Seachain an duine a bhíonn ina thost

I thought I should probably post to explain why I won't be posting for the next week, but then I realised I'm so rubbish at posting anyway that you probably wouldn't have noticed I was going away.

But I'll tell you anyway. Tomorrow, bright and early, I'm heading off to the Lake District for a couple of days of yomping. I'm a bit worried about it really; Andy and family like to do really challenging walks and I'm really unfit and (this week) asthmatic. We walked up Bangor Mountain (which should really be called Bangor Hill) yesterday and my legs really hurt. Sam says I should get my own back by whining all the way up and down the mountains for two days, then I won't be made do difficult exercise again.

On the way we're going to stop off at Cheshire Oaks so I can buy a handbag and look for walking shoes and maybe even a smart outfit to wear at interviews. Andy wants to buy a rucksack too but he doesn't need one, whereas I definitely need a handbag. And maybe some new shoes.

Then on Tuesday we head south (of Cumbria) to Blackpool for NUS Annual Conference. I'm so very fed up with the bickering about the Governance Review, the stupid arguments, the scurrilous accusations, that I really can't wait until Conference votes either way. I've been disappointed not to be involved in the development of the Schedules as I felt that was just as important as the Articles (if not more so). Anyway I don't mind, I'm going to be concentrating on wearing Norris t-shirts with panache. We've got several classy tshirt designs including my personal favourite 'NORRIS: I'd give him one' (it's a joke about preferential voting systems, geddit?).

Conference is a very bizarre event though. 14-hour days, 1000 people, lots of factions and shouting and safe spaces and cuddly-fluffy-NUS-speak conflicting with vicious factional politics. This year we are staying in the hideous Lawton Hotel which isn't as (ahem) nice as the Norbreck but is much, much closer to the Winter Gardens. Which is nice.

But I'll tell you all about it when I get back. Toodle pip.

At the weekend my aunt subtly mentioned to me that Gran was upset I hadn't thanked her for my birthday present. Now I'm not a rude, ungrateful grandaughter, I just hadn't received any present. So I phoned her last night to ask her which address she'd sent it to and discovered I hadn't told her I'd moved house last summer.

So I went and knocked on my old front door but nobody answered. I knocked again today, and again nobody answered but this time I popped a note through the letterbox so I wouldn't feel I had to knock every day until the Easter holidays end.

And lo! I have just received all my post dating back to about October. That's six months of Liberal Democrat mailings (including several testimonials encouraging me to vote for Nick Clegg or Chris Huhne and, indeed, my postal voting form), a Christmas card, two birthday cards and an invitation to my uncle's birthday party. It's so exciting!

And my birthday money means I can just about afford to have my hard drive recovered, not the most exciting thing to spend money on but a great relief nonetheless: there's nothing absolutely crucial on there so I was feeling very guilty about spending lots on having stuff recovered, but how could I have replaced 20gb of music, lots and lots of photographs and my entire degree? The man in the data recovery place says they never get repeat customers, after someone's hard drive fails once they immediately learn the importance of regularly backing up. Quite right.

I have a cough. It hurts.

I'm just back from looking after 25 teenagers for the weekend at a Quaker youth event in Northern Ireland and I am so tired.

I was the only organiser on the train on the way to Newry and I really wondered what I had let myself in for: they were all shouting and flirting and texting and all sorts of teenage things like that (I kept my head down and pretended not to be with them to avoid suffering the wrath of our fellow passengers).

But the weekend was actually pretty fun once they got over the initial excitement of reuniting with friends (and former flames in some cases -- the hormones were raging). It was lovely to see 14-year-olds slip between 14-year-old worrying about clothes and boys and stuff to talking about religion, politics and values. I did feel very old at times though: I had met some of the teenagers before, when they were 4 or 7 or something really small like that, and it was a bit shocking to see them all grown up with their very own personalities.

I've committed to being an organiser for the next two years, so that's how I'll be spending my next two Easters. As I headed to Ireland last weekend that felt like a big commitment, but I had such a nice time (despite being kept up til 4:30 on Sunday) I'm really quite happy to do it.

I think my focus for next year will be on getting more young people to attend: I didn't get around to going to JYM myself until I was 17, and perhaps I should have gone earlier. So I'm going to work hard to remove all the things that stop young Quakers attending JYM, whether it's announcing the dates too late, not publicising it enough, having it in inaccessible locations or simply not making it sound interesting or fun. Well, I have to find something in my life to fill the void now I don't have Serendipity anymore.

I'm sorry I've been neglecting my blog. It's all Ian's fault, really. First of all, he's come home from Ghana. Secondly, he's not even writing his own blog and neither is Mum (edit: actually I just checked and she's just posted, damn). And thirdly, I'm far too busy worrying about his health to write stuff.

It's beautifully peaceful without any students (or indeed Sam) around. I'd like to say it means I'm being really productive, but you can tell by the fact that I'm blogging that that's not true. I had about 100 happy birthday posts on my Facebook wall as well as lots of photos of my birthday night out to look at, and I've spent quite some time browsing a party decorations website. Which I think strictly could be classed as work, since it's in preparation for the Societies Awards. I really want a six-foot Oscar-style statuette cut-out thing.

I've spent the weekend at the British Universities Championships, the finals of twenty sports, and all those athletes (and all the mirrors in the hotel) have highlighted my unhealthy lifestyle to me. So I have resolved to go to the gym today and tomorrow (I'm away after that), to exercise on the beach over the weekend, and to go to the gym all next week in preparation for a weekend's walking in the Lake District, only for all that good work to get undone at NUS Conference where I will snack on junk food for three days during 14-hour conference sessions.

Voting has now closed and I'm slobbing on the couch for an hour before heading back to start the count. We had an incredibly good first day on Tuesday with nearly 600 votes. Yesterday took us up to 936 votes, and we've finished up with 1163 in total. I'm quite pleased with that: it's lower than last year (1212) but only very slightly lower than the year before (1176) despite cutting the number of positions available from 15 to 5. Last year we had 17 candidates, 18 the year before, and this year just 9, so I'm really impressed we kept the voter turnout steady (the theory is that every candidate brings at least 50 voters with them).

It was a nice election, everyone was very nice to each other and the candidates' ceilidh was so much fun on Monday night. I'm glad it's over though, back to real work now I think.

I turned up to Main Arts foyer this morning to open the first ballot box only to find the whole place covered in plants. A bit frustrating really: I had taken pains to ensure we could use the foyer, and then gone out of my way to draw up a table plan and contact Security to check it would be okay for the Islamic Society to share it as it's Islamic Awareness Week, then I turn up and find another group has taken over the whole thing. It's pretty cluttered down there now, but at least it smells nice.

I am so relieved not to be campaigning at the moment. All I have to do is encourage people to vote generally. I have led by example, casting the first vote this morning. Very satisfying.

I'm currently in the computer lab in Main Arts and I've just remembered how nice it is to have my own computer with internet connection. There's people sitting here reading comic strips and laughing to themselves -- just shut up! It's early in the morning and I'm trying to concentrate! I would definitely listen to Storm on a University PC if only to block out the noises other people make (note: this is a reference to a long debate we're currently having on whether Storm should broadcast online or on FM).