Tuesday, April 26, 2005

+Pshhpshht+ Houston, we have a problem +Pssht+

There's something heartening about coming home and being greeted with a flurry of fur whether you've been gone all day or only twenty minutes. It's also nice when you're the only one at home and the little flurry of fur insists on accompanying you everywhere although she's getting too old to jump on the furniture by herself. I really miss my dog.

Getting back to the here and now, London stinks like a dungheap right after it rains and when it's warm. The slowly evaporating puddles release a miasma of stenches that make you wish for the haze back home and torrential rainfall. The colony of pigeons outsides Sainsburys looks happy enough though.

My motivation to study seems to be proprotionate to the proximity of the exams. I need another four weeks after this before I think I'll be properly ready - one week to bum around, and then another three to wish for four more. You know that there's always one bugger that'll use their last wish from a genie to wish for a million more wishes, and I think that'd be me.

The period leading up to the series of papers that'll define your entire academic life is filled with such extreme highs only to be followed by a despairing plunge into the depths of hopelessness. There's the excitement and relief of being able to finish a question on a practice paper, only to realise that you've spent two hours on that one question and in 18 days you'll be expected to finish at least four of those in that time. Thus, the ensuing fall from the stairway to enlightenment.

Two and a half weeks to exams and certain death.

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