lesson #46

Custard creams are the greatest form of tea biscuit known to human kind.

stressstressstress

Things that have gone wrong today:

- getting a bank statement from the bank, for the third time

- getting my Orange SIM card, for the third time

- attempting to financially register, for the third time

- attempting to turn in important papers

- having interesting lectures

- trying not to stress out

- buying new jeans

- eating

- phone credit has run out and I won't top up until I've switched SIMs. Again, for the third time.

- getting a room booked for the dabke society

- having a good time dabke-ing because the instructor just doesn't get the point of why we joined

- watching the England match on time

- dinner, or lack thereof

- buying the only textbook I plan on buying WHICH AMAZON.CO.UK DECIDED TO DISCONTINUE THE DAY AFTER I ORDER IT RAWR

Things that have gone right today:

- understanding my lectures

- chips&gravy

- buying a purple flat sheet for my bed

- buying make-up for the first time and becoming a lady (in progress)

- Jaffa cakes

shake that!

A couple days ago, my friend told me about this milkshake place that does pretty much every flavour ever and is basically Manchester's Moo Moo (Oxford reference, woo). I forgot about it until last night when Anisah and I were waiting for the queue to start for our Joshua Radin gig and I wanted to get something to munch on. I remembered this milkshake place so we went in search of it and found it right next to a place we'd just gone earlier that week AND WE SWEAR IT WAS NOT THERE BEFORE. It's like the Room of Requirement, seriously. But it was closed so we had to peek in through the windows and it looked so cute! So we made a date for the next afternoon whenever I had a break to come get milkshakes.

She ended up telling Kat and Becca and Mike (have I mentioned Mike ever? He's some loser who tags alo-- just kidding. He's a friend. We only like him for his N64 though.) too so they decided to meet up with us.

We walked in to this teeny little milkshake shop and were met with tall red stools and a teeny counter in front of a whole wall of ingredients and mix-ins and whatnot. It was amazing. I even told the guy at the counter that it was the most beautiful menu I've ever seen in my life. Shake That! is definitely one of those places I would take you to if you came to visit. SCORE.

We decided we're going to go there pretty much every week and go through the whole list one by one and save our cups because they write the flavour on the cups until we have a whole wall of cups that matches the wall of written flavours.

This time I got Twix and as I was drinking it, the cap popped off in front and just dribbled into my sleeve. Yeah. I'm pretty smooth like that. As I was struggling to get it out, Becca chirps up with a "Why aren't we filming this?"

Sigh. Anisah was saying how things like that always happen to her so I responded that when she's around me, I have a greater gravitational pull to these kind of situations. At the part were I turn around to look at someone off camera, the guy at the counter was just asking us if we were all enjoying our milkshakes and I smiled and gave him a thumbs up. He didn't notice my sleeve.

Other than that wonderful moment, my day kind of just dragged along. I feel like I'm behind on so many things but there's nothing to even be behind on. I need to make a large to-do list so I can attack it and scratch things off to make me feel productive.

Oh! Oh! I saw Joshua Radin last night! (And Thomas J Speight, whom I now adore, and Good Times Good Times, a one man band.) All were delightful and the whole gig was just .. so fantastic. Joshua is amazing and I would definitely go see him again, I really would. Only £9! Some stupid girl was in front of me moving around taking pictures with her fancy shmancy Canon Rebel (I say this out of envy..) but she wasn't even getting good pictures so obviously she just had it to SHOW OFF. She just kept bobbing into my view and all I could see was her stupid big head blocking my Josh & Thomas. Haven't uploaded pictures or video from that yet but will soon.

Sigh. Righto. I should get started on that list. The writing of it, I mean.

shake that! flavours milkshaken: 1

PS Tutorial time's been moved THANK GOODNESS GRACIOUSNESS.

today, a strangely good day

I really liked today. It started off with a pretty boring lecture on the molecular basis of learning and memory and then I had to rush around to pick up some missed papers from registration and then I had to endorse my student loan cheques during which time I discovered I never applied for the second loan that no one told me I didn't apply for even though I indicated I clearly was asking for more money than the one loan could provide.

SO THAT WAS SWELL.

And then I had a glorious lecture on axons. I really adore neurons; my love for them is quite possibly the major reason I am studying neuroscience. And then a lecture on mechanoreceptors which didn't make sense to me until halfway through it all, although I had a lovely chat with one of my neurogeek buddies about cinemas and haircuts and whatnot. Then I rushed into town with Becca to get my new Orange SIM card but when I went to my bank to get a bank statement with proof of address and all that, they told me I never updated my address so now it's going to take three whole days for them to print a stupid statement because they entered my address today. Mind you, that's three working days which means I have to go back in on MONDAY. At least my purple sheets will be in stock in Debenhams by then, I hope. Since that failed, we went to Lush instead and got a "fresher's" bag of stuff which is basically £10 for a bunch of small stuff like a shampoo bar, two chunks of hand soap, a moisturiser tester, some towel steaming tablets and some face mask. And I even think I'm forgetting something. Becca and I have set aside Saturday morning as Lush day, yay. Oh and while walking back, we decided to get some chips&gravy and we walked alllll the way back to uni and every person who walked past us just stared longingly after my chips and one guy even stopped me and asked where a proper chippy was because he was desperate for some and I think I made his day by directing him to Portland St.

Then I had a lovely meeting up for Action Palestine and we had a chitchat with all our wonderful occupation friends and it was nice to just feel like friends rather than just fellow protesters, you know? It's just that small difference of knowing someone cool because you know OF them and then actually being friends with them. I enjoy it when that line is crossed.

OH! and totally random -- I met Amina on the way back to Gabs and we walked down together for a bit and all of a sudden, while we were in a crowd walking down the street together, some man in a running outfit just comes sprinting between us and, with his voluntary hands, shoved us apart so he could run past and he did it to everyone before and after us walking down that sidewalk! WHO DOES THAT. If you are that desperate to run in a straight line, go to a gym and run the damn track! THAT'S WHAT THEY'RE THERE FOR. Jeebs.

Anyways. Then I got back to Gabs and got a silly email from my tutor person saying that basically two people had responded to his email asking about availability for when to have our tutorial and instead of giving him availability based on his suggested hours, they just told him preferred hours for their lovely little arses. And in response, he has scheduled our tutorial for 5-6pms on Thursdays. Can I just explain my timetable trials and tribulations since I arrived here, yeah? Mondays I had only one 9am and the rest free until they moved a lecture to 5pm because it wouldn't fit anywhere else. However, that then freed up my Thursdays for only a 9am and that was fine by me. Then I almost had my PASS session on Thursday afternoons but that got switched to Fridays mornings. So it was looking all good that Thursdays would be well free and lovely. And then he fecking goes and puts tutorials WHICH ARE MANDATORY on Thursday evenings! So now Mondays are 9am and 5pm and THURSDAYS are 9am and 5pm! I will not stand for this. Whoever those two little _____ are going down and they are going to MAKE TIME to fit this in. Rawr.

But then I vidchatted with my mum on Skype and she scoffed at my whinging. It's always so pointless talking to my mom about the silly things that annoy me in life because she just kind of looks at me like, yeah? and? But whatever. She made me smile.

And then a little while later, my dad signed on Skype and we chitchatted and I told him about the loan he was supposed to apply for on my behalf and we called Sallie Mae together because it wasn't working online because the stupid website could not comprehend that my dad's employer is not based in the States and therefore does not have a State or Zip Code and it wouldn't let me leave the info blank and move on. So we called and tried to explain to customer service for 40 minutes what this woman was not understanding. In the end, my dad would have to call and do the loan over the phone and he just sent me an email saying he was on the phone for an hour with them only to find that at the very very end, when he was meant to download this paper on Adobe, the file wasn't compatible with his version of Adobe Reader and he couldn't download the newer one so it was all for nothing. Sigh. That was stressful. (Becca was in my room at the time and she fell asleep in my bed while I was on the phone to Sallie Mae and woke up only when I was about to finish the call and she noted that I was basically explaining the same thing at the end that I had been at the beginning. USELESS.)

But then I went off to the Neuroscience chinese buffet dinner night and it was just really lovely. Low key, relaxed, meeting some new folks although most of the newbie neuroscientists didn't even make it so that was pointless. But I did meet a few new people and it was just nice to hang around the old ones and make better friends with them too. One in particular, the one I was discussing films and haircuts with, took my advice and went to the place I got my haircut last June and he came out looking rather snazzy. But apparently, while waiting to get his haircut, he was sat in the waiting room quite bored I imagine and did a little snooping around on the internet. And while we were sitting next to each other at the dinner, he simply turns to me and says, "So uh I noticed that Flintridge Sacred Heart Academy has a song .. a school song.. to the tune of Wagner. Something of 'Hail, Flintridge..' something? Care to give us a little rendition? Come on." To which I responded with a look of horror and shock. Is it really that easy or was he just really bored? I didn't end up having to sing anything due to careful steering of the conversation but holy crap.

After the dinner, we went off to some bar down Oxford Rd and chilled out for a bit before a few of us left and had a nice walk back together. It was just really nice -- I'm glad to be part of such a great group of science-y but social neuroscience folk.

Now I'm back, feeling good and thinking of other things to update you on. Saturday night was fun, housewarming party at Becca's & co. Some interesting conversations came out of that night, one of them being the 'ah, roadkill' I posted on my tumblr. Can't be bothered to link again so sort yourselves out. It was a good night. X-Factor went well for the girls but Cheryl Cole screwed up the boys finalists because she is clearly deaf and blind. Tuesday night there was a launch party for Fuse FM, the student radio station, and it was crap but I still hope we can get a show slot -- proposal forms went up today so Anisah and I will fill it out asap tomorrow. The questions are only slightly daunting so I hope we can make a good impression. And then really, you're up to speed with my lovely little life. Oh! New Student writing going well, I've now got a teeny job on the committee so that's cool. Yeah. Everything just feels really grand and I don't know why.

"Today is a beautiful day, the world is so big and inviting and someday I will have tread over all of it and it will all become a part of me and I will be made up of everything in it. " - Juliaaaaaa

PS Sylar sat in front of me in lectures today. Day = made from the start.

use of 'lovely' count: 6

moments of genius

I feel like I should make this title a reoccurring section but it'd be so sparse and therefore look pathetic and highlight the non-genius of my reality.

But these are the moments that matter in life.

Before I go to bed, I decide to watch the most recent episode of It's Always Sunny. Now, I can find a decent HDish video but the sound is completely whacked. They sound like Alvin & the Chipmunks. So, disappointedly, I go off in search of a video with the actual sound. It begins to play and the video is so shoddy I just can't take it. And that's when the moment hits.

I will play the HD video MUTED and the proper sound in the background! GENIUS. I even got the sound perfectly in sync with a couple pausing maneuvers. It's times like these I wonder why there are no careers that require a skill like that.

I just felt the need to tell someone. Screw neuroscience, THIS is what makes me feel accomplished.

life goals

Last year, there was this guy in my lectures who looked like a European Sylar. He did a make-up lab with my group once and I was just tickled to be that close to a Sylar look-alike. This year, I missed registration so I didn't get to see all the new neuroscientists who had switched over from biology or life sciences. This week, I walked into my neuroscience required lectures only to find him -- the Sylar look-alike -- sitting right there, one of us. He's switched over to Neuroscience.

HE IS SYLAR.

It is now one of my year goals to become best friends with him and live happily ever after.

Also a goal: to have a successful radio show. Or rather, to GET a radio slot, but that part's not really up to us. Fingers crossed!

happy october!

... and clear signs of autumn! mmmmmm.