mutation

Five to seven on an ordinary evening
One like many others
Seemingly doomed to be forgotten
As thousands before
Wind softly blowing through the golden
Leaves falling from the trees
Gathering in little huddles
Making fugacity seem so alive
So young
And yet so old
Just having fun
Presumably
Until the death of an innocent man
Changed everything

preston crime scene

When I came out of the Aikido-building yesterday I was about to go home on my usual way. But - this was blocked. I saw two police cars, so I still didn´t expect anything serious. I walked towards the parking next to the 53° as walking through there is shorter, but when I reached the stairs there were a few police men and a "crime scene - don´t cross" line. Great. So I just walk around the parking, it is not that much longer. Walked a bit further, where at the end of the street there were another couple of police cars. Turned around the corner and saw through the trees an ambulance and more police on the parking. OK - a crime scene.
Then I went to my room, went to the Black Horse, walked to the safety bus with Geneviève, but when it didn´t turn up we had to walk past the uni (Adelphi building I think) And on this side of the street - really a long way away - there were - crime scene lines! I hadn´t expected that. It was about 5 hours later than when I had first seen them. So we walked, tried to have a look. This enormous area was surrounded with those lines and police men making sure nobody walks through. Where I had seen the ambulance earlier now there was a blue tent (being the Forensic Scientist I suppose they had to make sure weather won´t destroy any evidence due to rain etc. :) - but I have never seen anything like it before).
I wonder what happened there, can´t find anything on the Internet yet - but this must have been something really big and serious.

safety bus sucks!

It is acceptable that buses run late - yes - there can always be a bit of traffic (you would expect a lot of traffic in the middle of the night, wouldn´t you?) But if the university classifies Preston as dangerous and gives students the chance to use a free savety bus to get to their homes, then this bus should at least turn up!
There was supposed to be one at 1:30 (you wish!!!!!) and at 2 (dito.....) - well, we waited for more than an hour and there was NOTHING apart from more students gathering, waiting.
Almost 3am now - and I am finally back in my room. So thanks to the uni - without your offer of a savety bus I would have happily safely made it back to my room two hours ago!

emptiness

Some of you might recognise this story - from the pre-sessional course. I thought it was not bad, so I decided to put it online.
Task: Write a monologue for one of the people on the picture!

Desert, nothing but desert! Ever since I left nothing but sand over sand over sand. The shadow of fear is slowly climbing up my body, has almost reached my heart. Emptiness! Not a sign of life for days. Just the monotone walk, one after the other..... I was the fifth of thirteen, now I am the first of nine. Not sure how many of us will make it to the end if ever that should be the case. We didn´t have time to bury the bodies – THEY are coming after us. I don´t know what they are but I know for sure that I don´t want to meet them.

Sunshine always. Bright light from the sky blinding me, no clouds. I knew the plain would be enormous but imagining the size of this is more than my brain is capable of doing.

Water! Water! No drink for days and feel how energy is slowly leaving my tired body. How much longer? Just continue walking. If I fall it will be the end. Nobody will pick me up just as nobody picked up the ones before me. A skeleton every so often is the only evidence of life long gone. Will I end up as one of them? Leafless trees, more dead than alive, are the only thing we sometimes see. Take a rope and hang myself? But then – I am already more a shadow of my soul than a living man. Will I find the land of my ancestors? Stories, more like fairy tales. That is all I know about it. I knew where I would go. Knew what I should expect ever since I signed for this task – but this is more than I could have ever thought of.

Do I have a chance?

Does any one of us have a chance of success?

evidence

Great practical - fingerprints this time (as you can see on the pictures).
Sadly my camera is not the best, so the photos are not too good - but you can imagine what it is supposed to look like!
The first set of prints were actually the second ones I took - from a piece of wood that I just touched for a second.




The following prints were taken from a little plastic cup that I touched - amazing how little contact is enough to leave those (clear?!) marks.....




Geneviève´s fingerprints - the colour is horrible - some of it still sticks to my fingers..... even though I washed them hundreds of times. We felt like criminals taking each other´s prints after doing the lifts of our evidence. But it was loads of fun!

visitor

chatted to my online friend Issy yesterday - and she might come to see me for her holidays in two weeks time (only her parents have to say yes first.....) - so that would be great!

some art

Skills for Forensic Scientists - practical - "american sperms have bigger heads and nothing in them"

Had another meeting with the creative writing society and actually did some writing.

Apart from that the day was just running around trying to get to lectures in time. Luckily Geneviève knew we would need our lab coats for the practical - so in the hour between lecture and practical - running home, get the lab coat, run back, eat, find the room for the practical (and end up being in the wrong one first.....- I am so tired and stressed out - I really need a holiday.

Only 30 days though until the Ring*Con



Just told my parents that I will stay in Preston during my Christmas holidays. So that will be the first Christmas I will spend completely on my own without anybody else.

Firealarm...

..the second time in a week! This time from the other kitchen in this cluster. Someone just burnt something.
Last time we actually had a fire - in the kitchen opposite my room. Don´t know how they managed to set their frying pan to fire - but the flames were fairly high. One of them just left an empty frying pan with a plastic spoon-thing in on the oven - forgot to turn it off (men.....). Well, at least then we knew how the fire alarm sounds and that the fire extinguisher worked! I don´t think I ever saw one being used before - so this was new to all of us. We were three in the kitchen then (I had come to find out what was going on and help) and one of them knew how to use it. Pressed this thing you have to press - it made a weird noise, the fire had gone and the whole kitchen was covered with white powder. Snow in Summer.....!
We had to open the door leading to the fire exit - how lucky that is close to the kitchen! Everything was full of smoke, horrible smell (of the plastic which had melted), toxic....
Raining outside. The one who was responsible for the fire decided that it is an excellent idea to just stand in the rain for a long time until I had talked long enough to make him come back in (was I that annoying..... :) ?) We cleaned the kitchen, but, well, we are students, so until the cleaners come on Wednesday you can still see the left overs of the fire.

footprints

from the back:

from the front:

We had such a great practical on Thursday! This is amazing - every time I come out of a lecture or practical I think to myself that I definitely chose the right subject! I LOVE studying, I think since I came to England there was not a single thing I learned that I didn´t absolutely enjoy!

In our first "real" practical we took a footprint cast and a screwdriver cast - so so great! Now I have a cast of my own footprint on my windowsill - whatever that is good for. Next Thursday we will do fingerprint lifts - so you better take care of what you do when you are around me - I will know it was you..... :)




Apart from that I have just been rushing around from one place to the other, from one meeting to the next trying to get everything sorted. Too many things. Why do I always get involved in too many things?

I assume that it will calm down a bit during the next few weeks. Once I have my timetable sorted and planned my days it will be better.


Now I am slightly ill. But it will pass. Just two hours of lecture tomorrow, so I will have another day to rest.

the eternal

Emptiness!

Nothing but ever returning emptiness

filling even the tiniest piece of emotion there possibly is.

Reaching for pain – to become happy?

Knowing it will hurt?

Desire it to hurt?

Trying to discard any feeling of happiness that might randomly occur

just to be even more depressed than I was already.

Frustrating piece of writing

just putting silly words into

useless sentences without order

to be able to – not get over it anyway,

so why bother?

Darkness is light,

destruction is life.

Is there anything real out there?

Everything fades eventually

leaving -

emptiness

emptiness again!

Nothing but ever returning emptiness!

light.....

no darkness without shadows

no tunnel without end

no fortune without sorrow

and desperation shakes my hand

never-ending stories

and tales of childhood dreams

trying to hide my worries

to no avail - it seems

silently floating above the clouds

magical and bright

vainly trying to reach the ground

tiny ray of light

CLOSEDOWN

I'm running out of time
I'm out of step
and closing down
and never sleep for wanting hours
the empty hours of greed
and uselessly
always the need
to feel again the real belief
of something more than mockery
if only I could
fill my heart with love

(by The Cure)

Promises

Wiktionary: "A transaction between two persons whereby the first person undertakes in the future to render some service or gift to the second person or devotes something valuable now and here to his use"

That simple?

What is a promise more than a few sentences?

Just empty words with nothing behind?

Promise something, just so that the other one is satisfied?

Misuse it – to get rid of someone´s silly questioning?

A promise you would keep without needing to make it in the first place is useless.

But then it is so much more if your promise is worth being kept;

if you are trusted and believed in;

because suddenly it makes sense;

because suddenly there is something to lose if you break it.

Suddenly you realise how much your life would be different – if you hadn´t made that promise.

How your behaviour and everything around the situation changed, even though it is hard in times.

Which is actually what makes the promise worth something.

Realising where you would be without it.

Being thankful to know that you are not alone.

Knowing that someone listens.

Thank you!