Healthy people die just as much as unhealthy people.

100% of people will die. Everyone you know, from those held closest to your heart to those who you despise with every fibre of your fleeting being, will die. Among those that you know, most likely classed in the latter category, there will be some health nuts- we all have a few people in our lives who impress upon us their natural and clean lifestyle. Fortunately, they will die just as much as everyone else will.

The best outcome that anyone can hope to attain from their existence is gratification. Whether this is obtained from monumental positive impacts on the world, purchasing a large and luxurious estate, or just eating a lot of chocolate, it's all we can ever hope to gain. Arguably, the easiest and most immediate approach is to focus on short-term happiness through ventures such as shopping and substance abuses, even if this ultimately means long-term discontent. If you have no ambition to eliminate world hunger or be the leader of a political party, then take pride in fulfilling your own literal hunger or being the life of the party. These behaviours may be damaging to your body, but it's there to be used however you see fit and it's not like it will matter how pristine your corpse is as it lays rotting upon the cessation of your stay on Earth.

Those who promote healthy lifestyles are missing the point of what life is. Life is here to be enjoyed. So eat as much chocolate as you desire, go on unrestrained shopping sprees, smoke like a turkey sandwich and only get up from in front of the computer to go to the fridge; if that's what makes you happy. Anyone who instructs you to do otherwise is regurgitating the indoctrination of the long standing campaign to relieve medical facilities of the stress of a content society. They can lead a boring, tofu-filled life if they want; but don't let that stop you from gorging on junk food to the full extent of your digesting abilities.

If you stop trying to sell me fugly stuff I don't want, then I might buy stuff from you more often.

Much to the detriment of my bank account, I supplement my life as a nerd with a slight shopping addiction. By slight, of course, I mean that I spend more money than I consume water. I always seem to have something that I desperately need, like the aforementioned suit, or desperately want, like shoes.
What pushy shop assistants have yet to realise, is that I will probably buy something from them if I am left to my own devices and don't have then desperately trying to make me purchase items that I wouldn't want if they paid me to take them.

Like the time when I bought my formal dress a few months ago- which is the cutest, pinkest, shiniest thing I have owned in my life, by the way.
"We have some cute Paris Hilton shoes on sale that would go absolutely perfectly with that dress," the vacuous looking shop assistant had told me. The words "Paris Hilton", "on sale", and "shoes" all in the same breath made that sentence the most exciting thing I had ever heard in my life thus far. Sadly, when she showed me the shoes, they were not only hideous, but also clashed horribly with the dress. When I tentatively pointed this out, she countered that my feet were all the way down there, so it wouldn't matter. I'm a big believer in the theory of feet being all the way down there so colours don't have to be a perfect match, but even I could see that the theory did not hold in this situation. And I have the fashion sense of Amy Winehouse on a bad day, so you can imagine what a horrible match the shoes and the dress were. Consequently, I left the store having not purchased any shoes.

Yesterday, in the same shopping trip that I attempted to locate a suit in, I also was in search of a silver clutch to go with my formal dress. I have my heart set on obtaining a massive clutch, and I will not rest until I manage to source one (not including all the times that I have rested since embraking on my search). I entered store after store and found myself approached by countless shop assistants draped in the lowest selling stock of their shops. When I would inform then of my need for a massive silver clutch, not knowing what stock they had in their own store, shop assistants would hunt through the entire store before producing something completely dissimilar to what I described, asking if it was close enough.
"Is this too small?"
"Is this too sequinned?"
"Is this too pewter?"
"Is this too white?"
"Is this too much of a wallet? And by the way, does it matter if it's black?"
"What about this nice leather laptop bag?"
Yes, someone actually tried to sell me a brown laptop bag in place of a large shiny silver clutch. And it was ugly. Do I really look that gullible!

Online shopping is starting to look like a really good idea. I might end up being shipped damaged goods that bear only a passing resemblance to the picture, but at least nobody will try to push me into buying fugly items that could never masquerade as what they are trying to convince me they are!

Looking for business a-tyre is deflating.

For reasons that are still unclear to me, I have spent today in search of a suit. First in my travels, I went to my aunt's house and endured the terror of being jumped on by her family's hideous puppy which lives indoors, because it smells better than my cousins. She had told me that she had two suits from when she was younger, and I was welcome to take whichever one fit me better- I took much delight in being offered the opportunity not to pay for my suit, because there are so many better things to buy, like shoes. Unfortunately, upon trying on both suits, I decided I would rather spend money that I don't have than wear those monstrosities.

My search for a suit then took me to Southland- an unfortunately named shopping centre so big, I reasoned, that I would be able to find something.
Three hours later and my situation was beginning to look more and more desperate. The thing is, I am far too short for suits. Even the mayor of the municipality in which I live has called me short, so it must be true. You would think that it wouldn't matter in terms of suit fitting, but no matter where I went, the suits are far too bulky and long. Even in the "petite" section. I look like a little kid playing dress ups- certainly not the look I'm going for.

I despondently entered Forever New, having not yet made my first purchase of the day. Three quarters of an hour and five shop assistants later, having tried on what felt like half of their store, I emerged from the change rooms intending to buy just one overpriced skirt- the only business skirt that I had found that looked reasonable on someone of my undesirable proportions. At the counter, I rifled through my bag for my purse. Figuring it was just hiding underneath the various useless items that reside in my bag, I emptied out everything in search of it. Of course, it wasn't there, and apparently they're not allowed to hold items in that store. And, of course, that skirt happened to be the very last one in my size that they had, leaving me clinging on to the vain hope that it will still be there on Thursday, which is the soonest I can go back there for it.

Even without my beloved savings card, I carried on in my search for anything I can pass off as a suit. And eventually I found it- a suit jacket that was not dress-length, black, and a nice cut that won't look like a cardboard box when worn. The only problem? They had pretty much every size except mine.

It's a sign. Perhaps I'm just not meant to have a suit. Perhaps nobody should. We should all walk around in Adidas trackies, tank tops and ugg boots. What a perfect world that would be.

The ONLY celebrity crush worth having.

Most teenage and even tweenage girls have some sort of celebrity crush- Robert Pattinson seems to be the object of everyone's affections at the moment, despite his close resemblance to a turnip with an awesome hairstyle- awesome for a vegetable, at least.

This is the idol of the masses? He's not even cute, although I have to say he does look much less like a Pervy Old Guy than usual in the above image. Also, in most of the posters plastered over girls' walls everywhere, he looks either angry, or like he is smirking. He doesn't have an endearing face that makes you want him in the same way you would want a fluffy pet- rather you would want him as much as you would love a terminal disease. The world needs a new pin-up.

I propose Andrew O'Keefe; the jolly and jocular host of Deal or No Deal. Every weekday at 5:30 p.m., he turns a horrible idea for a game show into the only thing on television worth watching.

He is sooo cute. Actually maybe everyone should stick to lusting after Robert Pattinson. That way there is more Andrew O'Keefe for me. Now to just find some way to convince his wife and children to leave him for Robert Pattinson.

I'm going to talk about Michael Jackson, just because everyone else is.

Today the world lost the best performer that ever lived- or exhausted itself of a deranged paedophile, depending on who you talk to. It's all too easy to dismiss the King of Pop as a lunatic who is addicted to plastic surgery and somehow bleached his skin; and totally discount what he has contributed to the world.

For the past five or so years, popular culture has been rife with digs at Jackson due to the accusations of child molestation made against him. The masses have cited this as a reason for being indifferent and even relieved at his death- we could always do with one less paedophile, they say. While he was brought to court over the charges in June 2005, he was actually acquitted- of course, this little technicality has never stopped the constant vilification his image is subjected to. Apparently modern justice is based on the premise of "innocent until proven guilty"- but somehow this has been perverted so that for someone of Jackson's celebrity, it's more along the lines of guilty after proven innocent. If it is true and has just escaped the justice system as so many things do, then it's disgusting and inexcusable, but we just don't know that. The best assumption that can be made in this case is that the courts and their jury got it right, and it is unethical to presume otherwise.

Another common reason used as a justification for laughing at Jackson's tragic death is "he's a freak because he looks funny", and the worn out adage that he somehow bleached himself white. Before concluding that he's a freak, therefore his achievements don't count, on preconceived and erroneous notions; let's look at some facts commonly available in the public domain- an uncommon practise, considering how many people believe things just because they're commonly accepted by the ignorant. First, Jackson is a sufferer of vitiligo, a skin disease that progressively lightens patches of skin. Second, yes, that's right, only patches of skin- therefore his whole body did not turn white as a result of vitiligo. But what would you do if your skin suddenly developed patches of a completely contrasting colour? You wouldn't just leave it be, especially if you had a high-profile career and were constantly in the public eye. While initially he covered the lighter patches with darker make-up, after the vitiligo had sufficiently spread, it became simpler to cover the dark patches with light make-up. While it remains unconfirmed, Jackson probably did undergo some permanent cosmetic skin lightening of the remaining darker regions- understandably, as he would look like even more of a "freak" if his skin was patchy. Furthermore, he was obviously insecure about his looks, as evidenced by his extensive use of cosmetic surgery.

There's no denying that Jackson's face has been altered dramatically since the height of his fame in the eighties, with at least two (probably more) nose jobs and various cheek and chin alterations. And if that made him happy, then good on him for doing it- it's not like his undergoing surgery hurts anyone other than himself. Besides, no matter how much he changed his face, at least he never looked as creepy as Robert Pattinson.

Jackson's contributions to popular culture through his music and dance are nothing short of colossal- there is no doubt he was extremely talented and it's such a shame that his fame was overshadowed by his more questionable antics. But ultimately, his public persona- the glittering, singing, dancing artist; and his actual identity as the messed-up molester that he has come to be known as; cannot be considered in the same breath. His extremely successful career and stellar contributions to his industry cannot be depreciated based on his personal life.

He will be missed.

So this is why I don't do chemistry.

Today I was meant to have English class last period, but due to my limited tolerance of tedium and crybaby nature, I decided to sample other classes instead. Come 2:15, I had a very important decision to make: whether to go to photography or chemistry (neither of which subject I actually do). I settled on chemistry, because more of my nerd friends do chemistry.

I must stress that the only reason I elected not to do chemistry this year was because I'm afraid of pretty much everything, especially chemicals. I have an irrational yet ubiquitous fear of getting chemicals in my eye, or on my skin, or in my hair; and there is too high a risk of that happening in chemistry. Also, it looks difficult and I'm far too quiescent and brainless to ever be able to keep up.

Forty minutes into my first and only chemistry lesson, I already had green goop in my hair. At least it washed out, but now it feels funny.
It was on this note that I left chemistry and ventured into photography. I was there for ten minutes and already bored.

Maybe I should just go back to English.

My self-assigned English project.

If you have read my previous blog entry on my English class, you will know that poking out your eyeballs with rusty forks that have previously been used to eat hot chillies is preferable to attending my English class. So I have proposed my own solution to this terror. Why don't I just not go!
It may seem counter-nerdtuitive to wag classes. In fact, you may be surprised to learn, I have skipped several classes. In year nine, for example, when P.E. was compulsory, I wagged P.E. to sit in the library and do maths. Nobody really noticed. So, I propose, I will wag English, so that I can finally get some English work done.
This thought first occured to me last Thursday when I asked my teacher if I could go to the VCE centre instead of attend class. She readily agreed, and did so for the next class. So why not continue doing this, just without the bother of attaining permission? It's a waste of time. I could even turn it into a kind of game- my self-assigned project. See how long I can avoid English class for.

Today I enacted my amazing plan- the third English class in a row that I haven't quite attended. I went to the VCE centre, nicely asked to borrow a laptop, and tried to look like I was meant to be there. Not only did I almost finish my entire Engish assignment, which I would never have been able to do with my raucous and disruptive class around, but I was so enthusiastic about it that I stayed in the VCE centre through lunchtime to finish it off. Hardcore.

Time Management, and other things that are irrelevant to performance.

As any nerd will know, much emphasis is placed on useless abstractions such as time management and a positive attitude and occupational health and safety- people will tell you how it is important to be organised and perseverent and optimistic and adhere to a whole lot of useless ideals. It doesn't take a genius to realise that those who attempt to browbeat these relics of last century upon us are full of... egesta. While this plethora of fluffy invention is useful to some extent, it's very shortsighted to focus on process rather than end result. Here are some actual useful tips regarding positive attitudes, internet safety and other things that should be common sense.

Time management
While it is important to plan out what you are doing, if you are spending an hour making yourself a schedule, you're missing the point. Time management is more a case of making sure that you don't leave everything to the last minute- estimate how long it will take you to do something, and keep it in mind until you have to have it completed by. Easy.

Positive Thinking
Far too much emphasis is placed on the power of positive thinking. While it keeps you placated, it doesn't DO anything. In fact it can be disadvantageous- people who think positively all the time usually don't know what to do if something goes wrong, because they didn't consider the possibility of it! Telling yourself that, for example, you will do well on an examination may assist you in that you are less stressed, but when you are sitting with a pencil poised in your hand and a vacuous mind, positive thinking will not help you. EFFORT is what makes people achieve, not optimism.

Teamwork
Cooperation and teamwork is, for the most part, not productive and is glorified way too much. The only reason anyone likes teamwork is because they can pass off their work onto other people, rather than actually do anything. Productive people generally do not like teamwork, because nobody likes to compromise, and there are few things more annoying than trying to work with someone who wants to do as little as possible.

Occupational Health and Safety
OH&S training permeates society, creating a deluge of useless jobs and hours wasted trying to train anyone who'll listen. While it is important to make sure that there isn't a puddle of water on the floor, or exposed electrical cables, anyone who needs to sit through four hours of training to know what should be common sense, deserves to die of something stupid like a heavy object falling on them.

Cyber Safety
Probably the only thing stupider than the word "cyber" is the concept of cyber safety. Anyone who is gullible enough to email someone their bank account details, or give their name, address, phone number and pets' birthdays to some random, deserves whatever befalls them.

Confidence
Confidence never helped anyone. In fact, people with no confidence are easier to manipulate. Making everyone cower in corners is the best way to control people and make sure that nobody breaks the law.

Emotions
Why would you cry or laugh when you can learn facts all day? Everything should be based on hard evidence. No feelings allowed.

Healthy Eating
Who needs fruit and vegetables when there is instant coffee. Fact: There is a 100% mortality rate for people who eat healthily.

Animal Cruelty
What have the animals ever done for us? If an endangered leopard is not being useful to me by being made into a fur coat or my dinner, then it deserves whatever it gets.

I think my original point may have gotten a little clouded along the way, but you get the idea. Basically, everyone should work hard all day in solitary confinement, on a diet of instant coffee. The end.

It will help me study better, I swear!

In the 1953 movie Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Marilyn Monroe's iconic showgirl character, Lorelai, justifies her lust for wealth by explaining that if one has plenty of money, they don't need to spend any time being worried about money, and more time concentrating on being in love. I apply a similar philosophy to studying. It's stressful enough as it is, but if you indulge in little wants whilst trying to study, you can concentrate more on what it is you are trying to learn. In this way I have managed to justify a number of purchases, because they will help me study better!

During exam week, I invested in four pairs of shoes, a book about geek culture, and a slight change of hair colour on the pretence that I would study better. I convinced my mother to buy me pink smart water and smarties, telling her that they would make me smarter- it didn't work, but she still doesn't know that as I've not told her my exam results yet. I even made her finally get me a new bed, as my old one was on the verge of collapsing. So it was with much relief that the end of exams were embraced, if only for the reduced strain on mum's and my bank accounts.

However, it is not all over yet. I have a history SAC on Thursday, which I have been intensely studying for all weekend and still know very little of. It crossed my mind yesterday that perhaps I need to spend some money so that I can study better. The only problem was coercing my mother to agree with me. Yesterday afternoon, we were happily driving home when she spotted a giant waving bear on the side of the world.
"Oh my god, what the hell is that?" she exclaimed and slowed down to have a closer look at it, in almost peak-hear traffic on Warrigal Road. "Oh, it's just a person in a bear suit advertising a sale."
"Oh my god, a sale!" I squealed, realising it was an underwear/sleepwear distributer, the same one that had a sale this time last year, where I purchased the most amazing underwear I've owned in my life: Aussie boxers. I rapidly explained this in one breath, before demanding that we stop there, on the premise it will help me study for history for reasons that I hadn't quite figured out yet.
"No, I can't be bothered, blah blah blah..." Clearly she did not appreciate the gravity of such a sale.

I spotted a McDonald's on the corner of the next intersection, so decided to change my stratagem, as bordering on a tantrum wasn't working. "Can we go to Maccas? Can we, can we, can we?"
Despite my hate for McDonald's, I convinced her that buying me an ice-cream would help me study better once I get home, as that was a lot easier than convincing her that going to an underwear sale would help. She reluctantly agreed, which resulted in my having an extra five minutes to persuade her of the benefits of buying things I don't need. Going through the drive through had the added benefit of pointing our car in the direction that it needed to go in to head back to the sale, which is a major advantage as she is horrible at driving, and if she had attempted to turn around whilst we continued in the same direction as before, we could well be dead by now.
Eventually she relented and agreed to stop at the sale, on the condition that I spend no more than twenty minutes there. I had just one more concern...
"Can I borrow $50? I have no cash on me." Seeing her face upon this request, I manipulated my facial expression into one resembling a sad bulldog and said... "it will help me study better!"

Fifteen minutes and thirty dollars later, I emerged from the sale with new flannelette pyjamas, cotton pyjama pants, three singlet tops and more aussie underwear. And you know what?
As I sit here wearing the same pyjamas I have refused to get out of for the last sixteen hours, I think it did help me study better.

That's also how I managed to justify the last four mugs of instant coffee... coffee is so much better than food. In a perfect world, everyone would be sustained by instant coffee, and whoever invented it would be the leader of the world. According to Wikipedia, it was invented by some Japanese guy in 1901. So that must be why there were relatively few technological advances before then. Suddenly it all makes sense.

50 Anonymous Messages.

Right now, I am sitting at home, being boring. While those two things are what I do best, I am currently somewhat frustrated at the fact because everyone else is out partying. Even the old people- seriously, I just came back from my best friend/clone's mum's birthday where there was a preponderance of old people, all dancing in their frail, ascetic way.
Usually when I am annoyed about something this frothy, I bitch about it, frequently about things that are nothing to do with whatever it is I'm incensed about. Sadly I can't, because of course being a nerd the majority of my correspondence happens on msn, and the only people online right now are probably too busy studying or whatever. So instead I bring to you, my invisible audience, a list of fifty things that I wish to say to 50 certain people, but have always been too much of a pussy to. It can be like a game, you can try to find yourself on the list!

1. Step away from the hairspray and take a make-up wipe.
2. Your art looks like baby vomit. You should give up.
3. You are quite annoying and I feel sorry for myself for being related to you.
4. I have no reason to hate you, but I do anyway. You're probably nice and funny and whatnot, but your face really annoys me.
5. Your shoes are disgusting and make my eyeballs vomit.
6. Stop doing stupid MySpace bulletin quizzes. Your answers are boring. Nobody cares.
7. You're so lazy. If you commit yourself to something, you should follow through with it.
8. There's a reason I never went out with you, and yes, you were right when you guessed it. Lose some weight and toughen up.
9. You spend so much time trying to be cool, it's sad. Maybe I'm just not cool enough to appreciate you.
10. It's your own fault that you ruined your life, stop whinging about it.
11. I lied. I did block you on msn. For a very long time. Sorry.
12. Guilt tripping others for your own mistakes only reflects badly on you.
13. How can you judge others for not being exactly like you, when you are actually quite weird?
14. You probably think that you are so cool for subverting authority, but you're only hurting yourself and your future (or lack of).
15. You expect too much, and you're not going to get it.
16. How can you think you're attractive? You're an orange faced fat hairy skank.
17. You act like you're from a farm. Please go back there.
18. You are the single most annoying person alive, and you would get along really well with number three.
19. Be realistic. The world isn't going to hand you opportunities, so stop expecting it to.
20. For the sake of your dignity, take down some of those photos. They're all the same.
21. The day you stopped texting me so much was one of the happiest days of my life.
22. Yes, you're gorgeous, but you don't have to rub it in so much, expecially to the more unfortunate looking.
23. You should try eating sometime. That's not normal.
24. No, I will not cyber with you, creep. However I did send the conversation round to others, if that's okay with you.
25. If your rash is that red and itchy, you should get it checked.
26. Why does everyone think you're so talented? You're good, but you're just not amazing.
27. You shouldn't let yourself be treated like that.
28. Your pregnancy is the most hysterical thing that's happened all year.
29. Your girlfriend is disgusting. Then again so are you... perfect match.
30. Do you find that having sweaty hands helps with fapping? (That would be one of the most satisfying things to say, ever.)
31. You're really pretty, but if I told you that you'd probably think I'm a Pervy Old Guy.
32. You two were a perfect couple. You were both ratty and pimply.
33. Just because it's not happening to you doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
34. Thanks for being such a great friend, even if I don't like you all that much.
35. You look like you've been smacked in the face with a shovel.
36. I want your life, because I don't know anything about it, but from here it looks like fun.
37. You look like a fish. Other than that there's probably not much wrong with you, but I'd rather not find out.
38. You are so lucky, and you probably don't even know it.
39. Your sob life story is actually really funny.
40. Your haircut looks like a pumpkin.
41. Go back to your own country, potato farmer.
42. I knew it was you when you prank called me. I only talked to you for so long to drain your credit.
43. The most you will ever do with your life is OD and die. Why bother.
44. I thought that you said what you did because you were being nice and trying to protect me, when in fact you were just pushing your own agenda.
45. I hope the next time you get blind drunk, you walk in front of a car. If you haven't already.
46. You look like the girl in the old Impulse ads, but better. Yet there's something very strange about you that nobody has been able to delineate.
47. I hate you because of MySpace. Get a life and stop posting whingey bulletins and status updates. And if that wasn't enough, you also infiltrate Facebook.
48. You laugh at me because I study when I get home, but you don't find it at all odd that you literally do nothing every evening.
49. It's a shame you're fat, because your brain is really attractive.
50. It's taken me years to realise that I actually do like you. You're a great friend and fun to be around, I'm sorry for letting competition get in the way of a friendship.

That was surprisingly easy to compile. I could probably keep going for days. It's actually kind of worrying.

Now that my rant is over, I can go back to doing what a nerd does best: study on an otherwise perfectly good Saturday night.

MySpace versus Facebook: the quintessential debate of the late noughties.

Since the beginning of time, a question of monumental magnitude has posed itself to mankind. A question that many propose is too subjective to have an answer, too broad to condense into a single resolution, which at times degenerates into a simple matter of popularity and the current Alexa rating.

Of course, by the beginning of time I mean when life began to be worth living, that is, ever since the joys of the Internet have been enjoyed by almost the entire first-world population. And by great question, I mean the question of whether MySpace or Facebook is better. Being of such gravity, this topic has been extensively covered on the Internet and in useless tabloid newspapers. Even people who have a social life and are rarely on the computer know the basic ascendances of each: MySpace is better looking, Facebook is easier to use, MySpace has music, Facebook is better for stalking. Many debates of this breed have been strongly (and unfairly!) weighted in favour of Facebook. The numbers certainly seem to be in Facebooks favour, with the boring old people's social network eclipsing MySpace in terms on unique visitors in April of 2008. This means more people in total (probably because nobody can figure out how to delete their Facebook accounts), and consequently more Pervy Old Guys. While statistics are unavailable, the proportion of Pervy Old Guys is likely to be higher on Facebook too, because most Facebook users are older and have more money.

Since opening a MySpace account way back in 2006, I have only ever received one friend request from a Pervy Old Guy. He wasn't even that old although his reply to my "hi, do I know you?" message on receipt of his friend request was slightly disturbing. That, and his porn star-esque display name means that he will forever be condemned to be a Pervy Old Guy, in my mind at least.

I created a Facebook account earlier this year, despite refusing to for an inordinately long time on the grounds of loyalty to MySpace and unwillingness to accept my age. In the few months I have had it, I've received countless "friend" requests from Pervy Old Guys. While a certain someone on my friends list who has many Pervy Old Guy friends is impugnable for some of these unwanted requests, some of them are seemingly random and I don't appear to share any common friends with them. Facebook seems to be a hub of filthy imbeciles who send me friend requests... and Pervy Old Guys.

A distinct lack of the aforementioned Pervy Old Guys means that MySpace has a big leg up over Facebook, and carries so much weighting with it that MySpace can be deemed to be irrefutably better in every way.

Maybe everything should be graded by the amount of Pervy Old Guys, the fewer the better, like in golf (a sport propagated by Pervy Old Guys). For example, school is awesome because it does not have Pervy Old Guys, and any school that does have a multitude of Pervy Old Guys is not one that anyone would wish to attend. Hot shoes are awesome because Pervy Old Guys have very limited interaction with them... I hope. Public transport is repugnant because it has far too many Pervy Old Guys. The shops on Centre Road are abhorrent because of the abundance of Pervy Old Guys.
And of course, nerds are awesome because the majority of us are not Pervy Old Guys, at least for the time being.

The joys of being uncoordinated.

Ever since I can remember, I've been pathetically uncoordinated, making me elephantine more than just aesthetically. When I was three, my mum tried to teach me how to throw a ball with the reward of an icy-pole when we managed to throw it back and forth twenty times. It was big and bright pink and slightly pearlescent, so you would think that I would try my hardest to catch it- in fact I did try very hard, but that didn't change the fact that I couldn't catch it. And when I managed to catch it, I was terrible at trying to throw it. Consequently, I got very few icy-poles.

My clumsiness didn't disappear throughout childhood- I reluctantly endured the travails of sport classes in primary school and the first few years of high school with consistent incompetence. Every single year on my primary school report, the sport teacher would write that I would benefit from lessons outside of school because I was struggling so much. That's how bad I was- needing a tutor for sport! Like I would want to subject myself to even more torture!!!

Despite an deeply ingrained love of Adidas sportswear, I've accepted that I am unconditionally maladroit when it comes to anything requiring coordination. That's why it's so exciting that I managed to throw a balled up piece of aluminium foil into the bin yesterday at school, from a distance of two whole metres (or something like that). Since I am so unadept at throwing, upon my successful throw, the whole little circle (of five or six nerds) applauded. That just illustrates how much of a rarity it is.

And that is why yesterday was the most exciting day of my life.

Glasses: the most defining feature of a nerd.

One of the most annoying things about being a nerd is needing glasses. Some people like glasses because they remind them of sexy secretaries, or because they make them look smarter, or because they're like another accessory that can complete an outfit. Personally I hate them, and am of the view that they are really bloody ugly. Not only this, but they can be inconvenient at times. When it rains, they get droplets of water on them and it gets hard to see, much like being on the inside of a car with no windscreen wipers. When it's cold, they fog up with every breath taken. Even steam from hot food fogs up the lenses, making the world appear even more obscured than it does without glasses.

Since wearing glasses, I've developed a slight fear of looking down, in case my glasses slip off, which has happened a stupidly huge amount of times. As much as they feel as fixated as any other facial feature, they're actually not. Luckily they have never fallen off whilst looking down a stairwell (probably because now I'm afraid to look down, even when I'm not wearing glasses, because I forget that I'm not wearing them). Speaking of stairwells, once upon a time I locked myself in one and had to call someone to rescue me, because the door was locked from the inside but open from the outside.

I think the moral of the story is to avoid stairwells at all costs. Never look down one, never look up one, never look directly at one and then walk closer to it and have the door shut behind you. Be lazy and use an escalator instead.

An English class that speaks simian.

My most dreaded part of every day is not getting up in the morning. It's not sitting down and studying at night. It's not even the part when I overhear the neighbours yelling at each other and have make-up sex later. No, the absolute worst trial that I endure every day is English class.

At best, everyone sits there and does nothing. Usually I am one of those people, unless I bring real work from other classes to keep myself entertained. At worst, everyone utilises the nearest objects as projectiles to transform the room into a labyrinth of flying paper planes, balled up sheets from their workbook, dismantled pens and other generic office supplies. All sorts of things can happen in an English class, from sticking hands in moving fans to someone throwing someone else on top of a table and violently humping him, both of which have actually happened. The one thing that you can be sure doesn't happen is fulfilling work requirements.

It's not that the students are stupid... well there is that, but most are just disillusioned. Every class involved a multitude of arguments between student and teacher; she yells at the wrong person, they yell back, it escalates until someone gets sent out. Five minutes later it starts again, but with someone else. While this is funny to an extent, it's about time everyone grew up, and realised that nobody wants to be in that classroom but there is little choice in the matter. Trying to protest the system is the surest way to be entrapped within its constraints for even longer- if you spend all of your time yelling at the teacher then obviously it will be hard to pass the semester!

You would think that in such an imbecilic class, entertaining things would happen all the time. Sadly, this is not so. It stopped being funny after the first week- now it's more bleak than blithe. At least there's only another eighty or so hours of it this year. Fantastic.

In other news, my poor fatty cat has a chin infection. Two weeks ago the vet thought it was AIDS, but it turns out that it's just acne. Makes sense, it must be pretty easy to confuse the two!

Somehow, I know less than nothing.

As a full-time nerd and part-time dork, I sometimes read. I often read magazines, but they're not exactly highbrow, although I have recently subscribed to Cosmos magazine, which sometimes teaches me stuff that is largely irrelevant to my everyday life. Recently though, I decided to read an actual book. Not too thrilled at the prospect of actually having to think while I read, I chose a pseudo-science text called "The Book of Nothing- Vacuums, Voids, and the Latest Ideas About the Origins of the Universe" by cosmologist J. D. Barrow. If it was about nothing, as the title proclaimed, then it stands to reason that it would be easy reading. For hardcore physicists maybe- certainly not for me! I laboured through its three hundred or so pages and eventually reached the end of the book last night.

Most young teenagers, especially nerds, think they know everything. Two or three years on and we realise that we don't know everything after all, in fact we know very little. But the least one can ever know is nothing- it's comforting to know that you can't possibly know less than that. At least that's what I thought, but J. D. Barrow and his stupid smart book has taught me (among other things) that I don't know nothing at all. Nothing is a lot more confusing than I ever imagined. That's right- I know less than nothing. Bleak, isn't it.

It's been a bit of a dream of mine to know everything. I once had this great idea to make a big knowledge map of everything that everyone in the world knows. Unfortunately this has already been invented and it's called Wikipedia. Also, J. D. Barrow has also written a book on Theories of Everything, so actually my idea has been invented twice already. Is there anything he can't do! The only way he could be more indomitable is if his first initials were E. L. so his name would sound like wheelbarrow. Now that would be classic.

He's only cute if he can spell.

I know I'm meant to be a nerd and all, but I can't study all the time. So today I took a few hours out of my homework time to hang out with my glasses-wearing friend, Becky. Despite carrying some of the markings of being a nerd, she is also a bit blonde, which means she must be a slut. This unique combination of attributes means that she is good at stalking hot guys on MySpace. We were checking out the profile of a male acquaintance of hers, and were undecided on whether he was hot or not. After much umming and erring, we finally came to the conclusion that yes, he is kind of hot. What was the deciding factor?

His spelling and grammar, of course.

His photo captions were in impeccable English with apostrophes and full stops where they are meant to be. The only exception that could be taken was in one of his captions, he attempted to use ellipses, but had four dots instead of the conventional three. Still, that's close enough.

One of the most annoying things about the Internet (as much as I love it) is that far too many people who use it just can't write properly. While it can be really funny to laugh at the things that people inadvertently say, nerds will only take others seriously if they can spell. Failing that, they better know the first 50 digits of pi, or be able to say LOL in binary, like i can (010011000100111101001100).

So, I guess this is hello.

This is my first blog entry, ever. Until now I've been a blog virgin- i don't read nor write blogs, not even on MySpace, which if you didn't know, is absolutely covered in superfluous and melancholy writings of teenagers and the occasional B-list celebrity. I've always assumed that blogs are nothing more than a waste of server space. In the advent of aptly named Twitter, the internet is looking more and more like the inside of a two dollar shop- some awesome stuff, but mostly annoying and useless devices which make you wonder why anybody would ever think of producing them. Like those fluffy hats shaped like bowling balls with a head hole that I once saw in a toy shop- what incentive anyone would ever have to invent them eludes me.

What better way to deal with this mess than add my own blog which nobody will read? Blogger.com makes it far too easy for people like me, that are too lazy to go and get a job, to sit at the computer and extemporaneously type to their heart's content.

So, while everyone is out partying and getting up to the things teenagers are meant to be doing, I will be sitting here, blogging, for you: my invisible audience. I'm pretty used to sitting at home as it is, after all, I am nerd. My life is study. My life is school. My life is computer. My life is stressing over whether or not mentioning George Clooney in my GAT will affect my marks.

Welcome.