The End of Paper

'If plastic bottles will not degrade, they can be reprocessed into the fibers for bike shorts. If the proliferation of paper is destroying the forests, recyclable plastic paper that feels like expensive vellum can be created. If the landfills are filling up, thermal depolymerization may soon make garbage too valuable a source of hydrocarbon raw material for fuels and petrochemical feedstocks to just throw away.' www.oilintheirblood.com [acessed 16/05/10]

Paper paper is now old-fasioned, a bunch of school kids touch it and fold it into paper aviation-machines of sorts we do not yet know. 'This is paper made from trees' their teacher says, 'it was used for centuries until the plasitc we know today was invented. And back then, they printed magazines on paper, daily newspapers, they took notes in class in little paper books and even made stuff out of it, here is a picture of a paper-mashe pig that children like you used to make back then'...
'It's pretty much the same stuff' the boy says 'why did they want to replace it?'; 'They were running out of trees, the world was once covered in trees and by the end of the ** century, there was almost none left. They had to distrobute oxygen inhailators to many people because there wasn't enough trees, and the excess carbon dioxide cause untold havock to the environment too, we're still recovering from those events now.'; 'Why were the people in the olden days so ignorant?' he asks, 'They just didn't know yet, they didn't really know what they were doing back then...'

Short and bittersweet

Young

Sweet

and furry.

Prey to all, predator to none.

You are doomed

to death

anon.

The Sea

I found this re-working, which I like a little better. What do you think?

The Sea

Paused
at a moment where
the ebb and flow of
desire drowns
each throbbing cell.
He’s
staring in the direction of
the Sea
The Sea.

Dreams of chasing
Mr.M.Dick,
while standing on his
gondola
clutching
a stick.

These waters are too smooth,
their hues too blue-
No mighty harpoon,
No pull of the moon.
Nor dishes of fishes
and kelp.
Help.
He’s marooned on a
flat-bellied bucket!

One day,
Transfixed
He’ll let slide this
Stick
And float out to
the Sea.
The Sea.

The Sea

From my notebook; I'm not convinced it's polished yet, but it was written to fit a watercolour by another student which depicted a man looking longingly into the distance from his gondola. Not wanting to reproduce the artwork without permission, I have instead added a random picture of me and my boyfriend looking into a puddle.

Paused

at a moment where

the ebb and fow of desire

drowns

each throbbing cell.

Staring in the direction of

the Sea.

Dreams of chasing

Mr. M. Dick

while standing on a gondola

clutching a

stick.

No mighty harpoon,

No pull of the moon,

No dishes of salt fishes

and kelp.

Instead,

He is marooned on a

flat-bellied-bucket.

These waters are too smooth,

Their hues too blue-

One day,

tansfixed,

He'll let slide this stick

and float out to

the Sea.

The Sea.

An essay-induced panic

To panic or not to panic?

That is the question which faces many students today. Don't panic, and you will sail through your essay writing in a calm and collected manner or perhaps just not write an essay at all. Panic and you will have a face like a pizza, high blood pressure and a finished essay.

Right now, I'm not panicking. But I'm panicked that I'm not panicking, because NOTHING is getting done and I've only got three weeks left of term. Aghghghghgh!

Hamlet

Have you ever read Shakespeare's Hamlet?

I've just re-read it for an essay I am writing, and I spotted scrawled in a corner of the battered student's edition I have: 'Hamlet is a dandy'. And you know what? He SO IS!

A Film: Hamlet
Hamlet is a fresher at University. He wears his skinny jeans half-way down his arse, showing off eccentric underweare; white with red kisses or a navy Kalvin Klien pair, with a silvery waistband that the girls all love. All the girls love Hamlet. All the boys call him an emo and detest his apathetic ways. Hamlet reacts to this with sulky moods and poems that hint at suicide, and all the girls come running to soothe him, particularly the beautiful Ophelia, an international student from China who chose her English name from a play she read once.

Hamlet is alerted one afternoon to an odd post his friend spotted on facebook. The post is from a random person he'd added to up his friend count, and the shillouetted profile picture looks very like Hamlet's dad. Hamlet is intruigued by the post, particularly because he has not seen his dad since his parent's divorce nearly two years ago. His mum has since married his Uncle Charlie, his dad's twin brother and perhaps out of shame, she has refused to allow Hamlet to contact his real dad.

The post describes Hamlet's step dad/ uncle as a poinsonous imposter to the household and hints that Uncle Charlie has a dark past that threatens Hamlet's future.
The following week, Hamlet is called back from University under the pretense that his mother has fallen ill...