Sometimes purpose devalues activity.
Wow, seems to have been ages since I last had anything interesting to say.
Not that today is any different, particularly. Nothing much is happening Apart from the usual sort of neo-machiavellian scheming and plotting that happens in a psychology department, of course, for which I have absolutely no tolerance nor patience. Also I have had what seems to be Freshers' Flu for about a week now. It just WON'T SHIFT. Particularly galling since I haven't been anywhere near any freshers at all. Hmph.
There are new PhD students here. We all went out to bond properly last night. As per normal, that involved a great deal of alcohol. Hoorah. Then I was overcome by fatigue at midnight or so and had to go home.
Oh. If memory serves, we committed to "Commando Friday" where no underwear is permitted.
Postgrads, eh?
Trying to put various experiments together. Gotta get ethics forms in for a massive social network-stylee investigation AND another for the collection of axillary hair.
Axillary? Of or relating to the armpit.
I could tell you why... but do I really need a reason?
My job is very strange.
I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but my job, as an academic, PhD type person involves quite a lot of work with faces. We use pictures of people to investigate various aspects of attractiveness etc. We have quite an exciting piece of software to do it with.
I have spent today ageing people.
The photo posted here is me, aged to the ripe old age of 55. Or thereabouts.
I must say, I think I look quite good for a fellow in his mid 50's.
This does not, however, negate just how utterly freaky I find this image. I am unsettled to the very core of me.
Listening to
Blue Jam is, of course, probably not helping.
All hail Chris Morris.
Approaching nuptuals.
A lot of talk about
weddings out there recently. Thought perhaps I should join in.
Got a call from Big Chris this lunchtime. HE'S TOTALLY ENGAGED. Yey. He and Rachel gonna do the decent after 9 years (9 years? Jesus) of itemship. Hoorah. I actually started to cry when he told me, sensitive guy that I am. Although it was a little embarassing because I was in a restaurant at the time. Also, I'm not sure the table of old ladies next to me appreciated my cry of "congratulations you big fuckstick". Fuck it. HOORAH. Weddings. Congrats to them (congrats to you).
ALSO. My old pal Owain has just got engaged as well. Tis the season. Hoorah. Weddings everywhere.
I'll have to buy a hat. Maybe 2.
Yeeha, let's get gibbered.
Danger in the darkness
Heading off for blissful slumber last night, I became aware of something rustling in my room. The noise of paper crinkling under the weight of a lifeform. Of something pushing its body through the detritus on my floor. Signals of a definite, non-human presence.
Now, I live in the top floor of my block of flats. Ok, so that's only three floors up, but still; a little high for a mouse. Straining in the darkness, I heard it again. Sure as hell sounded like a mouse to me. So I turned on the light, put on my glasses and looked around.
There was (was) a large cardboard box near my bed. The noise seemed to be coming from that general direction. As I looked at it (still trying to work out if I was really hearing the noise or not) a spider larger than madness crawled out onto the cardboard. Eyed me pointedly, and scuttled on its way out of the box and into my nightmares.
Now, I'm not exactly phobic. Not technically, but I will admit the point is a semantic one. I do not LIKE spiders. They make me recoil. I walk away from them with great purpose when I see them. I had to rescue a reasonably large spider from the bath the other day; the process took me about 20 minutes, most of which was spent with me staring at the beast and muttering "right". Last night's arachnid was bigger. I mean, huge.
Seriously. If god were a spider, he would be this big.
I had to log on and immediatly get online support from
Kathryn . My flatmate came home at 3.30 to find me standing in my room, armed with a kendo sword and a hoover, looking slightly ashamed of myself.
After he finished laughing, he gave me a hand.
We moved the box, but we never found the spider.
Spindly bastard.
Prescribe me not my duty,
Oh, the world would be such a less stressful place if people would just remember to keep their sense of a) humour and b) perspective.
Not going to go into detail, but someone I know was very bad last night. Not properly bad in any lasting sense, but certainly very, very naughty. The other party has not found it amusing. At all. Fair enough. I'm friends with both of them, can certainly understand why she's upset, but also understand what he was doing. Which was playing. Not a good thing to be doing, but less problematic than it could have been.
Anyway, so I had a VERY sternly worded email invoking my status as a FRIEND.
Now.
1. I don't like being told what I should and shouldn't do.
2. I don't think I need my duties as a chum pointed out.
3. This is, in the end, nothing really to do with me.
So I was cross. I'm less cross now. A bit... off, I guess. Not the subject matter of the email, but the phrasing.
ANYWAY. It'll all be fine.
ENORMOUS spider in my bath this morning. I knew that was a poor start to a day.
Elisabeth passed her viva yesterday. That makes her a doctor now. Very exciting. All went out for a nice dinner and DRINKS. Hoorah.
Also, my poi arrived today. Woo, new hobby for me. Boo, I just tried spinning them in the lab and hit myself in the ear.
Perhaps I could call today off. Got an eye infection too, so I'm in my specs, which I hate. HATE.
Sorry... can we go again?
Bibbety, bobbety, booze.
Friends of mine will be familiar with my ghost train analogy.
For those unaquainted with it...
Do we all remember Ghostbusters 2? Specifically, do we remember the scene where 3 of the 'busters are wandering through an old subway tunnel when a massive great ghost train comes screaming down the tunnel? Two of the heroes leap out of it's path, one stands in the track and screams as the whole train rushes over him. Being insubstantial, it goes through him. Being, well, a train, it also surrounds him. For a moment, he is utterly surrounded by an ethereal, glowing, rushing force. Then it is gone.
I find this a suitable image for those "oh... my... god" moments that we all have after a particularly heavy night. They tend to visit most people in the shower the following morning, generally when one has just started to relax and rinse shampoo out of one's hair. I'm talking when memories of indiscretions of the night before suddenly surface and knowledge of just what a fool you made of yourself scream around and through you like... well, like the ghost train in Ghostbusters 2.
It is a handy analogy. I use it often.
I feel it frequently.
Like today.
Now, I'm not actually going to tell you what todays ghost train is carrying. Suffice it to say that I now think that alcohol is EVIL. Evil and bad and wrong. I also think that I am a bit of an eejit. Surprised even me this time. Ah well, I shall blame the booze.
Beer used to be my friend. Suddenly beer hates me. What did I do to beer? Why, beer? Why the betrayal?
Ah well. As Homer said:
"Alcohol: cause of, and solution to, all life's problems"
Tease.
Just to let y'all know, I'm still around, but am waiting for the broadband thingummy to be activated in my new flat. Have had to treck into work today just to check my email and write this. I can't really be bothered to stay here much longer and desperately need coffee. This will be brief.
In fact... it's over.
