Belgium!

Yay I finally made it here! Spent the night in Brussels which is an amazing city, so many beautiful buildings, can't wait to come back and explore properly. This afternoon I'm heading down to Verviers, which is the place I'm actually working. Now I have the fun task of finding somewhere to live! Just a quick update for now, I'm going to create a new blog for all my Belgium updates so I'll let people know the address when I get round to doing it.
Au revoir for now!

9 days

Sorry I've been ignoring my blog-readers again! Just been so busy lately, had no time to write! Got back from Spain a few days ago, had a brilliant week there; sun, sea, mountains etc. Decided I want to do spanish degree when I finish this one, just so I can go spend a year there! Speaking of years abroad, I'm off to Belgium next week, it's scary! Still don't have anywhere to live, yet I'm strangely unworried about it! I know God will find me somewhere and it'll all be ok! I have a few contacts there now so that's good. Off to Manchester for the week tomorrow before I leave the country, so that will be fun!

Update

Well, it's been a while, and I have a lot to report! You'll be glad to know the countdown to my birthday is over, it's a little too early to begin the next one yet...
But the countdown was worth it, I had the best birthday ever!! T in the park was awesome, saw so many acts including chili peppers, franz ferdinand, kaiser chiefs, arctic monkeys, maximo park, feeder, placebo, boy kill boy, delays...there's too many to remember! And now I have V festival to look forward to too :)
In other news, this week I went to Germany for 2 days! A place came up on a school trip at my old school, and since I've been helping out there for the last few weeks I was asked if I wanted to go, so I did! Despite spending over 24 hours travelling in total, and the unbearable heat I had a brilliant time, went to the best theme park ever and got to see Cologne, oh and I made lots of little year 7 friends! And people understood my german! :)
I've finally found out where I'm going next year! I will be in a place called Verviers, which is close to Liege. Apparently it's not the most exciting place ever but I'm sure I'll still have fun! So all those people intending on coming to visit me can start planning now!

2 days

Woo, two days until my birthday and T in the park!! Just incase anyone had forgotten...

School reports

Back home in the country once again! It's good to be back, weird too though. The first thing I did on friday night before I even got to my house was help some people shift a load of hay bales!! So that really welcomed me back to the country! It was such a huge contrast to Manchester, but it was fun, I got to ride on a trailor and drink beer!
Anyway, yesterday my mum showed me some old school reports from primary school she'd found out, it was so funny reading them! I was such a little boffin! Similar comments every year, along the lines of:

"Marie has had another excellent year. She always works very hard indeed whatever the subject. She is popular with peers and adults...a credit to the school and to herself"

It's quite sickening really!! The thing that most made me laugh was a pupil comment I'd written myself on one of them:

"I think I have done well in most subjects, but I would like to improve them all, not because I'm not very good at them but because I want to learn more about everything"!!!

Last day in Manchester :(

Today is my last day in Manchester for over a year, sob sob! :( Well I'm sure I'll be back at some point so technically it's not, but it's my last day as a resident of the city! I'm currently sitting in school doing not a lot, cos it's an inset day so we're basically getting paid to do nothing for a day! Well, we did put up a display but that's finished now, and it's looking good! It's pink, purple, silver, green and pink! Very bright and colourful and cool! Had a fantastic night out at 5th ave last night, it's was the best last night ever! Random group of people, great music and generally just a brilliant time! And I got about 2 hours sleep but am unbelievably awake, I seem to have quite a talent for survivng on little amounts of sleep, yay!
In other exciting news, it's only 8 days until my birthday and t in the park, woo!!

Chocolate biscuits

About time I wrote a post I reckon, I've been so busy, just haven't had time to sit down and write. The last two weeks I've been working in a school again (diff school this time) which has been awesome, I feel like a proper teacher now, I've done loads of actual teaching, and even got to give out homework, that was a great feeling! Haha I'm so evil but I love exerting my authority and showing the kids who's boss! But I can't be that evil, cos in one of the lessons Rob and I taught the other day loads of kids were saying it was the best french lesson they'd ever had and asking if we could teach them next year!
Other than school I've just been mostly sleeping and eating, I seem to get in, fall asleep, wake up and eat, then go to bed! I'm pretty tired today though after having about 2 hours sleep last night, although I was surprisingly awake when i had to get up this morning. Last night Alex and I watched the entire 2 series of big train, woo! It is an amazing show, and the many people who haven't heard of it are missing out! But yeah then I had to get up at 7.15 to go to chester for the day with my aunty and uncle. Had a cool day, it's a really nice city and I'm very proud cos I managed not to buy anything despite being very tempted by the sale in hmv! The best thing of the day (hmm think that's really bad grammar but oh well) was that I was given a bag of chocolate and biscuits and crisps and stuff like that, yay! :D
Ooh and it's two weeks until my birthday and t in the park, yay!!!

Morning - but is it?!

Listening to radio breakfast show before you go to bed is very strange and confusing...they keep talking about this afternoon and tonight, but surely it should be tomorrow afternoon cos I haven't slept yet so it can't be the next day!! But it appears that it is...and I really can't be bothered to go to bed, it seems a bit pointless at half 8 in the morning, and it's such a nice day I just want to be outside, but today I will buy suncream cos I really don't want to get any more burnt! Got very sunburnt today, it's starting to hurt now, and is horribly patchy! argh and I'm hungry, despite having eaten breakfast (yep breakfast before bed too) I've now been up for over 24 hours, quite an achievement I reckon, it had been a cracking day (and night) though! Went to blackpool, woo! It was so hot and sunny, we sat on the beach for ages, had a picnic, played cricket and scatch, walked along the sea front and pier, ate ice-cream and fish&chips, and generally just had a typical day at the seaside! Went to pangaea in the evening, also so much fun! And I lasted until 6!! Woo, Marijn and I (I'm trying very hard to speak(and type) correctly, even though it sounds so weird to me!) are the only hardcore people, since everyone else wimped out and went home earlier! (well not everyone in general, just everyone else we were with, unfortunately we didn't have the whole place to ourselves) They all missed out though, we got to see Jack!! And learnt his real name, the mystery is finally over!! Well for us anyway, other people have to guess it...good luck! We also had yummy breakfast at about 6.30am (fried egg sandwich, yum yum!) and now I should probably think about sleeping, otherwise I will never be able to play and watch football later...so goodnight, or good morning, or whatever it is...

Free

Yay I finally finished exams and second year of uni! gosh that's weird, I'm half way through my degree now, scary! But freedom is such a great feeling, I was getting so depressed that everyone else had finished and I was still sitting in working. Today has been a great day, went for a drink after exam then went into town, then went to visit miffy then went to the lowry gallery (somewhere I've been meaning to go the whole time I've been at uni, and finally made it today!) then had a bbq in the evening and sat outside for ages, not worrying about having anything else to do! I did get sunburnt today though :( not badly but my arms are quite red. I have a feeling this is going to turn into a rambling post, but oh well. Tomorrow is blackpool day, yay! so excited, we're gonna play cricket on the beach! but not go swimming!! Paddling but not swimming. then in the evening it is pangaea...and the weekend after that involves lots of football! (playing ans well as watching) before monday morning I have to be up early(ish) to go to school for 3 weeks...yippee I think I should sleep soon cos i have to get up in a few hours time to get the train, ooh and it is a month until my birthday and t in the park, yay! but I don't want to be 20, that's just old, like a whole new decade, weird, hmm well I can still pass for 16 which could be a good thing, or not, I dunno. right now I really am rambling so I will think about sleeping...bonne nuit!

Saturday

If only there were an exam in procrastination, I would get 100%! I have an exam on tuesday which I know practically nothing for (started revising yesterday) and I'm still sitting here messing around on the internet!
Don't even want to write anything specific on here, it's just another thing to do to put off revision! Although I have actually found an interesting bit of typology, yay!
Updating my last post, I found out it should be i's as apparently plurals of letters always have an apostrophe. I would like to thank my dutch english tutor for that information!

How many eyes?!

I was reading some revision notes the other day when I came across the word indivisibility. I noticed the large number of eyes it contained (writing it like that cos I don't know if it should be i's or just is, and I don't want to get it wrong since I'm a language student as that would just make me look bad) I did a bit of research on it and found out it is actually the shortest english word with 6 eyes, wow! I also found this amazing website (well it's amazing if you're a language geek) :

http://plex.us/archives/word.html

It has some amazing facts, such as

AMBIDEXTROUSLY is the longest word in common use with no letter appearing more than once.
ONE THOUSAND contains the letter A, but none of the words from one to nine hundred ninety-nine has an A.

It is claimed that -OUGH can be pronounced 9 different ways in the following sentence:

A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.

However, David Olsen says that slough does not provide a unique pronunciation for -ough, but that HOUGH (pronounced hock) is a Scottish word, meaning the ankle joint of a horse, cow, or foul, or to hamstring, or it is an obsolete British word meaning to clear the throat. Olsen says that in order for the sentence to have 9 different ways of pronouncing -ough, it could be rewritten as:

A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed, houghed, and hiccoughed.

Ted Clarke says there are 10 pronunciations for OUGH. He adds LOUGH, the Irish form of loch.

Check out the site for more fascinating facts!

Culinary delights

Everyone knows that eating is something I do quite a lot of, and I can get quite excited about food, but meal times have been even more exciting the last couple of days! Last night was a key moment in my life: after almost 2 years of living in Manchester I finally went out for a curry in Rusholme! Yay! It was cool, and I'm so glad I decided to stop being a wimp and try food I always thought I didn't like! Help, too many exclamation marks, but I guess I'm just an exclamative person (is that a word?! Oh well, it is now!) And I just don't do serious...but I will try
Tonight for dinner I had potatoes, meatballs, salad and...rhubarb&strawberries! (yes, all mixed together) Rhubarb is another one of those things I always claimed I didn't like, and I would certainly never have eaten it with savoury stuff, but it was so good! Another fantastic thought made by the dutch, well done! Foe pudding we had more rhubarb and strawberries, with ice-cream and custard, mmmmmmmmmmmmm :D there was meant to be jelly with it too...but silly me messed it up :( I really don't know how it is possible to go wrong with jelly, it's the easiest thing in the world to make, but for some reason I forgot to put cold water in it!! Duh! So it might be set sometime next week if anyone fancies any
I may be lacking jelly-making skills, but I impressed myself with my dutch skills today, I managed to form a coherent sentence form random things I know, yay! I translated 'lovely weather for ducks', such a useful phrase!
Ooh and I had a good exam today! It was french listening, and I was expecting it to be abslolutely rubbish since I seem to have to ability to listen (to french anyway) but it was actually surprisingly easy, the first bit was so so easy I felt like I was back in primary school, not that you do phonetic transcription of french in primary school, but if you did it would be that easy.
Now I need to sleep and get up early to revise :( but there's light at the end of the tunnel, in the form of blackpool and other things such as karaoke, football, bbq which we put in our list of things to do after exams, bring on june 7th!!

Paperclip

Grr!!! Feeling stressed and angry, due to the annoying stupid little paperclip on word!! It is so so stupid and I wish it would just go jump off a cliff, and stop bothering me!! I was writing something earlier and it tried to tell me I was writing a letter when I wasn't! So it really doesn't have a clue what it's on about and is no help at all, I'm sure no-one appreciates it! Me and Alex are starting the "Club of rebels against the paperclip", if anyone wants to join let me know!!

My new favourite sweets

The other week I was watching the news and heard about some new sweets asda had brought out called "whatevers". They're basically like love hearts but have speech bubbles on them and say things such as "whatever", "bothered", "init", "you what", and "minger"!! So good, much better than the stupid things love hearts say! So anyway, we made a trip to asda yesterday to buy bbq food so I picked up a few packets, they're so cool!!!

Tonight and other things

Oops, just dropped a load of stuff on the floor...
anyway, argh I'm so hyper!!! this is bad, I should be sleeping! had a cool night though, got a certificate!!! to certify that I am a peer mentor, yay! We got free food and cake and (the best thing of all, yes, even better than free food and cake) a free phone torch thing!!! that you stick to you phone, it's so cool!!! So it was well worth sitting through 2 hours of boringness, watching people go up to get certificates and listen to people do speeches about nothing! then we went to the union and I was very hyper but I was allowed and then we walked home and my feet hurt from blisters but I don't care cos it's been so nice and warm and I haven't worn a jumper all day, yay! And we're having a bbq tomorrow, woo and now I really am rambling, wonder how long I can keep this up for, writing about absolutely nothing, probably quite a while knowing me cos this is one of my talents, rambling on about nothing...
ooh I've had 3 exams now, only 9 more to go! quarter of the way there...woo! 2 of them were really ribbish but one was good so it's not all bad, and I got a seen exam paper already for my last exam on june 7th, it's gonna be so much fun preparing for it! and I actually mean that, I know i'm a geek but I like phonology, it's cool, ooh and in final year me and Helen are going to be peer mentor co-ordinators and we're gonna do a fantastic job! such an excellent team we will be, and then we can get another certificate, yeah! see everything is related to something...I'm not really jsut rambling, everything is related ooh and I rode Helen's bike today, it was so much fun!! Hadn't ridden a bike in years, but I can still do it! so it really is true what they say, you never forget how to ride a bike! I wanna get one now, I miss my bike!! This summer, I will go on lots of bike rides! oh and I did a roly poly thing over the bar tonight, another thing I haven't done since being a lot smaller (ok maybe I should say a lot younger cos i haven't really grown since I was about 10. seriously, when i was at home over easter, I tried on my bridesmaid dress that I had when I was 10 and I could still get in it! it was only about 2 inches 2 short!) but anyway, yeah I was scared for ages that i would hit my head on the floor but i didn't and it was fun! I don't wanna turn 20!! 2 months on monday, urgh! :( for once in my life I'm not looking forward to my birthday
anyway i really should stop rambling soon and try sleep, i was planning on being in uni early tomorrow to print off work before computers get taken, dunno if that will happen now, but oh well...argh I really can't type! So, goodnight!!

First exam

1 down, 11 to go!! Had german listening today, it was ok I guess, not great though, I really hate listening! Some bits I could do ok, others I totally made up! But oh well, should really start revising grammar now!
All this nice sunny weather is going to make me super fit, yesterday I played football and walked back from uni, today I walked into uni and back, tomorrow I'm playing squash...woo!

Football

Woo, we girls rocked at football today!! Had a boys vs girls match that ended up being mixed cos the guys did have a slightly unfair advantage...they still won though :( but it's the taking part that counts (right Helen?!) and we got a fair few goals (I scored 1!!) I hurt my ankle :( and in true football player style I'm going to complain about it as much as possible! And anyway, I'm allowed!! Might even undo another button later...since it's not sunday!
I should really be working, since I have so much to do, and my first exam tomorrow, but instead I am sitting in front of the tv watching a thrilling snooker game and drinking beer! (how much of a guy am I today?!) I will listen to german tomorrow...
ooh and other news, I ate curry the other day!! proper curry, for the first time ever, it was great! Thanks Marijn!
oh and this is the last post for a while since Alex apparently won't speak to me cos he can just read about what I've done on here :(

Easter

Haven't written anything for a while since my spell of writing loads...but I've been pretty busy over the hols! So here is an update-

The first week of the holidays I was in school again, doing the second week of my teaching placement. It was really fun and a bit more relaxed than last time cos it was the last weelk of term. One afternoon I got to watch wallace&gromit with the kids for their end of term treat! Can't believe I got paid to watch a film! A lot of the lessons were just making easter cards and doing wordsearches so that was pretty easy! I did get to take part of a lesson again though, another presentation, that was cool. My highlight of the week was probably when a couple of girls said they couldn't believe I was only 19 and thought I was a lot older! Makes a change from people thinking I'm about 16! The only slightly negative thing was they thought I was 30 something!! Oh well...

After my tiring week of work I finally made it to Leeds to spend the weekend with Emily! Had a really cool time, we went to the cinema to see ice age 2, watched back to the future and lots of coupling, and went shopping and tried on lots of random clothes! I then had a long and tiring 6 hour journey back home!!! Crazy!

Last week I spent most of my time baking cakes! And earning money for baking cakes, woo!

This week Helen, Inge and Marijn came to stay for a couple of days, had a great time!! I showed them round a few places and felt like a bit of a tourist myself! On tuesday we had a pretty busy day, we went to 3 different places, ate fish&chips and ice-cream, went for a walk up a big hill and back down the other side, played on a little kids park, played pool...can't remember what else but I'm sure there was more! Oh and we took loads and loads of photos!

That's pretty much been my holiday, well the highlights anyway. Tomorrow I have a wedding to go to then back to Manc on sunday! with a big presentation to finish for monday, woo!

5 past 3 sunday morning

Actually managed to make a decision to go out tonight! Had a cool night out in 5th ave, lots of classic songs and good memories from last year! And when we got back me and Alex (ok I know that should be Alex and I but I don't speak proper!) planned our wedding! We're gonna have a huge huge cake which is big enough for us to stand on, and have a meringue igloo on too! And maybe penguins...real ones...and we're not singing shine Jesus shine!!! And part of the vows is gonna be the big mountain song 'ooh baby I love your way'! It contains classic lines such as:

Moon appears to shine and light the sky
With the help of some fireflies
I wonder how they have the power shine shine shine
I can see them under the pines
But don't hesitate 'cause your love won't wait hey
Ooh baby I love your way every day
Wanna tell you I love your way every day
Wanna be with you night and day uh yeah

Argh my jumper is so falling apart...I look like such a scrubber! (that's not part of it, that's just a random comment from me!)

On the subject of bad lyrics we've just been reminiscing about bad cheesy pop, such classics as Daphne and Celeste! I so wanna shoot them! How stupid are these lyrics?! kinda funny though!

Hi! This is my friend Daphne and I'm Celeste

[Chorus]
" Ooh stick you
Your mama too
And your daddy…
Ooh stick you
Your mama too
And your daddy…

Ooh stick you
Your mama too
And your daddy…

Ooh stick you
Ooh stick you! "

Your mama, your daddy
Your greasy, greasy grandmammy
You got a hole in your panty
Got a big behind like Frankenstein
Going beep-beep-beep down Sesame Street
Toot-toot-toot wear army boots
In your ear with a can of beer
Up your butt with a coconut
OOOHHHH!

" Ooh stick you..." [Repeat Chorus]

You go girl!
EEEEEEEEHHHHHHH!
OOOOOHHHHHHHH!
EYE!


Do you want me to tell you what I really think about you?

You got facial hair like a polar bear
You blow up like a toad and then explode
Your face looks mean like Halloween
You got big red eyes like cherry pies
You got the IQ of a digeridoo
You look insane and got no brain
You got a big fat belly like a bowl full of jelly
Your fat mum Milly looks like Free Willy

" Ooh stick you..." [Repeat Chorus]

You go girl!
Ride 'em cowboy!
Yee-ha!
Giddy up horsey!
Ride 'em cowboy!
Pew! Pew! Pew!
It’s like a horror movie isn't it?
OOHH!
Ride 'em cowboy!
Ooh Ooh Eee!
Ride 'em cowboy!

Do you wanna know what
I really think about you?

You're a little kid that looks like a squid- oh no!
You've got a bad perm like a can of worms- oh no!
Cheeks like a balloon ; face like a baboon- oh no!
Everybody knows you eat the nails from your toes & you rub 'em in dirt and eat them for dessert!

Whatever!

" Ooh stick you..." [Repeat Chorus]

ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!
ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!
eye!!!!!!!!!

You got ears on your face like spock in space!
You got teeth in your head like Mr Ed!
Everybody knows you put fleas in cheese, mix them with glue and use it like shampoo!

What?

Ping-pong why am I saying ping-pong?
Ping-pong Ping-pong Ping-pong!
Whatever whatever whatever!

" Ooh stick you..." [Repeat Chorus to fade]

Wow this is turning into a long post...
We're also planning to record a house CD, woo! It will include things such as Dan singing Hero by Enrique Inglesias with me playing guitar, Dan singing Stay another day by east 17, Thanh Mai singing Blackbird by Paul McCartney...
I haven't decided what I'm gonna do yet...but everyone has to do a song! It will be so cool!! Woo!

Dutch!

After finally dragging myself out of bed I decided my next activity of the day will be to learn some more dutch! I met some dutch people last night and realised it wasn't very impressive that all I could say to them (in dutch, obviously I could say a lot more in english...) was "all the ducks are swimming in the water", "I see the horse" and "you have a nice arse"!
So far I have learnt the numbers 1-10, and now I'm onto saying things about myself:

Mijn naam is Marie
Ik ben negentien jaar oud
Ik heb een zus en een broer

Time to go and talk to Sarah!

stopped

I'm so thick, the word 'stop' just needs to be in the past tense too! duh!

Spelling

Trying desperately to find things to distract and amuse myself with today, I have resorted to further analysing the look and read programme I was watching the other day! One of the rules they were teaching wsa how to form the plural of nouns ending in 0 - potatoes for example (ie you add an e before the s) There are however a few exceptions to this rule, piano, studio and video. I began to wonder why these are exceptions, had an idea that it could be something to do with the etymotology of the words, so I searched and found out all these words come from latin or italian (which is from latin anyway) so maybe it does have something to do with that...although I don't know what! However I could be being (can I say that?!) way too technical and geeky, cos I also noticed that these words all have two vowels at the end so maybe it's just simply to do with not wanting too many vowels together! Other exceptions to the rule such as kangeroo and zoo fit better with that theory!
Hmm...I think it's time I got out of bed and had a shower and stop being such a geek! Argh that sentence sounds really ungrammatical but I can't work out why...different tenses I guess but I don't know how to change it to make it right!

Advert

I decided to expand the repertoire of my blog and start doing some lonely hearts ads!
My housemate Dan is desperate to find a girlfriend, in his words "4/10 and over preferable"!
Only other requirement is that she must be shorter than him, less than about 5ft 8".
Leave a comment if interested!

Nemo!

Watched finding nemo, woo!! Hadn't watched it in years, it's cool!
Ooh and I forgot, this morning me and Alex (who is asking to be mentioned on my blog!) watched look and read which was amazing! We used to watch it at primary school, it is one fantastic programme! They were doing spelling rules for words ending in y, and how to form the plural of nouns, which actually taught me quite a lot! Although I was then overanalysing everything in linguistic terms and making it really complicated! But it gave me the ambition to do some kids tv programme teaching french! So watch out for me on french tv in a few years time! There was also a very funny bit on the programme with wolves trying to get onto the ark, but they weren't allowed cos they had a badge saying wolfs and not wolves! They then dressed up elephants and tried to get on in disguise but there were already enough elephants so that didn't work!! So you see, that's what happens to you if you ignore the rules of grammar!

Decision made!

I got a better offer so decided to stay in and watch a film with Alex! Then it doesn't matter if I fall asleep! I'm such an old woman!!

On the other hand...

I am actually really tired and will probably fall asleep if I go out, and I have no money...

To go out or not to go out...

Argh, I really am so rubbish at decision making!! Have been trying to decide for at least half an hour whether or not to go out tonight! It's such a hard decision, so many things to take into account!! Although I'm thinking maybe it'd be a good idea really...hmm...yes, I will go!!! Woo, maybe this is the way to make decisions, write about them on my blog! Will remember that for future reference! Now I just have to decide what to wear...

Monday morning

I made it in for my 9am lecture today, woo! 2 weeks in a row! I may have been 10 minutes late, but that is unimportant, it's the other 40 minutes I was there for which matter! And I managed to get almost everything right in the test we had, despite not having been to any of the classes on the topic the test was on! Go me!
And I finally got my exam results!! Got 67% in syntactic theory and 70% in psycholinguistcs, not bad given the amount of revision I did! Especially syntactic theory for which I started revising the day before!

My stupid mistake of the day

I am so silly, and here is proof of it! When I woke up this morning I looked at my clock and it said 1.50pm so I got in a huge panic cos I should have left the house around 9 to go to kids club, and thought I'd slept through my alarm and missed it all. But then when I checked my phone it said 9.10am so the panic was over and I managed to not be late! Anyway....when I just got back home I decided to check out the mystery of the alarm clock...Turns out when I reset it last night after the power had gone off I'd set the time as the alarm time and the alarm time as the normal time!! Duh!!

Naughty Marijn

Woo, I am no longer the only person to have broken the agreement! Thanks Marijn, I feel a lot better now!

Naughty me (in the words of Ricardo)

On monday night, an agreement was made between me, Helen, Inge and Marijn that we would all go to all of our lectures until the easter holidays, and then we could get some kind of reward after! I managed it for one day...argh! Unfortunately I failed to hear the part of the agreement which stated that whoever missed a lecture had to buy everyone else beer! Grr! If I had known that, I would have made more of an effort to get up this morning!

Breakfast

Today I discovered something amazing to eat for breakfast - ice-cream on toast!!! (Chocolate ice-cream so it tastes like chocolate spread but better! Especially when it's carte d'or triple chocolate ice-cream!)

Pirates!

In honour of Rachael's birthday we turned into pirates for the night! Yar!





We pillage, we plunder, we rifle and loot.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!
We kidnap and ravage and don't give a hoot.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.

We extort, we pilfer, we filch and sack.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!
Maraud and embezzle and even hijack.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.
Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.

We kindle and char, inflame and ignite.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!
We burn up the city, we're really a fright.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.

We're rascals, scoundrels, villans and knaves.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!
We're devils and black sheep, really bad eggs!
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.

We're beggars and blighters and ne'er-do-well cads.
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!
Aye! But we're loved by our mommies and dads!
Drink up me 'earties, Yo Ho!

Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.
Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.
Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.
Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me.

Evenki

I am currently studying the language of Evenki...which will be very useful if I ever go to Siberia! We have to do a presentation in two weeks time on this randopm language which I know nothing about apart from that it has millions of words for reindeer! There are 34 different words for different kinds of reindeer, and then loads more for other reindeer-related things! These are a few of my favourites!

reindeer harnessed on the left-hand side of a sledge-team = kostur
reindeer which became wild = gelu:n
castrated reindeer = aktaki
not completely castrated reindeer = nara
reindeer which cannot be trained = mullikan

They're so random!

Masterchef(ess)

Check out the mighty fine pavlova I made tonight! Although actually I shouldn't take all the credit, Helen, Inge and Marijn did help too so it was a team effort! (even if in some cases that was only reading the recipe out!) Maybe I should quit my degree and become a master chef instead! Cooking really isn't all that hard!

Change

Woo I changed the template! I was bored of the pink!

food

As most people will know, I do quite enjoy my food (ok so maybe quite isn't the right word to use but anyway, I don't want to make myself sound like too much of a pig...) and lately I've been branching out and discovering new culinary delights! Today I ate prawns and smoked salmon which I previously thought I didn't like...and realised that they're are very tasty! But my personal favourite is the amazing meal I made for dinner the other night - fishfinger, mushroom and chip sandwich!!! It was soooooooooo good!

Funny

I was told by Ben to write something funny on here but I really can't think of anything at the moment! I'm practically falling asleep and should really go to bed, but it's too much effort! ooh and I just noticed toblerone on my floor...am quite tempted to eat some! although I should really do some work but it's late and I'm tired and anyway I'm going to get up early in the morning and go to the library (that's my plan anyway...whether or not it will happen is a different matter!) just noticed how many times I've written the word really...oh dear and now I'm rambling and probably sound really silly so maybe this will be something funny...
ooh yeah, I realised today that one of my lecturers really sounds like c3po!! It's so funny and kinda hard to concentrate on the lecture when I just want to laugh all the time!

Resolutions

Well, can't say I'm doing too well with my new years resolutions so far! One of them was to try and be on time...yesterday I was 10 minutes late for 2 out of my 3 lectures...I've never been that late for a lecture ever! (on the first day of the semester too, not a good start!) So I seem to be getting worse not better! Haven't played Ben at squash or pool yet so can't judge that one, I've done pretty well with the films though! I've watched quite a few in the last few weeks, the shawshank redemption, anchorman, dodgeball, team america, wedding crashers, to name but a few, can't remember them all! Oh and a night at the roxbury, which has the best insult ever in it - "you're a jungle theme"!! classic! you kind of have to watch it to understand it though...not that it really makes sense!

Can't be bothererd to think of a title!

Woo I finished my exams today! All two of them!! I feel guilty being happy cos I've finished when my friends have had 4 or 6 or 7 exams!! I guess to them I can't appreciate the true greatness of exams being over! But I'm still happy, and now I'm starting to ramble...it's the wine talking...and to be fair I did hardly any revision so it's not like I can even be happy that I no longer have to spend all my days in the library revising, I think the most revision I've done in day in the last couple of weeks is about 4 hours, I've been such a slacker! But my exams were fine! :) Well I think anyway, obviously I could've done really badly but I feel like they went ok, for saying how badly prepared I felt beforehand anyway! I thought I was going to be so screwed in my exam today, we had to answer two questions out of 6, I knew 2 topics so was really relying on easy questions on them coming up! Thankfully they did so it was ok, I was so happy when I saw the questions! In the summer I will definitely start my revision earlier and be more organised, especially since I will have 11 exams!!! I'm going to die, I'll never cope with that many! I was struggling with two this week! Thinking about it, I must have had that many gcse exams, don't know how I ever managed then!
I am currently learning to airdrum! (if that's even a word!) it's well fun! And I'm getting the hang of it now! And I have to find something to amuse myself with since I've been abandoned by Ben who has gone off to join his flatmates while I'm left in his room with only the computer and music and wine and chocolate and guitar and air drums for company!!! So actually it's not that bad, but still, it's fun to complain!

Friday

Well, the week is over, and in a strange I'm giong to miss school! I feel settled in there now! There are some things I won't miss, such as getting up early, being mistaken for a pupil (as I was today by some kids walking behind me in the corridor!!! They don't even have 6th form there so that means at the oldest they thought I was 16! :S although to be fair they did realise I was a "teacher" when I turned round so it's not all bad!), and trying to make kids work who just sit there and go "I'm not doing it, I hate french, it's boring, i'm never going to use it" and refuse to do anything! I'm sure I was going to write more but I'm falling asleep now...oh yeah, I'm addicted to coffee and sudoku!!! Argh!

Teaching day four

Only one day left to go as being a teacher! :( for this week anyway! I've had a great time (apart from being ill and spending an afternoon asleep in the staffroom!), teaching is fun!! I had to take part of a german lesson the yesterday, cos the teacher doesn't speak any german!! How stupid is that, you can't teach something you don't know!!! It was only a year 7 class so she knew basic stuff but was rubbish at pronunciation and I had to tell her the word for wednesday! Today I had to do a presentation about different regions in France (got to use the interactive whiteboard!!) It was a year 9 class who are usually really noisy and disruptive but they actually sat quietly and were interested in it and could answer all the quiz questions afterwards to prove they actually had been paying attention!! So I was pretty pleased! And I think they will forever remember that you find marmots in the alps after one boy renamed them 'marmite eating marmots'(!?!)
In other news, I now drink coffee!!! I've finally trained myself, not sure if that's a good thing or not but at least I have a way of waking myself up now! (which I've had to do several times this week!)

Penguin

I finally got a penguin! Unfortunately not a real one but this will have to do until then! And she is very soft and cute and doesn't have to be fed out of my mouth with food I have already eaten so I guess that's always an advantage!

Teaching!

After getting up at the crazy hour of 5am (it's dark and cold at that time!!), leaving the house at 6 and getting the train at 7, I finally arrived in accrington for the first day of my paid work experience teaching kind of thing (don't really know what to call it but that kind of thing! basically I get paid to go into a school for a week and see if I like the idea of teaching!) It has been a great day, very interesting and I've learnt a lot about how not to teach! (as well as how to!) I'm working with one of the french teachers, who is neither french nor english, I have no idea where she's from but she pronounces all her w's as v's (and visit as 'wisit'!) and has the weirdist french accent ever! I had to stop myself from correcting her loads of times, these poor kids are gonna end up speaking french so badly! She doesn't seem to be able to handle the classes at all and doesn't make it in any way fun so no wonder I heard loads of the kids saying "I hate french, why can't we just say it in english?!" I really want to give her ideas of how to make it more interesting for them, but can't really! On the plus side she does give people chocolate if they're good! After school we had to stay for a staff meeting to see what other things teachers have to do, it was the most boring thing ever!!! I very nearly fell asleep, the only interesting bit was when they played a clip of little britain! But other than that it was just loads of ramble about classrooms looking nice, awards for the best looking classroom, marking schemes, review days, uniform and I can't remember what else!
It shall certainly be a very interesting week, and hopefully lots of fun! I met cool people who are also there from uni doing the same scheme, and I have lifts in for the rest of the week so don't have to get up crazily early to catch the train! yay!

Snow picture!

I took this near my house the other day, it was so pretty!

January 1st

Happy new year!!! wow it's 2006, that's strange! I remember when it was 1996, doesn't seem 10 years ago! Ooh that was when my sister was just born and I was a wee little girl of 9 years old...anyway, I'll stop being nostalgic now...
I don't normally bother making new years resolutions cos I know I probably won't end up keeping them, but for some reason I've got loads this year! I'm not sure if I should tell people or not, cos then at least if I don't keep them no-one will know! But I guess they're only really for me anyway (apart from the ones that affect other people) so it doesn't really matter...sorry I'm starting to do my rambling email thing now (a talent I learnt from helen) although since this isn't an email it's probably more a rambling blog...right, now I really am making no sense at all, this is what you get when you try type this late at night after having only about 4 hours sleep last night (sleeping on a living room floor where 7 other people are sleeping too isn't the best combination for getting lots of sleep!)
ANYWAY...back to the point (if there even is one) oh dear people are going to start to think I'm drunk or something, but I haven't drunk a drop of alchohol in ages, honestly! (well a few days anyway!)
But yeah, back to the resolutions, I will probably have forgotten them all by the end of the first week but nevermind, I can try!

no. 1: I will try and stop being late all the time and keep people waiting for ages (literally hours sometimes, sorry Sarah!!) Also maybe this will help me miss less buses, trains, planes etc!
no. 2: I want to better my film education! (which I know is pretty rubbish!) I hate feeling really thick when people talk about films that everyone else in the world has seen apart from me!
no. 3: I want to beat Ben at squash!! (this one may be slightly difficult considering the scores from when we last played, but I like a challenge! I guess I would settle for beating him at pool if I can't manage squash, I probably have a better chance with that!)

Hmm I did have more than this but I can't remember them! oops! oh well, it's late and I'm tired, I'm sure they'll come back to me!
Was gonna say be less stupid in general but I'm small so can't help that! (it's been scientifically proven that short people are stupid apparently! It makes a good excuse for doing silly things!)

Oh dear it's now gone past midnight so it's january 2nd and my title isn't true, nevermind!!