as an update i'd like to say that patrick owen did reply to my email after a period of about 5 days. and the email was totally platonic. so i'm heartbroken, and i don't really feel like writing back. i don't want to look like i'm desperate, chasing after a ghost, especially when another guy in my department has just declared undying love for me over the weekend.

well, not exactly, but i was duped into accepting a laptop from him, during which he may as well had declared undying love. i don't think it is, undying love, but buying someone you don't actually really know that well a laptop indicates pretty strong feelings. and since he's given it to me he's been avoiding being alone with me so i haven't as yet been able to confront him. its gus, the lab technician, by the way. ironically i had some weeks ago written a short entry about him, joking about how i sometimes find him strangely attractive even though he has a werewolf look to him and he has really bad BO.

i was really shaken, still am, although i've now gotten over the initial shock. i fell sick, and stayed in bad for two days, and i'm sure that had to do with the stress of the whole situation. i've told about 4 girls from SOP about it, but nobody from the department. the main concern really is that he'd want something (something, hah!) in return for it. and ethically, morally, the right thing to do would be to return it. but then i do also have feelings for him as well, although i would never pursue a proper relationship with him, and i am really touched by it. so i still have the laptop. and i have to talk to him at some point. lets hope he remains normal and doesn't go psycho, which is ofcourse the other main concern. i took the laptop to a computer shop today, and the guys there said it was worth 800-900pounds (GBP). which is alot of money. i don't quite get the guy.

i'm at home with my mum now, and its nice to get away from it all. i feel better already, although i've still got this twitching in my stomach which is really irritating.

on second thoughts i think i will write back to pat. well why not? who's to say if i'll ever see him again anyway? who's to say.

He didn't reply to my e-mail. sigh.

Ask me what I did during the weekend? I went to Venice! woohoo. Actually it sounds more fun than it actually was. i found it a little stressful. the weather was cold, and the hotel bed was too soft, and i didn't sleep all that well, for the four nights we were there. The first day was walking walking walking, walking into hundreds of tourists. And you take for granted that everybody speaks english, and when they don't you're absolutely flummoxed. And there are these small dogs, they like small dogs there. probably because big dogs wouldn't be able to squeeze themselves through the narrow alleyways. and dog poop! yeauch, I was constantly eyes to the ground to make sure i didn't step in anything. Every other shop we passed by seemed to sell those venetian masks, or this 'Murano' glass, which are probably some clever venetian idea to sucker the tourist public. They look pretty, but its just glass stuff. Glass bowls, glass ashtrays, glass ducks, horses, frames, pendants. ( I bought two small frames and a glass dolphin thing for my sisters). They sold alot of bags. I liked the bags, although I didn't buy. And at every bridge there seemed to be a gondolier wearing trainers and sunglasses, stripey tops and one of those dodgy hats hassling you. Not only did they hassle you, they'd say stuff in italian so you couldn't tell what they were saying, so it was like as if they were making fun of you. If they were in London, they'd be the equivalent of a cross between a minicab driver and one of those beggars who ask you for money and then swear at you when you walk past. We might have gone, if they hadn't charged so much. And I don't like it when people hassle you like that. And if there wasn't a gondalier, there'd be a black guy trying to sell you a fake Louis Vuitton/Prada/Gucci bag.
yes there were all the canals, and the bridges, and the charming alleyways and narrow streets with the tiled ground and the period two story buildings surrounding you wherever you went, but all the touristy distractions detracted from it. Maybe its because i went with a bunch of girls, but i missed out on the romantic vibe.
And then on our last day there we had to get up at 5am because we had to catch the coach to the airport which left at 6.50am. So by the time I got back to the flat i was exhausted. I still went into university to do some cell culture work, and chatted a but to Gus the technician.
The following day however I slept on and of for almost the entire day, only getting out of bed at about 7pm to get ready for Kung Fu.

And today, I sen an e-mail to Patrick Owen :p! I wonder if he'll reply, and I wonder if he has a girlfriend, and if so will it become really awkward. But I had to really. I don't want my life to be a bunch of 'if onlys'.

And today I found out that Loobylu (see links) is pregnant! omgosh!

I think by the end of the month I will have done something for every weekend. This, to me is something, as I usually find myself doing nothing at all during my weekends, sitting all sad and depressed in front of the tv. Shall I tell you what I did? oh, okay then.

last saturday (2nd march) I went to the school ball. This could have all gone a bit pear shaped, because i didn't really want to go. That is I did when the tickets first went on sale, but then i later found out that hardly anybody i knew would be going. me and my friend Himali were saying, yes we'll go this year, because it's our final year, plus Himali had never been before. I'd left her to deal with the tickets, and she sort of left it to the last minute. I actually said to her the week before the ball, have you bought the tickets yet? because if you haven't let's cancel... But unfortunately they had gone through by then. So we went. Himali brought her boyfriend along, so I felt a bit of a third wheel. On the day I wore myself out looking for a top just before the ball. I bought this black puffy top for £26, I bought these flowery hairbands and a big red flowery brooch ( I like what Carrie from Sex and the City wears) for £15 from Claire's Accessories, and I bought these boots from Dotty P's for £35. I think I looked more goth than cool. the food was ok, everybody looked sleek and elegant (except me). Himali's bf looked old, although she claims he's just 33 (or something) and didn't say that much to me. I had to ignore their canoodling, and I thought the evening was going to be a bust. And there really didn't seem to be hardly anybody there that I knew. For the entertainment the class president came out and gave out silly awards eg most likely to become a rockstar, and there was clapping and cheering and laughter, but I didn't know any of the people the awards were going out to. Well, except one, a lecturer who used to terrorise us all when I was still an innocent little undergraduate. He'd won and award for favourite lecturer, and he came out, with his cummerband, his wife was in the audience, and he gave a speech. And he was actually really good, funny. I laughed. They made him wear a baseball cap, because apparently he doesn't like students to wear hats in his lectures.
And then the music started, and neither me nor Himali felt like dancing at first. Its different when you don't know anybody, like when you're in a club. But when its all undergrad sproglets that you see on an almost day to day basis, its a little off putting, if you're not drunk enough. So i kept telling myself, I'll dance later, I'll dance later. I had three conversational exchanges with three guys though, and that kind of distracted me. i think they must have thought I looked really sad and alone (Himali had wondered off somewhere with bf). One of them was a guy siiting on the table. Nice guy, chatted a bit about usually friendly stuff. The second guy was someone that I've known since my undergrad years and has been at the school for ages, still trying to finish off his PhD. I don't like him that much, he used to go out with an ex-friend of mine, who herself used to go out with my ex-boyfriend (its all very incestuous). But he must have been drunk, he didn't sound drunk, but he was rambling on and on about life, and that there's more to life than pharmacy, and what are you going to do after you finish. I think he was having some kind of mid life type crisis. He really should have written up his PhD atleast a year ago, but maybe he's trying to put off the actual completion of it because he's afraid of being sucked out into the wilderness of the outside world. I can appreciate that. i was in that wilderness for two years, and ended up going out with my nightmare of an ex for two years. The third guy is a young lecturer who i've spoken about before, we bumped into each other at Bar Salsa about a month ago, and he invited me to a party I didn't go to. he rambled as well, man, could he talk. Himali joined us at that point, and then he started talking to her instead. which made me think that he only came over to sit with me in the first place was because he had no one else to talk to. And then he starts gossiping about colleagues, and Himali is appalled yet fascinated. The music stopped then, at 1am, because it was in a hotel and they weren't allowed to play any later. we carry on chatting till about 2am, and then we head home. So I didn't dance at all that evening, but I can honestly say that I enjoyed myself, in a weird way. All thanks to those three guys.

And this Saturday, well its my sister Lydia's b-day. and she decides to have a salsa night. She wanted to go to Salsa Fusion, but we find out that salsa fusion is no more, which is a little sad for me, because i used to take classes with them. So we went to the 'Empire Palladium', which is this tiny little room which probably hasn't been redecorated since the 1960's, if the psychadelic carpet is anything to go by, next to the infamous 'The Empire' (cheesy club, don't go there). this time i'll say that this evening was a bit of a bust. My sister's friends don't really dance salsa, and she hadn't brought any guys that knew how to, so we were just awkwardly standing around. because although you can, you don't really want to dance to salsa music unless you're dancing salsa. I chatted to various people. I met a guy who used to study at the same school of pharmacy as me. i found out from another guy who does Karate that my other sister Sarah had won these gold medals at a karate competition.
Strangely enough she didn't mention this to me herself. And as if that wasn't enough, sarah then tells me that she's now modelling. I couldn't believe it. I can't believe that we're actually related. I can go into the whole sibling rivalry thing, but suffice it to say, my sisters are definitely much prettier than me, but i always comforted myself with the thought that I did what I did better than them. Like, like writing, art, singing, being moody and dark. But now its like she's won. And I should definitely move to another country before she does my head in. Did I mention that she won a salsa competition, the prize was which to go to Mexico and enter another competition, and even there she won third prize?
enough of that. All my sisters and her friends left at about 12am, to catch the last trains. I stayed till 1am, by my sad self, goofily asking guys to dance. At one point I was standing right there at the edge of the dance floor and these guys were asking all these girls if they wanted to dance. They'd ask all they girls sitting down to the left of me, (they'd all say no), then they would walk right past me, and refused to make eye contact with me. In the end I had to ask one of them to dance. May be it was my glasses that made me invisible. who knew. I walked home, and listened to Linkin Park and Dido before I went to bed because I was so depressed.

Well I say I was really depressed. I'm ok really. y'know why? because I know I'm really something.

There was something else i wanted to tell you. I dreamed about Patrick Owen again, this was at the beginning of the week now, and I meant to tell you then, but I was busy. yeah. What do you think it means?

I think Russel Crowe is a horrible old tart, and doesn't deserve to win any BAFTA's or Oscars. I don't think he's good-looking either, you can just imagine him becoming this fat old smelly drunk when he gets old.

My head's going to drop off and my eyes are going cross-eyed from looking at the computer screen for too long, and I have been perusing all my usual weblog haunts and have not been inspired. I have however done my first bit of cell culture in ages though (yay!)

I'm going to the school ball tomorrow. And I don't have a frock. I will try to get a nice top though, really try.

I'm going to work for half a day in a pharmacy IN AN ESTATE, in HACKNEY (murder capital of London), tomorrow. I know. God help me. Why did I agree to do it? I'm obviously losing a grip.

As for the police guy, I'm seeing him next tuesday.

I have to go shopping in Safeways now. (Bleugh) Hopefully I'll be in one piece when I next get back to blog. Peace out.