"Phileas Fogg, having shut the door of his house at half-past eleven, and having put his right foot before his left five hundred and seventy-five times, and his left foot before his right five hundred and seventy-six times, reached the Reform Club..."
Chapter 3
So, here's a bit of an experiment. Sort of like "a day in the life" piece. I wrote down every little thing that happened to me, a typical A-level student, on a typical day in a typical week in a fairly typical school, to see how that reflects on my own personality, the education system, the day to day routine of life in general...
Ok, yes, so this could seem a little tediously self-centred. But hey, aren't blogs all about self-
Date: Monday, 16th January 2012 Timetable: Week B
6.55 a.m: Am woken up by Tina's worried face peering through my bedroom door. "Shouldn't you be up already?" she asks. Check my phone. Realise I haven't set my alarm to the right time. Curse profusely. Tumble out of bed. Then downstairs to scarf down breakfast.
Items utilised: fluffy white dressing gown (slightly tea-stained)
Consumed: two Continental Classics mini choc-chip brioches. One cup of coffee with copious amounts of milk.
7.04 a.m.: Back upstairs. Then up another flight of stairs. Search for clothes in laundry room without switching light on.
Number of clothes rails knocked over: 2
7.11 a.m.: Sister leaves house.
Slamming doors: 1
7.15 a.m.: To bathroom to brush teeth.
Number of faces made in the mirror: c10
7.25 a.m: Back to room to pack bag.
Approximate weight of bag: 10 tonnes
7.29 a.m: Remember last minute that a piece of homework needs to be printed off.
Probability of useless piece of junk masquerading as our printer facilitating this in time: 0
7.37 a.m.: Head downstairs.
Dogs lounging on kitchen sofa who really shouldn't be there: 1
7.38 a.m.: Start making packed lunch
Amount of sighs over the fact it's just another cheese sandwich: 100
7.44 a.m.: Finish making packed lunch.
Random other things I suddenly realise I've forgotten: 10
7.53 a.m.: Leave house. Turn on Russian podcast.
Approximate outdoor temperature: Arctic
Podcast subjects for the day: New technology conference, biographies in six words, Ukrainian brides and the French online film festival.
Percentage understood: c55%
8.00 a.m.: Arrive at bus stop. Realise again how chilly it is. Wish I had thought to buy gloves for winter.
Number of chilly fingers: 10
8.06 a.m.: The bus arrives.
Route: 156 to Wimbledon
Awkward smile at bus driver as Oyster card tapped: 1
8.08 a.m.: My bus friends- two little girls from the junior school and their mother- get on.
Approximate increase in decibel level: 150%
8.19 a.m.: Bus arrives in Wimbledon.
Regard pedestrians crossing road have for traffic safety: 0
8.24 a.m.: Arrival in Sixth Form house.
Amount of stairs to climb to form room on top floor: Innumerable
8.26 a.m.: Arrival in form room- T10.
People present: Sadiyah
8.30 a.m.: Commence playing Angry Birds.
Levels passed: Level 19, Episode 1
8.41 a.m.: Form tutor arrives.
Amount of hastily put away portable devices: c5
8.50 a.m: Leave for German conversation. Surprise mock oral.
Amount of falsely conjugated verbs: I dunno, I were too nervous to counting.
9.30 a.m.: Back to form room for French conversation.
Today's topic: poverty.
10.15 a.m.: French conversation over
Temptation to resume playing Angry Birds: overwhelming
10.20 a.m.: Mia finally shows up late, having, like me, had alarm issues.
Number of eye-rollings: 1
10.25 a.m.: Form time
Amount of yawns:99
10.40 a.m: Break. Unconfirmed and entirely irresponsible gossip about an ex-teacher being pregnant with another ex-teacher's child listened to with mild interest.
Consumed: Kit-kat
11.00 a.m.: Latin begins. About half the lesson spent picking apart my essay, then going through the extract to find other points to make. Every time I make some point, Magister goes "Yes! See, you can do it!"
Number of times tempted to punch him: 50
12.30 p.m.: Latin ends. Rush to library to print out German homework that I realised I had to in the morning and I had forgotten to do at break. Printers in the library playing up. Lovely Mrs Jones, the librarian, finally helps me out.
Number of muttered German swear words: 5
12.40 p.m.: Finally arrive in German. Receive essays back. Grin my most irritating grin to myself about my mark, especially as it was creative. Then on to the wonderful world of the conditional perfect tense.
Number of umlauts enunciated: 100
1.15 p.m.: German over. Class traipses out to make the long trek to the common room (due to the peculiar arrangement of the sixth-form block and Mrs Jones' pickiness about people cutting through the library, you have to go down two flights of stairs and up another two to get there from German)
Number of stairs climbed: 1,000,000,000
1.20 p.m.: Arrive in T10 for lunch.
Consumed: 1 cheese sandwich (a little dry), 1 packet Wotsits, 1 carton apple juice and half a satsuma (it turned out to be off and had to be thrown in the bin in disgust).
1.59 p.m.: Leave for a rehearsal for house assembly talent show tomorrow. As am on the committee cannot avoid participation in what turns out to be a cheerleading routine.
Fish out of water: 1
2.26 p.m.: Rehearsal and raiding of drama costume cupboard to find suitably silly costumes over. Head back up to T10 to pick up my bag. Manage to do a Tasha and knock over a mug of cold coffee left on top of the lockers.
Hasty moppings-up: 1
2.30 p.m.: Head to French with Princesse. Study the cinematographic techniques of La Haine.
Number of naughty French words overheard: c50
3.15 p.m.: Now it's time for French with Madame, which, incredibly logically, takes place in the lofty eyrie of the German classroom.
Number of out of breath, whinging French students: 8
3.20 p.m.: Madame's lesson begins.
Number of pestilental books: 1
4.00 p.m.: French ends.
Number of sneaky cut throughs through the libary:8
4.09 p.m.: Leave school.
Number of tired students: 1
4.15 p.m.: Reach bus stop.
Dilemma: Angry Birds or Fruit Ninja?
4.27 p.m.: Bus arrives, along with my bus friends and their au pair.
Songs played to them in order to educate them in good music taste young: c5
4.48 p.m.: Arrival home.
Desperation for cup of tea: At a critical level.
4.53 p.m.: Tina arrives home.
Heavy loads wearily put down: 1
4.57 p.m.: Eat slice of takeaway pizza from fridge. Put kettle on and get out chocolate biscuits. Then make tea and put feet up for a moment.
Number of calories in all this: who cares?
5.15 p.m.: As the biscuit packet is being put away, one falls out onto the floor, necessitating its consumption.
Legal precedent: Three second rule.
5.30 p.m.: Begin Latin practice timed paper.
Number of sweaty palms: 2
6.00 p.m.: Practice paper over. Hopefully takes into account everything Magister wants now. Or else...
Satisfied sighs: 1
6.01 p.m.:Downstairs to watch The Big Bang Theory.
Number of nerds observed: 1 (on the couch). Let's face it, the ones on TV are actors...
6.13 p.m: Ad break. At mother's request, turn on programme in the kitchen and begin making spag bog for dinner.
Watery eyes from onion chopping: 2
7.27 p.m.: Tina, Mum and I sit down to dinner.
Number of fathers coming home late: 1
7.45 p.m.: Dinner over.
Number of plates scraped: 3
7.47. p.m.: Sit down to do History revision for mocks next week.
Number of Henry II's assizes to learn: 5
8.42 p.m.: Dad comes home. Go downstairs to inform of spaghetti bolognaise on stove.
Number of stressed-out barristers: 1
9.02 p.m: Sister comes in to room and sits on my bed, wanting to talk.
9.04 p.m.: Decide to give up work. Sister leaves. Waste some time mucking around on the internet.
Number of refreshes of my Twitter page: 50
9.24 p.m.: Stop messing around. Sit and wonder what productive to do. Have had some brainwaves for a novel plot that just might work, so jot them down.
Number of sneaky giggles at my own comic talent as I do so: 2
10.31 p.m.: Finish my planning and head to the bath.
Slippery bar of soap: 1
10.49 p.m.: Return from bath, dress, and load podcast onto iPod for tomorrow.
Tomorrow's themes: eyewitness account of the Costa Concordia, implants extracted from alien abductees and China's panda diplomacy
11.09 p.m.: Go downstairs to say goodnight to parents.
Number of parents asleep: 1
11.11 p.m: Curl up in bed with book three, part two of the Game of Thrones series (ok, strictly "A Song of Ice and Fire". Whatever). Robb Stark has just managed to get himself killed by the likes of Walder Frey. Am seriously not impressed with him.
Spoiler alert warnings I should probably have put in here: 1
0.29 p.m.: Turn out light and go to sleep.
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