Interventions

Alright, I'm just about ready to go back to England now.

Excitement of first week back has worn off and I've been reduced, yet again, to sitting - this time on my bed, as my damn pc has chosen not to work - on my bed on my blog whilst occasionally staring at the ceiling and wondering what I am doing with my life.

I constantly feel like I'm living two lives in two different continents littered with different people and there are the different interactions and the way I think I act different (although I don't really because I seem to be incapable of modifying my behaviour at all,) but damn, sometimes I have no idea how I spent 17 years of my life living here...

Point A: went out for lunch on Friday (fine. Very nice, actually,) which was Lizzy's last lunch here but jesus christ, the journey just to pick up something for my mom and go home almost sent me into one hell of an anxiety attack and left me slamming my bedroom door when I finally arrived home and proclaiming "NEVER LEAVING THIS HOUSE AGAIN GODDAMMITIHATEPEOPLEWHYARETHEYEVERYWHEREWHYAREBUSESDUMB and so on."

And now I've reached the point where my parents, exhausted of all my uni stories, (which went "it's fine." "I love it." "yeah." "mmhm,") have gone back to treating me exactly as they did before which is fine because special treatment is stupid but when every conversation seems to go like this:

M: Laura what are you doing later?
L: nothing.
M: Why?
L: I have no money. And I don't want to.
M: You always spend so much money! I gave you money yesterday! You always go out and spend our money etc etc etc
L: okay.
M: Why do you always spend your time at home though??? You should go out and socialise with your friends more!!!
L: ...

And so on. I mean okay - I do spend a ridiculous amount of money for someone who barely does anything - investigate: where does it go??? - but it just so happens I'm here for another 18 days and there's plenty of time and people who aren't even back yet so I'll have time for that. Just because I spent this weekend moping about the fact my PC's died on me, thus disallowing me to continue my Final Fantasy 7 streak and forcing me back from a blissful unreality into real life, they think i'm being anti-social. Whatever mom and dad, Cloud totally gets me.

Readers all simultaneously groan as they prepare for a full-frontal fangirling blog entry. IT'S COMING GUYS! I have lots to say and it needs to be organised and typed up properly. Have no fear!

So what, asides from moping over the fact I cannot temporarily interact and engage with a fictional storyline that I am far too emotionally invested in, HAVE I been doing lately? Um I could say that I've traveled the world and invented a lightsaber and sponsored 5 children and discovered the recipe for Mrs. Field's cookies but all of those would blatantly be a lie and no one would believe me and this whole sentence is really just a waste of internet space isn't it. I've played a lot of draw something and read. Gone through:

(1) Will Grayson, Will Grayson - John Green & David Levithan.
(2) Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist - David Levithan & Rachel Cohn (This is beginning to look like writers word association oops.)
(3) Speak - Laurie Halse Anderson
(4) A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
STARTING (5) Prom - Laurie Halse Anderson.

Guys... I really love books wow. My parents, whilst I was growing up, always said to me that they'd always be fine with buying me books. I think they've always regretted it because if given the opportunity, I will just have stacks and stacks and be ridiculously happy. Nothing like having a pile of books to just sit and read through.

I'm such a hermit, geez.

I'm so lost with where I was even going with this blog entry. I guess it's less about events and just random thinking because I've gotten used to just clicking on here and writing new post even when nothing happens in my life. Which is often because I don't do a lot of significant stuff but that's cool. This was really heading in the direction of being a complaining blog but today when I went for a long walk - felt like being all deep and poetic and listening to music and flouncing around the peak - I've decided complaining is dumb because it's all I do and I never do anything about it, and thus, I got home and actually oiled my stupid door hinge and now it opens properly without hitting me in the face and check this: that's already one daily complaint I've knocked off the list. Score!

Other people are back this week which means i'll probably have to do something. Game of Thrones season 2 is out tomorrow which means I'm not doing anything tomorrow at least. I'm still not sure why I'm writing this and would delete it but I think I'll just keep it for further reference. Maybe if i'm bored I'll come back and edit book reviews it. Bye.

Sevens 2012 (Occupy South Stand)

Title of this post is a reference and call-out to the guy wearing an OCCUPY SOUTH STAND shirt. Sent me into hysterics.

This is going to be a long post for one of two reasons:

(1) I am currently mute. I'd already lost my voice on Saturday, for crying out loud, and it's only gotten worse in that I cannot even speak. Cannot utter a single word or make a sound. I was getting by with whispering but found out that makes it even worse. I've been reduced to pen and paper and eating lozenges like there's no tomorrow and gargling although I have a HUGE issue with gargling because I always feel like I sound like a bubbling lava pit and then I laugh and water goes everywhere because I'm a child apparently.

(2) A lot to say and I haven't had too much time. Portia's meeting another friend today which gives me some time off and a chance to heal my poor voice.

(3)

Yuuuupp. It was an eventful weekend.

Because I like categories, let's try keep this neat:

FRIDAY

Went to Mongkok first in the day to stock up on costume stuffs. Was unable to physically walk past the bubble tea store. Chocolate bubble tea, I have missed you dearly!

Got home and got ready, before heading off to the 7s. After realising there was no way we'd be able to get a cab, took the bus and thus arrived almost an hour later than we'd intended. Portia headed off to the bathroom whilst I went to South Stand, the 18+ stand (finally allowed in~~ not that I was ID'd ONCE anyway...) Didn't need to buy drinks as we'd predrunk (ooh, introducing new concepts to hk~) before. As in, right before we went inside. Walked in with no line and called around and finally (after bumping into and taking photos of two stormtroopers,) LIZZY. It's been 7 freaking months. The screaming here is probably why I lost my voice.

Stadium from the south. First time in aw i'm such a law abiding citizen.

Sel was only here for one day because she left Saturday morning and made me sad. Was still lovely seeing her though AS ALWAYS.

We went all camo. Kept in simple and because I'm obsessed with face paint in that I just like putting paint on my face. Hats were bought in Mong Kok on the day.

We really were gonna go out on the Friday but were completely wiped out. We did go to Wan Chai and went to Coyotes for some lovely mexican food AS ALWAYS but found to our alas (it wasn't really because we were tired like I said,) and chilled with the group and Portia went to stay with a friend and I came home and collapsed into bed which was really exciting cos i'm never usually that tired.

SATURDAY

Portia had to go for breakfast with the friend she was staying with, so I was heading down by myself. South Stand lines get insane so we aimed to meet at 9 and did so despite me managing to lose my phone in between texting Catherine at home and arriving at Causeway Bay.

Costumes were colourful and exciting and it was a nice day and my allergies had been acting up so I had to wear sunglasses anyway cus my eyes looked all puffy because I have shit genes and this kind of stuff happens all the time. We were all incredibly giddy and started drinking around 10, which was clearly a great idea.

Sooo excited when I saw a group of guys from my old school dressed as Hobbits (& Gandalf.) Fully spazzed. When we watched the films, I kept going on about how I really liked what they wore. Now that i've seen them in the flesh, I really want hobbit-clothes...

Met up with Portia and had to leave South Stand. We queued for roughly 2 hours to get back in, BUT IT'S OKAY, because as you do, you always make loads of friends queueing for anything at the 7s. New best friends forever in the half an hour line to pee yay!

After a full afternoon of drunken shenanigans, we went up to one of the VIP boxes because we were hungry and there was food. We didn't even touch the alcohol because we were all just so hungry cause food is so expensive at the 7s. (So is everything else really, but yeah.)

Kermit just casually using an atm NO BIG DEAL.

SA vs... I don't even remember, which is awful. We were supporting SA of course though (Cos of Sav!) but this was our view from the boxes after we'd scarfed down pretty much all the remaining food there, heh.

My voice had pretty much gone early Saturday morning and came back in bits and chunks throughout the day so I was drunkenly rasping (which didn't help) and shouting (which certainly didn't help) so when we went to dinner with my parents and Portia's dad, I'd pretty much just given up speaking and was half playing charades (note: my parents must be so shit at charades, just based on how difficult it is for me to communicate with them at this stage...) and whilst we were all hyped up for going out this morning (as in EVERYONE,) most of us were just too tired and went home LIKE A BUNCH OF QUITTERS. (Give us a break, we'd been there/drinking ~9 hours)

SUNDAY

Me and Portia were champions and got to the stadium BEFORE 8AM. On a sunday. This did involve some clever taxi-swiping and a quick starbucks breakfast run, but we made it into an empty South Stand and got to watch it fill up. Kickoff was 9 so we all sat around exhausted until then.

Like I said - drinks ridiculously expensive. $220 for a vodka redbull! I mean, it was one litre but even so. We got "thirsty" and just bored and started bit after 10. Sun was shining which meant we spent a lot of the day - or at least I did - dehydrated and burning in the sun. Lizzy has THE most impressive sunburn/tanline..

Saw a ton of people in South Stand from SIS so ~reunited~ and said my hellos although I just didn't have a voice so I had to mime everything which people found funny anyway so I guess that was okay.

Most useful way of communicating my lack of voice, especially NOW that Esme has turned my inability to defend myself vocally into a really fun game where she interprets everything incorrectly. GUESS what me pointing to my throat in an attempt to show 'lost voice' is turned into via her 'Make-Laura-Look-Bad' interpretation to everyone else...

We stayed only til just before FIVE... Didn't even make the fireworks :( But getting anywhere is a massive hassle - not that it wasn't when we left really.. - and we were both so, so tired, so we just went home and watched a stupid film and lay down and ate food. No one really went out because they were probably (a) hungover from Saturday, and if not (b) getting a hangover/just plain exhausted from Sunday.

SO, finally finished typing this up. It's now Wednesday and I've just gotten round to finishing typing it up since I put the pro in procrastination and just keep putting it off. Itinerary for the rest of the week:

Thursday - Portia leaves early morning. I downloaded Final Fantasy 7 again. I'm going to replay it. Humans I interact with in real life can expect not to see me for a while... BUT...

Friday - Lunch with Lizzers because she leaves soon (Saturday) and I love her and I hadn't seen her in 7 MONTHS for crying out loud.

I'm just planning on spending the rest of my time lounging around and being lazy and not interacting with humans in real life (because who does that anymore?) And of course revision. I'm actually excited to revise - sadly watching now as all my friends defriend me for even saying that - but there's a lot I want to read over and it's interesting okay shut the fuck up it's my blog i'll say what i want.

Will update sometime that's not now (OH NO, BACKDATING BLOGGING ALREADY?!) concerning last night. Spoiler alert: vodka tuesday, quiz night, drawing with friends, fried rice by the side of the road, porksword, lots of giggles and drama. Tune in next time!

Finishing School

(I know we haven't really finished school, just term, but it's a Dashboard Confessional song and I was just listening to it geez get over yourself and get with the times.)

God damn it, I was meant to post before I left but I didn't and now I have to - fuck that, I'll post about last week next week or something, just to ~throw ya'll off a little and give my readers a little excitement in their lives.

(Prediction: will end up writing about it anyway because once I start one of these I never seem to really stop..)

Okay, I'll just talk about last week after all.

For Sophie's 21st, we all went off to Gatecrasher, but there was a crazy-special twist: Esme was also present for the festivities! (Not actually present for Sophie's 21st cus that'd be kinda weird cus she didn't know Sophie; she was at Warwick (about to say here but I'M NOT HERE AM I and oh god, I'm bracketing within brackets I am the worst person ever for overlong sentences,) for her interview WHICH WENT WELL AND WAS SUCCESSFUL okay, sentence terminate.) It was 80's theme so I just threw on a neon clash of colours because I didn't know what else to really do and my bank account was draining like mad - bless being at home where i don't have to pay 3 quid for laundry - so kept it simple~~

Friday was just a lovely DAY overall. Picked up Esme Thursday night and we finished off Return Of The King, (well, watched the whole thing but finished off the trilogy with it I should've said and YEAH EXTENDED,) and she got to meet my hallmates who kindly restrained themselves from making too many of their usual comments to me until she went to bed. (Not that she's too much better herself.)

And then Friday lunch, since we had an extra hour off cus of no Theatre seminar, we went to Varsity for our lunch - FUCK, I just realised I've talked about this already. I'm really the worst blogger ever. Here, have some more photos whilst I awkwardly brush this flounder off.

(I could really just delete and pretend I never made this mistake, BUT I LIKE TO KEEP THINGS REAL AND AUTHENTIC, Y'ALL KNOW ME.)

Yes I WAS one of those twats who wears sunglasses indoors.

After everyone left and I waved my farewells, the number of people in the halls quickly dwindled to the point where I didn't have to bother putting pants on to do a mad kitchen dash (long shirt okay, and I mean PANTS in an American way god you guys,) and I felt free to dance around my room like a loon after both my neighbours had left, not that their presence really stopped me before.

But um, cool as it sounds, spent the nights with those left in the hall playing Cosmic Encounter WHICH IS REALLY FUN OKAY GUYS SERIOUSLY and I was so happy to get the Zombie card for my alien power because I mean - if a card described me..

I MISS PLAYING THIS ALREADY. We watched a few films as well and I sat around and started my complaining about flying home relatively early.

I took all my photos down even though it was kind of pointless mainly because I had nothing else to do . I had planned my time so that I would be packing all Tuesday and not spend loads of time sitting around being bored. Turns out I packed within 20 minutes and still had loads of time to sit around being bored, so I took all my photos down and put them all up here. I mean, I'm here for a month. I like having my face all around my room because I'm a self centered brat and I just like documenting things.

Speaking of which, me and Lucinda were actually considering hitchhiking to Amsterdam for Jailbreak but we missed the deadline. (As Andrew pointed out, possibly the worst idea ever. Me (bad) and Lucinda (bad) hitchhiking (very bad) to amsterdam (bad.) "Knowing you, you'd probably get kidnapped." was another phrase used, I believe.) I've been - like I've mentioned in another blog entry I'M SURE or maybe I just made that up in my head, - in a super adventurous mood as of late and just want to frolic around and road trip and go somewhere without knowing where and see where the road takes me and document it all and dress all twee with cute hats and sunglasses and I'm getting ahead of myself with the idealisation of this all but it's fun to think about. Next term, after exams, definitely. Even if just a short trip to some random place nearby.

So, airport. Traveling is always... interesting. There's the excitement of going to a new place and the 30 odd seconds or so of excitement when you board the plane and then when you land, but all the faffing around is completely insane-making. The security was being a bit ridiculous; I was fine, but some people got called in at the security check and had to step through a machine that looked like what I can best describe as some time machine or cloning device. I got quite jealous and I ended up having nothing to do for THREE HOURS anyway, so I was really in the mood to kill time.

Due to buying stuff for my sister - she begged me and now owes me starbucks, note! - I spent the LAST of my UK bank money on a chai tea from Starbucks and then realised there was a sushi place right there in the airport. With the burning fury of a thousand suns I composed a furious message to my sister blaming her for my plight then sat down with my latte and complained on my phone to people about how bored I was.

Cutest thing then happened: I took out my sketchbook to doodle - god I know, how quaint and artsy of me - and then after about 10 minutes, a little girl came and sat next to me and asked to see my drawings. I flipped through a few pages and she oohed and then took out her own little drawing pad and drew some pictures for me, which was the cutest thing anyone's probably ever done - I mean hello, she drew me a bear aww - and then she asked me if I was a princess because I had princess hair and I just wanted to adopt her even though I hate kids. She had to go after that but I told her to keep drawing everyday (like I'm some authority on drawing, hah,) and that she was really good and would only improve and her momma said thank you and they went off. Such a cute encounter!

Dad booked me exit row seats (more leg room, yay,) and turns out I had the whole row to myself. I was beaming in triumph as they officially closed the door but then I realised I couldn't lift the arm rests between the seats and thus, all my dreams of just spreading out and sleeping the 12 hours away were shattered and banished to the land of broken and lost hope. I thus experimented with a shitload of comfortable sitting positions, namely involving draping my legs over the armrest. Most of my other positions were a variant on this but eventually my back got a little achey. I was additionally moving the pillows and blankets (3 of each, aaand a extra warm one from the nice flight attendant who I talked to as we took off but who wouldn't damn leave me alone after,) around and sitting there like a spoiled princess with my tv to the dislike of other passengers who took to glaring at me as they waited for the toilet. Despite this, I still had the indecency to be uncomfortable and unable to sleep the whole flight. Watched:

(1) The Descendants. I know it got really good critical reception on the whole, but I wasn't too interested with the premise but I gave it a whirl anyway. Turns out I really, really liked it. I liked the characterisation and use of multiple plots and the way these plotlines interacted around the characters. Despite the overall rather depressing premise, there were moments of lightness and it didn't leave me with a depressed feeling at all. It was well paced and moving and I may have almost teared up except I think that's because I got a really bad toothache and was in considerable pain and was really fearing it would be that painful all flight (it wasn't.)

(2) The Artist. I'd been wanting to watch this for so long and finally was able to. Annoyed I didn't get to see it on the big screen as that would have probably added to the experience, but I completely fell in love with it regardless. I spent a bit of time thinking about how someone with no or little knowledge of film history and the silent era would take it and couldn't really because of my own bias. I loved the whole thing. The story is simple enough, with Jujardin's character echoing the silent era stars who lost their appeal following the introduction of the talkies, whilst Bajo's Peppy is the star who rose at the same time, (might add that their relationship, with George Valentin being the one giving Peppy her boost into the industry, and then her rising stardom in conjunction with his falling one is very similar to A Star Is Born (George Cukor, 1954, OH MY GOD I'M CITING ON MY BLOG WHO HAVE I BECOME) And whilst most of it was relatively predictable, it was in a really nice way in that it was almost making allusions to these older films. All the insight to the industry and production and the idea of stars was all so relevant to my history module and I was practically bouncing in my seat with excitement thinking of things I could have potentially discussed in film hist. Definitely one of my favourite films that I've seen this year (I know it's only march, but I watch a lot of films...) Left me wanting to stand up and dance in the aisles and then I left it at wishing I could actually dance and live in a silent film and then I decided I couldn't do that because I just talk too much.

(3) True Grit. I'd been wanting to watch this too, but not to the extent I'd actually bother to do it, if you get what I mean. The Coen Brothers don't ever really do too wrong in my eyes so I'd had high expectations and really enjoyed it. Steinfield's performance was fantastic, as was Bridges of course, and it was a beautiful shot and crafted film. I always tend to go for easyish stuff to watch (according to me,) on planes because I'm just not in the mindset to deal with anything Tinker Tailor-esque, and this easily fulfilled that quota by being both entertaining and beautiful to watch.

(4) In Time. I love a good dystopian setting so that ticked the box. Whilst it was a pretty depth-lacking film, it made for a good waste of two hours and looked good. I can never really see Justin Timberlake as anybody but Justin Timberlake though - this isn't even a thing that happens with all well known actors, it's just certain ones - and sometimes in scenes I would get confused because I'd think it was a music video and it'd be like 'What's Justin Timb- OH. Yeah. I'm watching a film.' (I hadn't slept for about 26 hours at this point, cut me a bit of slack.)

Started the Ides Of March but unfortunately I MEAN FORTUNATELY!!! we started our descent. I will watch the rest of it though, even if just to stare at Ryan Gosling's face I mean because it was interesting at the point where I was up to, (really early on,) so I'll do that soon.

Today I did nothing. I woke up and went for a walk and went to the supermarket and compared prices to everything 'back home,' (in quotation marks because in England, HK is back home and vice versa and I throw around that phrase so much,) Portia's arriving tonight at mine and I'm hoping if there are tickets available, to go watch the Hunger Games because I'M SUCH A FANNERD OVER THE HUNGER GAMES REMEMBER WHEN I READ THE FIRST BOOK? (Can't believe I just wrote that phrase then found the link for that. This blog is actually my life.) And she's just called and says she's almost on her way which is great timing because it gives me a bit to tidy my room up a bit IT'S SO MESSY IN HONG KONG. Uni people don't believe me because I'm borderline OCD there but it really is guys. And it's also fairylight-less, which is making me almost prone to depression. Man, I miss my lights.

Alpaca Farms

I don't usually summarise just days, (as in, I usually do sporadic updates concerning the latest events in the past week or so,) but today was lovely and I feel like writing about it.

Esme got here last night. Bailed halfway through Return Of The King as she was hungover & jetlagged, an apparently lethal combination. She's currenly meant to be napping but is watching Freaks & Geeks instead and laughs every so often which is kinda weird as she has headphones in and it just sounds like she's laughing at nothing.

Today was the last day of term. The main joy of this was the lunch we'd planned. We usually do Friday lunches in the cafe-food-court-esque thing in University House, which normally consists of fish & chips/jacket potatoes etc, but as we had an extra hour today, we decided to go to Varsity, a proper ... I don't even know what it's really called? thing instead.

(This was after me wandering around the theatre department for ages because I got lost and didn't know where to hand in my portfolio. The same portfolio I'd gone to the learning grid yesterday to complete only to find that it only took 20 minutes. This then put me in an awkward position as I therefore didn't want to leave the learning grid after just 20 minutes because it would seem like I'd just given up...)

So we went down to Varsity - fuck, that's hard to type. Keep typing varstiy.. - and due to the relatively large crowd - all thanks to Keira's announcement and Rosy's subtle 'OWEN, YOU SHOULD COME TOO' attempt at getting everyone's fave seminar tutor to come join us - there was actually a lack of room indoors. Therefore, we migrated outside and despite all the boys whining about the cold, we had a lovely lunch!


Rosy's mission was to finish this. She succeeded...


... and was very, very proud.

We had speeches - including Tom's wonderful "When I first met you all, I thought you would all be horrible people and I was right. But I've slowly grown accustomed to you..." etc. speech. Chips were stolen and stories exchanged as we enjoyed the final friday lunch of term 2. I love the film people.

Seminar - met Esme beforehand because she was waiting for her interview and she got to meet the film lot - was hilarious. One of the English lit girls we know was persuaded to come in which really confused Owen, and all of us giddy - perhaps initiated by the fact Owen wasn't wearing any shoes when we walked in which resulted in us all yelling SHOES OFF and deciding that was the dress code of the seminar - just ended up pretty much very hyper and not too attentive..


And then Sidney turned the brother and sister from the film we watched into Edward & Bella and Josh said Edward looked like melted ice cream.

Tonight is Gatecrasher for Sophie's 21st with an 80s theme so we'll be seeing how that goes! I'm leaving on Tuesday and I've talked enough concerning my feelings about leaving (since I'm such a deep thinker and shit,) so I'll just leave it at that. Here are some photos as of recent because I'm vain and want to plaster my face all over this page. (MY BLOG, I'LL DO WHAT I WANT.)


Sarah and Becky at Pop! when I worked Weds. (I actually left early because I was so tired and Jonno drove me home because he's a darling except it was so foggy and we had like 10cm visibility and he couldn't see anything and didn't know where the roundabout was and it was terrifying.)


With Erika last week at Gatecrasher (bad placement/timing I guess, but Gatecrasher is huge so it's fun,) <3


On the bus :)

Will be on the bus again later tonight - Megan's got to come around and we need to buy our freaking tickets as well. Getting cash out is such a pain. Also gotta do a booze run - I'm really loving Amaretto at this point in time, got a bit sick of vodka in that I've just had it too often. Amaretto and Malibu it is now!

I will leave it at that as I'll probably have updates from this weekend, and since most people will be gone, I shall have nothing to do until Tuesday :(

Funny Things

Wordy post because I lack new and interesting photos. Photos off my twitter may be sporadically dispersed throughout due to my presentation issues that mean I am offended by long posts of just text on my blog, (minus articles of course, but let's face it, when was the last time I wrote one of those?)

As of lately, I have become a slave to the place we all call the learning grid. In this barricaded section of University house, students congregate to complain and procrastinate and then occasionally actually do the tasks due to either (a) overwhelming feelings of guilt/compulsion because you made the journey, (b) a lack of anything else to do. Hence, this is a good place for me, someone who is arguably borderline ADD to me when it comes to concentrating.



I enjoy motivating myself. This did work. It was finished. Not well, but still done.

On the whole though, I've been trying to keep myself more motivated in not just doing my work, but starting it early enough and doing enough background reading for essays especially. You lose the manic adrenaline that I used to hold responsible for being able to complete the task before deadline, but it's not really such a loss to take your time and not have to worry about it at all, really.

With my Bergman essay handed back to me and a not fantastic mark - not that I expected one, given that it was done on manic adrenaline and on the whole just not a fantastic essay - I believe my exact words were: "This is the biggest piece of shit I've ever written." (Grant, Laura. To Myself: Things I Say Aloud Wallowing In My Room Alone. 2012 citations have taken over my life dot com.) - and as a result, I decided to work hard on my history one. I started it early and did a fair bit of reading and research and to my delight, found it - say it with me now - a lot easier. (NO SHIT, SHERLOCK! Thanks guys.) Furthermore, I found it so much more interesting, and when it comes down to it, I'll say it: a lot of the stuff I'm studying is damn interesting. I'm lucky that I did decide to pursue this and picked a course that I'm in love with. I love learning. I love what we're learning and although sitting in a lecture hall at 9am when all I want to do is curl up and read a book is sometimes disagreeable and I'm still complaining, I still wouldn't do anything else. Man, I'm just really happy here, you know what I'm saying?

Now, on a completely separate note, I am returning home in one week today. I am still uncertain how to feel about this; I am on the whole, very excited. Hong Kong - although the younger sister claims the weather is current shit - is usually nice around this time of year.

You see, I've lately become obsessed with traveling and adventure. And by that, I mean moreso than usual. In a Sunday afternoon frenzy, I took my map off my wall, and pins flying everywhere, ripped off all the flyers on my bulletin, sticking my map there in its place and using the pins now spread all over the ground to mark places I've been. Some observations are that 1. Russia, Canada and Greenland are massive and it looks like I haven't been to that many places even though 2. I really have and a lot of people have commented on this yet I still 3. don't remember all the times and dates and get muddled and I'm pretty sure the dates I have are quite inaccurate but I'll sort them out over Easter.

I've also marked down where I want to go. And where I want to go back to. I'm obsessed with memories of places and people and things and the feelings you felt when you were in a certain place or with certain people doing certain things. And then you make the funny little associations and every so often, something tiny will jog your memory into collective overdrive and in flashes you see your past, (or your reconstructed past, but let's not ruin this illusion and go too deep into how memory actually works.) For example:

I can't see a poster of Charlie St. Cloud without remembering seeing the audition notice for extras on Gibsons in Vancouver. And subsequently then, that opens up all the memories of that seafood restaurant in the main town and the quaint ice cream store tucked in a corner and we'd always see people walking around in the afternoon with these massive scoops of all sorts of multicolours and then there was the rock candy I bought at the souvenir shop and the log-running competition we watched and it was just so funny and canadian and it's just weird to think I was there. And who I was there. That was two years ago and I was starting the IB and listening to a lot of Jack's Mannequin and I just remember getting off the plane and driving and I opened the windows and sniffed and it smelled so different and I looked at all the trees towering over my head and just marveled over how vast the world was. The fact that a place like this could exist at the same time and in conjunction to the contrasting places I'd been was stunning and suddenly I felt so small and I looked around at all these people I would never know and realised that there would always be places I wouldn't go but I made a note to try and go to as many as possible.

And then:

Even the smallest things such as a stone can suddenly make me think of a different time. The stones in the Thai airports - I always think about them. The display with an ocean background and one palm tree and those stones, representing the Thai tropics with all their inanimate glory and I think about each time I've passed through that airport, one, two, nine times? More than that, surely. The people I've met there and gone there with, from the girl I made friends with on the waterslide at the place with the trapeze to running along the beach imitating the crabs with Catherine. And a lot of the time, I cannot separate all these events and they all fuse into one big memory of one place and I start to define this place by this memory and it's just wrong because I haven't seen or done enough to know the place: all I have is what I know of it, and a lot of the time, that's enough.

I don't know, I'm in a strangely prose-y mood today.

Just to finish, as this entry, whilst doing okay word count wise, is a bit short of actual content about my actual life:

(1) Esme arrives Thursday for a bit.
(2) I leave on Tuesday
(3) Most people leave Saturday
(4) I may be bored
(5) I'm scared I'm going to descend into a ridiculous spiral of loneliness and depress myself.
(6) Especially after how last term ended.
(7) Or maybe I'm just being silly.
(8) After all, I quite like being along.
(9) Lists don't work out too well for me. I'm too long-winded.

This is a funny point because I can't believe it's March already. My blog has bypassed it's one year birthday. And check it out, March 2011:

(1) This miserable post about me whining about my shit life and first world problems etc.
(2) Post about Innovation (The 2012 one has happened already wow weird.)
(3) That time I went to England March 2011 for my Warwick interview and fell in love and then I read my first John Green book which is weird because I just finished my 4th one this morning.
(4) Me panicking and thinking and writing about university.

The difference is bizarre. Maybe it's too many life-centric, thought provoking novels or just the time I spend awake by myself at night, but all I seem to do now is think. Properly think. About life and death and the connections and the people I've met and the people I haven't but want to and will. And i've come so fascinated by the idea of living and the fact that from now on, I really have no idea what direction everything is headed and that's both scary and exciting and my life has been reduced to a series of run-on thoughts and sentences and an overabundance of the word and because there's just so much I'm thinking about and - oops! - no way to eloquently phrase it all.

Regardless, we can deduce that:

(1) I shall be home soon.
(2) I will come into money.
(3) Thus will materially spoil myself because I am a bad person.
(4) But the main thing is that over this break,
(5) I would like to change the way I think about a lot of things.

And I shall leave you with that.

Let's Talk About...

Question: Guess who got completely wasted on Friday?
Answer: Me.

To sum it up, I temporarily forgot - as I tend to do quite a lot unfortunately - that I am a 5foot4 female with a low alcohol tolerance and downed almost a litre of vodka in a ridiculously short amount of time. There is luckily little pictorial evidence that I have seen thus far but this exciting adventure ended up with me waking up at 8 the next day utterly confused, before remembering I hadn't even made it to the foam party.

(Observation: It's always foam/UV/paint parties I never make it to slash don't do well in. Seeing a pattern here. I shouldn't be allowed.)

So, after evaluating my life choices and writing up drinking rules for myself -

(NEW DRINKING RULES
1. No drinking on an empty stomach
2. NO downing drinks (no is underlined three times,)
3. < 1L of vodka please.
FAILURE TO KEEP THESE RULES MAY WILL (Joe told me to add this change,) RESULT IN SPENDING THE NEXT DAY WITH SELF-HATRED, ANNOYANCE AND SHAME.
THIS IS A WARNING.) -

Anyway, needless to say, I behaved myself on saturday night - skool dayz - and skool dayz should really get its own tag on here because I pretty much work at every one. It's always good fun, but the most exciting part was that magic Anson had come down to Warwick for a visit!

(Can I just pull a very typical Laura and go way back off topic and say ALSO, I lost my phone Friday but I called them and they had it so I picked it up earlier today and I am happy now.)




Stunning and aweing audiences everywhere. Pretty much gave a show and impressed the hell out of my hallmates at lunch earlier today. And also me. I was very impressed despite having seen him defy logic and real life so many times.


Few groups of people I knew milling around, so I was back to socialising self... and of course, there reached the point in the night where i thought fuck it about work and just got reduced to self-camming with people I know. I am such a shameless poser and it makes me sad.


This is like a weird deja vu because I have an almost identical photo from the first skool dayz we went to, which is a bit sad. :(


Took so long to find Megan because I was without phone. Typical girly yelling at each other in excitement when I finally located them at the end of the night.






Oh yeah - me and Jonno also worked Pop! I was desperately bored when I first got there, but after we showed up, we went up on stage and chilled with the DJ, who also got us all to do the macarena up on stage. Not sure what came over me that I agreed to that, to be honest...


Lucinda and Chris were only there for 10 minutes, hah. Should mention, we played the meme-face drinking game which is pretty much a death trap for girls. Especially after I'd made my new rules so I treaded carefully. I was in a nice bubbly state so that was all fine.

So, this week:

• I don't know what I did on monday. Probably nothing special.
• Or Tuesday.
• Or Wednesday. Except for working at Pop! Oh yeah. I finally did the thing I'd been threatening to do since I first got to uni and managed to drop my keys. Luckily, Karl, (the dear,) handed them in and I went and was able to get into my room and all that.
• I ordered 2 more dvds in class. I need to stop.
• My chair broke. It now also tilts forwards instead of just side to side. I keep falling off because I sit with my feet up. I need to stop this two.
• I'm running for exec on WarwickTV (Marketing.) I need to do a speech and read it out and answer questions. So far, I've written a few vague things and it's tomorrow. It's just like every past speech I've ever made.

I... haven't done too much. My productivity's slowed down a bit. Fun.'s new album has been my soundtrack this week. Why Am I The One is my favourite right at this time but that may change by the time the next song comes on.

I can't believe it's week 9 already. Mixed feelings about going home again. It's a different situation this time round - i'm not leaving behind as much (ya'll know what I mean,) and I'll get to see Lizzy and everyone and the 7s... but the thought of traveling is making me want to cry already. And packing. Jesus, note to self: do NOT bring back as much as you did last time. There is no way you need winter clothes.