I got my hair done today. It's now pink and purple, to match my Valedictory dress. :D

NaNoWriMo Word Count: 24,395

I'm starting to get a little fuzzy with my typing, but it's only six hundred more words. (Gah.) This is definitely incentive to never get behind again. Tomorrow I'm going to do my writing in the morning.

I'm so used to having something to do -- well, something with a degree of urgency -- that it's quite bizarre to suddenly have so much time on my hands. On the other hand, there's still plenty for me to do, NaNovel aside. Today, for instance, I restarted Ratchet and Clank 2. I never finished this one, mainly because I suck at ship missions, or I did when I tried to play it a couple of years ago. The game in general is much much easier after spending so much time on Kingdom Hearts and even the Jak games. Except for when I run out of ammo unexpectedly or the enemies surprise me, the levels are fairly easy.

Just don't talk to me about the hoverbikes.

I also began the laborious task of sorting out my stamp collection. I've had the thing since I was six and it's been sitting in a huge disorganised mess in a box under my desk for the last three years. Today I dragged it out and emptied all the stamps onto my bedroom floor, where I sorted them out in their categories. Or a rough approximation of their categories, anyway. Over the next few days I'll see if I have enough pages to put them all away.

I did consider giving it away, but I'm beginning to remember why I kept them in the first place. All the pretty pictures. I sense a crack drabble in the works here... But that's a task for another day, as it's getting late and I am tired.

Oh, I did a little work on A Challenger Appears last night. Once I get back on track with NaNo, I'll put some work into that, as well. :D

Here is a brief summary of my day:

Owned my art exam.

Went into town, where I purchased a copy of Revenge of the Fallen, an Optimus Prime T-shirt and a copy of Basil: The Great Mouse Detective for my mother.

Went home, where I received a copy of The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde from my parents as a graduation present. Cue squeeing.

Watched Revenge of the Fallen and two hours of bonus material.

Went over to a friend's place, where we discussed how wonderful it was to have time to oneself again.

Came home, ate dinner.

End day, because I'm looking forward to getting a good night's sleep for the first time in weeks and I'm still ahead of my word count for NaNo. Thank goodness. :D

Last exam tomorrow. Thank God.

That was like a study session multiplied by about a thousand. I couldn't manage more than a thousand words tonight. But I did introduce the main conflict, so further writing can wait. And besides, this is why I got ahead of the word count in the first place -- so I could opt out if things were too much after an exam.

NaNoWriMo Word Count: 18,462

I wasn't able to get as much done on the softball!AU Weiss/Shelke/Nero or some permutation thereof as I would have liked, unfortunately. I hit the five page mark before I finished up, though, so depending on how much time my novel takes up... If all else fails, I should be good after exams are over, but I hope I'll be able to finish it before then.

Still a little iffy on Weiss's characterisation, but I guess I'll fix that as I go along.

Dear Lord I hate studying for maths. When I'm thorough enough to make sure I avoid hasty mistakes, it can take up to fifteen minutes to complete a question -- longer, if it's extended response. But if I work quickly enough to have some form of efficiency, I make stupid errors.

ARGH.

The only thing that's keeping me sane right now is the Transformers score. There is some truly beautiful music on it.

Went back to the immunologist today. Had to get another prick test. For those not familiar with the process, the nurse writes a bunch of numbers on your arm (or wherever you have clear, healed skin -- the last time I got this done, my arms were all covered in eczema, so they had to perform it on my back instead), put drops of allergen next to the numbers, and then scratch you with a razor. Then you wait about ten minutes to see which allergens affect you.

My forearm was a mass of itchy red rash by the time those ten minutes was up. I'm allergic to cyprus, apparently, something that I didn't know before. Dust mites are still a concern -- raised a lump about the size of my thumbnail -- with lesser reactions from cats, guinea pigs, a variety of pollens... About the only thing I wasn't allergic to was horse. I find that somewhat comforting, even if I don't have a lot of contact with horses.

So, hooray for more shots. :P

On a completely different note:

"I agree, You don't need to prove whether or not you exist, because very soon, you won't."

Darling Scar, how I have missed you in my time away. :D

1. I dislike sports. Even social sports.

2. Everything can be used as inspiration, so I shouldn't bitch.

One silly AU softball Weiss/Shelke/Nero or some permutation thereof coming up.

I find early morning housework soothing. I don't know whether it's because I'm getting older or because I'm (gradually) getting more organised, but it's bothering me more to see things in a state of untidiness. Hence, me setting up a few loads of laundry, packing the dishwasher, taking out the rubbish and recycling, and cleaning my room. Today, 'cleaning my room' also involved getting all of my school uniform and getting it ready to get sold back to the uniform shop. I'm glad to get it out of my room -- now there's actually room in my drawers for my socks. (Knee-high socks and stockings take up way too much room.) I polished up my shoes, tore up the dress that was so old it was nearly see-through, relegating the rags to the shoe-polishing box and the buttons to the button jar. Also, I learned that dirty clothes are not sorted into lights and darks, as I have thought for nearly eighteen years, but into darks, lights, and colours. Shock!

Anyway, with everything that I did, it's not really surprising that my mother asked whether I was well when she got up and found me washing the few things that don't belong in the dishwasher.

Too bad I haven't gotten much stusy done today, but now that my room is in some state of order, I'll find it easier to work without distractions. I'll see about getting some more maths problems done after dinner. If not, there's always trying to commit those notes to memory. I need to find some really silly mnemonics for graph transformations, because I can't remember them for the life of me.

Our schooling doesn't officially end until Friday, even if tomorrow is the last days of classes. So, can somebody explain to me why we should have to hand in the locks for our lockers on Thursday morning, necessitating the need for us to lug the entire contents of our lockers home on Wednesday night, thereby risking back injuries for everyone concerned? Our school bags are designed to carry that much stuff, you know.

Stupid school.

I saw The Dark Knight for the first time a couple of days ago. I'd heard a lot of good things about it (Heath Ledger being the really obvious one), so I wasn't really sure what to expect. (Sometimes, when I've heard good things, they've turned out to be dumb; sometimes when I've heard good things, they're great.)

Firstly, Batman's voice sounds like he's been gargling cigarette butts. I'd say broken glass, but it's not quite that raspy. I understand the need for disguising his voice, given that his alter ego is very well-known, but still... Surely there was a better alternative?

Secondly, Heath Ledger deserves the praise he's gotten for the Joker. I was kind of afraid that all the good things were being said because he was, y'know, dead, but he was genuinely frightening. I think this was because the Joker was so...reasonable, non-chalant about what he was doing. When you juxtaposed it with these grand displays of mastermindful, psychotic villainy, it was truly scary. Also, the scene where he blows up the hospital? The one where he ends up shaking the detonator because the explosives jammed or something? The scene on its own was awesome. The fact that it was real, and Ledger stayed in character? That made it infinitely more so.

Thirdly, I have to say that I was probably slightly more interested in Two-Face than I was in the Joker. I would have liked to see Dent's descent into madness expanded on a little more. I'd say that there's always a chance for the sequel, but Word of God apparently says that Two-Face is dead. Pity.

I did have a couple of WTF moments (and some eye-rolls), but on the whole it was a really enjoyable film. Didn't pick me up and carry me away like some films have, but a relatively enjoyable two hours.

I wish the weekend was longer. I can get five hours of study done in the morning, but after eleven o'clock, my productivity goes way down. Forget trying to get anything done past three in the afternoon. Maybe it'll be different in school, but there's a different set of distractions there, so I don't know.

Stolen from akaihikari:

( Survey below the cut )

I really wish I'd done 3/4 Art last year.

One of our tasks during the exam is to analyse an artwork from a selected number, which are in a coloured insert in the exam paper. They choose a wide variety of artworks, from ancient sculpture to modern pop art and just about everything else you can think of. Including movie stills.

Last year they had a still from Transformers. Words do not adequately express my jealousy.

Since I find it difficult to concentrate on my study while listening to contemporary music, tonight I'm recording all of my mother's classical CDs into my iTunes library. Then I will create a mega playlist of classical music to listen to while I study.

Let's hope this works.

Today, I read Olympos. I have never in my life read a book with so many different plot-threads happening simultaneously. I have never in my life read anything that wasn't a science magazine loaded with so much jargon that I didn't understand a word of.

And never in my life have I finished a book and been quite this flavour of confused.

What the hell happened?

A couple of months ago, Youtube removed two of my videos. Now, I find, inexplicably, that they have been restored.

I don't know whether I should be glad or just confused.