Hello folks. I thought I would add a little update since I can't sleep and I'm kept busy by discussions with friends.

My life seems so flat that I spend much more time sleeping than being awake. And if I'd listen to myself I wouldn't ever wake up. How sad is that.

Hum... Other than that, I'm trying to summon the energy to start on a healthier note. That should probably start with stopping going to bed at 4+ am... But I have so few classes at university :/


Oh a happier note, I've been working a lot on Peter's manager project, and I'm up to the point where it's going to switch to Beta. I'm happy I managed to get the cron jobs up and running smoothly ! It's the first time for years that one of my web project is actually going to be used by random, unknown people. While my tests have been successful, I'm afraid they might not find the system easy to use, or buggy, etc... Guess that's my paranoia again, huh ?

The Kiweo project is going well, perhaps a little bit less than we hoped but now that I'm done with the manager I should get closer to an admin position and perhaps even extend from conception to actual coding. There are still loads to do ! but it's a really interesting project on all levels and I'm excited about it.


Also I'm starting to be totally fed up at that stupid idiotic (yet, from what I heard, interesting... huh...) Pay-per-post thing. (Nenya, ne te sens pas particulièrement visée sur ce point, hein ?). And not only on Livejournal (there is actually only one person in my friends page who uses that). I don't give a damn about whatever these posts are about because when I go read a blog, it's to read about its author's experience, not for some hypocrit entry about something they most of the time haven't even used themselves anyway.
Furthermore, those people have taken to write loads of small entries, which also just fill up your (their) space. All of them within a short time. Why posting on four entries what you can post on just one ? That looks like flood to me. I don't like it.

We're living in a dictatorship and money runs it. (That's no news, unfortunately.)

That was today's rant. So long, and mind the step when you get out of here.

So I went to London on Halloween day. I'll post more about that, because I wrote in my green book quite a fair number of details about the day (and by the way, it's not easy to write when the train will shake you around every now and then).

I had promised my sister to take her the next time I'd travel, so I did that, and off we went at 6 in the morning at Paris-Nord Station waiting for the check-in to open, in the middle of a fairly long line of people.
I'm always amused at the UK Immigration point, because the "EU Citizens" line goes so fast (they just check passports) and the "Non-EU Citizens" line goes so much slower. Gotta love the EU !
But then it was a bit short because the train was leaving at 6:22.
Then we got an extra 2 hours and a half to sleep before we made it to London.
I'll go quickly through this then, don't need you to fall asleep just now. If you want the full story well just ask for it, or wait till I actually type it in ;)

So Sister and I arrived at Waterloo International just before 8:00 am local time. So a breakfast was needed but as we were there I thought we ought to have a look at Big Ben, since it's so close. So we crossed that narrow street at the foot of the station, up the bridge then down the stairs and through the park to the open area at the bottom of the London Eye. As we were there, we saw people running towards us and there were cops among them (recognizable at their bright yellow reflecting outfit). Wondering what was happening, we quickly backed away to avoid the running people. It turned out it actually was a filming and all those people were stunts. They pretty much used whoever was around, so we played the stunts and now we've got to watch every single british series to find out what one it was ;)
Only problem, we couldn't cross the platform to get to Westminster Bridge, so we had to go the other way. Crossed River Thames at the next bridge, and up to Trafalgar we went. There we got some breakfast, and also a bit of heat, because it was a very sunny day but the banks were extremely windy and the cold was biting our ears.

After that, we had to meet David who'd said he'd be at our meeting point around 10:20. The meeting point I'd called for was a pub located behind Leicester Square, at the cross between Leicester Street and Lisle Street, a pub called the Hog's Head.
Well David texted he was running late, so we sat a bit in the sun in the park on Leicester Square, then went to find... that the pub was gone anyway. Replaced by another one called the Crooked Surgeon (what's it with all those weird names for pubs anyway), which happened to be closed. Baaah.
When our juicy-sweet friend arrived, it was already time to go pick up Sara at Victoria Coach Station, but her coach was actually running late as well so in fact everybody was late. Everyone finally met up in the middle of the street.
Off to go for a drink, but when I asked who was knowing London best, they said it was me ! Which really doesn't make sense, because I'd only been there once, but since Sara had only been there twice, that was hardly better, was it ?

Off we went towards wherever looked a more crowded place. At last we decided to get lunch instead, and so David told us about a pub he knew. We were around Lambeth at that moment, so up we went to Lambeth Bridge and back to Westminster and the filming ;), but it so happened that David can't estimate a distance right and his pub was located on Blackfriars Bridge, which is really way further than we expected. Sister and I were starting to be tired, because for our bodies it was 1 hour later (because of the timezone difference) and we had woken up so early. But we finally managed to get there and have nice yummy chips (and fish, of course).

After that nice stop in a WARM place for a change, I decided that Sister wasn't to have been in London and NOT have seen Tower Bridge and I was sure she'd like the Tower of London anyway (she usually likes medieval and possibly blood related stuff), we crossed Blackfriars Brigde and went down to the Tube, which was actually pretty crowded.
After a moment at Tower Bridge, it was time to go to Harrod's, because well it's nice to be seen as well, even though there's little chance you can afford to buy anything in there lol...
Back out it was tea time, so we entered the first place where to get something, which happened to be a Starbucks Coffee house - from what I remember, on Brompton Road opposite of Hans Crescent, not far from the crossroads with Knightsbridge Road and Sloane Street, but from their website & Google Maps, it looks like it doesn't exist... So huh...)

Then back to Waterloo, it was time to check in. I got duty-free food for the train and off we were in a rather crowded train which actually looked more like a pic-nic area at first, lol !


So that was it. Nice day, I have to say. I was really looking forward to seeing David and Sara as well and it's always nice to be moving around for a change ! Juicy-sweet day !

Also, I was really proud of my English talking, which has improved a lot over the past year. Sara said she was surprised because I hadn't got the French accent she was expecting :D but, it seems I still sound a bit German, which I've always been told throughout my schooltime english classes... and all this even though my voice was half-gone from being sick lol...


Then on Wednesday, I added one unit to my Age Counter. Got an awesome-looking book from Frikki and Freyja, it came all the way from Iceland in a nice envelope :) Also got a few cards, more books from my parents, and a number of gadgets such as a new home for my cellphone - the previous one was like 8 year old, and all ruined from being carried around so much lol...

AND MY AWESOME TRADITIONAL APPLE PIE !!!

;)

I guess it's time for a bit of an update, even if hardly anyone still reads this, even if it's hardly interesting at all, etc. I'll make sure never to write my memoires, unless I want to make the biggest crash in the whole history of literature.

So where were we.

Ah yes, university, of course. Well. My situation was going to be sorted when it turned out that the history department hadn't got the right to register me as a final exam student in political science - which they did, because of all the shit of last year's and I registered off-delay. Anyway, nobody ever noticed, and so the second session jury invalidated one of my political science marks.

So now, I'm stuck in third year and I only have one bloody subject to take. With the old system I could've graduated and taken it as a debt, but with the latest reform - the same one as that which introduced the european standard LMD system - you can no longer do that. I could probably negociate with the pedagogic responsible for the master 1, but he wasn't keen on force that, and the office absolutely refused to consider it. Bloody fuckers. I can't even take the M1 subjects as credits. I planned to get them as a free attendant, but that doesn't allow me for exams, so it'd be near to useless. Except, of course, if I decide I've got enough and go seek fortune elsewhere instead.

At least, I could register at all, because the website was blocked until friday, the second session results hadn't been validated. Fuckers, I told you. Making all they can to disgust people and clear out the area - the price to pay for too crowded free universities, I expect. It's still no excuses.

In one word, I'm rather disgusted not to mention angry because I did everything I could to precisely avoid that.
I am to go back to the office on Monday, which will be my last chance to sort it out without too much damage.

-

Other than that, I'm still working on that apathy thing. I force myself to walk rather than to take the bus/métro for short distances (less than 3 métro stations = around 1,5 km), I force myself to take the stairs rather than to use escalators, etc... I still feel tired, which I blame on going to bed too late at night, that's probably true, though. But night time is when I work best.

On the work side, I've got the ADAG website and its webshop (codename Nex B) finished at last, there are only details to finalize now, but the banking thing is totally done and worky. Woot.
Also, I've been doing an outstanding (for me, that is) work on Peter's admin panel project (codename Nex A "TOD"), and I'm rather pleased with my work, something I haven't been for ages. That's encouraging.
Nex hasn't moved at all, but all the work on TOD and on Nex B will help it to greatly improve, so it's all good :)

Anyway, that's about it now. Hopefully I'll get a not too abnormal university year, and that'll help things settle.

I'm going to London on the 31st of October - got bargain tickets (50 euros round trip) earlier in september, I thought I'd buy them even though I'm short on money. My father actually paid them. I need a day off somewhere else, I suppose.

That's it for now, I'll get back here if I have something else to say...

A little change of decoration for a new academic year...

Or well. September has come with its lot of problems, I should be used to it by now. This year, it's a change of value in the credit system that occured earlier last year, and that wasn't properly done. In short, the values have only been changed for those taking full subjects, but not for those, like me, taking final exams. As a result, while I algebraically validated my year, I'm lacking 3 credits so that caused my info to be marked as error.
This is why I couldn't register online for the new year...
Been in touch with the responsible for the Masters I intended to start, to know if I could still register and if needed, take an extra subject (called a "debt") to fill in the hole, because I think having a year to do with only one or two subjects would be a waste of time.

It really looks like it's not going to work that easy... but whatever.


I got my new laptop, too, remember I posted about it ? Well I got it for 840 euros, bargain !
And he's what's in the little beauty :
- an Intel Core Duo processor, 2x1,83 GHz !
- 1024 MB of RAM !
- A nice big fat 120 GB drive !
- A cool 15,4 inches screen,
- Decent graphic card and sound card too,
- A standard CD-DVD-R-RW combo drive,
- A memory card reader (I had no idea there was one when I ordered it, lol)
- And all the usual wifi/ethernet/modem connections...
- Running Windows XP Media Center (rather than Home), which I decided to try before switching it to Linux.

Pretty nice, huh ?




This past year, I've been pretty apathetic. Sort of. Except for the CPE period, I've been mostly quiet, and not precisely energetic. I had little to say to people, unless they started a subject. My phone counter has dropped from fifteen hours a month down to about two hours a month, in spite of having my best friends as infinite (= unlimited calls, text messages, media messages and visio) numbers. I hardly went out, either. Just never really felt like it (aside, of course, from having no money to spend).
While I still assume it may be different if I actually had a bloody idea of what I want to do next/later, I just lack motivation and energy. I even have difficulty to process with my web projects.
What makes it bad, though, is that I have no idea how it started. I know it was around October last year. And most probably around the time I started to think about going to Canada, although I'm not sure if that actually was before of after. I can't think of any event that may have caused that, though.

I feel like I miss stuff, to. I miss being chatty. I miss playing the piano. I miss speaking German. I miss travelling around to see my friends.
I feel like I need a break. I need to go away from here for a little while, perhaps a few weeks, or maybe even not much so.

I think my next trip should be to Germany. Whenever I hear German, I feel like speaking it - actually speaking, that is, not just writing. Nothing's worth a trip to Germany from that. I'll try to get Thalys tickets and possibly hosting to go to Cologne around christmas - it's a bloody nice place to be around christmas for sure.

Okay, it's about all I had to say, so here we go.

Stay around in case there should be much ! :)

Hello people. Long time no see, huh ? Well well, I certainly do have a few things to add about my holidays...

( A few details about my trip to Bayonne )
( The Peter Story )

After having had to deal with a bit more of bank problems - they failed at counting some of the money I put on it quickly enough to avoid my limit to be blown up, sent me tons of letters and billed me a lot of "debit fee" or stuff like that (98,75 euros in total), I finally managed to get an appointement, to get my debit authorization back, and everything is settled, except that now I deadly need money.

Funnily enough, something happened tonight that made me all thoughtful.
I was going out to meet Julia and her new boyfriend, Corentin, along with two guys who work with Corentin. The three of them are actually the Kookai computing crew ! We went to Footsie, a place in the 2nd arrondissement near the Opéra, which is an amusing bar : the prices aren't fixed, they evolve depending of how many people order them, etc... just like a stock exchange ! So you can drink for (rather) cheap if you manage... An interesting concept, that keeps you occupied for a while ;) It was good to go out for a change, I even managed three drinks for only 6,40 euros, go me !

At some point, Corentin told me that they may have a job offer near the end of the year : one of the other two will be leaving cos he's been offered an awesome job, so the third one, who is currently only under a work placement contract for his studies, is probably going to take his place. Trouble is, neither of the two remaining of them can develop in html and php, so they're going to need someone. They plan on coupling that with internal helpdesk.
In short, he thought I might be interested, which I actually really am (and I must add that the Kookai HQs are only 10 little minutes away by foot from my home !) because php and xhtml are my thing, I can bring my knowledge of accessibility standards, and as I'm autodidactic, I may not know everything but I can adapt easily... and as a bonus, I'd be working with two people I'm friends with.
... the only problem, as always, is that it takes a full time job to do all that, and my current studies status doesn't allow me for that. I could never fit 35 hours of work into my typical week, not with some 18 hours of work + all the work I need to do outside of univ (well I must admit I'm far from working as much as I'm expected to, but still !). I'd need a part time (half time would be perfect).
So I'm a bit confused because well, I know I can do this, I have the two others speaking for me, and I probably could do well for a job interview, but there's no way I can stop my studies. I can't do anything good with my current degrees, so I need to carry on ; and I've been at school for nineteen years and I really want to finish asap, so I don't see myself taking a year off. If I do that, I know I'll never go back.

I'm going to get a new laptop : a friend of my dad who's full of money, suggested that he could lend me the requiered amount without having to give it back before a year... after he heard the tragic story of my laptop. There are Dell promotions that shouldn't be missed.

After coming back from the Footsie, as I hadn't had dinner, I stepped by the McDonald's Jaurès, which stays open (for take away food) until 2 am. The chips I ate had that particular taste they had back when I was little and that going to McDonald's was rare. I don't know why, but the term that comes to my mind to describe it is : "paper".

I won on the bank application binary file I had to install on the ADAG website. Yay me, I can now bill people and have they pay by credit card ;) it's really handy though, once you get to know how it works...

I think that's it for now. Sister's at home, having friends, but apart from her and myself both being pissed off at the same time (ended up fighting) two days ago, it's going OK.... She's squatting my room at the very moment so she can phone her boyfriend without being hassled by the others, lol !

This morning, I awoke with the radio talking about Bloody Sunday in Derry, Northern Ireland, in 1972. I've been interested in NI story and having Peter around to talk about it proved handy because I learnt quite a lot of things I probably wouldn't have got without him. It made me sort of depressed, and I ended up spending the day listening to U2... yeah, I know.

Stay tuned on Channel Clem for more news coming soon !

I got my results this morning. They're better than what I expected !
So I passed the political science side !! WOO !
And I failed the history side ! not cool, but it wasn't the most important anyway ! I'll have to re-take three subjects + 1 side subject in september in order to validate it.

In the meantime, I am the proud owner of a Licence of Political Science !

If anyone cares, my results were as follows : (F = failed, P = passed)
Semester 5 :
Ancient Hist. 9,75 (F), Modern Hist. 11,5 (P), Contemporary Hist 15 : (P)
Political Life in France and Europe : 9 (F), European Construction : 13 (P)
English : 14 (P)
Semester 6 :
Medieval Hist : 9,75 (F), Modern Hist : 14 (P), Contemporary Hist : 9,5 (F)
Epistemology : 8,5 (F), Sociology : 15 (P), Postwar Britain in English : 16,5 (P)
Lexicology : 11,5 (P)

Basically here is what I needed :
- to have more than 10 at the total average (which is 12,16 for me)
- in order to validate the Licence of History, I had to validate 4 subjects out of 6 (I only validated 3)
- in order to validate the Licence of Political Science, I had to validate 3 subjects out of 5 + the English subject from Semester 5

Also, I'm rather happy that my medieval history results are not too bad (7,5 on the written paper, 12 at the spoken exam !). I'm disappointed at contemporary history semester 6, because I thought it'd be better and that's what failed it for me !

Anyway, the important part is here, now that I have my licence, I can get on to the master !
Trouble is, I can't register online because it's what's called a "closed" degree, so I have to get there myself. And the office is closed until the 25 of August !

And now I'm entering the "long studies" students club, more than 2 years !

***

Aside from those good news, I had a sleepless night wednesday to thursday, because I was working and I finished my code at around 4:15, I didn't want to stop earlier because then I would have gotten confused when I'd be back to it. And it so happened that my sister had her train to Béziers at 6:24 at Gare de Lyon and I'd said I'd take her there, and we had to depart at 5:30 just to be safe, so I thought it would be really stupid to go to bed, because then I couldn't wake up, see ?
Loads of people, of course : this Thursday was the beginning of a five days week-end (most of the people taking their time off (RTT) on Thursday, Friday was Bastille Day, + a week-end) + the beginning of the second double-week of the month, means hell lot of people going away on holiday anyway.
I was ROFL as my mother at one point pointed a group of people obviously with north-African ascent, with loads of luggage, whom she said were probably going to take the 6:20 train to Marseille. The funny part is that she was right.
It was the first time my sister (who is 17) was travelling totally on her own : no group, nobody with her at all. As she's got a sometime awkward sense of responsibility (she's sometimes a bit deconnected from what would seem obvious to you, e.g. if she needs to find a train she'd phone me for advice instead of just asking a SNCF staff), my mother was a bit worried, but everything went smoothly (in spite of her nearly missing her train in Montpellier, lol). Whatever, I wasn't going to talk about that anyway.
On the way back home, I tried to start the car using the parking ticket. I decided that my mother would drive in the end.

***

I was working on Nex 0.4 (again, lol) and around 17h40, I get a phonecall from Julia who summoned me to see the fireworks with her and a few friends I either didn't know, or hadn't seen for months and months. All of this after a game of bowling. I wasn't keen on to accept because I was tired and ruined, but for some reason I decided for it, so there I went.
First, I refused that she'd invite me, which I'm now deeply regretting because overall I spent 16 euros on it (2 games + shoes rent + 1 drink), but that was before I know that my account was particularly lower than I thought.
I played particularly badly on the first game, scoring only 5 points and having five null shoots in a row. I guess I'll use my tiredness as an excuse (I hadn't slept for a while, remember ?), but I've been having fun, that's what matters. After I found my balance, I became better (81 points for the second game with 3 spares and 1 strike, not bad for someone who rarely plays, eh ?)
Then we found out that this year the fireworks would be on the evening of the 14th, but we still had our pic-nic on the Champ de Mars, and then as we were going to join more people I decided that I was really too tired and decided to go home.

***

Now, my parents are gone, my sister are gone, it's just me and my two cats Lili and Ebra, until I go join the family in Bayonne next week...

As if this entry wasn't long enough, here is the meme stolen from onespiceybbw and faeangelique (yes, both of you, I'm still reading !) :

(Click here to post your own answers for this meme.)

× I miss somebody right now.	✓ I don't watch much TV these days.  (holidays = 99% crap on tv)	✓ I own lots of books.
× I wear glasses or contact lenses.	× I love to play video games.	× I've tried marijuana.
✓ I've watched porn movies.  (and trust me, it's highly un-erotic !)	× I have been the psycho-ex in a past relationship.	✓ I believe honesty is usually the best policy.
✓ I curse sometimes.  (not that often, now that I think of it...)	× I have changed a lot mentally over the last year.  (if only !)	× I carry my knife/razor everywhere with me.

( it goes on... )

Last week-end was the 9th VDQS party, held at my old farm on the country.

The VDQS rugby team was founded by the Rueil A.C. rugby club members in the late seventies and is now the "ancient" team of the club. Its name comes from the French acronym for "Vin de qualité supérieure" (litt. "top quality wine"), shifted to "Vieux débris de qualité supérieure" ("old top quality trash"). My father was a founder of the VDQS, and my uncle is a member of it too.

So you can imagine the picture, I guess : 25 people in their forties or fifties, including the players' wives, and add to that the kids, most of whom play in the Rueil A.C. team either Seniors (my former team-mates), or Juniors (my sister's former team-mates).

All those people, in the rugby spirit, and 75 litres of wine.
Add a big fire in the night, and you'll get the picture (=> a bunch of dirty songs !! WOO !)

As a matter of fact, this year it took place later than usual because of various reasons. As a result, a lot of people were on holidays, including nearly all the young ones. There were only 25 of us in total, instead of about 60 usually.

The absence of my former team-mates is actually one of the reasons why I didn't find a good reason to stay in Paris for the week-end, aside from the fact that it was my chance before last to get there for a week-end before August.
The fact is that I've been growing up aside from the rugby spirit, after I was sent off on injury. I've never been a fan of sports, but I quite liked it, and while I wasn't a very good player, I was still enjoying myself a lot with those mates I'd known forever.
After a couple of years of refereeing, I just stopped and my visits to the team became less and less frequent, I started to feel I was out of the group. My father stopped playing at the VDQS in 1985, so I was less and less involved when I stopped too. I then missed most of the events that took place (new year parties, summer parties esp. in Guadeloupe two years ago, and lots of going skiing) mostly because of that and the fact that faking to be part of the group was becoming too hard on my mind, I just didn't belong to that world anymore and I was feeling really uneasy about that. And so did they.

Note that I'm not really regretting it ; I've been growing in a different world from their world, and I find that we haven't really much in common, especially not in our ways of thinking. That's how it is.
It's just strange to think about all these when I find myself into those parties. The atmosphere, I guess.

Anyway, sorry about the emo part, but the week-end was very enjoyable and I'm pretty satisfied I went there.

Now I'm back to my life and work. I'm still on my three projects - A&C, ADAG and Nex - to which I have 2 new websites to add : the LOLu website, on the Lands of Lore series games (a website I've been promising to the members of the jeuxvideo.com forums, but that will rely on Nex anyway), and my own personal website, with my French blog, which will rely on Nex too.

I'm left with the choice of going to the south-western coast with my parents for one or two weeks, they're going to Capbreton (Landes, see where it is) and I have a feeling a good bit of holidays would do well on me.

My sister has had to cancel her week on the mediterranean coast at the last minute, so I've been trying to find something for us to do. I was still on that idea I had to take her for a day in London (as I did back in September with my friend Luce). But of course, there was no way I could afford the tickets. The best price was 130 euros each, and that didn't include the way back. You can't get any decent offer unless you book the seats six months in advance anyway, travelling has become so expensive that I can't afford anything whatsoever. This is also the reason why I had to cancel the day in London with my sister already back in January, along with the trip we'd been planning to go to the United States to visit my old friends - I couldn't get hold of prime tickets with my uncle's frequent flier card on the Paris-Minneapolis Air France/Skyteam line.

All I can do is contemplate my beautiful - but useless - passport.

When I see my friends travelling to the four corners of the world without any issue, I feel like I need to slap someone in the face. And I can't even blame them cos they're really not responsible for me belonging to the lower parts of the society, and what makes me even sicker is that I'm far from being in the lowest.

The good side is that even if I had a decent job, I still wouldn't be able to afford it, so no regrets.

And with all that, I found that I'm going to have to pay much higher university fees last year, because it so happens that master students have to pay more than licence students.
Level - last year fee - next year fee
Licence : 154 euros - 162 euros
Master : 196 euros - 211 euros
Social security : 180 euros - 189 euros

With the various functionment fees, this makes my total for next year to be 426 euros (351 euros last year).

I know it will sound like nothing for most of you, fellow readers, nothing in comparison of the freaking tens of thousands dollars universities abroad demand.
But take it that way : my family is too rich to be helped, and is not rich enough to afford it. I'm just stuck in the middle.

How the heck am I going to find 426 euros without a job to save the money from ? :(

I know it's been long (yet again) but hey, I'm still that introverted person after all.

Life's been actually very busy this month. Exams, you know. Loads and loads of exams.
Well the results are starting to spread out, one by one as they seem to have a technical problem that prevent them from releasing them as lists as they should.
Two marks for now : 10 in lexicology which I really wasn't expecting, as that exam went quite wrong. But well maybe not that wrong in fact... I'll call it the happy luck in my dark exam time !
I got 9,5 at contemporary history (11 at my written exam, 8 at my spoken exam). I must say I'm disappointed with the latter, as I was feeling it had been way better than that and I was actually expecting a 12 or something. The former is pretty good because the marks were pretty low for the others. But in the end, I don't reach 10, so it's another subject I don't validate.
It also means that in order to avoid ending up taking a few exams in september, I have to either validate all my other subjects (given that I already failed 2 on the first semester), or have very good marks in all the subjects I'll validate.
Not easy since there is still medieval history (my weakest point) that went horribly wrong, and modern history I wasn't exactly satisfied with. Also I wasn't happy with Epistemology which was a kind of exam I had never taken before and I found it difficult because I couldn't get exactly the idea of what they were expecting.
On the other hand, English political science and sociology went pretty good.

I'm now officially registered as a master student in political science, provided of course that I validate my year (whether in June or September). I'm going to held 2 licences : a Licence of Human Science, domain : History ; and a Licence of Political Science. Woot to me, they'll go just above my "BiDEUG History and Political Science" line in my CV.
I must say that I'm delighted that I'm going to have those two degrees. It should ease my future professionnal life, shouldn't it ? (mind you, that would only work in foreigner countries. One of my contacts at the University of Minnesota already told me that even with just one licence, the word "Sorbonne" would probably get me in straight way. I checked around and it sounds like it opens doors about everywhere. Except in here, where they'll always take someone from a grande école before considering people from universities. Bloody elitist country !)

Other than that, the holidays have begun, and I'm quite fine for now, taking a lot of time off. Although in the same time I still have work to do with those websites I still have to finish. One of them needs a credit card payment unit installed, and it's quite tricky because I still need to understand a few things on how the module works, but it's not that difficult, I just need to get used to it.

I spent the week-end at my country house, and on monday I was sick as hell, paracetamol was no use against my headache and I basically spent the day in the living room on the sofa, with TV being the farthest as it could be, watching stupid soaps with my sister. Mind you, stupid soaps have their patterns that are amusing to observe, providing you know a bit about movie analysis.

Well I think it's about all I have to say for now, keep connected folks !

For some reason, I haven't felt much like spending time online these days.

After I released Nex 0.3.6, completed the ADAG website (working a lot on the future Nex A design !) and put the Arts-et-Culture website on standby until after the exams, I haven't felt like doing anything. I could be working on Nex 0.4 but the main changes have been planned for the half-version, i.e. 0.5. Basically what I have to do to complete 0.4 is heavy and boring work.

At the same time, I'm supposed to be working for the forthcoming exams. They start on Monday, until the 16th of June. Bit late really, but they'd been postponed because of the strike and the seven week of closure of the Sorbonne by the riot police.
My planning is as follows : databases analysis on Monday, contemporary history on Tuesday, medieval history on Thursday, modern history on Friday, social sciences epistemology on the following Monday, sociology on Tuesday, English political science (postwar Britain) on Wednesday, and political analysis on Friday.

Pretty balanced planning, as a matter of fact.

Other than that, I've been reading quite a lot. I'm currently reading a book by Fred Vargas entitled Dans les bois éternels. ISBN : 2878582330. I put those links here because I know for a fact that her books are relatively popular and have been translated into many languages, so I expect someone here may know her. That one book released here last month so I don't expect it to be available in English just yet, but it's taking place just a few time after Sous les vents de Neptune known in English as Wash This Blood Clean From My Hand which should release in English in 2007.

Talking about Fred Vargas, I definitely recommend Have Mercy on Us All which is absolutely awesome.

Hey, I wonder how it would feel to read one of her books translated into English ? (especially when being so familiar about where the whole books take place !)


I got my phone bill yesterday. I was finding suspicious that my credit was so low. When I re-activated my line (suspended between the 25th of April and the 19th of May), it told me that I had 31 euros out of 67 euros left. But the problem is that my credit cycle starts on the 24th, and I was pretty sure I hadn't phoned for 28 euros in just two days.
So the bill came and I had a look at the detailed bill bit.
On the 30th of April - i.e. during the time when my line was suspended - there have been several calls made between 16:26 and 16:55.
Here are the numbers :
16:26 : 223 633 30 55 (2 sec)
16:26 : 223 607 53 03 (3 min)
16:31 : 220 566 77 39 (59 sec)
16:32 : 220 566 77 39 (45 sec)
16:34 : 223 633 30 55 (11 min 14 sec)
16:47 : 223 607 53 03 (2 min 22 sec)
16:51 : 33 6 11 76 00 54 (9 sec)
16:55 : 223 623 78 40 (3 min 44 sec).

I'm putting the numbers online because it was definitely not cool and I really don't care about whoever those numbers belong to.
I looked on my world map to find out what countries (tagged "World Zone 3" on the bill) were. 220 is Gambia, and 223 is Mali.
The total cost of those calls is 35,27 euros.

Amusingly enough, it didn't go past my credit (I had 67 euros of credit, as I mentionned, and as a "Pro" customer, international calls are included rather than billed "on top" like regular customers). So there is no real harm done...
... except that it's a very serious problem as my line was suspended and even if someone had grabbed my sim card, it was protected by my pincode and it had been cut away from my line itself five days before.
I phoned SFR and they're going to credit me 40 euros of extra communications next month, and they're investigating what might've happened.

And I promise I don't know anyone in those countries.


I'm pretty sure I already mention how unlucky I could get. When it does happen, it's usually real and strong, not just details. Or well, maybe details in fact. Whatever.
Tell you what, I was gone for food yesterday and when I had to pay... my card was refused. I should be used to it by now, but I know my father's lent me a bit of money, so I was sure it wasn't that, and the message on the terminal wasn't the same as usual ("payment rejected"). It was saying "Expired card".
Yeah, it was the 1st of June and my blue card expired on the 31st of May.
For some reason, my bank didn't make a new one, I hadn't realized it was expiring that month, and it's usually all automatic so I should've got the notice around two weeks ago. They were closed today but I'm going to drop by there tomorrow morning to see what's happened.


Anyway, that's about all what's happened to me these days. I mostly kept to sorting my notes, and watching tennis (Roland Garros rules, go Amélie Mauresmo !). There have been amazing matches, by the way.
What I particularly like is when someone pretty unknown is showing very good abilities and threatens "top" players, it's usually very distracting and as they haven't anything to lose, it can give excellent matches.
Quoting, for instance : Aravane Rezaï, World #145 (lost on the 3rd round after coming from the qualifications, caused real difficulties to Czech World #16 Nicole Vadisova 6-1 6-7 6-0. The second set was awesome, the czech girl was sooo fustrated !). Or in the men's tournament, the French Marc Gicquel who had never played a 5-set match before, who nearly won against Nicolas Kiefer. He pushed him in his last resources, final score was 6-0, 6-1, 5-7, 3-6, 11-9.

Honestly, that's a lot better than seeing matches where they just hit the ball very very hard and fast. I remember a few years ago having seen a match between U.S. player Andy Roddick and Australian player Lleyton Hewitt, no service below 200 km/h and it was just *boring*.

Anyway, that's pretty much all I've got to tell for now. Farewell then, and stay connected !

Three and a half week after my phone line vanished from the air, it's back with a brand new cool phone :) I managed to get it for sixty nine euros... It's a Samsung ZV10, basically the one just above the one I used to have, quite not the most recent of theirs (those are like, hundreds of euros worth), but still very nice with a beautiful screen, a 50 Mo memory and a media player that will be useful for putting the songs that get stuck into my head so I can listen to them and get them away from there.
Oh, and it's 3G compatible too. Not that I know anybody that has a 3G phone, so it won't be much use... As for online streaming, while my contract includes 3 free hours of wap connection, the streaming itself remains very expensive (10 c€/min) so erm, no thanks.
Still, there is the free area where I could watch the X-men 3 presentation, pretty cool :)

So I'm back online and no longer left out from the world. Not that I have that much of a busy life, but a phone is still welcome for helping during the mobilisation against the LEC and Sarkozy's CESEDA (immigration) bill.
We're still fighting for people who got sent to jail for three months for having "thrown rocks at policemen", no witnesses, two cops as testifiers... Some people I know where trialed at 4 o'clock in the morning at the 23rd Courtroom. Madness. It's totally crazy... But let's not get into that or I'd need a full five hundred pages book to get over it.

Apart from that, life's back to the boring routine, university, work, etc. Exams to start on the 5th of June until the 14th.

Oh, and I got my new passport. The infamous electronic passport the U.S. have been made us have. You know, by not letting it whoever didn't have one or a visa (excluding those with passports delivered before the law was passed). The queue at the U.S. Embassy for visa was so huge, that they couldn't take appointments anymore for months and they had to get their embassies in Berlin, London, Madrid and Brussels to deliver visas to French citizens as well. Mad, eh ?

Anyway, apart from the electronic chip (look, I'm biometrized ! now the FBI and CIA will be able to spy on me ! Well about time guys, the French RGs are already on my back since the LEC crisis !), it does look cool. The page with the picture and details is like full of holograms representing France with a Marianne instead, the version with the phrygian cap.
The inner pages, aka those who host the visas or stamps, are dedicated to the 5 continents and then the 26 French Régions. Each one has its page, except for the DOM-TOMs and CTOMs that have just to be all on the same page.

While it all does look nice, I liked the "Delphine" passports better ; the pages were dedicated to technology and co-operation. So you had a double-page for the TGV, another one for Airbus or Ariane, but also landscapes, and even the Moon !

But anyway, it's just that now I can go in a lot of countries without even needing a visa.
( Just in case you want to know where I can go )
That's a hell lot of places to visit, eh ? I hope I'll have a list that's full of crosses in a few years !

Well that's pretty much all for the moment. Evening everyone !

Again, I don't have much to say.

My last exam was last Tuesday and it went pretty average. I messed things up, I think, by getting confused between dates and european commission directives names (surprise, when you have about a few hundreds), but thoroughly I was in my subject (« The European Commission among the European Institutions »). How the heck do you want to manage such a subject in 7 mins of preparation and 7 mins of presentation ? I kept to the main facts, and answered the questions, couldn't really do more. The "fun" part is when they tell you you don't go into depth enough. But my dear man, I'd've needed a lot more time for this. I know they're testing how precise and synthetic we can be, but there are limits !

Other than that, I released Syntax Nex 0.3 and I lost the envy to code for the moment, I think it's a great achievement, but I also thought I did deserve a few holidays.

The school holidays in Zone C started today for two weeks.
My holidays are going to end with the inter-semester break, meaning, next monday. Next monday, I'll be back into the Sorbonne amphitheaters. New subjects in political science, and ancient history (my strongest point) will vanish for medieval history (my weakest point) to come back.

Yuck.

So I haven't been doing anything related to work and I intend to continue this tomorrow.
But I've been reading at night : first of all, Antéchrista by Amélie Nothomb.
Amélie Nothomb is a belgian writer, for those who wouldn't know her, and people are usually split about her : most of the people seem to either love her or hate her.
As for me, I wasn't really into some of their books, while some others I really liked.
Antéchrista is one of those I liked. The story is really wicked. It tells the life of Blanche, who's a quiet and lonely girl of sixteen who attends the University in Brussels, studying political science. She's a sort of loner, so she doesn't mind ; but one day she meet Christa, a quite popular girl who she's delighted to get to know. But it soon appears that Christa isn't exactly "nice", but rather manipulates about everyone.
The story is wicked, as I was saying. It makes you think that Amélie Nothomb herself is somewhat crazy, not to tell mad. But it's very enjoyable. It's very well built, the style is direct and cool. And who said that a wicked story was bad ? :p

The second book I'm currently into reading is The tales of Alvin Maker, Book 5 by Orson Scott Card. I'm not going into a description of this one, because it's a huge and long story, but this one book is just as good as the previous ones, or even better because it's really funny. Not that the subjects aren't serious, but some lines are really worth it, and the way the author uses real historical characters such as Napoléon, Honoré de Balzac, Bill Harrison, John Adams, Tenska-Tawa and so many others, not to mention the way the translator (Patrick Couton) makes them all speak like old-fashionned canadians (I assume there was some kind of accent rendered by the author in the original version)...
Two nights ago, I was stupidly shaken with laughter alone in my bed and I just couldn't stop. Freaked my two cats off, hehe...

Well those were the news. Ah, I watched rugby obviously, Ireland-Italy was a good game and the Italians are really getting better with time, I guess the Irish were a bit afraid ;)
Then England slaughtered Wales (47-13), which is a shame because I really don't like England and I really did like Wales beating them in Twickenham last year (especially since France and Ireland also won there). But the welsh weren't really a match for the english today.

Also a few things have happened about my Canada next-year trip, but I'm needing confirmations and stuff so I'll explain later.

Okay, that's it then. I'm going to go to bed with my brilliant book, and enjoy my Sunday !


( Time for what keisha tagged me ! )

Yeah, my title is wicked, but so am I.

Life update -
I'm bankrupted, if I may say. Today, I had an exam at 13:25. I wanted food. I went for food before I went there. No way to pay, my blue card was refused. Bastards. I moved my way on Tuesday (they're closed on mondays) and credited my account with the 320 euros in cash I got for christmas, so as to avoid exactly what happened. They suspended my card 24 hours after my account was back in credit. I have 146 € on it. And I'm suspended. And of course, to avoid debit, I put all my money on my account, meaning that not only I can't use my card, but I don't even have any money left. 22 eurocents is what I own.
My only way is now to get cash directly from them. Yeah, I know what you think. Not that bad, they'll sort it out soon and the annoyance will be small. Only, you need to know that those idiots bastards fuckers annoying bank people are open exclusively between 10-12 and 14:30-16 on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. Just when I'm *not* available, obviously.
Stuck I am. All I can do is hope they unsuspend me asap. In the meantime, I don't know.

Exam update -
After I ridiculized myself, I spent the afternoon starving as the exam went by. Spoken English exam. An easy one for me, actually (not that I'm showing off... but the level in my university is very low, as we're not a languages university).
They give you a text, and you have 1 hour to prepare a summary, commentary and translation of it (only one paragraph is to be translated, mind you). The translation is handed in. Then you discuss with the examiner during 20 min.
At first it was chaos. Sounded like the teachers weren't aware that they had to work this afternoon too. So, they went away. One of them they managed to grab quickly. The other was coming back, but would be a little late, nothing too bad. The third, was nowhere to be contacted, so they sought for a substitute.
My luck is legend. I was in the list for the third one.
Had to wait one hour and a half to have the substitute in, making me start at 14:40 (I actually started at the same time as the guy who was supposed to take it just before me, so I had an extra 25 min to prepare, not that I needed it...)
The text was actually a review about some post-war Europe related book, but it went very smoothly and I don't worry about my mark, which I estimate should be around 17.
However, something funny happened to me. As I had german references, such as Berlin Wall or Nazism, I actually used the german words for it whenever I came across talking about them. Made the teacher laugh, and as my former German teacher would say, "he was showing his true nature, he's got Sprachsgefühl !" - true germanist, then, I take it ;) *winks to Sara*
(for people who didn't follow, I haven't been studying German for three years now, since I left high school, but I've always been very fond of languages.)
Next exam's tomorrow, 9 am : political life.

Life update 2 -
Back home, chatted a bit, drew a netcard for Julia's birthday (she was turning 20 !) and revised a bit for tomorrow, then went to the restaurant with family, friend of ours owning it inviting us for a change.

Geek update -
I then used my time to upgrade Agatha's kernel to 2.6.14-r5 and to configure it so I could share directories to the other computers (nfs for linux computers and samba for windows computers).
Also, I used the occasion to retrieve the lost diskspace on Morgane, I somehow forgot to add the last 40 Go of it so I did that, made the filesystem it to ext3 and mounted it, here I go, 40 extra gigas of diskspace !
When everything was all right, I installed Apache so I can remove my Venus server from my distant accounts, it'll save a lot of diskspace and I no longer have to upload all my files when I want to share them !
Also designed a nice logo, and a mean page for it !
Oh, and I sent the card to Julia at 23:53. Maybe she thought I had forgotten, huh ? I can be SO mean sometimes :p

Well I think this is it, all the exciting stuff that goes on in my life !

For some odd reason, I woke up straight awake at 9:30, record of the season I'd say. Maybe it has something to do with someone dropping a heavy thing that strongly smells washing powder down the trash pipe, causing my door to the trash pipe to burst open right onto a mug that was there (don't ask) - mug smashed, kitchen smells washing powder. It scared Ebra off, mind you. I had gone to bed fairly late, like 4:30ish, so it's even more weird from me :)

*goes to make toast, then back*

Ah, sister finished the toast bread it seems, I'll get out later to buy some.

So what was I saying. Hum. I've been through ups and downs these days. More downs than ups. As you could tell with my previous entries. Though I reached the bottom point two days ago, and I was feeling very weak all over Sunday, weak in a physical meaning that is, as if my strength had gone, but I decided not to care and to do as if it was fine. Effective way of getting rid of that feeling.
So then I could give a good kick on the bottom and I'm attempting to get back on tracks as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, I have a lot of plans for these days, including the launching of a new e-zine, not for you people mind you, because it'll be all in French. But the website is being designed right now, and it'll use my wonderful Nex 0.2.3 soon-to-be 0.2.4 (should be sometime today :D).
Nex is doing great, and will end up being something quite good I think.
Also used the empty time - when I couldn't think of/want anything to do - to upgrade all my computers to a newer kernel, Agatha (my server that also host the irc, agatha.dnwt.net) hadn't been updated for a year and Morgane is my experiment platform, so it was a bit needed. While everything went smooth on the latter, the former caused problems notably by smashing Portage, which is currently re-compiling.

Exams are going OK so far, here it is :

- Modern History (wr) : Tue Jan 17. Went averagely, i don't really know how well I did, but it was BORING. All about the Habsbourgs (Modern History of Central Europe).
- Ancient History (wr) : Thu Jan 19. Went fairly good although the subject was so very sharp. I reckon I've been OK but then that's my strongest point. (Myth and Politics in Greece during the classic and archaic periods).
- Contemporean History (wr) : Fri Jan 20. Also went fairly good for a class I skipped half the time (actually, three quarters of the time). Essay wasn't that hard, had a loooot of things to say, I actually wrote nearly 9 pages which is rare from me, I usually go for 7 and a half. Also exam papers are bigger than standard paper (24x32 cm instead of 21x29,7 cm). (History of social inquiries, France and UK, XIXth century).

More to come :

- Ancient History (sp) : Tue Jan 24, 9:00
- English (sp) : Wed Jan 25, 13:30
- French and European Political Life (wr) : Wed Jan 26, 9:00-11:00
- Contemporean History (sp) : Wed Jan 26, 11:15
- European Construction (sp) : Tue Jan 31, 16:00

Fascinating, isn't it ? By the way in case you were wondering, (wr) stands for written exam and (sp) stands for spoken exam.

That's about it, then. Trying to get back to the old me, then dealing with short term projects such as Canada and master years since I don't have a long term project. At least I'm going somewhere.

To finish this entry, I'd like to tell a story. It's actually from lyrics to the song I'm very fond of at the moment, but let me tell you
( The story of Ceridwen )

Unlike most people around these days, I don't have much to tell about.

Absolutely nothing's happened in my life since I last wrote in here. How sad is that ?
It's intersemester break now at university, exams are starting tomorrow and frankly I'm sort of fed up already. What's the point ? I mean, right I'll have my Licence at the end of the year, and what for ? What's the use of it with the new rules on M1 acceptance ? (thanks the government for having passed that in spite of the strikes).
Canada isn't even a proper aim. All the latest info notes say it's for students in years L2 and L3, meaning that being a M1, I wouldn't qualify. Moreover, even if I purposedly fail my year, not only wouldn't I get taken, but undergraduate programs for the exchange just suck. As does the undergraduate status itself, in my high opinion.
Edit January 16 : Funnily enough, I received my application form today. It says "L2 and L3 student for 2005-2006. Meaning that they mean this year. Meaning that I do qualify. yay !

Other than that, I tend to remain projectless, jobless and aimless.
However, I've been doing good work on the A&C website, and I'm quite happy with it, I'm doing way better than the ADAG website. (For those who didn't follow/care, those are 2 websites I'm being paid to do).

Jobless for various reasons, the main being that I'm suffering of the too-high-a-profile syndrom, said my job advisor. Great, what's the use of studies then ? Well the true problem is that for most student jobs, they're less likely to hire someone with such a profile, mainly because they fear I may be smarter than average or more aware of the laws and work rights, I may be a pain and not be as sheepish as some would. Secondly, in my area of competence, there is little chance to find part-time jobs with flexible hours (my timetable changes nearly every week).

Aimless because I still don't have a clue about what I want to do.
Sara reckons it's no big deal and that I'll just see what happens.
True enough, still not very handy to make choices. I mean honestly, without an aim, why would I go fight to enter a M2 that takes like 15 people out of 500 applicants ?

As for life itself, I've been questionning my friends a bit these days. I'm unsure who's who. Most of them are just inexistant these days, as I explained in an earlier entry. Too busy with their "partners". Also I found out they've started organizing inter-couple stuff (except for those who're just busy due to an excessive liking for work), like dinners, bowlings, etc... just the 4 or 6 of them. They said they didn't tell me so I wouldn't feel left out. Honestly, even if they did, I wouldn't have gone with them, and I would even have been annoyed at them, so no real harm done, but I only get to see them twice a week at the university now.
As for those in the other group, the university one, it's just the old same crap about theaters, dinners and opera seats. Urgh.

Not to mention a few things I've been disliking, like how for new year (mainly) they all (including online people, most unfortunately) started to make tributes in their blogs, or articles... like, thanking those who make them happy, etc... I aim at nobody in particular with this and most of them aren't on LiveJournal anyway, but given that I happened to never been quoted a single time, I take it I don't bring anything special to anyone.
I mean, it's not something that I particularly care about or desire or whatever. It's more like the fact of having tons of people thanked for being there, from various people, and never being there that makes me jump to conclusions. It's just a bit too much.
So then, I don't bring anything noticeable, that's a good think to know though, means that I won't continue wasting my time listening and trying to work out ways out or just what to say to everyone... After all, I should care of myself first thing, shouldn't I ?

So to sum it up, I'm projectless, aimless, jobless and soon-to-be friendless. And a huge victim of society's standards (but you knew it already, didn't you ?)

So let's fall into fashion and here is an egoist song, well a song about egoism :P
( Lyrics )

Just took the time to write this and I'm feeling OK again... Cool :)
So, arey ou friend or foe ? (for this one, comments are open even to anonymous (non-LJ) people !

First of all, happy new year everybody !
I know I'm not updating this a lot... Mmm... Well, I have a sort of boring life, so no surprise.

Peter was here the first week of holidays, it was neat, but I'm not going into details. Basically I showed him the city around, we spent an evening with llaunje, etc. Also we went up up up the Eiffel Tower and I still love the view you've got from up there, especially at night - but the price is sort of argh.

Xmas eve went rather fine too, like last year, family sort of party at my uncle's in Ezanville. Lots of pictures were taken, lots of fun esp. since one of my other uncles had brought small flashing lights for everyone to wear !

Xmas was a rather quiet day since we ate so much, and the presents were all good - I got the fifth book of the Tales of Alvin Maker by Orson Scott Card, and also the newest story by Elizabeth George entitled With No One As a Witness and also a new bottle of perfume, the CK One Scene limited edition. The last thing I got was a 512 MB SO-DIMM memory bar for my laptop, a well needed gift ! :D

New year went quietly, as was my father's birthday on December 31st 2005. A simple evening home with a few friends of my parents - that's what you get when all your friends are away for the holidays... Hehe. Yeah, I chose not to go to the RAC new year party, for the fourth year in a row.
And then 2006 started quietly and University's back...

Time for a bit of fun posting, as I've been re-filling my special "Stuff to post to LJ" file again !

( Slogans for the Clem )

( However good he is, Clem has sins )

( I can really act badly sometimes )

That's all folks ! Next on Clem channel, exams... Well I still have time :p
(That entry was so good for the ego lol !)

I had another of those weird dreams.

For some reason, my sister was to fly to Hong Kong, don't ask me why, maybe she's become a deep alter-mondialism believer or some eco freak lately ? - Anyway, she was to fly to Hong Kong, but once there, she realized that she had forgotten her passport at home, and she was held by the authorities there that didn't want to accept her on their territory, but the french authorities wouldn't do anything because they didn't recognize her as French as she had no passport. So there she was in custody.
Then she was flying with a friend of me, who was probably llaunje, who then flew back to Paris to get me, and as I was the legal responsible of my sister, I had to fly to Hong Kong with her to give my sister her passport so she could be released.
It all happened in little time, as if Hong Kong was just one hour away from here, lol.
I'm such a travelling freak.

Anyway, a bit of dream can't hurt in such a world/life.
Lastest invention of our government : to compensate the winter service on regional train lines, which means 157 more trains every day here in Île-de-France, they hired 11 drivers. SNCF workers are then very worried, because it means more work. Then the press seems to be focusing on them being lazy bastards, like, dripping silly commentsoh how many advantages they have (which includes job safety, retirement at 55 instead of 65 and 6-hour working days instead of 7)...
But evidently, the press forgets the most important thing ever : those huys work 365 days a year, including sundays and holidays, they have very irregular plannings, they can sometimes start working at 3 or 4 in the morning, finish at midnight or later... And it's thanks to them that people can actually move during holidays or sundays... I remember sainstace rambling last year about how she couldn't go to work on the first of January because the trains weren't running... Stupid fucking morons. Not to mention that they only interview people who're sick and angry at them and are sort of jealous of those "advantages" they're supposed to have - they'd rather have a low-level equality, it seems...

Anyway, that was the rant against our liberal government. More to come !

Also, I've been seeing two movies in the past weeks.

Firstly, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by Mike Newell.
I must say that Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is my favourite book of the series, the first one that really goes deep into dark stuff, etc. I swore I wouldn't go see it, but as usual I couldn't help myself, even if only to be able to criticize it after having actually seen it.
I was sort of disappointed, but I could see a few positive spots. The screenplay is a true disaster and the book is all torn up, although I guess that someone not having read the book would understand what's going on. The cuts weren't as bad as Sorcerer's Stone or Chamber of Secrets. But what I really can't stand is, merges. Mixes. Take one bit here, one bit here, one there, and mix them up into a weird scene. No, I don't like that.
Actors were average, though some were really good : James and Oliver Phelps, Emma Watson, and Maggie Smith who had a very difficult line to say (this comes from a non-english speaker, though, so it was impressive !). However, none was really bad IMO, especially compared to the first movies.
Also, I know that it was hard to make it up into a 3-hour only movie, but some characters would have deserved a better depht : the Weasley Twins, Fleur Delacour...
One of the good points is that the screenplay writer added a few funny comments or lines that were sort of relaxing. Also the grounds and action scene like the one with the dragon are truly good.
In average, I didn't like the movie, but it hopefully had a few good points. Maybe we can expect something decent for Order of the Phoenix, which should release in May 2007.
( Legal credit, long live the LEN law )

Then, I went to see Palais Royal by Valérie Lemercier.
Palais Royal is a comedy about a royal family in Europe in our days. Basically, the King dies, so there is a plot between the Queen and the Chancellor to prevent Prince Alban to access the throne, under the pretext that he has no wife. His younger brother Arnaud - someone who enjoys the benefits of life - is then to succeed his father. The story is set on his life and centered on his soon-to-be wife, Armelle. Cheated on by his husband, disliked by the Queen, she'll mess up around to gain popularity and cause mayhem into the family, notably by organizing an open day at the castle.
To write the movie, Valérie Lemercier has observed royal courts in Europe and quite got inspiration from the figure of Princess Diana with a nice wink at some point. It's toroughly a nice comedy, quite funny but not too heavy, and very enjoyable to watch with very good actors - Valérie Lemercier herself is perfect, and note that Catherine Deneuve is absolutely brilliant in evil plotting Queen. I daresay I hope it gets out for english-speaking people to understand it !
( Legal credit, long live the LEN law )

( Special bonus : pictures )

So here goes my life. Stay on !

Boring. That's the word. (Eh, Peter ?!)

After two days of being sort of down (not to add the shame and guilt from it), I decided it was time to pull myself back up, so on Wednesday after my lecture I went to see a movie, which turned to be Woody Allen's Match Point.
I went at the UGC Ciné Cité Les Halles after having booked my ticket on the wap, got it with my wonderful Unlimited card from the machine and headed down to Room 4.
The room was quite empty, which wasn't surprising as it was just lunch time.

(Side note : that IMDB whole thing is always so scary. Did you know that Scarlett Johansson actually was three weeks younger than I am ? ! I'd give her 4 more years at least, from the movie ! damn make up !)

I love sitting in a theatre's room right before a movie starts, when it's all dark, empty and quiet. I just leave myself be carried by the crappish music they've got. Follow my thoughts, making a note that I'll have it all forgotten after a while. So good.
Those lunchtime shows have one great advantage : the announcements show less known movies, less crap such as Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which I'm probably going to boycott once again.
I noticed that there were many movies involving religion these days. The life of a muslim woman. The life of a christian woman in the west bank. The life of a hindi woman who shares her food and helps people around in India. And something involving Satan servants being chased by some super-heroic christian american sweeties.

How big a deal is religion ? With everything bad it makes people do, I wonder how its popularity can be increasing that way (also see the U.S. Election 2004).

Anyway.
The movie was quite good, actually. I have nothing special for/against Woody Allen, the announcement stills weren't especially attractive to me either. But it was good. Good play, I'd say. Predictable, but good play. Well the end was actually thrilling.
That Chris Wilton character reminds me of... me. The sort of guy that just lives life the way it comes and just sizes occasions on the fly - or not. I used to sort of live like that. Until nothing happened anymore, that is. But I don't like the way it all ends. I mean, speaking of the character, obviously :)

As of today, it was all difficult to wake up so early with the radio telling it would be about 0 degree out there. Brrr. 8 am, started a dull lecture about the European Commission in an over-heated amphitheater. Wouldn't have survived if we hadn't got the half-time break. Woosh.

Student Expo tomorrow, hope I'll have more information for next year at last !

( A little question, only for those who care )

( I think it's time for a few tests ;) )

Here you go then... Not much to add.

Ah, yes. The Aurélia story.
Maybe you've heard this from your homelands. A small girl named Aurélia was kidnapped in Jallais (Maine-et-Loire) a few days ago. Her sister narrowly escaped the kidnapper. Then 24 hours later, she was found in Cholet (Maine-et-loire), 20 km away from there, left alone in the city where she rang a door etc etc. The only info they had from her sister was that the guy was about 30 and drove a grey car they identified as a 309, whose plates ended with 49.
They finally found the owner of the car (very stupid of him) to be guilty.
He was given by his wife, who called the police when the portrait was released.
Then - sick - they found that the girl - Aurélia - had been raped.
Then - very sick - they found that it was premedited. The girl was being watched by the guy.
Then - sicker - they found that it wasn't a first. They found on his computers data that proved he's raped severeal other kids (they don't specify whether girls and/or boys) under 10 years old.
Then - even sicker - they found that not only was it not the first time, but that at some points they actually befriended the families and offered to keep watch on the kids when the parents had to be away.

The guy risks a lifetime sentence in jail and his wife risks up to 30 years.

This is so sick.

How weird is that, when you randomly browse the Internet and then you bump into someone who was at your school, at the same time you were there. Given that that school was a small one (500ish students)...

Boggles the mind, eh ?


I'm getting slowly pissed of at how I'm leading my life at present.
I'm like going to bed at 4 am and waking up at 13. Or 14. I even missed my classes on Thursday morning (woke up at 8, class at 8. Thought that dashing there to be asleep during the dull lecture wasn't as worthy as sleeping in my own bed. I stayed where I was).

Moreover, university work is worse than ever. Because of all the problems I had back in September, I'm in final exam for every subject I have. Not that I mind, I'd rather that - I've always been better at spoken finals than presentation and the silly tests they give.
But the trouble is, that I feel like I'm really not working *at all*. Which is extremely unusual from me because I usually don't mind that. I find it disturbing. I know that I wouldn't work more if I was in a normal situation, but here I am. Wicked. Twisted. I guess.

Add the friends. Should I still call them that, I sometimes wonder.
I'm rendered at a point where I'm split between two groups.

Group one : my usual friends mostly from High School with whom I kept contact, whom I see quite often (some are even in university with me !), with whom I used to be partying every now and then.
Those are... well, we're not doing much hanging out anymore. They mostly have better/more interesting things to do on evenings and week-ends, like, spending time with their own beloved being (sooo romantic).

Group two : all those I met at the university. I put them on another group because they never interact with the others.
Well I like them a lot and we have some cool times when we're there. But I have one major problem here. Politics are mostly taken by people from eased/rich families. I say eased because it's awkward to say they're rich, as they're not, but let's say that they don't have to worry too much on money. Which means loads of going to see plays, operas... and loads of hanging out into expensive places. Or well, just they don't care too much about the prices.
I told them a few times. They do care. They then seek for cheaper places (we all know some). Then they forget.
So needless to day that I don't spend that much time with them in the end, out of university.

That's the situation. Now, meeting new people ? Agreed, but I need the money, Paris is an expensive place to hang out in. Add the fact that I'm sort of a loner anyway, and that I don't really fancy night clubs, and you see the problem.

I'm not usually down about it, though. Annoyed. But you know how it is, sometimes you just feel like having people around, instead of staying home like a good boy.

Anyway, I'm bored in another sort of way as I don't even feel like working on the websites I'm still supposed to do, how fucked up is that ? I went hyper on travelling over the last week, and now I'm all down. Well done, money. Thank you so very much for ruining my plans for the future and my immediate fun !


And add to the whole fun the people who're you trying to understand or to help out and who go like blaming you for not acting as if they were your friend. Damn. I wish I was egoistic, then I wouldn't have to care. Fuck off.


 

NEWS FLASH !!

Here is the very explanation of why the americans (as a mass) are so dumb and ignorant of the world around them.

IT'S BECAUSE OF THEIR MEDIA !!

CNN keep broadcasting this :


Courtesy of France 2 - Map from CNN, all right reserved ;)

The commentary on the map on France 2 says :
« At the end of the report, CNN screens a map showing the main cities hit by the riots. Trouble is, that Toulouse is in the Alps, Strasbourg in the middle of Germany, Cannes in Montpellier and even Paris isn't at the proper place. »

(Sorry for not using lj-cuts, but everybody HAS to see this !)

... LOL ...


*pats americans* well now if they decide on some preventive bombing, I think we're safe, but the countries around should worry a bit ! HA HA HA

Some of my friends have blogs.
They've blogs that they keep up-to-date on a nearly daily basis.
These friends are doing their year in another country with a bunch of cool people, have tons of fun stuff happening to them, they go to parties, they go to pubs (not much different after all), they see people falling in the streets, have a close group to hold on, to hang out with, well, in other words, they're experiencing.

I'm rather a home-quiet boy. Meaning that I don't enjoy parties that much - in any case, not *too many* parties a week. There are many occasions on which I'd rather stay in my calm homeplace rather than going to busy places. That's what I call being a loner but with a slightly modified meaning. I have my friends and I enjoy being with them, just not all the time and in parties, etc. I'm not asocial, if you prefer. And at any rate I couldn't really afford it anyway.

Would it then be correct to assume that my life is boring ?

I can't make up my mind. It certainly lacks a bit of fun. But I don't really mind it...
Then I wonder.
If I was currently in Canada (where, needless to remind you, I plan on going next year), would it be so different ?
I bet for yes.
First of all, I'd live in the very university itself, so I couldn't really avoid being in constant contact of other students. Secondly, usually, foreigner groups tend to gather as it provides security and help for starters. Thirdly, it's just how life is there (although it seems to be here too, from what the parisbouge.com website says... yet I mostly hear about Erasmus parties, how ironic is that ?).
Would I mind ?
I guess not. As long as it doesn't ruin me and that I actually have the choice to stay alone when I feel like it.

(pause here : my father started rambling on the european constitutionnal treaty again and this does require me to reply)

So what's the problem and why am I rambling about it ?
Well, it's just that I sort of like a bit of change, but at the same time I really fancy staying here. Mmm.
Trouble is : I'm getting older. Already 21 years old. Not been living that much in the end. Mostly kept to my own work fun and quiet little life. Bah. I still have many years to live. But still - where are my teens ?!

And then, a so quiet life means meeting less new people, nearly none outside of university (and as I was implying, our university isn't the easiest place to meet people - no campus, etc). Then my loner personnality gets problems with something nasty which presence has been growing up and up along those last years... the whore-me !

I already referred to the whore-me, so I assume I don't need to introduce him. Just take a look at the tests in my October entries (and also, down here).
Mind you, I'm just not being helped. My friends are truly sex-obsessed themselves, whether they're irc/.net friends or real life friends. As you can see :

02/11/2005 (¬) 23:16:07 - <Diseased_Punk> the only bad side effect of the kombucha is that it gives your sex drive a boost

This is just ONE line taken out of... thousands. Not to mention that James here is like, referring to sex all the time, even if we're not into a sex-related conversation. What to expect from me after that, I wonder !

Real life friends, as I was saying, are just as affected. The only difference is that it's more subtle, and often undermeant :

Luce : Big boobs are annoying, it's so easy to get a cold with those.

Of course, this could sound innocent... but then, the reference to breasts is just like, highlighted. The english translation isn't worth anything anyway.

Okay, so much for proving that. I'll do better.
( Meanwhile, a few more tests. )

I have all I need for a perfect life... I'd just have not to worry about CIA black spots, riots in the northeastern parisian suburbs, and generally how badly the world goes.
If only.