Blogging mea culpa

Forgive me mum my legions of loyal readers, for I have sinned... it has been 18 days since my last post.

It's not that I don't love you it's just...

Well, it's not you - it's me.

Normal service will be resumed as soon as I emerge from under this pile of thoroughly average essays crying out to be failed and have sarcastic comments scrawled over them.

It will also be resumed when this godawful jetlag stops torturing me and I get to sleep at something other than 4.30am. The dawn chorus can be fucking annoying when trying to get to sleep.

That is all.

I will be nicer next time.

xxxxx

The Hatter.

Working on commission for Dubai Tourism #2

Must be time for more on the joys of Dubai.

Dubai is an intensely boring intriguing city that upholds many admirable traditional values. It is also a largely dry city alcohol-wise.

Consequently, their entertainment options are ... shall we say ... also a little conservative.

I was gutted I couldn't compete in this mall-based entertainment extravaganza due to time restrictions - SO would have kicked arse if I had been able to.



For the adults, the customer service culture is also pretty fab - this fruit juice bar had all the mod-cons, including complimentary cigarette lighter.



And last, but by no means least - children's entertainment is well-covered too...in every sense of the expression...


... 'Burkha Barbie' anyone?

Working on commission for Dubai Tourism #1

Well I'm now in London doing a whanau thingy - as I am wont to do on occasion. More about the joys of London later but I thought I had better fulfil my contractual obligations to Dubai - bland stopover city to the stars.

Never thought i'd meet a city more boring than Singapore but Dubai takes the cake. It has shopping [expensive gold kitsch anyone?] going for it

....and sand

...............and more Filipino workers than locals (who don't work)

....................................and some fabulously named restaurants.

Taking higha edukation seriuslee

Although I am working hard on my 15 year plan to become a furniture restorer I have had to settle for being a university lecturer in the interim while I work my way up.

This involves subjecting myself to the scrutiny and ridicule of up to 170 pubescent students at a time on a regular basis. In one of my classes the poor sods are stuck with me for 3 hours in a row - during which time they talk amongst themselves, look bored and critically assess every aspect of me - presentation, funny accent, hairstyle etc etc.

This is not great for the ego and the pay is rather dismal ($30K paycut to make the move from being a PR gal to an academic anyone?) but there are certain perks:

• Inflicting my notoriously cheesy music tastes on them at full volume before class (the less cool the better as far as I am concerned - watching them writhe in agony is a joy)
• Torturing them with the revision lecture at the end of semester ('is she telling us what's in the test or is she just mucking with us?')
• Reading the end of semester evaluations - highlights of this semester included "the interface should be burgundy next time" [name one thing most in need of improvement] and "the madhatter is sometimes funny" [name one thing you enjoyed the most].
  
• Marking the little buggers' assignments [170x 1500 word essays + 250 exams + 20 major assignments for this semester].

Now why would the last one be a pleasure you ask? Well - it's not. Except that my 'essay marking coffee table' at home currently looks like this:

[wanders off sniggering]

I even forget my own birthday!

Tramspotting turned two yesterday - a momentous occasion in the life of any badly neglected cutting-edge blog.

Now my inability to remember birthdays, anniversaries etc is well-documented. Just ask Mouse or anyone else I have managed to offend over the years ... but forgetting my own blog's birthday - now that's a new low.

There have been several possible reasons posited for this inexcusable omission thus far, none of which could possibly include:

• The four hours sleep the night before owing to major computer crashes and lecture that had to be rewritten 3 times
• The fact that it was the last day of teaching for the semester
• The fact that Dr Steph and Dr John are in town
  
• The fact that aforementioned docs drink like fish and dragged me kicking and screaming [....honest!] to a vodka bar for the night

• The fact that the vodka bar has this on the menu:

• (which looks like this when being prepared by a waitress in what, from memory, strongly resembled a french maid's outfit):

• Or the fact that it seemed like a good 'nightcap' after a couple of vodka shots, a large vodka cocktail and some more shots (errr...and the drinks that somehow happened before heading out)
  
• Or that, after terrorising a number of innocent service workers (taxi drivers and supermarket checkout operators come to mind) some more drinks seemed like a good idea at home ... CS cowboys anyone?
  
• ... as did playing with sparklers on the deck at 1am

Given that none of the foregoing are possibilities, it seems I'm fresh out of excuses - any ideas why I might have forgotten my own blog's birthday?