"I've got it!"
"What?"
"42!"
"What's 42?"
"That's the question!"

So… an alien species invent the smartest computer ever made and call it "deep thought"… and to test it out they give it a really hard question… "What's the answer to life the universe and everything?" Deep Thought sits there, for a good millennia and tries to come up with the solution to life the universe and everything… eventually, as 2 aliens walk past, he comes up with the solution… 42… but by then the aliens have forgotten what the question was… so deep thought gives them instructions to find the question… the instructions go something like this: go find Zafod Beeblebrox and get him to make you a planet… call it earth and let it sit there and ponder the question… one day it will become apparent… so the aliens get Zafod to build earth… and wait it out, watching the earthlings go about their day… however… 5 minutes before the question to the solution is found… the universe council blows up earth to make way for a solar bypass for their spaceships! But this doesn't really matter anyway, because the humans on earth actually came from the B ark of another planet… this was a clever trick to get all the useless middlemen eg, estate agents, and telephone cleaners, off of their planet… and they crashed the B ark into earth and populated earth anyway.

What on earth am I talking about? If you don't already know, go look up "the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy" in your local bookshop… the 5 books in this trilogy give us a complete understanding of life… and what it means… maybe…
So yeah… this article is about life. Don't worry about the universe and everything. I might get around to that one day. I want to look at life today. I think this was triggered by me watching "Battle Royal" last night. It is a very good film and I urge all of you to go watch it! But not now… keep reading this! As I type it while I am yet again skipping another stupid lesson of Key Skills. I am meant to be doing my art exam now… hmm… I guess this is a form of art… what is art… I know artists make art… but what makes an artist? If I screwed up a tissue it would be a screwed up tissue… but if an artist did it, it would be art… strange that… anyhoo!

Life… if we are lucky, we have somewhere around 80 years of it to enjoy… maybe even more, since we are coming up with new medical treatments every day. There are of course, the unfortunate cases. Terrible accidents which cause fatalities, people dieing from cancer and other fatal illnesses, and then the idiots who smoke their life away, apparently you take 8 minutes off your life every time you smoke a cigarette. Don't ask my how they worked that out, I am just as interested to find out as you are! So, those people who smoke 40 a day… hmm… that's… 320 minutes a day, and 116800 minutes a year… i.e. 1946.6 hours a year… 81.1 days!!! Just think what you could do with those days you are just deleting forever from your life! If you have kids, you can watch them grow up, and watch their children grow up, and maybe even watch their children's children starting to grow! All that spare time you could spend with loved ones, people who you not only adore, but who adore you in return! All those happy memories that could happen and which never will because you took that time away from them away from yourself.

I'm not here to complain about smoking… I don't mind smoking. What I do mind is wasting you life. Lots of people tell me I waste my life in front of my computer. Well… maybe, but at least I have a whole lot of fun, talking to people from all over the world through devices such as MSN and AOL. I get to meet lots of amazing people because of the internet, and this website. I wonder if the inventor of the internet ever thought he would one day give one girl the ability to meet all her heroes, and interview them.
Wait… I'm not here to talk about the net either. Ok… so… life… no one gets out alive, I read that somewhere recently and it made me laugh, or maybe that was the evil laugh that came after it… who knows! But yeah. Life could be really short. I mean, I have been on this earth for about 17 and a half years. In that time I have probably wasted a whole load of time doing nothing. I sometimes feel that an education is a waste of time. I mean, we are young. We are still trying to figure out who we are, and where we fit into society. And we are forced to go to this institution to learn a whole bunch of facts, most of which you may never need to know ever again… do I look like I care what happens when waves pick up rocks and hurl them at a cliff repeatedly? No! I don't! And who knows. Today, as I go out to my art exam, I could be hit by a bus. Or be struck by lightning. And that would be it. All those facts and problems which have been filling my brain for the last 13 years would all be useless. Because I never got to go out and use it properly.
But then. What if the bus doesn't hit me, and I get on it and go to college and learn, and then use that knowledge to solve huge world problems, or just, y'know, use it to make some more random articles. Then it must have been worth while. Mustn't it? So the is education a good thing?

I don't feel my life has been a waste though. I have lived, I have laughed, I have cried, and I'm not dead yet! Some things are tedious, some things (or teachers) just make you want to fall asleep they are so boring and useless. And I think that is a waste. You could die tomorrow, and that would be it. What are you going to say to saint john when he asks you what you did with your life? I will say I did lots of things. I try to think, but all I think of is a feeling… maybe not even a feeling. I just think back over the last couple of years, and what I have done, and who I have met, and who has touched my life in some way. And I smile.

Life is short. That's another phrase you hear a lot. I guess it's true too, I mean, you only have a small window onto which to make your mark. No matter how insignificant it may be to the rest of the world. (And no this doesn't mean go out and over populate the world… there's too much of that going on as it is). so live your life… yes, as cheesy as it may be. Live while you're alive! And let the people who help your living know just how much they mean to you! If you didn't have those to make your life worth it, what would you do? Would you be able to cope? And if not, then make sure you respect and cherish those who help you. And help them in return!
Now… I'm off to live, what are you gonna do?