In Australia, small breasts are apparently going to be banned in porn because they turn the paedophiles' crank. Of course. That's why completely hairless women aren't allowed in porn, either. OH WAIT. THEY ARE. No pubic hair = child like. Small breasts? Women of all ages have small breasts. Thank you, Australia, for telling me that my body is too obscene to be shown in something that is already pretty damn obscene most of the time. What on earth is going to be banned next? Spanking? OH WAIT.

Seriously, Australia. Sort it out. I just read some of the government FAQ on internet censorship where they compare themselves with Scandinavian countries because we, too, target child pornography rings on the internet. Except the kind of porn you get arrested for up north IS ACTUAL CHILD PORN.

I'm unhappy and I don't know what to do about it. That's pretty much it.

I hate when people say that you shouldn't hurt a woman because she is someone's mother/daughter/sister. It's demeaning. I don't think people should avoid hurting me because it might upset my father, I think people should avoid hurting me because I'm a human being. I became a human being when I was born, I did not become a human because I have relationships with other people. Kindly stop treating women like cars.

HELLO I LIKE YOU WILL YOU MOVE IN WITH ME PLEASE I WILL COOK SOMETIMES ?

I'm crying at five in the morning because I don't want to grow up. Which pretty much proves that I'm not going to any time soon. But maybe it wouldn't be so bad. People keep talking about youth as something valuable and beautiful. Well, I'm neither. It's not magical, most of us have shitty sex lives and it doesn't matter if you de-age to the foetus state, you will not look like Dorian Gray. Can we get this over with, please? The only thing I'd miss is my certainty. I know if I got to decide everything, everything would be awesome. So far, I've made exactly two properly adult decisions. They were both awesome. There, you see?

I bought my dad's 50s cocktail mixer for a song (Angie - Rolling Stones, if you must know), so I decided to learn how to mix. But too many drinks contain gin or Cointreau, and I hate both. So instead of a Sidecar, I'm making a Streetcar.

1 part cognac
1/2 part apple liqueur
1 part lemon juice

Shake, serve in a sugared glass whilst screaming "STELLAAAAA!"

So, I'm back in my old neck of the woods, good old east Oslo. After a brief sojourn in Berlin, that is. That means being woken up at o'dark thirty by my dad, asking if I want to go skiing with him (no) and if I'd like my eggs fried or scrambled (fried). It also means I get to have conversations like these at the local ice rink:

"Hey, remember that time we stuffed sand in our pants and it fuckin' hurt?"
"Hey, remember that time we had to sit in the naughty corner for planning to bring toy cars outside?"
"Hey, remember that time you beat the shit out of me with a hammer in front of 20 kids and a teacher and no one did anything?"
"Hey, remember that time we adopted a tadpole and fed it chocolate and it died?"
"Hey, remember that time you threw me naked into the boys' shower after PE?"

Yeah. My 'hood is a bit shit, but also very normal.

Upside:
1: I don't have to see those kids again, ever. Except at reunions when my job is going to be so much cooler than theirs, and I'll look awesome and they'll be too fat or too skinny and I'll be reasonably happy and they'll all be miserable. I'm not bitter! I'd just like to see them suffer.
2: Breakfast, though served early, is free and made by someone NOT ME. As are all other meals.
3: Snow
4: Mum and dad. I'm secretly a daddy's girl. Not so secret, perhaps.

Downside:
1: - 15 degrees celsius
2: My dad still thinks he gets to yell at me for eating chocolate. IT'S CHRISTMAS, I'M NEARLY TWENTY AND I LIVE IN LONDON NOW. GET ON THE CLUE BUS.
3: Was Norway this sodding expensive before I left? Surely not.
4: Everyone in the local shop knows me.

Have to get back to my busy schedule of drinking wine and watching telly with the mumster now.

In January, I wished I was back in NY and finished my UCAS application.
In February, I won a poetry competition.
In March, I turned 19, broke my laptop, got a mac.
In April, I had a million tests and hung out in parks. And I met Michaëlle Jean, Governor General of Canada!
In May, I got drunk in parks, in bed, outside school, and then had my exams. And attended a lecture in my underwear. Good month.
In June, I graduated and quit my first job.
In July, I saw HBP, went to Roskilde music festival for the first time and visited Germany, Luxembourg, France and Belgium with my parents. Good month.
In August, I went to Shanghai (and Hanzhou and Xian) and met people from all over the world. And I won another poetry competition.
In September, I voted for the first time, moved to London and started uni.
In October, I wrote some awesome essays and auditioned for a part in a play (I didn't get it).
In November, I went to Bristol and a village I can't remember the name of. There were a lot of firsts this month.
In December, I saw Regina Spektor live, partied like it was 1941, performed for the first time in ages, wrote a lot of mediocre essays and went to Berlin with my Shanghai people.

Here's to a new decade! Since I was 9-19 in the last one, it was pretty shit most of the time. I think 19-29 will be better.

It was the best 25 quid I ever spent in my life. She is magical. The only experience I can compare it to are my religious experiences as a child. I might write something that makes sense about it tomorrow. Tonight I'm just enjoying being in love.

People here talk about how middle class people are. I don't really get it. Everyone is middle class where I'm from, and they are all different and have different lifestyles. But then I went to Herforshire. We met a very nice couple with whom we were going to see a string quartet. They invited us to dinner with this other lovely couple, for no apparent reason. I felt a bit uncomfortable, since it was my friend who knew them and none of us knew the second couple.

They had this quite formal dinner party, we got salmon and cabbage and potatoes, and they talked about growing their own vegetables. Their conversation was so contrived and “look at my wit go”, it was quite embarrassing. They had special fish plates and cutlery, and no one started to eat before everyone had agreed by some secret symbol that it was eating time. Not even when everyone was served, because that would make sense. They had several sitting rooms on the ground floor alone. They were all in so many committees it was almost funny. Committee for growing cabbage, probably.

Second thing they asked me:
"What do your parents do?"
“Dad is an economist, mum is a pedagogue.”
“Oh, a teacher.”
“Yes, but her degree was in pedagogy.”
“Oh. Do you know what they say about economists? You can string all the economists in the world together and never come to a conclusion. Economists and madmen are the only ones who believe in infinite growth.”

I'm ashamed that I said that. My mother is a kindergarten teacher, there's nothing at all wrong with that, I just pretended she had a more fancy title than she has just because I knew they would think my dad's job was better than my mum's. I would take her job over his any day.

It wasn't that they weren't nice, they were just very formal and contrived and "let us discuss this topic" instead of letting conversation shift naturally. Just because I'm a student and a Norwegian doesn't mean you can't talk about something other than studies and Norway to me. When conversation took a different turn, they all assumed that I wouldn't understand. “Tolstoy once said-” OH DID HE? The man had some good stories, but they were preceded by this air of “I shall say something clever, and you must laugh. Hahaha!”

I don't understand. They were evidently well traveled, but then how can they be so ignorant? They dared to insinuate that Finland has no culture. They have some of the best young authors in the world! Oksanen! They have some of the best contemporary circus performance in the world, come to that.

So I spilled wine all over their table, ate with the wrong fork and hope to never see them again. I can deal with disagreeing, I just can't handle this degree of artifice.

When people ask me what I do in my drama classes, my answer is usually "mostly we gambol". I wish that some day someone would say "hang on, isn't that a reference do that DS fanfic about Fraser being a wereotter?" but that has yet to happen. A truer answer would perhaps be "mostly we scream, laugh, roll around on the floor and invent new animals", in case anyone was wondering.

Today was odd. RTI was amazing, discovered that half my seminar group are feminists. Came up with a new movement sequence in drama which involved me rolling around on the floor and waltzing with the bloke everyone in uni is attracted to except me. Then I decided I'd do some work, but ended up fiddling with my play instead. I might actually finish it. Then I made an arse of myself in front of the handsome bloke. Who I don't even fancy that much anymore, it's more like affection with a bit of "ooh, pretty" in there.

Him: you fancy everyone when you're younger, you're like "hello, I fancy you. Why? Because you've got a funny voice!"
Me: "Haha, yeah. That's why I fancy you."

PLEASE PLEASE WILL SOMEONE STAPLE MY MOUTH SHUT. Oh well.

On the train from Bristol:

Bloke in a nice coat who reminded me of my friend Eivind: Veni vidi vici
Pretty girl: E tu, Brute?
Ugly man: Anno domini
Pretty girl: No, no, that's only two words, too easy.
Me: What's the game, to say things in latin?
Pretty girl: Yes, but it has got to be longer than two words
Me: Quo usque tandem abutere patientia nostra, Catilina?
Pretty girl: That's not fair, you speak latin.
Me: Nope, I only know that sentence. Means "why are you wasting our patience, Catilina?"
Pretty girl: Cool. You win.

I mean, how often do you get to a) show off like that in front of pretty girls and b) actually use knowledge like that when you aren't on QI?

I have too many favourite poems, but there are some that I read more often than others. Some of these are about as exciting as liking Mozart: of course you do. Poems that I have read more than 20 times:


I Know I Am But Summer To Your Heart by Edna St. Vincent Millay
( I know I am but summer to your heart )


Therapy by Walta Borawski

( unravel the obsession )

Sonnet #130 by Shakespeare

( my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun )


Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost

( Whose woods these are I think I know )


The More Loving One by W.H Auden

( Looking up at the stars, I know quite well )


Dulce Et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen

( Bent double, like old beggars under sacks )


Lady Lazarus by Sylvia Plath

( I have done it again )


Beneath My Hands by Leonard Cohen

( beneath my hands )

Upon a Dying Lady, parts II and III by W.B Yeats

( Curtain Artist bring her Dolls and Drawings )


I could go on.

In order of importance:

1: my feet are cold
2: I owe my bank £400
3: I can't get a UK bank account because Barclays is the worst bank ever
4: I have an essay due in a week and I haven't even read the book
5: Everyone has gone away for reading week and I'm lonely
6: I accomplished nothing today
7: I'm generally dissatisfied

I am so unbelievably dull. How did I not realize?

I suddenly have the time to consider whether or not I'm happy. And I suppose I am! And in November, when I'm usually sobbing into my tea and waiting for March. Truly impressive. I've finished all my essays (though the Shakespeare one was a bit shit), I have next to no work to do over reading week, MY FRIEND EIRA CAME OVER FROM NORWAY, I have only argued with one person this week, I'm catching up on my correspondence... Good times. Though some of my friends and family are less than awesome and there's not that much I can do on this side of the channel. I'm not a good conversationalist any day, but when I'm present I can at least offer hugs and a shoulder to cry on. I can't wait for Christmas, to see snow, see my dad again, find out if he likes all the new music I've discovered/been forced to listen to over here.

Alex just came in and complained about my playlist. I'M ALWAYS PRETTY HAPPY WHEN I'M JUST KICKING BACK WITH YOU.

Eira, Alex and I are going out soon, it will we fun to go to central London with someone who doesn't live here. London used to be a bit magical to me before I moved here. I wished we did more, went to more plays and galleries and walked about more. But mostly we just sack out on someone's bed and watch things on iplayer.

As You Like It, 4.3, line 105 and so on, Norton p. 1670 as it really happened.





Oliver: Oh, hi there, lion.
Lion: Oh, piss off.
Orlando: *kicks lion in the head*
Lion: *dies*
Oliver: Omg, you can kill lions? We should do lunch sometime. Nevermind that thing where I wanted to set fire to you, that's just how big brothers are. My hat is nicer than yours, but that's all right. We'll be friends. Oh, you have hot babes in this forest? I like this forest. It is a good forest. I should sell this forest on ebay.
Celia: Hi, I'm a hot babe.
Oliver: I like hot babes. Let's get married in fifteen minutes.
Celia: Oh, all right, since your hat is so nice. Almost as nice as that Crusoe bloke's hat.

Had a workshop at the Globe. WAS ON STAGE AT THE GLOBE. It was well good.
"Pick whatever Shakespeare line you know and say in the directions I just showed you."
"What if you don't know any lines?"
"Say: O!"
(I ended up with "If music be the food of love", but only because "O!" got a bit old.)

Went to a concert with m'colleague citoyenne . Not a hardcore headbanging rock concert, it was Händel and Mozart. And it was really good! I used to hate Händel a bit, because we were forced to write down facts about his life for music lessons in primary school, but The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba is a kicking tune, man.

Had cake in a cafe with rude waitresses. Then we took the tube home, and I went to New Globe (the pub) to make my day symmetrical. Had some bad news. A bloke bought me drinks. I bought me drinks. That's pretty much it.

I did wake up in bed, in my pyjamas, with a bottle of water on my windowsill. So that's good?

I HATE MYSELF.

(I know the young master doesn't play the ukulele. But he would if he had one.)

I want to learn to play the ukulele. Why, you ask?

BECAUSE IT IS VERY COOL. All the cool kids do it. Want proof?




Thus.

This post was brought to you by: my essay suddenly makes no sense and is too ranty and is due in three hours.