Well, now that I've finally accepted that Guernsey is where I shall spend most of my time for at least another 18 months I am being faced with the issue of deciding where I'd like to go when I do finally escape. I had an interview with the school careers advisor the other day and he gave me countless pieces of paper telling me what grades and UCAS points I need to get in order to go to a whole range of institutions - I got lists of universities for french and/or english degrees with varying requirements, ranging from 360 points down to 80 points - I hope to get more points than that.
I guess you know all about these dreaded points so I'll not list the grade boundaries for each point range or anything, right now I'm predicted AABB for my final A Level grades - how they can tell that with another 18 months to go I don't know, also I plan to drop one subject so I'll only end up with three complete A Levels and one AS Level. If I were to get ABB at the end of year 13 then that would leave me with 320 points, plus a good few extra points from music exams and Young Enterprise exams. However I think the presence of any A grades in that line up is just a little too ambitious - three B grades I would love, but again lets not aim too high...
This Tuesday is the Higher Education fair, whereby about 75 universities come down and set up stalls in our school hall and we get to talk to admission tutors and students, plus collect prospectuses for places that we're interested in - preferably whittled down to a top ten. Taking into account predicted grades I have got a list of 8, with varying entry requirements - to allow for fluctuating final results. These are; Warwick, St Andrews, Exeter, Bath, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Kent and Southampton - although Southampton and Portsmouth would be my insurance, to be honest they're only on the list to keep my parents happy for the moment.
It's a little under three weeks before I go over to France now and I have to admit I'm getting irrationally nervous - I have been to France tonnes of times and I know all the language necessary to make myself understood. I'm staying, along with Eilidh, in a french family and attending a french university for five days - the university will be all morning and in the afternoons we're going to various local places, and Paris for a daytrip. I've never been to Caen but we've been told that it's a nice town by previous participants so I am excited, in fact it's very strange for me to be nervous before going off island - usually I can't wait to get away, as you know.
Within a week of returning from France I will be going off to Barcelona, in Spain, for a trip with much the same format. We'll be staying with a friend in a spanish holiday and attending a language school for non-native speakers in the morning, before going to random local places in the afternoons and out in the evenings. The parental consent form was pretty funny - it had in bold letters that alcohol would be offered to us by the host families (this is in France and Spain) and also would be available if we went out. It was however stressed that we were not to sit in cafés and bars and simply sit drinking. Not that I will be anyway, but I still thought that it was funny.
These two trips will be followed by the easter break, which I will have to probably work for most of - which is a pain because I had hoped to get away by myself before summer. We (year 12) will then return to school for a further two weeks before going on study leave for a month before returning back to lessons for a month before the summer holiday. Why the fuck am I telling you my plan for the coming months? Sorry.
I haven't written a really good, long post for ages - I think that's why I started this one, with the intention of getting a good idea and just writing and writing for ages, but I don't seem to be able to do that. I'm in a bit of a writing crisis at the moment because I haven't written anything for the whole of February and each new thing I start, I hate. Just the first line of a poem at the moment, if I write it and read it then I hate it and screw it up - my bin is absolutely full with one sentences written on little bits of paper. I can't write any more of my book because I'm scared of ruining the few thousand words I have already, even this non-fiction post is going downhill and I think now might be a good time to transfer it to memory stick and possibly post it a school tomorrow.
Hope you're all ok
xxx
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Good girls are just bad girls that never get caught
I am indeed real.
Glasgow was awesome, really really awesome. Was great meeting up with Chloe, Davey, Conor and Keir properly - ie without my dad, and with Gordon for the very first time.
We went to open class coffee shops, we walked around the Botanic Gardens, we went to an Art Gallery and Gordon and I went to a big tower thing which was really cool - and sparkly in the roof. We also went to the Cinema and I wandered around other bits of the city when Gordon had gone back to Uni.
I had all sorts to write but I'm feeling deflated at the thought of being home - I shall write more later. This is really just to say thank you to everyone I met, I had a really great time - and to Keir for the loan of his amazing floor, I hope Lisa didn't mind too much.
The fact that it was raining as I walked to the bus station yesterday morning was a sign I feel, the weather was good for the rest of the week and maybe the sky was crying because I miss Scotland, and Irn Bru.
Ugh, that was terrible sounding.
xxx
Glasgow was awesome, really really awesome. Was great meeting up with Chloe, Davey, Conor and Keir properly - ie without my dad, and with Gordon for the very first time.
We went to open class coffee shops, we walked around the Botanic Gardens, we went to an Art Gallery and Gordon and I went to a big tower thing which was really cool - and sparkly in the roof. We also went to the Cinema and I wandered around other bits of the city when Gordon had gone back to Uni.
I had all sorts to write but I'm feeling deflated at the thought of being home - I shall write more later. This is really just to say thank you to everyone I met, I had a really great time - and to Keir for the loan of his amazing floor, I hope Lisa didn't mind too much.
The fact that it was raining as I walked to the bus station yesterday morning was a sign I feel, the weather was good for the rest of the week and maybe the sky was crying because I miss Scotland, and Irn Bru.
Ugh, that was terrible sounding.
xxx
Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Rucksacks
What on earth possessed the rucksackmakers to make a 30l rucksack?
Now if you ask me, a proper rucksack should be at least 75l - don't you think? Mine was in fact just that, 75l - and I loved it like a member of my family. I am a big believer in forgiveness but I don't expect I shall ever forgive Rach for leaving it in Nottingham.
I have been forced to borrow a tiny little 30l which quite frankly is smaller than some of the year 7's school bags. I don't think this is right - although I am of course grateful to Eilidh for lending me it, then again - she's never used the thing.
I consider myself to be quite a light traveller - never bring more than you can comfortably carry is a good motto I think. I've just got a few t-shirts, a few jumpers and I guess two pairs of trousers - plus essentials and bathroom stuff. Nothing that I don't need.
But can I get this damn bag to close properly? Noooooo. Sorry Mr Eurohike but I think you're very silly for passing off a bag of this size as a rucksack.
I intend to write to, uh, the relevant authorities with regards to this matter.
xxx
Now if you ask me, a proper rucksack should be at least 75l - don't you think? Mine was in fact just that, 75l - and I loved it like a member of my family. I am a big believer in forgiveness but I don't expect I shall ever forgive Rach for leaving it in Nottingham.
I have been forced to borrow a tiny little 30l which quite frankly is smaller than some of the year 7's school bags. I don't think this is right - although I am of course grateful to Eilidh for lending me it, then again - she's never used the thing.
I consider myself to be quite a light traveller - never bring more than you can comfortably carry is a good motto I think. I've just got a few t-shirts, a few jumpers and I guess two pairs of trousers - plus essentials and bathroom stuff. Nothing that I don't need.
But can I get this damn bag to close properly? Noooooo. Sorry Mr Eurohike but I think you're very silly for passing off a bag of this size as a rucksack.
I intend to write to, uh, the relevant authorities with regards to this matter.
xxx
Friday, February 10, 2006
Picnic
Very, very odd poem here. It looks a bit muddled up and round the wrong way to me, but hey - maybe you can suggest what to do with it. Maybe there's not one good line, I don't know.
The rose has a thousand thorns,
One snags on my finger,
I see the liquid seeping out,
The blood drips down from the tip.
We sit down and the grass itches,
Red rashes spread over our legs,
They itch, and we scratch them.
I look up and I stare,
The sky grows dark spots,
Earth begins to swim,
I lose my balance and I'm back on the floor.
Bees flit between our heads,
They land and they sting,
Angry marks upon our arms,
Where nature bites us back.
The drinks are flat,
Our sandwiches are soggy,
Children are screaming,
I want to cry.
Words snag into our soul,
They pull us apart slowly.
We are scratched and scarred,
Gradually the hurt spreads.
Darkness can smother us all at once,
Knock us off course and push us down.
Then some people sting,
An unwelcome encore to our days.
Flattened, washed out and squashed,
No more picnics.
xxx
The rose has a thousand thorns,
One snags on my finger,
I see the liquid seeping out,
The blood drips down from the tip.
We sit down and the grass itches,
Red rashes spread over our legs,
They itch, and we scratch them.
I look up and I stare,
The sky grows dark spots,
Earth begins to swim,
I lose my balance and I'm back on the floor.
Bees flit between our heads,
They land and they sting,
Angry marks upon our arms,
Where nature bites us back.
The drinks are flat,
Our sandwiches are soggy,
Children are screaming,
I want to cry.
Words snag into our soul,
They pull us apart slowly.
We are scratched and scarred,
Gradually the hurt spreads.
Darkness can smother us all at once,
Knock us off course and push us down.
Then some people sting,
An unwelcome encore to our days.
Flattened, washed out and squashed,
No more picnics.
xxx
Monday, February 06, 2006
Tulips
Another new post, before there are any comments on the previous - but oh well. Not at college today and I just watched 'Sylvia' again, so I'm just posting one of her poems - one of my favourites at the moment.
Tulips
The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here.
Look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in
I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly
As the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands.
I am nobody; I have nothing to do with explosions.
I have given my name and my day-clothes up to the nurses
And my history to the anaesthetist and my body to surgeons.
They have propped my head between the pillow and the sheet-cuff
Like an eye between two white lids that will not shut.
Stupid pupil, it has to take everything in.
The nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble,
They pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps,
Doing things with their hands, one just the same as another,
So it is impossible to tell how many there are.
My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water
Tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently.
They bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep.
Now I have lost myself I am sick of baggage -
My patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox,
My husband and child smiling out of the family photo;
Their smiles catch onto my skin, little smiling hooks.
I have let things slip, a thirty-year-old cargo boat
Stubbornly hanging on to my name and address.
They have swabbed me clear of my loving associations.
Scared and bare on the green plastic-pillowed trolley
I watched my teaset, my bureaus of linen, my books
Sink out of sight, and the water went over my head.
I am a nun now, I have never been so pure.
I didn't want any flowers, I only wanted
To lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.
How free it is, you have no idea how free -
The peacefulness is so big it dazes you,
And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets.
It is what the dead close on, finally; I imagine them
Shutting their mouths on it, like a Communion tablet.
The tulips are too red in the first place, they hurt me.
Even through the gift paper I could hear them breathe
Lightly, through their white swaddlings, like an awful baby.
Their redness talks to my wound, it corresponds.
They are subtle: they seem to float, though they weigh me down,
Upsetting me with their sudden tongues and their colour,
A dozen red lead sinkers round my neck.
Nobody watched me before, now I am watched.
The tulips turn to me, and the window behind me
Where once a day the light slowly widens and slowly thins,
And I see myself, flat, ridiculous, a cut-paper shadow
Between the eye of the sun and the eyes of the tulips,
And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself.
The vivid tulips eat my oxygen.
Before they came the air was calm enough,
Coming and going, breath by breath, without any fuss.
Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise.
Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river
Snags and eddies round a sunken rust-red engine.
They concentrate my attention, that was happy
Playing and resting without committing itself.
The walls, also, seem to be warming themselves.
The tulips should be behind bars like dangerous animals;
They are opening like the mouth of some great African cat,
And I am aware of my heart: it opens and closes
Its bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me.
The water I taste is warm and salt, like the sea,
And comes from a country far away as health.
xxx
Tulips
The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here.
Look how white everything is, how quiet, how snowed-in
I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly
As the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands.
I am nobody; I have nothing to do with explosions.
I have given my name and my day-clothes up to the nurses
And my history to the anaesthetist and my body to surgeons.
They have propped my head between the pillow and the sheet-cuff
Like an eye between two white lids that will not shut.
Stupid pupil, it has to take everything in.
The nurses pass and pass, they are no trouble,
They pass the way gulls pass inland in their white caps,
Doing things with their hands, one just the same as another,
So it is impossible to tell how many there are.
My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as water
Tends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently.
They bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep.
Now I have lost myself I am sick of baggage -
My patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox,
My husband and child smiling out of the family photo;
Their smiles catch onto my skin, little smiling hooks.
I have let things slip, a thirty-year-old cargo boat
Stubbornly hanging on to my name and address.
They have swabbed me clear of my loving associations.
Scared and bare on the green plastic-pillowed trolley
I watched my teaset, my bureaus of linen, my books
Sink out of sight, and the water went over my head.
I am a nun now, I have never been so pure.
I didn't want any flowers, I only wanted
To lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.
How free it is, you have no idea how free -
The peacefulness is so big it dazes you,
And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets.
It is what the dead close on, finally; I imagine them
Shutting their mouths on it, like a Communion tablet.
The tulips are too red in the first place, they hurt me.
Even through the gift paper I could hear them breathe
Lightly, through their white swaddlings, like an awful baby.
Their redness talks to my wound, it corresponds.
They are subtle: they seem to float, though they weigh me down,
Upsetting me with their sudden tongues and their colour,
A dozen red lead sinkers round my neck.
Nobody watched me before, now I am watched.
The tulips turn to me, and the window behind me
Where once a day the light slowly widens and slowly thins,
And I see myself, flat, ridiculous, a cut-paper shadow
Between the eye of the sun and the eyes of the tulips,
And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself.
The vivid tulips eat my oxygen.
Before they came the air was calm enough,
Coming and going, breath by breath, without any fuss.
Then the tulips filled it up like a loud noise.
Now the air snags and eddies round them the way a river
Snags and eddies round a sunken rust-red engine.
They concentrate my attention, that was happy
Playing and resting without committing itself.
The walls, also, seem to be warming themselves.
The tulips should be behind bars like dangerous animals;
They are opening like the mouth of some great African cat,
And I am aware of my heart: it opens and closes
Its bowl of red blooms out of sheer love of me.
The water I taste is warm and salt, like the sea,
And comes from a country far away as health.
xxx
Friday, February 03, 2006
I guess in the end, you start thinking about the beginning
I have had a monumental 'disagreement' with my parents. Let's not go into the finer details but lets just say they are trying to prevent me from doing something which I believe is of benefit to me. Surely if it's going to help me then by extension it's going to help them right? Well apparently not - I must stop 'messing around' and start being the 'perfect daughter I used to be'.
I'm sorry to inform my parents that I never have been perfect, and am now even further away from that unacheivable state. I know that I am a mere 16 years old and I know that sometimes I really do act like an apathetic teenager - but you have to grant me that a lot of the time, I'm not half bad for a mid-teen girl.
According to those so-called 'bringers of wisdom' I am an awful person and the moment and am inflicting my selfish tendencies and 'stupid problems which are non-existent' on most people within a 20-mile radius of myself. So most of Guernsey then.
Now you'd be forgiven for dismissing this as a post-argument rant, but it's more than that - plus that was two days ago. Yes I am still harping on about it. I've not stopped thinking about some things said since that day.
When on earth did the two of them start talking anyway? Last time I knew anything about it they only spoke through lawyers, myself, or loud-hailers in the streets. Next thing I know Dad shows up in the middle of fucking suburbia and stands on one side of the breakfast bar, next to Mum, and I stand on the opposite - not listening to every word yelled at first because usually when he yells he's pissed out of his head and she's suffering with PMT. Not only does he look out of place in stupid suburbia - he should stick to his bloody town house - but if they're going to talk without me knowing, I'd rather it wasn't only to discuss how badly I've turned out.
Which brings me to my title, what the hell went so wrong? I still have a picture of my Mum, my Dad, my first sister and myself - sitting in the garden, smiling and drinking tea (milk in Jemma's case - she was a baby), like nothing was wrong. In fact the bastard had another woman and Mum refused to let him go, refused to admit it - the last family photo I have, is a fucking fake.
Nikita - the Good Student, Consciencious, Popular, Funny, Happy. Well sorry Mum, sorry Dad - that's all a load of shit. I decide what I'm like, if I want a label I'll damn well write it myself.
Thanks all the same
I'm sorry to inform my parents that I never have been perfect, and am now even further away from that unacheivable state. I know that I am a mere 16 years old and I know that sometimes I really do act like an apathetic teenager - but you have to grant me that a lot of the time, I'm not half bad for a mid-teen girl.
According to those so-called 'bringers of wisdom' I am an awful person and the moment and am inflicting my selfish tendencies and 'stupid problems which are non-existent' on most people within a 20-mile radius of myself. So most of Guernsey then.
Now you'd be forgiven for dismissing this as a post-argument rant, but it's more than that - plus that was two days ago. Yes I am still harping on about it. I've not stopped thinking about some things said since that day.
When on earth did the two of them start talking anyway? Last time I knew anything about it they only spoke through lawyers, myself, or loud-hailers in the streets. Next thing I know Dad shows up in the middle of fucking suburbia and stands on one side of the breakfast bar, next to Mum, and I stand on the opposite - not listening to every word yelled at first because usually when he yells he's pissed out of his head and she's suffering with PMT. Not only does he look out of place in stupid suburbia - he should stick to his bloody town house - but if they're going to talk without me knowing, I'd rather it wasn't only to discuss how badly I've turned out.
Which brings me to my title, what the hell went so wrong? I still have a picture of my Mum, my Dad, my first sister and myself - sitting in the garden, smiling and drinking tea (milk in Jemma's case - she was a baby), like nothing was wrong. In fact the bastard had another woman and Mum refused to let him go, refused to admit it - the last family photo I have, is a fucking fake.
Nikita - the Good Student, Consciencious, Popular, Funny, Happy. Well sorry Mum, sorry Dad - that's all a load of shit. I decide what I'm like, if I want a label I'll damn well write it myself.
Thanks all the same
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Respect The Elements
Time for a new post I think, I'm sort of out of the 'swing' of writing posts with any hint of coherency so maybe this one'll help me break back into it - I do have an idea of what I'm going to write, if that's any help. So here it comes, from me - sitting on my bed, in my room, eating Starmix. I don't even like Starmix, after the first three sweeties - I'm having a real junk-food 'thing' lately, I used to be so healthy!
I finally watched the conclusion to this series of Lost last night, I borrowed the tape from someone. I was laying on my sofa at about 1am, with the light off - watching Lost. I have to admit that I had to turn the light on at one point because I got ever so slightly scared, plus I'm not a big fan of the dark. I liked lots of parts in it, but I do have a few favourites.
Like when Claire is sitting and crying, the Korean lady comes over and reassures her that the baby - Aaron - will be brought back, because Charlie said that he would bring him back. I think I was just struck at how the Korean lady put her trust - dare I say faith - in somebody because they said that they'd do something. How often does that happen nowadays? That woman was certain that all would be well because Charlie had said it would be - she hardly knew him. That's an awful lot of belief in humans as a whole don't you think?
Then there was the bit when Sawyer told Michael that he had "the patience of a saint". I think it's an example of what impression your character has on another person, whom you hardly know. Michael probably wouldn't have thought very much of himself at that moment, and in the past, but from an objective point of view Sawyer was able to comment on what he saw.
Finally the bit that made me cry. When Charlie picked up one of those false statuettes of the Virgin Mary - filled with heroin. Now I know that he hasn't taken it yet but he had previously given it up - albeit by force - and to see him with it was just crushing. He'd survived weeks without it but when push came to shove, he had to have it - and that made me very sad. Who knows why.
Apologies if you didn't watch/like Lost - the previous paragraphs will have been slightly pointless to you.
Why on earth was I kidding myself? I don't really have anything to say, nothing in particular. I'm not in the best of moods to write anything factual right now.
I'll write something better later, maybe.
aloha xxx
I finally watched the conclusion to this series of Lost last night, I borrowed the tape from someone. I was laying on my sofa at about 1am, with the light off - watching Lost. I have to admit that I had to turn the light on at one point because I got ever so slightly scared, plus I'm not a big fan of the dark. I liked lots of parts in it, but I do have a few favourites.
Like when Claire is sitting and crying, the Korean lady comes over and reassures her that the baby - Aaron - will be brought back, because Charlie said that he would bring him back. I think I was just struck at how the Korean lady put her trust - dare I say faith - in somebody because they said that they'd do something. How often does that happen nowadays? That woman was certain that all would be well because Charlie had said it would be - she hardly knew him. That's an awful lot of belief in humans as a whole don't you think?
Then there was the bit when Sawyer told Michael that he had "the patience of a saint". I think it's an example of what impression your character has on another person, whom you hardly know. Michael probably wouldn't have thought very much of himself at that moment, and in the past, but from an objective point of view Sawyer was able to comment on what he saw.
Finally the bit that made me cry. When Charlie picked up one of those false statuettes of the Virgin Mary - filled with heroin. Now I know that he hasn't taken it yet but he had previously given it up - albeit by force - and to see him with it was just crushing. He'd survived weeks without it but when push came to shove, he had to have it - and that made me very sad. Who knows why.
Apologies if you didn't watch/like Lost - the previous paragraphs will have been slightly pointless to you.
Why on earth was I kidding myself? I don't really have anything to say, nothing in particular. I'm not in the best of moods to write anything factual right now.
I'll write something better later, maybe.
aloha xxx
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