Time passes by with no remorse, here we are, only a day removed from the long-awaited, exalted trip. I spent the better half of my day cleaning my room. As always I half-assed it, but I did get a lot more done than usual, I finally cleaned my keyboard and dusted my shelves (most of them). All I need to do is finish packing and I guess I'm as physically ready as I can be to go to the university trip in Africa for two weeks. Two weeks of my life. Short, relatively, but two weeks? To the wearied mind, that's a lot.

To be honest, I'm not ready. My mind just isn't there anymore. I'm fatigued by all things school and study, even the things that are supposed to be fun, seem tiresome and annoying. What's funny was, this trip to Africa was one of the selling points of this course and university before I started. Now, I just want to get it over with.

I don't want to think too much about the future. When I do, I start to spiral. I just need to step back and repeat to myself that I've got a life ahead of me. I wonder how long it can keep going though, at some point it has to stop.

I think when I'm back from Africa I'll make a big travel log, probably stick it in journal and have multiple parts, or something to that effect, or maybe I keep it in blog and make it a separate entry... Hmmm, I don't know, I'd ask you, but you can't answer. I'll figure it out when I get back.

See ya.

I'd like to start this off by saying, thank you to stackoverflow, w3schools and everyone who has learnt how to code or is learning how to code so that I don't have to, because HOLYYY would making a modal take far less longer if I actually learnt what the things I copy and paste actually mean. I mean... what the hell is a query?

One day, one day for sure I will learn. Today is not that day, tomorrow is not that day. Will next month be that day, ehhh unlikely, but rest assured that day will come.

I think the basic layout for my new book page is all but finished, I only need to find better backgrounds, designs, more thing all that, but the skeleton is there, and I can do all of that when I get back from my trip.

Speaking of, I've finally settled on the books I'm going to bring, this time I brought 6 books, hoping that I can occupy my time while I'm there, I'm aiming high and some of these books are pretty big, but I don't mind not finishing.

The books I brought are:

I think Crime and Punishment, the big one, is the one I'll knock out first, I can probably get a decent chunk on the train, waiting for the plane and the flight itself, hell, I might even finish it. Probably not. I'm bringing a few non-fiction books too! I'll be honest, I haven't read a non-fiction book since I stopped reading all those years ago and since I started reading again in 2022, I've only read fiction. It might be boring, it might not be, but I think, hopefully, I can slug through them if need be, I mean, they are pretty important books to read.

Oh man, took a look through all my posts/entries on this website and its actually quite amazing how many times I repeat things, not that its bad or anything, just an interesting observation, funny to imagine someone going on my website and thinking "hmm... I think maybe this guy doesn't know what to do in life." Its not a wrong assessment, but still, funny to imagine.

I've been getting some good usage out of the Alan Wake thermos I bought, I made myself some coffee and went on a walk around my house, there's a large field that feeds into a meadow near my area that I used to walk through during secondary school. I didn't go that far though, only about 10 minutes away and I ended up turning around quicker than I thought once I finished all my coffee.

I'm glad I went on that walk though because as it so happens, it started raining at the time I usually go on walks. Though I typically prefer walks in the evening, its perhaps the best time to go out, when the sun has hardly set and the soft blue remains faintly in the sky. Mornings and afternoons are far too harsh in the summer, but the evening is just right.

I just read the latest Hirayasumi chapter, I will sing this manga's praises anywhere I can, cause damn... It resonates with me on such a real level, nothing special happens, yet everything that happens is simultaneously incredibly special. There is a quiet passion that blasts outwards from each page that is felt from the heart, I don't like to be reactionary but it may just be one of my favourite mangas out there.

It touches on something that is perhaps the biggest dilemma in my life right now. Passion and dreams. Throughout these formative years of my life, the nascent stage of my adulthood, I have lost passion, and I have gained it elsewhere. In doing so, I have lost my path, I have lost my dream and I have no idea where to go from here. I've studied STEM my whole life, I never considered anything else, now, its the absolute last thing I want to do. I still like learning, I still have that curiosity, I just think that, when the sole purpose of learning anything is to get a degree to give you job prospects, the joy is violently expunged and all that is left is abject misery. Marx was right, this alienation stuff gets real.

I suppose being lost isn't so bad though. I can go anywhere and there is a beauty in that freedom if I have the courage to be free.

I had to wake up early today for a university thing and finally managed to finish the book I've been reading for these past two months while on the train today. It was The Sorrow of War by Bao Ninh, now all I need to do is finish up my book page on my website after the website construction worm found its way into my brain and I decided to redo it again. I think once I can figure out how I want it to look and how I want to code it, I'll start doing reviews and the like.

The train is just about the only time I can find to read a book, uninterrupted and in one session. At home I don't often find myself reaching for a book when I'm bored, most times I read, I force myself to do so. On the train however, where London trains vary from bad connection to no connection at all, I can very easily pull out a book and enjoy. Well... only if I can get a seat.

Speaking of books, I'm going away for two weeks on the end of this month and I'm wondering what books I should bring. Last time I went away for a week, I brought only two books, greatly underestimating how much reading I could get done and ended up with no books to read by the third day. Seeing as I'm going for two days and its a 10+ hour flight there and back I figure that I should probably bring around 5-6 books with at least one considerably long book.

I don't know how to end this, so here's a picture of a grasshopper or something that landed on my shoe.

I feel like I'm forcing myself to write these blog posts recently, at the start I was genuinely enthused, but now I feel like I'm thinking way too much about saying and doing something rather than writing what comes naturally. On that note, my Alan Wake II coffee thermos came in today, a whole two months after I ordered it cause somehow it got lost and they had to send a new one. Though, at least it came. As soon as I got it, I was super excited to use it and then I realised that I drink Vietnamese coffee mainly and that the yield isn't quite worth putting in to a thermos so I'm not quite sure if I'd ever use it. Its not big enough to replace a normal water bottle and its weight is pretty hefty so I guess for now, it'll stay as a decoration.

I got into the Kind Words 2 playtest and I've been having a lot of fun. A game who's central dogma is kindness is really quite beautiful. I even wrote a poem! I haven't written a poem in years. I don't think I'm a poetic person, I've never really written a poem for the sake of writing a poem but I had to write a lot of poems for English in Friday school.

Friday school was what they called extra classes every Friday week that lasted roughly 3 hours from 6 pm to 9 pm where I learnt English, Maths and Science. I hated it, but the English teacher was a really kind lady. Well at least to me she was, she always complimented my work, my short stories, my poems, I kinda quiet quitted Friday school when one day I just told my dad I don't want to go anymore and then there it was, the end, no goodbye, no nothing, and I never went back. I was always afraid of asking to quit because I felt like he would scold me or shout at me and say no, but he didn't. I realise only now that the reason my dad had started treating me different is because I grew up in my parents eyes. I suppose he trusted I was mature enough to start to make decisions that were best for me when really it was because all my friends in those classes had quit and I was the only one left. It worked out though I suppose, I did pretty well on my GCSEs.

I enjoyed writing this, I guess maybe these blogs aren't quite so cooked after all.

I've been feeling quite listless lately. There isn't much for me to do and I end up wasting away my days with no aim in sight. I'm the type of person where if I have plans to do something or go somewhere I feel like I can't do anything before hand and end up wasting hours doing nothing until its time to go.

I'm going away at the end of this month for two weeks for a University thing. Its the most I've ever travelled in a year. Earlier in April I travelled and now I'm travelling again. Don't get it twisted though, these trips aren't for fun. I can get a whole modules worth of credits in one or two weeks through these trips and although they burn a hole in my wallet, I'd rather take the hit than go through a whole semester of exams and lectures.

Everyday I wake up at around 10 am, with a sleep worth 5-6 hours with the occasional 7 here and there. Its horrible. Perhaps some people can make do with less sleep but not me. And yet I must. Coffee has become an invaluable part of my day, otherwise I'd lay on bed, too tired to do anything but too awake to sleep. What's worse is I don't do anything, there's no lectures, no school, no work, no nothing. I wake up tired and lacking sleep for no reason at all.

Thing are looking up! I say with no tangible changes happening to my life. I think the fact that I'm going outside on a walk every single day is doing crazy things for the stability of my mental health. Thank god for the sun and the clouds and the skies and the trees.

I watched Blue Velvet today. I've been trying to watch this movie for months but for some reason I find it incredibly difficult to watch movies. Whenever I feel like I should watch a movie, instead I play a game or watch videos. But today I managed to force myself to watch it. I consider Twin Peaks to be perhaps one of my favourite T.V show, but works of Lynch proper, I have not quite engaged in fully. I went in blind and came out with an organ removed. Perhaps somewhere along the way the wiring of my brain had gone awry because whenever I noticed something you would call "Lynchian" I could not help but smile or laugh. Trying not to spoil, there was a part where the main antagonist does something incredibly evil near the beginning but then pulls out a line so insane I burst out laughing like crazy. Just the contrast of the insanity while committing acts of depravity, very few can do it quite like Lynch.

August is going to be quite a busy month, already on the first day I've ended up getting myself sunburnt walking around in a farm for three hours for a university project . The same project that nearly made me go crazy a few weeks ago. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, but still, I wish I weren't here.

How the sun gives and the sun takes, I find it hard to feel too sad when the sun is out but when the sun's too strong and I end up sweating off all my sunscreen, outside is not a fun place to be, the way back to home from the farm was not an enjoyable journey I'll say the least, I usually bring a hand fan with me but today I forgot one so it was unbearably hot and humid. Let me tell you, water is an amazing thing, as soon as I got off the train, I rushed to get back home, I didn't care at all how I looked, as soon as I arrived I downed two glasses of water and hopped into the bathroom for a cold shower, it was blissful.

Perhaps today would've been more enjoyable if not for the beaming sun and I guess having only four hours of sleep didn't help either. Honestly its quite disturbing how used I am to sleeping so little. I can't remember the last time I woke up refreshed. So is life I guess, sleep has always eluded me, I've probably spent more time in bed trying to sleep than actually sleeping cumatively.