the city of mirrors would be wiped out by the wind. (also I complain a lot)

Hey.



One of my favorite Joanna Newsom songs. I sort of love her. I don’t know why I’m listening to this music now. Spring of 8th grade nostalgia, perhaps.

My mom’s spending the week in England, so I’m stuck with my dad, who can be annoying as hell, also I have to write all of the time for nanowrimo(keeping up with it thus far) and I have a rather bad cold which means I cannot talk very easily. It’s a bit of a weird week, but my mom’s bringing me back the new and totally amazing-looking Bombay Bicycle Club record, so it works out well enough. She almost didn't go the England because of the power outage and everything. I really don't like just my dad being here.

In English at the moment, we’re reading a book by Elie Wiesel called Night and it’s pretty famous so I don’t even know why I’m telling you, but it’s about the holocaust. I’m liking it. We really haven’t done much of anything in class at the moment, the power outage kinda threw us off, we’ve mainly been watching videos and reading. Also, we’ve been given a Big Huge Enormous Project for this book, since my teacher really, once again, cannot be bothered to do her job herself. And we’ve been put into groups and told to analyze a certain question and present it. We’re supposed to start class discussions, for gods sake. Like that’s gonna work out! it's supposed to be so relaxed, these class discussions are supposed to be so natural, says my teacher. She keeps telling us to "bring in some coffee" and stuff, these are just gonna be such great and eloquent discussions, we're gonna be a total book club, she says. She's fascinated more by the romance of literature types than anything else, hence the coffee and the book discussions and the look-guys-Hemingway-didn't-even-go-to-college-ohmygod-artists mentality. So we started these trainwrecks today, the first group of questions, and it was all absolutely terrible and all of the things brought up were really forced and just used to get points. I’ve mentioned it before, but forced talking for points makes me very, very angry. And then some of the discussion questions brought up just became sadistic and odd, (presenting group: “what punishment would you give to the perpetrators of these crimes?” girl in class: “life imprisonment. Oh, and daily torture” my internal dialogue: “jesus christ”). We’re presenting on Monday. Oh, and I don’t know if everyone else’s middle schools were as into TEAMWORK and EXPERIMENTAL LEARNING and DIFFERENT LEARNING STYLES as mine was but we were always given these projects and awarded points for creativity rather than, like, effort and good information and stuff. So, people always milked this for all it was worth, and created the most terrible projects ever, full of gimmicks, and it got them As and my work which was thorough and took effort, albeit quite pretentious, never quite made the cut like theirs did. Well, my group because they are hungry for points rather than any sort of self-validation due to effort or whatever, are going down this route and baking the class cupcakes. It has “metaphoric significance”, guys. Of course it does. It’s like when we were in 6th grade and doing science projects the entire time and when planning groups would always say “...and let’s give out candy to the class at the end!”. Except this is four years later. And I thought it was a stupid idea age eleven, too.

Fascinating way to continue the week , in 20th century we’re just watching video after video about the holocaust. Including this really really unpleasant one that was unfinished and stored in London for some time. Some cameraman went around with British soldiers liberating camps. That...was something else. Tough stuff. Oh, but, we also did a mock Nuremberg Trials thing which was awful, especially considering it was just completely scripted and everything. If we’re gonna do a mock trial(god forbid, but I digress) at least allow some wiggle room to make it marginally more interesting. And, I was on the jury. We were told to be put into groups yesterday and the jury didn’t have enough to do, as much as my teacher tried to convince us otherwise. So we sat there for like forty five minutes doing nothing, and did much the same the following day, except the bit at the end where we were given something like forty five seconds to come to decisions on five of those officers. Yep, mock trials done the wrong way. Also I was in the minority in the jurt and no one listened to me. I held my case, though.

Bio, we’re learning about osmosis and, for some reason, the kidneys. I don’t even know. I’ve developed a problem where I drift in and out of microsleep every day, at that exact time, in that class. For twenty minutes or so. We have a quiz tomorrow and it’s going to be absolutely terrible. We also did a lab using liver that lasted far too long, I’m not suqemish but that was vile.

The town postponed trick or trating until Saturday. I was pleased with my costume in the end, although the heels hurt like hell for the night and I couldn't feel my fingers for much of it. Both my parents went way over top with the decorating. We had four pumpkins, and mine took an hour to carve and didn’t look very good, and gravestones and stuff. It was very cold that day, two of my friends came over and we went trick or treating for a while, then came back and watched Sweeney Tod with another friend. it was too cold to stay out for long in the evening, although there was this one house who had home-made baked goods and hot chocolate and stuff out; that was impressive. The movie and rest of the night was great, though. Man, I love Sweeney Todd so much. I want the Broadway version on DVD for christmas. It was a pretty great night. Also, i went to the book shop the day after and bought all this JD Salinger stuff, I’m weirdly into JD Salinger, as uncool as that might be. Unfortunately I’ve already finished the Glass family stuff, such a shame because I really, really liked all of that. I finished One Hundred Years of Solitude a few days ago. Few books have affected me like that one.

So, not a great week. On Monday after school I was supposed to take this test that I was supposed to take two weeks ago but I was sick then, or pretending to be, and I was actually sick now. My teacher does dopey things like hear the way I can’t talk and goes ‘oh, take it Thursday then’ after I’ve stayed after school, missed my bus, and walked all the way over to the classroom. And since my mom’s away, I couldn’t be picked up till way late in the evening so I went downtown and did homework in the library and that was my favorite part of the week. I’m sort of at a total loss of things to talk about it. In a little while I’m gonna drive into Boston with my dad to pick my mom up, excuse to go to a city at night, even though the combination of NaNoWriMo and school work is taking up very much all of my time. I don’t even listen to enough music or go for enough walks. It’s tiring.

Since I’ve whined for this entire post, here’s a second song to make up for it. This one’s brilliant. It’s like a tacky halloween thing. happy belated Halloween to you all.

i was playing a tree trunk in a forest of fools

Gorky's Zygotic Mynci were a Welsh Britpop band from the 90s who never got as much recognition as they deserved. I assume this is the case because they incorporated mariachi brass into their music and they sang about things like playing a tree trunk in a forest of fools and joining a Spanish dance troupe because the British summer weather was shitty. I think this band discovery gets me all the indie cred.

Not the best weekend ever. It’s one of those weekends that you think is going to be good, and then it isn’t, and you feel disappointed and sad and just end up compounding the error. Hanging out with friends on Saturday was a plan that unfortunately fell apart, and so me and my mom went looking for stuff for my Halloween costume instead. I don’t know that I’ve mentioned this before, I probably have, but whatever I’m being Mrs. Lovett from Sweeney Todd. She has a pretty generic witchy thing going on, but I’m all up for it. I really love Victorian clothes, men and women’s, especially men’s, which unfortunately will never be acceptable for me to wear, so dresses and stuff will suffice. I sort of like the idea of spending the night as an Edward Gorey character a lot. Also, I just love all things Sweeney Todd. Apparently stuff of this sort was vaguely popular in the 70s or 80s or something, says my mom, ‘cause I already have these black heels which are perfect and lacey gloves thanks to her. I need red/black tights and a dress(a dress! When did I last wear a dress?!). Also the character choice means I’ll probably need to take a stab at—horror of horrors—eye makeup, which I don’t ever wear. Still not sure about that. I love Halloween and I’ve always revelled in dressing up, and also just for looking for the pieces of a costume. I mean, if you just walk into Spencers’ and grab a sexy bunny outfit or something, whatever, up to you and I really don’t mind, but I just think half the fun of the whole event is looking through multiple places and taking individual things and watching the whole thing form piece by piece. It’s a sort of halloween passion that I don’t think many people invest in over the age of eleven or so, isn’t it? Ah well, it’s fun all the same. Apart from all the crappy halloween stores we tried, just in case, you know, and they were awful and these were Gryffindor scalves and black lipstick everywhere and, ugh. Hyper judgemental? Yes. But still!

I think I spent most of the weekend watching loads and loads of the Inbetweeners and I started reading A Hundred Years Of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, which so far is quite enjoyable but also weird and slightly difficult to follow. And oh, Sunday? Mom showed me this part of a forest round here I’d never been to before, it’s amazing. For whatever reason my mom knows the nature walks round here inside –out, and believe me there is an awful lot of them. It’s...impressive? Helps with things like this.

Otherwise, I spent much of the weekend working on a bio project. It didn’t take an overly long time, not like that macromolecule project which, my god, was awful, and the info was fairly accessible. All we really had to do was create an info sheet and write a case study. I’m getting no points for aesthetics in the info sheet but the information’s there, albeit in a kind of waffly, long-winded fashion. Think I overdid it on the case study. I’m prone to either overdoing or violently undergoing projects. It was two pages long single spaced and it didn’t even make a hell of a lot of sense. Later in the week, we’re supposedly doing an activity where we use these info sheets and case studies to assign diseases. Or something. I don’t know, it sounds like the sort of thing a lot of teachers say they’ll do but never actually get around to working on. Again, we’ve been working with the microscopes(still nothing broken on my behalf, thank god) and today I looked at onion cells and my own cheek cells stained blue and it was neat. I have a quiz tomorrow on cell organelles and I know nothing about ‘em.

And, tonight is he big day with that research paper. It’s due tomorrow and I’m so screwed if I think I’ll actually have any free time tonight. So far it’s about ten pages long, I think, and I’ve edited something like three of these. And, I repeat, it’s due tomorrow. I procrastinate, but this is bad even by my standards. My teacher’s being very particular vis-à-vis citations and stuff, and just going through all of that nonsense is very much taking the majority of my time. It’s not going to be very good, but it might be adequate if I just don’t sleep tonight. The ‘just don’t sleep’ route is one I seem to favor a lot at the moment, as I’ve mentioned repeatedly.

We’re just about finishing Gatsby in English, and we have a test tomorrow. We started watching the movie a bit, too, the one from the 70s. And we watch movies an awful lot in that class so it’s the sort of thing I’ve become kind of desensitized to, and this movie I thought was patchy, not that I’m any expert on movies. Speaking of films, I watched Dead Poets Society for the first time a couple of days ago. I’d heard loads about it, so I ordered it, and then I watched it and kind of really, really didn’t like it? I’m just saying, I was surprised, given its popularity(if not critical acclaim). It felt pompous and dull and, my god, that teacher. He’s the worst kind of teacher! Why does nobody see that? If I was the kid who never said anything which, let’s face it, I pretty much am, I was thinking I’d get that teacher guy fired for fucking physically holding me in front of the class and making me talk? Cause it's humiliating and um, counts as harassment? And somehow that guy’s behavior is celebrated. Probably explains why so many teachers are so fucking terrible. The attitude to teaching is just all wrong.

Okay, I’ve essay-editing to do, bye for now.

Tired To The Point of Passing Out + Birthday Stuff + School

Lucky it's been a fairly manageable couple of days back at school so far. Only a few minor upsets, and that's just the usual stuff. The birthday(15. gosh) was absolutely wonderful of course and I'm happy with all the stuff I got.

Run through time, no?


I got the expected group of CDs, with a couple of them still in the mail, most of them people at V. Hurts(Happiness), KT Tunstall(Tiger Still), Rihanna(Loud), Eminem(Recovery), The Kills(Blood Pressures), Kele(Boxer), Elbow(Build A Rocket Buys! finally!) Courteeners(St. Jude), Primal Scream(Screamadelica), PJ Harvey(Let England Shake), The Script(Science & faith), and the Submarine soundtrack. Seeing as I've been a tad preoccupied with Manchester Orchestra(listen to the new song, Virgin, it's great) and Cage the Elephant and such, I've only listened to Hurts so far...but let me just say, that album is so good. I'd describe it as the 'perfect pop record' if I didn't take to doing that with a different album every fortnight or so. Better Than Love is beyond catchy, it drives me crazy...and the intro song, it's surprisingly dark, for a pop song. Hurts are interesting, because they're both very 80s and very modern pop, it's strange. It's all Pet Shop Boys synth, with Depeche Mode darkness, plus dub step influences, dance influences, and (heterosexual) sex appeal. It's fuuuuun. I thought I'd drive my parents crazy with the record but, luckily, they really like it too. They're definitely a 'love them or hate them' sort of band...as for me, now that I'm more familiar with them, I'm very excited to see them in August. Also, I got piano versions for Sweeney Todd and Star Wars, like I kept going on about. they're both pretty easy but I can only play easy stuff, so it works well. Unfortunately, no No Place Like London(my favorite ST song after Johanna Reprise), but it has all the other popular ones so it's all good. I got an awful lot of DVDs, not exactly sure why! I got Peep Show Series 7 on DVD(love.) and I've consequentially been reminded of how utterly brilliant all of Peep Show is. It's better to watch them on DVD, because the series are so short it almost seems like they don't flow together when you're just watching them as debuts. I really liked the episodes when re-watching them now. The rest of the family seemed to like them, also, so now I can probably get away with watching them every single day until Series 8 in November...which I'm totally excited for. I'm really worried about Dobby moving in with Mark, though, simply because I adore Dobby and I'll be heartbroken when Mark&Dobby inevitably break up in the next series. Also, in series eight, I need to see more of Sophie(as much as I dislike her), and also I'd like a return of either Elana or, better yet, Nancy. Or Zhara! Zhara's character is so brilliant.

Also got Deathly Hallows Part 1 on DVD. Also, a few months ago, I suddenly remembered Doogle and the Blue Cat...which was my favorite movie when I was, um, eight. if you went through your childhood without Doogle and the Blue Cat, you are missing out on so much. Basically, it's a French kids from from the early 1970s which was (as all good kids films are) probably made on hallucinatory drugs. It's great because the English version is dubbed with a completely different storyline to the original French one, goodness knows why. I'd, um, recommend it if you're into trippy kids stuff. Also, I got the much sought-after original theatrical versions of Star Wars IV, V, and VI. Not only does the nerdiness in me revel in that, but laughing at the crappy special affects in itself is a very fun event. I got the Clangers(haha, love) on DVD as a sort of joke, but also a whole array of old Disney movies...I have them on VHS, not DVD, and I no longer have a VHS player, so re-buying them was good.

Weekend was good. Bought magazines on Sunday and working until 12:30 AM on Monday morning for a science project, no big deal there. But the crux of my weekend is, of course, the new episode of my beloved Doctor Who. So, thoughts--1. I want loads of clothes in Tardis Blue. 2. This episode is...so confusing. 3. What was the point of the whole 'Doctor, I'm pregnant' thing? 4. The orphanage scene was AMAZING to the max, but really creepy even by Doctor Who standards. 5. The guy at the orphanage is my new favorite person, I think. 6. Matt Smith with a beard...like, woah. mind blown. 7. I've just realized, now, how brilliant/terrifying the Silence are. 8. the ending was kind of fast and difficult to follow, but good nonetheless. 9. The bit with the girl at the end...takes 'mind blown' to a whole new extreme. Damn you, Moffat, you Doctor Who writing genius! 10. And, most importantly, the kiss! I wasn't expecting it this early to be honest, but I'm just glad the kiss wasn't with Amy(growl.)...and as It's River's last kiss with him, it's also quite sad. Overall, good episode, I really like it...and I totally just love River.

World Civ is a big nightmare. We finished our projects on civilizations on Tuesday. On Tuesday through Thursday, all the groups put up their posters around the room and we were told to take notes on them. However, it wasn't usual 'take notes' type stuff, we were taking notes on six specific questions that were completely irrelevent to the posters. If nothing else, it was slightly frustrating to think that I did that massive timeline for nothing. He gave us like twnrty minutes on each country, though in reality those notes only too about five. And we spent all of yesterrday doing the shitty essay I have to write tonight, and then watched 9/11 videos. Stayed up to 11:30 last night doing a supremely irritating essay, and did decently on the test today. Time to move out of the middle ages, please.

health was watching the embarassing English puberty vid in one day, and then a crappy TV movie about HIV. Ugh. And I have to do a term project for this silly class--I'm choosing Bi-Bolar. On the one hand, yes, bi polar has been done to death but on the other, remarkably, most people seem to know very little about it still. I'm tired of hearing teenagers talk about how they were so happy one day and then so sad the next and how they're 'totally Bi-polar' and such, so I want to shed a little light on how fucking stupid these people are. Also, today we had symbolic unprotected sex, by exchanging index cards. I got symbolic AIDs. Ah, health class.

I finally finshed my picture in art--we're onto some geometric thing that requires creativity, of which I have little. Mostly I do homework and sit through stupid conversations. (Someone at my table asked today 'Can you die from Aspergers?' The amount of time it took for the others to resolve this girl's question was, um, troubling). Doctor Who has been on my mind too much and a fellow Whovian suggested I do a Doctor Who theme for the next project, but I'm not sure I could make it work. Sigh.

Classifacation of animals in science...going thyrough all the domains and kingdoms and classes and I want to cry with how boring they are, also the teacher continues to bring in skins for no reason...last week she brought in a bear skin, and continued to spend a half hour talking about bears. She called finding wild bears 'summer fun'. Time-waster or what? We went out at the beginning of the week to our environmental site. As per usual, we rushed through our tests in fifteen minutes and then the guys in our group started breaking sticks of increasing sizes with their hands and feet and faces. But, at least its got warm as of late o going outside is far less torturous. Present my awful(really, honestly awful) poster yesterday, to much stress. It's a test grade. I have a quiz next week--always a cause for minor mental breakdowns, as any reader of my blog will know--and then I have to do an organism report on some sort of reed. Fun, no?

Lastly, English hasn't benn too great so far this last week and a half. We've started Tale of Two Cities, hoorah! I guess I'm liking the book so far. My reading comprehension isn't very good so sometimes it's a struggle, but overall it seems to be good. (Apart from Lucie. I mean, what the hell, Dickens? Aren't you supposed to be about over-the-top people and good characterization? Explain yourself.). Unfortunately, my uber pretentious literature-snob of a teacher decided to be particularly irritating about 'one of her favorite books'. We've been put into reading groups. I'm with one girl who I'm pretty sure hates me, another quiet girl who also doesn't seem to like me, and two guys with no interest in doing any work whatsoever. Most of the time she just sits us down with this vast packets, all about analyzing the text, even when I'm pretty sure there is very little that needs to be analyzed. Last week that and vocab(not fun, either) was all we did, even on Friday afternoon. Just packets. Just when I thought things in that class could not got any worse, the teacher announced we would do a graded fishbowl activity. Graded. Basically, we have a four-person discussion going on about one question in the packet and you get a point for every time that you contribute something. Probably is, it creates the most vapid discussions imaginable, because people aren't looking to build off what other people have said, all they care about is saying loads and loads of things. That in itself is something I don't like, but grading it? Scandalous! I didn't contribute for all of the first day, but then the second day I was sitting next to this girl who, while being certainly less shy than I am, didn't want to participate either. Moving onto another question, we just decided to go together. And then, turns out we get the most ridiculous, irritating question in the entire packet to answer, one that I remember not 48 hours beforehand, ranting to my mother about due to its stupidity. It's all like "Defarge talks about the troubles with the French government at the time. Can you draw any parallels to today's world?" WELL, DUH. Anyone above the age of seven could answer yes to that, no? But you want me to draw parallels? Oh yay, you've totally just given a bunch of teenagers a chance to talk about shit they no nothing about! Then everyone else is all like "So, there's corruption...and Africa...and Libra, and, like, world hunger..." and all that jazz that these people seem to think is interrelated, even when it's not. And I'm there thinking, well, um, what do I say? Then we're told to discuss "how does this theme transcend place and time?" and I'm thinking...ugh, again? Cause it's universal? Y'know, bad shit that happens? Does this really need an explanation? Then the question ends and we go back to our seats and I've got a 0 for a participation grade.

The teacher pulled me and the other girl aside at the end of the lesson. The other girl was absent the day before so 'she had an excuse' but I did not. She did say she wanted us to contribute because we were 'two of the most articule people in the class'(which is both innacurate and very flattering) but 'it's no good if you can't voice these opinions to others'. So, shit, guys, I've got to start pretending I've got opinions...quite a feat, right? I did actually wanna say something about Miss Pross at one point, but I was too scared to stand up and sit down at the discussion table, so I didn't, and I regret that.

New Antlers album, ahhh, so good. Not Hospice level goodness, though Hospice is my all time favorite album, so beating that would be quite something. But really quite good.

Sorry it's been too long...I feel like I look unenthusiastic and dull here, which is sad because I had so much to say. Sorry. It has beena good week, really, I've liked it! It's just I'm forgetting what happened a week ago and I'm tired to the point of passing out right now.

So, night!

March 12th.

This guy is awesome. It doesn't get much better than that.

This weekend is going to be hell. I have a science test monday, which covers everything from the beginning of the semester(6 weeks ago) onwards, I have a science project due Monday that I haven't started, and I have a health project due Thursday that I haven't started. Add this to liberal amounts of La Roux and Star Wars and I'm in for a busy weekend.

The science test is going to be a massive disaster, because you know when you get a 99% on a quiz the following test is going to be catastrophically awful, thatt's just the way these things work. I'm going/being forced to go to the library Sunday to study with the girl who sits next to me. I never quite understood this mutual studying thing but hey, every little helps**. The health project is pretty basic--write a three page paper about myself, answer some questions, decorate + fill a paper bag with ten things that summarize me. Needless to say writing three pages all about me will be a walk in the park, sad how I could do that any day. The value statements are just about what makes me happy/sad and where I wanna be in five years time, all that usual Health stuff. (do you know how much bs I'm gonna have to stuff into this project? D'you think I could answer this stuff honestly? pfft, as if. Don't the teachers know that half the stuff we write in All About You projects is completely made up?). The paper bag element is more problematic. What does symbolize me, anyway?

(This week was the week of private school acceptance letters. The madness of this, which I despise and like to rant about at every oppurtunity, makes me feel so fucking Holden Caulfield it makes me sick. That's who I am, isn't it? I'm him. I'm the very stereotype I wish to avoid. I spend so much time going on about how kids are forced to know their career choices before they want to and how we're forced into privaye schools and looking good for collages, that my CV's literally just gonna read "catcher of small children before they fall over a cliff". SIGH.) I don't know why the last paragrapjh led to this, but it did. Private schools aren't even worth that much. If you're smart you're smart, wherever you go, and you'll get into a good college. Public schools suck, but private schools are just expensive, elitist, overrated public schools. I don't see the big deal. The ordeal makes me sad.

The science project is worst of all. My three partners need to keep their egos in check. Yesterday we were planning to meet up in the science room before school. The male person in our group was all too fast to declare that he'd have NO problem WHATSOEVER with showing up before school. So I show up and there are the other towo people. Okay. He never shows up. Is he such a narcissist that he literally thinks he's too good for the person he was yesterday? Is that the extent of his arrogance? Because it's pathetic. The other two girls in my group got to cleaning out their turtle tank which flooded and was then having a sort of lettuce overload, and thenpone of their boyfriends came(who is perfectly boring. I'd never seen him in real life before). Mornings on G days are usually reserved for sitting alone in the health room listening to music that I'm too embarassed to listen to at times when I'm with people who might hear and recognise the song. It's a valuable part of the day. And I lost that because of someone else's overly high self esteem. I was not very happy. And I'm not very happy with writing about glaciers for hours upon hours this weekend.

I really despise homework-heavy weekends. It always feels like I never left school and I have school for a whole fortnight which is awful. I look half-dead right now even though this week wasn't terribly bad.


The snow is melting here really fast. We had an amazing sunset today and I was able to go outside in a sweatshirt to take crappy photos and I wasn't even cold. It was an amazing moment. I cannot wait for spring...I miss wearing shorts even though I shouldn't. and spring music--the Kooks, yeah I'm gonna sink that low. Although Naive is a nice little song in my opinion. But I like Razorlight more. Don't kill me!

I'm not doing Lent but in health I have to give up something for a week. Yeah, like they're really gonna control my life that much. A friend suggested I give up coffee, because I don't drink coffee in the first place. So that's what I'm doing. Health isn't too bad actually, for health, you don't do anything. Health is good because it's not art--any project which is "limited only by your imagination" instantly gets my heart racing. I'm not a creative person. And don't all your artists start telling me that everyone's creative, because that's crap and I know it even if you don't. We're doing op art. I would've thought I could handle this because when I doodle everything's really geometic, I must draw like a hundred triangles every day for no reason to the point of hating triangles. But alas my brain can't even wake up enough for that I so opted for the People Who Aren't Artists choice, which is basically writing my name loads of times and stuff. It's awful, but there we go. I have art three times next week and I really, really don't want to go to school because of it. worst. class. of the day. not joking.

We watched a video about Marco Polo in World Civ for like two days and we didn't even finish it. Crappy movie but lovely timewaster, And Kublai Khan was white in this? Even though every other Asian person was portrayed by an Asian actor? That was really quite strange. Today we started talking about Feudalism--proud to say I don't care and don't know everything about it, though my class expected me to be a master. I wish people would know how much I don't like the royal family. Why do people assume I give my absolte obedience to them? I don't! If you think this then you're just ignorant, and yet this view 'round here is so, so common that it's scary. They don't know anything about the UK. We have real politics and stuff too, guys...it's not all earls and barrons(I don't even know what those are) and such. People in this country seem to be incapable of grasping the completel insignificance of the royal family in the UK. When the stuff about the royal wedding came out, all these womens magazines were gushing over it and I was like "wait, what? who's getting married?". I can give you a pretty good list of the history of the UK's monarchs off the top of my head, but that's my nerdy party trick, that doesn't mean I actually know about the royal family or feudalism or anything like that, god. People think we live in the middle ages, dead serious, and it's pathetic. It's good that my world civ teacher mentioned how the Family are just for ceremonial purposes, but still, some people think we're so backwater. Don't talk to me about your fucking democracy, cause it all comes from English stuff.(which comes from Greek stuff. BUT MY POINT REMAINS.) We're not so oldfashioned. Our political system's fucked up, but any American would tell me in a heartbeat that theirs is too. So just because we were once imperalists and we still have knights, doesn't mean we're behind. it's working okay for us, as it is for Belgium, Denmark, Luzemborg, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and the other reaosnably developed constitutional monarchies, mkay? we're in the same boat whther you'd admit it or not. And also I don't pledge random allegience to my country.


AND while I'm into this orgy of ignorant anti-Americanism, there's this Facebook group that says "Japan gave us sushi, Germany gave us cars, Americans gave us the light bulb, and England...well, England gave us something to laugh at". Fuck you. Don't you know the rest of the world is laughing at you? And I'm sorry for the many decent Americans(and yes, there are many, many of them out there) for having to deal with these ignorant double digit IQ conservative wankers. Surely, you cannot look at what most people see as your culture, and think you come off well? Fast food, crappy TV, religious maniacs, the jury's still out on abortion, the death sentence is okay, homophobia, racism, sexism, gun-owning, ignorance, sensationalism? And that's totally okay, right? That's not totally laughable? We're far, far from perfect in about a billion ways, but this Brit is not claiming to hate an entire country. Not even this hell hole.

(PS, an Englishman invented the lightswitch. Good luck turning your lightbulb on without it, you dick).

(PPS, whenever Germany comes up in conversation for whatever reason, the word Nazi is fast to follow it. I've heard some seriously erroneous beleifs on Germany and Nazi-occupied Germany, and for some reason people seem to hate the country, and yet now they've decided they're awesome for this FB group.)

(PPPS, speaking of Japan, I saw a blog post the other day with these artsy pictures followed by "My heart is with Japan today". Fuck you too, you used a tragedy as an excuse to post Tumblr pictures to your blog, that's vile. Sad thing is, you're not the only one. I'm not claiming to go rushing out there right now to save everyone, or indeed to be taking any action at all. Call me cruel, but you're exactly the same, only difference being I'm honest about it.)

Where did that all come from? Jesus.

English was a nightmare this week--grammar test Wednesday, vocab test thursday, short story test Friday. what planet does my teacher live on? The first two were stresful but basically okay, whereas yesterday's was not a fun experience. It was pretty predictable, but the essay, oh the essay, was something else. First off, we read a story and we're given six literary devices and asked to explain three of them in relation to the story and it's theme. Dull stuff, but to be expected. But the last part, describe how these devices 'place this story in the short story genre'. Okay, hang on, last time I checked, there are two qualifacations to become a short story. One, you must be a story. Two, you must be short. WHAT ELSE IS THERE TO THAT? It has nothing to do with characterization, duh! God. Now she's gonna give me a C because she rambles on and on about how if we miss out a part of the prompt that the world is literally gonna explode, or something, but what was I supposed to write to that? All the other classes are reading Tale of Two Cities and stuff, ugh.

Oh yeah, my cousin's visiting next weekend. He's moved to Chicago in september. It'll be awkward but I don't see my family much, tiny as we are.

I'm being perfectly boring, but all I wanna do is sleep and watch TV and listen to Yann Tiersen. I apologize. But...goodnight.


**Speaking of that, someone in the cagereria the other day had a plastic Tescos bag. A PLASTIC TESCOS BAG. My mind was blown.

baby I was born this way

yes, I am adding to the surplus of Born This Way quotes that have been all over the universe for the past 48 hours. I listened to Born This Way for the 1st time last night, and I was instantly blown away. I like Lady Gaga but usually it takes me a while to really start enjoying her songs, but....WOW this was something else. It came out Friday and it sort of already feels like a classic, y'know? that's astonishing.

this song and my getting lost on Simon Neil's tumblr are probably why I've done no homework and tomorrow will be hell. Biffy clyro are playing to a bunch of fans in Boston tomorrow, only I am too young to be one of them. it's so not fair. luckily, Tim Minchin in less than four months! and, V lineup announced in sixteen days! and stuff like that!

I loooooove Bify Clyro, I just remembered. well I never really forgot but you know I've been listening to too much La Roux and LCD Soundsystem lately too notice. Those two groups do lovely stuff, believe it or not. I can't stop listening to Drunk Girls by LCD Soundsystem. I've known and liked the song since it came out(April) so why I've decided to become particularly attached to it now, I'm not quite sure. My album birthday list is growing fast...and I still haven't listened to all my Christmas stuff yet. I'm bad. I cannot stop listening to Klaxons too--Echoes is quite good. It puts what little I know of Myths of The Near Future to shame. plus, Elbow just released a song a week ago. and, it's taking me way longer to get into it than their for other stuff, but Elbow have been around for almost 15 years and I like every single one of their songs, so I think it's unlikely they'll fail me now. argh, not long until the new album out. everything Guy Garvey does is to die for.

yeah, I didn't mean to start rambling about music tonight.

I'm doing a World Civ project where we have to compare a European renaissance man and an Islanic Empire renaissance man and I actually love it. I have a habit of falling for subjects of projects. I'm comparing Abu Nadr al-Farabi and Nicholas of Cusa. I felt like looking for philosophers that day, I don't really know why. I guess a lot of people were after artists and I wouldn't to do something a little bit different. al-Farabi was pretty awesome, he did more or less everything, wrote hundreds of books, and spoke loads of languages. he was a genius. Nicholas of Cusa was too--he wrote a book called De Docta Ignorantia('Of Learned Ignorance') where he's talking about how knowledge is good but we're all inherently ignorant and the human mind can never fully comprehend the universe and nothing can be totally proven and everything we learn is relative to the simplistic things we already know. He was a Cardinal. He was, by today's standards, an agnostic theist. Also, he had some pantheistic views and his idea of heaven was one of a unison of all good people of all religions. All of this was kind of extraordinary for his time. I really want to buy Of Learned Ignorance now but it's more than likely I won't understand half of what's being said. Hell, some online summaries are even a bit of a stretch for my feeble literary comprehension. Also I want to get into Plato, because both of my renaissance men(and also everyone I came across in research) were kinda obsessed with him, but the same issue of comprehension presents itself. anyway, for all I love this stuff(and really, I do adore it all) it loses its appeal a bit late at night, like tonight, when I still need to research. and I need to type everything up by Monday, ugh, hell.

and an English essay! We have to do some awful essay about comparing heroes in stories we've read. I did my planning really late Thursday so everything I'm gonna write will be even more terrible than usual. on friday the teacher made us write our theses anonymously on the board then she went round and everyone critiqued them. this is something I've seen done before in this school system, and I don't really understand. there's this idea that the moment a name disappears from some work, the writer behind it disappears. in other words, the critics can be complete assholes about whatever's written(teacher included!). For a few theses, some people's reaction was to openly laugh at them. What?! How is that okay?! There's someone in the room who's most likely feeling awful about their writing now, and just because you don't know who that is, does not make them feel any better. I find it quite disgusting, actually. Luckily mine didn't cause laughter, but it was far from good, too. I think the teacher grimaced? Hmm. And I know some of the kids who were being the most cruel about this; they're hardly T S Eliot. this whole experience has put me off this class and this essay, of which I have a first draft due Monday. it's horrible.

and I have to start a health project soon...well, two. 1st one's a time capsule, that's easy and interesting for someone who seems absolutely obsessed with themself, and is. finding a hero in health is more problematic, simply because I don't have any. at least, none that I think would be appropriate for this project. sigh again.

Even though tomorrow's gonna be Homework Hell, I'm gonna see True Grit and I'm so excited.

I've only got one week until February vacation, which will contain the bulk of my celebration of Peter Doherty Appreciation Month(yeah, this is still happening), mainly by watching the Peter Doherty Arena documentary, the music video to Fuck Forever, and that really weird video on YouTube where he's with Amy Winehouse and some day-old baby mice.(the last one's really worth a watch, actually). oh yeah, February is also a bit Radiohead-ish for me, more pop-y and electronic Radiohead though, and I need to get into Kid A nowish.

also, Tokion had better release a new issue now or I am not going to be happy.

anyway, that's about all that's going on for me right, just thought I should write it here...

night

I Never Want to Know of Stars Again

It's true.

I came home from school at like 2:25, 2:30 yesterday, and worked--without Facebook or TV etc.--until 11:15. Oh. My God. AND, I found out a few days ago it's double spaced not single spaced and I was like, oh yeah, thanks Mrs. Teacher, how about putting that on thee rubric next time? And I worked the entire week anyway, completely neglecting everything else, subsequently lowering my science grade a few other percents to the point where I'm .1% away from a B+, not my beloved A- which I've worked so hard for this year. It was one lab, maybe two labs okay, that I completely fucked up on because I'm basically asleep when I'm doing them. And oh yeah I'm sorry my writing isn't legible. I'd rather it be weird looking and slightly eccentric than use that enormous bubbly girly handwriting every female person in the developed world has seem to have adopted for no reason I can find. You could be the smartest person in the school; if you write like that, you look ditsy.

I have a test on Tuesday and I don't understand anything and I really need it to be at least an A- and I've got two graded labs to do, and I'll probably end up, like, wearing sterile gloves and doing ten drafts on one-word sentences, because if I lose even the slightest fraction of a point, I am fucked for good. PHYSICAL SCIENCE, PLEASE END. YOU ARE KILLING ME. IT IS A FRIDAY EVENING AND I AM FOURTEEN YEARS OLD AND YOUR GRADE IS ALL I SEEM TO THINK ABOUT.

Bam, there went my so-called sense of calmness for, like, forever.

Speaking of that, here's an interesting thought, why am I apparently prone to being stereotyped and generalized? And I mean, more than most people it seems, but of course that's a hugely self absorbed thing to suggest, but for today, I will anyway. This week, in particular, this has happened frequently. First in Geometry I'm at my table and I'm not talking, because I don't want to. And really, there's no sizeable reason for any of this. They're talking about something I don't want to talk about or have anything to say about. is that such a crime? Well apparently in this world, yes it is, but actually no it isn't but that's sort of an angry mini-rant in its own right. And then out of the blue someone at my table starts talking about me being quiet. It's partly an English thing. She knows I'm British, she thinks I'm gonna be like Matt Bellamy's personality clone. Oh, how I wish I was. Trust me, I'm not that interesting or whatever, but even if I was, leave me to be quiet. And then my Geometry teacher starts talking about how she wrote in my progress report I'm too quiet. I may be the quietest, but I've also got a 97% in that class(in case you haven't noticed, my brain is 95% numbers right now) so apparently it isn't killing me. People in study and gym call me 'cute' and the way you might call a baby cute and I'm like, why? You don't know me that well. I don't understand it. Someone told a sub-par 'perverted' joke the other day and I think I smiled. They were no Frankie Boyle, but I smiled. And then someone's like "oh, look at Naomi. She's like 'I shouldn't be laughing at this but i am anyway'".

Excuse me, but when did I ever say that or suggest anything to that extent? By not talking? By being quiet? Somehow, that and my sense of humour don't really add up. Do you assume that by my thinking that a lot of jokes I hear are sexist or xenophobic or distasteful or racist or offensive to someone, somewhere? By the way, I do have a sense of humour--and it is frequently quite dark. you don't know that, you don't know what I think. And let me tell you, dark is not necessarily the same as disgusting. It's everyone else who doesn't know that. People in gym are annoying. I'm always the last left in the game because no one wants to get the kid who isn't a threat out, right? So then I keep running the length of the gym in whatever stupid game we were playing, and these girls are like 'look at her, she's so cute'. In Spanish today, which mind you was a total waste of time minus the sweet tea(since when did I like sweet tea?) we spent nearly an hour assigning traits to people. We're comparing people and using the superlative but the whole thing falls flat to gossip after a few minutes. for example, when people aren't there, we don't get 'he is the funniest in the class' and 'she is the prettiest in the class'. No, we are as inhibited as to say 'he's the most childish in the class' and 'she's the most freakishly skinny in the class'. And the teacher doesn't do a damn thing, you just stand there being examined head to toe and in your brain, not that they know what goes on in there. I eventually got 'she has the best accent in the class'. I'm trying to work out whether that's better than Naomi You're So Quiet, but this really is another matter, so I'm stopping that.

This whole thing does lower you as a person as a tiny bit. I guess it happens to everyone, but if you're ever so slightly off to one side of the imaginary bell curve of normality, people think they know the inner workings of your brain. Or is it me? if so, why? Is it a physical thing? My being awkward? My not wanting to run? Just being...not as talkative as is maybe within social convention? It happens and I hate it. But tell me the answer, because I really, really want to know.

I never thought in a free country one would have to make a sort of liberal bullshit-ridden 'stand' about how much they speak, but if I have to, I will; Introverted And Proud. Hardly a complicated thing to discuss, anything but, yet apparently we have to. Separate your minds and your mouths and let others do the same. and don't boast about how not to judge people while simultaneously judging the quiet kid. that's just nonsense.

This wasn't supposed to be a rant post, I haven't gotten a chance to write all week. I'm exhausted, by my standards, and am going through a Friday Night rampage of fashion blogs, David Mitchell clips on YouTube, Sweeney Todd, men's clothes in Sweeney Todd(honestly my favorite period male fashion wise, not that I know a single thing of it. Ditch the too-skinny or too-baggy jeans and baseball caps, boys.), and House of leaves by Mark Danielewski. I haven't read in forever too and it's a breath of fresh air. Marry me, Mr. Danielewski. You and your perfect illustrations of teenage angst and your random half empty pages and your fetish of all things whimsical. Love it.

I think I'm writing like his main character anyway. I'm no grail of coolness in terms of how my blog is, but I'm writing ever so slightly weirder than normal.

also, apparently, I'm so 'normal'. You know, I'm not your fucking parameter for how weird you are. You and your uggs and yoga pants and American Eagle sweaters and your paramore songs on your ipod and your so-called hilarity and your hoards of friends and your normality. yes, it is certainly logical for you to be the weird one in this situation. because you talk more. which is normal. MAKES SO MUCH SENSE, YOU KNOW?

I tend not to have a problem with most of the above list, other than it's sorta boring, but don't claim to be God Of Diversity because of it, kay?

I think my mom thinks I'm going to have an aneurysm because of my homework, or something, so she wants to go out of her way to make this weekend relaxing. I made cookies after school and I'm gonna look for more Christmas sheet music tomorrow. I'm seeing Weezer on Tuesday. Christmas in 15 days. Hey remember when I hated winter and didn't want it to snow yet? Haha, yeah...*blushes* I'd die without my white Christmas, and it had better hurry up, like, now.

Since this is a hate post, let me add something; thing I hate #286. Fake Christmas Trees. Oh my God we don't live in Mexico, it's fairly simple to go out and buy a tree. And yes it'll go off. That's why you're not supposed to put it up the day after Thanksgiving. These are the same people who meticulously clean leaves off their lawns the first day of october. you people depress me. live a little. ironically listen to Mud and sing even though you can't. contradict yourself fairly regularly.

what am I talking about?

I'm not even trying to be all allovertheplace indie. I'm not. That is why these posts are so long.

At risk of turning away anyone else at the endless list of slightly irritating things I've written about, I'm going to leave and watch Buzzcocks. Good day.

Dude, I have a science project.

Hey.



I should be doing homework right now. I've a ton of science homework this weekend--we were supposed to have none so we could work on our project(which--shit--I need to actually work on, like, now, to get a first drat together by Friday) but then she's like, oh hey here's an ENTIRE LAB for you to do for Monday. And I'm like, oh dear, because I am gonna fail this project and I NEED a good grade because my test/quiz grade, which is a big part of the overall grade, is only an 88% and I need like a 90%-ish. And the project is huge and I haven't even researched enough and I just realised the whole thing is such a mess.


Also, there's no way to change the massive title picture a far as I currently know. So live with it. Because I'm not an artist and it's the best blog design I've ever done. Although what with all the tinkering around with the layout, that wasted up an enormous chunk of my weekend. You know what I should have done? RESEARCHED STARS. But no, I really needed to meticulously study every shade of gray Blogger has to offer for text for fifteen minutes. That's totally a good use of time.



Did you hear about Peter? Like, it was crack this time. I'm sorry Peter. there's so many cheap jokes bloggers like to use about you, when actually you're a lot smarter, creative, and interesting than the rest o them. So I won't do that. BUT, it's a shame, because I've been randomly itching for some more 'Shambles stuff lately. Also, his jewelry line! Heard about that. Albion Trinkery. I like it. I like unisex jewelry. And his whole Albion shtick. And he's such a male model. It's Peter so it's a bit messy but nonetheless I like it.

This weekend is basically me watching Shooting tars, eating Pot Noodle, doing homework, and getting bored. Oh, have you seen the Tim Minchin Buzzcocks episode yet? It was love times ten. Noel and Paloma are so adorable. And so is Tim, but that much was already known. When tim and Paloma got on the table and danced to Too Many Broken Hearts for like fifteen seconds, I was an explosion of emotions. Everything between "Tim, you are fantastic" and "Paloma, I wish I was you", all the Ural things. and then was Noel's ramble about Tim moving in on his wife, and Noel calling Tim a Goat in A Waistcoat. Wonderful. And, amazing moment, when Paloma was like 'Chris martin's a scientologist" and Tim says "Really?" and Paloma says "No". I died laughing. Classic Buzzcocks, Tim's a genius, and everything else in this series so far doesn't even come close to this episode.

The new Peep Show isn't up yet. I really wanna know about superhans' new band, Man Feelings. And the baby! It seems the baby won't be in the series that much, but nonetheless, a baby's a baby. And a Mark Corrigan baby is bound to be super amazing.

I love Christmas music. I can play a few songs on piano, but I'm gonna get some more stuff soon. My favorite one is Silent night, no question. I enjoy the classics.

Oh, yesterday I bought a little kinda lizard snake mythical statue thing. Tiny but adorable, and rather gothic in a kinda toned down way. I love it and thought it might be worth mentioning in a really pointless sort of way.

Spanish fashion how was possibly the worst experience of the year to date. I hated what I was wearing, everyone stared, everyone laughed, and some girl made me put on fucking millions of neon bracelets that made the whole experience just gruesome. We modelled, and I couldn't do anything so I walked and didn't even point to my clothing. Part of it was me having a heartbeat like a jackhammer that stopped most normal functions, another part was that I really dislike my airhead of a teacher. Apparently we are getting graded on our 'modelling skills'. Excuse me? Our modelling skils? you mean, those which are completely disconnected from SPANISH? Oh yeah, those, that makes since. Give me a D, I don't care, I'd rather get a D and have the grace of a hamster and speak Spanish, than get an A for being Kate Moss and not know how to construct a single sentence in Spanish, and anyone who thinks otherwise is frankly downright moronic. Including her. I like this semester, but this class is the cornerstone of all my rare unhappiness about it.

That and oh yeah, STARS. And a partner who doesn't check his e-mail or write notes or do anything. Or me, who apparently does nothing either. Oh dear, this whole horrible mess.

Since this whole thing basically ties back to superstressnovas, I'll leave you with some pseudo post-apocalyptic space stuff.




Yay.