I bloody fucking managed to do it! ... I DID IT.

I did it. Dissertation in, radio sorted. Life is manageable again. I KNEW the universe wouldn't let me down.
I knew I wouldn't let me down.
And the Dropkicks last night were effin' brilliant. I caught a guitar pick!

Time to start doing myself justice, 'though. As soon as I've recovered from these two consecutive (and painful) all-nighters, I'm straight back in - head first - to make the most of the little college that's left.

I got an award this week (that's apparently been sitting in a box for a while now, having been awarded at a ceremony I couldn't go to - and no one told me!!) and I was thrilled about it. It was for "outstanding contribution" to a college society over the four years I've been here. Delighted.

Then I found out that, this Monday, I'm being presented with another: the Chairperson's Medal for my "outstanding contribution to college life". Again, it's for all the societies stuff I did. Similar - but sounds to be a much bigger deal. I didn't even know such a thing existed. Socs office nominated me.

Whether it's deserved or not, it's certainly flattering. There are 10 medals in total and, when I heard who else was nominated, I was gobsmacked that the socs office thought I was up there with them: People who've worked their arses off and really made a huge difference, people who've set up hugely successful societies, people who've powered through college despite crazy hectic outside lives, people who've done amazing things...

I dunno if I've done "amazing" things for socs, but it feels amazing to have won something like this. I'll be honest... I've, genuinely, spent the last few months doubting my choices... wondering if my priorities were a bit fucked up going through college... wondering if I should have concentrated on the course more than all the other shit I got sidetracked with... wondering if I'd spent four years here working hard at wasting a whole lot of time.

But the shit I got sidetracked with was amazing shit. It was worthwhile shit. It was the best possible kind of shit. And it's that shit that I'm going to take with me from my college experience... and cherish forever.

When our Cumann Gaelach was awarded the "Most Improved Society" award in my second year of college, we got through to BICS - the national final. There was a guy there who'd won "Best Individual" in DIT, and who'd just gone on to win "Best Individual" nationally. Basically, it means he was, by far, the hardest working individual person in any college society in the country. He certainly was. Everyone knew it. He helped make something magical out of the already brilliant Drama Soc. And he was involved in every other aspect of college life too. And studying full time. And doing everything else you could possibly imagine. Think "impossible amount of achievement"... now, double it.

I remember talking to him... Barely. I was "interviewing" him, both of us propping up the bar, drunk as skunks... I wrote down his answers in the margins of the awards ceremony brochure... Scrabbling together a few quotes for my report in the DIT News was tricky; my usually illegible scrawl is even worse when I'm drunk.

But I got one good quote out of it. And a damn good one at that.

"If you're not involved in a society you're not going to college, you're going to class."

Here here.

Hmm.

I thought for certain I'd become a mad hermit for these weeks - crawl deep into my work and block all out; Obsess. And get it done.

But I've spent plenty of time with him . He offered help and I took it; ignoring my usual pride, vanity, stubborness, control-freaky-osity... I asked him for help. He was a brilliant help. And good at it. Every call he made was good. It's nice to know, too, that he understands the inner-workings of it all a little better. I can share that, for the first time.

And, best and strangest of all, I've let him in.

Standing Up... for the impossible.

"You're not actually doing this...?"
My friends couldn't believe me when I told them I was going to do it.
They certainly didn't think I'd be able to do it.





Can't possibly make people laugh?



Can't possibly write my dissertation in less than a week?

Watch me.

Exactly 2 weeks.

Exactly two weeks and it's hand-in day. Jesus H. Christ.

Thousands have gone before and managed it, must remember that, must keep saying that. No way in hell I'm the LEAST organised person to ever finish this course. Nor the least able. Far from it.

2 weeks - 336 hours, right? And I'm more than able - and willing - to run on the minimum amount of sleep. Or none, I'd imagine, nearing the end.

Don't ask me how I fell so far behind. But, fuck it, if there's one thing I'm good at it's last-minute, quality cramming. Aoife McCrammy-Ryan. Old habits die hard and I never genuinely expected any less - even if it IS final year, even if it IS the dissertation... It's how I do things. And I've scraped by fine so far.

Breathe.

We'll all do fine. Or, at the very least, we'll all get through it.

Breathe.

And my reward? What I'm most looking forward to? Not the degree I've lost enthusiam for, not a fun-filled summer, not a breather from the weight of work and stress of it all.... No. My brightest light at the end of the tunnel is...
...

That's right. The night of the 22nd it'll be me, the boy, the Bucky, and the Dropkick Murphys. Win, Lose or Draw; that will be a damn good night.

Hell. Fucking. Yeah.

Goodnight... tomorrow begins the marathon...

No Escape

On holliers from all my jobs... All of them. One month of nothing. Nothing. Christ - I can't stand it.

It's probably been about 3'na half years since I'd this much damn time off. Nowhere to rush to. No mad work schedule (with bleak hours of study crammed in wherever possible; never a minute of "free time" without that hanging guilt of procrastination...)

I quit to create time to do my Dissertation, y'see... To finish my research and write it all up; leather-bound and beautiful by the 22nd. Also, the radio project needs finishing (a documentary on how Stand-Up Comics start out - with my very own performance coming up on the 13th. Yes. I'm really doing it. God help us all.)

But, even 'though it's a lot of work, I feel...idle. Helplessly idle. Without the pressure of work and lateness and lack of time to do college work, it's been impossible to do college work.

What's that expression? "If you want something done, ask a busy person"...? That's just it. My momentum's gone. And there's no escape into work or rehearsals or society work or... anything. Seems it was easier to get assignments done when all I had were those tiny, designated, rare windows.

I took this time off to work solely on college: final stretch of final year, get it done! I thought I needed time...
But I'm going insane with endless empty hours... to fill as I please...

Ah well... I'll just have to get used to it.

Almost...! Graaaah!

I think I'm getting there. If I can't come out of today with a solid plan for this dratted dissertation, then I may as well give up. Today. Obsessively. I must sort it out.

Everyone's started collecting data already and have been workin' away for a month or so, as I've been wrestling with my research plan and scrambling to pinpoint some basic fucking idea of the direction for the thing.

But I think I've almost got it.

It all has to come down to Today. It has to be Today. I want to go to sleep tonight happy that I know what the hell I'm doing.

In other news... Other proj's are going swimmingly. Suspiciously so. But whatever.
And I'm still utterly smitten - more-so every day.
And life is good. (Except for dissertations and research topics. All else; good.)

Write what you love...

This isn't it.

What am I doing? Fuck this college stuff. But won't shy at the last hurdle. Gonna do it. And do it well.

And, on a vaguely related note, something (wonderful) happened that I, at first, thought would scupper my final year successes (...when you least expect it, they say...) But, bad timing or no, I couldn't be more delighted that it happened. Whenever it happened. So long as it happened.

And... I have found it hard to stop smiling all month. Everything else may be demanding, stressful, difficult... but this has been effortless. Uncharacteristically, and ideally, I feel neither threatened nor desperate to sabotage. Everyone says it's supposed to be hard - and I believed that. And I saw it, from experience, to be true. But it's not meant to be hard.
It's so deliriously easy.

A whole new direction entirely?

What of Dublin? Do I stay or do I go? Is there any point being there? Certainly more of a point than being in Limerick. I never felt home in Limerick... and can't imagine uprooting all over again...

I'm tempted to stay put - it's easier to imagine. But I'm restless, too. And people keep asking asking asking - What are your plans for next year? My response of "I haven't any" gets pricklier every time..


I've gotten along fine 'till now favourong impulses over plans. So, fuck it, that's what I'll do this time too. Play it by ear. I feel that prickle of annoyance subsiding already.

Everyone has an opinion, 'though... You should travel. You should work for a while and think about it. You should do a masters.

I'll do what feels right when the time comes. And, for now, enjoy being where I am.

Great Coffee...

... can turn a bad day into a great one... a highly unproductive mood into a hopeful one... an anxious tummy into a happy one... and a grey city scene into something of gobsmacking beauty.

Try an americano in The Bald Barista at the Avalon house. Has to be black. Thick as tar, and tastes of burnt chocolate ashes, or something.

A Good Time

I like to believe that people – most people, anyway – aren’t deliberately cruel. I believe that, like me, they only treat other people badly when they can justify it to their self-involved selves, or forget to be considerate, or just… neglect to think about it at all. And even when someone IS deliberately cruel, there’s some reason. Maybe not a GOOD reason, but maybe enough for them. Maybe you just caught them at a bad time. Maybe their shit’s hitting the fan in another area of their life and their tolerance is down. Maybe being pleasant is too much work that day.

Justified negligence of the ‘right thing’. I readily forgive that trait in myself… Haha, not that it registers… It doesn’t even make me flinch most of the time (‘till afterwards when I weigh up its worth). When I really feel like I’m justified, who can convince me otherwise? But it’s harder for us to forgive it in others. Maybe because it’s much easier to internally convince yourself something’s ok to do/doesn’t matter/isn’t THAT bad. Or to convince yourself that you just don’t really care, at all. We all do it. All the time.

But, from the outside, it’s more obvious that you’re being a shit and, no matter how many excuses you come up with, it’s probably inexcusable.

Maybe being a shit just comes naturally… to everyone… sometimes… and maybe it’s about pushing yourself t’wards self-control.

Or maybe, like everything else, it’s all about timing and circumstance.
Timing and circumstance control your destiny, if there is such a thing. Unless you can control them, you can’t control anything. And… you can only ever really control them to an extent.

Love, hate, rivalry, mercy, charity, faith, wealth, choices, success, first impressions… Timing and circumstance rule it all. Even your mood. Even who you ‘are’.

I left my favourite scarf in Cork on New Year’s Eve and my friend, who I was sure would forget all about it, got it safely back to me.

And then (subsequently, promptly) I lost it. And it occurred to me that, if he HAD forgotten it, and still had it, unreturned… I’d be irked somewhat, but basically would still have a scarf. But now it’s gone forever.

Which has nothing to do with anything. But it was a funny thought.

Like missing a plane that crashes. Or never getting to know that person. Or applying for a job at JUST the right time. Or the introversion and imposed loneliness that comes with forgetting for a while that your life is, in fact, so much bigger than just you (and that it takes work to keep it that way… work you can’t cram in at the end…)

Or, losing your scarf.

Snow in the City

It was beautifully snowy in Dublin today. This winter's been snowier than I've ever seen in my life. At home in Limerick, it was the first white Christmas we've ever had.

Dublin shut down today. (City of drama-queens...) Shops and pubs and everything closed and the buses stopped - everything screeched to a standstill. (It's just a little snow! The rest of the country shrugged and got on with it, but when Dublin's slippery, the world stops!)

Sigh. Anyway. Seeing as College, like most everything else, was closed, and I had nothing better to do... I grabbed my camera and headed for a walk.

Here are my faves:






































Enjoy! ^_^
(If you wanna see the rest, see here: X)

The Days of Dial-up

I’m having flashbacks. My new meteor broadband plugin USB yokey is sheer shite. Reminiscent of dial-up frustrations. It’s bullshit, like. What should have taken no time at all (uploading pics to FB and finding a map to where I need to be tomorrow) has taken hours. Balls to this.

Dial-up… god wasn’t it awful? The internet was a place for those with plenty of patience, and a high threshold for annoyance and despair. Clicking the same link 50 times, knowing it would only slow things further, but doing it anyway…. to SPITE it.

Back then, ‘though, I practically lived online. Insane. Back when I was a gamer too, and had taught myself a little html, and knew all the lingo… I fit in quite nicely in the e-world. I was a “reg” in several rooms across the net... a triumph, in my young, lonely eyes. I was even subject to (what I now suspect was) "grooming" (but was far too shy for it to ever have worked - haha.)

Then I suddenly got a life (IRL) and all changed.

Now, even with Twittering, FB and blogging sparsely… it’s NOTHING to the hours, days, months I accumulated in various chatrooms, online forums, etc. Now I almost feel like a tourist or something. I’m only ever just passing through. The only on-line communities I’m part of are made up of real-life communities and friends (apart from blogging, which I really, really wish I had more time to give to - but I don't at the moment. Must make more time...)

And a part of me might miss those square-eyed sessions, telling strangers what I could tell no one else and knowing it’d never matter… There's something lovely about that. But...

Me and the net have grown apart. Gone our separate ways. And, like with many old, faded friendships; I don’t recognise it anymore. We still talk, but… well, y’know.
I suppose, this, where I am now, is the real triumph.

Clumsy? Me?

After a nice new year's dinner with parents and couple of family friends, sitting around playing pictionary. (Cute!) I pour myself a glass of wine (my FIRST) and take a sip. Then it's our turn.

I reach for a pencil... and my elbow grazes my glass, making it wobble slightly.

Panicked, my cat-like reflexes kick in and I lunge to grab for it... swinging it off the table with the back of my hand. On my second attempt I sorta swing an upper-cut at it in mid-air, making it spin and splatter all over my sister, before it crashes to the ground.

Slick.
And I couldn't even blame the wine as I hadn't but a small sip drank.

I can only hope my reflexes are as quick if I'm ever attacked. I'll spot the villain wobbling out the corner of my eye, and have him dazed on the ground in seconds.

On the other hand...if a friend was ever to slip suddenly, say, and I end up back-handing and thwacking them in the face...that would be less helpful.

Numb

Watching stupid top kerrang hits of the '00s. I forgot how in love with this song I was.

Released 2003?
Impossible.

Hear about Rage getting the Christmas #1 in Britain? (#2 in Ireland - we're just less cool, I guess! Still, wouldn't it be AMAZING if it were included on all the christmas compilation albums from now on? hehe. Also, apparently sweet li'l Joe was "delighted" to have reached the "New Year's No.1" in Britain. Smiles and publicity. Wait, I'm sorry, but I've never, ever, EVER heard talk of a new year's chart before......)

Aaaanyway... at a recent (brilliant) house party, had an argument with a canadian guy over when rage's masterpiece originally come out/was popular.

"It's funny how it got big around the time of the twin towers.. there's more to that than people realise, I think," says he..

"No dude... It was out WAY before then. I remember listening to it when I was 14"

"Uh, Yeah! In 2001, right?"

I thought for a secs......
"Fuck..."

Ok, the dude was still COMPELTELY wrong* and a bit of a conspiracy loon, but the point is, I can't believe how long ago that was. Watching the planes on TV. 8'n'a bit years ago!? Insane.

Time does fly.

*('twas released on MY BIRTHDAY back in '92, fyi! ^_^)

Holidays

The longest I've been home in about a year and a half. Any not nearly long enough. Never enough time!

New Years.... what to do with it. Tbh, I'd almost stay in; it's too much hassle dressing up for a letdown. Still...could be fun.
Aaah, I'll find something. Creeping up quicker than expected, 'though. Best get act together. Get organised. Hurry.





How the hell do people decide what's important? Priorities... What's important to me? Everything! I want everything.
There just isn't enough time in this life for everything.

My mum didn't find her career for a very, very long time. I'll probably end up the same. Which is ok.

Oh just stop worrying and enjoy it for Christ's sake.

Speak of the devil!

RE: last post

OMG, loike! Thanks to an ol' buddy of mine I found one of those typical (and absolutely enthralling) trashy internet arguments I was JUST talking about! (And it's a good one.)

Come on in, the bullshit's steaming!

^_^

Coursework... yeah...

I'm meant to be working on an important, scary, nowhere-NEAR-finished presentation (which, by the way, is to be ready, rehearsed, and really impressive... BY TOMORROW)

I got sidetracked. And I'm finding some absolute e-gold. E-xcellent.

This ('though an old vid) made me snort with laughter:



This is amazing, and in Dublin! Look at the rest too. No joke. They're class.




One of the other protesty pics caught my eye;
"Huh... a protest against video games?"
Intrigued, went to find out who the mentallers were...
*gasp* It was EA! Staging a fake protest! Scannal! Couldn't effing believe it. And had a good laugh at this, which has a little bit about the aftermath...
And, on that page, I rambled down to the comments... And remembered why I love the internet.
I mean, look at that mad angry argument!

Reading through it, found this super-snarky gem:

"Hey guys, there's a whole lot of scholarship on this issue. You might want to peruse some of it - you know, the parts that aren't in make-you-feel-better-for-being-a-smart-atheist documentary form - before making wild irrelevant generalizations.

And the cross is an "ancient death symbol?" Yeah, no shit, because they fucking nailed people to them."

The same extremist, to-and-fro arguments break out on a billion threads every day. Everyone on the net is up for a fight. Imagine real life being as volatile... everyone would have to be drunk all the time or something...
And, ok, this story was bound, obviously, to start such. I understand that...
But how did THIS cutsey thing get a vicious political debate started?

Really?

See?

This is exactly why I've been so reluctant to buy a wireless USB thingie.
True, it makes college work easier, email more accessible, saves on paying for internet cafes... all very good, yes?

Ah, but you see... it's 4am... and here I am.

I've been googling the Dublin Hellfire Club* (freaky shit right there), as a dude in work has organised a trip there late this Friday. Eep.

At least two of the lads are going dressed as ghostbusters. Hell yeah.

Shhh - Yes I know I have college stuff, and the play, and all that jazz, but dya honestly think this is something I was gonna miss?




*why that link? well, it's the first article i read that really sparked a thirst for more. wikipedia's too dry-shite-y and reasonable - it's the hearsay and crap that makes this ooggy-boogy stuff fun.

Frazzled

Working on my law assignment, got a text from a classmate asking what time tomorrow it was due... (it's 2am, so by tomorrow I mean today)

Here's the jist of the answer he got;

I can't be sure.. all the handout says is "on or before Wednesday 25th", but it then goes on to say that "late submissions will be penalised as per the Course Handbook", which suggests the deadline must be what the course handbook defines it as, ie. 4pm on the given date. But you could probably argue that it was unclear.

Hmm. Can you tell I've been reading effing law stuff for the last few days..?

Yesterday

Late evening, I stepped outside work for a quick smoke in the peace, cold, dark... watching nothing of interest. I thought about how this was my last day being 21 - just hours to go - and smiled.

All I did yesterday was what I normally do. Sleep in; late and rushing. Messy hair. College. Lunch on the run. Hour of two in the pub with a friend I don't see enough of. Work. Make tea and coffee for bright-eyed foghlaimeoiri (oblivious to the putrid grudges and politics in the place), and serve them smilingly while sipping one of my thickest, soupiest coffees. Home to play Xbox with my housemate and a can or two. Out for "one" to "celebrate". Fast food. Had a look at my diary - deadlines, meetings... bullshit. Late to bed.

Fairly routine... dotted with plenty of solitary cigarettes - one of my favourite ways to break up any day. 3 minutes (almost to the second) to myself, my breathing, my nicotine.

Not the most special day to anyone else - but to me it was perfect.

All I wanted to do... was what I always do. On my last, lovely day being 21.

It gets overwhelming sometimes, but fuck it. I've got it pretty good.