Right!

In the next 10 hours I aim to have finished writing my dissertation and not have a caffiene induced headache/twitch etc. Ready, steady - go!

The next day...
Yeah...so that worked really well...(not)

not important.

Gah! Stupid brain! I have too much to do to spend time thinking and yet all I can do is think, and not even about anything productive or relevant. Why do I find it so easy to fool myself? And what's worse is I'm utterly consious of it and I'm still disappointed when I remind myself that it's not real or likely. The curse of a good imagination. I wish I were more cynical then perhaps it would all go away.

Gonna stop whining now.

Pointless post

I love grapes.


That is all.

Oh, wait - no it's not. I HAVE SIAMESE-TWIN GRAPES! I win!

Oh no I didn't, I LOST! DAMN!

Lesson learned

Need to learn to be less critical. Do as you would be done by, etc. It's far too easy to bitch without even realising it. To anyone who I may have been unfair to ; it was very probably inadvertant but I'm sorry none the less. Will aim to improve.

Later...
Am feeling guilty for something I may or may not have done, and I don't even know what it is, or whether guilt vibes are even being aimed at me or whether I'm just picking up on them on their way to someone else! CONFUSED! Am I just a bit paranoid, or do I actually have something to feel guilty about (at a local rather than cosmic level, I mean)? This would all be a bit clearer if a certain person would blooming well answer the text I sent them.
I think I should go off and live as a hermit - that way I'd never have to worry about whether I hurt or offended anyone. Living on a croft in the Highlands is looking increasingly appealing: stuff getting a real life and engaging in human interaction, it would probably be for the best.

Even later...
Right, I should be feeling guilty apparently, and do so. But what I did was accidental, so I feel not entirely to blame. Will explain situation at earliest oppertunity, and try to clear it up. I get the impression that I'm not a great friend to anyone. I just wish people would stop telling me things in confidence, I just seem to let them down.

The Fear

Right, I am now exactly 3 weeks from my dissertation hand-in and am experiancing what is commonly known as 'The Fear'. It's completely irrational as I know i've done a lot of the work and have more than enough time to finish it and edit it (oh good, more editing), but all the same I'm starting to wake up in the night panicing because I can't remember if I saved the work I had done that day (mind you, I keep on waking up thinking I left the oven on too, so maybe that's not so suprising afterall, but it's still messing with the old body-clock). And I'm worried, given my laptop's level of sheer vile malevolence, that everything is going to be lost in the ether - again irrational as I have 3 differant back-ups (paranoia, moi?) Gah! But was very ammused by the dissertation word-limit one-upmanship that was happening on the classic fm forum yesterday - think the winner was 300,000 one, although that was in actual fact a book so doesn't really count. Put's mine into perspective though :) Why am I so worried by 10,000 words?!
Family dinner last night was tres ammusant! It was almost like having dinner with a modern day version of the Bennet family - my Mum and Aunts all teasing Gran for being daft about "the youngsters of today are really missing out by not learning Bridge", and bullying Grandad into giving up the kitchen to them to prepare his birthday meal - reticence is not the word! He would only agree if Uncle Peter would agree to supervise, mostly because he knew this would wind them up. But I can't help but notice that Grandad really does prefer (my brother) Pete; suspect that it's because he's an athlete and is an engineering student, where as I'm a theatre person and study an arts subject; just feel that he underestimates me because I'm not like him. It really shows in the way he'll turn to Pete in discussions about certain subjects, even when Pete doesn't know much about it but I do, I can give an answer and he'll say 'ah well, that might be it certainly, but I'll check and see if anyone else knows', where as with Pete it'll be 'Ah yes, that'll be right' - have noticed it for a long time and it's really quite a confidence shaker :( But I reckon it's because Pete's the only boy on this side of the family - neither of my Aunts have children and my Grandparents never had any male children - so Grandad expects a lot of him, where as because they had all daughters, then I'm just not quite as important to him.

Later still...
Just back from huge family meal - was fun; intelligent debate about the expression of pride in industrial heritage through the works of Lowrie and the 'Angel of the North' - suitably highbrow. Then continued discussion of situation in Zimbabwe via Facebook - really interesting stuff. Now feel like a true intelectual snob ;) And it's back to the postmaterialist value orientation and social movements bright and early tomorrow. Must rest ovesized brain now...

Carnage!

Why oh why did I think that a dinner party was a good idea?! There's a universal law that states (probably also in very small writing on the 12th page) that a party cannot happen without some variety of emotional upheavel. Gah! Now that I've done the washing up I'm off to discuss said fall-out over coffee.
(Having said that, it was a fun party although the level of conversation left an awful lot to be desired - I'm all for crude jokes within reason, but really!)
Yay - off home this weekend :)

Later...
Coffee with Ads was nice - he's leaving Edinburgh soon :( It's slightly terrifying as I have yet to adapt to the fact that lots of people I know will be leaving and not coming back! We had a really good chat about life, the universe and everything; it was great to chat about a few things that have been playing on my mind recently and one thing I should certainly NOT be thinking about. It's the worst time of the year to have things on my mind that won't go away because I tend to think about that and not get any work done *sigh*. Ah well.

Oh, and cast-list not quite so predictable as I had thought.

Oh, the predictability of it all!

So, saw Titanic last night - it was carried off reasonably well considering the show itself is rubbish. This production did a pretty good job with very poor material - who knows how the show got 5 Tonys!
Am back in the chorus this year :) Actually missed it rather a lot last year as a principal - but anyone who so much as even thinks the words 'self-elected chorus leader' is going to get bitch-slapped. Believe me, I will be leading the coup de etat!
Back to work now.

Later...
Right, so I'm hosting a Tapas dinner party tonight - should probably be about 15 people turning up, which'll be fun and more than a little bit crowded given the size of the sitting room! Everyone's bringing food and films, and Iona is bringing her chocolate fountain (this can only spell trouble - or possibly suger-high) so will be scraping people off the ceiling later on. I'm going to make mini sweet-potato cakes and chili prawns (hopefully) - nice and healthy (comparativly that is). Also need to clean the sitting room as I seem to have turned into the slothful flatmate, having done my stint as cleaning-nazi.
Am also really pissed off by this whole Virgin Media debacle; what a load of trollop!!!! We got sent out information package, and basicly they're saying that 'yes! You get a cheaper call package! *ittybitty writing at the bottom of the page* all calls will be rounded up to the next minute' Gah!' oh, and you won't be getting any channels worth watching' Double Gah! Just as well I don't watch tv much, but it's more the fact that I'm being charged just the same for less *mutters*. Can see that when I'm old and doddery I'll be one of those old women who walk around grumbling about the price of everything. When I worked in Tesco I was confronted by a little, pinch-faced old man who was prepared to blame me for the rise in the price of milk, and wanted to know what I intended to do about it! So, being a good employee I said I'd go and speak to the EU general council about the Common Agricultural Policy with regards to the price of milk just as soon as I got off shift, and walked away *evil smile*.

*cough*

Ill :( Bloody tonsilitis has moved in and built an extention *grump* Oh well. Find out who got what part in the Fringe show at some point today - should be interesting, but have already got a list in my head of who-got-what, and admittedly it is a bit of a predictable list, but there you go. Am off to see Titanic: the musical (oh dear, let's just hope it's not a self-fulfilling prophesy) this evening; will report back later...
Hmm, back to work now.

Later...
I'm finding it difficult to think much beyond the next three weeks. With the dreaded dissertation due on Friday 13th of April (great planning guys) I find my life revolving around that and Facebook (it's an addiction, sad but true). But at the same time I just can't seem to focus or even care about it even though I should really have 'the fear' by now; I would happily fast-forward to 15.01 on 13/04/07 right now, but sadly it cannot be so. I can't wait until it's over! Going to spend a few days relaxing before heading into revision mode; I want to get out of Edinburgh for a couple of days but don't really want to spend them at home, so might go see people in Glasgow or might head to the bright lights of London. I love edinburgh as a city, but I'm getting stir-crazy here; if I get my MSc here, then that would be very nice, but quite frankly I would far rather do it elsewhere. I've been looking at MSc by research degrees in environmental ethics, and there are really very few places that offer much; Leicester and Manchester are about it. So really, If I'm serious about the MSc I have to stay here, which makes me even more twitchy.

The first step...

Well, it's about time I joined the digital-diary age I reckon - I was good at keeping diaries until I came to uni, so it's time to get back to it.

(First bit of news to add here; I've lost another 2.5lb :) So that's 11lb in 6 weeks - so proud of me!)