Did I ever say an engagement was an elephant, madam?

Perfect. PERFECT. Moar review to come, when I have come all the way down, and decided where the hell to even start. :)

I have a life plan. I've sorted it. It's going to take some doing but I know what I want.

I want a job. Something enough to pay the rent and buy the food.
I want an MA.
I want to live in Sweden. Lund? Stockholm? Malmö? Göteborg? I don't mind. I don't care. So long as I get to live with me best friend, innit. (That's as emotionally open I will ever get on the internet. Understand?)
I want to live in Groningen.
I want to live in the USA.
One day, if I'm good enough, no, I AM good enough, I hope to have a PhD.
I don't know what I'll do with my PhD but a nice little post in an American University would be nice.
I want to specialise in gender.
I want to specialise in culture.
I want to specialise in identity.
I want to specialise in modern literature. From books, to magazines, to anything written word.
I want to write poetry about birds.
I want an old, fat cat from a rescue shelter.

I DO NOT WANT a flashy career. A nine to five job that I drive my car to, where I sit behind a desk, where I switch off at 5pm, come home and do nothing. I don't want to have worked for a degree and then have to spend my life climbing up the career ladder to hit the glass ceiling because they'll think I want time off to have babies and be a mother. If I ever have babies they will be by accident and because I was too lazy to get the thing scooped out of me in time. Fame, fortune whatever is pointless. I remember saying to my mother "I'd rather have infamy than fame" and I stand by that. Only now I've grown up out of my angsty goth phase I may replace "infamy" with "being well respected in my field."

I KNOW I'm not a top class academic. I haven't shat out a series of firsts since the first day of uni. If anything I'm average, with the potential to be above average. But why should I let that stop me? Just because I happen to be a rubbish essay writer. So what if I can't structure my thoughts on paper? Have you ever (tried to) read Marx?! Or Hegel?! or Feuerbach?! (and given up because they just make no sense?)

http://lillabloggmonstret.blogg.se/2009/november/hello.html

I'm going to delete this blog soon. It's grown stale.

I will be re-locating to here very soon. Update your favourites.

At the photography night class I started taking yesterday, we were shown this classic Hasselblad (500 C/M), to illustrate the principles of aperture, shutter speed and DoF. I was familiar with the theory, but turning the dials on this REAL camera felt exciting. And the sound it makes....

Date: (Fri) November 13, 2009
Location: Delft, Holland
Camera: Not a Hasselblad ;-)

This will be the dullest Livejournal post I have ever written.

I love teeth. I've always had a weird thing about teeth. I think it's because my Nana had horrid, horrid stubs where teeth used to be (she was a massive chain smoker most of her life and had a huge fear of the dentist). All of her teeth were rotten and I was always scared that mine would end up like hers. She was a nice woman, just not tooth wise.

So I obsessively clean my teeth, chew gum, avoid fizzy drinks, hard/over chewy sweets and the like. My latest must have in the dental cabinet are little interdental brushes. The only trouble is, my dental hygiene routine takes forever. Morning and night. Brush, two minutes. (I bought an amazing new toothbrush along with P-fjant on offer at Boots last week.) I've upgraded from my Oral B Vitality to a super flashy Oral B one, a little like The Doc has, with an inbuilt timer that pulses every thirty seconds so you can brush each quarter of your mouth equally. Then there's the flossing, that's another two minutes to do it properly. The interdental brushes - three different sizes, each for different gaps in different teeth. That can take forever, sometimes if I forget which brush goes where, it's quite a painful, bloody experience as the wire rips half my gum out with it. Finish it all off with a mouthwash and we're good to go.

The dentist is one of those places that I love going. Mainly because of all the praise I get thanks to my teeth-cleaning OCD. I still get a feeling of dread that I'll have to have a root canal because I skipped brushing a couple of nights because I was too sleepy, or not flossing because I couldn't find it... Anyhoo. I went there last Thursday (I was going to update about it but never quite got round to it). It was quite good fun. You know you do a good job with your teeth when the dentist jokes and sends her dental nurse to the hygienist to tell her that the next patient has terrible plaque that will take ages to shift. Then you get told repeatedly by said dentist and hygienist that you have wonderful teeth.

I'm bloody glad I have wonderful teeth. The last time I had to pay for my (only) filling (caused by food getting stuck in that metal ring they put round your molars when you have a brace) it cost me somewhere around £130. I can't afford any more of those. I mean, root canals are like, £500 these days. I live in fear for the day this filling comes out. Fear for the pain, fear for what a half broken tooth looks like... and fear of... the bill.

Told you it was a dull LJ post.

I really miss Groningen. Everything about it (except maybe the student housing)

http://lillabloggmonstret.blogg.se/2009/november/starbucks-igen.html

It's been full swing uni recently. This blog has fallen behind because I've had so much to do - plus it's easier to update my tumblr with just a picture. Translation project on a Dutch author due tomorrow. Finished. Marx essay research well underway. In between uni and going home, I always make an effort to stop off at Starbucks. This is killing both my bank saldo and my waistline. I was going to stop, but I'm a whore to capitalism and well, the red cups are here.

I've made an effort to step out of my double-tall-latte or short-drip-no-room usuals and have vowed to try all the Christmas flavours on offer. I've only ever really tried the gingerbread latte which is completely amazing and helped me survive Germany.

Today I tried the Eggnog latte which was odd to say the least. Imagine eggnog, warm milk and coffee. No thanks? Yeah that's what I thought. Until I tried it. It was unusual, the texture wasn't thick like eggnog, nor was it thin like mellanmjölk. It was somewhere between vaniljsås and cream. Painfully sweet (thank god I always go for the extra shot of espresso) but with a gentle christmassy glow. All in all, it went well with a cold November Sheffield highstreet. I'm looking forward to December now. My flights North are booked and my anticipation for Christmas is just around the corner. How am I going to survive a whole month without Starbucks, is what I wonder. It's a long way to Arlanda...

I sense a Starbucks themed Christmas present for The Doc and R-Man. For selfish reasons, of course.

So we're back online. CHEERS BT.

Now I can talk a little about how awesome my driving lesson was yesterday. Considering it's been five years since I last got behind the wheel of the car I was impressed with how much I remembered. The driving instructor was quite impressed really. Not as much as me... I only stalled THREE TIMES in two hours. All three times on hill starts.

I saw so much of Sheffield I'd never seen before. Lodge Moor will now no longer be the destination of the 51 bus, but the place where I learned how to hold biting point going up a hill.

Things seemed to move on quite quickly. From just driving a fairly flat circuit, to getting out into traffic (quite stressful) to driving down into Broomhill (hell on earth) through Walkley and Hillsborough and hill starts of death "I wouldn't normally do this on a first lesson" in Crookes.

Learning with a real driving instructor in a car with dual controls is much better than learning with family members. True fact. 

So now, the goal is pass my test by summer - or at least in as few lessons as possible (it's all $$ y'see). My instructor seemed to think that this is highly do-able. So keep your fingers crossed and for the next few weeks, stay off the roads of Sheffield on a wednesday afternoon.

I know I've become really bad at posting on here.

I spent the entire weekend lounging around the house, doped up on painkillers which made my brain too fuzzy to comprehend much, interspersed with crying and taking baths, and eating rather a lot of mushy foods.

I went to the dentist last Tuesday (i've been A LOT over the last few weeks) to have a filling replaced, but when he drilled into it, he discovered that the previous (NHS) dentist who had put the filling in in the first place, instead of doing a proper root filling had cut corners, but in a "temporary" dressing and just bunged a normal filling on top so it would look ok. My dentist said that kind of thing was only designed to last 6 months at best. The fucking thing was in my mouth for 6 years and I've spent much of the past year in pain any time i eat sweet things or anything too cold. I have another filling on the other side which is also giving me (admittedly less) pain, and though my current dentist has x-rayed it, and it looks like a straightforward job, there's no way to know for sure until he drills into it. Around the same time I was supposed to get a filling in my bottom tooth, but I ended up getting (current) private dentist to do it because otherwise i would have been waiting about 7 months for an appointment.
Right. I know we're lucky to have the NHS. I try not to mind when they do things like make me wait over a week to actually manage to get an appointment to get a new prescription for the pill, and then leave me in the waiting room for 45 minutes after the time my appointment is supposed to be to actually see a doctor. Then of course she forgets to actually SIGN my prescription, and then the surgery is closed. Then i have to wait another 45 minutes for the receptionist to bother to go find a doctor (ANY DOCTOR) to sign it. This happened quite recently.
ANYWAY, i have become quite used to such bad service, we all know about the wait for hospital beds etc but i tell myself "it's free, you get what you pay for."
This, however, has pushed me over the edge.
1) Dental treatment on the NHS isn't even fucking free
2) The government refuses to increase the number of places for dentists to train. It also refuses to recognise dental qualifications from a whole load of other nations, or provide an opportunity for people with dental training abroad to quickly and cheaply prove they are up to the UK's amazingly high standards (like making people wait months for urgent treatment, or doing a botched job).
3) THERE IS NO FUCKING EXCUSE FOR DOING A SHIT JOB YOU KNOW IS SHIT ON SOMEONE'S TEETH. TEETH ARE FUCKING IMPORTANT. IT CAUSES PEOPLE TO SUFFER UNNECESSARILY.

so anyway, on Tuesday, he drilled my tooth out, and put in a temporary dressing as the tooth and the roots had been really irritated by the botched job wearing out, and he wanted to let it "calm down" a bit. Fine. Until Friday evening when the mild-but-bearable pain i'd had all week became PAIN OF DEATH. Which just got worse over the weekend. I spent fucking ages ringing round trying to get some sort of treatment or prescription for painkillers in shef to tide me over until i could get back to Mossley to see my dentist. HA! I phoned so many places, answered so many questions, spent so long on hold, got nowhere. Eventually a nice man and NHS direct told me a dental nurse would phone me back WITHIN THREE HOURS to assess whether i needed emergency treatment. If it had been a real emergency, I would probably have been dead by the time anyone helped me.
ANYWAY, the dental nurse eventually told me to see my dentist ASAP and alternate taking Paramol and Ibuprofen - basically "buy the strongest painkillers you can get without prescription. Take as much as you possibly can." So i did. it helped, but surely I could have been told that earlier? Or been given a prescription for codeine which is what she and the nurse at my dentist seemed to think i actually needed?

So I went back yesterday. He drilled it out again, it was inflammed, so he put another dressing, this time a bit more robust, on it and he's going to fix it properly on Friday. No charge for yesterday's emergency treatment, which is decent of him, but it's costing a fucking fortune overall. My parents are paying, because my mum thinks its too important for me to not get it done because i really cannot afford it, and it's a lot of to-and-fro-ing.

Seriously, no fucking wonder the stereotype is of British people having really terrible teeth. There is no decent affordable dental care in this country.

What a day of stress.

BT disconnected our broadband last night, saying we hadn't paid. Now we've paid a lot of bills to BT all of them on time, so we didn't really understand this. Sadly for us, we were disconnected ten minutes after the BT "help"lines had closed, so had to sit tight and wait until this morning before we could do anything.

R. was the first to call. He seemed to get nowhere and left the task up to D to sort out whilst he went to uni.

When D called, we started going round and round in circles. As any BT customer will know by now, you trace a loop of automated responses that get you nowhere and when you can eventually get hold of a real life person, they're somewhere in deepest darkest Mumbai and are only as useful as the tick box sheet in front of them lets them be. That is, assuming, they understand you and you understand them.

D tried to explain the situation. BT- (will now be known as IT - India Telecom) couldn't do much to help us, except say that there was nothing they could do, so put us through to the billing department. They said nothing was wrong under our account name and number. They put us through to technical services. They told us what any good technical service helpline would do - restart the router, re start your computer. Yeah, we're not idiots. We did it about five times before being told to. They didn't know what to do, so further along the lines of India Telecom we were put through to some other idiot who told us to restart. WE JUST DID.

Eventually, we were put on hold and disconnected. We called and called and called and all that India Telecom could do was repeat back what we had just said. Us: "our broadband has been disconnected" India: "your broadband appears to be disconnected". Us: "we have paid our bill" India: "you have paid your bill". We gave up. D. called back later and was lucky enough to get a British call centre. This is when we began to see what the problem was.

The BT call centre told us that the account was in someone else's name. The previous tennants. They'd been sending broadband bills and reminders to this bloke who hasn't lived in our house for ages and who we have never met. After one too many red letters, we've been disconnected. Through the fault of BT. Though BT (Bullshit telecom) won't admit this. There wasn't a lot we could do then until R got home because he's the account holder and we needed to sort stuff out.

So I went off on my two hour driving lesson - which was amazing. I like driving, it's good fun and I seem to be quite ok at it. My instructor thinks I'll have my test passed before summer, not bad considering this was my first lesson in about five years.

I came home and it was decided that I'd call BT (Bollocks Telecom) and pay the bill with my card.

So I call BT again. Try to use the automated services to pay the bill, no luck. I get through to India again. They're no help. I was frustrated at this point because he started to patronise me "this is technical services, you want billing. This is the direct line for billing" OI IDIOT I've just spent the last 10 minutes on the "direct line" (automated service) for billing and got nowhere. Don't you dare disconnect me. I think he manages to detect a sarcastic tone in my voice when I thank him for his help and ask him what the complaints process is. He tells me "oh well I will put you through to my colleague and then ask him to put you through to the complaints service hotline". 

He puts me through to another Geordie. Thank god. Now someone with an understanding of the job to be able to get things done properly. After around ten minutes of explaining what's wrong I managed to pay the bill, get the information I needed and generally feel a lot better. I then say that even though he has been wonderful and really helpful, I need to be put through to the complaints department. He then tells me that no such thing exists and complaints are to be put in writing.

Now I didn't mention previously, but the Indian call centres had pumped us full of lies. "We'll put you through to a department" and we get disconnected. "Your internet will be working soon" and it's not. This was the icing on the cake of lies they are trained to tell us.

I really hate Indian call centres. Not because of the whole racist thing, but because they just don't know what they're doing. They're the Ryanair of the customer service world. Cheap and useless. I can see why they get arsey, they probably have to deal with a lot of racist abuse during the day so they assume that every angry customer is going to swear at them. When I complained to the Geordie man, I never once said that my problem was with the Indian side of the call centre - but even he knew where I was coming from. I just wish they could do more than read off a sheet and disconnect people. It's taken three people a whole day. Crazy.

Now I'm in the IC like all the other little chavs using university resources to piss about on facebook. At least I brought my own laptop and even setting that up for the internet here took a lifetime.

BT have done a lot of damage to their reputation today. Next time I look for a telephone and internet provider, they will be last on the list. For starters, they provide both phone and internet to our house, yet they send two seperate bills... one to the wrong person EVEN THOUGH we told them in JULY that we were the new tennants and all that jazz. Rubbish.

The exam went ok I think. It was about finance which sucked, but at least I had already done a text like that for Spanish, so it wasn't all bad. I'm generally feeling in a good mood today, which is odd seeing as I had an exam... I weighed myself this morning though, and I've lost 4lbs so maybe that has something to do with it. Although Rachel made 2 cheesecakes and they are sat downstairs so I need to avoid the kitchen at all costs :-S

My weekend was SO amazing. I most definitely made up for the fact that I hardly saw Ed the other week! On Saturday we went to Ilkley for the day. ( It was so so so nice to be surrounded by green! )( It was so so so nice to be surrounded by green! )
On Saturday we went into town to do a bit of shopping for a present for my brother's birthday, and I finally took Ed to Yo!Sushi! Yaaaaaaay! I absolutely love it there. It's soooo yummy. I could probably eat sushi all the time. It was just so nice to spend so much time together all at once and not have to worry about what work I've still got to do, and what I should have already done. It was also nice to actually do stuff, cos we usually just stay in and watch TV or something and I get quite fidgety. I should probably stop doing things for a while though and spending so much money. I have a fair few nights out\parties over the next few weeks, and my bank account is looking a bit sorry for itself. Hopefully it shouldn't take too long to get the money for the translations I did though. It should be just over £100 for the 2. Although I suppose it will probably take ages. Boo.

This week it's reading week. It's nice to not have lessons, so I can catch up with all my reading etc, but tomorrow and Wednesday I have my timed translation tests and I'm nervous. I know there's not that much I can do to prepare. I've already read over all my translations and made notes on things to remember, and I'm going to read the Economist's Style Guide, 'cos the text will be journalistic, but I don't feel like there's much else I can do. I guess I just feel guilty for not doing much. I also need to start reading for my Methods and Approaches to Translation essay, cos I have to hand that in 5 weeks, and I really don't want to leave it 'til the last minute. It needs to be good!

Yesterday, I visited a museum with a friend and had dinner at a very nice restaurant; afterwards it was pretty dark already. So here's yet another night shot:



Click here to see the dinner photos.

Date: Nov 7, 2009
Location: The Hague, Holland

As I walked to the train station after work today, I captured this building the color of which always impresses me whenever I walk past it. It's an office (social security office) building, and in front the taxi rank near the train station.

http://lillabloggmonstret.blogg.se/2009/november/clogs-ii.html

I told you I was going to bring back clogs. From Chanel spring summer, via Hapsical via style dot com

http://lillabloggmonstret.blogg.se/2009/november/doo-be-doo.html

You know when you have so much stuff to update, but you've left it so long you really just don't have the lust to do it?

Well yes. The latest craze hos me is tumblr. It's the lazier, more hipster way to blog.

Have a look! Maybe Roine, you should get one!

Every Muse gig I've been to has been special for a different reason. I've seen them 10 times, because when you're there you really get a feeling that each show is a REAL moment in history. This is the only show on Earth! They are fantastic live. I don't go on about them all the time for no reason. But, if you haven't already skipped past this post with a mumble of, 'Oh God, Gemsy's babbling about that ridiculous Queen band again', then you've probably heard about the setlist beef...

Bands get bigger stage shows as their catalogue of work and fanbase gets bigger. Well, duh! More money, more scope for mad ideas, crazier outfits, more drugs and less rock 'n' roll. Of course, it gets harder to please everybody. There's new fans, and there's the old ones who talk of 'glory days'. All bands get it, and they carry on rolling in dosh, either giving a toss about what the fans think or not. A lot of Muse's fans aren't happy. I don't think the band have stopped giving a toss, but it sounds like they've got complacent. The setlist is short. I joked the other day that they're playing all the songs I normally skip! Even though I love all their songs, and watching Muse is always going to be the best way to spend an evening (even if it's £60 for 1 song) they just seem a bit lazy these days. Teignmouth felt quite lazy. We were excited to hear the new songs for the first time, but they didn't sound that exciting (Unnatural Selection excluded!) My mates and I were a bit disappointed after the gig, truth be told (the awful crowd probably had a lot to do with that!) We actually booed when the Feeling Good megaphone came out. I have to admit, hearing the singles and crowd-pleasers every time... it gets a bit dull. But we discussed it thus, "Yeah but it's a homecoming gig, they're gonna play hits rather than album tracks and fan favourites." And the curfew was early. And the sound levels had to be low. But, even though they played Cave (!) there was something else lacking. It's hard to explain, but it's a vibe, maaan. In Teignmouth I had the depressing thought that maybe I just didn't like them anymore, but my love for The Resistance certainly put the kybosh on that idea. Yeah, there's definitely just a weird vibe with the live show. I didn't think that vibe would continue on the tour, but by all accounts, it is.

Tonight's Liverpool gig was over at 10pm. Crazy. I remember running for trains after Muse gigs, because their last jam would go on until 11:06, 11:10... then they'd come back and say thanks again, throw champagne around, dive into the drumkit and smash everything up. Maybe they feel like they don't need to work hard anymore? It's like they can't be arsed. Maybe they've realised that they could stroll in and play Feeling Good three times and just the verse of Starlight and then go home, and they'd still get a 'best live band' award. It definitely feels like they've lost it a bit. It's a bit like when the Manics alienated a lot of old fans by only playing songs from Everything Must Go and This Is My Truth... They came back with a bang, so hopefully Muse will too. Just seems weird that this 'slow' vibe is appearing at the height of their career. Matt admitted that they've had no time to rehearse, which I found a bit shocking. No rehearsals for a world tour, touring a number 1 album? Really? And the stories are getting worse, 18 songs, then 17, then 16... rumours of pre-recorded vocals... tonight people were even discussing the possibility that the band could be ill!

So, the argument keeps going in circles. Most people are still thrilled and excited to be seeing them, myself included, which is brilliant. Some people are whinging, myself included, which is disappointing. Haha. Most people are coming back from the gigs full of yay, but some people are shaking their heads and wondering why they bothered. Of course there's no way they can please everyone and there's nothing we can do about it - no amount of moaning and harrassing the band on Twitter is going to change anything. We didn't get Escape added to the setlist, and we didn't get our Bobbleheads (boo!) Really, I think the show is still amazing (it's the lads on a stage playing some instruments ffs, how can they really be bad?!) and this is really just a case of old fans being the worst critics. They always are, the miserable bastards. Of course I want Dead Star and Glorious and Space Dementia and Ruled by Secrecy and The Small Print and Hyper Music (the last one isn't that much of a far-out request! It was a single!) As I keep saying, 'short' doesn't necessarily mean 'shit'. I think this time next week I'll be just as pumped as I normally am when I've been to a Muse gig. Plus, by the sounds of it we'll still be able to catch last orders! :)

SATURDAY 14TH NOVEMBER IS LYNZI DAY!

One advantage of this season and its early sunset, is that some buildings can be seen in a totally different light; literally.
Here's Delft University's Faculty of Mechanical, Maritime, and Materials Engineering (3M).

Date: November 5, 2009.
Location: Delft, Holland
Camera: Nikon D90, 35-70 mm

Went to another classical concert on Saturday night.
Afterwards, I had a look in the grand piano, and took the above shot.

Oct 31, 2009
Oegstgeest, Holland
Nikon D90, 50mm f/1.8

The more and more I go around these damn university careers fairs, the more and more I have it hit home to me that it doesn't matter how passionate I feel about my degree, about learning, about taking my skills to go forth and do good - my only options are Human bloody Resources and Business sodding Management. The more and more I'm met with "go getters with an MBA" in flashy suits, men with highlighted hair and pointy shoes, the more the terms "competitive" and "graduate market" are thrown about the less and less I wish to join in with it all.

I haven't invested four years of education (and money) to come away with a piece of BA Modern Languages paper that, at the end of it all, is worth nothing in the world of scrambling up the corporate ladder. I want to take my skills and use them in areas I love. I don't want to be automatically pushed into the teacher or translator bracket. I want a job that's going to be rewarding, that's going to stretch my mind, where I'll be respected for who I am, what I can do and not my ability to bullshit some enthusiasm for "entrepreneurship". I know teaching can be rewarding, mind stretching and so on but I don't know if it really is the job for me, or if I'm just going with the idea because it's a comfort zone.'

There was one stall at the Graduate Recruitment Fair today that really made me get fired up. Careers in British Intelligence. Partly because it was the only stall where they may as well have done a little happy dance and shouted with joy from the rooftops when I said "I'm a language undergraduate" but mainly because what they do looks amazing. I'd get to use my languages for loads of stuff. I'd be stimulated (even with something as boring as listening signals or something). It'd be a bit Bond (but with much less glamour and much more Civil Service). It'd be the challenge I'm after without being too familiar and "safe". Trouble is, the languages I do aren't the ones they're currently looking for.

If only it was still 1939 and Germany was the enemy.