Academically Challenged

I actually just passed the 1000 word mark on my dissertation, but I have this gut feeling im going to go for a meeting with my academic tutor tomorrow and she is going to shred it and use it as hamster bedding. So im feeling especially academically challenged, Im also stressed out with people speaking in riddles, a simple yes or no would do folks......AND i need to design some form of research questionaire by tomorrow AND theres a person next to me in the library who keeps releasing gas.....
COULD TODAY GET ANY BETTER?

Photo day

After mourning the loss of my beloved camera, i am pleased to introduce my new friend minolta. Incidentally, Ive decided that if the teaching career falls through...im going to become a photographer. Heres some of the arty shots from today, and a vid of laro and the bananaphone song!

Dont wanna be an American Idiot - Greenday

K, im offski to pretend to be an American and celebrate the 4th of July in the city that hates the English. Darmstadt, Very few cities would go to the trouble of putting plaques everywhere, i mean everywhere, that the English took the pleasure of bombing, every building, every bench...everywhere...I mean yes, im sorry and all but guys, really it was a long time ago. So Im gonna go cover up my milk white skin and don some dark glasses and party like its 1999(I have no idea why they say that. Enjoy
xx

Overly philosophical conversations with 4 year olds

Ive had two deep conversations with Emma today, the first being while trying to convince her that if she gets me mad enough I will turn green, tear up my shirt, climb the nearest tall building and roar loudly...but the second was cute, philosophical and got me thinking too. While trying to get her to sleep she kept covering her mouth with her blankie and that stuff creeps me out, cot death, suffocation the like, so I was trying to persuade her not to do it, and without thinking I said that if she covered her head the angels wont be able to see her face. She was looking at me in total awe like what angels?!?! So I taught her the prayer I used to say at Gran and Grandads when I was little
"god Keep us safe this night, secure from all our fears, may angels watch us while we sleep til morning light appears" and she thought it was cool but still wanted to know more. So I went down the guardian angel path and after she listed every single one of her freinds individually, we concluded that we all had guardian angels. She wanted to know what they looked like, what they sounded like, what they wore, can she speak to them, and the cutest...can she dream about them. It was totally cool and got me thinking, its sad that the stories here dont have things like angels in them, its not an angelic culture, as far back as I can remember I believed in things like magic, and santa clause and fairies and angels...but these kids dont, they grow up with reality and (im totally not sugestting the things out lined above are not reality) thats got to such when your a little kid.
Thinking back to Jolie and how amazed and delighted she was when she met arthur, the zebra handpuppet, and how she is so careful with her baby dolls incase she might hurt them, because they do feel pain...its part of growing up, to some the kids here might seem more mature, you cant even trick Laro with a puppet and he is 1, and Emma knows her dolls and teddies are made of plastic, and her play kitchen is plastic... but isnt there a time when its too soon to be mature, before you mature you have to be a kid first.

The Only Difference Between Martyrdom And Suicide Is Press Coverage

Starting with just a little get you thinking style lyric there, but today I thought for a long time about the stark differences between countries and cultures. Of all the places I have visited this is the first place which i have "lived" as one of the locals, doing as they do, something you just dont get the chance to do on holiday and there are so many differences. Some are quirky ones, like the fact that on name tags in shops they have "Frau Worth" (as an example) instead of Kirsty, which makes me laugh and would certainly put a bummer of a stop to the things that we used to get up to at currys when we swapped name tags. But there are more serious differences.
The news from England that I have been checking is so depressing, if that crap happens here you sure as hell dont hear about it! I check the BBC site daily, and I find that in 2 days there has been two terrorist atacks on the UK, one was caught and the other didnt do as much damage as would be expected..but coming up to the anniversary of 7/7you cant help but realise that someone wants to hurt the UK nd no matter how much we try to stop it, eventually someone will get through. But even on the bbc sites, the tyne area for example, there is 4 headlines, a severe assault, a sexual assult, a hit and run and a robber who attacked someone with a hammer, oh happy days. THe local news paper here this morning was talking about thee fair in Darmstadt town, which of course I was obliged to visit, being one of the biggest in Germany. Again, the culture clash was obvious when we passed 2 paramedics, where Uk ones where stab vests and radios these guys were wearing flip flops. UK police have high speed pursuit vehicles, German police have tandems, yes, tandems, and this is in a big town!
But I went to the fair with an American girl who works at the kindergarten and her dad is stationed in Darmstadt and met up with some of her friends and actually had a really good day. went on some rides, including the scariest ferris wheel ever, had something to eat and then watched a jazz SKA band, who tried to pull of Kenny G, PUUULEEEASEEE! but all in all it was fun!
The first week is offically over, im bloody knackered but still havin fun, but I do feel slightly out of the loop. I found the daily mail atthe army base...wooo English! And felt a little confused when I was reading about the London Bómb things and it had prime minister godron browns response...i was like huh? how long have I been gone....what the hell happened to Anthony? help!

The north wind does blow

In a grand statement I can proudly say that I have cheated death a grand total of twice today. Which is a very good or a very bad dayy depending on how you look at it.
Incident one - Im goin to pick Emma up from kindergarten and lolling along, and its been all stormy and really dark then it went like FREAKY dark. I glance over a field and whatdya know theres a frickin twister. Oh excellent, they dont mention that in the tourism books! I mean it was small and there was no damage (physically i mean, mentally, my nerves were shot to shit) and this woman let us hide in her car. But still people! ahhhh
Incident two - went to take the DVDS back to the shop and this walk takes 20 minutes usually, but this time I had slow and slower in tow, it took 2 hours, I kid you not to get there and back, and no, I didnt cheat death by not dying of boredom, or slipping through a rift in the space-time continuum because we were walkng so slowly. Ever heard of Un-manned train level crossings? well in England theres a little warning before the barriers come down, and even then they come down pretty slow, these are fast, and also silent... Were walking under the bastard and boom it comes shooting down on top of us and thankfully hit the buggy (which was empty, im not that callous).
There could be an incident three sooon enough because I had lunch with this American dude from thepool and he said that he would show us German food so he bought what translates roughly into white sausage...it tasted okay (not great), bitlike a cheap saveloy. I was just about to bite into it when he said, enjoy, and dont ask what its made of......I rarely do ask what my food is made of but that made me suspicious so when I got home I looked it up and I think I have just eaten horse meat and pig skin.....excuse me, I need to vomit

BARRETSTOWNNNNNNNNNNN

More about Germany later, I got accepted back to camp for halloween on the teen sib. camp nd im chaperoning, lets hope for no bomb scares this time, with any luck we will get on the right plane! I overly ecxited