Hello! I´m in Barcelona! Food´s spectacular and my feet hurt from walking so much. And I´ve only been here for 2.5 days. There´s so much to see! Will report more soon.

OK, you're probably not going to hear from me for the next week as I'm gonna be in Barcelona. I might update once while I'm there but I'm not making any promises.

Viet Hoa is great! Kim Kian had the pho (beef noodle soup) which was good and I had the prawn paste on sugar cane with noodles which was very good! And the prices are reasonable...too bad the area is horribly dodgy. Then we headed to Mandalay, the ultimate Burmese restaurant, for their delectable banana fritters. We had some prawn and bean sprout fritters as well and I have to say that they really have a way with batter! As we were absolute gluttons, we also split a coconut agar agar (a hard jelly) which was nice but it could have done without the sauce.

Anyway, I'm starving so I'll eat now. I'll let you know how Barcelona is!

Wow...just made a chocolate shop trip with Kim Kian and had numerous samples and ended up buying some little orangettes - dark chocolate covered bits of candied orange peel - from the Chocolate Society. Oooh yum! So many little samples too!

We're now heading to Borough Market where I've never been before and then we're off to Viet Hoa for Kim Kian's birthday dinner. I hope to have a review of the place later. And then off to Mandalay for dessert! They have the best banana fritters ever.

Had a good meeting with my next year's supervisor...very excited about the work! But also praying that I do well this year... eeks!

Friday Five:

1. Do you live in a house, an apartment or a condo?
How about a ROOM? I've got a single room in a private hall of residence.

2. Do you rent or own?
I'm a student. I rent.

3. Does anyone else live with you?
In my room, no. In my hall of residence...yeah, something like 150 other people.

4. How many times have you moved in your life?
Hang on...lemme count. At least 10 times. But most of that's because of student dwellings.

5. What are your plans for this weekend?
Might go to Camden Town this Saturday but I'm not too sure. Could be just bumming around and I really have to start packing...

This or That...and I'm late again.

1. Popcorn at the movies: buttered or not? Definitely buttered. Maybe even a sprinkling of those flavours they have...
2. Sometimes you feel like a nut..sometimes you don't...Mounds or Almond Joy? hmmm...dunno. Mounds, I guess...closest to a Bounty.
3. Chips or pretzels? Chips!!! Both corn chips and potato chips!
4. Milky Way or Snickers? Snickers. Nice and nutty.
5. M&M's or Reese's Pieces? M&M's.
6. McDonald's or Burger King? uh.....both? Like McDonald's cheeseburgers and fries but I how Burger King has onion rings.
7. Vanilla Coke or Pepsi Twist? Don't know because I haven't tried either.
8. Hostess Twinkies or Cupcakes? Hmmm.... haven't tried Cupcakes so I wouldn't know.
9. Hershey's Kisses or Hugs? Kisses!
10. Original Mountain Dew or Code Red? What's Code Red? And I don't like the taste of Mountain Dew.

Woohoo! Everybody's done! Send me your contact details for the summer, folks!

I went to visit the Natural History Museum a couple of days ago and spent a heck of a lot of the time there staring at the leaf-cutter ants do their work. And now you can too! AntCast is a webcam trained directly on these little guys. If you're wondering what they do with all that leaf material (and they give them apple too), they rot it in their home and it's the fungus that they eat.

Also watched Spiderman with Nirosh yesterday. Great movie but what an ending. Sheesh. Any hot-blooded testoterone-filled guy wouldn't do that.

Well, I had a haircut at the Vidal Sassoon Advanced Academy yesterday and I'm not even sure whether I'm happy or not with my haircut. It's definitely different from what I had before. (Before, I went to the Vidal Sasson Creative School and was ecstatically happy with the results) This may be a bit exaggerated but I think I look the alien dressed as a woman from Mars Attacks.

I'm done! I'm done! I've finished my presentation! Hahahahahahahahaha! Freedom! I'm finished!

OK. Now to share a joke which my family and Blai don't seem to appreciate as much as I do. Read it in one of the Saturday papers but I don't remember which one:

Sven-Goran Eriksson introduces David Beckham at a conference. "Now I shall pass you over to the England captain, David Beckham, for his opinion on this very important topic."
David smiles and begins. "They're small, minty and keep my breath fresh for hours! And Victoria tells me that they're only two calories each!"
Sven murmurs to him, "No, David, you're supposed to talk about tactics."

Everyone likes free things, right? Well, I've noticed that free goodies and samples are much easier to come by in the States but there is a site dedicated to free stuff in the UK. And its name? freeinuk, of course.

Was utterly depressed yesterday as everything minor seemed to go wrong for the past couple of days... Ended up taking a walk in Holland Park for a couple hours. Here's a hint: go between 8 and 9pm if you actually want to see the rabbits (I saw about 8 of them bounding around all over the place). The little children terrorize the poor things at any other time of the day. Bizet's The Pearl Fishers (opera in the park) was also on and although I couldn't wangle my way in, it was possible to see part of the stage if I looked in at a particular angle and stood on my tiptoes. Or you could just go all the way around to the back (where the pile of rocks sculpture is) and see the singers come out and take a breather when they're not on.

But I'm slightly more cheered up today. Now to get this presentation out of the way. I want to go shopping...I think a bathing suit and a dress might be in order for the trip to Barcelona. If only I could afford some new ones though.

The Friday Five's back.

1. How often do you do laundry? Uh...when I run out of clothes...a typical student answer.

2. What's in a typical wash load? Darks/colours or lights? Everything that falls into one of those categories!!!

3. Front or top loader? Powder or liquid detergent? The hall has a front loader. And I guess I'm using liquid detergent...but it's those squishy capsules from Persil (?). The ones that are portrayed as alien ships in the commercials.

4. Do you use fabric softener in the rinse cycle? Yup.

5. Dryer or clothesline? Dryer. There's no sun in London to dry anything...and no space. I think there's a law prohibiting us from hanging stuff out of the window in London.

Found the link from Jejune.net.

For those of you not in London, the London Underground commissioned a set of posters featuring the "Love is..." characters to advertise their etiquette rules of travel on the Tube. They came out in September of last year but the posters are still all around.

Oh my goodness...is this program for real? A program to keep track of women's menstrual cycles?

I've just handed it in!!! I've handed in my report!!!

Well, can't have celebrations yet; I've got to prepare a presentation for Monday.

Tuesday's This or That:

1. Regular or electric/battery operated toothbrush? Regular. But I'd like to try battery operated one day.
2. Shower or bath? Shower for everyday but bath when I'm feeling kinda blue...like now.
3. Automatic dishwasher or hand-wash dishes? Hand wash!
4. Paying bills: online or write out checks? Write out checks. Still don't trust online.
5. Laundromat or your own washer/dryer? Laundromat. I'm in a student hall.
6. Electric or gas stove? Gas!, ever since I discovered it.
7. Subscribe to magazines/newspapers or buy at newsstand? Buy but not everyday. Don't have the money for a subscription.
8. Alarm clock...music or buzzer? Buzzer. I think music will send me to sleep again.
9. Go grocery shopping yourself, or order stuff to be delivered? Myself, thank you very much.
10. On workdays...pack a lunch or eat out? Mostly eat out. Paraphrased from Bridget Jones - "I can't even make a glass of water in the morning."

Oh my goodness...the run up to project hand in and presentation is absolutely hellish. I need stress relief!!! I have barely eaten, I know I'm going to do badly and ... well, I want this thing done and over with NOW but at the same time I want another month to make it a lot better.

Where the hell am I going?! I've managed to scare the living **** out of me by reading about the scams in Barcelona.

Ooh! I'm going to Barcelona! I'm going to Barcelona!

Now to get this pesky project out of the way.

SpongeFont SquareType! A Spongebob Squarepants inspired font. Link from groovy mom.

Ooh! I want to go to Barcelona! I want to go to Barcelona!

The Completely Pointless Personality Quiz

Gosh, that was pointless. kaymc has ranted about the pointlessness about all these quizzes but I think they're perfectly harmless fun. They definitely add some colour to pages who are unable to have image hosting anywhere else. And perhaps somewhere out there, someone wants to know whether they're an angel or a psycho bitch from hell. I think I'm the latter.

These are some of the cutest games I've seen!

A week more...only another week and then this stupid project will be over...

I think this will be what I start off with this summer - a good looking easy chunky scarf. It kinda reminds me of Blai's sweater (that's jumper to you Brits).

Ok, now I'm really starting to panic about my project...it feels like I haven't done anything and the report is a load of rubbish. Great. Oh man, I hope I'm not massacred in the presentation.

Why is Spongebob Squarepants so popular? (May require registration with the LA Times)

Or if you just want to party - throw a Spongebob Squarepants party!

Continuing on...

Things to Do with an Empty Tic Tac Container
7. Store your herbs and spices.
8. Travel sized salt and pepper shakers (excellent if you have the containers with the divider in the middle!)
9. Storage container for needles.
10. Storage container for pins.

A review of La Boheme from the Guardian. Obviously, I don't share all their views! Mind you, it's a critic's choice over at the Telegraph.

Yesterday, we arrived at Covent Garden very early in the evening and looked around for a bite to eat before staking out our spot in the Piazza. We headed to the Maple Leaf - a Canadian pub off Covent Garden - where Sunil had his usual poutine and I satisfied my craving for meatloaf. For those of you wondering, poutine is a Quebecois dish consisting of french fries (that's chips to the Brits), cheese curds (can be replaced by any other cheese) and gravy. At the Maple Leaf, they use onion gravy. It's groovy stuff and yummy! If you wish to take a more scientific view of poutine, I'm going to refer you to these experiments. Anyway, the meatloaf was yummy even though I felt that the addition of peas and sweetcorn was a bit strange. I had been expecting two little scoops of mashed potatoes but I found myself sitting before a huge mound of mash (made with REAL potatoes!). I managed to get my way through only about a third of it.

After that, it was time to head to the Piazza. We stood there until it started (7:30pm) and closer to the time, we started getting very rude remarks about how we should sit down like everybody else through the entire show. Now, we believed that the event would be run like the Proms - standing room only - but we were obviously mistaken. But these people were exceptionally rude to us (I suppose it's because we're young people) and they weren't just sitting, but SPRAWLING themselves all over the place. Technically, portable seating was not allowed but they managed to sidestep that rule by bringing picnic blankets, inflatable yoga mats, etc. Crazy. I mean, we're not entirely innocent: we should have sat down earlier but really, I had never experienced such rudeness before. They could have asked nicely. And the really weird thing was, when it started raining, they all got up, put on their raincoats and proceeded to sit down again! Sitting down...in the rain...ugh. This was the only blip in the night though.

On to the show. It was very very good. I was very impressed with Ainhoa Arteta, who played Musetta - the coquette. Gorgeous voice. I adored the aria she sings in the cafe. And Ramon Vargas - Rodolfo - was excellent as well. Cristina Gallardo-Domas (Mimi) and Peter Coleman-Wright (Marcello) were both also very good.

And to end the night, after taking their bows on stage inside, they ventured outside into the spitting rain to see everyone. That was nice of them. And it was brilliant and good fun in the end.

I am so tired of working today. I have typed numerous pages for my report and I'm now at 40 pages. I have to get about 10 more by this weekend. And I have a lot of other tweaking to do with the rest of my project too. Argh.

As I reminded myself a while ago, there's a free broadcast of Puccini's La Boheme today. I'm going with Sunil and hopefully it won't rain. I need this something to take my mind off this project (but I bet it won't...I'll be thinking of callback events as Mimi sings "Mi Chiamano Mimi").

If anyone's wondering why I'm not going with Blai, it's because he flew off to Barcelona today for a month! :(

The author of Nancy Drew, Mildred Benson - aka Carolyn Keene, passed away on Tuesday. I loved reading the Nancy Drew books and I think they were some of the first novels I ever read. I remember finding them hidden away in the school library at my elementary school. They were so old...from the 1940's, I think, and such fun to read. The originals by Mildred Benson were the best, of course; the follow up series with Nancy Drew at university weren't the same. But it was interesting to read the Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys specials since you knew Nancy could do better by tossing Ned away and getting together with Frank!

I've written to a number of forums about my problem with waveOutOpen and my event callback (it gives me an invalid handle error) but no one has come up with anything...and I am desperate now.

Can you help me, please?

Tuesday's This or That...but on a Wednesday.

1. Laptop or desktop computer? "Walter"'s a desktop but I like my old faithful (laptop) back home.
2. PC or Mac? PC
3. DVD or VHS? VHS... but only because I can't afford a DVD drive and old faithful can't deal with one.
4. Cell phone or regular phone? Cell...but sometimes regular.
5. Satellite or cable TV? Cable...but again, only because I can't see myself purchasing satellite.
6. X-Box or PlayStation? um....dunno
7. Netflix or video store? Video Store
8. Wide-screen or regular TV? Regular
9. Film or digital camera? Both please!
10. Dial-up or high-speed internet connection? Dial up at home and high speed in college.

For all of you who are interested or curious, this is the BBC's online coverage of the Queen's Golden Jubilee. It's a once in a lifetime deal here! Well, many people in the UK have seen her coronation, her Silver Jubilee and now her Golden one! Amazing...

We watched the last hour of the Party in the Palace last night and marvelled at the fireworks which were so much better than those in London during the Millennium celebrations. At least, I only heard about the celebrations that night: I was in Edinburgh for Hogmanay when the year 2000 hit. And the fireworks at Buckingham Palace were also loads better than the stuff there.

Photos of the fireworks:
Buckingham Palace just after the Party in the Palace and before the fireworks
Buckingham Palace lit up with the Union Jack
Another shot of Buckingham Palace
View from the Mall
Another View from the Mall

explodingdog has some absolutely great cartoon like pictures based on sentences that visitors send in to him. The Peter I know (yes, that's you) should check it out - the latest sentence is "Peter has one fish". So, as you can see, these aren't overly conventional sentences we're dealing with. I have no particular favourites but I like "This hole I've dug is mine forever" and "what the hell is that?" and "I like hot dogs".

Nyah nyah! We have two days of bank holiday here! Monday and Tuesday! All because of the Queen's Jubilee (50 years on the throne).

And unfortunately, I'm in college doing work...

Can you believe it? I'm an emotional adulteress. At least that's what the Style section in the Sunday Times told me. The new theory (coming from the US, of course) states that people having emotional relationships (read: friends) outside their own personal relationship (read: partner, lover, spouse, etc) will have troubles with their partner. One must focus all their attention on their partner. The man behind this theory has no female friends except his wife and only ever touches his wife and mother. No shaking of hands even. I find this very disturbing.

Ok, don't visit this site if you're feeling particularly confident and don't want that feeling to go away. This little application will tell you what others have managed to accomplish at your age and so sounds like the mother I never had (thank goodness). But a good site to visit anyway.

I found the link from trippyswell.

In college again to do work. How dull is my life? It's an absolutely gorgeous day (bit too hot though) outside but I've got a project to finish, a report to hand in and a presentation to give. Hope I survive.

Thanks to kaymc for linking to me.

How appropriate. That's how I feel right now.

Oh my goodness, I'm having some nightmarish problems with MATLAB. I mean, it's not a huge problem but an itsy bitsy little one that will not go away. I think I tend to exaggerate the importance of problems but this one is important!