Leaf, probably…

My Public Policy text book is drier than cardboard. That’s right drier than cardboard.  That puts it in the same dryness category as dried up salt lakes, and scrub bushes in the heat of an Australian summer. That’s dry.

Luckily for me (and now for you) I have a plan of action for dealing with dry text books.

First off, I aim to have the right supplies. Highlighters, spare paper for jotting (or, you know, doodling pictures) and two or three of my favorite pens. I also find having a small snack handy can make study that much more pleasant. Perhaps a slice of cheese. I could go for some cheese.

Next I find a comfortable place. I can’t study at my desk because the chair makes me squirm, and I always end up slouched way down in my chair with my legs up sprawled across my desk. It’s comfortable at the time, but a few hours of that leaves one hell of a kink in my back.  

Instead I go for one of the sofas in our lounge, or the patch of sunny carpet by the front door. I NEVER attempt to study on my bed. It’s just too comfortable. The next thing I know I’m studying in the bed, then in the bed while lying down, which naturally progresses to me studying in the bed, while lying down, with my eyes closed.

Then I take a deep cleansing breath and open my book. I’m currently chapter two. The very first page of chapter two to be exact. I have two more chapters plus that one to finish by Thursday.

I like to start my readings by highlighting something. Anything at all. This time I highlight the first sentence. Then I underline the words”public policy”.

It’s important for me to do this now because within seconds of starting my reading I have forgotten I even own a highlighter. This way I at least get to use it once a study session, and I don’t feel like such a study dunce when I see other students massively highlighted and annotated readings during group discussions.

I read a few paragraphs before pausing to nibble on cheese and note down my observations so far. When I realise I have absorbed nothing but that chapter heading I go back and re-read, only this time I do it while massaging my aching shoulders and neck.

When re-reading and neck massages get me no further than page two of chapter two I change tactics. I know when something isn’t working, and I’m not scared to admit it.

Taking my cheese slice I place it between chapter six and seven (the public sector, and the judiciary) of my text.

After lightly rubbing the front and back cover of my book with olive oil, and a pinch or two of thyme, I place it into the oven to grill at a medium to high temperature.

When the cheese is melted I like to cut the text into diagonal slices and serve with a side of The Crazy and a glass of wine. Or ten.

I haven’t done a post in list form for a very long time. At least a week anyway. So I thought I’d do one today: 

• I might be going for drinks tonight with Karlie and Leslea. Or I might be going to the gym to work out all alone. Considering how much I enjoy working out on my own (I don’t) I’m leaning a lot towards the drinks.

• This morning, while on the bus, I saw a man stumble out of Mermaids (Wellingtons premier men’s entertainment club.) He grinned blearily at my bus and waved before stumbling down Courtney place. He looked very pleased with himself.

• The other day I had to buy a text book for my POLS course. I hate it when the lecturers prescribe books that they, or the course administrator, have written. And I hate it even more when the text is so very obviously overpriced. $50 for a badly written dry-as-toast book.

• Because I was angry about the book and the spending of hard earned money I went on TradeMe and bid on the equivalent amount of trashy romance novels, and winter clothing. I am a very bad influence on myself.

• Taekwon-Do camp is coming up on the 15th-17th (I think) of August. It’s near Lower Hutt somewhere, and Dad, if you’re reading this, family is allowed to come watch the grading, which I’m fairly sure is on Saturday (16th) morning.

• Last night at TKD they made that same joke about the 6am run and swim in a freezing cold river. I think they might actually be serious.

• I hate running.

• It’s winter here in New Zealand. Winter is cold. 6am in the morning is cold. Rivers are very cold.

• I hate being cold.

• Seriously, I don’t like the cold. I have an electric blanket, two duvets, two blankets, a throw rug, a hot water bottle and many many pairs of flannelette PJ’s. Last night I used them all. Except the electric blanket - I’m scared it’s too old to be safe anymore, and I’ll wake up on fire.

• In that same week of the TKD camp I have a briefing paper (worth15%), a class test (worth25%) and a 2000 word essay (worth 25%) due. I’m thinking I’d better start writing now.

• Also: I’d better start practicing and learning my theory for TKD because my mini-grading is in roughly two weeks. (there will be no grading without first passing the mini-grading.)

• Whoops. I agreed to go out for a drink with the girls before considering the fact that I am so not dressed for it. I am wearing trainers, jeans, a woolly casual Friday jumper, and a very baggy thermal top that I stole off my Mum last weekend. Crap. I need to go shopping.

• I also need to go food shopping. I am down to a packet of pasta, three different types of rice, a jar of pesto, and a jar of garlic aioli. I’ve had pesto and pasta for three nights in a row. It would have been four, but thankfully Louise took pity on me last night and gave me some of her chicken and vegetable pie.

• Who says I’m not domesticated huh? THREE types of rice. Domestic goddesses probably only ever have two at a time. And one of my bags is wholegrain brown rice. That’s very healthy.

• Usually I have brown wholegrain pasta too. Last time I couldn’t find any on the supermarket shelf, so I gave up. Also: It takes five times as long as normal pasta and rice to cook because it’s so much denser. Sometimes I’m just not that patient.

• Ok. I’m never that patient. I eat crunchy pasta and rice 99.9% of the time.

Hm. So that was less of a list and more of a stream of consciousness in list form.

Anyway: Homework.

I’ve just started back at uni, and there seems to be an excess of it. You know me though: I like to share the fun around, so today you have homework: I’d like you to list three things you’ll be doing today. If you don’t have three things, make some up. 

Shannon needs some procrastination material…

Yesterday at Taekwon Do I had to do push ups on my knuckles for the first time ever. On a hard wood floor. Today - I shit you not - my knuckles are black and blue. OUCH. 

Luckily bruises on my hands don’t usually linger too long - as opposed to the ones on my legs that hang around for weeks. 

My marks for last semester came back: I got a B for International Relations, and a B+ for my European politics paper. Monday was my first day back at uni, and I think the papers I’m doing this time are alright. 

They seem a little easier than what I’ve done before - they’ll be covering a lot of old ground, but I choose to look at that as a good thing. I think my average is sitting at about a high B, I’d like to get it up to a B+ at least this semester. 

Finally: This morning I read something on the Internet about bacon. This afternoon my brain went: Bacon. Bacon. I need to do some filing. Bacon. I should probably do a quick milk run. Bacon. Bacon. Phone call. Bacon. Baaaaaccccooooon!

I have bacon on the brain.

Last night I dreamed about sleeping, and having to wake up, and not feeling rested enough. Then I had to wake up, and I didn’t feel rested enough. I think when you reach the point where you’re even dreaming about sleeping, then perhaps it’s time to schedule a few more hours sleep in.

Today I reapplied with study link for a loan for my course costs for Semester 2 and 3, and I picked the courses I will be whining about for the next few months. After a bit of indecisiveness I went with a POLS course about institutions and policy process, and a INTP course about New Zealand in the world. I’m also signing myself up for a 300 level summer paper. The summer paper is a self directed study one, and I have absolutely no idea what it’s about, or what I’m expected to study over the Christmas break.

I have yet to ask my bosses permission for this lot, and it could get a little hairy because of my contract. I’m on an events based contract, and it’s highly likely that I will be losing my job later this year. From where I’m standing that’s not such a bad thing, as I’ve been desperately needing a job change for a while now (see: The Totally Awesome Job Fantasies that began to spring up a few months ago.) It also means I could find a new job with dramatically scaled back hours, and allow myself to finish uni as a full time student.

The only problem is getting my boss to agree to more study during a particularly prickly time of year. Oh well, I guess I’ll see how it goes.

I could always resign if he doesn’t agree (because as previously discussed study tops working on my list of priorities)  the only problem is getting the guts to do it. Once I’m settled into a job it takes a lot to get me to change… I really don’t like upheaval.

Wish me luck…

Despite my assertion that the weekend was going to suck, it didn’t.

I got my exam done, and that pretty much sucked. The rest was pretty awesome.

I went to Leslea’s birthday party on Friday night. She had mini slices on one of those cute three tiered cake things. There was also mudcake from the chocolate cake company, and many cocktails. Has anyone tried Fejoa vodka and Chi, with a squeeze of lime? It’s my new favourite thing. It tastes just like fejoa.

Karlie, Louise and I brought Leslea the Dirty Dancing special anniversary DVD, and the workout DVD. Leslea’s partner, Damon, saw them and wept. With happiness no doubt. I know he’s been dying to do that workout tape for some time now, we’ve just made his dearest dreams come true.

When it came time to leave we realised that I - true to form - had checked the wrong bus timetable. So we walked to Kilbirnie and caught a taxi.

On Saturday Louise, Karlie an I went to the zoo and Karlie photographed anything that moved - and plenty of things that didn’t. She has a new camera, and was super excited about it. You could take a gander at her photos here if you were so inclined…

After that we went for a very late lunch at Kallais in Newtown. It’s a bit dodgy looking on the outside, but the inside is a totally different story. We all ate too much, especially considering we had an early dinner at One Red Dog to go to.

Chris piled us all into his car, and took us out to his place where we met a goat called Buster. Karlie took photos and bonded. Did you know that Karlie daydreams about owning a heard of goats and making goats cheese for a living? No? Well she does.

One Red Dog was good, but then Pizza is always good.

Cats was amazing. I went with Louise, Becks, and Becks’ two flatmates. I got us seats WAY up in the gallery, and off to the side, so we missed all the action in the front right hand corner of the stage. There was enough action on the rest of the stage for me not to give a damn.

I had goose bumps the entire time, it was that great.

Then Louise and I went home and attempted to recreate the magic for Karlie. We would have succeeded too, except Louise wasn’t half as good as me at pretending to be a fat cat. I forgive her though, because she did attempt to sing, and not everyone can be as fabulous as me at this sort of thing. Neither of us attempted to do the splits, and that was probably for the best.

The rest of my weekend was spent eating roast pork, and slaving over the stupid 1000 piece black and white puzzle that I bought from the Salvation Army ages ago. Is anyone out there considering buying a black and white puzzle? Because you shouldn’t. Colours are what make these sorts of things fun. Also… you know… possible.

My POLS class took up residence in the lecture theatre at 10.45am. We settled in for cramming and fretting, and a short wait.

I was feeling quite smug with the amount of revision I managed to cram into 15 minutes until I realised that it was far later than it should have been. The rest of the class was beginning to realise this too. The noise level was quickly rising to an angry hum. 

At 11.20 we sent an envoy of students to the POLS INTP head office, to negotiate a mutually beneficial resolution to the crisis, and a ceasefire on the essay front.

The head of department responded, aggressively, with a take home exam, due Tuesday 11am, and an essay word limit of 1500. Our delegation, aided by the plaintive cries of the natives, bargained him down to 800 and came to a verbal agreement on the deal.

So there goes my weekend.

Wintertime really does showcase Wellington flats at their best. Over what seems like the last two weeks our idyllic Miramar flat has turned into a damp chilly fridge box.

In summer, or during the day - when nobody is home - the sun shines into our lounge and kitchen warming them up through our very big windows and ranch slider. At night the heat escapes though those same windows and we huddle under blankets.

As winter mornings are pretty much unbearable to shower in, we’re been leaving the window in our bathroom shut, and sometimes forgetting to open it again once we’re done. As there is no other form of ventilation, and our bathroom has a heat light, our pristine white walls have bloomed with black mould over the space of a week.

I sprayed exit mould onto the walls this morning, and I’m hoping that’s all that’s required to keep it at bay.

Our washroom will also soon become victim to the mould, as whomever designed it chose not to put in any sort of reliable ventilation and one window that does not open. It does have a door to the back to the house, but you have to be home all day, or very stupid to leave that wide open while the washing machine and drier are going.

And another thing, do you remember when I mentioned my bedroom and it’s linoleum floors? Yes? Good, because those suckers are COLD in the morning. They’re cold in the morning, and the afternoon, and they’re even cold in the evening.

Actually my room doesn’t hold heat at all. Despite only having one very small window. It’s damp, and I’m tempted to keep the dehumidifier in there all day every day. Unfortunately the dehumidifier is upstairs being used to solve the drier/ mouldy bathroom/ condensation-y lounge and kitchen issue.

Does anyone actually have a nice ventilated, dry, well insulated house in Wellington?!

Do they even exist?

In other news I have my POLS exam today. I’m freaking out a wee bit over here, so I think I’m going to sneak out of work early to go over my notes. It’s not like my boss is here anyway…

Yesterday I went shopping and brought a Jersey dress to be worn over pants, and a flowey empire type top. I um-med and ah-hed over them for ages, because although I need something to wear to Leslie’s, and for Mums partners 50th, and for Cats on Saturday I wasn’t quite sure whether they drew all sorts of nasty attention to my tummy. I’m blaming winter fat stores if they make me look bloated and preggers (I’m NOT by the way that’s just where I happen to store all my fat.)

That and the strange skinny mirrors in Farmers. They’re honestly like something from a fun house. One minute you’re wondering if you’ve gained weight from all the shitty exam eating, and the next minute you’re standing in front of the skinny mirrors marvelling at your reality defying tummy and butt.

Perhaps I should break out the nasty black corset I brought on our flat’s last outing to Bras ’N’ Things (nasty in a very good way of course)… How do you guys hide the inevitable winter bulk up?

I feel like I’ve been wrung out. I feel like my insides have been dissected, and weighed, and found wanting.

I feel like I didn’t finish either essay in my 50 minute test. Mostly because I didn’t.

I feel like I should have written more about foreign policy after the Soviet Union became Russia. Two garbled sentences were probably not enough.

I feel like I should know more than I do. Mostly because The only tangible things I can remember right now from this course is the correct spelling of Britain and that the Bay of Pigs was not a fight about Cuban bacon.

In other news: We’re celebrating Leslea’s 23rd birthday this weekend by attending a swanky cocktail party with her.

This Saturday I’m going to see Cats at the Opera House with Becks and Louise, and we’re going to One Red Dogbeforehand for pizza. MMmm good!

And best of all? This Monday is a public holiday!

I finished my essay on Friday at 15 minutes to 11. I got up the hill in record time, handed it in, and promptly forgot about my 11am class. I was too busy hearing ‘Eye of the tiger’ while bouncing around on the 5th floor stairs in the Political Science office.

I wandered out of the building and caught the next bus into town. When I sat down all the tension in my back released. It sounded like a baby T-Rex was munching on my spine.

Then I went and did 3 gym classes in a row, had a bath, and drank a bottle of wine with Ben.

So I have two 50 minute exams coming up, that, to be completely honest with you? I’m not thrilled about.

I also have an essay that I’m moderately interested in writing. It’s on a really interesting subject and the readings for it have been great, however the actual writing of? blah.

It seems I’m always much more interested in writing these essays when they’re still an idea, rather than an activity I have to actually perform.

Loads of people I know are graduating this week notably: Karlie, Louise, and Adey. Ben would have been too, if he wasn’t doing honours this year.

It’s going to take forever before I get to that point. Remind me again why I signed up for all this study and essay and test crap?

I’m kidding I know why I’m here. I just enjoy moaning pitifully about the misfortune it all. It makes me feel like I’m getting my moneys worth out of Study Link.