Follow meeee... I have loads to say!
(you might wanna split up this entry for extended reading pleasure lol)
So. It's been a while uh? Mhm. Let's start where we left off... as you may remember I was complaining about my lack of original ideas. This was because I was trying to make that card for Sue that I mentioned in an earlier entry. I ended up copying one of Doug Savage's ideas... mainly because it's very me and my "glass half empty" attitude had come up during our sessions countless times. I did some drafting for it, most of it during our Marketing class on Tuesday.
Then when I got back home I managed to burn the palm of my right hand on the stove *lol* so drawing was kind of painful... I gave it a go anyway:
I wasn't happy with this version (the paper was all wrong to start with, far too absorbing, and yellow didn't look good either), but somehow that still seemed preferable to starting over. 
But the cards I have have three folds, so I needed to find something else. I was reminded of my neat Chinese calligraphy set and thought I'd try to write "Thanks" in Chinese. I enlisted the help of Lo and did lots of practising, right to left, top to bottom... I think I filled three sheets with the same symbol over and over. 
Now with two ex-sinology-students among my readership (the above-mentioned Lo and Michelle) I wasn't sure if I should embarrass myself by showing my lame arse attempt... but what the heck. I don't have a clue about the structure behind it but I am not supposed to.
So that was that. I wrote some "soppy text", had it reviewed by Tom, and gave it to Sue at the end of my final session on Wednesday. And would you believe it, today I got a letter from them with the following contents: Your Counsellor, Sue, has asked us to pass on to you that she felt overwhelmed by the feeling that came through the card and wanted us to thank you very much for the card. 
I thought that was so cute. 
I know the "soppy text" above makes it sound like I didn't mean it or something, but I did, I'm just not terribly at ease expressing feelings. As Sue knows only too well.
Moving on. Let's get to exciting future stuff. First off, it appears TomTom is coming to visit me in ten days 
! Obviously (glass half empty, see above) I will only really believe it once I see it (him), or once I get a text from him confirming he's on the train down from London, but it's very exciting all the same - he's already booked the ticket & all (or so he says ). Tho it is also fairly scary of course. I might just chicken out. 
(no no I won't!!! 
)
The other exciting future thing - OMFGZZZ#&@! - is the Placebo tour. 
UK dates were announced on Tuesday, pre-sale started on Thursday, and we have booked 3 dates:
Saturday April 8th NEWCASTLE
Sunday April 9th BIRMINGHAM
Tuesday April 11th LONDON
w00t w00t, as annoying people would say (of which I am not one). Not to sound greedy, but I hope there will be some French gigs I can go to as well. *teehee* Ooh Brian's eyes... (oh yeah, speaking of which, the video's up at Placeboworld).
Mhm. I rang my nan the other night - I don't do it nearly often enough, and to be honest I am not entirely sure why that is. Most of the time when I do speak to her I actually find it quite interesting. She obviously makes a huge effort not to be boring when she speaks to me, because both my mum and Gaby complain about her being repetitive and annoying (ok mainly my mum lol), anyway I spent some 3 hours on the phone to her. We spoke about many things. one of which - my father - I may dedicate a separate entry to. Or not.
The other main one was journalism. Actually this does not take its origins in my conversation with my nan. It all started - well recently anyway - with my slutbag. She does not really approve of me doing this course, and when I asked her for suggestions about what I should do, she veered towards journalism. Now apparently she did not know that this was one of the very first jobs I'd considered and that I did two internships at a Lux newspaper. Anyway she thought I'd be good at it. My main problem with that is that I don't feel confident enough about my "mastery" (is that a word?) of the English language (don't argue. I know what I can do. but I also know what I can't).
Then on Monday, Jeff, who is our PR and journalism tutor, told Kayce and me that he could totally see us in journalism and how he thinks we've got what it takes, and that he would support us and show us the way if we decided to go down that alley (Kayce has already decided to do so apparently.) So now I am thinking about it somewhat more seriously. It's so weird... it's like coming full circle. After considering every possible career (or almost), and wasting 10 years, I would end up right where I started. In a way it makes sense, and in a way it seems very wrong. But I have decided not to make any decisions before mid-end March anyway. So there. What a waste of two paragraphs.
Oh yeah and the third topic with my nan was working in the US. My nan insists I have increased chances because my great-grandma (her mum) was born there and had proper citizenship. So I looked into the whole thing again earlier and... I really don't see it. My only chance is "immigration through employment" which means you need a job offer to start with. All of this immigration stuff seems to go round in circles. It's depressing. I'm probably missing something crucial here... how do other people get into that blasted country!? 
Ah well. I won't freak out over that just now. Maybe I will win the green card lottery (hehehe) - or maybe I will want to do journalism and stay here anyway. My nan cutely asked where I'd want to do that - in the UK or in Lux. In Luxembourg!?!? Yeah right. I'd rather cut my legs off.
Ok enough of this. Let me finish by saying I've given up in my battle with Dixons and am now using my iPod again. I know, I never told you about that either but it's not really that interesting. Let it be known that Dixons are arseholes, their returns policy is a joke and their customer service sucks. But I can now watch videos on the bus. Hooray.
I know what you mean @ "coming full circle". I sometimes feel like that, too. And I feel just like you about those many wasted years trying out so many things to come back to goals you've always had long before. I want to kick my butt sometimes when I think about it.
About the USA topic - a friend of my aunt who lives in the USA got a job offer during her vacation over there. She got the offer and simply extended her vacation forever, hehe. Probably you could visit your "great-gandma" for a month or two and look around to find a job offer. If you get one the company will most probably take care of the worst part of the paperwork then, too. I don't believe it's all that difficult. You might easily get a job as a teacher, teaching languages or such.
Posted by: Michelle on Fri February 3, 2006 at 22:01Yeah I am thinking of that (going there on a 3 month visa and looking) - and that seems the most likely way to go - but from what I can glean even for a potential employer applying seems a complete nightmare.
The positive way of thinking about wasted years is - it's experience, and only by trying & eliminating can you know for sure it wasn't for you. 
I don't get why they are wasted years. Unless work is the only/most important thing in life.
Posted by: JarJar on Fri February 3, 2006 at 23:21
Not in the sense of "everything from getting up in the morning to going to bed at night was a waste of time"... But I could be so much further if I'd had a clear goal and had followed it from the beginning. Like that year doing my MA... absolutely useless (I'd say the same about the teaching but at least that earned me lots of money lol).
Now I'm 28 and as far as other people are aged 20.
Yeah, that's exactly what I'm thinking. I'm studying Law now, and chances are rather low at my age - almost 30 - to become a e.g. judge later. I'll probably be 33/34/35 when I'm done with my two state examinations. If I had started a lot earlier I could have achieved a lot more.
Posted by: Michelle on Fri February 3, 2006 at 23:47It's quite easy to get into the U.S. and work. It's called illegal immigration! Many people do it. You should look into it, I'll help sneak you in the border:).
This is just my opinion, but age is but just a number. I don't believe that I have wasted my time. Everything we do makes us who we are. Maybe it's taken you a longer path to reach a conclusion to be a journalist or whatever you eventually decide to do. Perhaps you will do journalism for awhile and then want to do something different.
And by the way, cute drawings!
Posted by: jimmy on Sat February 4, 2006 at 5:23First of all, I don't think you are where most people are at age 20. Again I can really only speak for this country, but most people here no longer have everything sorted out at a very young age. People don't get married, have kids, dogs, houses, sorted careers by the time they're 25. It's not at all uncommon for people to finish their education at 33/34/35, as Michelle mentioned, in this country.
And well, you didn't HAVE a clear goal from very early on. You never were that person. So how can you say what you have done has been a waste, you had to be doing SOMETHING in the time it took you to decide what you really wanted to do.
Aaaaand (yeah I get you have some weird age limits and stuff in Lux, but if we ignore those), you're going to be working for SO many years, so why's it a problem that you spend a few of your younger years doing other things?
I just don't get why we're in such a hurry. Besides I'm sure you'll get bored of your job sooner or later anyway, so why in a rush to get there.
lol @ illegal immigration.
I guess I still feel that there's quite a lot of competition out there for jobs, and they'd rather take someone who didn't take 10 years to decide this was the job. Doesn't make you sound very determined now does it. But I guess it's just my negative view lol.
Posted by: Clarissa on Sat February 4, 2006 at 18:14Sometimes it's good to be older and more experienced though.
But ja, I didn't think that was what you meant earlier, when you were talking about wasted time + could have been further. (If it's easier or harder to get a job when you're young seems a different discussion to me than 'I've wasted time and could be further now'.)
Posted by: JarJar on Sat February 4, 2006 at 18:55>>how do other people get into that blasted country
So bloody true, I've been looking into this (for CA) since I was 16 and as you say, it's nigh on impossible. The only way to do it is to transfer from the company you already work with (yeah, right), go out there and LOOK for work, but again you're having to convince them you have skills they can't find from anyone in America applying for the same job as you, or do voluntary work and hope it leads to something, which is what I plan on doing. It's very, very hard, or you can find a sponsor who'll... well, sponsor you. Not quite sure how that works tho. As far as I can see the green card lottery is kinda pointless as like you said in another entry, you can't gain entry to the country without a job to go to and you can't find a job without residence in the country. It's one of the hardest countries to break into.
Or, you can become a millionaire through working in the UK and emigrate when you're old. They only let millionaires in that way tho. *sigh*
And, I'm probably being really thick (hell, wouldn't be the first time) but what is that Chinese symbol above meant to be?
Posted by: The BML on Mon February 6, 2006 at 18:07