18th March

Getting increasingly excited about my trip to Paris, which it now less than a month away... also vaguely thinking about my wardrobe, which although reflecting the supreme quality of Topshop and River Island at their mediocre best is hardly likely to live up to anything that a Parisian femme might have to offer. Luckily Glamour magazine sent its style-wise fashion reporters out onto the streets of Paris during fashion week, where they tracked down a host of sartorially elegant (and occasionally affordably dressed) locals. My favourite is Parisian blogger Clementine  –I love everything about her outfit! Here it is shamelessly stolen from the Glamour website:

5th February

I’ve just watched Sun, Sea and Suspicious Parents and I almost couldn’t believe what I was seeing –not from the kids, who have been massively exploited without even suspecting it by television bosses, but from their supposedly responsible parents.

After following her 18-year-old daughter to Zante and subsequently being found out, the mother in question declared that she would be forgiven, and that if her daughter was in any way mature she wouldn’t even be upset.

Well, I think the fact that her daughter did forgive her was amazingly naive.

The kids on this programme are 17 and 18; they are applying to university and in a few years they’ll be on the graduate job market. How can it possibly be ok that when they get to this stage in their lives they won’t be able to forget their drunken, sun-induced teenage behaviour?

Quick illustrative point: Last year a trainee teacher was thrown off her course because a drunken photograph of her dressed as a pirate appeared on Facebook. It was deemed inappropriate, in her profession. A few years ago I read about a woman, again a teacher, who had made a suggestive video before she had ever decided which job she was going to go into –and when it came to light she too was fired.

Most people have done messy things at the age of 18, and being on holiday is almost certainly a situation where things get out of hand. But for most of us the only thing that we need to do is destroy the evidence –and generally this means detagging a few Facebook pictures. The video footage of Jen drinking out of a stranger’s waistband is going to be on YouTube for years. It will still be there when the rest of us, whose parents didn’t deliberately condone our drunken antics being posted all over the mass media, have been able to forget.

Aside from the ethical implications, what kind of teenage boy is going to behave naturally whilst faced by a camera crew and the knowledge that his friends at home are certainly going to be watching? Girls might monitor their behaviour, but boys are almost certainly going to put on an act. And what teenager is going to pass up a free holiday, if a TV crew offers it them? The footage isn’t even a valid representation of how they would’ve acted if they’d simply been allowed to go on holiday uninterrupted. Any 17-year-old with an AS level in psychology could tell you that, so why haven’t the parents realised it?

Jen et al should have been allowed to act like teenagers on holiday without it being splashed forever across BBC3 and IPlayer. There are some things that parents have absolutely no reason to see –and why on earth would they want to?

This is the worst kind of TV.

9th January...

5 reasons to be excited for 2011...

1.       Graduation. Yes, between July the 18^th and 22^nd (date to be confirmed in February, natch), most of us will be donning ridiculous hats and capes, and tripping up onto the Great Hall stage to collect our degrees from the mysterious Vice Chancellor. Does this sound Harry Potter-esque to anyone else? (as a side note, who is the Vice Chancellor? What does he actually do? I’ve been at Lancaster for two and a half years and I still don’t know). I’m hoping that in six months time we will also have sorted our lives out and will all have stable plans, for the following couple of months at least. But I doubt it. Ho hum.

2.       Tate and Tennant. From June to September, the brilliant Catherine Tate and David Tennant will be taking the roles of Beatrice and Benedick in a Wyndam’s Theatre production of Much Ado About Nothing. This is very exciting times for us Shakespeare/ theatre geeks, so here is the link to the BBC story on it - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-12134635

3.       Moving to London. At the end of the year I’ll be moving to London to take up my place on my journalism diploma with News Associates. The thought of this fills me with terror and lots of happiness ...Ainscough and I are currently recruiting housemates, apply via Facebook =)

4.       Finally handing in the dissertation. I cannot explain how happy I’ll be when m y 10,000 words are finally over with. This is all I’ll say on the matter.

5.       I may take up painting. This is not a New Year’s Resolution, because I’ve never been a huge fan of those. It’s just something I thought about today, whilst looking at my festive photographs and wondering if I could recreate them. So I’m not committing myself. In fact, I’ll probably never get round to it... unless someone buys me an easel, paints and canvas.

One of the many things that makes me rant is pointless fads, and the people who follow them seemingly blindfold without giving a second thought to what they actually mean.

In the last 48 hours, I have on numerous occasions been asked to change my Facebook profile picture to a cartoon. Why? This morning I was asked again, by one of my closest friends. ‘Have you changed your profile picture to a cartoon character?’ she bbm-ed. ‘No,’ I replied. ‘Why?’ Her response was ‘Do it, everyone else has. It’s for the NSPCC.’ But what was it actually going to do? After a long pause, the answer was exactly as I had expected: ‘I have no idea.’

Same friend, later in the day: ‘Change your profile picture. Do you realise you’re the only human on my Facebook chat?’

I quick tally of my ‘friends’ revealed that 197 out of 600-odd had replaced their own faces with those of lion cubs, Disney princesses, animated woodland creatures, mythical fairies, evil ogres, etc. Cute and nostalgic? Of course. Anything whatsoever to do with charity? Well...

The main question is, how many of these people are actually going to do anything of merit, after changing their identification pictures to Tigger, Cinderella, SpongeBob , et al? I would even go as far as saying that it is insulting to the NSPCC, which does such important work –because those who are urging others to change their pictures and then failing to actually meaningfully support the charity are almost giving an entirely different message than they wish:

‘Yeah, I know, child cruelty is terrible. We should STAMP IT OUT... yeah. What’s that, set up a standing order? What, money coming out of my bank account? Well, I would, but... £10 per month, seriously? That’s almost a night out, I don’t really think... I know, let’s all change our profile pictures to childhood cartoon characters instead, this perfunctory act will definitely buy an abused child safe overnight shelter! I support the NSPCC! ’

This meaningless act of changing profile pictures means nothing at all –if you actually care about the cause you’re saying you support, you WILL do something concrete about it.

Money comes out of my bank account every month for Cancer Research UK, I’ve given up my Saturdays for the Oxfam Bookshop and helped to build an orphanage in Africa and led Rainbow units for 7 years. So don’t try to pin me down as not being interested in charity, just because I’m not jumping onto your meaningless bandwagon.

Simply raising awareness means very little post James Bulger, Victoria Climbie and Peter Connolly. We all know about the horrific things that happen in this world, so instead of indulging in pointless fads, act.

Of course, those who donate money or time to the NSPCC and have changed their profile pictures to cartoon characters should feel proud of what they are doing. Everyone else, however, should be ashamed of themselves.

On second thoughts, maybe I’ll change my picture to the Grinch.  

29th November

Hola!

Graduation terror I’ve just checked my academic inbox expecting another thirteen emails about M&S grad schemes and opportunities in engineering (thanks Angela Bywater and Milkround, for conspiring to waste my time marking as read) and found a notice confirming our graduation dates.

Well thanks Lancaster, as if we aren’t all stressed out enough already.

Setting feminism back approximately 200 years , it’s Gillers After 10 hours of campus today (count ‘em, third year is hardcore) I was very happy to get back to my comfy flat this evening just in time for a bit of flatmate banter and jungle nonsense. Gillian McKeith seems to be reaching new levels of lunacy every night. I don’t feel sorry for her in the least (what the FRECK is she doing in there?) but I hate to imagine the kind of crap her daughters are getting at school. It’s pretty selfish of her, in all honesty...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-P1BtqqD0WA&feature=related

Christmas no.1? I've heard it's already in the top 30, so let's get downloading and beat X Factor...

Lancaster dodges the snow, again Once again looked out of my window, as I did last night, to find the carpark hidden under a glittery sheathe of snow. And three minutes after I’d opened my curtains to take in the winteriness of it, the snow stopped. Again, like last night. Am I causing this?

Beautiful visitors and too much vodka After 3 nights out in a row I’m looking forward to a few days of sobriety and a lot of sleep. The last few days have been so busy, but brilliant at the same time –a visit from one of my fave Lancaster exports, the absolute beaut Katy Shaw, meant very little sleep and a very, very messy couple of evenings. Highlights include ending up in Hustle in my huge cold-defying lecture cardigan (absolutely beautiful photographs), seeing a ghost in the toilets and then a man in terrifying angel wings on the bus home, and a lovely meal at The Borough, a restaurant in Dalton Square that I will definitely be visiting again.

The Shaw is one of my very favourite people and one of my best friends ever and I miss her an inordinate amount now she’s in Madrid. I hope she knows how much she means to everyone here ...massive love ♥

Fairytale productivity and beautiful words in secret corner Aside from the drunken debauchery inflicted on us by our usually absent friend, I’ve also managed to get 2000 words of my dissertation written. It’s a massive weight off my mind, and was probably even worth spending my Saturday afternoon in the secret corner of the library for... just. To further the productivity, this week’s Women’s Lit module reading was the Virago Book of Love Poetry. I’m not going to lie or pretend I’m anything other than a massive geek at this point, because the half of the book that I’ve got through so far has pretty much reminded me why I’m doing the degree that I am. I don’t think I can ever remember seeing more beautiful words written on a page before. Why are these female poets not better known?

Little Red Riding Hood While on the subject of dissertation and general geeking, Rotten Tomatoes tells me that a new gothic version of Little Red Riding Hood starring Amanda Seifried is out next March... this is of massive interest to me since the dissertation that is currently the bane of my life is on the rewriting of fairytales, but is probably not going to be that thrilling to anyone else. So I’ll move on to much more interesting events...

Parisian planning I’m massively excited after booking flights to Paris to see another Lancaster placement-er, Louise, who is spending a year teaching in Le Mans. After first being seduced by Jet2 and their improbable £30 return flights (who were they trying to kid? Not us... ) we reverted to good old reliable Easyjet –I’m beginning to feel that I’m keeping the airline going singlehandedly.

I’ve never properly done Paris before so I feel that it is very important that I experience it as soon as possible, for the cultural and educational opportunities that it brings... I am also looking forward to adding to my growing portfolio of photographs that should be entitled ‘Absolutely Inebriated in European Capital Cities’. No, I’m not pretending it’s going to be a museum-laden trip, although there may be a couple of historical landmarks thrown in.

I can’t believe we have to wait until April, but with four 3000 word essays to write, a festive London trip after term has ended, then Christmas itself, a New Year back in Lancaster and another newspaper placement afterwards, I’m thinking the time is going to fly!

Rediscovering words I’ve been writing a bit today too –not a massive amount, but little is better than nothing. It’s so easy to lose sight of your interests as a student, and fall into the perpetual cycle of working and drinking and sleeping and eating and repeating, and after two years of this I’m making a conscious effort to stop it in third year. I’ve recently revisited a couple of stories that never really got going, so they might appear on here in the near future if I can make them decent J

Keep reading

xxx

10th October...

Thoughts on Entering 3^rd Year ....Cynicism and Cider; or, what happens when you start your final year of university and realise that in a year's time you'll be moving 200 miles south to Wimbledon to start a training course with £20,000+ worth of debt and no idea how to pay a gas bill. Christ.

 

Freshers week of third year has just ended, and I feel old. Yes, old. Not old like I should be settling down with a Labrador and a suburban bungalow and a copy of Reader’s Digest, but old as in I might be getting past the ‘student’ mode of living that has been the norm for the last couple of years.

 

Allow me to explain.

 

My feelings this past week have leant towards the notion that going out every night is massively over-rated; freshers week is forced. The amount of over-eager freshers reps who have asked me if I know where to park on South West/  which group I’m in for the bar crawl/ etc etc etc, only to be silenced by one shot of my cynical glare and the unspoken message ‘I’m a bloody third year!’ has made me feeling sort of… well, bitchy.

 

But I’m finding it hard to feel bad about my cynicism.

 

When I started here in October 2008, everyone I met told me the same things. Freshers week was going to be the MOST AMAZING week of my life. I was going to meet SO MANY people. It was going to be the BEST thing I’d remember about university.

 

Erm, yes. Because the constant pressure to be perky, to talk to every single person you meet in case they become your new best friend, to ward off the hangover in case you come across as grouchy, to survive all week on four hours sleep a night, to live up to the expectations of everyone around you, not to mention your home friends who will doubtless be having the VERY BEST week of their lives too really is a recipe for a great week.

 

I could never escape the feeling that freshers week is the most superficial time that anyone has, at any university. Everyone is on their best behaviour; no one is genuine. And in any case, why force getting to meet people? I have a beautiful, hilarious, individual group of friends at this university. But I met them in seminars, over long lunches, and on film nights in their flats. A deeper, less practised and more natural connection was forged than would have been possible at 3am on the post-headphone disco Sugar bus.

 

I felt mildly sorry for the first years I saw on their Big Night Out last week, all fresh faced in their horrible t-shirts that identified them as freshers, sat around tables in Friary with their VKs, determined to have a good night. The best advice they could have been given was not which bars have the best drinks offers (they’ll discover this themselves soon enough) but that freshers week is very, very unlikely to be the high point of their time at university –nor should they expect it to be.

 

The best week of their lives? I can almost guarantee that by November they’ll have topped it easily.