Day 2:

Morale is high, but it ever is while the supplies last. Everyone is still well groomed and civil, but already the cracks are beginning to show.

The chittering from our headsets grows more insistent and angry, like hornets trapped in a jar. Every howl from the People of the Broken Printers reveals the depth of our painted-on smiles, the shaking hands holding our coffee cups betray the whispering fears beneath the surface. When will it stop? Will we hold or break?

We look to each other for solace, hoping the endless stream of corrupted profiles and servers shrieking their agony will cease before we run screaming into the dark. We know it won't, but for now there is fragile, precious hope.

Privately, we all wonder who will be first to acquiesce to that dark temptation, to be torn to pieces by the chanting masses, those unspeakable horrors known only as the End Users. Perhaps the first will be speared by the weapons of his fellows, envious of their new-found freedom from sanity.

As I huddle deeper into my blanket of apathy, part of me hopes I will be the one to run first.

Farewell the Tranquil Mind.

Hello Blog,

Yes, I know. I'm shit at updating this thing. Still, school time again soon so I need the practice. I passed my first year by the way. 50 something percent, which is just enough that I don't have to describe it as squeaking a pass. I took the internet hivemind's advice and just handed in what I had when deadline time was up and accepted that I didn't have time for it to be perfect. This meant I had to hand in a couple of almost empty essays, which torpedoed my average. A pass is a pass though, and I'm pretty proud of myself anyway. I'm not an easy guy to motivate but between you guys, last FM's blues tag radio and my ever supportive cat, we got it done.

I was originally planning on putting the degree on hold after this year, but then our country's fair and noble leadership decided that fuck students. So my degree costs would have drastically risen, but if I keep studying I get to pay pre-governmental sodomy prices. So yay, full time work and study for many years to come. This is my comeuppance for many years of laziness, we all knew it would come. Friggin' Karma Monkey has had it in for me ever since I torched that orphanage.

My next course actually counts towards my degree fo' realz, so I have to work hard, as I actually want to get a good degree result (more on why next time). Fortunately, the title of the module is “Reading and Studying English Literature” and that right there is one of my faaaavourite things. It hasn't even started yet and I'm already balls-deep in Othello, if you'll pardon the unnecessarily graphic metaphor. I realise what a tool it makes me, but I'm really enjoying it. The introduction is twice as long as the play and studded with little footnote numbers. It'll get tiresome I'm sure, but it's really nice to be reading something challenging after a few months of relatively light reading.

Speaking of the literary arts, I WRITED A POME. I didn't really intend it to be poetry, but a few of the people who read it described it that way and who am I to deny my adoring audience? I guess I'll retroactively claim it's free verse and look like a clever artsy-man. I had the idea of a busy service desk as a siege and it kinda stuck with me so I wrote it down as a Facebook status. People seemed to like it, so I thought I'd do one or two more entries. I'm only going to post them here though, as Facebook is basically the mask you wear in public while on the internet, and it's wise to be careful what you say. It'd be easy to misconstrue it as publicly bitching about my job and I've seen more than one person get into trouble for that. I'll repost the first entry here as my next update and get to work on Day 3.

I'll try and keep up with this more, but I've said that before. I wouldn't want to hurt you again, Blog.

NR