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.

Tim Minchin Concert and Stuff.

mixed week.

Got a really bad headache on Friday so I stayed home from school. Which was good, I suppose, as I had to do a health project that day and I 'd been up late every day that week, and I don't think I could've handled it. I do the whole 'I don't think I could've handled it' routine a lot, I know, but this time it was most accurate.

I'm feeling much better now, particularly after a couple of nights in which I was not forced awake way before what is reasonable or comfortable. While apparently I have a science test on Tuesday, I'm gonna try to have a relaxing weekend. I would to try to care about this damn science test, but I'm almost beyond empathy. So tired. It's very hard to care when it's so nice outside, you know? Damn June. End of the year. I'll try to pull myself together for this science test, than give up and give in to two days of playing Sweeney Todd songs on piano, reading Lolita, watching old Disney movies, and playing Animal Cross(my revived love). Then I'll stay up on Monday as long as I can without the aid of caffeine.

So, I saw Tim Minchin last night. It was....hilight of...well, the year? Is that too wild a thing to say? 'cause it might just be true. I've been a huge(and really, a huge) Tim fan for about a year now. I got into, like, Canvas Bags and Predjudice last June and fell in love with his music and his lyrics and his amazing brain, and now I know and adore absolutely everything he's done. We got into Boston pretty late, and I couldn't bear to miss anything so I just about ran through Boston common and most of the theater area. Turns out we got there in bags of time--the theater, which I'd never been to before, is built like an old fashioned cabaret, tables in the front and waitress service and everything, so their main priority is to sell you as much pre-gig overpriced drinks as they can. Therefore, show starts late. The place is small and luckily his gorgeous grand piano was facing towards me, so I got to be very close up. We waited a while and the venue was very surreal so that's okay, but he came on and I kind of had a sort of moment of huge fangirlishiness. TIM. All big hair and eyemakeup and skinny jeans and NO SHOES. No shoes, everyone, it's amazing! And I was so close to him too. He comes on, plays around with the mic and what have you, and of course there's no one guy who has to scream "I LOVE YOU" and then "I WANNA HAVE YOUR BABIES". And then he opened with Rock & Roll nerd(always brilliant). He gets up, does a bit of dark, explicit humor that kinda is supposed to make you cringe, and he talks about, like, objectification and he's like "What if I got my cock and balls out right, now?" and the same man sort of screams in delight at the idea. He does a statistics joke(<3) THEN he plays his new song called Cont(ext)...I'll spare you the details, it's not on the internet yet but you need the element of surprise if ever you see it. Let me just say, it is very, very funny. Then he plays another new song called Thank You God, which follows the path of his other religion-bashing songs(The Good Book, Ten Foot, etc.) but it's good and it has one verse which is very, very clever. After he asks 'So, is anyone here interested in the game tonight? I mean, probably not...I tend to attract weird nerds, so probably not.." and some guy's like "what game?" and Tim's like "yeah...". then he plays if I Didn't Have You, complete with the famous Tim Wiggle, and I think he did you Grew On Me and then ended with Lullaby. It's hard to judge--he did a lot of standup, which turned out to be very funny, especially a little bit where he's comparing, like, the Quaran and Harry Potter, and it was good, and unlike the songs the standup is kinda hard to remember...bits stick out, yeah, but you can't remember everything. An interval, and then he played Predjudice, Confessions, Storm(' this is about the time of the night where most comedians would relax with something lightweight...so, this is a nine and a half minute jazz beat poem'), the Pope Song, and Darkside. He did a first enchore, with Drowned, and a second with Second Enchore(nach). More standup, too. Darkside's already amazing solo was lengthened a bit and it was even faster and more incredible, and then it kinda merged into Fur Elise for a second and I was like, oh my god, wow, genius. Overall I was blown away with just how good he was last night...I love him, his music, his songs, his everything. Go listen to him, now. I'm sad it's over. xD

Also, the Script on Tuesday. again I have to remind myself why I'm so keen to see this band...this'll be the 3rd time ? and then, um, it'll be four if I see them at V(which is likely). No matter. I'm so excited for V randomly, now. Probably to do with, like, the new Arctic Monkeys album out on Monday, which is supposed to be amazing and that I'm so excited for. Also, new kaiser Chiefs album! I'll be seeing both of those bands at V...also Razorlight, the Wombats, Pendulum for the hell of it, et cetera. V Fest is always the hi light of the year, and I cannot wait.


From a non-school standpoint, there's nothing much else to say this week. I have a science test and a health project due Tuesday, sooo...basically the next two days won't be fun. And finals coming up soon, sarcastic yay.

Finished my art project early this week, basically got a day off then. Then I started to draw my house, gonna paint it in watercolors. When I'm not talking about music to the people at my table, I hate this class.

Nothing new in health, was only there for one class anyway. Can't even remember what happened. Oh yeah, a quiz, and then I was reading the entire time.

Science is evolution, organism populations, and working towards out final project, nothing interesting. We got a review packet for our final(not looking forward to it in the slightest, of course). But since this whole class has just overloaded me with information this semester, this makes it a whole lot more interesting. Test Tuesday, Im scared.

World Civ has not been a whole lot of fun, either. Talking more about slavery and watching a movie(had a sub on Tuesday, woo)and the scientific revolution and stuff, and then on Thursday we had to do this shitty debate, where the class was divided into two and then one side had to side with Locke, and the other with Hobbes. It was shitty, because it's really not the sort of thing you can back up or argue, as both sides are kinda wishy-washy and in my opinion rather outdated and, frankly, inaffective. My teacher's really into debates, though. Plus, he made me talk...I was forced to do the closing statement with some guy I've never talked to before, and it was an embarrassing, humiliating mess, and no one knew anything and I felt like we were just sitting there bastardizing the works of both Hobbes and Locke. What's doubly annoying, is while the teacher is of course obligated to not choose a side, he made very--and I mean very--clear which side he was on, and then basically ridiculed the whole class when we were on the other side. It's a problem with many a history teacher, I've found--really liberal and makes a show of being all open-minded, but secretly they're a liiiiittle bit of a bigot. Sorry all. It was a bit tiring, and we've done this whole to-do before in this class and it only serves to make me a bit annoyed and frustrated the entire time.

English! The essay I was writing turned out to be terrible, my teacher is gonna be severely disappointed. I had a grammar test which turned out to be surprisingly decent. Then we started Romeo & Juliet. I've gotta through the first few chapters r whatever, I guess it's pretty good but I'm honestly not paying anywhere near as much attention to it as I should be. Then we analyzed some poems and talked at lengths about sexual innuendo in the writing, to the point of it being irritating and tiresome, and luckily we aren't doing fishbowl activities yet, we're not being forced to act, and we get to watch some of the movie. It's like my dream read-through of a book. This class is currently good.

The Wednesday and Thursday morning were spent doing state tests. Science tests. Luckily, they were the only ones Im doing this year but, unluckily, it was terrible. Not that they were particularly hard, of course, but its just that for the first time, they actually matter...like, if I'd have gone back in time and told 8th grade me that they'd be up late the night before and got up early on the day to study for state tests, they'd think I'd completely lost my mind. Maybe I have lost my mind,just a little bit? Wait, no, I'm okay...I was at a distinct disadvantage, along with 50% of my grade, because this tested only on physical science stuff. Which I did first semester. Some of which, I haven't looked at since, oh, November. Im sure if I was taking this stuff early in the year, it would have been painfully simple. Alas, I struggled in places because I hadn't done it in so long...I'm sure I did adequately, however.

Since this is a smaller than average post, Ill leave you with a Tim song, okay?



12 days to go.

I'm Tireeeeeed.

Hello,

I'm a little out of it right now. For some reason for the last few days I haven't been too bad getting up for school and going to bed and things. And I don't think I'm jet lagged anymore, I don't feel it anyway. And then two hours ago I just kinda collapsed on the sofa I was so tired and feel asleep for two hours. I know it's very cool as a teenager to have silly sleeping schedules, but I am not liking this. I had so much to do tonight! That's two hours gone! It doesn't even feel like anything at the moment, I have a headache and I'm so exhausted, I dont have a chance to catch up on my reading, start my music blog, watch Peep Show again, go exploring the bands in the pages of the NME, or something. I'm really upset now. I used to love my nine to twelve Internet time followed by one episode of something on TV. But I just don't think I can make it. But what can I do? Ugh.

While day one was great, I've been definitely having a case of Second Album Syndrome with the last two. First off, on the subject of homework, I am most definitely not a happy camper. Monday was pretty bad, Tuesday was something else. I was struggling with math quite a lot at first, and I had to study for Spanish and I had science a little bit, and I needed to go get some more paper(mostly just to get out of the house, admittedly, although I spent most of the time outside the house in a panic). I got into the I'm So Stupid thing which is inconvenient and frustrating while doing homework but also wastes a good amount of time. I literally didn't have time for anything else that day. Maybe like a half hour to an hour online, that's it. There comes a point, surely, where the amount of homework one has becomes not only annoying, but unhealthy, right? If I didn't have time to do anything I liked...that can't be right, can it? How can anyone do this? How does anyone make it through high school alive? The work load is killing me right now.

I have two friends on the bus, and one of them is in my Physical Science, Spanish, and lunch with me. And don't get me wrong I like him, but I'm missing the independence that for me came with middle school in that I wasn't followed around by someone half the day. I've spent so much of the last few days talking to him or someone in the hallway, and frankly it's driving me a bit crazy. I'm excited for this weekend just so I can be to myself at last. Gaaaah. I'll bring my iPod on Tuesday(long weekend, woo). I'm sick of being talked to for the moment. I brought my book in to lunch today. It was worth it. Lunch feels long in high school, but of course it isn't.

OH WAIT. Just so you know, while I like Blogspot, it can be unbearably annoying sometimes. Like last night, where as you recall I was fighting to urge to collapse at my keyboard, I finally wrote out the damn post, and then Blogspot decided to save only to here. Silly Blogspot. Maybe it was a sign--it's 8 in the morning now and it's finally the weekend! Also, I'm not so tired anymore. So hello again!

Anyway I finally found the short route to Geometry yesterday! Finally! I finally understand this place. Classes are same old. Science isn't that interesting but I'm actually keeping up at the moment and geometry isn't that boring for Geometry. Notice how the combination of physical science, geometry, Spanish, and gym is pure, pure evil. I dislike my Spanish class a lot and I don't get to sit where I want anymore but I'm not struggling as much as I thought i would. I had a quiz yesterday on some basic stuff and I didn't do great(hey--no time to study!), but at the same time, I didn't completely fail either. the middle ground is where it's best to be, right?

I've always dreaded gym, because all I've ever known is dreading gym. But the high school gym we have isn't that bad. Mostly because it isn't gym, admittedly, but still. Yesterday we walked round the ropes course they have out there. It's nice that they have such a thing, but no, I will not be using it if I can avoid it. that stuff stresses me. It will not stress me as much as middle school volleyball, but it stresses me nonetheless. Afterwards we played some get to know you games that involved talking to people and that was that. Also, big moment for me, I had my first proper conversation with someone not from my school. okay, so a conversation for me probably isn't a conversation for you, but it was a moment nonetheless. She said her school was full of stupid people and she likes music. Um, kinda sounds exactly like me. She's in my study too. It should be fun.

Earl was supposed to go by where I live. No show! I wanted apocalyptic dramatic weather! Not fair!

Also, what are your opinions on the background? It's my belief that summer is decided by weather not by school so technically it's still summer and I needed something summery. it's either that or the brown one with birds. obviously that'd fit in with the title more, but who knows? The background fits in with how I feel right now--relaxed, summery, happy, happy to be doing nothing whatsoever. Happy happy happy. I've no plans for the weekend yet. Beach maybe. Today I'm probably going out for yet more CDs. FREELANCE WHALES, PLEASE. The question is, will anywhere sell them? I'm guessing no but it's worth a shot. I think my sister will have a friend round too. I just need to get out of the house. I haven't been anywhere for recreation since we got back, and I'm a bit bored.

So until another jumbled, horrendously bad blog post. See ya, world!

- Naomi