05 June 2001 - I Hate Jamie -- 05:00 p.m.
Jamie is, as you have probably noticed, the person I hate most in the entire universe. Here are some samples of his annoyingness:
Florence: So you hate all gay people?
Jamie: Yeah, I think they're all dicks.
(everyone on the whole bus turns to stare at him)

Jamie: Your hair is really stupid.
(hitting me where it hurts, obviously. I mean my hair is my pride and joy, I may just have to kill myself.)

Me: I went to primary school with you, I do know how old you are.
Jamie: Shut up or I'll slit your throat.
Laura: How would you reach her throat?
(NB He's a midget)

Jamie: Right, prove that you're so clever, boffin.
Me: Okay....
Jamie: On the pelagogic-
Edward: Periodic?
Jamie: -table, what does So stand for.
Me: Nothing.
Jamie: No, I don't think so, duhh, I got 100% on my test. It's sodium.
Me: Sodium is Na.
Jamie: It's not.
Edward: Yes, it is.
Adam: What's CO₂? Jamie: Water.
Me: Wow, you're right, I am stupid.
Aaaaaaaaargh, as I said.

05 June 2001 - Biology Exam -- 04:56 p.m.
Biology was relatively unhorrible, but I had to completely make up the entire bit about the reflex arc (I didn't know the name so I called it a synaptic loop which doesn't exist).
Tim says that probably top scientists will read my synaptic loop theory and say 'ah! of course! now I understand everything!". I love Tim, he always cheers me up.
English Literature English Language Maths Biology Chemistry Physics French German History Geography Graphics

05 June 2001 - Last one, promise -- 09:43 a.m.
My diary is getting very tall, maybe I'll move again? Next time I can be bothered (while of course occasionally putting things here to keep you on your toes, or whatever the expression is). See, wasn't that worth it.

05 June 2001 - I really should revise -- 09:34 a.m.
...but I can't be bothered.
I have read Karen's diary (link to your left) and left her a private gbook message, just to give her some excitement while she finds her password etc. Also I vaguely looked at Emily's, but I don't think I know any of the people she's talking about so I gave up. I was also just looking at all my old diaries, ah the nostalgia.
My first ever online diary entry:
"Hi! THis is my first diary entry, as you can see. I am exhasuted as yesterday i was on a 25km hike, and i am also suffering from hayfever, so sorry about bad typing. At the moment i am waiting after school, using the internet, before going to the Duke of Edinburgh meeting to have a debrief for the hike. Okay - about me. I'm 15, I'm from Essex (england), and i go to what people insist on calling a school for posh lesbians. it isn't, it's an all-girls selective school. that reallly annoys me, so i often complain. i am called Katy, but my nickname is KatyBob for a very complicated reason. i live with my parents, my 9yo brother Matthew, and my 12yo sister Lisa. oh actually matthew is 10, i forgot. i am in year 10, meaning that in one year i will be taking my gcse's. my friends include laura, charlotte, emily, sara, sam, eli, ruth, loren, karen, meera and emma (aka wagwag). today in german, alina (i can't spell her name) asked for a tissue, and miss d asked who else wanted one, and we ended up getting a 5min break to go to the canteen. i can't be bothered to write anymore, i'll try and remember to write more about my friends next time. hugs KatyBob xxx"
I'm so depressed by my inconsistent capitalisation, that I may have to kill myself.
Inner voice: No! death is a sign of weakness!
Shut up, inner voice. I think that was the inner voice known as Lavinia. Schizophrenic? What makes you think that?
And for consistency, my first received gbook entry:
Hi katy, o, what a fun diary. i could get one, but now i must do maths with the olypic swimmer mr. robbin. urgh. -loren
Oh, nostalgia.
Hang on, I'm too young to be nostalgic. Ah well, nostalgia isn't what it used to be... <g>

05 June 2001 - American adverts -- 09:00 a.m.
or is it commercials? I never can remember. Here is a random link to Karen's diary site. She is called indigo for some reason.
American adverts, yes. I have noticed the following two things about American adverts:
Many of them are dubbed into received pronunciation (which I, as an avid television watcher, find harder to understand than actual Merkian) - presumably so that we can understand them. It just looks like bad lipsynching.
Many of them have the following disclaimer: "sold under several different brand names in the USA". Why? What can possibly be the point of that?
Anyways, as Karen rightly says, why aren't we revising?

05 June 2001 - Pre-Biology -- 08:42 a.m.
Hello, I am in the lovely school IT room and this afternoon I have my biology exam. Joy of ultimate joy, do I hear you say? Anyway, I have oh, nothing to do while the DT exam happens, so I'm just aimlessly doing nothing for a while. I have no email, and no anything else to read. Maybe I can email some relatives and annoy them.
Oh I know, I'll email Mike.
Byebye.

04 June 2001 - Writeup of holiday diary part one -- 05:36 p.m.
Friday 25 May 2001 (11.00 ish)
Today we are going to Southwold, the excuse being that we have to 'test' our new caravan. But it's a good excuse for a few days of minimal revision only (obv. not no revision, I haven't done enough as it is).
We include this year:
Mum (Aunty Rita), Dad (Uncle Bob), Me (Katy Bob), Lisa (Lisa Bob), and Matthew (Matthew Bob) (these 5 known collectively as 'the Bobs'), Julie, Michael and Katie Knights and Julia, Nick and Leila Fairbanks.
I'm on a bus going home after oh, an hour of school. German Writing exam. I had to write a 100 word letter to my German penpal about my job (I did 101) which ended up as total BS, but eh, and an article called '11 years of school - my thoughts.' 150 words (I did 149). So on avg. I hit the word count exactly. I think I did okay, obviously seeing 6 lawnmower men on the way was a good omen (!). Ooh, and I just saw Armageddon Lawnmower again in the Uni.
Today's Lawnmower men:
Death, Famine, Really Cool People (check those sunglasses!), Clothes With Mirrors On, Death of Grass and Armageddon twice. I've still only seen People Covered In Fish once though.
After the exam I walked into town (with PE bag, note) and bought lunch as well as Matthew's bd present, 12 colouring pencils, 12 HB pencils, maths stuff (ruler, protractor, etc.)
Had a bizarre dream about teleporting. Some weird bearded guy called Tho and his friend tried to teleport me and unknown male to a picnic on a cloud, his friend yelled at him and pressed 'Stop Transmission'. This meant we weren't moved, and every other molecule in their body swapped with those of one of the picnicers, whoe sank gracefully to the ground without noticing. And the semitransmission made them glow blue. The clouds were moving particularly fast, I seem to recall. Also, that's the second dream this week where a dream character has asked me where my parents are and I've said 'They've gone to Israel.' Is that significant? It's bloody weird, anyway.

Have to go, I'll finish this typeup later.

04 June 2001 - Exam evilness, day 1 -- 05:35 p.m.
Geography (first exam): Slightly less evil than it could have been. The mapwork question was about the Isle of Arran (?sp). One of the questions was about the distance between two towns - almost everyone I spoke to said it was 6km or thereabouts, but I got (as did Suzannah) 32. I, nerd that I am, looked in an atlas, and I personally think it is closer to 32. But I could be wrong, and besides, it was only a 1 mark question, and it's only geography. The tectonics was about plate margins and volcanoes (I completely made up the case studies bit, except for the name and number of deaths which Ruth said to me just before we went in - Mt St Helens, 57.) For rivers it was hydrographs and formation of gorges, and for coasts it was physical features and formation of spits. Except to fill up space I rambled about tombolos, because they have a better name.
English Literature (only exam): The To Kill A Mockingbird question was really weird, it was about minor characters. Explaining how minor characters were used to convey major themes, or something. The poetry was about feelings of protectiveness in parents, and I wrote about a paragraph. Partly because I hate analysing poetry, and partly because I forgot my hayfever stuff this morning and about halfway through the essay I noticed I was suffocating. Ah well. It's not like I'm taking it to A level.
The day was also slightly marred by the fact that I've developed an irrational fear of my own bones and keep having brief moments of trying to amputate my legs and index fingers. Oh, and I finished reading Zeitgeist. It was very well written, but kind of odd, and the ending was a bit anticlimatic. But eh, who am I to complain.
English Literature English Language Maths Biology Chemistry Physics French German History Geography Graphics
Also, Jamie was on the bus. He claims he's 16, he's left school, and he was at work today. I have several problems believing this:
You can't leave school before the end of year 11, which is the year he'd be in if he was 16 this month.
I went to the same primary school as him and know for a fact he's year 10.
Since he's year 10, the oldest he can possibly be is 15, and maybe even 14.
He's on work experience.
Oh, I hate him! Arrrrrrrrrrgh!
Calm, calm.

04 June 2001 - Things I've been meaning to say -- 05:32 p.m.
The Devil: We have work to do!
Demon: Evil work?
The Devil: No, knitting.
--God, the Devil and Bob.

"I take Neurodin superstrength maxi-ultra-strong extra power painbusters - with added plus!"
--Jack Dee, about chemists.

02 June 2001 - Rhubarb -- 08:05 p.m.
Today Lisa invented rhubarb strudle for dessert. Matthew refused to eat it, as per.
Matthew: I hate rhubarb strudle!
Mum: You've never, ever had it. It doesn't exist, Lisa just made it up.
Matthew: I have! I hate it!
Dad: Look, even I've never had strubarb rhudle.
Mum: I should hope not!
I'm pretending to revise still.

01 June 2001 - Birthday -- 01:46 p.m.
Tis my darling father's birthday, he is old years old (I don't know). Happy birthday to him. We have no wrapping paper so the living room is full of piled up brown paper packages tied up with string (literally). Lala.
Matthew and his annoying friends only managed to wake me up once, much to their disappointment. Transcript:
Matthew etc.: Crash, bang, wallop, etc.
Mum: Would you boys just SHUT UP it's 4 am and I haven't been to sleep yet!
Typically, my darling father didn't even notice. And his alarm went off 3 hours later, so my mum is fairly moody. The scaffolding is being piled up in the front garden as we speak (as I type?) - they have a complicated contraption for getting over the garage, it's fantastic.

30 May 2001 - Fresh Air Quota -- 07:40 p.m.
I went into town, to buy my dad a birthday present (his birthday is Friday). Also, I got something for mum to give him, and something for Matthew to give him. Is my work never done? Oh, and I went to the library, and got a Big Issue, and got the Waterstones magazine.
As days go, fairly productive.
A good quote: "To look more warlike, draw your sword while riding; but be careful not to cut off your horses ear."

29 May 2001 - Fake Revision -- 08:47 p.m.
This is clearly Chemistry revision, can't you just tell?
Just an amusing picture: the littles and Amy are toasting marshmallows on the patio. Over nightlights.
I was complaining a while ago about living in England, and was told that I should be joyous because we invented: cricket, twiglets and the Beatles. Whoop.
I wish for next summer. No more GCSEs, the Discworld convention, the Red Dwarf movie, a new Star Wars episode (probably) and the Matrix sequel. I need a time machine.

28 May 2001 - I have returned. -- 04:05 p.m.
I forget whether I told you - I've been camping with the Knights' and Fairbanks'. It was super excellent and lovely, and also marvellous. I have a long update but it may take about seven thousand years to type up, so I'll do it later.

21 May 2001 - Isn't Study Leave Repetitive? -- 10:53 a.m.
This weekend our house was surrounded by scaffolding (Paul fixing the gutters) in a bizarre futuristic spaceshippy way - we couldn't get out of the front door, and the view from the window was fairly amusing.
And other news - my darling brother has been having more frequent temper tantrums, particularly yesterday when he was inhumanely forced to go for a walk. In the woods. The horror! Plus he's smashed up his bike, so the parents have decided to ban him from having a birthday this year. Obviously talking to him in an understanding voice didn't really work.

17 May 2001 - Just a thought (I have them now and then) -- 12:06 p.m.
Picture the scene. A family consisting of me, my little brother and sister and my parents have just finished eating. Lisa discovers that her father has ginger biscuits. Father says everyone can have one, except Matthew who didn't eat his fish. Matthew thinks this is unfair, so father says anyone over the age of 13 can have one. Matthew is 11. Matthew walks around on tiptoes, also mysteriously making his neck longer.
Mother says 'Oh, he looks just like that tall guy you like, Katy.' Katy is very confused, going through a list of all the tall people she can think of.
Matthew says 'You mean the wicked witch of the west?'
Oh. Ryan Stiles. Speaking of which, I've just seen another WL episode. The TV hoedown, etc. Episode 116, I think. Hilarious.

16 May 2001 - Bored, again -- 12:58 p.m.
Bored, although now with half a French GCSE! Anyway, it wasn't too horrible except for the bit about swimming, which was just bizarre.
Watching Sam B's Red Dwarf video and giggling like a loon. What is a loon, I wonder. It is hard to type round a bowl, hang on while I move it...
They updated!

16 May 2001 - Typed Yesterday -- 12:56 p.m.
Sorry but nothing has happened to day, so here is some stuff that made me laugh instead (all credit to their authors for this entry):
Stupid analogies (from Kim):
"He felt like he was being hunted down like a dog, in a place that hunts dogs, I suppose." (Russ Beland, Springfield)
"The lamp just sat there, like an inanimate object." (Nanci Phillips Sharp, Gaithersburg)
"She grew on him like she was a colony of E.coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef." (Brian Broadus, Charlottesville)
"He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something." (John Kammer, Herndon)
Unix commands (posted to alt.fan.sailor-moon):
$ lost
lost: not found
$ rm God
rm: God nonexistent
% got a light?
No match.
% "How would you rate Reagan's incompetence?
Unmatched ".
% If I had a ( for every $ Congress spent, what would I have?
Too many ('s.
An Easter Egg in RHPS (from eeggs.com):
On the wall beside the control panel in the lab are loosely scrawled chemical formulas. Read the handwriting all the way to the bottom. The formulas morph into a grocery list: "FlOUR, EGGS, BREAD, SUGAR and TWO HYPODERMIC NEEDLES".
An analysis of my name from this site. (comments in italics)
Your first name of Katy has made you a friendly, approachable, and generous person. Generally you are good-natured, though at times you can be blunt and sarcastic. As you are naturally talkative, you find it easy to meet and make friends with many people. oh, definitely... This name inclines you to be sympathetic and generous to those in difficult or unfortunate circumstances. You can be firm, positive, and independent in your own ideas and in reaching your own decisions, yet when it comes to taking action or following things through to completion, you often need encouragement. You respond quickly to kind words or any appreciation shown you. There are artistic, creative abilities in this name that you could express through music or singing, or, in a practical way, through sewing or interior decorating. !! You enjoy freedom from monotony and are stimulated by unexpected opportunities for meeting people, entertaining, or pursuing activities of a carefree nature. In your work, you find it difficult to be neat and orderly. You rarely plan things ahead of time, or follow a routine. Emotion and feeling, the desire to be carefree, friendly, and happy, are the driving forces in your being, rather than shrewdness, ambition, and material success. You could experience headaches yes, or problems with your teeth, ears, eyes yes, or sinuses. Health weaknesses relative to the functioning of the liver could appear. what?
Fairly accurate, apart from the talkative bit. And as for artistic I can barely draw a straight line!
Bizarre French phrases from here:
"Would you stop spitting on me while you're talking!"
"Voulez-vous cesser de me cracher dessus pendant que vous parlez!"
"Reality and you don't get on, do they?"
"Le réalité et toi, vous ne vous entendez pas, n'est-ce pas?"
"You've got a face that would blow off manhole covers"
"T'as une tête a faire sauter les plaques d'egouts!"
This page which I can't be bothered to reproduce.
This was posted to alt.language.artificial by 'Navoznik': "Here's a new and unusual contong (contrived tongue) that may fill the gap in dealing with the coherence-impaired. It's called Logjam and these are its traits and rules:
LETTERS
1. There are 7 consonants: B, F, M, P, V, W, and Y which are pronounced as B, F, M, P, V, W, and Y.
2. There are 12 diphthongs AE, AI, AU, EO, EU, IO, OE, OI, OU, UE, UI, UO, and EIEIO which are pronounced approximately as they would be in 6th century Algonkian.
WORDS
0 1. The allowable standard Logjam word patterns are: CD, CDC, CDCC, CDCD, CDCCD, CDCDCCD, CDCCDC, CDCCDCC, CDCCDCD, DC, DCD, DCCD, DCDC, DCCDCCD, DCDCCDC,DCDCCDCD, and DCDCDCDCDCD (where C = consonant and D = diphthong).
2. The stress may fall on whichever syllable the speaker prefers as long as it's on the 1st, last, or 3rd to the last one if it's at the beginning of a diatribe, and any stressed syllable is held for 2 full beats during which the voice quivers.
3. Nouns are inflected for case, number, and importance to the speaker. (Example: pueweumwai = inside an ordinary satirist [inessive singular inconsequential], oipweumwai = by satirists; my god, keep them away from the children! [instrumental plural earth-shattering])
4. Verbs indicate 1 tense, which can be interpreted as: any time, often sometimes, or pretty much always.
5. Adjectives must agree with their speaker.
6. Logjam vocabulary shall be generated by alcohol and lots of free time."
And no collection of humour would be complete without something from The Spark, so here are my test results.
According to our analysis, you are not currently pregnant. During your life, you'll have: 2 children. Here are some stats about your next one:
Sex: male
Birth weight: 4 lbs. 2 oz.
Length at birth: 6 inches
Chance of mangling birth-defect: 10%
Most likely defect: cleft palate
Mark your calendar or Palm V. You can expect to die on: November 4, 2057 at the age of 72 years old. On that date you will most likely die from:
Cancer (35%)
Electrolysis (16%)
Heart Attack (11%)
Alcoholism (5%)
You are 81% Pure! (Very interesting.)
Greedy Animal! You are... 53% greedy!
In addition, we have determined that for a small bribe of 170 bucks, you'd spread a jar mayonnaise in your underwear and wear it for a month straight. er, no.
Hmmm... You scored a: 29 % on the ass quiz, which is not enough for my full moon.
Congratulations! Based on inflation, taxes, the anticipated world economy, melting icecaps, free love, the global yeast war of 2017, the Canadian depression of 2021, and your personal financial outlook, you can expect to be worth one million dollars at... 40 years old! This is how you'll make (or lose) big bucks during your very eventful life. Match these events on your personal timeline with the graph to see their effects.
2004: Your single "Rooty-Tooty-Booty (freak remix)" goes platinum.
2006: Your directorial debut, Little Rascals: Post-Apocalypse, fails miserably.
2011: Doctors discover that beer makes you richer.
2014: Crotch-less pants prove too casual for casual Fridays. You're fired.
"Hi, I'm Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, noted crap-monger, and star of TV's Melrose Place. I'm also a psychic. Anyway... I predict that your first million dollars will be made in 2022, in the following ways:"
$124,000 begging in the streets.
$243,000 through lucrative nerd-ism, like me, Bill Gates.
$116,000 criminal mischief.
$364,000 working 9 to 5.
$153,000 keeping the money that people drop, jerk."
Congrats! In your life, you'll have sex with 5 people! only 5? stingy meanies.. And you'll first have sex at age 19, in your lover's bed. The info on your 5 future sex partner(s): 2 of them will be female, 3 of them will be male, And you will actually love 3 of them!
You have a 72% chance of dying during sex.
The Test Results Are In! "You are a smooth chick." You have a knack for greatness. For the record,you are: 69% Un-telligent! which is significantly higher than the current average of 60%. Here is the custom report of your personality that led our team of geeks to conclude (with confidence) that you are resourceful and sly woman:
"The subject shows a very high level of intelligence, and her sense of observation is one of her best qualities. Considering this, she shows a lot of potential, but that's only part of the equation. Also, as much as we hate violence, an occasional mauling is one way to solve day-to-day problems like unpleasant coworkers or pesky door-to-door salesmen; she just isn't tough enough, sir, and she avoids any solution that involves violence. Finally, the subject displayed a healthy (better than most net freaks anyway) sense of humor, a down and dirty sense of morality, and a barbaric self-confidence. The balance of these three traits is important; high levels of confidence, medium levels of morality, and a good level of humor make for the strongest individuals."
The results are in. You are certifiably: 38% bitch! which is equal to the worldwide average 38%
The results are in. You are certifiably: 36% bastard! Why am I more bitch than bastard? 20% of which is Tard what? The worldwide average is 44% bastard. The results are in! You are 27% slutty which is actually less than the average, 46%.
Anyway, enough of this entry because it is frankly a load of rubbish.

15 May 2001 - Tradition -- 12:03 p.m.
Does every family have weird traditions, or is it just us? For example, in our backgarden is a light that turns on if you walk past it. If it turns on at night when none of us are outside you have to shout 'cat' as soon as you notice, and the last one to shout... is the loser. Technically it's 'the last one to shout has to buy the drinks' but since we only do it at home, that doesn't make the smallest bit of sense. Weird.

15 May 2001 - Dreaming -- 12:02 p.m.
yet another totally bizarre dream. I was supposed to be studying these people who lived on an island and ate poisonous red frogs, but they turned out to be monkeys so I had to learn to speak monkeyish. And they had really thin arms. And they had some thing about only the babies eating fruit. And they could breath under water for 1 hour at 40 degrees C (that was very important for some reason, they kept telling me that). And they wanted to get to China (except it was called The ShadowLand of Cheila, but it was definitely China). One of them who had a hat and a red/black coat took me swimming under water (they taught me to breath underwater) to a house where some pirates lived until they died mysteriously after drinking lots of alcohol. And then I woke up, and when I went to sleep again I didn't have any more dreams.

14 May 2001 - Study Leave (boring) -- 11:20 a.m.
I had a really bizarre dream - we were on a school trip and I got lost, so a giant dog was taking me back to the coach. I think we were in London, a big city anyway. And the dog wanted me to tell it dog jokes. But I couldn't remember anyway. And then Kermit the Frog came and we iceskated all the way to a really small hall with wood floors where my class were all iceskating, and on the way we were singing and it ended in the carpark (the song, that is). And I kept nearly falling over when I was iceskating with my class, but not with Kermit.
I wonder what that means?

13 May 2001 - The Parents Have Returned -- 08:23 p.m.
As the title says, they're back from their weekend caravanning break with many a witty sandmartin anecdote (oh the joy).
I have an email from Susanne! She says it's Muttertag in Germany, and I think it's also Mother's Day in USA. Is it only the UK where it was about 2 months ago?
I think the BAFTAs are on, I'm going to watch them now.

Eurovision Update -- 11:48 a.m.
Any Merkins, and others who don't know of the Eurovision Song Contest, here is an explanation. Apparently it was started to show off that they could do a live broadcast all across Europe (including Israel, for some reason). Mainly you have loony presenters, and then each country sings a song. And then everyone in the countries watching who can be bothered phones in to vote for their favourite song (you can't vote for your own country) and then the winner gets to host the next years. This year the last 8 get relegated.
Amy Lisa and I doodled notes on what we thought, so here they are with original spelling punctuation and abbreviations.
Netherlands: A good singer, not very catchy. Bad dancing.
Iceland: Quite good singer, quite cute & sexy, dodgy dancing, catchy but singer winks and beckons!!! Lots of oohoohoo-oohs.
Bosnia-Herzegovina: Singer seems to think he's sexy, wearing orange! but not. Soulful verses, poppy chorus. Started singing English halfway through! What the hell, crap.
Norway: Boring ballad. Rubbish. Johnny Logan take off. Brains popping out of his head.
Israel: Not English. Secondhand carsalesman. Not v. good, basically (Mr. Pitiful).
Russia: Man version of Davina Maccall! (Amy's spelling!) big mouth, very bad singer. Sounds like a snake (Lisa's view) on drugs, pink snake skin trousers. Wearing a tie round his waist.
Sweden: Abba. 2 girls, red leather. Dance routines. Not too bad but Abba. Goodish.
Lithuania: Oh My God!! 70s outfits, very good! rapping in Lithuanian.
Latvia: is that an accordion? Guy needs English lessons. OMG! so Eurovisiony and said 'wotting' instead of 'voting'. Chorus is okay though without the shouting bits.
Croatia: She's wearing a trouserskirt! Lisa thinks she's heard it before. IMHO unnecessary violiny bits but she can sing. Middling (not awful).
Portugal: In Portugese okayish with annoying jiggly dancing and handwaving. I feel like chicken tonight, tuneless backing singers.
Ireland: Normally they're quite good but he's offkey (they don't want to win it's expensive) and very westlifey. King of chins, okay but not as good as expected.
Spain: Ricky Martin-a-like. If he wasn't slimy he'd be cute and leather legs! Very latin. Lisa thinks he looks like Dominic. Backing dancer is Anthea Turner.
France: sung by a Canadian. Terry Wogan's fave. Amy says looks like Cat Deely? Odd eyebrows. Very angsty but quite nice, she can sing but not tacky enough to win this! First time the French have sung bits in English.
Turkey: Have never won and need to avoid relegation. Matt says Dane Bowers. Very sweet but wearing a white suit and has Matthew Pendle's hair. Dramatic song at the end of a Disney film.
UK: Our intro film is a mime artist! The really little 16 year old annoying rap man in the backgroud. Very Eurovisiony. Her top makes her look fat. Looks like Stephanie someone. Random cellos. Hate the pointless rapping. She hit the last note woohoo!
Slovenia: She's wearing a banana! Looks like Carol on Friends. Can sing but god, the leather! 2 people playing piano at once? Scary eyes. Want to sing 'I will survive' or 'It's raining men'? aerobics people. Terry Wogan says 'The old leather fetishists will have a wonderful time'.
Poland: Background singers are scary nuns! Catchy, backers are irritating and pointless. Makes me want to jig. Singer wearing a dead bear!
German: Ballad but in German so sounds weird. Would sound prettier in English/French but okay. Wearing a blancmange. Not very good singing.
Estonia: Partyparty! Eurovisiony and tacky but good. 'Estonia's Chaz and Dave accompanied by a boyband'.
Malta: Flamenco background dancers. Ricky Martin/Paul Nicholls with big eyebrows. Dancing like Lara Croft on monkeybars.
Greece: Posh Spice has donated hair/clothes for this one (dodgy extensions) Very Eurovisiony and Phoebedance.
Denmark: Catchy but countryish. Matt says Dennis Berkamp (?sp). Bloody annoying.

Anyway, we voted for Lithuania and Estonia, and Estonia won!

more links -- 11:45 a.m.
Origami and Gnomeweb.

Some Total Randomness (doodled at midnight, typed up now) -- 11:29 a.m.
11.47 pm - Eurovision was as entertaining as can be expected. Lengthy update to follow (with explanation for Merkins). Before I forget, it lives here.
I'm just randomly flicking through 'It's your choice 2001' - a booklet we got in careers on Thursday. They seem to be trying to persuade as many people to do A levels as possible, they'll probably end up making it compulsory sooner or later. My school offers loads of A level subjects but not many obscure ones - the closest we get are Classical Civilisations or Philosophy. Not that I want to take anything obscure, it's maths, further maths, physics and French for me.
Not forgetting that my school has compulsory General Studies, which universities don't even count in their points systems.
Another thing they're obsessing about is not skipping meals for revision. We get the picture, dying is not going to help us learn.
On a completely different note, apparently 47.6% of websites are in English. Followed by 9.6% Japanese and 7.6% Chinese. How that must annoy the anti-anglicisation people.
And now, random linkage. If you have a lot of spare time/are being chased b the police, go here. If you're feeling peckish try one of these two sites. If you're really, and I mean really bored then there's always this. If like me you should be revising, you could combine the internet and actual school work in this place. I could go on but my neck kills and I'm tired. (Finished 12.18)

12 May 2001 - Enough of the Philosophy -- 02:23 p.m.
After that attack of deep and meaningful-ness, here is some everyday-life to balance it out. (By the way, it was brought on by receiving a newsletter from Plough.
Yesterday was my last day of compulsory education. We arrived at school, and had our school shirts signed by each other (which continued throughout the day). The only obscenity on mine is Emily's 'lovely arse' signature, I managed to avoid having breasts drawn on me like most others. The thing most likely to confuse my grandchildren (funny how I picture having grandchildren but not children, isn't it? Maybe Lisa's grandchildren) is Sam's comment which included a picture of the Well of Unemployment. A joke from history lessons past.
Mr Griffiths made us do maths for about half the lesson, but noone was really paying attention and he was trying not to laugh at the pictures of breasts. The rest of the lesson was more signing while he went to photograph Mrs Allen's maths class for them.
We then had geography - practically everyone was late, but Mrs Chapman didn't seem particularly bothered. She gave us past exam papers and told us last years grade boundaries (my coursework is actually an A rather than a B!) and then we signed people again. Some people bizarrely drew lipstick and freckles on themselves with permanent marker. In French Meera wrote 'I love 11H..' on my arm, which I had to remove sharpish when I got home as it itched like hell. Mrs Bennet wrote 'bonne chance' on my shirt, and gave us tarte aux pommes and carrot cake. Which was nice. And then we chatted randomly. At lunch we all went into the field and photographed each other, and Laura made the entire year do a giant hokeycokey. But they weren't very good, so just our form did it and then we had a group hug. And, I got my yearbook which is very lovely, and a list of my entire form's email addresses.
Some people did a train thing around the school. At 1.30 we were chucked out, and we (meaning me, Ruth, Eli, Charlotte, Emma, Meera, Laura, Perrie and Sam) walked to Castle Park with loud music. Real life should so have a soundtrack. And I bought a McFlurry on the way.
We sat around in Castle Park doing very little from about 2ish until about half past 5, and eventually most people left. We (same group, minus Perrie Eli and Charlotte) went to McDonalds and then the cinema.
We saw The Mexican, which was hilarious and lovely, except slightly too many people got shot in my personal opinion. Afterwards, I went home because everyone else was going to Hilly Fields to get drunk, and I wouldn't have been able to get home due to the lack of buses, was tired, didn't particularly want to go and wanted to go home.
Frasier was bloody hilarious as well.
Oh, what a perfect day as the song says.

12 May 2001 - Thinking about Religion -- 02:17 p.m.
I'm really jealous of religious people. I wish I was one. The thing is, they seem a lot more certain about what they should be doing. It's not that they always know exactly what to say in every situation, but they do seem to have an overall aim, goal or whatever. My life currently has no direction other than 'don't fail all your exams'.
And they don't seem so worried about death, probably because of their immortal soul theories. I, however, have occasional realisation-of-mortality moments which are fairly similar to panic attacks in my experience. I know religion doesn't solve everything, but it does seem to provide answers to things that people in the 'unsure' category find hard to answer themselves.
What happens after you die?
If you don't believe in a specific deity but live a life that is good overall, do you still get eternally damned or whatever the equivalent is?

10 May 2001 - Sorry, back again. Randomness from my inbox. -- 05:37 p.m.
And first, some quotes from The Adam and Joe Show:
"she would be president of the International Mingers Association" --Baaaddad.
"Mmm...this salad looks healthy. But wait, there's a snickers hiding under it!!" --Joe as 'Lindsay' in People Place.
"The quiz controlled entirely by me, entirely ent ent ent entirely by me the computer. The printer is now online." -- 200%, the quiz show hosted by a suicidal computer.

10 May 2001 - Harry Potter-ing -- 05:30 p.m.
Links courtesy of Krystal's diary.
http://members.fortunecity.com/retrokat/potter/sorthat.htm
I am a Ravenclaw, yaya!
The Wand Shop
"Your wand is eight and one half inches long. It is made from Ebony and a Unicorn Tail Hair. Your wand is nice and springy. It is good for dueling."
Well, how nice.

10 May 2001 - Bookfest Again and Mourning for Purple -- 05:15 p.m.
Both the other books that Amazon decided to send me arrived today (Harry Potter und der Stein der Weiser and a Neal Stephenson one)! Bookfest, again!
Today I had the last ever history lesson (mainly watching videos about Appeasement), the last ever fitness lesson (we played rounders, I lost 2 lives and got no points), the last but one French lesson. That is just the morning. In French I got a question right on the listening practice because it was on So Graham Norton (see, it is educational mother).
And at lunch was interform rounders, but my hayfever was misbehaving so I had to stay in by my self. Oh, and I signed Steph and Nicola's leaving books, and payed for my yearbook.
And Mrs. Hawkins gave us chocolate cake, and also cards.
In the afternoon was my last physics lesson of this year (I'm taking it for A level so at least 2 more years to go!) and the last careers, where Mrs. Ward fed us Celebrations.
Tomorrow because I have nothing to do party-wise, Emma said I could go with them. So, the plan is: