Pretty hair

Nursing is far too much like hard work. I am going to become a hairdresser. I have cut my own hair in a pretty manner and so I shall share my talent with the world, and soon everyone will have pretty hair, albeit all in the same style (my hairdressing skills are alas not very diverse) and with a few mistakes and cut-off ears here and there.

I am so very bogged down with work at the moment. I have had five essays and three workbooks to complete over the last three months, and so of course have spent the entirety of last week slogging my guts out trying to fit a semester of work into seven days, and bursting alternately into fits of rage at the computer, and tears. I’ve done most of it now, although I still have four essays to do (I say most…) and an exam, for which I have attended one lecture, to revise for. I fear I am not the world’s most consciencious student.

I’m working at the Liverpool Women’s Hospital at the moment. And we all know what that means. Babies! I am revoltingly broody at the moment – I see a baby and my womb contracts. I can’t keep my hands off the newborns at the hospital. As soon as one is left unattended I slink up and give it a surruptitious cuddle before the mother returns from having a faaag downstairs. Speaking of, that’s something I hate to see – pregnant women smoking. I hate it. I want to go straight up to them and rip that cigarette straight out of their mouths, stamp on it, shake them by the shoulders and ask if they are aware of the irreparable damage they are causing to their unborn child. I saw a baby being born a couple of weeks ago. It was just, an incredible experience. I was sobbing more than the mother. That child will live for perhaps eighty or ninety years, and do so many things in their life, and I saw that first second of it. I stood there watching while a new life was brought into the world. Corny it may be, but if you’ve seen it yourself, you’ll know what I mean.

Beth’s gone back to Uganda. I’ve spoken to her on the phone a few times since, and even knowing she’s back there, in the same places I know like the back of my hand, made me feel sick with longing to be there. I still miss it. I miss her too – she’s there for a whole six months. The Uganda crew (well, the cool section of the uganda crew, ie. me, Paul, Nick and Paddy) are having a meetup in about a month in Liverpool, and she won’t be there. It will be weird. You know when you just click with someone straight away, it was like that with me and her – first time we met. She knows more about me than anyone, except perhaps Rose and Nick, she knows exactly what I’m thinking.

Gillian still won’t talk to me. We had a minor ‘falling out’ about January – her fault incidentally for telling me she couldn’t share a house with me because, basically, I was too irritating. Since then, I’ve decided it was a stupid argument, and tried to make an effort with her. I mean, our friends are the same, and it’s always difficult when two of your friends don’t get on. I’ve been in that position many a time. She couldn’t make less of an effort back. I’m on the brink of just leaving her alone in her stupid, selfish little world. Bitter, me? Perhaps a little.

I have become a clean freak. I’ve actually never been a particularly tidy person (guys, you can back me up on this!) but I seem to be developing an obsession with cleanliness. It all started in Uganda when I hated the house being dirty. As my housemate was a slob, this meant I spent a large portion of the time washing up in a bucket, or on my knees scrubbing the porch or the floor. It’s continued into uni – my room must be spotless, books in a line, cd’s ordered, desk empty, bed perfectly made. I don’t understand. Why has this happened? It takes up far too much time and is frankly just unhealthy.

Some snapshots of Katy and Em’s trip to Brighton

Em and one of her many vices

Em looking through a large cast iron doughnut

We had a good time. I love random trips to random places. I would have loved it a lot more had it not been freezing cold and tipping down with rain the majority of the time, but we indulged in drinks and fine cuisine (wine out of teacups and chips eaten under the pier) and in the end great fun was had by all.