Newbie

It occurred to me that last time I talked about moving out, we were looking for a luxury castle for the three of us. This is no longer the case. We've found a cute flat for four of us, including Archie, the newbie.

After testing him in several ways, we decided he would do, although he did seem slightly timid, we thought we could fix that. Also, he seemed to have no specific music taste, which meant that he probably wouldn't try to play anything dreadful, and if he did, he wouldn't get too upset when we turned it off and played something better.

I feel we've done a rather good job in choosing a new someone suitable, so, because I am kind, I've decided to develop a guide for others. It's a little sketchy at the moment, but my faithful blog-readers may have a sneak preview. I should probably mention that the "sneak preview" is likely to be the only bit that actually gets written, since I'm fair to busy and important to sit around writing nonsense all day. Obviously.

So yeah, that makes you even more special.

Five ways to test a new flat mate:

1. Interview:
It's an obvious choice, though some people get it wrong by going too easy on their candidates. All current flat mates should be present and sit at the opposite side of the table to the prospective newbie. Then ask the meanest questions you can think of. Do not laugh, if they maintain their confidence that you're just joking, even when none of you are laughing, you'll know they're sharp enough.

2. Cake baking:
I'm aware that not all students bother with a cake rota like we do, and as such it may not be quite as essential in other flats. However, even if you don't regularly make cakes (and you probably should) you have to admit that having a new flat mate who can is an advantage.

3. Absorbency.
I'm sure I don't need to explain this.

4. Ability to fight a bear.
The smart person will chose both their weapons, and the bear they wish to fight carefully, since clearly you don't want to look like a coward, but at the same time you'd also rather not be mauled too severely.

5. What would they do if...
This could go in the interview section, but there's some really important questions of this type which people often forget to ask, so I felt it deserved it's own section. Those questions are
-...There was a zombie-velociraptor outbreak?
-...You needed to destroy the population of the world with a genetically modified virus?
-...Vladimir Putin turned out to be your great uncle?

The answers to those questions really will tell you a lot about a person.

So there you go. I urge anyone considering taking in a new flat mate to follow these steps carefully, goodness only knows what kind of person you might end up living with otherwise.

How to Write an Essay

GuiThis is intended as a guide for people who want to know how to write an essay.

To begin, you should attempt to get up an hour earlier than you usually do, unless you already rise at 9am or earlier. You should go through your morning routine, and make sure you look entirely excellent, this will help avoid the temptation to get up and redo your hair or paint your nails. Although clearly this will be inevitable at some point, if you get it as close to being right as you can the first time, then it will take longer before you crave change.

Why not try a new hairstyle altogether at this point, who knows, maybe having a new style will convince you that it only feels like you want to change it because it's so different - and a truly open-minded person would give it a fair chance.

Ok, so once your morning routine is out of the way, you should turn on your computer. You should absolutely not at this point open any kind of word processing program. You are not prepared yet, and wouldn't be able to write anything useful anyway. Instead; check your email, facebook, bebo, any other regularly updated site on your favourites list (webcomics are good).

Next you should window shop - online only, and preferably only for shoes, though I'll accept fashion in general, and you can check play.com if they're having a sale.

Now shut down your computer, disgusted at your tendency to procrastinate. Unless you've actually bought something, in which case you can celebrate your sucess, as you've been semi-productive and now need to go check your wardrobe to make sure you have outfits that your new thing(s) will work well with.

Now for the essay bit. Make a to do list. At the top of the list write "essay," add all the other major and minor chores you need to have completed for the next week or so. Draw little check boxes. Go find some highlighters and set up a colour scheme so you know how urgent each item on the list is.

Have lunch. No one works well hungry.

Do some of the easier chores on your list so you can get into the mood for doing work. Check them off and feel acomplished.

Find some books relevent to your essay subject, and go back to your computer. This time, you're going to open a word-processor, but you aren't going to write anything, because you're also going to open wikipedia and search for your topic there.

You may now write the title, and make a note of the books you've found and the wikipedia URL (assuming you haven't lost the URL and the last three hours to frantic link-clicking). Maybe a vague sentence or two is appropriate by now, if you're certain you won't be sad when you come back and have to rewrite everything.

Get distracted and go out to buy perfume. When you come back, burn a CD and write a blog instucting people on writing essays.

You see my problem?