Existentialism vs. me: 1/0

I handed in my last paper yesterday. Yippee, right?
How come that whenever you’re doing something you don’t particularly like (that’s a euphemism people), you come up with 1001 better things to do in the blink of an eye? And when that moment arises, nothing seems remotely interesting anymore. Hell, even vacuuming was a more blissful experience last week than it now. Maybe it’s just me? Maybe I’m just having a bad day. You know the kind I’m talking about, when you burn the milk, ruin the sauce, get caught in the rain and make a friend cry, all by accident of course. It’s a day when you spend hours and hours looking at a computer screen in a faint attempt to actually “do” something and nothing substantially is happening. As I sit here eating my carbon-flavored pudding, I keep on wondering: Is this normal? I should get started on my thesis, only three more months to go and I haven’t written a word not even a letter but though this thought is even starting to haunt my dreams I keep on wondering: Is this it? The things I loved to do like reading and writing have now turned against me. Weeks of wallowing in academia have scarred me for life. Once they were fun, but now they are mere modes or torture that consume my every waking minute until all the exhilaration has been sucked out of it and I am left with a pathetic and shrivelled up little heap of plain non-satisfying paper. To end on a more positive note (I am an optimist for god’s sake), carbon-flavored pudding isn’t that bad once you get used to it.

Every day is a winding road

I handed in three papers yesterday, hence the silence. I should be researching my last paper as we speak but seeing as I’m lacking inspiration or any kind of enthusiasm, I thought I’d keep you all informed about the joys of being me.

Not much has happened the past week: lots of researching (again DeLillo be damned), writing (about 30 pages a week) and I celebrated my 26^th birthday. I’m officially a big girl now. To commemorate this joyous occasion my sweetheart bought me the most gorgeous ruby necklace ever (meaning, as witnessed by me until now) which made me so blissfully happy that I need to share this with the world. And I just did.

I also read Starting out in the Evening by Brian Morton last week who was totally unknown to me. They just made a movie out of the novel starring Frank Langella and Lauren Ambrose (Six Feet Under’s Claire) which was getting rave reviews and through the trailer I discovered the book. Go figure. Anyway, it was a beautiful story about an aging writer and a young student who’s writing her master’s thesis (a concept that gives me the chills right about now) on his work. I highly recommend it and can’t wait to see the film.

Talking about movies, its been ages since I’ve been to the cinema, a few weeks at least. Bare in mind, I used to go twice a week but that was a long time ago in a land far, far away. When I’m finished with these godawful papers (which I suck at apparently seeing as I was told I can’t write, at least not academically speaking), then I’m locking myself into the multiplex for a day. Hell, I’ve deserved it.

Ramblings about reading, part I

One of my new year’s resolutions was to keep track of all the books I read this year. As to be expected I’m already off to a bad start. With all those papers that are due this month, I am mostly reading mind-numbing articles and insomnia-curing essays as well as my own “exhilarating” writing. Every now and them I have some time in between to seek solace in some real literature.

I decided to start the year with an easy breezy book, Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. It was the first novel of his that I’ve ever read and alas I won’t be reading another too quickly. It was a story full of fantastical elements like talking rats, angels, monsters, knights and what not but even though it had fairy tale allures; it was bland, predictable and a bit tedious towards the end. The style was simple and although I hardly ever read fantastic fiction, I felt I’d heard it all before but with the ruckus around Stardust these past few weeks I thought I should give one of his novels a try. Maybe I made a bad choice with Neverwhere (which was originally a televison series on BBC) or maybe I’m just not into Gaiman. Who’s to say?

The second novel I’ve read this year was Douglas Coupland’s latest expedition into postmodern paradise, The Gum Thief. The story consisted mainly of letters left by two Staples employees during their breaks in which they communicate their hopes, aspirations and even a novel to each other with some interruptive notes of secondary characters. His approach as usual is innovative and the story is sweet and simple although less wacky than we’re used to. The end was a bit disappointing but then you can’t win them all.

Now It's back to the papers for me, joy!

My hair, my precious hair

Today I handed in my first "exam" paper. It was a nasty little SOB on Don Delillo's, in my opinion, god awful and highly overrated Underworld. Only 5 more to go now... Seeing as I survived this ordeal, I decided to treat myself to a haircut. It had been a few months and my hair started doing a weird outwordsy flippy thing. I've never had much luck with hairdressers and this experience wasn't, as to be expected, any different. I just wanted it trimmed but came out looking like a nun. It was bad, so very bad. All I could do to keep myself from a) crying or b) slapping the woman at Kreatos in the Nationalestraat (Antwerp) was to go home and salvage what was left of my ever shortening hair. I frantically went to work with a pair of scissors, shampoo and a blow dryer and this is the final result. Trust me, you don't want to see any before shots. They will already haunt me and the people I encountered on my way home forever.

Happy New Year

I would like to wish you all lots of love, health and happiness in 2008.

Yours truly,

Ginny Jones