Well, what is there to say? Los Parentos (I know that is wrong, I don't need to be told, but the RIGHT way of writing it would be nice) have returned from Italy. They bought me a beaded purse, which was nice of them. It is in the shape of a very fat bunch of grapes, with three leaves and then the grapes all below. Unfortunately:
a) I have noticed that in some lights you can see these gold dots in the grapes (they are also outlined in gold), which makes them look like strange, periwinkle-y purple boobs. It's not even funny, just weird.
b) It's actually smaller inside than it looks. I was all excited about it potentially being able to replace my current purse, which has broken a bit, but I don't think it can fit cards, change and keys all at once without some kind of tragic accident.
Yesterday, because I had a bit of real free time for the first time in ages, I spent at least four hours tidying the house in preparation of the parents' return. I actually missed my mum, because living with my lazy-ass brother for four days does that to a girl. I hoovered the back room, the front passage, the downstairs bathroom and the kitchen (twice!). I mopped the kitchen floor. I loaded the dishwasher, cleaned the computer screen and dusted it, tried to clean the keyboard as much as I could, cleaned the mousemat and then the desk that it sits on. I tidied the papers round there too. I cleaned the TV and the glass shelf-thingy which houses the DVD player, Sky box and video (way to make myself sound overprivileged!), and cleaned the fronts of those appliances too. I tidied the area around the TV and cleaned the cabinet that holds our videos. I took the clothes upstairs, sorted and folded them (though there were only four...). I straightened out the sofa and plumped the cushions. I tidied the shoes, put whatever new mail I found in a magnetic clamp, and then stuck that on the fridge. I sorted all the random papers affixed to the fridge so that letters were in the clamp at the top, then random shite, then phone numbers and contact details for people below. I also wiped the surfaces in the kitchen, with spray, tidied the area near the turntable and TV and cleaned the microwave and the two racks and two metal protector thingies that came with it.
I think it is quite clear to see from that lengthy paragraph that I am Superwoman. However, my arse hurts rather a lot now. It feels rather bruised. It was a pretty wearying weekend for me when you consider all I did yesterday, plus the fact that I accidentally got up too early on Saturday (after not getting enough sleep). And after dinner on Saturday, I got really bad stomach pains due to something I'd eaten that was intent on tormenting me. I had to take Rennie Deflatine, for God's sake, and that did help, even though wind was not the problem. Something wanting to exit my stomach pronto - it would seem, preferably through my mouth - was the problem. The pain was making me writhe and sweat for a while, and I may even have prayed. Oh, the shame. Nonetheless, this has only made me more vehement about avoiding left-overs wherever possible, and heating stuff up properly. Laziness - especially when it comes to food - is unforgivable.
I shall end this rather pedestrian rant with a couple of mini-rants. Firstly, I really am not cut out to be studying Seventeenth-Century Literary Culture. Our seminar leader Rose went to Oxford, and can I say, it really shows. She's OK and all, but I just get that sense of slimy slipperiness from her that I always get from those people. I can't explain it at all. They just kind of remind me of lizards - perfectly-trained, smooth, diplomatic, hairless, CREEPY people. It is as if all the personality and individuality in them gets distilled out to make them smooth, efficient analysing machines who know lots of critical jargon but don't really seem to have their own opinions on, or passion for, what they're talking about. Rose was genuinely shocked that people in our class had come from 'such different academic backgrounds.' Steph muttered to me afterwards something about how she was probably shocked we hadn't all read the classics, or something, and I suspect she was right. Need I say any more about the Oxford / Cambridge production line? I'm sure some people must just be thinking I'm jealous and that I'd go like a shot if I had the chance, but in all honesty, even if I could go, I can't imagine staying. I could never be one of those people though, which rules me out. It makes me think of the first issue of The Invisibles, where they say something about being made smooth in their heads and between their legs, or something. It's all very Demon Headmaster.
Might I add that the major cause of my bitterness was getting 62 for a rather labour-intensive essay (trans: I laboured and laboured to make my relatively weak points, and it so showed), only to have what I already knew repeatedly pointed out to me. I pretty much always know what is wrong with my essays, but usually there is a proper reason for it. With this course however, it's because there's NOTHING I can do. I fucking HATE studying stuff that has mountains of criticism on it, it makes me seize up mentally and produce shite essays because my real control over what I say is already so diminished. It's just like Shakespeare last year. Fun to read - crap to write about. Also, the seventeenth century is really boring because - and I can just imagine legions of studious, conservative old farts spitting dust at me for this - it is so far removed from our age now, and me, as to be insensible. If you want to call our age self-obsessed, try looking at them. White men writing English epics about conquest and trying to turn London into a Rome or Athens? Women being publicly invisible? Religion virtually dominating mass culture (don't even try to link it to now, it's not the same.)? Fuck off. At least with Nineteenth-Century American Literature, we get to do people like Kate Chopin, who have more relevance to me and mines, so to speak..
A word on global warming before I go: how the hell can anyone really deny it exists now? I know that Britain's weather has always been capricious (to say the least), but suddenly going from 18-degree heat (well, apparently - I know it got up to 16 at least) and sunshine to 4 degrees this morning and sleet (apparently hail and snow will follow) is insanity. Anyone who thinks that God is sending it to punish us deserves to get sleet down their trousers. Seventeenth-Century and Milton are making me lose my already tremulous (read: virtually non-existent) appetite for God even more. Yes, he's a genius. Yes, Paradise Lost is soooo amazingly dense. So what? He's dead now, and I ain't no Puritan!
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