A Monday Morning

I went for a run for the first time in about 4 months this morning. My alarm went off at 7, and then again every 10 minutes until 7:40 while I tried to sleep through the inevitable. Unfortunately, I had told everyone I knew the night before that I would be running the following morning, so no matter how long I snoozed, unless I was prepared to embrace the shame of not going, I had to follow through.

I struggled into my ridiculously small and tight lycra ensemble and stumbled out of the front door. It didn’t get any better. My running playlist was too outdated. One song in and I could hardly breathe. My heart literally felt like one of those funky balls of elastic bands that you get in cool stationary shops. I needed to blow my nose. I needed to spit. I spat. It went all over my face. I got to the main road and it was just after 8am on a Monday morning i.e. there were a lot of cars and buses with people in that were looking at me as I jog-walked with a blotchy complexion and excess dribble. (If you read that sentence as it was punctuated, you will see how out of breath I was). I eventually reached the turning into the field, which now appeared to be an amalgamation of mud and small ponds. (I walked that bit). Then I hit another road, which has a very slight (very very slight) incline. I would have kept walking, except that cars kept driving past, and for fear of judgment I managed to drag my feet fast enough so to create the illusion that I might actually be running. Not sure how convincing I was. Ran-walked a bit more, nearly got run over by a small car, got to the home stretch and stumbled down the road. Just about to cross to my house, when all the traffic in the world decided to drive down the road which resulted in me standing opposite my house for too long, being stared at by drivers and passengers alike. Hurrah! I made it across the road, took off my muddy trainers, put the key in the door, and why won’t it open? It’s been double locked. I only have one key. My entire family has gone out.

There is a positive end to my tale. My mother, by chance, happened to drive past at the exact moment that I turned around, and even now I am genuinely shocked at how much energy I mustered as I leapt up and down with arms flailing. She, along with every other driver, saw me, and this time I didn’t even care what the other drivers thought of me (there is the moral, even if it’s not the point). Despite this, I am not sure I will be running again tomorrow.

Hello again

Hurrah, it’s the end of term and I’ve given up on the library and any form of productive work and wearing nice clothes and buying healthy food and eating anything other than marks and spencer’s chocolate biscuits. I know this is okay because it’s the time of year when marks and spencer’s extremely chocolately biscuit selection is on offer. Here I have documented the current state of my life in meme form. 

What my friends think I do:

Read all the books in the world

Make a list

Snack too much

Have fun

What my parents think I do:

Spend an unnecessary amount of money in M&S

Spend an unnecessary amount of time making lists

What society thinks I do:

Drink alcohol on a school night

Listen to drum and bass music

Fester in an unhealthy pit of dirt and squalor

Drive dangerously

Cycle dangerously

Sleep

What my tutors think I do:

Not enough

What I think I do:

Too much

What I actually do:

Sit in the library doing nothing

Make a list

Watch Home and Away

Play on photobooth

Spend too much money in M&S

Observe my books

Download music illegally

Read all the books in the world

Remember to charge my phone

Forget what happens in all the books in the world

Spend money

Never make decisions

Make a list

Make tea

Snack too much

Accumulate large library fines

Go on Daily Mail

Paint my nails

Spend money

Make Google translate say funny things

Daydream about all the greats things that are going to happen to me in life

Freak out because daydreaming won’t necessarily deliver

Make a list

Decide to start my work

Post a blog

Maybe I'm just high-maintenance

(Correct me if I’m wrong but…)

Is it ever actually okay to type noisily in the library? I just think that people need to reassess things (such as life) when they are so angry that they start attacking their keyboard in the silent study section of the frickin’ library.

When you submit an ‘absence notification form’ on the university portal, do they really expect you to know already when your illness will end? I vote we introduce an ‘indefinitely’ button.

Does it really need to rain all the time?

Am I the only person who understands the concept of a silent study area in a library, where you have to be silent and not talk and not eat doritos and not use your phone and not listen to music so loudly that we can all hear Rihanna screaming “giddy up, giddy up, giddy up babe”? Not today thank you, and certainly not here in the silent study section of the library ever.

Will I ever know how much rice is the right amount for one person?

Why is a 30mph speed limit never adhered to? #hydepark #chilloutwithyourshittycarsandblaringmusicandstoprunningchildrenover

And also, why do cyclists think it’s okay to terrorize both the roads AND the pavements? If you’re so keen to be eco-friendly, can you at least do it slowly and safely, and respect those of us who wish to walk?

Whilst we’re on the subject of trafficking problems, I do believe it might become necessary to introduce a “pavement etiquette” class at school, owing the ridiculous inabilities of so many of the British public to be polite on the streets. Rules ought to include:

moving out of the way for mums+children+shopping+pushchairs

no spitting (this seems to be a northern thing – sorry but it’s true)

no dominating (don’t walk four in a row holding hands, it’s just not fair)

if it’s raining, you should let people into shops first, not make them wait outside whilst you assemble your hood/umbrella/life in the doorway

Should library fines really exist? (I actually vote yes for this, but it’s still rather annoying when you have to pay them off)

Why are the chocolate brownies in the Parkinson café so absolutely mind-blowingly delicious?

Why do pigeons actually exist?

Will I ever learn that leaving my essays until the last minute and then blogging to further my procrastination is not a good idea?

Bosoms, bosoms

I found this hand-written poem tucked inside my second-hand copy of The Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse. Unsurprisingly it is anonymous (as much as I would like to say it is my own genius). Many congratulations to the poet, who has technically met with fame at last.

Bosoms, bosoms, bouncing, bare

Down the bush paths everywhere

What immortal hand or eye

Framed thy matchless symmetry?

Bosoms vast and bosoms trim,

Bosoms sleek and bosoms firm,

Bosoms large and bosoms tiny,

Bosoms warm and round and shiny,

Bosoms petite and bosoms bold,

Bosoms pendulous and cold.

Sugar plums and acid drops

Naafi teacups, razor strops

What a study in the nude,

Overpowering, rather rude.

O, to see again one fair

Damsel, in a brassiere!

ANON.

Driving Advising

I recently took a trip up to the north, which is a considerable journey so I feel I have seen a great enough representation of our nation’s driving abilities to generalize a little. Some advice is in order.

Please indicate when you wish to change lanes. Please don’t change lanes abruptly/dangerously. Please don’t throw apple cores/cigarette ends out of your window. Please don’t pick your nose visibly. Please refrain from placing large, bare, hairy feet on the dashboard by the window. Please do not play drum and bass at full volume. Please remove all nodding-dogs, hats and boxes of tissues from your parcel shelf. Please do not park your car on a bend of a fast road. Please do not ride bicycles in the middle of the road/veer sporadically into the middle of the road. When you stop for a lunch break, please look around before you start reversing into your parking spot and please take care not to urinate on the seat in the service station (girls, seriously what is going on?). Please migrate into the middle lane when cars are joining the motorway at a junction. Please move out of the middle lane if you are not overtaking cars in the left-hand lane. Please do not overtake in the wrong lanes – if these things are happening, the motorway is being used incorrectly. Please try not to lose a bag/shoe/jumper out of your window – I have never seen this happen but am curious to know how these objects end up on the edge of the road. Please stop at all red lights (taxis and buses, you are no exception). Please go at green lights. If you are not in a vehicle, please do not run out into the middle of the road. And finally, I would recommend that you please review the Highway Code.

The Elastoplast Error

Yesterday, I had a dinner party. When I was preparing the food, I accidentally stabbed myself with a metal skewer and it made a small hole in my arm. Then I decided it would be nice to have some flowers at the table so I popped out to the florist, and when I picked up a bunch of roses a thorn punctured my finger. When I got home, I realized I had left my pet rabbit out in the garden. He only has one tooth, and when I tried to pick him up, he bit my leg and drew blood the sly dog. In my surprise, I stepped backwards and I stood on a wasp which in turn stung me (fair enough). Then I decided I needed to write something down but I fell over whilst I was carrying my pen and the nib pierced my stomach. All in all, it wasn’t the most successful day, but I survived.

None of the above actually happened (nor do I own a rabbit with one tooth), but I just thought I would provide a list of the individual uses of the small, round plasters that you get in your average multipack. Those were the only possible causes I could think of that might benefit from such an insignificant band-aid. The ratio of normal plasters to entirely impractical sticky circles is all wrong. I am no mathematician, but I can guarantee that the majority of the cases listed above are unlikely to happen that often, and if/when they do, the average wo/man will survive without the aid of a ‘waterproof’, ‘natural-coloured’ plaster. You can observe this for yourselves now by simply looking in your designated plaster storage space and working out the ratio of useful:useless plasters. In short, I think I speak for the nation when I say I rather think they're a waste of time and we'd be better off sticking them together and getting two extra big plasters per box.

A Half-Blog

I thought, since my exams finished long ago, I cancelled my gym membership and I moved back home, that my number of blog posts would increase rapidly; I hardly have anything more productive to do with my time. But I have realized this is exactly my problem. I am so lazy and so unmotivated to do the necessary things in life, I realized that the only reason I blog is to procrastinate, and now I have nothing to procrastinate from, I am procrastinating from blogging. I am here today because I am going on holiday at 4am tomorrow and I haven’t packed yet.

It seems that the less I do, the less energy I have and over the last couple of weeks I have just about mustered half a blog post for everything that annoys me. So, to make my life a little bit easier, here are some short sentences about things that have pushed my buttons recently.

I redecorated my room and it took a really long time and it was really boring and most of the paint seemed to end up in my hair or in my radiator as opposed to on my walls.

I found out that you have to pay a lot of money to volunteer abroad which, in my eyes, defeats the exact point of helping people for free, because other people are making money out of it.

I saw an advert (quite a few times) that claimed that the new Samsung Galaxy S3 understands you, it shares what’s in your heart, it keeps track of loved ones, it recognizes who you are, it follows your every move, it sees your best side, it shares the warmth of nature, it waits till you’re asleep and then the advert ends which is a shame because that was turning into a pretty good thriller about a psychopathic stalker.

Also, what is with all of these “reality tv” shows, which apparently are not legitimately classified as reality anymore, and have been renamed “structured reality”? The bigger question at hand is if you’re going to turn reality into a drama anyway, why is it still so boring?

And finally, I would like to point out the flaws in the statement “make tea, not war”. Making tea in my household is an unspoken war and creates and maintains everyday tension between each member of my family (first world problems, right?). There is an assumed rule that when you make a hot beverage for yourself, you have to offer everyone else too and four out of five of my family members will automatically say yes please. If we estimate that to make one cup of tea takes approximately 3 minutes (including boiling the kettle), it is fair to assume that making four cups of tea will take considerably longer (I am not going to insert an exact figure here because it technically adds minimal time to the task, but that is not the point I am making). The point I am making appears to be that I am either incredibly selfish or incredibly lazy.

In my defence, if painting wasn’t so boring, if volunteering didn’t cost so much money, if I had that new phone that can replace the necessity of human interaction, if someone would insert more stage directions than awkward pause into Made In Chelsea, and if I had a maid to make my tea, then maybe I wouldn’t always be so bored. (I incidentally read an article about boredom the other day and there is such a thing as “chronic boredom” but I took the test at the end and had very average results so I know you’re all thinking the same things as me).