Tales of Mocktails and the Fail Whale

Two major events occurred today. I was hard pressed to decide which one I wanted to write about, and too lazy to write separate posts, so I decided to cover both in one. They do have something in common: they both relate to my future. The first in the construction of it, the second in the destruction. Enjoy.

1. Constructing my future: 2010 Careers Market

Basically, at school today, we only completed the first two periods. The middle two were taken up with the Career Market. The teachers collected the whole of Year 10 together, packed us on to several buses, and sent us off. After an uneventful bus trip, during which Lala and Ariane argued about the failure of their marriage and the fate of their unborn child Roman (I picked the name). They eventually decided that he could spend Christmas with Lala and birthdays with Ariane. Unless he ends up being born on Christmas. In this case, however, he would be Jesus, and they'd have more than enough to worry about without custody issues (and yes, this is quite as bizarre as it sounds. I will get around to telling you about it, I promise. But it really deserves a whole post to itself).

Anyway, arrived at the Careers Market without major incident. The Careers Market is only around for a couple of days, yesterday and today. It consists of a lot of booths in a large and crowded (not to mention stuffy) room. Most major Australian universities had booths there, as did several colleges and, for some reason, both MacDonalds and KFC. I was hoping for a free-Mars-Bar booth, but to no avail. There were a couple of other schools there at the same time as us. We had an hour at the Market, to collect various books and brochures and other freebies. I began by going around with Peanut. We immediately ran into her aunt, before we had a chance to look at any of the stalls. Peanut's aunt is slightly younger than she is, thanks to the divorce and re-marriage of her grandfather (Peanut's grandfather, that is. Her aunt's father). Is a mildly confusing situation. Was duly and mildly confused. Anyway, the very first booth we found was one for the Academy of Interactive Entertainment. As Peanut wants to be a game designer, this was ideal. She later confided to me she has decided to go to the AIE when she leaves school. And people say I make snap decisions.

At this point I foresaw it would be a little hard going around a Careers Market with somebody who wanted a completely different career to me, so I found Marie-Clare instead. We got two free bags from UC stall. It was easy enough. I just went up and said 'I'm really interested in studying IT at university, do you have any documents I could look at?' They did, and they gave me a free bag to carry them in. Quick, easy, and I never had to tell them I wouldn't touch IT with a barge pole. Still, I've never considered going to the UC anyway, so it probably doesn't count as lying.

Marie-Clare and I both want the same thing: to study languages at a good university (she Japanese, and I French), become successful journalists, and then move to England. The moving-to-England part was less relevant today, but we wandered around all the university stalls. Before now, I've only ever considered attending the ANU (Or possibly Oxford University. But let's be honest. That's not going to happen). My eyes have been opened considerably. We went to almost every stall: the only one I think we didn't go to was Charles Sturt University, and that's because it reminded us of deserts, which, in turn, reminded us of how hot and thirsty we were (as it was a school excursion, we were forced to wear our ridiculous and cumbersome blazers). I came back with 24 separate books in my UC bag, and an unknown quantity of loose sheets. The ones that really stood out were UNSW, University of Sydney, and Macquarie University. Also the make-up artists' stand. But the only reason that stood out was because they were showing students how to make fake wounds, and I turn into a pitiful mess at the sight of blood. Even fake blood. Even my own blood. Even when there isn't any blood, but seems likely there might be some at a later date. Marie-Clare was unimpressed. 'If I'm ever in a car crash, I really hope you're not the one trying to pull me out of the car.'

For some reason, among all the further educational booths, there was also one teaching you how to make mocktails (I think it was for some kind of barkeeping holiday course). Ariane was a little confused for a bit. 'Is this Cocktail University?' Anyway, behind it, there was a tub of greenish-brownish water, containing a few leaves. I think it may have been used to wash the mint leaves they were using in the mocktails: at any rate, it didn't look spectacularly appealing. Lala, who, having sorted out custody battles with Ariane, was in a cheerful mood, addressed Pablo and said 'I bet you $10 you won't drink any of that.'

Pablo is an amiable chap, and not the kind to pass up money. 'I'm tempted. Will you pay up?'

Lala, much surprised, assured him she would. He promptly went up to the man at the mocktails booth, and said 'Can I have a cup, please? It's for a bet.'

The man gave him one, and Pablo went round the back of the booth and scooped up a cup of the suspicious water. I think it was probably at this point I nudged Marie-Clare and whispered 'Please, let's move away, and pretend we don't know them.' We moved a safe distance away and watched Pablo drink the whole cup down. He finished by eating a couple of the leaves that had been wedged at the bottom of the cup. I hope he enjoys his $10.

After the hour had passed we were rounded back up and returned to the school, just in time for lunch. Marie-Clare and I went to the library to inspect our brochures.

2. Destructing my future: Maths Competition

The last two periods were spent doing a nation-wide Maths competition. It doesn't count towards your grade, but if you do well you get a prettily coloured certificate you can frame or, more often, throw away. There were thirty questions on the test. It was one of the ones where you write your name by shading different bubbles on the sheet, and almost all the questions are multiple choice. In this particular test the last five questions weren't multiple choice: you had to write a three digit number in instead. I managed the first few questions. Then things got tricky.

It didn't help that whoever had had the desk before me had been practicing their artistic skill on it, as opposed to doing the test. They had drawn a whale on it, drawn a lot of arrows pointing towards it, and then given it a little speech bubble saying 'Fail Whale'. This was less than encouraging. I spent some time drawing it a blowhole and a spout of water, then went back to the test.

I had to guess the last five questions. Hell, I guessed a lot of the other questions too, but those were multiple choice. I have a one-in-five chance of getting those ones right. The other ones, I have a one-in-nine hundred and ninety nine. What's more, while the other questions were all worth either three, four, or five points, the last five questions were worth six, seven, eight, nine, and ten respectively.

I talked to other people afterwards, and they reported the same experience as me. I don't know a single person who managed to get even one of the last five questions, which is quite reassuring. Pablo thought the only thing he'd got right was filling his name out. Midgie (who is new to this blog: I was going to call her Ostrich Girl, but she preferred Midgie) confided that in last year's test she'd only gotten five questions right.

At any rate, I'm not sure my future lies in Mathematics. I may just have destroyed any chance I had of working in the industry. Not that I want to work in the maths industry. Or am even sure what a maths industry is, or would do. That path is gone, man.

I doubt I'll regret that when I'm studying French at the ANU in three years time, though.