This entry is going to be my shortest yet. The day has been so long - 9am until 10pm pure work. At least I am feeling like I'm achieving, even if that achievement is purely the satisfaction of ordering Domino's.

Roll on Supergrass and tomorrow...

Because he was working his little socks off. Or something like that.

Towers Hall Summer Formal is going on as I type and despite the fact I bought a ticket, I'm not there. I have decided to take a raincheck and stay in. I realised I really wasn't up for it, not even one bit.

Back tracking over the past two years, I'd have thought I'd have noticed it, but until Dizzy Jo made her reasons for not going clear, the penny had never dropped. To put it simply - I don't like these events. I don't like dressing in a suit to go out and get drunk, let alone a DJ. I can put up with a reception, or a meal, but club visits are ruined. I spent too much time trying to keep things spill-free. Also, I get queasy. I don't know why, but dressing up like that for a ball physically makes me feel uneasy and sick. Now, don't get me wrong, I love to socialise, and I love boats, but this just does not appeal.

I could make other excuses as well; like I have to operate heavy machinery tomorrow at 9am and can't afford to be drunk, or that 25 quid is fine, but when four-fifths of that is directly paying for the open-bar (which I can't use too heavily due to aforementioned reason), the cost is too much.

I have been conned before, but it is only now I have woken up to the real reason why I don't have a good night. It's the same at every ball I have ever been to. My leaver's ball, my fresher's ball, the two Christmas balls, last year's summer formal. It's not even like I'm surrounded by people I don't know, it's purely my distaste of these events.

Well a least I finally got that out of my system (and retrieved my ticket money before it got banked).

So now instead I am here, still in the tower, still working away. I am contemplating an early night. My sister MSN'd me earlier. Am I coming home for my birthday?

My birthday? I'd forgotten. It's just over a week away and I haven't even had a chance to think what I'm going to do for it let alone to let anyone else around here know. Maybe I could stay in and do some electronics or stick pins in my eyes. I don't even know which I'd prefer.

I've just stumbled upon this. As you probably know, six month's ago one of the icon's of the British music scene tragically passed away. I am of course talking about John Peel.

I have to say I was never a particular fan of his show or his music choice, but I did listen occasionally and understood how well respected then man was. I even expressed sorrow at his death. So it was strange today to come across this blog entry by Stodge.

How strange it must have been to firstly witness a death; something which I hope I never have to endure, and secondly to realise it is a man for whom you have great respect for. It made for thought-provoking reading.

In a similar vein, one of my close friends last night lost his granddad. He had travelled home on Saturday, then come back after saying his goodbyes. I find the thought of doing that so hard to comprehend, but am glad that for my mate's sake the painful waiting is over.

On a far more mundane front; I have made considerable progress with the mould blocks for the Ribena widget, however I am not allowed to utter a word about it as I will be fined under a new system that the Swan, Devito, Rufio and myself introduced last night after our (mediocre) curry. To be explicit, Rufio didn't actually agree to it, but we have decided he has to obey it anyway.

I, am no longer allowed to be either vague or talk about my course in front of my friends. If I do, I will we fined 50 English New Pence. The same applies if Swanny misses one of his lectures. If DeVito hits anyone when unprovoked he pays up or if Rufio says anything that is outside of the boundaries of taste and decency, the sound of rattling change can be heard.

As a late addition, Mike must not be Cheesy or face the same penalty. It is good fun, but Rufio reckons it is 'Ruining the dynamic'. The whole point was to reign him in a bit. Recently his comments have been becoming so grossly inappropriate, and we really are making an effort to piss on his bonfire, but unfortunately, he can still make it sound funny, even if it isn't.

I currently owe about £2.50, Swanny £1.50, Devito is doing pretty well, but Sean... well Sean has had to take out a second student loan.

Tomorrow is the Towers Summer Formal. I am unsure if I am truly looking forward to the event, but it is one of those things you feel obliged to do. This week is so packed with work that I shouldn't even be contemplating going, let alone the Supergrass concert on Thursday.

I did my materials presentation this morning. I was very worried before I went in. Early reports were fed back detailing the use of PowerPoint presentations, the weaing of suits etc etc. All I had was some footnotes and a hoody. This did not promise to go well, especially when upon trying do my 'Recital to Lufbra', I faulted repeatedly with just woolly clouds floating through between my ears. Glad that all cleared when I got up there. Plus I had the bonus happiness that PowerPoint made no difference to the marks and our boards were one of the best set they had seen so far.

Even if DDS did run off with my keys and leave me stranded outside my room for two hours, all in all it has been a good day.

Last night I had a party in my room. The thing that is confusing me the most is whose party it was, as it certainly wasn't mine.

Actually, I do know - it was Nadine's 19th, which was celebrated on my floor and eventually spilled into my room where I was attempting to work. In fact, it made a pleasant break from the rigmarole of bloody materials work, which I was slaving away on, and have continued to be doing ever since.

I was pleased to be visited by the likes of DDS, Blondage, Fat Dave, Fish, Greg, Nadine, Chloe and Dizzy Jo amongst others. It was amusing to watch the lots of them slowly bleed into a blissful alcoholic state, even if it was (that is, the punch) all over my bed/carpet/walls etc etc.

Even though I had intended on going out for the night for Sammi's birthday at VV, it ended up with me staying in and up until 2.30am working on the finer points of Scanning Electron Microscopy. Even me, the loveable geek, does not enjoy this, especially while the sounds of clinking glasses and highly tippled people are echoing around my floor. Luis was once again disappointed in my lack of attendance. These Spanish; so hard to please.

I have just been down to the committee meeting to try and sell FC and Pedalo tops to the members. I'm really trying to push the point but getting little in the way of coordinated help. Partially it's my fault, but sometimes I just wish a (stunningly gorgeous) superheroine clad in a social society cape (and bikini) would fly over, spot the issues I'm having and sort out the polo shirts.

Looks like we're getting a curry tonight. It's going to be the highlight of my day. I've had to put up with glancing up through my window all day, only to be greeted by blazing sunshine. This is not conducive to work, and makes me feel mortified I'm missing all this. The worst thing is that I know I could be doing exactly the same thing next week, but doing my CAD work instead. Why can't I have a weekend like everyone else?

The sun is setting over Lufbra and I've hardly seen/been in any of it all day. This is because I've spent my waking hours trying to sort out

a) the pile of materials work - reports, presentation boards etc and
b) sifting through my list of important things to do and problems to solve

Productive, but decidedly boring.

Last night turned from 'chilled out night' to full scale going out. I think it has had it's toll on me and I am in need of sleep. After intending to leave the Union at at half one, I didn't in fact go until the lights came on. I had a good time, and it certainly was less of a fiasco than Wednesday night.

I got my marks back for electronics yesterday. They weren't great, but they weren't bad either and I'm just happy I got what I got. I was actually quite worried about the result, as when we handed in the project the bloody thing refused to work more than just the basic functions.

Today I also missed out on Man Day. This event (the second in it's history) invloves beer, wrestling, pro-evo and other manly things. Swannny, DeVito and Mike are all involved and I have failed to see them since they locked themselves in the common room with a copy of Royal Rumble 2004 and several crates of beer early this morning. I would get involved in these manly things, but some of us have work to do, not to mention the fact we don't like computer games or football, even worse, computer games which are based on football.

I'm meant to be going out tonight. This week is killing me slowly. Tonight is Sammi's birthday party, Emma's birthday bar crawl and Nadine's punch party (which is going on on my floor). And what do I need? Sleep. Either I'm going to go out dressed as a Hawaiian Lemon Sherbert, or sleep. If only there was some way of achieving both successfully.

I saw the latest episode of the OC today. Wow. I still friggin' love that programme.

Why is it that Loughborough fails to provide more than one wide format printer to the entire campus? The printer in town informed me this morning that it simply isn't viable, time-wise that is, to set one up and keep it running. He told me this as he proceeded to colour copy my A2 presentation boards onto two separate A3 sheets, so later I could fix them together onto the foam board.

Now I understand the difficulty in the time it does consume, but with 12,000 students clambering at the doors of Media Services to get all those big posters printed off, surely there must be some sniff of profit in there?

I picked up a considerable amount of squash from Somerfield this morning. Progress on the DP4 point of sale for the Ribena widget is good, even though Jim, Tim and myself, spent hours searching the hardware stores of outer Lufbra for some bendy wood last night, with limited-to-no success.

Jono is back and his nose looks straight enough to me (following the incident on Wednesday night), and things are pretty much back to their normal self. One thing I did remember which had totally slipped my mind since seeing Fiona, was that Uncle Stanley had a stroke a couple of weeks ago. This went totally unbeknownst to me until the night she organised that rather 'abrupt' party. I haven't really had a chance to pass on my good wishes, I just hope he recovers soon. Thankfully he still has speech, but some motor movement was affected. I'm unsure how severe it is, but strokes really worry me. Nanna (his sister), had a series of them when I was 12, and so they have always been an issue for me. I'm just so glad it wasn't a bad one.

I'm not sure how extensive my night out is going to be. I'm well and truly knackered - I nearly fell asleep in the shower this morning which could have proved interesting. I am still hoping to catch a nap later on today, but in the meanwhile I have a two-hour electronics lecture to attend to, which is nice.

I found some awesome screensavers yesterday. It didn't even enter my mind when I got my new graphics card that I could run very high quality savers, but these are truly mind muddling. Download them for free at Really Slick.

On the women front, things are hopeless at the moment. I'm sure Olivia and Lucy Pinder must have just misplaced my number or something. Girls, if you want it again, just drop me an email.

That was possibly the most eventful night I've ever seen at Lufbra.

It was Rufio's birthday celebrations and to enter into the spirit of things, we all put on the prerequisite stripy tops and did our hair up in trademark yellow and red. The night started well, a few drinks on West 14 before heading down to the bar at 7.30pm. What Sean didn't realise was that we had booked him a stripper.

Now Sean loves being the centre of attention, but this was too much for him. Poor stripper. It was almost cringeworthy at times, but also very amusing. I don't envy anyone taking there clothes off who has to put up with a client like young Rufio.

So the night continued. There was a fair bit of alcohol flowing and by the time it came to heading out, we were all fairly drunk. Sean was absolutely hammered (Swan and I had discussed getting him a drink each, but in retrospect our decision not too was justified). Sean was in no state to get into the Union, and after barging his way out of the bar (through the bouncer, and therefore earing himself a ban) he left with Cat who was going to get him into the back door of the Union using her sport's sec pass.

It didn't work and Sean ended up in the queue with us. The only reason he got in was because he knew one of the bouncers on the Union door. Once inside it was a while until I saw him again. I spent most of the night wandering around doing my usual drunken thing. Flash and I headed over to the bar and picked up a couple of triple sambucas. This morning I've got a blister on the roof of my mouth though, as I think I might have left the Flaming bit of a Flaming Sambuca a couple of seconds too long.

Later that evening there were several notable events. Jono got nutted. Broken nose, blood everywhere. I find this absolutely disgusting as there was no need for this to ever spark off, and even worse it was a fight between friends (or at least hallmates) which could have been avoided had it not been for people acting on impulse. It's going to leave a nasty taste in quite a few mouths.

Also, Sean got chucked out the Union. I'm not going to elaborate on the reasons behind it, but when he got home he also found himself in trouble. I phoned him up this morning (under a alcoholic haze and still in a semi-drunken state) to tell him the list of people he owed apologies. Even for an Eddie he exceeded all expectations, going way beyond the call of duty. I think it's the first time at uni he has been genuinely embarrassed about his actions.

Apart from this, it was definitely an awesome night. I forgot how much I loved Wednesday nights.

This morning I peeled myself off my bed, grabbed a shower and turned up in the department for about half nine. Lectures all morning. To be fair on myself, I didn't get a hangover, even if concentration was a little flimsy, but I steered away from the workshop machinery until I'd fully sobered up. I'm happy with the ten fingers I have the way they are.

We also had a lecture on next year's options. I really am unsure what I'm going to do. I am soooo tempted to sack of the BSc course (which I have pursued for a year) and just do a BA. I know if I come out with a BSc it's going to be a low 2.1, but if I do the BA there is a good chance of a high 2.1, plus I'll have enjoyed it more. The ones I am really considering (BA modules) are Internet for Designers (I'll breeze it) and Entrepreneurship. I want to speak to a few people before I start filling out forms though.

I've got to crack on with work this afternoon. I don't know how we are going to get these boards printed in time....