clo_again

Having spent a month in Cumbria I have reached my one and only conclusion about the place.

Namely, that everyone here wants you to eat cake.

All the many, many coffee shops serve delicious and cheap cake. Booths down the road is a fairly small supermarket but still sells an inordinate amount of cake. Lancaster which is near enough to Cumbria to be implicated in the Crimes of Cake (DAMN YOU LANCASTER) has the nicest freaking CUPCAKE-AND-CAKE-BASED CAFE IN THE WORLD and, not content with simply the cafe (!!!!) they have stalls in the Wednesday and Saturday markets also flinging AMAZING and CHEAP (99p a cupcake! And they are AMAZING! Starbucks charges more than that for a biscuit!) cupcakes at you in an unthinkable variety of flavours, colours and decoration every time you walk past.

Everyone in Cumbria is obsessed with cake. And, over the last month with no job to go to and only my trip to Australia to plan, I have eaten increasing amounts of cake. This week with pre-period assorted aches, general sleep deprivation, and having to cook dinner every night for my dad because my mother has buggered off back to Wales to dig up her garden or somesuch nonsense, I progressed to chocolate and crumpets as well.

In short I stood up earlier, caught sight of myself in the mirror, and stopped to gape in mute horror for almost a minute. I was a little squishy at the edges before after nine months of sitting in an office but now I'm definitely starting to show a solid month of cake. It's- it's really got to stop.

Well probably not tomorrow because I spent most of today on the sofa with a hot water bottle and tomorrow, apart from a trip to the post-office, looks to be fairly similar. But as soon as nature stops treating me as her punchbag I will climb the rather large hill behind our house at least twice a week or more.

And stop eating cake. That's probably the main thing. Maybe I'll have one Yummy Cupcake before Oz but only if I climb that damn hill.

~

Speaking of Oz, I haven't worked out my travel plan yet (somehow it is Thursday and all I've done all week is be a couch potato -_-) but I have got a credit card and overdraft for my In Case situations on the other side of the world and seen the lightweight trainers I need to buy in Lancaster so I need to go back for them sometime next week. And I'm going to our Saturday market to see if the stall there can unlock my phone so I can use the damn travel sim in it, after which I can pass around my Oz phone number. I'm still annoyed that I'll have to pay to unlock my damn phone just to use a travel sim in it. Thanks a bunch there Orange. You just used up your awesome for those ads right there.

I really wanted to capitalise sim there but I'm pretty sure that's just too many years of The Sims. Hm.

~

The thing that I cried at in tonight's Grey's Anatomy episode was the pigs. I cry every week at something or other and this week it was at the pigs. I like pigs; they are smart and cute and you, Dr McDeep-and-lasting-trauma-aw-bless-whatever, have a lot of making up to do. McPigkiller.

(...I am aware that they were plastic pigs. This is not the point. One of them was called Wilbur and I have enough lasting emotional damage from Charlotte's Web thank you, wihout Grey's adding to the therapy bill.)

~

So far this week I've achieved about two things on my very long to-do list, which is bad. But on the plus side I finally caught that goddamn Hylian Loach on Twilight Princess. Maybe I can roast and eat it when I end up lost in the middle of Australia.


edit: I didn't realise until I hit post that I'd forgotten to pick an icon due to hurrying because of my "low battery!" warning... and my default icon has a pig. Dear Universe: I approve.

A got hold of the last four episodes from series 3 Grey's Anatomy for me. I watched them. Now all is no longer well in my happy place of McDreamy/Meredith and I'm still upset and my hair looks like I've been pulling my fingers through it since ten last night. Probably because I have.

And I get my university degree results in seven hours.

Yeah. One of those days.

Shockingly, I'm not in fact dead. I'm just turning the computer off during the day to make myself read for the dissertation of doom. No wait: Dissertation of Doom. Better. So, I won't be around LJ much for a while yet (twomonths*cough*). Having said that, new Doctor Who on Saturday and squee will be necessary. Maybe I'll be around more at weekends. I don't know.

People who requested ficlets way back in February that I in no way forgot about (honest), I swear they'll be the first thing I write after deadlines and coursework and exam are all over with. I just have to work for the next two months and then I've got the rest of my life to write. Even if I do get any of them done before then, it's not fair to post one and not the others, so I'll wait 'til they're all done. But you'll get them. I swear on McDreamy's prettiness.

Speaking of McDreamy, I have all the third season of Grey's Anatomy to watch and I'd forgotten how much I love it. I'm rationing it out: an episode a night if I've done enough work. So far (two days) I've even stuck to it. Mostly, on the work front. Kinda need to go start re-reading Beowulf now.

Sullen Fresher Who Makes Porn Star Noises has gone home for Easter. The kitchen is clean (after I cleaned up the mouldy mess she'd left in one washing up bowl and yeah, that idea about bricking up her door with her inside? Tempting. Tempting beyond *words*.)I get to live in a flat with only a couple of other people, neither of whom make a mess or a noise or are annoying, for an entire month. And I have new Grey's, new Doctor Who soon, a ton of room in the fridge with no one here and even though I'm starting to get vague feelings of panic over deadlines now, life? Is fucking awesome.

Okay. Beowulf. Yeah.

edit: Oh and everyone in the UK? There's a Doctor Who special of the Weakest Link at 8:30pm Friday. With David Tennant *and* John Barrowman. And some other people too but mainly *Tennant* and *Barrowman*. In *the same room*.

Just, y'know. In case you're interested. ;)

edit: And another thing - recently found out that I'm meant to be going to Wimbledon when our Grad Ball is on. Only, as it's being held in the student club in town... not sure if that's a bad thing yet. Except K gave me the Woeful Face when I told her. Forsee begging after Easter. But really, I'm bored enough at the Winter Ball and it's not like I'll be able to afford a new dress for it, not that I'd risk an expensive new dress wandering around Sugarhouse anyway. I'd rather go for a dinner out in Manchester or something but... I don't know. Watch this space.

edit: They... they've put the prices back up on the Farscape box set. It's now £240 instead of £180.

...May cry. Cannot afford that. Couldn't really afford the £180 but it was my end-of-uni reward. I've been looking forward to it for months.

Going to sulk. And hope they lower the goddamn prices again by the end of May. :(

So I've spent the last two nights mainlining the seven or so episodes of Grey's Anatomy I had to catch up on. Figured I'd watch, delete, then catch up on the next four I'm going to miss at Christmas.

Except of course the last one had to be the first of a two-parter (which I wouldn't have watched if it'd said on the summary, dammit) and of course it had to be It's the End of the World and I'm now GOING. INSANE. There are no words for the sheer levels of brilliance or for how much I have fiery hatred for whoever decided to write *that* ending *now* when I probably -- since my parents are utterly incompetent with DVDing anything -- won't get to see for FOUR DAMNED WEEKS. Because she has her *hand* and *bomb* and she *almost stayed in bed*, I mean jesus--

Crack can not be this good. Seriously.

Either my parents DVD the next episode for me on Thursday and post it to me before the weekend, or I'm catching the train back Friday morning because I can't wait four weeks for the conclusion. It's physically impossible. I'll go clinically insane. Every week I get closer to buying a region one DVD player and just ordering the entire damn series from the U.S.. You know I hate you all too for getting to see this back in the spring right? Hatehatehate with the fire of a thousand suns and I never understood the full feeling behind that before today. It's a giant conspiracy to drive me crazy.

Hate. Really.

In other news, Torchwood I love and adore you for not letting me down. This week was so much better, it was almost a different show entirely and even my dad, who hates pretty much any and all sci-fi or fantasy related things on principle, gave it the high praise of "That was much better than last week." There were still problems but they're much more minor and nitpicky than before. Main thing is, I'm no longer ashamed to say I watch Torchwood. Damn good job.

Unrelated news; sorry I'm slightly AWOL but the laptop runs slower than a hedgehog going backwards and I tend to be out most of the day when I'm home. Normal service will resume Wednesday night. Also, I've forgotten to renew my paid account and am stuck with minimal icons until I can be bothered to go find my debit card which is why I have no appropriate icon of shock for this post. Bugger.

...*Her hand*. Holy fucking smeg.

EDIT: Oh, and checking the results from Shanghai just now? My day cannot get any better. All is shininess; my TV is great, tennis is great, I'm managing to utterly ignore my lack of submitting a creative writing piece this week and tomorrow I'm going shopping to one of my favourite places anywhere. If I can just get to see that next episode sometime in the next week or two, it'll be even better. :)