If you are interested in the pointless contraption -I mean, who needs anything that can destroy our world? Why do we need particles that go that fast? My particles are generally slow and I'm fine- you can check this link to Wikipedia about what it can do. And while you are accelerating your particles, can you learn to move forward in time and skip workdays? I could live in a world of weekends.

The device

But no, I meant a more dramatic kind of end of the world. Where is he romance in pressing a few buttons, turning on a beam and going Whooooosh! into nothingness? I meant more like Apocalyptic natural disasters and premonitory dreams, the kind that Nostradamus would have planned for us. Why take the trouble to assemble the world with all it's plug-ins and add-ons if a simple power surge is going to reboot us? And also, that would not be the end of the world. It would just be a re-configuration of the current one.

But, still, the signs are clear to me. What says DOOM louder than the end of holidays? The first day of work after a bank holiday right after coming back to work. That makes you long for the End or for a quick painless death. But it gets better: last week we had 37ºC (guess your own Fahrenheit, I can't be bothered, but it was hot!) and on Monday we had 17ºC. A twenty-degree difference? I knew the world was coming to an end when my stomach started to ache like mad for two days in a row. My mates said it was because of the weather, well, could be. Check out the kind of weather we're having lately:

The hail storm

That happened at 1.30am. The next morning we found that plants had been smashed by the ice, trees had been uprooted and sparrows lay dead on the street by the dozen. They were about twice as big as the hailstones falling. Imagine something as big as a sheep falling from the sky and hitting you. Yes, the birds must have thought "Whatever", just like you, and then they thought "splat."

But why would this be responsible for keeping me awake all of last night? I felt so weak this morning that I could hardly do my job, let alone smile my usual stupid, blank way. My colleagues said circles round my eyes made me look like a raccoon. Don't you wish you worked with people as sharp as that? But I wasn't sharp. "Me dull" said my facial expression until lunch time. It showed clear signs of me watching the Special Olympics until 5am with a huge stomachache.

And what about cinema? Remakes and sequels? It's as close to hell as I can think. University? They ask me to write silly stories for little children. I don't do silly. I do children, teenagers and adults, male and female, of any sex or creed but I can't bear stupid. I still have a few exams to do but hopefully this is the last year. You see? Again the word "last"

More signs of the impending end of the world? Flies. They come and go whenever they please but recently they have acquired a taste for staying around my dustbin and that reminds me of the seven plagues. If you are not Christian, forgive my lack of originality in the imagery. One has to make do with what there is. Flies have got nothing to do with the harmless rubbish that shares my flat with me. (No, M is neither harmless nor rubbish, I mean actual refuse) The flies are not here because of the roast chicken and banana skins. They are here because it's cosier to spend the last days of one's life in a warm flat like ours.

And what about mysterious silent phone calls from withheld numbers? I keep getting those. It must be someone who lost his voice trying to warn everyone in the phonebook about our impending fate. That's why I write instead.

Run you fools!

Life is beautiful in many little ways. I realized yesterday when I arrived home after a truly long day at work during which I basically carried books upstairs and downstairs following my boss's every whim -it was the same books all the time, she's mental- and material for my colleagues. I was tired. I had gone to the doctor's. I had been shopping for presents -fruitlessly. So, immersed in my own sense of misery, I came home to find the light was on in the living room and a parcel was sitting in the centre of the dinner table. It said it came from Honolulu!!!

It all came back to me then: a few months ago I met a Hawaiian couple and helped them out of some trouble they met while spending their vacation in Madrid. They were so kind and thanked me so many times that it was embarrasing. All I did was spend a while with them and interpret for them. When the trouble was more or less solved they went back to their hotel and even paid my taxi home. They took my details in case they needed to contact me while they were in Spain and I thought no more of it.

So yesterday when I came home I found that they had sent me a parcel with some presents and a thank you note. How sweet! The bad moments of the day were lost in the way some people are kind and grateful for small things. It meant so much to me that I almost forgot to open the box until a while after I read the note.

It must be that, as my friend Cristina says, good and evil bounce back. You do a favour and it's returned to you tenfold. Like my exam two days ago: I passed! I hadn't studied a word for it but I got 95% You'll probably say that I should have studied but I had already done the exam and got the same grade 3 months ago. Only the teacher failed me for not submitting my final essay. In case you want to know I handed it in, yes, my final essay, not as brilliant as the exam, just 75% but still a passing grade. That's all I need to keep my tuition free.

As for work, I had never been so little prepared. Let's see what happens on the K day, Wednesday. Wish me luck.