Cough, choke, splutter

Hello, world. I’m sitting here in the resources room at school with Lou (who has been POKING ME and MAKING ME CHOKE ON MY WATER and then HITTING ME ON THE BACK REALLY HARD), who says hello. She has been introduced to the joy of blogs, and can now be found at her blog, cunningly entitled ‘Quintus is god’. (We came up with that idea disturbingly quickly.) And now she must be prodded into posting, as she actually hasn’t yet. Lazy girl.

I have had (effectively) four frees today. Four frees! That’s more than Friday. They weren’t technically meant to happen, though – the first only appeared in my timetable because I was sent to work on music composition in the ICT room and got conveniently lost on the way, ending up in the library for the remainder of the lesson.

Rather looking forward to tonight. I realise I only have about a fifty minute turnaround for getting ready and sorting musicy things and eating spaghetti, but I’m sure such a thing is manageable. I will of course be ready, waiting and Organised for when Paul arrives to pick up. Because I always am.

Nikko, I gave Chris a cd with the other Death Note chapters on. If you don’t receive it at some point, he has probably stolen it and attempted to sell it on eBay, so mind that you ask him about it. People with That kind of hair simply cannot be trusted.

Five minutes until the end of school. Fweeeee!

/ Out of the box

Hmm. Parents have just got back from grandparents’ – they were called out tonight because Nana had fallen over, and couldn’t get up again. Both Big Nana and Big Poppa (petnames from ickledom, shush) are fairly large people, and now that Big Nana’s got worse (she was in hospital last week – nothing serious, but she’s on lots of different medications for heart/kidney failings as well as lots of smaller infections) it’s got to the stage that she just doesn’t have the strength to walk from room to room. Being in a big house anyway, this is somewhat of a problem.

She’s living in the study at the moment, as she can’t do stairs, and she has a commode in the room with her, but anytime she wants to use it she needs help moving, and Big Poppa’s just not able to help her by himself. There’s a rota being started, people he can call, for when she needs help in the night. I’m rather glad Mum’s not on it, really (she’s not strong enough to be of much help) as she’s been so stressed out lately with all the extra work in the office from the 1st feb tax deadline. Dad’ll be on it when he’s not in London overnight for workliness.

I don’t really know how I feel about it. I think because I can’t see it, it hasn’t had a real impact on me. Mum’s said she wants to take me and Sam over to see her in the next few days, because we don’t know how long there is. Whatever else my family has difficulty speaking frankly about, I’m glad we can talk frankly about death. There’s no knowing whether it’s just a few days or whether it’ll be like this for years to come.

The worst part is / there’s no-one else to blame

Omg. I’ve been trying to get a copy of this song for… ever. Since I heard it on a CSI episode where some girl’s killed, and Alex is wiping all the makeup off her face. It was… perhaps a year ago now.

Sia – Breathe Me

The thing I love most about it is how delicately it starts, and how much you can hear on the recording – the sound of her breathing at the start, and even the little popping noise you get when you part your lips. Even the quality of her voice, with how clearly she pronounces her consonants, and the way her voice keeps breaking as she holds a note. It’s beautiful.

1. Aristophanes
2. English cw
3. Prison Break, 10pm (squeee)

More than bent on getting by / more than fine

Am deeply amused to find out from Ed that my Death Note manga has been doing the rounds. Except for thinking that Ryuk a transvestite (amusing but difficult, since I don’t think he has a gender) I think they’re doing rather well with it.

School today was… very dull and unnoteworthy. The most exciting thing that happened in Music was the absence and subsequent arrival halfway of Maniac With Pink Mittens, and one of the three of us girls falling inescapably, incontrovertibly and tragically ill, and being forced to miss the whole hour of western tonal harmony practice. (Funnily enough, this coincided with her impending French oral mock that same morning and her failure to do any revision for it. I call that a miracle.)

Greek lang was an amusing mix of a mind-bogglingly impossible unseen translation (we do NOT know what anistamasthesnamastikosthenaios means, no), interspersed by wailings whenever Mrs K popped out of the room to see to things more important than Lou and myself. Which, as you can imagine, was a regular event. We weren’t meant to have been discussing it, so the whole thing was a bit like a game of peekaboo.

Other lessons are too dull to describe. If I tried, I might lose all my powers of vocabulary, sarcasm and ability to wear coloured clothing. And that would be a shame.

I’m really looking forward to the music competition tomorrow. I shouldn’t be, but I am. I’ll admit it has less to do with the music and more to do with the company. I need to change my E-string tonight, though, so it’ll settle for tomorrow – it started unravelling at orch. NB, Hetty, NB.

διωκω? κωλυω? same difference really.

I just texted Lou becuase I suddenly realised that I couldn’t remember what ‘to pursue’ was in Greek. I kept thinking it was κωλυω, but κωλυω is ‘to hinder’.

I texted Lou to ask. It couldn’t have waited for tomorrow.

I am such a geek.

work, hetty! or not.

Sztuugle says:

pfft, look at you getting all technical. Who mentioned a fridge or a microwave?

Sztuugle says:

Kettle, mug, instant muck…

Sztuugle says:

you don’t need anything else

Hetty says:

stuart.

Sztuugle says:

Hetty

Hetty says:

the direction of this conversation is paining me.

Sztuugle says:

XD

Hetty says:

I’M SERIOUS.

Sztuugle says:

I KNOW.

Sztuugle says:

that’s why it’s so amusing

Hetty says:

XD

Hetty says:

shush, you

Chatlogs are bad nasty evil timewasters, but besides that are much fun. I usually end up giggling at things all over again. (I think I was looking for something particular, but I get distracted.)

I have Pink Floyd! CDs are being copied as I await Paul’s arrival. My last.fm page has been amusingly lopsided in the last few days, first with overplays of various Marillion, and now with overplays of Wish You Were Here. I’m not complaining.

did did you did you hear the falling bombs

Today has been a good day. A lot of this has been down to the ‘compulsory lie-in’ that Mum’s begun to enforce for Saturdays – not a thing I’m complaining about, as you might guess. I normally feel a bit guilty for sleeping until lunchtime, but now that she’s actually forcing me to (for fear that I don’t get enough rest during the week) anysuch guilt is happily gone.

I was up for lunch, though. I have Standards. (Not entirely dressed, mind, but I maintain there’s nothing wrong with keeping a pajama top on, providing that it’s covered by a jumper.)

I like the fact that some parts of my day I can’t even recall especially what was done, or what was said. A lot of things seem to be getting comfortabler and comfortabler. I think town basically involved snarkiness in Smith’s about organisers, another trip to Peacock’s to examine the nonexistant nice grey jeans of nonexistance, takeaway hot chocolate (taken away to St Helen’s church graveyard – good plan that), more photos taken in Wilcox’s, and an amusingly cold picnic up by the leisure centre after buying cake from Somerfield’s. There was swingings, too, but sadly the swings’ chains are now slightly smaller for me than they were ten years ago, and have bruised my behind. But a worthy sacrifice, I thought.

This evening, it was established that:

1. hot chocolate made from chocolate is gorgeous, provided that you have a very high tolerance for sweet, sickly drinks. (I do.)
2. Labyrinth is… absolutely fantastic.
3. David Bowie wears thermal underwear!
4. slime is not always bad.
5. Pink Floyd is really rather omgsqueecool.
6. evenings are far too short.

I’m focussing very much on the general doings, and not on the particulars. Yes. The particulars are mine, and I’m very grateful for them. Tomorrow, I need to do Aristophanes. And coursework.

There’s this ‘meme’ I’ve been doing privately, in a file on my desktop. I add comments to it every now and then; things I’d like to say to people but don’t. Usually when I do it I write lots, as there’s things I need to just… get out of myself. Usually when I read them back I can tell it’s because I was feeling bitter, or scared, or just confused. But tonight there was only one, and it was only five words. And it wasn’t any of those.

This is the moment / that you know

Ahhh, Saturday Fridays. I love Fridays.

Fridays are good for:

1. firedrills. which are cold, but i enjoy the chaos.
2. greek lessons with Mr B! Jonny wasn’t there, so we just read some of the play in English, starting from Hippolytus’s misogynistic sod speech and ending with the most apathetic-sounding acting I’ve ever heard, courtesy of Lou’s my-wife-has-just-hanged-herself-Theseus. Yes, I giggled myself silly.
3. triplefreetriplefreetriplefreeeee!
4. lunchbreak, which involved townage, the buying of onions/hyacinth bulbs as a birthday present for Ed T’s mother and lots of beating-up Nikko (ie, otherEd) with the folders I bought. He seems to enjoy it. masochist.
5. having an entirely, entirely free evening.
6. getting through the last movement of Mendelssohn’s violin concerto without having to stop for hissy fits difficult passages.
7. having conversations of Good and Progressive natures on msn, and Chris and Stu ruling the world together without ever speaking to each other. go figure.

I have sporadically abandoned caps for the evening. it’s quite thrilling.

In which our choir’s new Gloria sounds like Star Wars.

Tagged by Stu. Tagging in turn anyone who hasn’t done it yet, and might like to at some later date. i.e., Ev. *prods* Come to think of it, Ed also. Just if they want to.

Five Weird Habits:

The Rules: The first player of this game starts with the topic “five weird habits” and people who get tagged need to write an entry about their five weird habits as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose the next five people to be tagged and link to their web journals. Don’t forget to leave a comment in their blog or journal that says “You have been tagged” (assuming they take comments) and tell them to read yours.

1. I count everything into tens, whenever I can. Whether it’s reading a page of a book, or walking up stairs, I… count. Normally I don’t notice the total, but I’m always very aware of whether it’s a proper set of ten or some weird freakish odd number. (You wouldn’t believe the number of houses that have sixteen stairs.) I’ll usually go back to the top of any page if I’ve lost count of its lines.
2. Spaghetti and cheese. And peas too, if I can be bothered to do them. This is about the only meal I can cook, so I’d have a special affection for it anyway, but I just can’t get enough of it. It’s my comfort food.
3. I tut. Sometimes I hum, but tutting is more common if I’m around someone besides myself. I don’t tend to realise I’m doing it; it’s normally just when Paul pokes me and tells me that I am that I find out.
4. I’m a perfectionist in all that I do that I care about. Not only do I want to get things done eptly, I want to understand them and get inside them and know them inside and out before I move on. It leads more to frustration than anything else, but it’s a good way to be.
5. Touch. I’ve found out in the last few months what a very tactile person I am, and I’m making as much of it as I can now. Physical contact for me is the very best thing you can have in a friendship - it’s a really special kind of connection to have with someone. Even just leaning. Or thwapping. Anything, really.

Probably none of these are surprises to anyone. I’m fairly dull and transparent, really. I do apologise. But then, at least I don’t wear clothes that are all the same colour.

…And it’s back to Twelfth Night I go.

Tooth fairies are clearly the way to go.

Horrifying spelling mistakes made in essays – 1 (‘cymbol’, ohgod), unnecessary apostrophe lessons – 1, Latin lessons bluffed through – 3, cashew nuts eaten - 50, pieces of homework done at breaktime – 1, odd injokes shared - 1, excluding texts.

Today? Today is Thursday. Thursday, for the most part, is usually conducive to Unfun School. Triple Cicero with - as a friend calls him - Mr Gay, a single Music down at the boys’ school, another single Music up at the girls’ school, and a triple English. And the entire lunchbreak lost to fun things like townage and instead taken up with octette.

But… not so bad today. Latin dull, Music dull, but then octette group was… good. For the sections we looked at, I could play my part. I could play it! Yes, I was happy. (It’s about damned time too, though, as we have about three practices left until the concert. But yes. Float, damnit.) It still feels sometimes like I’m being dragged along by a lethal, neckbreaking current, but it’s great to be able to get the right notes somewhere in there too, among the rocks and piranhas (and slime). Finally.

Probably the most interesting part of the rest of the day was the very start of Music, when Matt announced to everyone that Ed D had told him to give me a message about… black capes and scythes. Now my entire class probably thinks we have some kind of sadomasochistic relationship going on, Ed. Cheers.

And I continue to squee at Kings of Convenience.

1. …Hippolytus? ask Lou
2. Aristophanes / 12N
3. check hw diary for other
4. *record* House. NB, Hetty, NB!