Friday Night Questions
I have a few questions on my mind today: -
- Can you actually sleep your life away?
- Can a broke heart actually kill you? (Broken in the sense of unrequited love…)
- Why do things NEVER go the way we planned?
- And extending from that…why do relationships get so freaking messy?
- AND FINALLY, the question plaguing my life so much these past few days (more like years…)… why does the one we love never really love us?
Right well I’m off not to try and write some of my book. Gotta put this pathetic melancholy to good use. Ciao.
Survival of the most lucid
As I write TH is already in a coma from our first early morning start at uni for 2008. I can’t imagine what everyone in the lab is thinking…head down on the desk, headphones on, document of study left abandoned. Sounds more like study week before exam block rather than the second day of semester 1 classes.
So far I have managed to survive. But it is only day two and week one can be extremely misleading. Yesterday I had my first video conference lecture, something that CI are now excited to be doing. It wasn’t too exciting but to think that QUT is stepping up the technology is great. Especially since last year we spent the majority of Journalism lectures waiting for the staff to work out how to operate the software or not being able to do anything on computers because the system crashes at the most inopportune times (usually exams which made the whole assessment process a complete nightmare). Welcome to the School of Creative Writing and Culture studies (although in my opinion those things are two very different areas and you can definately hold the culture studies from my program thanks!).
The most daunting thing about my course change is trying to keep up with all the creative kids. I’m no slouch by any stretch, I pen a couple thousand, if not more, words a week on my book or on little writing snippets. And I’m a creative advertising kid as well. I would even say that I prefer to use my imagination most days over my intelligence. However, now I have classes with insainly talents people. In my lecture yesterday there were actors, photographers, dancers, graphic designers and artists. And little lonely journo drop out me. I feel I was too creative to be a Journo but now not creative enough for a smooth transition into the new world that I find myself in. Oh well, I suppose that’s how things go.
First day back at uni kicked off well with a big drinking weekend for me and my housemates. AS came down friday for some shopping and socialising and we headed out to the Normanby after several rounds of ‘I’ve Never’ with my great housemates and a bunch of mates. AS was so impressed by the Normanby we’ve got her birthday celebrations books there for next weekend. In my usual style, I was well and truly drunk before we left the house at 10pm. All thanks to MM’s incredibly alcoholic ice cocktails of course. After a quick drink at the Normanby, and a couple of fights with MG on the walk there, MG and LP headed off home and the rest of us caught a bus into the city. Our first and only stop was the casino where AS, MM and I had a frozen dacquri while RN blew $120 on the blackjack tables. After a quick game of Deal or No Deal in the second bar, we headed for HJ’s to end the night.
Now the Queen St Mall Hungry Jacks always seems like a great idea. Until you walk in. And until you eat the food. Ewww. Thankfully there wasn’t anyone creepy about this time, and MM was there to protect us anyway, and then we caught a cab home. We grabbed a quick nightcap before all heading off to bed at 2am.
Managed to work though an 8 hour shift on saturday with only 3 hours sleep and then gave AS some terrible directions to get back to the Sunny Coast. The rest of the weekend was filled with work, sleep and increasing anxiety about this week.
However all those things have subsided this week. Sleep is at a happy medium again with my waking hours and uni is back to occupy my mind. Let’s see how much I am enjoying my five days a week at uni by friday huh?
Just a little scared…
Oh God, the mind-numbing fear of starting uni is beginning to set it. It really shouldn’t be, as this is my THIRD year but now that I’ve officially emancipated myself from my journalism dreams and jumped on the writer train, I’m starting to freak out. The best solution at this point in time is to hide myself away from my flatmates and confine my freak out to my own room. Otherwise, I am a little nervous that they will think I’m strange. And I mean, so far the past four weeks have been good and they haven’t picked up on it. I would hate to shatter the household now.
I’m not really sure what’s freaking me out to be honest. I think it has something to do with the fact that now I have no machine to rage against and its just me and the good old folks in the Creative Writing and Advertising schools. For the past two years I have always thought, oh well, at least I don’t really care about wanting to be a journo so it doesn’t really matter if I do well or terrible. Okay, that was a flat out lie to myself. I only really thought that once during my Journalism studies. And that was when I was standing in front of a camera on Ann St while the Cameraman lectured on what the fuck I was doing – because I had no idea myself. And it was at that moment when I realised that I probably looked like I weighed a hundred and 190Kgs in front of camera and was no where near as attractive as the pretty little blondes that were flitting around back in the newsroom, that my career as a writer did not lie within the Journalism category.
I have been saying for ages, in-fact probably comforting myself with the thought, that I would write a book. A novel even. And it wouldn’t been literary noteworthy but it would be my heart and soul on paper and maybe if I got my editing skills into top gear that I could actually get it published. But not that I am looking down the barrel of a creative writing degree I am freaking out. I have to do it now. And those two great plots that I dreamed up in my head seem less significant, less emotional and really rather trivial and crap. And now I realise that wholly fuck, I am actually going to do this. No more talking about it, cry about Journalism and how I’m cut out for much more creative things. I now have to actually be a writer. And that seriously scares the shit out of me.
Sometimes I wish I had just sucked it up and gone, “You know what, being creative is such a waste of a lifetime. Do something useful like engineering, curing medicine or warming orphans.” But then I remember how it feels to sit down and churn out a 9,000 word chapter in a couple of days and look back and go, omg, this actually means something. And it makes me wonder, if I took away the writing and my imagination, I don’t think I would be me. And even though I am extremely neurotic and have a terrible temper, there is one thing in my life that I am proud I can do. And that is put words on paper. And I love it.
(It is also the ability to overuse the word And in a blog. A skill my high school english teacher would kill me for if she ever read.)I’m still sacred and significantly more neurotic, but now that its down on paper, it seems like an entirely natural flaw.
Bad Summer TV finally over
Let me express my relief – finally this week summer programming ceases and we finally get some decent TV! Although I am sad that we have lost Bones (apparently Channel 7 is bonkers and doesn’t recognize the worth of this show, just like when Channel 10 banished Torchwood to a late night TV spot after 4 weeks in primetime!) we’ve managed to gain back the zany antics of Good News Week and picked up a great show in the Women’s Murder Club. I’ll be the first to admit, I was extremely surprised with how good Women’s Murder Club was last night, considering I’m not a very big fan anything written by James Patterson. Tuesday nite’s on 10 are great now with Women’s Murder Club and the fantastically original Burn Notice.
Apart for avid TV watching over the past few days, I have been reading and really taking a break. I need to desperately get back to university before I go insane. I have been on holidays since November and let me tell you there is only so much free time you can fill before you start to go stir crazy.
