Ah Sod it!

Bearlix has been shut down, due to the owner 'lacking the resources to push it beyond this point'. Going forward, to use corporate speak, he puts his support behind Bearciti. A shame, as bearlix had a very fetching interface, and looked like it was gaining members rapidly.

Now I'm going to have to set up a profile at Bearciti again, having deleted my old one off their site a few months back. Oh well...

Good riddance.

Over last weekend, one of our flatmates moved out. She had become such a pain to live with over the last 9 months, and departed under such a cloud, that when she left, myself and one of the other flatmates went to the pub to celebrate.

At the start of the year, she claimed one of the biggest rooms in the house on the basis that she 'needed room for all her stuff'. This was met with no small amount of hostility by the others, but eventually we let her have it. Rather than organise a rotation of the rooms to make it fair, however, she held onto it all year.

Not long after that, I found out that her mother wasn't well, and at the time of going to press, there isn't much that can be done except make her comfortable and give her pain relief. As the year progressed, said flatmate spent less and less time in the house, and more time back home with her parents. Understandable enough, except when it came to paying her way, she was probably amongst the most unreliable people I've had to live with in a long time. Whenever a bill was due, she was nowhere to be found, and developed an irritating habit of ignoring phone calls and text messages. The landlord, who I wouldn't normally go out of my way to defend, was getting increasingly exasperated with her, and resorted to phoning us in an attempt to reach her.

Around the time of her departure, she organised someone to take over her room, but barely told us anything about it, and when we tried ringing her and sending her messages (she had left to go to London), she ignored them, and then offered the pitiful excuse that she didn't have any credit to listen to her voice messages. At the last minute, she moved in the new guy right under our noses, much to the chagrin of one of the other flatmates, announcing that she had cleared it all with the landlord. The latter hasn't returned my calls, so I don't even know if she's telling the truth.

Oh, and she left without settling up her share of the bills, mumbling something about how she was coming back next week 'to sort things out'. Well, we still have her deposit, so we'll be getting it one way or the other. We'd better.

Alas, said flatmate is in my class, so I'll be bumping into her next year, unfortunately. I'll just have to put as much distance between her and myself as possible.

I can't wait to get over this phase of living with annoying younger students who don't seem to understand that if you don't pay a bill for a utility, that utility will be withdrawn. Or people who think that it's OK for you to pay their share until they deign to obtain the money for it themselves.

Going home tomorrow to Mallow for a week. Some time away from this place is what I need right now.

An update on things in general

It's been a great few days, not have the constant drudge of 12-hour study marathons to have to deal with, and I'm fast getting used to it.

On Friday night, I got picked up by a daddy bear in the Bulldog and headed back to his. It was a bit strange, as the first thing I noticed was that he had about three layers of jackets on. The second thing I picked up on (not that it would have been hard) was that he kept interwining his fingers with mine, and then trying to bend mine back, trying to get me to submit. I didn't. The third thing was that, figuratively, his lights were on upstairs, but nobody seemed to be home: He KEPT repeating himself, right upto the point where I had to (just about!) good-naturedly tell him to shut up.

Back at his flat, I got him undressed, and found that in addition to all the jackets he was wearing, he was wearing a blanket under his shirt! I asked him why, he replied that it was to make him look big.

Whatever.

Once we got down to it, he kept telling me I was gorgeous (fine by me) and that he could make a lot of money out of me (er...say what?). After quizzing him about this, he said he would be my pimp and that together, we could target young gay affluent men. I thought about it for about three seconds, and then dismissed it.

Shortly after that, I grew impatient with his clumsy fumblings, made my excuses and left. As broke as I am, I don't think I'd be comfortable with getting it on with strangers for money.

The search for a new house for October grinds on slowly, with people entering and exiting the equation, but I have another two months before I start getting worried. We're trying to organise bills at our current house, because one of the flatmates is leaving, and it's quite a pain. Also, after getting NO water bill for the whole year, IN SPITE OF THE FACT THAT I RANG THE COMPANY LAST NOVEMBER AND TOLD THEM WE HAD MOVED IN, we have now been told that a 'cumulative bill will arrive, based on estimates made since January'. Wankers. Some public service companies are breathtakingly incompetent. The electricity company still have to sort out a refund for us, even though I've been chasing them since last november.

I hereby vow to avoid taking responsibility for ANY bills for the next house I move into, if I can help it.

Also, I seem to have landed myself a decent dissertation for next year. Research is being done into Angiotensin IV, a neurotransmitter that seems to have some impact on cognition and memory, and it looks like I may be a part of the drive to find out more about it. It's all territory that's pretty unchartered, but in an area I've always had an interest in, so fingers crossed it should go well. The weird thing is that my supervisor told me I could well end up experimenting on mice, but I've always held that animal research is necessary to some extent in this area, if a little unpalatable.

Finally, I have at long last landed a pharmacy placement. It's in a branch in a chain of community branches in Brighton, so I don't have to move away for it. The only thing is that it's only for one month, so I have July and September to worry about in terms of money. It should be OK, I just wish my bank at home would finalise my loan top-up, which they were supposed to do 3 weeks ago!

Righto. Time to go, and work out how I'm going to spend my evening.

Bliss...

THANK GOD!

The exams are over with, and I really don't have much to say about it all, other than that I intend to do NOTHING for the next few days except lie on the beach.

Well, except maybe prowl the Bulldog looking for potential suitors.

It's only now I've noticed

1) Coffee is NOWHERE to be had within the vicinity of the university after 8pm.

2) The parts of the building that have vending machines are locked securely at about the same time.

What the fuck is that about? The staple diet of an exam-stressed student consists of two things:

1) Coffee

2) Chocolate

If someone set up a coffee stall outside the library at this time of year, they'd clean up.

First one tomorrow. Or should that be today?

Amen

Shame about some of the comments that followed. Nothing like the 'net to bring out the sub-literate, eh?

(Courtesy of MediaWatchWatch. As the site says, watch it before it gets pulled.)

I do NOT need this right now!

The gas bill arrived this morning. It is £214.

£214

Thanks to the carelessness of my flatmates (I suspect one in particular), the boiler was on constantly during the period of February to March, and during this period £175 was racked up on our account. Once the weather got better, I switched the boiler to the 'summer' setting, and in the two months that followed, we notched up only £25.

Words will be had at a house meeting tonight.

Our landlord still has to fix the the two separate leaks in our ceiling. I was advised to get a rent abatement on account of this before, but I dismissed the idea. It's starting to look like a viable option now.

My exams start on Wednesday.

I'm doomed...

In the post yesterday.

It has recently come to light that 'Flee and Bear have decided to tie the knot in a civil partnership in Brighton.

That clanger I dropped upon hearing this announcement from MizzFlee in the Bully ("I'm so happy for you both! Make sure you send me an invitation...) must have worked: When I got home from the library yesterday, I found this in the post:

It reminds me of a purple feather boa. So you, Ms. Flee.

And on the inside...

I've it pencilled into my diary, honeez. See you there, for the Brighton social event of the year!

I HATE exams!

They are in exactly two weeks.

In time honoured tradition, I am now getting to grips - for the first time, it hardly needs to be said - with material that was presented to me over 8 months ago. God bless the blood coagulation cascade. It's all starting to make sense now, but why couldn't I have done before Christmas, instead of last night, at 1am?

4 other lever-arch binders await, stuffed to bursting.

I swear to God, I'd nearly try hypnotherapy at this stage to break this last-minute habit of mine.

Onwards and downwards.

I like films about paedophiles

I saw an ad for a film on Channel 4 a while back that piqued my interest. It was called Secret Life. Billed on the More4 website itself as:

'...a powerful feature-length single drama that questions the lack of effective measures in place to prevent convicted child sex offenders from re-offending after prison, and ultimately seeks to explore ways to best safeguard our children.'

...the review highlights how it can sometimes do a disservice to the film it is trying to summarise. In the film, the lack of effective measures was called into question, but it was given nowhere near the amount of emphasis the main character's perspective was. I'm guessing whoever wrote that review had children.

In a climate that spawns undereducated mobs (Remember the attack on the paediatrician's house in the wake of Rebekah Wade's Name and Shame campaign?) and where even the otherwise normally restrained join the 'bang 'em and hang 'em' bandwagon, making films like these is one of the few genuine anti-establishment things left you can do.

Usually when this subject is touched upon by mainstream cinema, it invariably features a victim is slowly and profoundly destroyed by some one-dimensionally evil maladjusted predator, or else a victim that struggles to overcome the violation and - in a move with which we are often invited to sympathise - returns years later to exact revenge.

Or other such similar rot.

This was the first film I'd seen where not only was the plight of the perpertrator was highlighted, but where sympathy for him was invited. Telling the story of a man just out of prison, after being jailed for sex crimes against young children, it showed how he tried to adjust back to life on the outside.

*spoilers ahead*

This was different in a few ways. For one thing, it didn't dwell to the point of pain on what he had done to merit his jail sentence. In fact, the film opened with what could be construed as a get-out clause for his behaviour: He was at his last support group meeting, explaining how his father had abused him, and that he himself getting caught was the best thing that had ever happened to him.

Once he was out, he was presented almost as much of a victim of his desires as his past victims were. His efforts to avoid temptation were valiant, but often futile, and it was with only heroic restraint on his part that he kept himself from reoffending. Still, he was met constantly with a lack of sympathy and often with barely hidden contempt at every turn. His psychologist only barely managed to conceal her feelings of repulsion, his parole officer was unprofessional at best, but more often than not disdainful, and then there was the incident with the police officer.

Having arrived at the police station for the obligatory daily signing of the sex offenders register, the main character found another woman who was in obvious distress, having just been mugged outside a shopping centre. He offered her (if I remember rightly) the bus fare home, as her purse had been stolen and she didn't have any money left. Gradually her look of distress start to be replaced by wan gratitude. That is, until the police officer bellowed out from under the glass partition "Are you here to sign the sex offenders register?!" The change in the girl was instantaneous, she retreated with her pram, as if the kindness he had offered her had never happened, and at the same time, everyone looked at him, and then away when he looked at them. Am I alone in thinking that could've been handled more professionally?

It goes downhill for him from there. Every now and again the tabloids stir up an interest in his case, and he ends up running from mobs with baseball bats as a result (the second time it happened, I derived particular satisfaction from that fact that one of the thugs ended up getting hit by a car as he tried to chase his target across the road), and then, thanks to a bunch of reactionary Not In My Back Yards protesting outside his rehabilitation centre, it gets closed, and he gets transferred to an ordinary hostel with little to no support as he attempts to reenter the community. After a while, he meets a girl of 12, and spends the day trying to woo her. Having no idea about his past, she eventually warms to him, but he sees her to her home untouched. After he leaves her, we get a glimpse into what his thoughts on her are, but the film ends in tragedy.

It made me think about the nature of paedophilia in general. Is it a sexual orientation in its own right? It seems to be, given that a lot of offenders don't seem to have a distinct preference for one gender over another, and it seems to be just as deep-rooted, because if it was a mere disorder, the so-called afflicted would be bending over backwards to rid themselves of it. We're all familiar with closet gays who try to maintain the outward deception of non-interest in boys, but in private are unable to keep it in their pants. Paedophiles seem to be the same: temptation seems to win eventually. If that's the case, then they're pretty much fucked. We've already learned that so-called reparative therapy for gays is a waste of time, not to mention potentially extremely damaging to the person involved. It wouldn't be an outrageous extrapolation to assume the same for reparative measures for paedophiles. It would appear that the only practical solution is to take a vow of celibacy.

It also makes me think about the nature of sexuality in children in general. 14-year olds are going at it hammer and tongs these days, yet if they were to embark on a relationship with an adult, the latter would be thrown in jail. I remember having a discussion once with a psychiatrist who worked mostly with teenagers and young adults, and she said that in the current climate, people seem to be averse to recognising the existence of sexuality in young children. Part of this is why some people go into meltdown when confronted with a situation like this, one that seems unnatural, when it actually isn't. I remember fancying one of my teachers when I was 12, but if anything had come of it, I would have been considered a victim, in spite of the fact that if I had known I was in with a chance, I would have encouraged it.

Funnily enough, the age gap between me and some of my men has more or less maintained itself since then. Har har...

I've gone off the point somewhat, but the fluidity with which sexuality emerges in children needs to be recognised.

As for paedophilia itself, I'm stumped. In this age, if that's your inclination, then the future looks substantially less than rosy. It was particularly unfortunate for the character in Secret Life, as the evidence is there to suggest that it was thanks to his father that he was thrust into a world that no-one in their right mind would want to be a part of. I really don't know what else to say, other than if you're going to follow your instincts, make sure the object of your affections won't suffer for it later. Otherwise resort to good old-fashioned DIY.

As for the tabloids, their offices need to be bombed. While their editors are in them. That would be one problem solved.

Are you getting this, Rebekah?

It just flew by...

On the Friday just gone, I turned 32.

Normally I try and do something for my birthday, like go out for a meal or whatever. This year, though, because I had an exam the day before (which I'm still not sure about passing) and went out that night afterwards with my class, I didn't feel like doing anything on the day itself. I didn't even get it together to invite friends down from London. Oh well, 32 is hardly a landmark. Still though, I wish I'd been a bit more organised.

Also, as much as I would like to go to Manchester next week and chase hot bearded men, I can't. With only one month left to my end of year exams, I don't have the time, and I don't have the money either.

Ho hum. It's not going to be an easy month ahead.

Oh, and a special mention goes out to Luke Vernon Brooks, son of Dan and June, who also celebrated his birthday on Friday. He is now one year old.

Drool much?

I recently came across someone's profile on a dating site on the internet. The guy has to be one of the beefiest daddy bears I have ever seen.

Behold, this pinnacle of blazing hotness.


Boy, what I wouldn't do to wake up next to that in the morning. And get a load of this one:

I'm not normally a nipples man, but looking at that makes my tongue hang out of my mouth, ready to run it around those pencil erasers.

Just one more, I hear you cry? Oh alright then.

Gentlemen, we have lift-off.

This guy is actually going to the great British Bear Bash in Manchester at the start of May. I've been toying with the idea of going, but hesitating due to lack of time and money. This guy, though. On his own he would make the trip worthwhile.

Internetty profiley things

I've a few internet profiles here and there, on gaydar, bear411 (yes, I'm still there in spite of everything), and bearlix. In the past, I've given my hobbies as 'music, books, films and fitness', which is as about as useful as tits on a bull when it comes to imparting information that is unique to yourself, especially on the gay scene. So now I've changed it to list the bands I like, some of the books I've read, and the film makers I like. Behold, and see if you share my interests:

Musical preferences: Aphex Twin, Autechre, Squarepusher, The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, (Some!) Captain Beefheart, Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Galaxie 500, The Stooges, Sonic Youth, Patti Smith, Pavement, Dinosaur Jr, Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins, Therapy?, My Bloody Valentine, Roxy Music when they had Brian Eno, The Velvet Underground, Simon and Garfunkel, Air, Stereolab, Glenn Branca, Port Royal (Criminally underrated italian electronic combo), The Smiths, Radiohead, NEU! Orbital, Clint Mansell, Good Film Soundtracks, Arab Strap, PJ Harvey, Jesus and Mary Chain, The Pixies, The Chemical Brothers, Television, Donna Summer, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Cash, Kate Bush (the Queen!), Joy Division/New Order, Ride, Q magazine's Chillout CD, David Bowie, Sigur Ros, Beck, Bjork, The Breeders... it goes on and on...

Film preferences = anything by the following, Danny Boyle, Steven Speilberg, James Cameron, David Lynch, David Cronenberg, Quentin Tarantino, Stanley Kubrick, Darren Aronofsky, Sofia Coppola, Francis Ford Coppola, Mike Leigh, Ken Loach, The Heathers, Carrie, Three Colours: Blue, White & Red, L.I.E, Ringu, Terminator 3, Kill Bill, Amelie, 21 grams, Alien(s)

Like books by Nuala O Faoláin, Eric Schlosser, Naomi Klein, Armistead Maupin, (some!) Steven King, Kurt Vonnegut...

I've since set up a myspace profile as well, as most of my online profiles are geared towards trying to get me with as many hot bears as possible, but I feel it's now time for a change. Here that one is.

I'd better work on my friend space though. Having only two is a little embarassing.

I've also set up a bebo profile. I wouldn't normally go with that site, but half the irish pharmacy class seem to be on it, so what the hell. Click here to be filled with envy of the shining beacon of my life.

Back in Brighton

...after spending the last two weeks at home. Easter weekend was spent catching up with Steven in Dublin and a good time was had checking out the old haunts, including the Front Lounge, which had a rather yummy (if slightly speeding) DJ on the decks. If only I hadn't horsed the wine on Thursday night and spent half of good friday in bed. Oh well...

I returned back to the usual mess of things. A gas bill that my flatmates didn't get off their arses and sort out, despite having two weeks to do it, and the subsequent threat of disconnection that has since come through the door. Oh, and the bathroom appears to have sprouted a leak somewhere: After my shower this morning, I found that an ocean of water had come down through the ceiling into the kitchen.

Living with young undergrads is a pain in the arse. When I was living in Dublin, just before I moved here, everything was fine. The house was nice, I didn't feel like I had to get out of there during the day, everyone was organised, and everything was paid on time. It would be nice to get back to that, instead of having to put up with this student chaos.

One of the hardest things about going back to college was the lifestyle change. Not so much the money, though that has been a problem from time to time, but the fact that I've had to live in places and with people under circumstances that were often less than ideal. One thing that's come out of all this is that I've already begun my search for something next september. I'm not getting stuck in a less-than-ideal living arrangement again, because I haven't organised something else in time beforehand.

At least the weather's holding up. Nothing like a bit of sunshine to brighten up your day when you're walking to college with a hangover after spending the night with a cuddly bear...

Nooooooo!

From this week's issue of the Friday Thing:

In recent weeks and months, we've undergone massive upheaval,including the launch of a new website, Fridaycities.com, and the setting up of an entire new company to run it. One of the consequences of this is that there has been less and less time to concentrate on TFT. So. Rather than neglect the baby, we have decided to ruthlessly murder it. And bury it in under the patio.

Essentially, and unfortunately, we have had to choose between two possible paths. The first path takes us to a place where we carry on with TFT, aware that it will inevitably decline and decay as we become more and more caught up with the things we have to do to pay the bills. The second is where we stop TFT before that happens; we see the shark jump ahead and think, no: we deserve better than that. We turn off our engine. We say 'Eeeeeeeeeeey'.

So, yes. After very careful consideration, we've settled on the second path, content also that we have an archive of five years of great issues, and that we're really proud of what the email comment sheet has achieved.

Plus of course, there's no certainty that we'll be going away completely. We'll almost certainly do the odd special issue if something major happens. We won't be able to resist. Plus, the future is a strange place. They do things differently there. So, frankly, who knows? But for the weekly Thing, this is the end of the line.

I've written about this comment sheet before, and how it was a complete saviour of my sanity on a Friday morning. Unfortunately, as staff changed, so did the paper, and it had started to slip a bit towards the end, most noticeably in the last year, where it was only half the length it used to be. I first started reading it around the start of 2001, and now, 6 years later, I'm finding myself saying goodbye.

This newsletter was perfect for me when I was deskbound for the whole day on Friday, but when I left Dublin for Brighton, it stopped occupying centre stage on that day at the end of the week, as I always seemed to be stuck in some lecture or lab or some other trivial inconvenience like that. Soon after that, it started arriving late (not much point in getting an excuse to doss at 4:30pm on a Friday when everyone's about to head to the pub anyway) and soon after that again, it's length (and sometimes its quality, it has to be said) started to decline.

Still, like they said, there's plenty of back issues to be going on with, and for anyone with an interest in humour or bettering their own social commentary (this blog wouldn't be half what it is if I hadn't been sent that faithful introductory e-mail forward 6 years ago), they would do well to get cracking on it.

Oh....*Sniff*. It's the end of an era.

New face at an old place

I'm liking the Star Inn more since its original manager Dave left, and now I can go in there without feeling like I'm prostituting myself by going into a bar whose manager I have no time for whatsoever (and whose boyfriend, mystifyingly enough, is a very nice bubbly chap).

Interestingly, Dave jumped before he was pushed by the owners, after he set up a darkroom in the pub one night, a night I wrote about previously. I derive no small amount of satisfaction from the fact that I was one of the few people who did what the owners were afraid of people doing that night, and it also makes me laugh that even though it had some people up in arms, it was actually hardly used at all. And now, a wanker who never showed his customers appreciation or respect is gone. Good riddance.

Perhaps disrobing him on my first night in the pub was a bit hasty of me.

Now onto the new manager.

His name is Russell Cooper, and he was one of the bar staff in the King's Arms I noticed that weekend I was up in London for Bear Pride last year. As you can see, he's nice and cuddly. He often greets me with 'Hi Gorgeous'. I think I shall have to get him into my bed.

Interestingly, on his first night of management there, a riot erupted. From BN2 Beeyatches:

'Flee has confirmed that there was a fight-cum-riot on Sunday involving two straight men and two straight women. These pieces of human waste had actually played the 'discrimination' card to get in when told it was a men only night. How low can these people go? Evidently as low as throwing heavy stools into crowds and biting lumps out of peoples arms. Savages.

Further it was the new manager's first night, the unconfirmed rumour that the old one was canned because the brewery didn't like the idea of men touching other men's wee wee parts on the premises. All bear events are 'Postponed until further notice'. Hmmm.

New manager a rather furry bear. Nice.

I couldn't agree more, Ms. Howarth.

Recreational chemistry

Last friday we had a rather interesting series of lectures on drug addiction by Angela McAdam, probably the most engaging lecturer in the university's department of pharmacy. Having gone to art-school and moonlighted as a goth/punk in the dispensary, she is proof that you can be a pharmacist and not be boring. Perhaps a little like Albert Hoffman, but without the incendiary hallucinogen discovery to her name.

Firstly, to prove a point, an assessment of the risk-taking potential of the classmates was conducted via individual questionnares. I scored 7, which means I must have been an accountant in a previous life. It was found, rather unsurprisingly, that the results of the class in general, instead of being normally distributed, were skewed somewhat towards the conservative end. Mind you, some of the questions were a bit silly:

Do you often arrive for a train at the last minute? (Yes, because disorganisation is genetically encoded into my DNA)
Do you wear a seatbelt? (Yes. Have you seen the end of the film Very Bad Things?)
Do you often go out of the house leaving it unlocked? (Yes, I'd like to hang onto the precious few things of value I have)
Do you often drive fast? ('I can't drive' wasn't given as an reply option here, so I don't know...)

Then we were given a glossary of all the different street names for all the different drugs and their paraphernalia:

'Bombita' - A mixture of cocaine and heroin (another name for speedball, in other words)
'Big Chief' - Mescaline (never hear of that nickname before)
'Uncle' - Federal agents (ditto)
'Busted' - Arrested on a drug-related charge (never would have guessed)
'Score' - To locate and purchase a quantity of drugs (Oh please)

It went on. And on.

Then we were given information on 'safe injecting', which provided the foundation from which we were supposed to advise users of a needle exchange programme. That particular part of the class was rather bizarre, giving us detailed step-by-step procedures on how to inject intravenous narcotics, along with some rather eyebrow-raising facts: Ascorbic acid is a better solvent for heroin than citric acid, as the latter burns your veins and leads to problems at the injection site. Also, did you know that the penis can be used as an injection site? I'll bet you could have done without that picture. For anyone interested in trying it, a masterclass in use was practically the order of the day.

Finally, a methadone pharmacist came in and told us some more about withdrawal management and working in addiction clinics. He was interesting enough, though he didn't hold out much hope for complete and utter recovery from heroin, being of the opinion that it was better to get people onto methadone and maintain them on that for the long-term. Both another classmate and I told him that we didn't consider that a recovery by our standards, as methadone is more addictive than heroin in some ways. He had a tendency to shrug it off, saying that people generally don't stay off heroin in general for very long, and seemed to have a rather Daily Mail-esque view of drug dealers: 'They're businessmen. Even if you try and give up, they'll come after you and try and get you hooked again. And anyway, all your normal friends will be gone and you'll just have other heroin users left'.

I asked Angela about this during an intermission. It seemed that all users (we can't say addicts any more, apparently) were depicted as occupying one of two opposite poles: Those who had tried it once, and at the other end, those who were so addicted, the focus at the centre of their miserable and wretched lives was the acquisition of the next fix. I asked her if there was such a thing as an intermittent user, whose life continued as it was before they had encountered it. She said there most likely was, but there were too many deaths from it for the popular media to allow such a portrayal, or for suburbia to accept it.

It reminded me of the film Drugstore Cowboy, which had a cameo from William Burroughs in it, playing an heroin user who was also a defrocked priest. At one point he waxed (I'm paraphrasing, because I can't find the bloody screenplay on the internet) about how the idea of people being long term users and not meeting with an ignominous end was anathema to some idiots, which goes back to what I was saying earlier. Having said that, all the characters in that film were living in a squat with no money, and were faking epileptic fits inside in pharmacies to lure the manager out from behind the counter so they could plunder the controlled-drugs cupboard. Living? Maybe, but not like that of Riley.

All in all, it leads me to wonder just how addictive something like heroin really is. Is the depravity to which some addicts sink related to the intensity of the withdrawal experience, or because they tended towards risky behaviour all their lives?

We're having workshop on Friday coming, where we get to meet ex-users. It should be interesting. I'll have more than a few questions.

Saint Patrick's Day

It was good and my friend Joanne and her boyfriend Tony came over for it, which was great given that I'm always too broke to go to Dublin to see them these days.

Friday night, one of the main sights of (my) Brighton, the Bulldog, was taken in. The atmosphere was great, and of course I didn't leave until the small hours of the morning. Pulling myself together on Saturday, I got out of bed and headed into town, and we met up again. It was there we took in various pubs before trying the Fiddlers Elbow, *the* most Irish pub I have ever seen. We're talking pale-skinned, red-haired ceili dancing people everywhere. I've mentioned before that some people have a cast that is totally any utterly nothing other than Irish, and it can almost be scary sometimes.

We ended up in the Bugle, the main pub for Irish students over here, and a great (if rather squashed!) time was had. Of course, it being St. Paddy's Day, loads of people were wearing silly Guinness hats, though most of the culprits were actually non-Irish, for some bizarre reason. There were lots of green jerseys as well, so being the rebel that I am(!), I decided to join in by wearing green eyeshadow. I have no doubt it enhanced my attractiveness to the more rugged of the sex, and I'm sure everyone else felt so too, as evinced by the fact that they all fell about laughing.

I got home at a fairly reasonable hour, and rose this morning to see off J and Tony before going to work, which is where I am now. Thankfully it's been easy enough.

In other news, I'm going home to Ireland next week for two weeks. I've also got my Kung Fu suit, which is black with red trim, and looks rather nice. The classes themselves are going reasonably well. There's been more running around the place outside the gym. On Tuesday night, we ran about a mile out of town and then up a wooded hill. In the dark. It was rather fun, though I had a bit of a problem getting motivated on Friday. I think more off-the-wall surprises are what we need.

College classes are winding to a close now, and after Easter, all our practical work is finished and we're down to just one day of lectures a week. Not that I'm spoiled with all the time I have. I'll need all of it for study between now and the summer exams.

HIGH as a KITE!

I just got back from Kung Fu. Our master ran us ragged tonight, and now, even though it's close to 10pm, I'm practically bouncing off the walls with energy.

It's got me thinking. These last few months have seen not necessarily the worst winter ever, but certainly the most miserable, pissy, depressing weather has predominated for much of them and my mood has adjusted accordingly to reflect it. Now there has just been two consecutive days of sunshine, which means (hold your breath!) that spring may finally be here.

I once lived in Cork with a girl who always maintained that the lack of sun kept her in a constant state of melancholia. She used to visit Australia at every opportunity, and moaned about the lack of fine weather on her return. Not surprisingly, she eventually emigrated there for good.

I've noticed that in the past few months I've been more sluggish and unmotivated than at any time since I've come here, and I'm convinced that it has a great deal to do with the fact that for a given morning when I step outside the door, there is approximately a fucking 80% chance that I'm going to need my umbrella. Now that it's starting to become sunny, I'm feeling a little bit less like throwing myself off the top of a tall building.

The exercise I had tonight was a bit like that too. Normally we run laps of the gym to warm up. This time, our master thought it would be a novel idea to have us run around the campus a few times, battling furze bushes and muddy pathways that threatened to subside at any minute, in the dark, all with the on-campus stragglers looking on at us in amusement.

I've fallen behind a bit by missing classes, what with exams, placements and being sick and all that, but now I'm catching up again. I don't really care if I'll ever become good enough to use it effectively in real life, but the artistic aspect of it appeals to me. Also, I recently got a refund of tax I overpaid last summer, and I used this to pay for my suit for the class. So soon, I shall be sporting a black-with-red-piping outfit, which will strike TERROR into the hearts of anyone who dares to voice dissent against me, and people will come to FEAR my ability to kill at will.

Yeah right.

Sussex Beer Festival on Thursday night, at Hove Town Hall. I'm such a model of discipline.

Boots SUCK!

I am sitting here typing this with a red mist of rage in front of my eyes. Here is why.

Quite some time ago, I applied for a position on the Boots summer 2007 placement programme. The company now specify that if you want to do your pre-reg year (your first year post-graduation) with them, you must satisfactorily complete an 8-week summer placement with them between the third and fourth year of your course. The shower of cunts make no bones about the fact that they treat it like an extended interview, as if hiring a graduate straight out of a rigorous and demanding course presents a substantial risk on their part if they have no direct Boots experience, and it has recently become standard corporate policy that whichever store you do your summer placement in, that's where you'll also do your pre-reg. It's all part of standard corporate policy to get the costs associated with human resource management down. Right down. Down to the absolute bare fucking minimum and to hell with the students themselves.

I applied for a Boots summer placement while I was in the second year of this degree, last year. My main selling point was my first year results: I'd got a 2.1, and I spent a lot of time on the application and got it in well before the deadline. I heard nothing back for ages, and in the end, I received a rejection only because I e-mailed them, badgering them for a response. I since found out that some people in my class had been made offers. The secret to their success? They'd worked with Boots before, mainly during the college year, as counter assistants. Once they'd got their foot in the door, they were first in line to be considered for the placements that counted later. In short, getting a pre-reg with Boots depends on you getting a previous summer placement with Boots, which in turn depends on you being lucky enough to get a job with them prior to that (by whatever means possible, because the ongoing low-end jobs are no doubt more accessible to those who know the right people). It's pure nepotism and it fucking stinks!

I applied for Boots again this year. Once again, I was early. Once again, I heard nothing for ages, while certain classmates of mine who had worked with them before were quick to receive notification of offers in locations that were their first or second choice.

Boots got back to me today at about 3:30pm by e-mail, with an offer of a placement. In Wick. Fucking Wick!

For those of you who don't know where this is - and I didn't, until I looked it up on Google - it's almost right at the tip of the United Kingdom, relatively near John O' Groats. I asked for somewhere roundabout the South East, where Brighton is, and I got somewhere that couldn't be much more north.

Not only that, but they have given me until 9am tomorrow to reply to them. If I didn't have work this evening, I'd likely have either gone home, or gone into town and not checked my mail until tomorrow, and by then it would have been too late. Oh, and they've attached two documents, which I must fill out with reference details and reattach them when I reply.

The options open to me now are:

1. Tell them to stick their offer up their arse.

The most tempting option. They've very obviously prioritised me at the bottom of the pile, and for them to give me less than 24 hours to consider this offer is taking the extreme piss.
'We aim to meet your prferences (sic) and the offer is the best match we can make between the information you have given and the placements we have available' they told me in the mail. Loosely translated, this means 'We have given summer placements to all the people who have previously been pulled into Boots by their parents, and now we have a few dumps left, which we may as well give to the rest, in case our current crop of little darlings realise what a shower of wankers we are and decide not to work for us after they graduate'.

Unfortunately, this chain is all over the UK and Ireland like a rash right now, and it wouldn't benefit my career to start limiting who I work for before I even graduate.

2. Politely decline, explaining why.

Again, reducing my options before I know what else is on the table. Just supposing I couldn't get work anywhere else for the summer? I'd either end up in the Co-op supermarket in Kemptown for the summer, or worse, back in Mallow with my parents and no money. That way lies suicide.

3. Accepting for the moment, until a better offer comes along.

This looks like the best option. I might get a placement in a hospital in Brighton or snag a job in a pharmacy that's within commuting distance from here, and if I got one of those, I could just write back something along the lines of 'Sorry, but due to circumstances entirely within my control, I'm leaving you in the lurch'. Or something.

Bitching apart, this is what happens in all corporations once the number of applicants for something exceeds the number of jobs. Rather than genuinely screen out the worthy applicants, the company just takes the laziest, most risk-free, cost-effective way out, regardless of whether it'll benefit them in the long run or not. I'm not overtly depressed. I'd never have stayed with them anyway, I'd have just used them to get experience and then set up my own place, but it would have been handy from a money point of view.

Oh well, fingers crossed something better presents itself.