Life is short

Yesterday, someone I went to school with passed away. This is actually already the second death of a person from our year group this year (and we’re not even 40 yet!), but the first was someone I never had much to do with. This woman is someone I hung around with in sixth form… I helped her get together with a boy she liked, who she later went on to marry and have children with. He’s now her widower, which is so weird to type. I knew she had been in hospital recently, but just a week ago, in response to someone offering to visit, she said she would be going home the next morning. From comments, I see that people who are in regular contact with her thought she had been getting better.

I don’t want to hijack her family and friends’ grief, which is why I’m posting on my blog (which, as far as I know, only one person from school actually knows about – and she wasn’t in our year). Having left that town as quickly as I could after high school, I hadn’t actually spoken to this girl in person since leaving sixth form, so I can’t claim to be devastated by her death. I was, however, shocked to read about it. We communicated occasionally on Facebook. I enjoyed looking at her photos of her (still quite young) children. So for her to just suddenly be gone, after such a short illness, has really brought home to me how short life is and that we really do never know what’s just around the corner. I may not have everything I want in life, but I am alive and I am healthy. It shouldn’t take the loss of someone else to remind me of that.

I wanted to insert some meaningful quote here, but I can neither think of nor find one, so I will just leave it at that. Life is precious, friends. Don’t take it for granted.

Brain dump

This is one of those posts where I choose the bullet point option then just spill whatever thoights are buzzing round in my brain that aren’t enough to make an entire blog post by themselves. Basically, it’s one big confusing mess. Here goes…

• I recently received a letter from my favourite penpal (yes, I’m in my 30s and have penpals. Don’t judge!) saying she doesn’t want to write to me anymore. Apparently she doesn’t like the style of my letters because she wants to have a “conversation” with her penpals and she doesn’t get that with me (this is me translating – we write wrote 😦 to each other in German). I suppose it’s mainly my fault because I keep getting busy/distracted and not writing for ages, which makes it difficult to keep up a conversation. And also I guess I fail just as much at conversation on paper as in real life. Oh well, I’d just better try harder with my remaining penpals!
• Our Biomüll bin was full recently so Jan decided to throw some banana skins in the normal rubbish (people in Germany – that’s actually allowed here!). The bin was still almost empty at the time and still isn’t full so now I’m attacked by a swarm of fruit flies every time I open the bin. I am never buying bananas again!! I don’t even like them that much…
• Autumn is coming!! At least the supermarkets think it is. I walked into Coop the other day and the first thing I spotted was pumpkins. I *may* have got a little overexcited and immediately picked up a butternut squash despite the fact that I’d only gone in for milk, cream and bacon, parmesan and bacon bits. Time to have pumpkin with 90% of my meals again! Om nom nom. (I am also in the processing of cooking chestnuts in caramel sauce for lunch – autumn, you bring the best foods!)
  
• Remembering how long it took my last year, I decided to start my Christmas cross stitching last week. How are there only 16 weeks until Christmas?!
• We were looking at flights last night for our trip to England in October and I realised I haven’t been home for over a year – and that was only the briefest of brief visits for my grandpa’s funeral. That’s more than a year since I’ve seen my dad, grandma and little brother! Crazy! (I saw my other brother, my mum and my sister at the wedding in July, but obviously only my mum’s side of the family attended that).
• Our tickets for The Lion King musical arrived! We go the day after tomorrow. Excitement!

Right, that’s all. I need to eat my lunch now… then it’s back to work for me. I have loads to do this afternoon.

This has been your mid-week catch up. Or something. Goodbye!

Random snippets from my brain

• This morning I overheard a phone conversation in which someone was apparantly explaining the concept of changing trains. “I’ll be travelling for a while yet, I have to change trains now” *Pause while, presumably, the other person spoke”. “We’re just pulling into Mannheim now then I have to get out of the train, go to another platform then get on a different train”. He wasn’t even speaking to a child either (unless I missed the point where it became normal to address children as Mr. so-and-so). The mind really does boggle. Or at least mine does.
• Currently wondering whether working at a place where I actually know how to use the coffee machine (and don’t feel guilty every time I dare to so much as think about leaving my seat) is a blessing or a curse? I think I may have overdoed on caffeine today, all in a desperate attempt to stay awake. (Sooo tired…)
• Having spent the last two evenings  searching every clothes shop in Karlsruhe for something to wear over a dress at a wedding I’m invited to next month. I’ve come to the conclusion that the colour white is an endangered species this season. I even resorted to looking in United Colours of Benetton today – the first time I’ve been in there since I was about 12. Unsurprisingly I found nothing I liked.
• Despite not finding the top I wanted, I have spent a small fortune over the last few days. A serious dent has been made in my wages already and November isn’t even here yet. Not good people!
• The first assignment for my science course is due on 4th November. I haven’t written a single word of it yet. I guess I know what my plans are for this weekend…
• Snippets is a fabulous word. I feel like I should use it more often.
• That is all.

The mystery of time

Time is a funny thing isn’t it? Sometimes it flies by, sometimes it seems to drag and at other times it somehow manages to do both at once.
Take right now for instance. I’ve had both of the following thoughts at some point this morning:

– How is it only Thursday? Surely it’s been longer than that since we last had a weekend?
– It’s the 19th February already? Wow, this month has gone by so fast.

Maybe I’m just strange…

Thoughts

I’ve just been looking through some random stats on my blog. It seems my most used tag is “boyfriend” with a total of 43 times. Second is work with 22 uses and in third place comes books, 21 uses. I’m pretty sure that says something about me. I don’t know what but I’m pretty sure it’s misleading. How have I managed to mention work more often than books? Must do something about that.

I need to do a translation for uni. It was actually supposed to be handed in on Monday. Oops. Not even a month into the year and I’m behind already. Luckily it’s only a practice piece so I won’t lose any marks for handing it in late or anything. It would probably be a good idea to get on and do it though.

How is it Wednesday already? I’m sure it was only just Friday. I always thought putting the clocks back was meant to give us another hour. Instead I seem to have lost about 72.

Time going fast does have its advantages though. It’s pay day on Friday. And I get extra money starting this month. I’ve already had my wage slip and seen how much I’ll be earning from now. I’m going to be rich. Rich I tell you! (Actually I’m still going to be poor, but rich compared to what I was before. And at least I’ll be able to afford a few decent Christmas presents this year).

And oh my gosh, I’ve just realised my internship is half over already. Three more months to go. And after that? We’ll see… it depends whether the boss decides to give me a proper job.

OK, enough procrastinating. Time to get on with the translation.