Concept of education

Firstly, Bush. May he rot in all seven levels of hell. Except the ones where rotting is a problem because of, y'know, hellfire and brimstone 'n' stuff. Mr Evans tackled me in the corridor and quoted him at me. I cringed. There was a collective prayer breathed for Kerry before he disappered in the direction of a first-year history lesson.

Secondly, the new headmistress seems out to make herself unpopular. She held her second assembly this morning, and it was lacklusture as yesterday's was - I said later that she seems to be reading off a script that no-one else can see - and she finished it off with, well, I can't really describe it. It sounded perfectly innocuous to begin with, but soon descended into a thinly veiled bitchfest about the sixth form approach to uniform. It's probably the clannish, you're-new side to it, but the general consensus is that she can't walk in and start changing the way we've always done things on her second day.

I don't like her, myself. Mrs Mills was annoying in her own way, but I interviewed her for the magazine in those last few days and she struck me as someone who above all cared for the school and its people. And you could do much worse than that. This new woman seems out to change things. Plus she's got this whole jewellery embargo going in, and people have been laughing and teasing me gently for my earrings today. For the record, they're large rainbow-coloured hoops. I call them subtle - because on the one hand they're really not, but if you consider the symbolism, then they are. I'm rather fond of them.

But the new head clearly isn't, and people aren't fond of her. I went in to do some shelving in the library this morning, and Mrs Barry asked, giggling, "Were you in assembly?"

"Our new Fuhrer," I agreed. Emma's quoted Mr Wood as calling her a miserable old cow. Thankfully she hasn't descended on the library yet. Those in charge tend to avoid the place, which can only be a good thing. I was in there this morning to find Sam, who is currently my favourite person in the world. She lent me season five of Buffy on DVD (yay!) but not the first four episodes as she's lost them. I've already seen Buffy vs. Dracula, so that makes only three episodes, and I'm hoping I don't lose too much of the continuity. Sam also promised to lend me The Dark Age, but she can't remember which disc it's on so she's just given me season two in its entirety.

Did I mention she's my new favourite person?

quackaquacka was also around, and apparently both she and Sam watched The Dark Age again yesterday. This is good. Great minds and all that.

After that, I realised I had something I needed to do. And this something is scary, and scary, and very scary, and stuff. Yes, I started filling in my UCAS form this morning, and it took me five minutes to remember my name. Following that my address, my nationality, my birthplace, my centre number, all the rest of it. I floundered a bit when it came to qualifications. The problem remains that no-one can remember the exact syllabuses (syllabi?) they took at GCSE, and I'm loath to guess when there's, say, six different options, as there actually for subjects like History.

Still, I muddled on as best as I could, and had better luck filling in my AS results. Then came the section that is imaginatively titled "where you want to go."

This is the scary part. You don't type in the name of the university and course you want to go to; you find the UCAS code and pick it out of the list. My first-choice code is short, LV-something or other, only four characters, and I picked it out of the drop-down list. What I didn't realise is that it would show you what you'd picked, just to confirm it, and I got: "Oxford University. Philosophy, Politics and Economics."

It was the act of typing it in, seeing it stare at me on the computer screen, that made it seem real. And that was scary. I wasn't the only one who bolted at that point - just quickly pressed Ctrl + S and made a break for it. I fled to the common room and avoided the whole issue.

However, I have arranged to go and talk to Mrs Enstone on Monday, and I'm planning to write my first draft of my personal statement this weekend. I'm not totally head-in-the-sand over this, but that's only because I can't afford to be. My deadline is October 15th. I actually wish it was October 15th and all this was over.

Well, all over bar the shouting. And for "shouting", read "the four A-levels that are going to kill me plus Advanced Extension."

Because yes, I signed up for Advanced Extension. Not Biology, of course. But Chemistry, certainly, and I am going to die from stress and it's only my second day. I really, really don't like school. I do, however, like the concept of education.

I was glad to get out of school today. Rice-Oxley seems fond of us all, at least since Rhyd-y-creuau, and especially compared with her L6 group; she's decided to let us out five minutes early where possible, which for her is a major step. On my way home, I met Michael, who amused me as he always does, talking about, of all things, how Ripper/Ethan/Spike is a good thing, but only if Ripper is involved - Ethan/Spike is just wrong.

I agree with that. And that's my day sorted, and my weekend promises to be good - I'm meeting Hannah and Jane, watching a lot of Buffy, and deciding my future. It's all good.