rain

there is nothing quite as powerful as hard rain... and whilst a little scary, if you're driving in it and there's 10 cms of the stuff on the road, it also gives one this amazingly peaceful feeling, during, and especially after, the fall. things have been unleashed, washed, and everything is new again. it's like getting rid of too many emotions that have just been building up inside.

the bat family

as the sun set, our bat family, which is usually hiding behind the shutters of the upstairs room, came out. there were a lot of them, about 20, i think, some of them obviously tiny - babies. one of them decided to have a look inside and fluttered just outside the open window for about 20s. then they all did this elaborate dance, which mostly seemed to involve flying back and forth between two points, swooping down every so often. it was hilarious, and quite cute. seen up close, those little fellas are really endearing.

i'm really going to miss this whole atmosphere, when i move...

the royal 'we'

the Archaeologist noticed that several of her friends use the third person to post their blogs, and she thus decided to try it out and see what happened. she thought about it and realised that the third person does make a blog sound more like an actual story, and that's nice. the Archaeologist would like her blog to be like that sometimes, like an adventure with characters who have great adventurous names. a blog that the Archaeologist likes tells the tale of the Knight and his Masters and where girls are Maidens. she always smiles when she reads it. sadly, the Archaeologist herself has nothing to report today, but there will hopefully be a time, soon, where Professors, Students and Diggers will be part of the story...

the party

it's 2 am. i've just finished doing the dishes and everything is now clean again, so i can go to sleep knowing that i don't have to wake up and deal with all the aftermath of the party. nice.

after a rocky start (invited 15 people, 11 were supposed to come, some of whom cancelled, and by an hour before the official start, 3 more people had cancelled, so that we were down to the usual 5, we were still only 3 people 3 hours after the official starting time), more people showed up (ended up 9) and we actually managed to eat most of the food - that i'd made for 12. we also managed to swim a few times, the best of those being at about 11:30pm, looking at the stars and once again enjoying the mist coming from the water, warmer than the air. with jazz playing in the background, candles on the table and torches burning around the pool, it looked like some movie set.

caught up with everyone and saw everyone in one place and time, which was incredibly nice. a really good time was had by all.

cleansed

after several days of half-hearted thunder and lightning ending our very hot days, we finally got ourselves a little thunderstorm last night. it suddenly started to rain very hard and the lightning was spectacular. the air was a lot cooler when i awoke this morning. nice, fresh, clean. i got up early and made for the pool. a few laps at 7am. the pool was ten degrees warmer than the air, and was thus covered in a light mist. it was really nice. it reminded me of swimming in a warm lake in NZ's South Island. misty and warm. totally unreal.

the joys of having a new computer

so after months of putting it off, and off, and off, here i am, finally in possession of my new laptop. yes! this is very good.

of course, there was the minor problem of it not actually working, at first. went back with it and confronted guy who said we'd just done it wrong...until he noticed it didn't work. ah, yes. apologies all round. but everything is now in order and many a program has been set up.

and here i am, writing today's blog on this pristine new thing that i now own. nice, nice, nice.

10 things i don't want to do this weekend

in no particular order, i don't want to:
work a lot
be stuck in a traffic jam trying to get to the concerts in Geneva
get sunburnt
think too much
do any kind of physical activity that doesn't include water
be bored
have to try to leave yet another msg on my sister's various phones
get up early
write poetry
think about the meaning of life

the date

well, it was very nice. couldn't have been better, i think. we're seeing each other again next week, and he's probably coming to the party i'm having here next week. i'll say things are going rather well...

arghhhhhhhh.....!!!

do you know any better way to get rid of frustation that screaming? apart from actual physical exercise, i mean.

life was going so well and my class (did i mention i'm an ESL teacher?) had finally settled into a great group of people. i'd 'got rid' of the lower levels, who were moved down, and the problem people had left. it was all great...for about 2 days.

one particular problem-making student showed up this morning, fully expecting to return to my class after missing a whole week of lessons. not only was the not the level before, so i was going to make her change class anyway, but she'd also just missed 6 days of lessons covering the past and the future, among other important topics. my mistake, of course, but i assumed management had told her she was moving class, and as i was helping another student move to a higher class, i had no time to explain the situation to her. after her lesson with this other group, she point blank refused to take any other class than mine. which would be fine if she hadn't missed the most important week of the course, or if i thought she could easily make it up. she said she was much better than the people in that other class she took this morning. now, i wasn't there but i really doubt it.

she was in my class for a week and it was quickly obvious that she thought she understood what was going on and then couldn't wait to move onto something else. except the never once used what she was taught voluntarily. and it's not like my class isn't geared towards practising the point being taught.so, when i was told all this, i said that of course i would talk to her and explain, hopefully tomorrow. in the meantime, a receptionist called her to explain the situation, which is when she point blank refused to have another class than mine. so she asked the student to come in early tomorrow to discuss it. which is fine and what i wanted, but she's now been alienated and it's gonna be much harder to make her see the point. and it just drives me nuts. because apart from not actually learning anything, she's very confrontational, and seems to feel a need to get in on possible arguments taking place, even after i've just told off the people arguing. she is not in any way part of this argument but starts screaming about something totally unrelated, verbally abusing other students. it's not that i hate her, but i probably will this time tomorrow, unless she actually listens to me, which, at this stage, seems very unlikely.

not being connected...

due to unforeseen events, i ended up unconnected for a whole week! ouch. not that i cannot live without email (although it's close), but the timing was horrendous: i was just about to book my flight to Scandinavia when it all went down. needless to say that i'm now faced with my return flight being fully booked, although it's still two months away.

there are, of course, other possibilities. the more expensive ones, or the cheaper ones that require an extra day off. which wouldn't be the end of the world if i wasn't paid by the hour, and thus i'd be loosing a whole morning's wages, which, as i currently only work mornings and as i'll be in unpaid training all of July, is pretty much the end of the world...

so here i am debating with myself while waiting for a call from the travel agent's, to confirm whether or not they have a seat left on that plane. but time's arunning and if they haven't called in the next ten minutes... say twenty minutes, but i'm really stretching it, then it'll have to be an extra day off. i just wish they'd get on with it so i can book the bloody thing and stop stressing about it.

giddy

the reason there hasn't been any news lately is that i don't actually have a working connection. hopefully that will be fixed tomorrow.

the reason i HAD to attempt a post today anyway was to let those of you who keep asking me know that he's finally emailed me. and this response to my postcard, which, thanks to the Swiss post being as it is, i'd started to fear he didn't actually get, was very positive indeed... am i happy or am i happy?