The Debate Society

Yep, I joined it. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

After a few days, and a lot of ridicule, I wasn't so sure. But We had our first debate on Thursday ('This House would Abolish the Monarchy') and it was really good fun. And my side won. Not through any amazing arguments on my part, but there were some pretty good people on my side. They refferred to people on the opposition as 'The Right Honorable Gentleman' and things like that. They sounded quite experienced.

We were against. Obviously. The Queen is sweet. Why would I want to get rid of her?


Anyway, I'm glad I joined now.

The only problem is, it's on the same day as football. At the same time.

Paul is back from university now, and he'll be coaching us again, because Wes has decided to be a Fitness Trainer (much to Malikah's disgust!).

As you can imagine, she's heart broken. But I'm giving her the necessary therapy, and reminding her that she once claimed to be in love with Paul, until he left and a few months later she claimed to be in love with Wes. (And then Niall. And then she went out with Niall. She went out with our football coach. Against my adivce. And then decided to never go against my advice again. But we try not to talk about that now. ;-P )

So yeah. My point is, she will probably find herself in love with Paul again soon. He seems like less of a player than Wes (in the girls sense - not the football sense!) so maybe thats not such a bad thing. I don't know how much drama I can cope with at the moment.

But now I'm kinda in a dilemma. Should I continue going to football, or should I go to the Debate Society?

I think it's gonna have to be the Debate Society.

It's all about the UCAS points, baby! ;-)


I have an innappropriate song stuck in my head.
'Stacey's Mum has got it going on, she's all I want and I've waited for so long...'

Good thing I don't know anyone called Stacey.

Stacey is a popular name to write songs about. The new song by The Zutons is called 'Stacey'.
Or is it called 'Oh Stacey'? Whatever. It's about someone called Stacey.


'Lola' is another name that there are a lot of songs about. I know someone called Lola. I think Lola is a cool name. =)

This post has fallen apart. I was actually only going to write about the Debate Society, and about how next Thursday we are debating whether alcohol is the root of all evil.
In November I will be speaking at a debate about whether we should restrict the influence of Hollywood. I'm speaking for it.

There.

I'll shut up now, and stop wasting fibre optic cables and all the other bits that make up the internet.
Also stop wasting time. Coz I have a lot of work to do. I haven't been very focussed recently.
Argh.

SHUT UP!

I'm going.

Should I be concerned about my brother?!

He is sucking a tea bag. He said it tastes nice.


That is something I would expect to see on documentaries about what happens when people smoke so much dope they become insane and have to be put into institutions. (I don't think anyone's ever done a documentary about that. I should sell my idea to BBC. It could be presented by Dick n Dom.)


Oh dear. Now he is throwing it in the air and catching it in his mouth. It will end in tears.


It just hit him in the eye.

I think I'll give you a running commentary:

He's still chucking it in the air and catching it in his mouth.....

.....I can't believe he's doing that with a tea bag.....

....OK.....It just fell in the dog's bed. And he's picked it up and put it in his mouth. That is DISGUSTING. I love my dog and everything, but her bed is kind of smelly.


Uh oh. It's exploded inside his mouth. He's now jumping up and down and screaming.



I can't believe I'm related to him.

I'm so weird.

I've been eating all day.

I'm not even hungry right now, but I'm eating an onion. Because there is nothing else left in the fridge. Except an avocado. Which would probably be a slightly more normal thing to eat than an onion, but I'm not really in the mood for an avocado. And I'm kind of in the mood for an onion.


Anyway, I'm going to watch Sleepless in Seattle now. Hopefully it will take my mind off food.

Beetles Seduce Bees to Survive

I kid you not.

I was on the discovery channel website, watching their 'Pandacam' (a webcam inside the panda cage...) and I was a bit bored, because the panda was just sleeping, so my eyes started to drift around the rest of the page. An interesting headline caught my eye: 'Beetles Seduce Bees to Survive'. I clicked on the link, and it sent me to an article by someone called Jennifer Viegas who apparently works for Discovery News.

Heres what she said:

Sept. 12, 2006 — Clusters of blister beetle larvae mimic female bees in an act of deception so successful that male bees try to mate with them and bring them back to the nest. There the larvae live in the lap of bee luxury by receiving free food and shelter, according to a new study.
Scientists believe the behavior is the first known example of cooperative, aggressive mimicry among insects. Cooperation is involved since the larvae stack up on top of each other and work as a unit to mimic just one female bee. The act is aggressive because,
once in the bee’s nest, the sneaky parasites either eat the egg or the bees' hard-won food.

I promise I'm not making it up. You can read the rest of the article here: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2006/09/12/beetle_ani.html?category=animals&guid=20060912100030&&clik=news_tkr


Do you think seductive mimicry would work for me?!

Rock Treatment

This is an interesting idea.





www.rocktreatment.com

Guess how bored I am?!

I've had a Bagel Related Accident

It happened at lunch time.

I was cutting a bagel, to put in the toaster, and I slid the knife a little bit too far through the bagel without moving my hand, so the knife went into my finger, leaving me with a huge laceration that my heart might fall out of any minute now.

I burnt my other hand on the stupid thing when I was trying to get it out of the toaster.

Why is it that bagels get so much hotter than anything else which is toasted?

Apparently I'm not the only one who has suffered a Bagel Related Accident though. This article appeared in The Washington Post in 2005:

"Experiencing a Slice of Bagel Life: The Less Adept Find the
Cutting Edge of a Round Bun."
(Page A1, A18. Washington Post, Feb 25, 1995.)

Every weekend, they arrive at District and suburban emergency rooms with blood dripping from their injuries: upstanding citizens, often leaders in their fields, sometimes with their pajamas showing beneath their coats.
It happened one morning to Eric Berman, head of research for the Democratic National Committee. He tried to hide his wound, wrapping it in a red kitchen towel. But when his face turned ashen, his mother-in-law shoved him into a cab and took him to George Washington University Medical Center.
"When I pulled off the towel, the doctor said, 'Oh, a bagel injury.' He knew immediately, " Berman said of the cut he suffered while slicing his breakfast. How could the doctor conclude that about a patient he'd never seen before? "Oh, we get a bunch of these every Saturday morning," Berman said the doctor told him. Indeed, an informal survey of area hospitals revealed that bagel-related accidents are, in the words of Mark Smith, head of George Washington's Department of Emergency Medicine, "the great underreported injury of our times. I wish I had statistics, but I can say it's unbelievable how many there are."

Mr Big

This morning, as I lay in bed, listening to the radio and trying to wake up, I heard a song that I haven't heard in a very, very, very long time.

I really liked it. So I thought I'd share it with you, because you probably haven't heard it in a very, very, very long time either, and I always like to share a musical find.

Here's the video. It's worth watching, if only to check out the retro hair styles.

Enjoy! =)

4 year old Psychologist

I was sitting in the car with my 4 yr old cousin, Annie, a few days ago. She was chattering away quite happily, about all the usual 4 yr old stuff like what her favourite colour is, and how she likes puppies and kittens, and her favourite ice cream flavour...

...and then she paused, put her hand on my knee, turned to face me properly, and said, 'I'm not being rude or anything, but do you have a boyfriend?'.

I was a bit surprised, in an amusing kind of way, but I answered her, 'No, I don't'.

She looked at me for a few seconds, taking in my response, and then she said, 'Oh, right. I just had to ask, because most girls your age do have boyfriends you know...?'

Cheers Annie.

Anyway, I thought it was quite funny, so I told her Mum about the conversation we'd had.

Later I heard her telling someone else, 'Yes.....she doesn't have a boyfriend..... I'm pretty sure it's because she doesn't like the snogging part.'

?!


She's 4. Who told her what snogging is?!
It they had to talk to her about that sort of thing, I wish they'd used more up to date language.
I mean, c'mon, my parents use the word 'snog'. Not good.

Results!

The phone call that was to decide my destiny arrived while I was in a supermarket. I answered the phone and all I could hear was people screaming in the school hall, about 200 miles away. (I heard them through the phone... they weren't so loud that I heard them without it!)

I shouted, 'Go somewhere quieter, I can't hear you!!!', and then realised I had the attention of everyone in the shop.

Eventually, Elizabeth (and someone else who sounded like Tanya, speaking in the background) read me my results, I said them out loud to my Dad, and he wrote them down for me:

Maths: A (Can you believe it?! I made her check about 10 times!!!)
English Language: A
English Literature: A*
Chemistry: A
Biology: A
Physics: B (I know....poo....)
French: A*
RE: B (Again....poo....)
Health and Social Care: A*, A*.

I also got a letter that told me I got a top 5 score for Health and Social Care. It says, '.....I am very pleased to tell you that you are amongst the group of candidates who scored one of the top 5 marks in Health and Social Care (Double Award) this summer. There were 5566 candidates for the examination, so this is an exceptional result.....'
Get that?!
Exceptional.

It went on a bit longer, using more words that are a bit like 'exceptional', but not as satisfying to say.
It also said that they informed my school. Well, I actually already knew that, because my teachers phoned me up, and they sounded more excited than I was. Although that might have been because it was a bit weird being phoned by my teachers... so it took a while for what they were saying to sink in.

Anyway, it would have been nice if I'd made it into the top 5 of a more academic subject. Like French or Chemistry or Maths or something. But to be honest, I was kinda shocked that I got As in Maths and Chemistry. I really worried about those 2... Apparently Sister Margaret is very proud of me. I was hoping I could make her proud. She always believed in me. If I ever win the Nobel Prize, I'll mention her in my acceptance speech. =)

So now I am in a bit of a dilemma, because I was planning to do physics next year, to try and fool universities into thinking I can do maths. But somehow I managed to end up with a higher grade in maths than in physics.

Now what?

I decided that I didn't want to do physics, because it kinda looks like I'm rubbish at it, and had everyone believing I actually knew what I was talking about when I didn't. I thought it would be better to do French, because I really am good at French (I'm not just pretending!). But then I just realised that French and Chemistry are in the same option block....so I can't do French. So I've decided to do physics - just for one year.

(Brace yourselves for the inevitable series of Physics Bashing Posts that will be written over the course of the next year.)

Anyway. At least it's all over now.

Actually, it might not all be over now, because I heard a rumour that the teachers might be appealing our RE results (apparently most people did really badly...).

I'll pretend it's all over though, because in a few days I will be starting 6th Form.
It's so weird.

I feel like I'd be better suited to starting back in Yr 7. But I might end up in my sisters class. So I'd better not.
Thats another weird thing. I'm going to go from having no siblings at my school, to seeing 2 siblings at school. Because I'll be spending half my time over at the boys school (where I'll see Josh. Who has just started his GCSEs. Poor boy...) and the other half of my time at the girls side, where I'll see my sister, who will only just be starting secondary school. (Cue: Awwwwww.....)

I feel so old. Especially since I have a job now.
It feels weird saying, "I'm going to work now, see you later". Or, "No, I can't meet up then - I'll be at work.".
And now I'll have to say, "I'm off to 6th Form now." Hmmm. I won't say that actually, will I?! I'll just say, "I'm off to school."

Anyway. Yeah. Weird.

According to Phelan, we start on Tuesday, but we only have to go in to confirm which classes we'll be doing. And then we go in on Wednesday for some kind of induction (sounds like joining a cult or a gang...), and then on Thursday I think we have Mass or Assembly. I have no idea when we actually start working. Hopefully not for a few years. =)