You Obviously Didn't Hear What I Said

so i just sent an email update around to my contacts, friends and family and people i know who have been supportive of me in various ways during the past few years while i've been living abroad and working on my phd.  it's submitted now, and my viva is in ten days.  yay for that. 

however, everything else in my life is up in the air.  i have no visa currently, because the visa people haven't dealt with my application from back in april.  which means i might not be able to apply for the post-study visa i've been planning on getting forever since i started this program here.  and if i can't do that, then i'll have to go back 'home', which is NOT home anymore.  i. do. not. want. to. go. back.

i detailed both these things in the email, and then asked for people to pray with me, if they are the praying kind.  for peace of mind in the viva, so i don't break down in tears-- crying being my default reaction to any strong emotion, and completely beyond my control to stop.  which could be embarrassing in an academic meeting of that sort.  =S  but also for peace of mind as to what to do in the future-- because i don't have peace about any of my options just now.  if it were just financial, there is only one obvious choice.  if it were just emotional and what i want, there is only one obvious choice.  but it's a mix of those things, and things outside my control.  and i have no peace about any of the options that i can see before me just now.  so i asked for people to pray with me in this. 

so what did some woman i don't even know write back?  my mum apparently forwarded my email to all the people she works with (wonderful.  really. *sarcasm*), and so this woman writes back-- oh yes, i'll be praying for you in the middle of the night when you have your viva (the time difference makes it not a convenient time for most of the people i know in other parts of the world), and then, i quote:

'as for discernment of the future, i think your mama would like you to come home.'

seriously, woman?  did you not just read my email?  it's not home to me now, and i do not want to be there.  i don't give a damn about what my mum would like.  even if i have to move back there, i will NOT be living with or near my mum.  ever.  i love her, but only from a distance.  so i do not care one bit what she wants. 

how does what she wants have any place in my discernment?  it doesn't.  and it shouldn't.  this is my fucking life, and i'm going to make my own fucking choices.  i've spent too damn long having to be and do what my mum expected from me, and i'm not doing it any more.  so either do what i ask, or don't do anything.  bitch.

stupid small-town mentality

i'm flatsitting for a friend in mid-country nowhere, in a very small hamlet.  they have everything you need--fast food, grocery, pharmacy, bank, library... the only problem is the hours.  why is it the pharmacy thinks they can close for two hours in the middle of the day?  i need a prescription filled.  i can't be waiting around to drop it off, and then wait around to pick it up the next day.  i want it now.  but nooooo.  they open for a couple of hours in the morning, and a couple more hours in the afternoon.  how is that helpful?!

the grocery store stays open til 10pm, but they charge an arm and a leg for everything.  more than £2 for a small jar of peanut butter? no plain vanilla ice cream?  shelves empty with no idea when they'll restock?  i guess when they have a captive market they think they can get away with anything. 

and the fast food joint, as well as the restaurants and delivery places, charge more than anywhere else i've been.  captive market again?  perhaps.  in a hamlet that can't possibly be more than 1 mile square, why do they think they can charge £3 and more for delivery?  that's outrageous. 

mostly i'm just frustrated.  it costs too much to get the bus into the next city over (20 minutes, £4.90 return), so i can't even easily go get things cheaper.  or with more variety.  or whatever. 

i hate small towns.

i hope they burn in hell

and that's only a slight exaggeration.

some jerks broke into our flat this week.  the one day i was out, meeting a friend for lunch.  i was gone two hours, and when i got back couldn't get in.  our lock was broken.  we've had trouble with it before, so i thought it was just acting up.  when we finally forced the door, my flatmate and i, we still didn't really see anything amiss.  till i went to check my email, and my laptop was gone.  and the laptop a friend was loaning me so my own laptop doesn't overheat and shut down and lose my thesis.  and the thumb drive with all my work from the past six years.  and my filofax.  and two chequebooks.  and a wallet with us cash and cards.  and my flatmate's broken laptop.  and his camera with all his photos from his last holiday.  and his filofax.  and his gold chain. 

mostly i was angry about losing all my work.  my thesis.  everything but the last draft i'd emailed to my supervisor, because he still had it in email form.  two weeks' of work, completely gone.  six years of random bits and smaller pieces, completely gone.  and i'm supposed to submit in a month, and now i'm totally demoralised and don't want to do anything. 

those assholes.  i hope they get caught.  i hope they get nothing for the stuff they took.  i hope they suffer horribly from painful and humiliating diseases because of the time and energy they stole from me.  bastards.

waste of my time

there's this guy who is in my department at uni.  he was here to do a masters two years ago, was home a year, and now is back to do a phd.  was back.  something. 

anyway.  i've met him twice, i think.  his supervisor is my supervisor.  he's... socially awkward, to put it nicely.

so he's sent me a friend request on facebook this week. 

for the third time. because the other two times, he deleted his account.  and then recreated it.  with a different name.  out of worries of identity theft. 

seriously?!  you're putting things on facebook that will get your credit stolen and stuff?  whatever.

so i'm not sure whether to even bother responding to this friend request or not.  because it's not like i know and like him;  it was just out of common courtesy for being in the same place at the same time.  i don't really want to get to him any better, either. 

and besides.  he'll just delete this account in a month or so, and in a few more months make another, and request my friendship.  again. 

*sigh*

flatmate complaint

i generally really like my flatmate.  but sometimes, i want to say, 'one of these days, k... pow!  to the moon!'

this is one of those days.

k is out of town.  for a week.  which is great for having the flat to myself.  i love that. 

it's not so great when k left all kinds of gross and grody dishes from cooking and stuff, unwashed.  for me to do, i guess.  what a nice gift. 

and also not great when i can't lift the rubbish out of our bin, but less heave it into the big bin outside... especially when k empties the litterboxes in there a couple of times.  that junk is heavy.  so i'm gonna be stuffing in as much rubbish as i can, and leaving the damn bin for k to clear upon return. 

another thing.  leaving laundry clogging up the washer and dryer.  and hanging all over the flat.  when there was a full week to get it done beforehand.  so now, i'm left dealing with k's laundry just so i can deal with mine. 

if i were to leave any of these kinds of things undone while i went away for a week, boy, would i hear about it!  but since it's k's flat, it's just expected that i deal with it.  which is unfair, really.  i pay my rent, and i'm not here to be a maid or slave of any sort. 

it just works out that way most of the time.  grrrr!

flat-block woes

there are six flats in my building.  all of them owned by a different person.  some of them lived in by the owners, many of them just rented.  this makes it very, very hard to get anything done at the 'communal' level. 

like our front door. it's old and filthy and doesn't lock/unlock very well. 

and our intercom system.  it's never worked since i've been here.  so if you buzz me, i can either just let you in and hope you are someone who is supposed to be here... or i ignore you and don't let you in.  because i can't call down to see who it is.  either i can hear you and you can't hear me, or you can hear me and i can't hear you, or (nearly all the time) neither one of us can hear anything.  so if i'm not expecting anyone, don't bother buzzing. 

besides, the buzzer often doesn't even sound up here.  or it gets stuck and just keeps buzzing.  so really, you're better off just texting me to let you in, if you are an actual person i know and like. 

then there's the back garden.  oh my life, this is travesty.  i've been here for nearly six years, and it has never once been tended.  i went down to try and get it sorted so we can hit the pinata tomorrow at my party, but noooo.  it's thigh high in most places, and not with just weeds and grass but with reeds and small trees.  it'll take a bushhog to get it sorted.  and the parts that are just weeds and might be able to be mowed (if the mower i only just found out we have actualy works, which is debatable since it's been sitting in the cupboard in the stairwell for more than five years) is all covered with piles of bracken and branches and vines that were trimmed at some point and just left there.  why bother to cut stuff if you aren't going to move it out of the way?!  and i don't have a car or any way to get rid of it.  i want to be able to use my garden this year... but noooo.  that seems like a losing battle.  hmph. 

maybe i just need to take the initiative and figure out a way to sort some of these.  except the intercom.  that's too dang expensive.  the garden, at least.  and maybe cleaning the front door and the stairway.  am i nice enough to do that?  we'll see, i suppose. 

johnny-come-latey

friend, i am glad you've discovered doctor who and are loving it so far.  in some ways, you are lucky to be coming in with the newest regenerated doctor eleven, because you don't have to deal with the heartbreak of getting to know and love one just to have them change.  and yet, you are totally missing out as well, because that's part of what makes the doctor--his past incarnations, companions, and adventures. 

so don't think that you, the new viewer, are the reason this show keeps going.  and that you are the best because you are fresh to it and discovering baddies and goodies and other things for the first time that we've known for years.  you are not the reason this show keeps going.  i am. 

me and millions of people who have been following the doctor through time and space for all our lives are.  those of us who grew up fearing the daleks and cybermen, who know the quirks and outfits of all eleven, who have gotten every silly pop-culture reference that pops up in random places all the time.  we're the ones who know and love the doctor, and who keep him alive.  us. 

not you.

welcome to the family, though.  just realise that you are the baby, and you have a lot to learn.  and when this doctor finally regenerates, you'll understand a little more.  but until then, enjoy the show and shut your trap.