It’s quite a nice place here. Of course you get the odd thing or two that catches your eye and makes you do a double-take, but what place doesn’t? I mean, who hasn’t seen a guy in a pig costume wondering the streets at 4pm on a Friday waving at the students? (Whoever decided the university mascot should be a pig should get a medal *rolls eyes*.) And yesterday I got slightly weirded out by a guy in a gorilla costume that was handing out flyers. And of course, we can’t neglect to mention the guy dressed as a set of traffic lights outside Junk.

In true student fashion, my phone has broken itself twice since I got here and now only works some of the time. Neither of these were anything to do with me- the first time it lost signal the second we got here and didn’t get it back for most of a week, and now its saying “message not sent” when I try to text people, when in fact, its sending 3 of every message I’m trying to send and not telling me, which is why I’ve managed to spend £3 on 4 texts. :S

Anyways, the photos from the first week are up on facebook. Luckily, there’s not very many of me in there, as I was the one behind the camera, however, there might be some when my flatmates get the photos off their various phones and cameras. Add me if you’re really that bored and/or desperate for friends. www.facebook.com/spike1790

Student life is fairly easy to adapt to. You’ll be amazed at just how ok-ish Tesco value spaghetti is when it’s on slightly stale bread. Ok, so in the first week we might have let a few loaves go a bit green, but we caught them before they ran off to colonise in Flat B’s bathroom. There’s currently a pint of milk in the fridge that is a little past it’s use by date (when you turn the bottle upside down the milk inside doesn’t move. :S ).

There should be another post in about 16 or 17 days, just because I feel like it and this is a good way of putting off work.

TODAY IS RESULTS DAY. THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE AROUND THE COUNTRY HAVE BEEN CELEBRATING AND/OR COMMISERATING THEIR GRADES. I GOT MY CELEBRATING OUT THE WAY ON MONDAY NIGHT, THERE IS NOTHING LEFT TO DO BUT START THE LONG PROCESS OF PACKING.

I HAVE RECENTLY REALISED I DON’T HAVE THE SLIGHTEST CLUE ABOUT ANYTHING TO DO WITH PSYCHOLOGY, AND THIS MIGHT BE A PROBLEM COME SEPTEMBER 19^TH. THIS DOES NOT MATTER. I DO, HOWEVER, HAVE A FEW QUOTES THAT FIT NICELY WITH THE FLOW OF TODAY (NOT INCLUDING THE BRIEF TIME I SPENT SLEEPING IN THE LIVING ROOM WHILE PRETENDING TO WATCH PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN).  MOST OF THESE BARE LITTLE RELEVENCE TO A LEVELS AND MORE TO UNIVERSITY, BUT OH WELL…

At commencement you wear your square-shaped mortarboards. My hope is that from time to time you will let your minds be bold, and wear sombreros.
Paul Freund

Commencement speeches were invented largely in the belief that outgoing college students should never be released into the world until they have been properly sedated.
Garry Trudeau

Education is a companion which no misfortune can depress, no crime can destroy, no enemy can alienate, no despotism can enslave. At home, a friend, abroad, an introduction, in solitude a solace and in society an ornament. It chastens vice, it guides virtue, it gives at once grace and government to genius. Without it, what is man? A splendid slave, a reasoning savage.
Joseph Addison

Graduation day is tough for adults. They go to the ceremony as parents. They come home as contemporaries. After twenty-two years of child-raising, they are unemployed.
Erma Bombeck

If you feel that you have both feet planted on level ground, then the university has failed you.
Robert Goheen
Time Magazine, 23 June 1961

Of course there’s a lot of knowledge in universities: the freshmen bring a little in; the seniors don’t take much away, so knowledge sort of accumulates.
A. Lawrence Lowell

The man who will use his skill and constructive imagination to see how much he can give for a dollar, instead of how little he can give for a dollar, is bound to succeed.
Henry Ford

To the uneducated, an A is just three sticks.
A.A. Milne

(BECAUSE WINNIE THE POOH IS STILL AWESOME)

Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.
Yoda
In movie The Empire Strikes Back

(BECAUSE IVE BEEN STARING AT THE SIGN SAYING IT IN THE RE ROOM FOR THE LAST TWO YEARS)

Your families are extremely proud of you. You can’t imagine the sense of relief they are experiencing. This would be a most opportune time to ask for money.
Gary Bolding

(BECAUSE ITS SO TRUE. LOL)

As the day of judgement approaches (read- results day), its time to take a look at student life. I, for one, am looking forward to the endless nights of pasta for dinner and drinking more than is humanly possible. I have been given much advice on things to do when I finally/ hopefully get there, including, climb something you aren’t meant to climb, and assassinate somebody with a courgette. This sounds quite intriguing and im looking forward to giving it a go.

 I have an 8 page list of things I need to take with me too. The first thing I have got to kit out my student flat is… drum roll please… tea towels. Yeah. With pictures of donuts on. Bet you don’t have tea towels with pictures of donuts on. I appear to be well on my way to becoming a fully fledged student, as I have broken nearly everything I have come into contact with recently- tills at work, mobile phone (the 5 key is held on with blu-tack and the 7 key only works if u press it really hard), etc.

Its kinda strange how a matter of days can seem like such a yawning chasm of time, while at the same time, too close for comfort. Which brings us to the fact that there will be a post on Thursday at about midday IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS (!!!!!) either expressing my anger/disappointment at not getting in or my excitement (followed rapidly by terror) at passing and getting in.

See ya all on Thursday!

www.poetrymoment.com

Enjoy.

This post is very much based on Stewie Griffin’s list from season 7 of Family Guy. I had that song going through my head when I was drafting it. So here is my list:

The person who set off the fire bell in the middle of my 2 and a half hour English exam

No. its not funny. Its not clever. And it completely makes up for everyone in year 13 driving their cars into the playground and making as much noise as possible. During the remainder of that exam, I thought of various punishments for what you did. And the comments on my facebook status bear testament to the fact im not the only one.  

Builders

Why are you outside my house when I still have 2 exams to revise for? And why are you making a noise with that pneumatic drill? And at this ungodly hour of the morning?! It’s half past 11 for God’s sake! There are students trying to sleep!

Miley Cyrus

Comment on a YouTube video: 95% of American teens said they would cry if they saw Miley Cyrus about to jump off a tall building. Repost if you are in the 5% shouting “jump, bitch!” Not my personal opinion, just so long as she stays out my way. She’s not God’s Gift- she is a spoilt over-rich American bitch. There. Its been said. Deal with it.

Mika

Are you a guy or a girl? If you are a guy, sing like one, don’t just squeak in an annoyingly high pitch at me. It makes me want to hurt you. That is all.

Firstly, why do people try to pretend they know you?

Even if its someone you have known for years, they still think they can control you. They tell you who you can be friends with, what to wear, and all that shit. The worst of it is when they tell you what YOU are like. Oddly enough, I have been close to me for the last 18 and a half years, and I know me much better than they do. I have developed a personality in the 10 years since we last had a real conversation. Family for example, talk to you in ridiculous fake accents and it drives you crazy and they know it, but they do it anyway until you want to smack them in the face and destroy every inanimate object in a 10 mile radius just with the power of your extreme pissed-off-ness. This might just be me, but I still want to rant about it.

Or just because some distant relative has read something about you on facebook, myspace or similar, it gives them the right to gossip about you as if they have been close to you for years and aren’t just nosy interfering cows. (Hi! Yes, you. You know who you are. Leave a comment if you think I am addressing you in this post)

Secondly, why is it the more you worry about exams, the easier they are?

This confuses me, simply because it shouldn’t logically happen. Surely, the more worked up you are about a problem, the harder it will be perceived as, just because of the tension and confusion in your mind? You end up being so worried you don’t realise how simple the problem in question is.

I have now done 2 of my 7 exams and have got off pretty lightly, all things considered.

I am apparently going to lunch some time during the exams, with various people. I hope this involves them setting up the desk next to me with a small china tea set and a candelabra, while they procede to talk in very English voices about the latest going ons in the press (“Oh, I know Darrrrling… I completely agree that thingy should go and talk to them about the very pressing issue outlined in the Times.” “Yes, completely. Would you like some more tea with your crumpets darrrrling?”). I would enjoy this just for the look on the invigilators faces. Classic. Lolz.

There should be some pretty good photos of me burning all my old school books coming sometime after the 19^th, so watch this space. (fire= pretty= J)

Ode to a Bacon Sandwich

O, Bacon Sandwich, you are so yummy;

On white bread, with onions or with some cheese.

You stop the rumbling in my tummy;

I always have to say “another, please”.

When I put the butter upon the bread,

While the bacon sizzles under the grill,

I think to myself inside of my head

That perhaps I should add a bit off dill.

With HP sauce or ketchup or mustard,

I would eat you up because you’re the best.

Even if I had you served up with custard…

Ok, that might be a bit of a test.

O, Bacon Sandwich, the best of the foods,

You are the lunch of the kids, chicks and dudes.

Now on to more important things.

Firstly, wireless internet. Its amazing! Never before was I able to spend all night on my laptop looking at all the useless crap I never wanted to know. For example, I spent half an hour reading an article about the rising number of man-boobs. Why? Because I could! MSN is the one of the best things ever created, even if there are some weirdo’s on there. FaceBook is fun, as is Myspace and Bebo.

This is probably the reason why I am so tired. Fun as it may be, playing games until 4:am isn’t really such a good idea.

Secondly, exams. This is essentially writing down all the stuff I know as quickly as I can to be read by no-one except insane people with no lives who think grading papers is the highlight of the year. My first exam is on the 4^th of June. This is a problem. With 5 hours of lesson time left with our RS teacher, we still have another whole unit to cover. Which is all of this…

http://store.aqa.org.uk/qual/gceasa/qp-ms/AQA-RS12-W-QP-JUN08.PDF

No matter what the Hitchhikers Guide says, I will panic. This occasion definitely requires some level of panic.

On a happier note, I am now working on cleaning my room, which has proved to be more difficult than I had originally thought. I have chucked out 2 bin-bags of stuff I don’t need, and will be putting some stuff on eBay or holding a yard sale to get rid of the rest. Four of the 6 boxes of stuff to be sold are dedicated entirely to Buffy the Vampire Slayer memorabilia (an indication of the level of patheticness of my life). However, those boxes are stacked up on my floor, which has rather halted the cleaning process, as there is now just enough space for me to move between the wall and the boxes to get to my bed. Feeling better for having a clear out, though.

1. there may be a market for shark infested custard
2. I suck at describing things to people

Number one originated with the classic joke “what’s yellow and dangerous?” “Shark infested custard”. This was discussed at length among two hyper people over the phone, and the result was that yes, we want to see shark infested custard, but we don’t want to eat it. If it was full of tiny, miniature sharks, we might like to keep it as a pet, but if its got one massive shark in it, then we would probably get eaten when we open the tin, or powder mix or whatever form you want your shark infested custard to be in, and that wouldn’t be too good for your health.

The second point came from last night’s discussion about going swimming. I was asked if I would be wearing a bikini when we went swimming. I am fully aware that this is a horrible image and would make people very ill. So I said that I would be wearing a metal box thing “what old divers go in”.

I was referring to one of these:

http://www.globeimports.com/ProdImages/WW-4417F.JPG

But what was seemingly conveyed was that I would like to drown pre-pensioners in metal cages and drag them behind cross-channel ferries. This concept took the best part of an hour to re-explain and give better examples for and by the time Rob had worked out what I was talking about, we had forgotten why we were talking about it and were both very confused- me probably more so than him.

If you have any comments on shark infested custard, new-car-smell flavour ice-cream, or diving suits as swim wear, please let me know.