2002-07-25 at 9:02 p.m.

Remember that piano recital I was complaining about in my first entry? Of course you don't, because no-one's actually reading this thing. Anyway, I got 90/100, which is (apparently) the highest mark by a piano student. Go me!

I've suddenly realised that not practising at all during the holidays was not the most brilliant of schemes. So, now I'm playing a little game I like to call 'Panic Practise'. Here is how a session of 'Panic Practise' tends to go-

12pm- Look for practise room.

12.01pm- Realise they're all full. Give up, surf net for a while.

3.30pm- Look for practise room.

3.31pm- Still full. Decide to sit on floor near rooms and wait for one to vacate.

3.57- Still waiting. Buttocks fallen asleep.

3.58- Hoorah! A room has just become vacant. Massage buttocks back into life, sit down at piano, take out score, place on music stand, take several deep, cleansing breaths.

4.02- Stop attempting to play. Curse. Loudly.

4.03- Stop cursing. Take several deep, cleansing breaths.

4.12- Curse some more. Use far worse expletives. Suggest improper things concerning this particular piano's heritage, descendants, and sexual history.

4.31- Settle into a nice rhythm of crappy playing and sporadic expletives.

4.32- Less than half an hour until lesson. Still playing like crap.

4.33- Dither. Stand up, walk around, take several deep cleansing breaths, realise this technique hasn't worked once yet. Dither some more.

4.45- Panic.

5.00- Lesson.

6.00- Slink from teacher's room like disgraced ferret.

In other news, I'm going to Sydney this weekend to compete in the McDonalds Performing Arts Challenge with the choir. We're defending champions, so we've got quite a bit to live up to. We've also got about half the numbers we had last year. Oh well, should score some free Big Mac vouchers out of it. Shame I don't like Big Macs.

And, just for your time-wasting enjoyment, here's something I've been working on lately-