (10:00 p.m.) ------------------------------------------ |