I got halfway up the Edgware Road this morning when I realised I'd forgotten my keycard for the office. This is bad. Mainly because the development floor is one flight of stairs and two keycarded doors away from the coffee machine. Noooooo!!! So far this morning I've had to beg the quiet Swedish guy in the corner to lend me his keycard so I can go and get some of that precious joe. Damn, today is going to be a hard day.

C and I were going to go to the cinema last night but it was just too damn cold. By the time I'd got home and curled up on the sofa with a hot chocolate, there was no way I could go out again. So we stayed in and C did housework while I had a bath. I tell you, he's a keeper that one. I used to live in absolute squalor, but now I've got this guy who comes round and does all those icky household tasks I could never be bothered to do, like scrubbing out my rubbish bin or bleaching the drains. The other night he bleached my white towels because they were covered in pink & purple splodges from our hair-dying experiment. I'd never do that, I'd just leave them splodgy. I'm much impressed.

I have a custard apple for lunch. Just thought you'd like to know that. I haven't had custard apples since I was growing up in the UAE, but on Saturday I spotted them for sale at the street market and got 5 for �1. Ah, the taste of my youth. I had one after dinner last night and put most of the seeds on the floor for Jerry to play with. She spent about twenty minutes batting them around the floor. That cat really knows how to turn on the cuteness...

I have been trying to think what to do when my art classes end in February. This is the second term I've done life drawing, and I'm kinda bored with it now (short attention span anyone?). I think the main problem is that I'm not working towards a qualification, and I can't really work towards one in art because I already have a foundation diploma in art & design, and the next step up from that is a degree. I don't really have the time or money to do a degree right now.

But... if I start on a qualified course in some other subject, I'm worried that I'll wind up swamped in homework & stress. But I'm a qualification junkie.

Since I'm currently weighing up my career options, I think it might be prudent to take some sort of course towards that. Of course, I still have no idea what I want to do with my life (wishy-washy, much?). I spent a bit of time perusing Floodlight yesterday, looking at part-time A level (those are the exams you usually take at 18) and post-graduate courses. I'm quite tempted to take a maths A or AS level. Frankly, I can't add up for toffee and it would be nice to prove to myself that I'm not thick (honest). I'm not sure what good it would do me, career-wise, though. I suppose most employers would be impressed that I'm still so interested in learning.

Westminster Kingsway college do a pure maths with mechanics AS level, one year, one night a week, stating in September. After you've completed that course, they have an A2 level in pure maths which will take a further year (and give you the full A level). Tempting.

I also looked at a computing sciences MSc at Birkbeck, which doesn't require any computing qualifications, but rather a "demonstrable ability and interest" (which I have). However, that course would be expensive and very time-consuming. And if I did it, I'd be committing myself to working in IT for at least a few years more - if only to justify the expense.

Well. If I want to do the MSc, I'd have to wait until 2004 to apply (to give myself time to save for the course fees). The maths AS level is a more realistic option, and I can probably start that in September 2003 if I make my mind up before April next year. The fees wouldn't be more than a couple of hundred at most.

I'm also going to look at Open University courses because with them, I can study in my own time. And they're a pretty well-respected institution.

Anyway, that's me for now...