All things in time.

Well hello. I hadn't realised it was so long since my last post, oops! Anyway, I just popped in to wrap things up here at VLR...yes, I'm jumping on the blog-trend bandwagon and shutting up shop. Well, no that's not true, I'm not jumping on a bandwagon.

Truth be told, this blog was meant to chart my daily awkwardness, social incompetence, minor (and yet at the same time MAJOR) fails and my little frustrations all set against the backdrop of my thesis. Since I've been here last, all that has changed a bit. I'm working away at it and should be finished inside of two months (supervisor depending). Therefore I don't have time to be getting into as many hilarious japes as I used to and am not interacting with people as much so as to provide occasion for same. On THAT note however, I'd like to point out that a post or two back I mentioned a date I went on? Well it's over two months later and we're flying it! Couldn't be happier with each other. Can you believe it? ME in a functioning relationship?? I'd like to add that he's seen me get violently sick after a night on the gin, puts up with my neuroses, and finds my bumbling endearing. It's almost too good to be true.

I'm also moving house at the end of the week. For the last three years, my lovely and unassuming home on Glasheen road has been both refuge and cage, heaven and hell. It has seen me as happy and as safe as I have ever felt, and it has seen me at my lowest ebb. It has been the setting of some of the most important conversations and revelations of my life so far; it has seen friends come and go, births, marriages and three painful deaths; it has seen me fall in love. This place is intertwined with my thesis and my college years and so it's only fitting that it should come to a close as the work does. After all, a lot of other things are. Two friends are moving to Australia all of a sudden, and one to England. Those that are left are moving on in their own way. They'll still be around and still my friends...but this time, right now, really is the end of what we had.

As for work, well I'm safe until the winter in the job I have, but the funding runs out then so I'll be looking for a REAL job with a REAL salary. Having said that though, with the downturn that's in it, things aren't not looking very bright at the moment for an arts graduate with a post-grad in Church history. Will my choices of the last few years turn against me when it comes to translating them into 'making a living'? Am I the only person thinking: 'Oh sure NOW that I leave college there's no work to be had!', I doubt it. Our demographic was promised the world on a plate back when we would have started college. We had a lot to be hopeful for, now it seems almost like we've been the butt of some giant practical joke. As one person has suggested to me, it might be the case that a lot of people in my age group will experience the meaning of 'emigration' first hand.

Anyway, there might be a lot of uncertainty at the moment in all aspects of my life; but there's also a strong sense of potential. It's almost like there's a smell of curiosity that's drawing me onward; like that feeling you get when you're just about to find out what's around the corner, or when you unwrap a surprise birthday present. So...I'm not worried, or sad, or at all bitter...I think 'reflective' is what I feel at the moment.

So yeah. Thanks to people for commenting or just reading. I hope I was of help by showing you that 'these things' just happen to other people too. And just to show you that my sense of humor is the same as ever, let's have one more LOL cat for the road, eh?


Thanks, PEACE OUT!!
Rusty.

Order the coffin now methinks.

I found my first gray hair...ARRRRGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Grrrrr!

Oh don't you just hate small aggravations?

I woke up yesterday morning and realized it was just after eight. Ran through my morning routine with nary a care for decorum and safety. Ironed shirt (badly) for date I had after work, ran into kitchen to find I only had enough cereal for one bowl, which is all I had time for in any case, and then ruined it by pouring sour milk over it. You might remember a similar episode from a few weeks ago, but in this case I didn't have time to have a break down, only to scrape it all into the bin and grab a banana to eat on the way to work.

All the computers were giving trouble, there were only two of us in and that banana didn't make the slightest impression on my stomach. So at eleven I was planning on enjoying food of ANY description. That is until my phone's reminder thing told me I had to ring two separate people for businessey things. When I finished with that it was too late to get anything and so I sat and starved until lunch....at which point I starved some more!

You see, I had a horrible thought that I had forgotten to unplug the iron and so rushed back to the house only to find I had not only unplugged the iron, but had put it and the ironing board away safely too. It was quarter to two when I got back into town and had to survive on another piece of fruit. Fuck's sake.

THEN I got a message asking if the date could be moved back to six, which was good as it gave me a chance to devour the sugariest thing I could find in O'Brien's before then. At the till however I dropped my money EVERYWHERE (I had the bright idea of getting rid of my change) and then had to go back three times as I forgot, successively, the milk, a spoon and my umbrella.

There were loads of other minor things along the way too, but those were the most annoying. All during dinner I was very conscious of how I was probably looking quite savage-esque, shoveling food down my throat and all, but he didn't seem to notice. In the end we spent all evening having tea and were eventually told the place was closing at 11:30! So, as you can imagine it went quite well!

Met again today for lunch at which I was a bit more civilised. So, it's off to a good start! Just like all the others... NO, cynicism aside!

Oh yes, I am also 24 now. Oil of Olay has a new customer...

Why the BBC can go right ahead and fuck off.

I have to say I find the BBC one minute news from its world service a handy add on for my browser. However, it doesn't mean I won't rail against them now and then for being a bunch of pricks. They have a piece up about the Lisbon treaty vote which took place yesterday and in it are clearly taking, as usual, the superior, 'aren't the Paddy's stupid' approach. Assuming that subtlety goes above our heads.

On the subject of how influential our decision will be concerning the expansion of Europe they say:

Just over three million Irish voters are registered - in a European Union of 490 million people.

As if that number of people should not have a say in what directly affects them as WELL as the other 487 million. After all, each state is supposed to be equal. Then they recap what happened last time with the Nice treaty:

In 2001, Irish voters almost wrecked EU plans to expand eastwards when they rejected the Nice treaty. It was only passed in a much-criticised second vote.

Oh yeah, like you Brits are just GAGGING to replace your precious Pound....hypocrites. And despite the overall tone of the piece, they still hadn't gotten enough digs in and so chose, even in this day and age, to portray the country in the only way they know how:




Fuckers.

Nearly drinkies-O'clock, only another 16 hours!

I'm sick. Or as they might say back my way, mouldy. But announciated Mao, as in Chairman Mao with an 'l' sound at the end, 'Maol'+'dee'. Altogether now, MAAAaaaoldee. God dammit, the height of an Indian summer (no racist overtones implied) with blazing sunshine at the ridiculous hour of six AM every morning and I manage to get a nasty headcold. I am after all, unique.

At least it's Friday, and I got paid yesterday! Although before I can drink that I have hours of mind numbing research to do in the basement this afternoon. Why does Christ have to be portrayed as a rock in the Bible? Why couldn't He just have been Christ and none of this metaphor business? T'wud make my life a lot easier that's for sure.

Anyway, off to the pool with me; cold be dammed!

Wanted: More hours per day, will pay cash.

Well, I've never gotten my head quite around numbers and the whole maths "thing", but I had a go at it last night in an attempt to figure out how my thesis workload was going to pan out over the summer...the numbers are in, but they're not looking good. Unfortunately I think this is the one time where the typically ridiculous answer I arrive at is actually correct.

It appears I will have to write on average of five hundred words a day (that's weekdays mind) for the next two months solid and about one and a half thousand on Weekend days. This, naturally, does not factor in all the revisions and writer's block sessions I will undoubtedly be encountering over the next while. Preliminary investigations into "free time" during this period suggest I will have between two and three hours to myself a day. Oh might I add at this point that this is only possible because of my new regime whereby I get up each morning at half six and every second day alternately go for a swim at seven or sit down and study/scribble before work.

I also can't get a hold of my supervisor for feedback on what I've done so far. Encouraging!

Am I not put out enough by my OWN mistakes?!?

So I found out why I wasn't paid on Friday. Someone else was paid...TWICE!

Honestly, there's stupid, there's George Bush stupid, and then there seems to be a special kind of incomprehensible stupid that's reserved for bureaucrats. Now because of some Dopey Doreen over in payroll, I now have to survive on €40 until Friday. This means I'll have to cut out the morning Starbucks, forget getting phone credit, not pay the ESB bill and certainly not get those new swim shorts I've been getting with the last fortnight!

I despair so I do...