Feeding An Army

I feel sorry for chickens and lambs whenever my mum invites anyone for dinner. Almost everything cooked contains meat or chicken.... and yesterday was no different.....

.... Mum had invited some people for dinner last night, and on Friday night we got a call from some distant relatives, telling us that they're gonna come over on Saturday afternoon. I nearly had a heart attack when I found out. That's 9 people in the afternoon and 11 in the evening.

So i had to wake up early yesterday (grrrr... saturday's the only day I get to sleep in). I did all the usual; quick shower, got dressed, cleaned my room. When I went downstairs, mum was already messing around with the extra-large sized pots and pans. My job was to make the lasagna.

After about 2 hours of messing around with 3lb of mince meat, a tonne of tomatoes, flour, milk and a load of other things, everything was ready. Now only the layers were left.

I buttered the dish, and started with a thin layer of mince...then pasta....then white sauce... then lots and lots of cheese.. and so on. I finally finished with cheese and sprinkled some oragano on top (so that it smells nice!..heh).

I shoved it in the oven and then helped mum with boring things... like making the salad and the hundreds of varieties of chutnies.

So the first lot came... ate... sat for a bit and went... then we cleaned up...and cooked some more. Then the second lot came and did the same. When they left I was exhausted..... and because mum thinks a dishwasher is a waste of space, all the dishes had to be hand washed. :(

We finished around 11ish....

That's when I realised it was the eclipse. So I impatiently stared the moon for about half an hour... then got bored and went to bed. This morning I found out that if had stayed there for about 15 more minutes I would have seen the whole eclipse...with the moon going red! Double GRRRRR!



That's a pic of the moon I took at about 11.30ish. Half the moon's covered. It isn't a very good pic. (magnified 8 times and there was a lampost in the way!)

Sigh....

I heard this that other day.... and well.... I miss my mum and I want her to come back! *Sniff, sniff* ( o.k maybe I'm a bit old for this) ..... Just four more days and she'll be back.

It was her birthday yesterday, so I rang her to say happy birthday. My uncle (mum's bro) threw her a surprise party, and she was telling me about all the fun they had and how she's gonna miss them all sooo much when she leaves...... Sounded like she doesn't want to come back! *feels even more depressed*

It's elevenish now and I'm trying to revise. I'm soooo tired, but I'm not gonna sleep! Only yesterday I realised how behind I am. (4 exams next week and I haven't done anything for one of them..... oh that's the one where I need to get through 24 powerpoints which are all at least 70 slides long).

I'm currently revising bones and different types of bone fractures and how they heal. Don't you think it's daft though. I mean as an optometrist, if someone comes to me with a fractured skull I'm not gonna do anything about it.... so why do we have to learn about it?

Temporary Mum

Seems likes aaages since I last blogged... actually it has been ages.... over a month...

But I've really busy. Mum's not at home. She's gone abroad, to meet her mum, for a whole month. So with me being the eldest, I have to be "temporary mum", and believe me it totally sucks!

I have to do all the really minging things like waking up early in the morning and making the breakfast (dad helps with that.... on most days he even cleans the kitchen before going to work), cleaning the house from top to bottom every single day (But I tend to miss things out like not mopping the floors in the bedrooms... nobody'll know!)... oh and cleaning the bathroom (nobody even offers to do that!).

With even more exams on the way (when will they end!?), I really need to revise.... but when!?! Well maybe it is slightly my fault for being sooo unorganised and not using my time effectively. Like today I had a few hours in which I could have revised.... but this is how I spent them:

11.00- 12.00..... got home and had a bath

12.00- 12.30..... lecturing my lil sis (she woke up in a bad mood, went to mosque and then refused to read.... how embarrasing!!)

12.30- 1.15.... fed my siblings

1.15- 3.00.... as a punishment, I made my sister sit in my room and learn the sixth kalimah ... however ended up helping her learn it

3.00 - present time .... made myself tea and a tuna & sweetcorn sandwhich, and I am currently stuffing my face with it....mmmmmmm

I've got an hour free now... and I'll try to use it constructively!

The Sheesha Craze

It's that thing ----->
It's pretty ugly. But it's big and seems like "the only thing to do"

My grandad's got a sheesha on display in his house. It used to belong to my great grandfather. The first time I saw one actually being used was at a friend's birthday party, a few years ago. I stared in amazement when I saw her and her sister-in-law go high on the thing. Before that I thought it was only a thing old Arab men did. I never tried it though. At that time I was too scared my mum might find out. But even now I wouldn't do it. Not because I'm scared of being caught, but because it seems like a daft thing to do.

They all say that isn't as bad as smoking, but it's still tobacco and probably addictive..... and therefore I class it as a drug....and I wouldn't touch it....

This morning, I went round to a friend's flat. There was one standing in the corner in her living room. She's never tried it either, but her flat mates smoke it. She was telling me that her flat mates invited some people over the other night, and the put weed into it and smoked that. How stupid.

*Sniff, Sniff*....*Cough, Cough*

Stooopid cold! .... It's that time of year again when one pack of Kleelex pocket-sized tissues isn't enough to last you the whole day, your nose is bright red, you look like you've been crying all-day and you have huge bags under your eyes. ... Not to mention sounding like an old sleeping man because you have to breath through your mouth!

The best of it all is the fact that I have exams in like TWO weeks!

Two weeks!?.... I just started uni..... and, and it's just too soon!

So I've started the only-go-to-bed-when-it's-absolutely-essential thing. That means at about 3 o'clock at night when you're so tired that you start seeing things.

And lectures.... Why do they bother having them? People are literally sleeping through them ( really!). But I don't blame them, the lecturers are sad old people who speak like they're reading out of a book , in monotone. I end up losing concentration and thinking about daft things like "I don't have a matching bag with that new outfit I just bought" or "why are the lights on the ceiling a funny shape?". Why can't I just miss lectures and do the work on my own? (because the guilt of missing a lecture would kill me.... eventhough they're not "mandatory").

I'm trying to get back into the habit of studying properly. By properly I mean actually reading a book and making notes, not just staring at the pages and yawning. But I take sooo much time doing everything. A year ago I could have read (and understood) a whole chapter in about 30 mins.... and now it's just taken me the whole morning! Man, that 4-month-long holiday has done nothing but made me lazy!

~*~*~*~*~*~

I thought i'd clean my room today; something I haven't done for months. My room's state was getting so bad that furtinure was starting to form out of the stacks of paper I was meant to recycle a gazillion years ago. Like under my desk, a foot stool had formed from A- level practice exam papers. And my shiny, expensive (very expensive), brand new books were lying on the floor, because the shelves were filled with useless things like baby books (well I had to fill the shelves with something otherwise my room would have looked like an empty warehouse).

I started getting rid of all the pointless things that were taking up space in my room. I put the baby books in a box and placed them in the "store room thing" downstairs. They can live in there until I find them a new home. Anyway, while I was there I found a box full of old photographs. Theres pics of us when were all ickle kids and some from holidays we've been to and lots of random ones. I found a little album of pics from my middle school. I was flicking through it when I came across one particular photo. There was a girl on it that looked like a younger version of a girl at uni. After a bit of wondering down memory lane, I realised that they both have the same name...so must be the same person. But I never thought that this could be her! I remember the girl at uni telling me that she used to live in the same city as me, and even went to the same middle school for a year. But I thought I had never seen her before. Well from what I can remember, she used to be a dopey tom-boy... but now she's a proper girl and..er..well not dopey :D. I have to tell her on Monday! (tell her that I knew her, not that she's not dopey anymore! hehe!).

But I find that so weird. Meeting someone from the past. Someone you had completely forgotten and thought that you'd never ever see again. It makes the world seem so small....

Can't drive!!!

I sit in the car and I get the feeling it doesn't like me. I always adjust the left mirror first, and then turn to sort out the right. I turn back to double check the left mirror and its moved out of place..... all by its self!

After numerous attempts, I give up with the mirrors..... They'll just have to do! So I put my foot on the clutch and press it down. Now according to my instructor it's supposed to make a sort of "clunk" sound.... And it does when she presses it down. But does it do it when I try? Nope! ( and according to my instructor i'm damaging the thing if I don't make it go "clunk" .... and it costs £300 to replace the dam thing!..whatever!)

Anyway... I find the biting point, put down the handbreak and set off.... and then approach a roundabout! Well, other than nearly being hit by another car, it didn't go too badly.... and I got round it.

It's near the end of my lesson, and I'm about to join a major road. The guy in the car infront of me is also going to do the same. He isn't a learner, and probably isn't a new driver (no "L" plates on his car!)... So I patiently wait for him to turn... and I wait a bit longer....I look at the clock and 5 minutes have passed.... and then another 5 and we're still on the same spot.... a car beeps from behind.... and then a few more minutes pass and he finally turns! I move forward and turn into the road in about 10 seconds.... now that made me feel better!