And bizarre day continues...

The rest of the week was pretty weird. A lot of odd things happened and I finally gave up trying to understand the world at all. I decided that although the 7th of February must be bizarre day officially, the rest of the week kind of build up to it and then trails off slowly...

On Thursday I managed to come up with a big Question for my project and I sat down with my supervisor and discussed it. It's looking good, very rough around the edges with LOADS of other things I can add in. I'm worrying a bit about time constraints, after all if I did honours in one year, and each chapter in a thesis is like an honours project, that means in 4 years I can do about 4 studies. And considering that I basically did 2 projects last year (4 if you count the seasonal things), I can probably cram in 8. Or 16. Who's counting? It's also looking like I'm going to be going to my field site in a few weeks time to look around. It makes sense, I can't really write a proposal based on a system I've never seen before. I'm really excited to be going there so soon!

Yesterday was the world's most unproductive day for me. some people from Hawaii were coming to visit and I was supposed to drive them to Wits, but they didn't confirm. fortunately I was exhausted and was able to sleep in with a relatively clear conscience in case I was called to go and fetch them. Finally I just went to wits to find out that they'd somehow managed to get there themselves so I ended up joining the other behaviour group and the people from Hawaii for tea.

It was really odd, they had hardly any accents at all and they were very un-zoologist looking. They knew a lot of people studying just about anything and they talked about a lot of fascinating stuff. After that I went to the lab, did very little and went for lunch. After that they gave a talk and then Luke and his supervisor and myself discussed the talk for ages and then we sat around not doing much until the honours students finished lectures and we could go to Biosoc where I found the hidden stash of Brutal Fruit (warm, but still infinitely better than beer!) and from there we collected Luke's sisters and friend and Luke's friend Athena. after dropping off sisters and friend, Athena, Luke and myself went to a restaurant called Soi, which is a Thai/Vietnamese/I-can't-remember-but-there-were-a-bunch-of-places type restaurant. It was really nice, stunningly decorated and the food was really good, especially the chocolate mousse!

This morning I woke up late and decided to take Max, one of my dogs, for a walk. It's been a long week and I had a lot to think about, so I ended up dragging him all over my suburb and then along the nature trail along the river (the Braamfontein spruit) which is a really pretty route. When my best friend, Gloria, lived a block away we used to walk there almost every day and sit on the bridge over the river and talk about stuff. We had a huge fight about 5 years ago and haven't spoken since. I haven't really missed her until today. It's hard to live in a goldfish-bowl like our department, where you know everyone and they know you and every move you make is discussed. The problem with walking alone is that you can think things through, and if you tend to be oversensitive like me it can be a bad thing.

I found that on the other side of the river was a big rocky outcrop, so Max and I went exploring and then sat and watched the lizards there for about half an hour. By the time I got home he was exhausted and could hardly lift his feet and I realised that we'd been gone for over two hours and I had to go shopping for shoes and beads (no particular order) before work.

I ended up swimming first and then fell asleep, so I only had time to rush out and find shoes. I was successful!

They're beige, rather than the goldish colour that Carla wants, but I'm sure I can get them sprayed for the wedding. More importantly they fit, they're comfortable and I'll definitely wear them after the wedding (I'll put up photos of the other shoes if you want. They're... not my style...).

From there I rushed off to work (amid a rather nasty rainstorm) and found that Lara was working with me. so I bombarded her with all my troubles and she did what she always does: listened, sympathised, put it all in perspective and yanked me out of my comfort zone.

Unfortunately we couldn't go for drinks after work, as is our tradition, because Joey wanted her to go and keep her company while a bunch of her husband's friends were at her house watching rugby. When I explained how annoyed I was she agreed to straighten my hair tomorrow, so I'm not angry. To tell the truth I'm just tired and I'm going to bed now.