Day 312 - 31st January 2008

It doesn't look like much, but there it is, the first sign of hail in Lancaster. It's actually quite thick here although you can't really make it out in the picture.

Naturally, I had a shite day, but let's not forget that it's Thursday so I was pretty ready for it. Hail, 70mph winds and rain made for a bad one weather wise; the wind was so strong it was physically painful, well beyond funny.

They've predicted snow tomorrow, yes! I really hope it doesn't turn out to be hail like today though...

Day 311 - 30th January 2008

Wednesday means that nothing really happened again today, what with being a really short day and all...

I've been working most of the day until boredom set in then I started playing on my chair on wheels which was fun for about ten minutes.

It's not been a bad day, just nothing really worth talking about. The birthday balloons are still up, since November, although I turned to my left and the white one was hovering in my face, so the balloon record might soon be over.

I don't know what Thursday will bring, it's usually piss poor so I'll apologise for any misery in advance; on the other hand, it might be a great day, who knows?

Day 310 - 29th January 2008

Oh how I laughed when I saw this guy (could a girl be that stupid?), clamped, parked smack back right up the kerb on the footpath. He must have literally driven straight off the road to get there, hey, why stop at the footpath? Why not drive down onto the football pitches, I hear there's a lot of space in those nets!

I can't believe how bloody stupid anyone can be, no sympathy can be given here I'm afraid. The sign in the window reads "you have parked your car in an undesignated space and it has now been clamped." Well done dumbass.

Anyway, as you can see it is quite close to that white building in the background, which happens to be a four storey residence block. This means that since I last went by, the owner of the fiesta has paid for his bit of choice parking; when I asked some friends as to whether they had seen this or not, they replied, "what? That one covered in eggs and banana skins?" Looks like I took the picture too early.

I don't advocate egging anything, but this guy had it coming; at a £40 a day clamping fee and much biological waste on the bonnet, whoever it is had better get it shifted quick!

Wednesday tomorrow; should be pretty good then...

Day 309 - 28th January 2008

It's probably not a good idea to talk much about today's picture, just to say that the sign reads "Please wash and put away dishes" and the dish pictured below it, covered in mank, belongs to the person who commissioned this particular sign. Anyway, I sort of seized the moment with the camera really, it didn't last long to be fair to the commissioner. Enough said.

Actually, nothing much else happened today, so the signs on the wall are about all there's left to mention. It's great to see trivial issues immortalised through the power of sign; I remember those days without the signs, my goodness those pots didn't half get dirty back then...

Day 308 - 27th January 2008

Boredom has slightly set in over the weekend, so when I finally got fed up of doing real work I thought I'd give making a 3D model a try.

There's a free program called blender which seems to be the one to go for, but believe me; it's not easy at all. After an hour and a half of working off youtube video tutorials, this is my final product.

Not very impressive, I know, and yet I can now see the full potential of this program, and it's endless! If I for some reason suddenly have two weeks to work on one project, then I could do something really good!

I'm going to do some more work now before bed, maybe things will pick up tomorrow and I'll be able to go back to using real pictures again...

Day 307 - 26th January 2008

It's been fairly dull today, a day which even included a slightly desperate attempt to instill some fun by flying my kite in the wind. This was actually quite fun but it is so cold here when there are no clouds!

I suppose there was a great sunset though, which, if you disregard the tyres in the foreground, made for a fairly nice picture of the day.

Tomorrow much work needs to be done, so it will.

Day 306 - 25th January 2008

Well, the cable has arrived and so has an iPod from a friend in America; it's a nano and it's so small I think I could probably swallow it if I'm not careful.

The sun shone again, I've ploughed through all my E-mails and now I'm pissing about with an iPod; what could be better?

Day 305 - 24th January 2008

I could only say that my time as university has only really had one major effect on me so far, and that is that I have slowly but surely grown to despise Thursdays.

It came as a surprise then to find that today we saw the sun in Lancaster for the first time in a month, on a Thursday! Yes, it was bloody freezing but hey, put a jumper on if you're cold!

So what, the charger hasn't turned up and I'm still writing this by hand, I don't care; I'm determined to make this my first good Thursday.

Day 304 - 23rd January 2008

So the laptop has now run completely out of power and I'm writing by hand. I've had nothing to do all day, no work left, no reading; nothing. I watched a film on channel Five in the afternoon, times are at a low. Ugh.

Hopefully the charger cable turns up tomorrow, I'm a bit worried about the inevitable pile of E-mails building up...

Day 303 - 22nd January 2008

The laptop battery is running low, I hope to God the charger turns up tomorrow!

Went out for a great meal, what more can I say; loads actually but I really need to save power!

Day 302 - 21st January 2008

Still not got a charger so I can't type much really; it shat it down so I took a night picture.

Hopefully my battery lasts a few days...

Day 301 - 20th January 2008

Finally, I've been picked up and I'm home after a visit to the hospital and a trip to drop off my brother at school.

I go back to Lancaster tomorrow but I managed to leave my laptop charger in East Anglia, so I'll have to wait for it to be sent back which is slightly irritating.

This does mean that I've got to conserve battery power, so I'm going to stop typing now; I haven't got the power to be quite as scathing as yesterday, probably just as well really!

Day 300 - 19th January 2008

Haddenham, like the rest of East Anglia, always depresses me and yet I should be more grateful towards the place; one day alone provides me with enough anecdotes to last several lifetimes, it's a shame that these are not enough to overcome the spiralling depression to which there is only one cure, departure. For example, this morning we went down to the coffee morning, a Saturday tradition in the village amongst the fifteen residents; good job 'those bloody foreigners' don't come along too though.
Amidst the talk of some developer building a whole new village on the fen and Vic Preston's sudden death (“What happened, he seemed fine on Thursday?” says one, “He's dead” says so-called friend) what treasure did I spot on the hall wall? Surely not? Is it an original? Can it be? Yes! It really is the last supper! Not only that, but it's been tastefully cross-stitched!
Someone, in all their Christian goodness thought it would be a good idea to reproduce a Michaelangelo using the wonders of cross-stitching. Why did I travel to Milan to see the original when there lies such a fine reproduction on the wall here in Cambridgeshire? You know what, I just don't know the answer to that question.
As I sat down a friendly looking fellow sat down next to me, put his hand on my shoulder (bearing in mind we'd never met before) and introduced himself with the line “Fred tells me you like sausages?” I laughed politely, he didn't; how can I even think to smirk in the presence of such a fine food product? Well that was awkward.
Then we went to a family lunch with people I had mostly never met before, apart from the twattiest twatfaced twatmonger I'd met briefly at the diamond wedding party two years ago. I was overjoyed when I knocked on the door and who answered? Why, if it isn't old cousin knobface! Haven't seen you in ages! Wonder why that is? Oh good, I'm so glad you've put your holiday pictures on a DVD to show us all without even asking so that we have to watch from the moment we set foot into your house! What is there not to like? Oh, and what's that? You've put Chris De Burgh on the stereo? Why, that can only make things better of course!
Ooh he's so annoying, he makes me want to be all sarcastic and rude. During the meal I very nearly, quite uncharacteristically, told him to fuck off. It's not something I would ever usually consider doing as I always try to come across as being nice in public but this time I really feel like I missed a great opportunity.
Anyway, the meal went OK even though I was surprised to find it was actually a buffet; some of the younger relatives were more attractive than the rest and yet they managed to retain the boring gene despite not looking quite so inbred as some of the locals. I was surprised to have never met them before, what with being of a similar age and all, I think they're second cousins or something, it's not as if I'll see them again for a while; I never do.
After the meal we moved on to go and see my grandmother in hospital, and she seemed to be on the mend which was good to see. What was not good to see was her being driven close to insanity by the people on her geriatric ward; she seems to be in a room full of people with whom you simply cannot hold a conversation, either that or they've just died, whichever it is it's not very nice...
There's a lot more I could go on about, but I'm getting tired now, I can save details of our fascinating discussion about the price of carrots or the quality of broadcasts on BBC radio Cambridgeshire for another time. So, on day 300, I bid you goodnight.

Day 299 - 18th January 2008

Well, here I am, back in the Fens. I think I have already described the onset of depression felt when entering this area, and getting here always seems to never go too smoothly. Last time I came here was when I came back home from France last summer for results day, and decided to pop down and see the grandparents. That time, there was no driver, clearly no one wanted to drive a train into such a place. This time, the bus took so long I missed the first train and was an hour late! Travelling six and a half hours to an area that shouldn't really exist, both for social and geographical reasons, is never a nice way to spend a weekend.
Anyway, I'm here now so I'd better stop complaining. In my room look what I found, a shitty old TV! At least I managed to get rid of the electric blanket from the bed, it's like being in a slow cooker otherwise. I could actually feel the skin coming off me. Right, tomorrow we're visiting Addenbrookes where my grandmother is right now; rumour has it she's getting better and could be out next week, so watch yourself.

Day 298 - 17th January 2008

AAAAAAAHHHHHH THURSDAY! Today brought me so close to just running for the hills. So I get up at 7am and write a magical 2000 word essay, which goes quite well. Sadly, that was about it.

The computer lab air con broke so everyone was sweating in the middle of winter, the computers having an oven like effect, I had to improvise a talk in my French oral class because no one thought to tell me about it, I started another essay but found I got all the protocol wrong on the first one and it shat down with rain on just the three occasions I decided to go out.

Then, very wet I had to watch a French film which was very clever in that for 90 minutes, you feel like you're living a year of your life in a chair watching some shitty boring 50's French film. Oh how I hate Thursdays. Then it rained on my way back of course, I think I offended some Germans and when I went to make some toast I came back to find that someone had left the toaster on ONE!! Who the hell uses the number one setting on the toaster? The picture you see is the toast after the toasting!

Tomorrow had better be something bloody special. In fact, I'm not sure I'll be online, I'm off down to the grandparents tomorrow evening on the train, but I might be back for Sunday at home where the Internet is. Looks like I'll be spending day 300 in a hospital in Cambridgeshire, life couldn't be better.

Day 297 - 16th January 2008

Wednesday, a day of rest for all; those who don't do sports anyway. I went into town and bought myself a new pen, which I'm happy to say is the same as the old one someone lost for me in France; I was rather fond of it so I got the same model again.

Pens are quite often a dull topic to discuss and this is no different, what can I say? I like the clicking action.

That pretty much sums it up, I did a lot of work today and I've still got a fair but to do before deadlines arrive, but I'm ready for it.

Tomorrow is Thursday, a tragedy on all accounts; it's foreign film night too so I'll be working extra late, oh goodo. Better get off to bed nice and early then.

Day 296 - 15th January 2008

Today's picture is all about the detail. It's raining very hard right now and upon coming back from the shop, I couldn't help but notice that water was coming down from the top of the pipe like a shower and if you look closely enough; you can just about see it flowing out.

Otherwise, nothing much else went on again on this second day of lessons. I can see the flow of work coming my way very soon, although it is manageable at the moment.

Tomorrow is Wednesday, so nothing much will happen again. I am thinking of going into town, but the rain will have to stop first; there's a foot deep puddle outside as I speak!

Wednesday being short but sweet means I have an early start, so it's off to bed with me now.

Day 295 - 14th January 2008

There it is, in almost all its glory; the inflatable chair. A friend of mine sent it to me for Christmas at the uni, but it is a bit tatty. Anyway, the other day I fell over it and burst the arm; it has since undergone huge repairs.

I put the patch on, although there is still a tiny leak; goodness only know where it is. It is fit for use, however I will have to top it up every now and again; actually, probably every day.

It was the first day of lessons again today, and it all went smoothly, I think I even managed to get through an exam pretty unscathed having done no work; I'd forgotten it was on until this morning!

Tomorrow shall be, without much doubt, a Tuesday like many others. It could be dull like today, it might not be; who knows? I'll keep writing though, as the 300th day approaches I hope something good happens, at least something more picture worthy than a broken chair.

Day 294 - 13th January 2008

Aha! I typed 2008 instead of 2007 for the first time this year; apart from on New Year's Day of course. That's hopefully a good sign of things to come, I hope not to make the stupid error again.

The last member of our flat arrived today, other than that nothing happened at all. Nothing. In fact, when I wanted to take a picture, I looked to the ceiling.

Strangely though, on the ceiling were my two birthday balloons given to me way back on my nineteenth in November. I thought helium balloons were meant to go down eventually? This must be some kind of record now I think; who knows, they might last until my twentieth!

We watched Louis Theroux go into a high security prison in the USA for two weeks which made for a really interesting show; I don't think any of us had seen anything like it before. It's a weird life in there, but it made for fascinating viewing.

Lessons start again tomorrow; back to the grindstone and back to bed early.

Day 293 - 12th January 2008

The rest of the flat bar one have arrived; we are so close to having a full set of people now! I do not seem to be able to adapt to the concept of 2008. That's twice now I've had to correct the date because I keep thinking we're in last year still; yesterday I even put December as the month!

I discovered a new game today called 'Guitar Hero'; I didn't fancy going out in the first place, I really didn't once I'd got onto this! So, I stayed in a played for a while with a friend. Again, yet another brilliant game out on the Wii; wireless guitar!

I managed to use the whammy bar and got myself into a suitable rock stance on my knees; I think I'm the next Hendrix.

That was that really, until tomorrow; goodnight.

Day 292 - 11th January 2008

It's now the end of the week of no lessons; just the weekend left and it's all over. Today, nothing much happened, someone broke a keyboard holder on their desk, the picture is of them panicking and fixing it. Also, a few more people turned up in the flat next door, we've got three right now and I think the rest arrive tomorrow.

It's been a fun week despite the work, and I really could spend a lot of time here alone, or with very few people. As it happens, the first night alone before the winter home started was the hardest. I felt lonely like never before, I guess I'd gotten too used to being with friends all the time. To be honest, after the dire holiday in France I was glad to be alone again; especially somewhere I like!

Turns out that the weekend after next I'm taking the train to go and see the grandparents, regardless of whether my grandmother's in hospital or not; would you believe it actually costs less to go a buy a railcard plus a ticket than it does to just buy the ticket on its own! They're doing their best to make rail travel as complicated as possible right now with all this pricing malarkey; what's more, I've got to change twice! Ugh...

Day 291 - 10th January 2008

And then there were three. Another flat member turned up today to brighten things up a bit and two of us discovered we could play against each other on computer tanks.

It's been pretty dull again otherwise, although I can't say it's been a bad day; I'm finally starting to get to the bottom of all my set work.

It's Friday tomorrow; how the week has flown by! I think that most of the flat turn up on Saturday then it's time to get back to work, I hope the rain and bad weather stops before I have start going out all the time...

Day 290 - 9th January 2008

Once again it was a fairly eventless day; I did some work and went back over the picture of the day entries changing the dates to 2008, I still haven't quite got used to the year change...

Someone has turned up from the flat tonight; it was a nice surprise and it's nice to have some company, although I was feeling surprisingly chipper on my own.

It looks like my grandmother is in hospital so I'm not sure about my planned visit down there for the weekend; I'll have to wait and see. I'm looking forward to tomorrow, don't know why though.

Day 289 - 8th January 2008

The fridge smelt a bit funny today, and I noticed that some dippy sod had left half an onion in the bottom drawer; the smell was deeply nauseating but it had to be cleaned.

Aside from that, nothing much happened all day, I haven't seen a soul! That is, until tonight, when the Lancaster weather decided to hit us all guns blazing.

Heavy rain, thunder storms and hail descended upon the campus tonight; the kind of thing you see in films or read about in Dickens novels.

It's been a surprisingly nice day though, I don't feel at all bored or lonely yet; maybe that's all to come...

Day 288 - 7th January 2008

Back to Lancaster at last, although now the real work starts. Nobody has arrived yet from my flat, lessons only start next week; I need to get some work done so I have come early.

I took the Christmas decorations back which was rather sad, time to move on I guess. There's not much more for me to say, so I'm off to bed now.

Day 287 - 6th January 2008

It was my second and last full day at home before I go back to university tomorrow and I suppose I didn't really get much done. We went to Marks and Spencer to find a sports jacket for my brother and whilst he was trying things on I couldn't help but noticed this rather provocatively arranged display; at least someone has a sense of humour after the holiday period.

This evening was the big game on TV; Stoke versus Newcastle in the FA cup. Nobody knew what was going to happen and by some miracle we drew to them 0-0. What's more is that we actually outplayed them and came incredibly close to scoring on several occasions in the second half, I don't know whether to laugh or cry; we've got to play the replay in Newcastle now.

Tomorrow is home time for me and due to unforeseen illnesses I'll be going home on the train, so I'm currently trying to work out how I'm going to take my TV back which I brought down here for the grandparents to use over Christmas along with my massive suitcase...

Day 286 - 5th January 2008

Out with the old and in with the new, despite it being my brother's birthday today I was the one who got the biggest present of all; my new computer arrived today (I wouldn't call it a present, I'm paying for a load of it!).

So here it is, all nice and shiny and new; it took me hours to get rid of all the crap I don't want off it and to install my old stuff again! It's got it all, in fact, I'm not typing right now, I'm actually physically writing!

I could go on, but not everyone is a geek so I'd better not besides, so long as I've got something to write this on; who cares about the spec?

I saw The Simpsons movie today which was funny, it had more of a plot than your average episode; I thought it was good. Anyway, tomorrow the mighty potters face Newcastle in the FA cup and guess what? It's being televised! Oh yeah man, it's been such a long time; I hope to God we don't get our arses kicked. The experts rate our chances highly though, despite being a better side they are at a low point right now and we're doing better than ever; who knows, maybe a giant killing will happen, I just hope it doesn't go to a replay and we have to travel to Newcastle...

Day 285 - 4th January 2008

The time finally came today to go home from France on the train. When we got to the station early this morning in Avignon it was pouring down with rain; the TGV appeared through the mist and on we got towards Paris.

It was an epic journey, we changed in Paris on the metro and had lunch at the eurostar cafe before crossing the channel. When we got into the tunnel itself, we shook hands and I bought a eurostar muffin.

Upon arrival in London we had two hours to burn so we went to Oxford Street and had a look around there; I forgot it was sales time and the place was heaving. We popped into John Lewis and all of a sudden I turned around and what did I see; the set of TV's filmed during the extras Christmas special only the other week, that very scene was there in front of my eyes for real.

We then went home to Stafford on the train; for such a long and exciting journey the picture of the day is rather sad but it is important to note that the trains simply weren't that interesting really; you had to be there.

So, plane or train? Well, the plane is quicker and usually costs less but I was beginning to become seriously fed up with the queueing and the endless security checks. The train ride cost the same as a plane ticket this time (it must be said that it usually quite a lot more expensive) and it took quite a long time (all day) but we barely ever stopped. Yes, there were two passport checks and an X-ray scan on the eurostar, but the total queueing time still only totted up to about five minutes; including the time it took to get a sandwich.

Put frankly, I liked the train more; you get to see some countryside (even though France is quite dull centrally) and you always feel like you're going somewhere, there's no sitting around on runways or faffing around waiting for bags which, short of a robbery, don't get lost on the train either.

Day 284 - 3rd January 2008

The time has come, rather abruptly, for a new computer. On Saturday I'm off to go and buy myself an upgrade and I hope it lasts as long as this one did. The one I currently own, pictured, has lasted me six years without any real trouble; problems have started to creep in now which make it quite hard to use.

The CD drive doesn't work anymore, neither does the floppy disk drive (not that it'll ever be used again), it now takes ten minutes to switch on and sounds like a leaf blower once it's heated up to its running temperature of 120 degrees centigrade; enough to boil water, definitely enough for me.

I was so determined to keep it for as long as possible, but the time has come for change; I feel like I'm actually wasting time waiting for stuff to load and I haven't even started on the huge amount of cables and external machinery required to keep it running, I accidentally unplugged my hard disk drive the other day and everything froze! The truth is that a 15GB hard drive and 128MB RAM just isn't enough anymore to run anything made after 1973.

So this is it, the very last time I'll be using it; I'm leaving it here in France, no point in taking it back really, I'm off home tomorrow and the day after I'll have the new one. Talking of which, I'd better get off to bed; it's a very early start tomorrow to catch the train, I hope they give us life jackets for when we go under the channel...

Day 283 - 2nd January 2008

It's not been a fascinating year so far, although I suppose it's still only two days in (and yes, I did originally put 2007 in the title); I went shopping with my brother, don't get too excited even if you're a girl, it was only food shopping.

For the rest of the time I've been trying to solve the mystery of my left trouser leg, which has mysteriously ripped up the back by just under a foot; I didn't feel it or hear it at all, goodness only knows what happened there.

Days don't get much duller where you rip trousers and talk about it; who knows what could happen tomorrow, maybe I'll rewind some old cassettes, that'll be more interesting.

Day 282 - 1st January 2008

The first day of 2008 was spent on the road for me, driving back to the dry flat lands of Provence; there's not much else to be said here really.

I'm quite saddened by the fact that my holiday feels like it's over despite there being three days to go yet; how many more miserable Christmases can I possibly put up with? I don't have the answer to that question, although I'm sure I'll find out someday.

Anyway, that's enough moaning for a while, I should be setting out my ambitions for the new year I guess; that's all boring though, I don't really have any interesting ambitions left.

Oh it's all so depressing tonight I know, so I'm going to stop now. On a lighter note; Happy New Year everybody!!