Danger and Safety

I read this today.

My thoughts go out to Hans Horrevoets and to the crew of ABN AMRO 2, for whom it must have been a horrible experience. I can imagine them fighting to revive their friend in a storm whipped sea. Cold and fearful. Desperate and ultimately hopeless.

I am genuinely gutted about his death, it's not like i knew him, or anything about him. But he died sailing, which scares me. Perhaps i shouldn't talk about this. It probably won't make anything better. But it has made me pause.

Sailing across an ocean is not like walking down the street. It is not easy, it is not safe. On the sea, particularily the 3000 miles between Cape Verde and Brazil nothing is certain. Your life is fragile and it is wise to remember that. A wave, some wind or a faulty in the boat can endanger you. I suspect if you looked at the statistics, you are more likely to die in a car than in a boat, but it suspect it wont feel that way when there is no land in any direction for 1000 miles. My trip will be a bit dangerous, I have to accept that, as will the people who care about me.

However, as someone comments on that link, this was a serious hardcore racing boat, they would have been driving the yacht hard despite a 30 knot, near gale force wind. I am not going to be in situations like that, if the weather gets like that (which is not unlikely) we will be safe, rather than fast. I do not believe i am taking any serious risk, i am more worried about getting mugged in Salvador than getting hurt at sea, maybe i'm looking a this the wrong way. Cochise is a modern, and very well built yacht, with an experinced skipper and all safety gear. She will be crewed by an experinenced and able crew. It will all be fine.

Sailing can be scary, it can be dangerous, it can also be enlightening, and joyful and safe. This week Dee Caffari, made it back to britain after sailing single handed around the world against the prevailing winds. It was a brilliant achievment and shows how amazing sailing can be.

Coupland Addiction

So i talked about Mcjobs, and then spent an hour online looking at Douglas Coupland stuff.
Neo-Logisms from Generation X most of which i am guilty of:

Expatriate Solipsism: (page 172)
When arriving in a foreign travel destination one had hoped was undiscovered, only to find many people just like oneself; the peeved refusal to talk to said people because they had ruined one's elitist travel fantasy.

Mid-Twenties Breakdown: (page 27)
A period of mental collapse occurring in one's twenties, often caused by an inability to function outside of school or structured environments coupled with a realization of one's aloneness in the world. Often marks the induction into the ritual of pharmaceutical usage.

Native Aping: (page 172)
Pretending to be a native when visiting a foreign destination.

Obscurism: (page 165)
The practice of peppering daily life with obscure references (forgotten films, dead TV stars, unpopular book, defunct countries, etc.) as a subliminal means of showcasing one's education and one's wish to disassociate from the world of mass culture.

Option Paralysis: (page 139)
The tendency, when given unlimited choices, to make none.

Terminal Wanderlust: (page 171)
A condition common to people of transient middle-class upbringings. Unable to feel rooted in any one environment, the move continually in hopes of finding an idealized sense of community in the next location.

Now i cant stop thinking about reading Microserfs in second year. My bed had broken, so the mattress was on the floor, i liked the bohemian feel to it. The room was big enough, though the unused bed took up alot of space. It was a sunny room, warm and nice. Facing the church, all i could hear on hot days was the clink of bowling balls hitting together. I lay sprawled on the mattress, basking in sunshine, drinking water from one of the many glasses that surrounded my makeshift bed. Microserfs was the second Coupland book i read, i hadn't read one in a long time, so i reveled in the cleverness of his writing, the wry wit and the deep insights cast casually into the text. It was nice time i think, at least it is in the romanticised version that exists in my head.

If you have never read any Douglas Coupland i suggest you do, particularily Girlfriend in a Coma or Microserfs. I must stop playing on the internet and go to work.

Oh i put lots more photos on flickr, check em out.

Sleep

I didn't sleep on saturday night. I sat in Cat's living room watching bits of telly and trying to sleep. A long dark tea time of the soul. I have a lot on my mind right now, will i get this job? where will i live for the summer? should i do tefl course? will i get to sail? Too many options can be a scary thing.

It's certainly a funny sort of time. I am still hanging on the telephone awaiting a yey, or a nay on this damn job. I think i'm going mad. No really, it's driving me crazy. I am beginning to think I should just write it off and start organising something else. But i can't bring my self to wholly give up without a final word saying so. So i'm sticking at the coop for now and waiting.

So my job at the co-op is real Mcjob, easy, low paid, dull and strangely satisfying. Yesterday was really good shift, Chris running the shift, me the (relatively) old timer who knows how things work, and two new guys called John and Jack both just out of first year, fresh faced and nervous. I helped run the shift, doing bits of admin and chatting. John and Jack did the dirty work, we joked about. By the time i left at midnight i was happy and cheered up.

When i got home from work i chatted to Jen, i hadn't seen her all weekend her boyfriend was here, so she was busy. We caught up, and talked about the summer, and the future. By the time i got to bed at 2.30, i was happy with my job, content after some chat and slightly stoned.

I slept like a baby.

*Chuckle*

Stolen

So everything i want to say about finishing uni is impossible to say.

So i'm just going to steal this. Change the details, but keep the sense of it and it works.

I am going to miss being a student so much, but i am so happy to be finished. Now i can do anything. And that is really cool.

Here be Monsters

So yesterday at 11.30 more or less exactly i finished my univeristy career. There is nothing i can do any more to change the degree that i will get, i no longer have to work at linguistics. Its a bit of an anticlimax. A major non-event. Though i cant stop smiling today.

Exam yesterday was fine too, which was nice. Two answers i was perfectly happy with, and it was a nice day too! So we smoked a joint, and drank lots of beer. I got very drunk and had a lovely time saying things like "i'm no longer a student" and "You should call me a graduand". Entertaining was it.

Jen said ages ago ending uni was weird because literally from birth our future had been planned to this point. We had a map for life that said primary school, secondary school, university. And this is where it stops. We have to figure it out for ourselves now. We're off the edge of the map, here be monsters.

In other news it is a beautiful day and i am going to go and walk in it. I may even read a book in the sunshine. And i wont feel guilty doing it

Photos

So i got around to scanning some of my old photos in last night. And now i have created a Flickr account so all and sundry can look at my photos. There is a badge thingy on the sidebar. Click it to go look at all of 13 photos. More to come when i get around to it.

Nothing else is going on, i'm trying to study. But it's not very successful. My last ever exam: historical linguistics, is in 6 days so that is fun.