The person sitting next to me is doing some internet webcam chat on a laptop. Chewing gum in place. Earphones on. Facial expression of intense pleasure. Constant silent giggling. Wireless is bliss.

I'm at college, 4th floor computer room. Managed to lose my wallet today so i don't have my special magnetic card which gives access to the postgraduate study room, and I have to sit with the undergrad plebs.
Very ungainly mood this evening
Humanity? Just say no

There's a lot of new academic year axcitment in the air, lots of disorientated new student moving in circles of orienataion tours. i'm starting to realize i'm not enjoying this so much

having a highly ambivalent and troubled relatioship with academia is a trope, a topos, a clicheic state of affairs, which i guess 90 percent of postgrad research students share. Acadmeia is a strange world indeed so no surprise there. Only in conferences or seminars i realize how alien I feel there.
So, what is your research about?
Hmmm... very interseting.
And what about you?
Have you looked at the writing of ...? I think she's very relevant
I'll write down the reference for you.
and so forth

What i want to ask people in those circumstances is how
how do you survive in london
what do you live on
what sense does it all make to you