new flowers

i don't think i've posted this picture, although i might be wrong (it seems i'm completely off the charts these days!). taken in a field in Denmark. a little optimism in my currently pessimistic frame of mind.

becoming too carefree...

i'm going to Marrakech on Friday. except i'm not. i'm actually leaving on Thursday. i'm not sure how this crucial information got past me, but somehow it did. at first, i thought S. was joking when she told me we were leaving on Thursday. i really did. but no, she was serious. and in the meantime, i'd asked for my days off, a replacement schedule was worked out, the works. and now i'm gonna have to go into work tomorrow and explain that i got my dates mixed-up. try to explain to your supervisor (everyone else is on holiday), that someone who's usually super-organised to the point of being anal about it made a mistake...

good thing i found out, though. otherwise i'd have got home Thursday to find several messages on my phone asking me why i wasn't at the airport, where i was, or worse yet, only shown up on Friday and wondering what had happened.

black hole

i live on top of the biggest particle accelerator in the world (27km circumference, i believe), the LHC, and it'll be put into action in a couple of months or so. they're trying to find out how the universe came into being by throwing atoms at each other at very high speeds. or so i am told.

anyway, a few weeks ago, some scientists in Hawaii apparently decided to sue CERN (the people in charge) on the grounds that using the LHC would create a black hole and kill us all. we think this is hilarious, because we live on top of it, we know a lot of people working for CERN, and they really don't seem concerned about this happening.

in a way, though, i don't think i'd mind too much if it did. on the plus side, we'd all die together, as equals. and think about this: no more politicians, no more food shortage crisis, no more rich or poor, no more wars, no more diseases, no more environmental problems, no more bills to pay, no more bad bosses and no more idiots ruining it all for everyone else. and no-one would be any wiser, as it would, as far as i understand, be pretty much instantaneous... i say go for it, black hole, go!

humanity? barbarians, more like

i just saw a movie about the genocide in Rwanda, back in 1994. no-one did anything. like no-one really did anything in Bosnia, not until a hell of a lot of people had been killed. who are we kidding? we're no more human than animals. highly socialised, but animals nonetheless. it's all about who has power, money, weapons.

i have friends working for NGOs - one is currently in Sudan, trying to make sure people don't get blown to pieces by landmines, one in Sri Lanka trying to help with the Red Cross. i get regular reports from the one in Sudan and really, it's not great. he put his fist through a table the other day. the last i heard from Sri Lanka was bombings.

and let's not talk about the situation in China. or the doubling of food prices around the world, as crops that used to be cultivated for food are now used to make bio-fuel for our cars. and thus 100 million people are about to starve to death. and many more, i wager, as food prices are just as high here in Europe, and if the salaries don't increase as well, most of us are fucked anyway.

and yes, tomorrow i'll go back to work and try to lead a 'normal' life, and i know i have no clue about how desperate the situation really is, that even in my wildest dreams, i probably wouldn't be able to fathom it - and just as well really, as i'd probably have to kill myself. but still. most people don't even think about it, or they blank it out. and no, i'm not about to go out there myself, on the field, to help, because frankly, i don't think i can do anything about it. no-one can. you can try, but most probably fail. my father spent 22 years of his life working for the UN, hoping against hope to change things, but was left disillusioned and pessimistic. the only people who could, possibly, maybe, do something are the ones who won't, cos that would cost them their power, their money.

care to explain?

i was a great party last night. it really was. it also made me very confused. yep, this is another rendering of my father versus my best friend: am i too forward or not enough? and finding a balance seems ever more complicated.

it all started with him flirting with me. or so it seemed to me, anyway. i mean, we were three girls, and he chose to talk to me. from the very first moment, i mean. which i didn't expect, as he knew both of them a lot better than he knew me. my friend was trying to ask him something relatively important, but he was really blowing her off. everything was directed at me. even an invitation to come to his house and listen to real funk. which i really didn't mind, seeing as i do like him - i just hadn't seen him in about 8 months, and he'd had a girlfriend then. i didn't ask about his current status, though. maybe i should have, as this could possibly explain some things.

anyway, a little later, he'd asked me to hold onto his drink while he went to get something or other. just after that, my friends decided that we'd spent enough time at the bar and wanted to go dancing. i said i'd wait for him, cos with 1000+ people in 3 rooms, it was going to be a bit tricky to find us. when he got back, i briefly explained the situation. he looked at me and asked me if i'd waited around just for him. uh,... yes. that was nice, he said, and kissed me on the cheek. i didn't quite know what to do, so i just took his hand and pulled him in the direction of the relevant spot on the dancefloor. that said, the only people who kiss me on the cheek are very good friends, so i basically interpreted this as a gesture of real interest. in my head, my father was saying 'don't rush things' and my best friend's 'just kiss him, for god's sake!'

fast forward some more and i decided to leave. we said our goodbyes ever so slowly: after the usual, albeit very slow airkissing that we use in Geneva, he first wished me a good night's sleep and a safe drive home, after which he reached out for my hand as i was leaving to ask if i'd retrieved my handbag (didn't have one), after which our fingers ever so slowly parted. my father ('take it slow') and best friend ('have you actually shown him you're interested??') were still fighting in my head, at high speed. what seemed incredibly easy and carefree a little earlier suddenly seemed incredibly risky. so i did the safest thing i could while still taking a risk (this is where both my father and my best friend say something like 'you did what?!?') and got the weirdest response of all - one that seemed a medium kind of answer to my question. he didn't completely blow me off, i think. maybe. mostly based on all of the above. either that or i'm deluding myself. or he's still with his girlfriend. arghhh....!!! someone give me a freaking manual for how guys work! please!

go figure!

snow. yes, snow. lots of it. blizzard like. it couldn't possibly have snowed before i changed the wheels. luckily, i didn't actually have to drive, but as i hadn't taken an umbrella or anything, i was covered in snow when i got home, and thus completely soaked.

changing wheels

as in, from winter tyres back to normal ones. it was about time, although the weather forecast now announces snow, of course.

it was my first time changing them. my father had made me change one when i'd got my driver's license, so he was sure i could do it if something happened. but that was AGES ago. so i didn't know how long it was going to take me. in the end, it was less than an hour for all four wheels. pretty good for a first time, i reckon...