And today...

I've been looking at lots of pictures of teacups and tea parties and wish I liked normal tea. I'm not very English in some respects, if you want to consider it in a stereotypical way (which I have spent the majority of the last four hours doing, to counteract my panic at not being able to do any of my essays).

I like green tea & fruit tea and stuff but that doesn't really count does it?

Speaking of tea, my poem 'Tea' is going to be up (along with 'Professor') in the December issue of blankpages the magazine of the Blank Media Collective and I am quite excited about this, mainly because despite having written NOTHING but my taxi related dissertation work in over a month now...I have publications in three places this month, wahoo, should really be inspiration to write more but I am being consumed by fear and panic re my essays/dissertation...

I'm so so so worried about not doing well enough cause I need a 2.1 to do anything in future really don't I? I know I can get it but because I've missed so many classes due to sickness and lack of money, I just don't know if I'll be able to be upto standard. Last year my essay grades ranged from 54 to 70, with most 4 out of 6 being 65 so I think I should be able to get strong enough essay results but what if not? This is a pointless ramble which you should really ignore!!

I'm having huge trouble with Halifax again...I owe them money which I don't have and they were ridiculously rude on the phone to me...they'll just have to wait until payday, I'm annoyed that theyve been charging me over my OD limit without telling me, especially because its annhilated my credit rating! In one month...ah stuff 'em.

I was absolutely shocked to hear about Robert Enke - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8353905.stm - seriously - who would have known? My heart goes out to his wife who clearly knew it was coming but there was nothing she could do. Rest in Peace.

I was also shocked and saddened that this year was the first year that 11/11 has been remembered without any English WWI survivors, I mean I know nobody can live forever but it is strange to see the rememberance ceremonies without Harry Patch and the others. Especially Patch with all his witticisms and other quips. Great man, rest in peace also.

Bit of a lamentful end to this blogpost but there we go, must go and argue with a blank page about Brick Lane etc :)

Blogpost of illingness...

My desperately busy period has already been halted by impromptu vomit...horrible as it sounds I can't describe it any other way. I don't feel normally ill yet despite going to be early by my standards I was up at 3.30 emptying my stomach and have felt bizarre ever since. So far it has meant I've missed my Holocaust class today, which is disappointing as I've missed loads of it already because of inability to get to Manchester...so that's rubbish. I'll hopefully be back tomorrow for the other class although I need to get enough sleep - I have an observation day at a primary school in Toxteth on Thursday. I've decided (pending further indecision) to take a year out before doing anymore study and am trying to get as many different experiences of jobs as possible...

Disappearing again now, on a mass hunt for Japanese Indie downloads & Totoro on youtube :~)

Neglect...please forgive me!

I am hugely neglecting plastic rosaries!!!

Mainly due to new job being all-consuming, dissertation work and other essay prep. As it stands I have no days off (where I'm not in work or uni or on placement/voluntary stuff) until 20th November. Perhaps I'll post around that time - I hope to!

Anyway, news aside from this:

74% done in terms of first draft of dissertation, various taxis from Delhi to Detroit, randomly!

Job is good, job is hard work because of the running round and bending about

Twitter got hack-ed so please follow my new account - I'm all lonely at the moment so get yourselves there!

Find me poems up at:

• Frigg Magazine
• The Glasgow Review

Tell me what you think! Have lots more to say but am mega tired and have a big fat labradoodle to deal with :)

Britishness (& other things)

I have been properly 'organised' today, in that I've chosen my questions for both this semester's essays (just the two haha) and I'm 43% through my first draft of my dissertation which is promising, although I am stuck...again.

Anyway this blog post is in relation to my Home&Exile module and the question I have chosen (and since found exceedingly difficult):

Consider the ways in which the notion of Britishness is reconstructed and interrogated with close reference to at least one novel/one long poem/two short poems/two short stories...

So obviously after reading loads and loads of journals, novels whatever - I am no closer to defining Britishness...it is indefinable...fact? How do you define Britishness?

I don't, which is going to have to be the whole premise of the essay, ATTACK BRITISHNESS. I'm not into national identities anyway!! Tell me what you think...if you consider yourself British or otherwise...

On another note, I've started my new job and bloody hell it's scary. It's the biggest one of these stores in the North of England and there's so many staff and so many specialists and genre specialists and millions of people. I met the Manga specialist who told me none of the Manga they stocked is technically Manga. I met a scary Children's specialist who was far too happy for her own good!! All in all it looks quite good although I'm going to be permanently shattered with two days at uni (7am - 3pm including journey times) and then three shifts varying between 10.30 - 12.45 start times and 7-10.30 finish!! I also have to bike but I am sure I'll get back into it.

More good news, my poems are now up at FRiGG magazine - I submitted awhile back and am really happy with how its turned out - I love the doves! Tell me what you think of the bits up there!

As it stands I'm not writing much at the moment, except my taxi stories but I'm wary of putting too many up online in case it breaches plagarism guidelines - if you do want to read any do ask and I can send them over...I'm currently working on a female taxi driver in Delhi & an unlicensed immigrant in New York - these will be the hardest ones as I have no experience of either of these places so making them authentic will be difficult. I wonder where I else I should go? So far I've had lots of UK, one Germany & one Italy...it's going quite well. When I met with my dissertation tutor he was positive and said its going well also but he also said I need to try and establish some sort of link...which is proving difficult. I've got individual links between certain stories but linking them all is going to be hard...I'll have to see what happens.

Anyway, I best shut up - I need to read 'The East End Bildungsroman' which sounds a thrilling article ... hmmmm.

Employed :)

I've got a job!!!!

In a bookshop!!

Happy times people, happy times.

Taxi Update

I have got through some dissertating over the weekend. I've written six of my taxi stories which total 2,500 words so it looks like I'll have about 18 left to go.

I have temporarily run out of ideas which I'm sure will not be a permanent state! I will have it finished by December!

Oh and by the way, one of them is up at Gloom Cupboard at the moment, thanks again to Stu and tell me what you think if you get a chance to read it :)

Thanks peoples!

We're going on a job hunt, we're going to catch? Any thoughts on a postcard

Job hunt continues, I didn't get that job last Friday - because they're incompetent, not because I'm crap...I hope.
I have two more interviews at Border's and a care home in Chester - I want both...
I'll get none!

Back at university, swapped my American Poetics module for Home & Exile which is about Black British Literature and I love it. For the first time in my life I sat through a three hour lecture that was really really good. The lecturer/tutor was fantastic and it was all really intersting.

Long post latr, I need to do about 80000 things :)