Journal Entries
That sleep thing again...
Posted Mar 16, 2003
Term is now officially over. This, you'd think, is a good thing. But with only a couple of weeks to revise a year's work, I'm only letting myself have this weekend as full-blown holiday. And my plan is (or was) to spend as much of it as possible asleep.
You see, even apart from the inevitable end-of-term late-night coursework-athons, I've actually not been getting much sleep lately anyway. And I realised my body was really in a bad way when, on leaving my room at 11AM, I kept thinking I should turn the light out to save electricity: I couldn't get my brain to accept that it was day-time now, and that was *sunlight*...
But even so, I've not been finding it easy to carry out my plan. You see, I'm not generally much of an insomniac, and never used to have any problems whatsoever. But when I have a lot of stuff going through my head, I sometimes find it hard to switch off, if you know what I mean. And right now, there just seem to be rather a lot of big, scary, things going on - or, rather, about to go on - that will determine the whole shape of the future. Which is what life's all about, really: "the only constant is change". But I just feel rather on the threshold right now, which doesn't make it easy to sleep...
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Latest reply: Mar 16, 2003
Here we go again...
Posted Mar 14, 2003
This house is so ridiculous!
We completely failed to get enough money into the joint account for this month's rent (or rather, a couple of people failed to get it in 2 months in a row, and were saved the first time because a couple of us paid in 2 months at once...
). So the standing order didn't come out; none of us got round to telling the landlord (who only lives next door, for 
s sake!) this for about a week. He then [demanded] that we give him as much as possible *in cash* - and we're not talking 
here, but we weren't exactly in a strong bargaining position.
Well, we got as much cash as was in the account, and then waited for one of my house-mates (who's lost his chequebook and has to get cash anyway! 
) to get a further wad. However, we didn't really see each other much yesterday, so this took a couple of days. This lunch-time, one of my housemates and I decided we ought to get it organised. We woke up[!] the one who'd got the joint cash, who said it was still in his coat pocket, and decided to as-it-were loan the rest so that we didn't have to wait for the chequebook-less one, who had about a million things to do today and wasn't entirely happy about it. However, at this point my housemate discovered that he'd lost his wallets. He looked everywhere, including in rooms of people who weren't up at the time he got back yesterday afternoon[!] and various places on campus, before giving up and cancelling the cards.
I, meanwhile, was supposedly writing up the piece of coursework which I'd spent a whole night finishing only to be very disappointed with it at the time of demonstrating.
Despite having slept from 6PM through to 11AM, I still felt completely dead - although this was improved by a 
in the fresh air. I am, however, still working on it, and it's now well gone 2AM.
So, in short, the house is a tip, we're all hopeless, we're all running on such completely different timezones that we never actually see each other, and it's the end of term tomorrow. This may sound like a good thing, but all it actually means is only two weeks until our second-year exams start...
Ah, well, you have to 
, I guess!
Oh, and my housemate found his wallets, as he was going to bed - on his bedroom windowsill!
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Latest reply: Mar 14, 2003
What am I like?
Posted Mar 10, 2003
It's 5:30 in the morning. I'm as - umm - a very thing. And more to the point, I've got a 9 O'Clock lecture tomorrow, which normally means I set my alarm for 7:30. Go figure!
On the other hand, I have come across some cool things on-line in the last few hours - I really must get a decent web-site going, with a proper little weblog and stuff... 
I think I'll just leave you with one favourite, for now: http://www.cockeyed.com/ - check out especially some of his 'pranks', and the thing about trophies and stuff and - well, just check it out, 
?
I'll leave you also with the news that Mr. Pastry Man finally struck, and I now know why we ended up crossing pelicans and puffins. I'll leave you to wonder what I'm on about with those 
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Latest reply: Mar 10, 2003
Statistics and subtle hints
Posted Feb 22, 2003
At the beginning of this week, one of my housemates got so fed up with how much washing-up and rubbish was just being left round the kitchen, that she suggested we moved it all onto the floor, to see if the lazier people got the hint. We didn't have to shout at anyone; we didn't have to give in and do somebody else's work; we didn't even set deadlines for compliance. We had to pick up the (fewer) bits that were still there a few days later, cos our landlord's advertised for next year's tenants already, and people wanted to look round. But it seems, at the moment, to have done the trick - we made our point, we said what we wanted, and it turned out they wanted the same thing anyway... 
Of course, the other "subtle hint" I took part in last week was the anti-war march. However you count the numbers, a lot of people from all around the world protested last Doobry. And as I've said elsewhere, it may not be a majority, but show me the protest spanning all continents of the world, all ages, and all walks of life in *support* of war, and I'll shut up. And we may, for all I know, be wrong in thinking there's a better way - but anyone who ignores us now forfeits any right they once had to the label "democrat".
It's interesting to note that our Prime Minister made a "moral case" for war, and found even that outside his power: the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Pope himself - the highest authorities in two branches of the religion Mr. Blair holds so dear - have told him that peaceful means should still be pursued.
I heard a program on the radio earlier, in which it was asserted that *nowhere* in the Middle East could be described as politically stable right now. So yes, it would be great if we could get rid of Saddam Hussein, and set Iraq up as some kind of shining example to its neighbours - but it would also be a blessing to persuade Egypt to hold free elections, or to rid Saudi Arabia of its abolute monarchy. And in the end, what are the chances of war succeeding? Will "we" really be able to just remove Hussein from power, along with all his supporters, forever? And if we do, will Iraq really be able to go straight from where it is now to a genuinely democratic state, based on the will of the people, not of politicians either local or foreign? Or will a war simply feed Saddam (and Bin Laden)'s propaganda; anger the people; kill innocent civillians; wear on into attrition, stand-offs, and guerrilla attacks; and finally end with a fractious and unhappy populace ruled by a neccessarily strict government, designed and supported by foreign politicians, and ultimately subsuming the people's will, rather than expressing it.
It's a worse case scenario, I know, but it's happened before, and we run a terrible risk of it happening again. I don't suggest we do nothing, and I don't suggest that Hussein should remain in power, but let's not get carried away with local, short-term, solutions. Blair, and Bush, and the politicians of the world, need to stop hiding behind the weapons inspectors, stop staring at Iraq, and come up with a coherent, honest, and consistent approach to the problems of the Middle East and the world.
It's not an easy task, I admit that, but sometimes we have to try a little harder to get what we want. And I can't say I have more than the vaguest understanding of the problems involved, let alone their solutions. But then, I've never requested the job of leading one of the most powerful nations of the world. George W. Bush has; Tony Blair has; and the members of governments all around the world have asked to participate in that task. That, then, is their job; going for the easy solution is not.
I just hope they get the hint in time...
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Latest reply: Feb 22, 2003
Everything *always* takes longer than you think
Posted Feb 21, 2003
(or: why 55 hours isn't the length of the official working day...
)
OK, so it's all my fault.
OK, so I should have done it weeks ago.
OK, I shouldn't have engaged in so much displacement activity and procrastination.
But, , I just wish this coursework would GO AWAY!
I stayed up 55 hours straight because I was getting one bit done. I didn't even manage to get that in before the deadline in the end.
I then had 19 hours sleep, and got up for a thoroughly organised day today.
I've another (much smaller, thankfully) piece of coursework due in midday tomorrow.
I've got no brain left, it's half past midnight, and Mozilla just crashed (it being a research-on-the-web Psychology task).
I think I'm going to give up and try and do it in the morning.
Ah well, que sera sera!
I'm not actually as depressed as this probably sounds - but I am VERY !!
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Latest reply: Feb 21, 2003
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