Just Smile and Nod

The Philosophy Society, then. It's something I feel slightly guilty being a member of, what with not being an Arts student and all, and whenever I tell anyone there I do, in fact, do Biology, they stare at me as though I'd just revealed I was actualy made out of polystyrene, and was the next big thing in Japan. But I don't care, because it's really great. Tonight was a lecture on Pascal's Wager, a topic which for an atheist basicly translates as "Your beliefs are rubbish and here's why". I did learn an awful lot- It's much more subtle than it first appears, although like a lot of theological arguments there's something ever so slightly silly about it, with its mathmatical reasons for why religion is a good thing (I'm paraphrasing a lot here, you'll understand. You'll need to look up a real website to find out about it properly). I also became ever so slightly jealous of Arts Students, as the lecturer started to do things like write "DALEKS" in large capital letters to illustrate free will and crack Woody Allen jokes to illustrate something which I can't remember anymore, but Was Profound.

So anyway, I was sitting there after the lecture thinking profound thoughts and wondering if the entire lecture theatre really was held up by what appeared to be two thin sheets of iron, which knowing Edinburgh University it probably was, when a smiling old man slid along the lower row of seats to talk to me. "Great!", I thought, "A smiling old man!"

"Good lecture, good lecture", said the smiling old man.

I smiled back and nodded.

"I thought there wasn't enough on psychadelia, of course."

My smile froze.

"Now, that Bloke up there's talking about his Wager and all that, and it's all well and good, but-hack, cough-he doesn't really know what he's talking about. Hell isn't a place of eternal punishment, it's just a place people go to respiritulize, a bit like a prison."

My smile unfroze.

"I've seen it many times, you see."

"Just keep nodding, you ponce", muttered my brain as the frost sparkled over my face.

"Oh, yes, and Heaven too. Now, Hell is-wry chuckle- quite hardcore, man, and it's not the sort of place you'd want too spend much of your time in. That Professor doesn't know what he's talking about! You've heard of the experiments in the sixties? With acid?"

"Oh, Dear God", thought my brain, as I tried to nod, smile, and search desperately for a magical exit from the middle of a lecture theatre all at once. Eighteen years of making cut out snowflakes and walking through the woods has left me completely unprepared for this kind of thing. The truth is, of course, that as a semi-smug atheist it absolutely terrifies me when somebody comes along and talks about Hell as a real place you can visit, albiet in a somewhat unconventional way. Factoring in the bit where said person is wild-eyed, coughing, and brandishing a half-empty beer bottle diminishes the sensation, of course, but it's a bit jarring all the same. Not in a conversion-style way, though. Atheism is really great.

Anyway, back at the lecture. The Professor asked for questions. My Old-Man from the Sixties friend's arm shot up.

"Good lecture, good lecture. I thought there wasn't enough on psychadelia, of course..."

As I looked down, and tried not to smile, I realised that my life's finally become interesting here in Edinburgh, even if it is in Old-Man related ways. It's kind of sad, but also not, to realise this was the sort of thing I wanted back in the Summer when I was Blogless and alone- the feeling that something had happened to you that might be strange, and might involve tortured academia, but that you wouldn't take back for the World. And now that happens pretty much every day. I love being a Nerd Student.

Glazed and Confused

Everyone seems to have a point in life where they suddenly look at themselves and realize they've become really thick. I'm worried it just happened to me. I spent three hours today looking at some graphs, and at the end of it I still didn't even know which way up they were supposed to go. I imagined University would be hard, but I imagined it being hard in a way that was at least slightly stimulating, not a way where you have to decipher 14 different tables simultaniously, each one of which contradicts the other ones. I guess that's life. And it gets worse once I've deciphered the graphs: I have to plot one of my own using values that don't exist, before writing a clear and lucid expliation of how elegant and simple Science is. It's all a bit of a nightmare. Good job it doesn't have to be in for 9 days, and I get to don my Liberal hat tonight and go to a talk about the Death Penalty. It isn't all bad.

That's pretty much all that happened today. I did have a lot of exciting and stimulating thoughts, but I either can't remember what they were or have a dim idea of how rubbish they are, so I won't be discussing those today. I rearranged large quantities of wierdly-shaped glass. But that isn't exactly thrilling either. Sorry, guys.

The Forecast Looks Glum

I'm beginning to suspect that a large majority of the small minority of Students here who know who I am think I'm a bit rubbish, and right now I feel somewhat prone to agree with them. Observe: I tried to go to the Philosophy Society today (It was "What is Beauty?", which in my opinion isn't the most interesting topic in all the World, although I thought they should have held it in the ugliest building they could find just for fun), only to simultaneously get lost and be late, while confusing some Third Years unintentionaly for good measure. It just sort of happens. Prior to this, I went to dinner, had a stupidly small amount of salad to eat, and ended up sitting next to the most interesting person ever. And here's the thing. While he was talking about Japanese culture and the functional grammar of Shakespeare (University. People really do that here), I was sitting spilling couscous all over my trousers and completely unable to say a word. Most people feel they lose their identity at Uni, and I'm one of them, but in my case the replacement appears to have become lost somewhere around Inverness. I feel very boring, and while I know that I thought lots of interesting things, once, I can't remember what any of them actualy were. So I feel a bit rubbish today.

It's probably just the weather. Edinburgh does wind like Glasgow does drunken crime: It's everywhere you go, and has a tendancy to bellow out of nowhere and knock you over. I had to walk to Princes Street yesterday sideways, which wouldn't have been so bad if the rain wasn't travelling upwards into my face due to a facinating meterological quirk. Once I actualy get a decent night's sleep and a waterproof that is I'll be fine. Then I won't feel rubbish, I'll hold my head high, and I'll talk cheerfuly to anyone about Japanese linguistics, while spilling couscous wherever I damn well please.

Reviewish upon a Star: Howl's Moving Castle

Given I can't talk about almost anything that happened over the weekend, for all sorts of reasons, I thought I'd restart the review feature from Old Bloglodytes that ran to a hugely impressive 1 post before never being heard from again (It was of Metroid Prime 2 on the GameCube. Don't get it). Howl's Moving Castle, then. A anime from Studio Gihbli (I think), the people that bought you Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, and the horrible nightmares you get where monsters with three faces mould into one another, it's a bit like watching a version of Yellow Submarine that's actualy good. Well. Good-ish.

The problem with Moving Castle is the Plot. There isn't one. Well, there is, but only in the very simplistic sense: A girl called Sophie gets turned into a 90 year old Woman by a Witch, and goes to work for Howl as a Cleaning Lady. Adventures ensue. There are so many holes, though, that you'll spend a lot of your time watching the Movie thinking "What?", even when you're not supposed to. When Howl's Moving Castle is confusing in a good way, it's trancendant: Villanous Blobs morph into giant monsters, flying airships drop living missiles then explode, witches melt under the effort of climbing up stairs. Even the castle itself is worth the (extortionate) price of admission alone: A bizzare mixture of gun-emplacements and houses stuck together on a small pair of moving legs. But the sheer frustration of the long periods of the Movie when nothing is going on, the sequences when all the characters try to reach a goal for no obvious reason, comes perilously close to destroying the whole film.

Not quite, though. Ultimately, Howl's Moving Castle is just too loveable to dislike, even when it's being tedious and meandering. It has Billy Crystal as a fire. You just can't critisise things like that. So see it, concentrate, and don't go if you're in the slightest bit tired. But don't be too upset if at times your brain feels as if it was on the screen, melting and folding like the giant blob it is.

Tales from a Balding World

It's a bit scary, being a science student. Even though you know the common conception of, well, non Arts-Grads is based on prejudices and misconceptions, usualy started by people who haven't met many science students, there's always a small part of you that thinks you'll wake up dribbling and bald. It's especialy bad in Edinburgh, as the powers that be decided to put the Arts Campus in the centre of town, and the Science one about 17 miles away, the upshot being you end up walking through sleet and rain while everyone else buys coffee and satirical magazines. Which they don't sell at the Science Campus, because Science students are like, nerds. I presume.

It's probably just paranoia, of course. Today was certainly full of science-related fun: I went to the Darwin Library, a building which resembles a time-warp to the 1970s in every possible way (I swear everything turns a little yellower as you walk in), and vainly tried to work out what on Earth my lecturer was on about as he read poems related to the origin of life. It's all good. Amazingly interesting things are still thin on the ground, though, which made me turn my attention to the media. It's unbelievably depressing. Being 18 sucks, although you could wring that conclusion out of pretty every blog published, ever.

I can't update this weekend for a really exciting reason, but I can't tell you what it is. Have a good one, though, and be sure to smile at a Scientist for me, because God knows they get enough negative publicity, even without mice with ears on their backs running around.

Ouch, Groo, and Ick

I woke up at six, again. It's like I have the exact reverse of stereotypical Student problems- I'm tired all the time, but largely because I wake up when everybody else is going to bed, and my body's a mess due to excercising too much. So I might be a little muted, here.

I had a great day yesterday, though, which makes up for the huge bags under my eyes. After spending every waking second wishing I didn't have to do chemistry, or indeed acknowledge its existance, I actualy went to a chemistry lecture and loved every second, which, again, shows what I know. The lecturer demonstrated half-life by bursting balloons. S'great. And just when I thought the vast majority of people I met last week had disappeared off the face of the Planet, I went through a bizarre four hour period where I met every single one of them, often in wildly improbable situations. It culminated in meeting my Christian friends in the Pleasance Bar, who are nice enough to override the fact that the Pleasance Bar is horrible, and we theologicaly argued the night away. I have several hilarious things to say about that, but I'm going through the bit of Uni where you become stupid and forget how to organize coherent sentances, so it'll have to wait. Perhaps I should only update when I'm actualy awake. There's nothing worse than a Comotose Blog. Well, Herpes.

Boring in the Mor(n)ing

Somewhat unpromisingly for the Blog, I feel very, very dull today- I have a suspision I left the interesting bit of myself back in Aberdeen, so God knows what it's doing there. In tears, probably. I got lost in several places again today, and walked 3 kilometeres in half an hour so not to miss a lecture. Student life isn't supposed to be that hard.

You know when you feel all things of interest you have to say slowly dissolving from your mind? Yeah, that's going on right now. This better not be the point of University, or in four years time all I'll be fit to talk about is what I'm doing in the immediate future and winches. Winches are quite dull.

...And I realise I've sailed into a problem here, one independant of the one where I'm a hopeless moron. Now that I'm a proper Biology student, most of the things that happen to me will be, well, really boring to anybody who isn't in the field. "A funny thing happened to me while analysing an asymptotic graph" does not the best Blog make. But hopefully things will be okay. Not today, though. I'm dull today.

Joe isn't, though. Joe is really interesting, and thanks to my being influential and all now has a Blog of his own. Read all about him at http://gayatedinburgh.blogspot.com, a Blog so called because he is indeed gay, and does indeed live in Edinburgh. To achieve such a zen-like state here I'd have to be a large frying pan who walked around explaining terrible puns to people. That wouldn't be dull, though, and so would defeat the whole purpose of the post, so we won't be talking about that any more.

Yo Ho Ho and a Barrel of Angst

Avast, Landlubbers! Greetings from the Depths of the Bloglodytes Sea! My belly feels like a keg'o'rum, my throat feels like a chest full of swordfish! Arrrrrrrrrr!

Right, now that that's done, I can actualy write about something useful (It's International Talk Like a Pirate Day, and the whole point of having a Blog is to mark things like that). I meant to update all through the weekend, thrilling you as I made my way across the Scottish coastline, but forgot that as soon as I come within eight miles of Aberdeen all my desire to do things leeches out of me like the guts of the Goose with the Golden Organs in the middle of a town in the Wild West. They say you can never go home, and, as I just did, they're obviously wrong, but I can kind of see what they mean. On arrival, I discovered Aberdeen had decided to live up to its record of torrential rain and moronic traffic decisions, and found more cones littering the street than there are in the pond beside Pollock Halls (Students, eh? They've employed a very grumpy man purely to fish things out of there. There was a chair on Saturday). Some of the buildings seemed to have switched position. It was cold. Franz Ferdinand's new album wasn't actualy out because I'd misread the promotional posters in two different ways. It was rubbish.

It got vastly better, though. I bought an incredably nerdy book about the future, met my friends and talked for hours, and picked brambles covered in interesting desieses. I ate real food. I slept in a real bed. I had a bath. It's amazing how even after a week small things like that are so infinately novel, but it's great, like being the Sultan for the day. I had a great time. Then I came back and everyone smiled. They hadn't noticed I was gone, but I won't go into that.

I have to go, sadly: my book review for the paper isn't writing itself, although I'm not sure I can improve on its motivation. I tried to write one about the greatest book I've ever read, then gave up and decided to try one with the Hypnodog in it. He's all over popular culture, after all.

The Curious Incident of the Hypnodog in the Night-time

I had an unbelievably wonderful time last night, full of unbelievably wonderful things, and it didn't cost me anything at all (if that's not an argument for gut-splintering medical conditions, I don't know what is. Not drinking is the best thing ever). I had a long argument with a creationist merely by telling him what subject I was doing, and he ended up buying me some water and becoming friends, which is a fine example or why controversial opinions are great, sometimes. Then I went to see the Hypnodog. I think I've mentioned this here before, but I'm going to talk about him again anyway, because I can do that, and you have to listen. Hah.

The Hypnodog is the best thing ever. Granted, he was only on the stage for about five minutes, and to see him I had to sit on a freezing staircase that didn't seem to lead anywhere for about an hour, but the sight of seeing someone who's been hypnotised for about two hours staring into a dog's eyes, then falling over is the sort of sight Uni is all about. My creationist friend giggled. His creationist friend, who is now also my friend, giggled. It was wonderful in every concievable way.

It appears to have sapped my writing ability, though, which given I just joined the Newspaper in an unbelievably minor position is probably not for the best. Until next time, when I can actualy communicate in an interesting way, stay calm,keep safe, and try not to get hypnotised by anything other than the most canine of entities.

Pan Bloglodytes: Now with 100% more incoherence.

Here's a rubbish thing: Nothing interesting happened to me today. In the middle of Fresher's Week. In a city where so many interesting things happened they even have a famous dog. I went to lots of places and got lost in them. It's very, very easy to get lost here.

Lots happened yesterday, though, the best thing being registering with the Doctor and instantly discovering I'm not supposed to drink, delivering a ready made excuse right on my lap, and the worst thing being hallucinating through the night due to my fever. I went to a Ceidiglgh, or however the hell it's spelt (you know, the Scottish dance night thing. You should know. Philistine), and that was fun until the bit where I felt like I was going to faint, on account of the sheer distances I've walked this week between places to get lost in. You wouldn't think Ceiidigilgigillighs would be popular during the Hedonist Fun of Fresher's Week (for everyone else. My Fresher's Week has so far been about as Hedonistic as Scrabble Night at the Nunnery, much to my relief), but the place turned out to be full, so full that before long it had decended into some sort of Scottish Moshpit. All the dances collided with each other, I got glared at by a member of the Scottish Dance Society for being rubbish, and I had to at one point dance down a flight of stairs while trying not to feel stupid.

I'm going home for the weekend. I still feel awfully groggy, and the thought of spending this one in Edinburgh with near nothing to do and a large headache fills me with despair, although realisticly that's how I'll be spending the 3000 or so after this one. I have a horrible suspicion when I get back everyone will be chummy and I'll feel an idiot, which is kind of what's happening now anyway. I joined the Revelation Rock Gospel Society yesterday and didn't realise it was Christian for half an hour.

Stay safe, wherever you are. It's one thing to be hit by a bus, quite another to do so after being patronized by a Blog.

Look! A Grouchy Student! Write an Angry Letter to The Mail!

I read on a Neighbours Forum before coming here (don't laugh, you do that secretly too), that in Soapland the surest way to have a baby was to be declared barren, and the best form of contraception was to desperatly, desperately want children. Uni is a bit like that, but not really. I've discovered that whenever I become convinced that I'm never going to meet everyone, everything in Edinburgh is awful, and I'm going to be beaten to death by the entire cast of Trainspotting in Kilts, I instantly meet about a million different people all inexplicably eager to hear my stories of going to bed early and being ill, and whenever I make a concerted effort to see anyone, I end up completely lost in the Arts complex, or at a jumble sale where the jumble hasn't turned up. Thus, writing my blog at 9:30 in the morning during Fresher's Week is actualy a really good thing, and isn't antisocial in any way at all. Really.

I have so much gubbins to sort out that I can't see myself doing things worth blogging about today. There are about a million forms to fill in, most of which require information that I don't have or relate to bank accounts that don't exist, and they've formed a small mountain over my laptop, which is still completely useless. I'm slightly worried my Hall is about to fall apart, given the entire building's habit of wobbling when a door slams, or somebody yells, which happens around 700 times a minute, and the fact that when I can flood my bathroom merely by walking into it, as sludgy goo comes up through the tiles. It's probably all part of the University experience, though, because that's how you're supposed to explain the millions of rubbish things that happen to you.

My, I'm a right grump this morning, I am. Stay cheery, anyone reading this, and don't get lost in an unfamiliar city at least three times a day. It's hard not to do.

Ed, Edd, and Terrifying Cases of Dissentry

Now, the reason there's been nothing for a while isn't because I've been doing interesting things all weekend, but rather because the internet services here are so unbelievably complicated (they involve a several page book, and long sequences of opening boxes I never even knew existed on my laptop) that I haven't been able to get online. I still haven't set it up, actualy, and am writing from the Hall Computer Lab, which took me this long to find despite being right next to my house.

Oh, but you'll understand. Unbelievably, it seems I wasn't paranoid enough about going to Uni, which, given I spent all August gibbering under a sheet, is something of an achievement. The entire first day read like an episode of "Mr.McFool does Academia", and was like something out of a nightmare (Edinburgh Halls do look like they exist in a dream, due to both the wierd geological mess of the surroundings and the confused, unreal looking students). I managed to be sick, three times, in the back of the dining hall. With all the students there. Then I had to run past them all to get to the toilets. Which were several doors away. And I went in to the womens' by mistake. This hardly did my nerves much good, and I ended up collapsing in a heap at 9:30, the exact time at which everyone else in my house left to party. When I woke up, everyone knew everyone else, and I had a headache any other student would have needed quite a lot of alchohol to achieve.

So things are a bit rubbish so far, and the "huge number of friends for life" you're supposed to meet are conspicuously failing to materialise. It's not all been doom and creaky floors; I went on a great coffee-house crawl last night, met loads of people, and forgot to ask where they lived, I finaly met one of my English friends due to a series of preposterous coincidences, and I met a wonderfuly lovely guy at supper today just as petrified as I am. And the Guardian costs 20 pence. But it's still strange, after living in total isolation for so long, and terrifying, having, well, lived in total isolation for so long. More soon, once I stop feeling so unwell, and the abnormal heatwave plauging the city goes away.

Trans-ition: Fun with Obscure Titles.

Genuinely significant days in your life-the last day before you go to Uni probably qualifying as one-are rare, and when they come along they tend to be a bit rubbish, at least if you're me, which I am. You keep thinking you're supposed to be having profound thoughts, or throwing lavish parties for all your friends, and you end up playing computer games all day in a pink shirt. I didn't even win the stupid computer game. Angst angst angst Mcangst.

I've also been packing, and realising how womanly I am, as every second item seems to be something like a minature sculpture of a pig or pure essential oils. I'm praying whoever lives next door to me doesn't turn out to be a muscley Jock who was constantly picked first for his school's official sport, beating up poncy nerds, or I'm in deep, deep trouble. Explaining to people I am in fact straight, while my perfumed cushions fragrence the tension-filled air around us is probably going to be one of the trickier things about this term. It's also totaly uninteresting, so I won't talk about it anymore, unless exciting developments occur (trans: I get beaten up).

Uni is supposed to make you into an apathetic slob, so this might be the last update of the Blog if we're all torturously unlucky. It better not be, but just warning you, y'know, in case. Stay in school, kids. And stop reading this instead of doing your homework, for Heaven's sake.

Soc and Awe (now with extra drink!)

Going to University is a little like going into Space: It sounds great until you learn that your organs'll be floating around inside you for the entire duration. Reading the Societies list made things even worse: The ones that don't involve passing out drunk in a sewer appear to involve firebombing old ladies for being connected to Capitalism in some way. There are Book Clubs with no books, and lots of drink, Philosophy Clubs which appear to consist of several people yelling at each other (while drunk), and PubSoc, which consists of drinking, with drink. PubSoc's promotional speil bizzarely proclaims at one point that "Tee-totallers are welcome", without appearing to have asked the question as to what exactly somebody who doesn't drink would be doing in a drinking society. It'd be like turning up to the string group with a guitar, or, from what I can gather, the book club with a book. The conclusion seems to be that anything designed to make you less scared about going to Uni only makes it seem even worse.

I'm going soon, though, which means (poor you), that the entirity of the Blog for around 7 years will be related to the subject in some way. When I do get there, I'll write about what I actualy do, assuming things do happen to me. Edinburgh has a great collection of skeletons. That might be exciting, in a dim sort of way.

Moan Kampf.

I'm aware that promising a Blog with "exciting regular updates", and then not updating it for ages, is a way to lose the three readers you actualy have, so sorry, guys. I spent the last few days mostly wondering if the internet wanted to hear about me wandering aimlessly through rooms humming to myself before deciding that no, it certainly wouldn't.

I think it's probably some sort of pre-Uni defence mechanism, this crushing apathy of mine. By achieving a state where I don't do anything, I become too bloated to care that in six days time I'll be crouched in a corner of a tiny room while drunken people try to bash my door down, in honour of an ancient Edinburgh University tradition I forgot to find out about (and my, do they have those: I discovered today that the Duke of Edinburgh is the Uni's Chancellor, a discovery akin to learning the old name of your school was "Herr Hitler's Male Correction Institute". Things are getting worse by the day). I really, honestly don't have any idea how I'm going to cope: I don't drink or drive, let alone both at the same time, and the most illegal thing I've ever done is stealing a complimentary sugar cube. I feel like a very ugly sacrificial lamb.

In other Uni news, my stupidly expensive pack arrived today (From Newcastle, inexplicably), full of questionable student offers, from corparations, and questionable student writing, from students. I read the Survival Guide with mounting panic, as sections on drugs (with in-jokes) gave way to sections on "how to deal with the police", while my inner censorship advisor from the fifties muttered "Good Heavens" over and over. The only practical thing I really learned is that I have even more work than I thought I did, and Arts students almost literaly have none at all, a maxim that basicly translates as "life isn't fair". You learn all sorts of lessons at Uni, you do.