This post is brought to you by WOE.

The Decemberists, for the first time ever, are apparently going to grace the shores of Australia in January next year. This is a) the best thing ever and also b) the most depressing thing ever because most of the shows are sold out and the only one which is not, is in Melbourne. I am in Brisbane. Herein lies my problem. I am also quite nearly penniless presently, which means it is unlikely I'd be able to finance tickets/accommodation/flights.

WOE. It is me.

I do not have an appropriate icon for this.

Waiting for my results is really freaking annoying.

It is Thursday and that means it's GLEE DAY, OMG. Even my partner watches it. Actually, he even suggests rewatching episodes a few days after they've aired.

Not much is happening lately... just waiting for results and freaking out because what if I don't get first class honours? What if I don't get a scholarship? Living on $220 a week is so not fun I'm not sure if I could do it for another four years. The uni has been quite irritating, every one of the three people I've talked to (we only have three senior lecturers, so, yeah) tells me a different story about what I should be doing to apply and who to get to supervise and ARGH IT IS JUST. NOT. ON.

But, Glee day.

Well, I handed in my thesis yesterday.

Now I get to write a fugue, with basically no experience ever playing one, so this should be...interesting?

I keep forgeting to update this lj. Although, I keep forgetting what day it is so perhaps this is a larger problem that just keeping the lj updated. Anyway.

It is almost Things Are Due time. As in, on Monday and Wednesday (and the following Monday). If my life was a film, there would be constant tension music playing right now.

I REALLY FREAKING want to graduate with my average over 80% so that I get a PhD scholarship. But I'm worried it's not going to happen, because what if the world just hates me? What if I'm too stupid to write a decent enough thesis? What if I'm too rubbish to do my coursework properly? What if what if what if. (For the record, with the exception of one course, my grades so far have been 83% and above but that doesn't stop me worrying).

Things I do not like:

1. Crying after being questioned about my methodology for my research proposal. Apparently I am stressed. Very stressed. I cried in one of my thesis meetings a week or so ago, too. It's not so much fun.

2. The person who drove into Bob's car on the weekend (it was parked, no one in it) and totalled it. This is decidedly Not Cool.

3. Summer.

4. People who don't wear things that cover enough skin at uni. Ugh.

I have been having some very unproductive days lately. Three of them in fact. Not impressed with this, as I am rapidly running out of time for everything. Especially my two-part invention and the thesis.

Did you know, my thesis is supposed to be around 60 pages long. O_O. When it's done, and bound and whatnot, I'm totally going to photograph it. Because that's freaking epic. Performance master theses here are only like, 35 pages long. I really don't know what the hell sort of crazy loons decided that honours students had to do course work AND more than a masters thesis.

But I digress.

I'm starting to really realise now that honours thesis + research project + research proposal + EPIC counterpoint = too much, really.

...Really.

Thesis: 1/3 done :)

Today: Glee fiiiinally (it seems longer than a week since the last episode)

Food: not enough in my belly. Need foods.

Sometimes I think I've updated LJ, but lo and behold, I have only updated it in my mind. Which is less useful.

So it's October now. I've heard horrible things about how October is The Month Everything Goes Completely Tits Up Because It's Always Less Than 30 Days Until The Thesis Is Due, And Frankly, It's Not Written Yet Is It. So, good times. I do worry that 90% of what I say is sarcastic. But anyway. It's true, I haven't written my thesis yet, and I do indeed have a million other course-work related assignments/essays to get done at the same time. And yes, I am freaked out by this. But as long as I keep the freaking out at bay, it might be okay. My problem is I research quite quickly, but every stage after that is SO SLOW. My brain just doesn't seem to want to keep a decent pace, because I can type quickly.

Am at a better place today than a few days ago, when I realised that, hey, I actually DON'T KNOW HOW TO WRITE 15,000 WORDS. So I looked at some Masters theses, and devised a layout based on them. Oh UQ, how you haven't taught me how to a) manage my time or b) construct a long document. It's as though everyone (i.e. lecturers) think that you'll just "figure it out" sometime before the thing is due.

In other news, Glee has taken over my brain, season 3 of Gossip Girl is strangely awesome (now that Vanessa's hair doesn't look like a dead animal), and I've essentially been mentoring C with the thesis DESPITE NOT HAVING WRITTEN MINE YET.

Sad thing is, with thesis writing: actual difficulty of concepts < difficulty of finding time to ACTUALLY WRITE.

Okay so I got this necklace from Sportsgirl on Saturday. It's a silver statement necklace (there are fifteen billion rings and chains attached to it, and I added crosses) and I've had two people complement me on it on the two occasions I've worn it. It must have magical powers, because I rarely get complemented on stuff. It's weird. Also, while I currently hate most of the omg/neon/pastel/corsets as outer-wear/90s teeny junk Sportsgirl is churning out at the momennt, there still are some nice drapey clothes for layering and some OTT necklaces for which I seem to have a strange addiction to. For some reason their nail polish is also freaking excellent. I recommend it. And it's only $8 AUD. I refuse to buy OPI nailpolish on the basis that nail polish shouldn't be $20. It's probably also worth it, but I mean, $20? Really?

Omg wtf weather. There is presently a dust storm going on outside. It's quite eerie and hard to breathe in. I'd link to a news story with pictures, but apparently people only report on things when it's in Sydney, not Brisbane.

Tonight I'm supposed to be going out for dinner with Brother for his 21st at the casino. I finally get to meet his new girlfriend, who got fired for having an affair (she was married) with a teenaged student. This should be interesting.

Research project presentation: DONE.

That was just...not enjoyable. I mean, it's not actually the "talking in front of people" thing. It's the "classmates not even attempting to pretend to be interested" thing. I mean, guys, I know you're not interested in Purcell's use of counterpoint, but I will sit and listen to your presentations, I will make eye contact with you and even nod or whatever at appropriate times even if I'm not particularly riveted by your topic, so for the love of God at least don't just sit there staring out the window or scribbling on paper. I was so close to just stopping the middle and telling them to pay attention or just leave. But I didn't. Lucky I'd drawn tiny cats through my script so I couldn't get too cranky.

So today I have finished my Purcell script for my presentation. Good thing, considering it's tomorrow afternoon. I hope to read through it a few times this evening by myself while Bob goes out to weight-lifting with his friends.
My eyes are also really dry, because it's sitting at about 35% humidity here presently. While this is good for not making the 30 degree (C) plus weather any nastier than it has to be, it's also very irritating to have dry eyes. This could be solved with eye drops, but I can't bring myself to use them. Lucky I don't have to wear contacts.
I have not gone outside since this time yesterday. I am restless now.
I feel like this week I've just been posting really fragment-y posts. Haven't decided if this is a bad thing or not yet. Regardless, it will probably cease now. While for the next month everything will probably be "OMG THESIS DEAD THESIS NEED MORE TIME ARGH", I'll try and keep it coherent. If only for the facade of sanity, if nothing else.

I am not happy it is now Summer though it is only the first month of Spring because:
a) I love wearing Docs but summer and Docs are just not a good mix.
b) I prefer to have my legs totally covered (arms too), and this is also hard to achieve in summer without frying.
c) My summer uniform of denim shorts, tshirt or tank top and sandals is incredibly boring. I am already sick of it.
d) Unscented sunscreen is never not just as smelly as regular sunscreen. I hate smelling like sunscreen at uni all day, but I also hate getting tanned/sunburn.

This isn't the end of semester yet, but at the end we get asked to fill in teaching or course evaluation surveys. I've been filling these out for five-ish years now. There's always a statement that you have to rank on them: "I felt I belonged to a group of students interested in learning". I have honestly never felt that I was in a group of students who were interested in learning. Counterpoint, probably. But everything else? No. In my research project course three out of eight people still haven't picked a seminar time to present their papers (the first session is next Monday), for example.

For years I have been trying to find out the origin and meaning of my last name. I really don't know why I've been so determined to find out, though it was probably because there are so few people with my last name in Australia, and even fewer who aren't directly related to me. But today, I found it.

IDDLES is a patronymic variation of an English habitation name Idle, a name with several origins. Idle could come from the Old English idel referring to wasteland or unused ground. A person living by such a place would be given the surname. Reaney suggests that it is an anglicised form of the Welsh Ithel meaning generous.
Iddles seems to be an attempt long ago to get away from the connotation of idleness.

And there we go. It's not particularly grand, but I'm glad I know.

I seriously fear for my sanity. As I've been doing listening analysis for my thesis, in the past day I have listened to the first eight bars of this freaking rhapsody 42 times, minimum (there's seven different recordings though). I think I have it memorised pretty well now. Dun-DUNN...Dun-nun-nun-NUN...Dun-DUNN... Oh how I wish I had research assistants to do this instead of me. My brainz, how they hurt.

In other, yet uni-related news, I have more work than time to do it in. I literally have eleven days and twenty days of work to do in those days. And I'd really prefer not to have to stay up all night, because nothing you write after three a.m. is ever any good. (In my experience anyway).

Last night I had a minor break and had sushi with Bob at Garden City. So. Tasty. I really do not like many foods, or eating in general (too time consuming, often too much effort) but I could honestly eat salmon and tuna nigiri all the time.

Jeez. You know you can't judge your own work when you do an assignment, are seriously worried that you've failed, then get it back and have recieved 100%. Sigh.

Thesis: not going so well as I have realised that I can't "prove" my thesis statement due to the non-specific "characteristics" I have to work with. It's kind of hard to write when you know you're writing bollocks.

Research project: ballooning out of control, really. I've discovered fifteen billion books that I should read for it, but am really not going to be able to. Because I have negative time.

Piano: I have resolved to become more accomplished at piano over the span of the PhD. Have picked some grade eight songs to learn and copied out the relevant scales AMEB likes you to learn. And I really do need to learn some freaking technical stuff.