Fashion, films and geisha girls fuel 17 pages

EXAM DIARY:WHEN I did the Leaving Cert for the first time, I spent the 11th hour sweating over Shakespeare. When I did it for the second time, I unwound with a cup of cocoa and an early night.

Now, on my third attempt, I tried something different: dinner out and a trip to see Sex and the City - The Movie. I was Carrie Bradshaw incarnate as I tripped through the streets of Donnybrook at 2am with my high heels in one hand and a copy of Othelloin the other.

And it worked! I woke up feeling relaxed and ready for anything. The film had filled my head full of passion and fashion and it turned out to be just the ticket for yesterday's higher level English paper I.

My head was in the right place for topics such as "We are what we wear", and I had great fun with the essay, which, I have to say, was a little bit saucier than anything I've ever produced for a Leaving Cert paper before.

I've always had a keen interest in Japanese culture, ever since reading Memoirs of a Geisha. When I spotted the short story on a rebellious teenager on yesterday's paper, the script starting writing itself.

My heroine is a 16-year-old geisha who tears up the map and starts an affair with another geisha.

It's Sex and the City, if the city is Tokyo and the year is 1923. She keeps a diary of her exploits, rather like Carrie Bradshaw's newspaper column, which provides a chorus, of sorts.

I have a touch of the geisha about me today, as I managed to break my toe on Tuesday.

That's the real reason why I had to walk home in my bare feet. There's not much you can do for a broken toe, the doctors say, but I got an A in biology last year and it went to my head.

Like Bruce Willis in Die Hard, I bravely shoved the offending bone back into place before taking up my Kalashnikov and jumping down the lift shaft.

Funnily enough, that didn't help at all. Turns out that wanting to be a doctor is not the same as actually being one. If I finally get the points to study medicine this time, I will not be specialising in osteopathy.

Still, I'm very happy with the essay I wrote. In fact, I'm very happy with all 17 pages of yesterday's exam - a new personal record.

I skipped over the first comprehension, on teenagers - snore - and headed for an intriguing tale about a beautiful young musician, a mysterious Russian and a Stradivarius violin.

And where was it set? Why, New York of course.

In my mind, I was already there. That trip to the cinema was charmed. I'll be using the ticket as a lucky talisman.

I must say I approve of this new timetable. Having tried the old regime (twice), I certainly enjoyed my afternoon on PlayStation. After a light meal and a little heart-to-heart with Romeo, my iguana, I got stuck into Othello.

Sitting there, I thought a night squinting over Othellomight not help me in this morning's exam. Perhaps recreating the magic of the cinema was the way to go. Indiana Jonesis supposed to be a bit of a laugh.

Romeo was keen, slipping on his Manolo's and Jimmy Choo's. If Carrie Bradshaw had four legs, she'd do the same.

Laura Brady is a repeat student at the Institute of Education in Dublin