Let it snow! (Or not)

I always feel so Scrooge like when I say that I hate snow, but I do, I hate it. What's there to hate? I love how pretty it looks, how you can take some of the most amazing photographs (see below), spontaneous snowball fights, and wrapping up in woolies. And I loved all of this until I started driving.

Driving in the snow is one of the most terrifying experiences I've ever had to endure, firstly, as a child you're blissfully ignorant to how dangerous the snow actually is, not just for cars, but the increased fall risk, the risk of the cold in certain groups of the population, the risk the ice poses to anyone. But driving is terrifying, the first time anything bad happened it really wasn't that bad, I was driving to sixth form, but before I even got out of my road I span round, it happened a few times until I managed to turn around and go home.

Yesterday, I got stuck getting out of a side road next to my house, and would have been completely stuck if it hadn't have been for the help from 3 strangers who were absolutely amazing! But today was something else

I had an exam this afternoon, and the plan was - Go to uni, do my exam, go and grab some food, go back to uni and revise until late and go home. Which in essence worked until it started to snow near the end of my exam. So I finished the exam and found Sarah. We looked at the snow which was falling a lot but just melting as it hit the ground, which, for a 10 minute round trip, really shouldn't be that much of an issue, and I'm one of these people who don't believe that a little bit of the white stuff should grind everything to a halt.

But apparently it does, with a country so unequipped to deal with this kind of situation (and to be fair, it doesn't happen very often!) a 5 minute trip can turn into 50 minutes, to which this point the snow had began to settle on the ground and mixed with the general wetness of the situation to form a thick slush, so after a LOT of shouting, panicking and general crying, we managed to coerce some strangers into pushing my car safely onto the pavement, it was far to dangerous to continue and I couldn't release the handbrake without the car sliding backwards.

It turns out we wouldn't have been able to proceed further anyway, we passed a bus at the top of the hill diagonally blocking the road, and with reports of a bus at the bottom of the hill which had basically split in half (a bendy bus, not actual metal!) we were absolutely stuck.

So at this point, we're both wearing pretty inappropriate shoes, and with a walk home ahead of us we needed to stock up on supplies for warmth and food resources, but what we met at Asda was emptiness, with the few people who were there panicking about how to get home, because Hollingbury was basically cut off from the rest of Brighton

In all honesty, the walk home probably would have been nice in better weather, and we had some amazing quotes come out of it like 'why did we bother with a car, trolley is clearly the best way to travel!!' and not only am I so glad I wasn't alone, but being with Sarah not only made it bearable, but almost enjoyable :)

An hour and a half later, and almost 4 hours after we left uni, we're home. After walking basically 4 and half miles in the snow.

And this is why I hate snow,

All because some white stuff fell from the sky!!!

XOX

The abnormal, acute stress reaction, by me....

Todays been a bad day, today I've just wanted to cry.

I wanted to cry because things kept going wrong, I didn't have the right notes on me, I'm far too chubby for someone of my height, that no one would help when I was almost dropping all my stuff down the stairs, the fact that I know that would be different if I was attractive, the fact that I've had to de-ice my car twice today, that there's ambiguity and I know the lecture slides are wrong but I don't want to be penalised for writing the wrong thing, that I have coursework due in tomorrow that I have no motivation to complete, because someone scratched my car, because I don't work at tesco anymore nor can I look at my club card points because my privilege card expired, because I don't know how well I can do in theses exams.

And I know I wouldn't be bothered by any of this if I wasn't ridiculously stressed out,
I do my best work in exams because I work well under pressure, but psychologically I'm falling apart slowly so I'm going to have a nice (lukewarm) shower and get a film in, some dinner and do the last few questions without any pressure and I'll submit the one due in Friday tomorrow as well

15 days until its all over, see how I fare then!!

XOX

Observations from the library :D

Pretty standard for working here but here goes

1. Somehow it's been an hour and a half since I last looked at the time
2. The multitude of pages I just wrote turns out to only be 6
3. Somehow it got dark since I last looked up
4. And I didn't notice someone take the chair away from beside me
5. Now I've stopped my arms are aching more than they do after a work out!
6. 2 of the 4 electrical devices i bought with me have run out of charge, with the other two being dangerously close
7. There's a lot fewer people here than when I last looked up
8. And I need to be home in 15 minutes if I'm going to be at all productive tonight!!

But in all seriousness I've actually got what I wanted to get done :)

The joys of exam time!

XOX

Tomorrow, Or Should I Say Today?

Tomorrow is a big day, Tomorrow is approaching too fast, I'm not ready for tomorrow. So what do I do? I sit here at 2am, completely awake, completely unable to sleep. My mind is racing about the gravity of the amount that I need to do and I don't know if I can actually physically cope with it.



I'm probably being dramatic.



Tomorrow brings the beginning of my fifth term of this course,  out of a potential 9 that I will experience in Brighton. And it starts with exams. If any of you have read my blogs from May then you'll know exactly how stressed I get about exams and now is no exception. But this time I'm going to do things slightly differently. I'm setting myself on a rigorous schedule of doing 8 hours a day for 6 days a week, spanning through the rest of January doing either assignments, lectures or revision, and I'll be doing this in uni. Here it is:

1. Get up at 8am, this is achievable by setting the alarm for 7am
2. Spend time with God in the morning, prayer is going to be so essential, and I won't get anywhere on my own
3. Make sure I have breakfast
4. Get into uni for around 9, stay there.
5. Make sure I have lunch
6. Make sure I have dinner
7. Sleep at a decent time (ignoring the fact that I'm currently blogging at 2am!)
8. Make sure I get to the gym 3 times a week, the increase in fitness will help to increase productivity as well as getting a break from academic pursuits.

All of these seem small, but at the moment, as someone who has no routine, who eats only when she is hungry, and seems to have a total lack of discipline, then this is going to be difficult for me. And with the increased pressure of the grades I'm going to achieve here not only impacting on my final degree classification but my chances of getting anywhere with my application to medical school.

Wish me luck, I'll update soon,

XOX

Resolutions, family, presents and too much turkey..

Belatedly- happy festive season!!
I've had the most amazing few weeks, beginning with a lovely early Christmas dinner with my 2 favourites, to going home, to having an amazing and very sober beginning to 2013!

Of course nothing seems to go without some kind of hiccup, and mine was £110 worth of repairs to my car, but also a solved mystery to why I've had so many problems and I'm now entering 2013 with a non clunky sounding car that runs like a dream (definitely the first time I've been able to say that!), but it meant that I couldn't drive down to south wales as originally planned therefore my car hasn't yet celebrated her 90,000th birthday.

I'm entering 2013 full of hope, because 2013 is going to be a big one. This year will see me apply for medical school after 5 years of anticipation, it will see a new phase to my currently 4 year relationship, because after what seems like an eternity of being stagnant, this year we will at least have to start looking towards the future both as individuals and as a couple. This is the year I turn 21, which seems so adult! But I think it'll prompt me to mature further to be able to take on commitments and mentally prepare for the possibility of becoming a doctor. It's the year I'll take the UKCAT, and the GAMSAT, which is frightening, on top of completing my second year, but I'm so much more ready now than I ever was when I was 17. The advantages of applying to medicine later in life is that you have the added responsibility and maturity, which I now see as necessary and I'm so glad that I'm here in Brighton first, because it feels so destined that I am here. I no longer resent the decisions I made when I was 16 but see them as something that was admittedly awful at the time, but its led me to where I am now and I'm so thankful for that. This year im going to at least look into where I'm going to live for at least the next few years of my adult life, and im excited! Finally this year is going to be a big one in my relationship with God, I don't know how yet, I just know it's going to be huge and I'm so excited by it!!

Now on to resolutions:
1. Take more photos, this is going to be a momentous year, and I want to document it, I will be doing a photo a day for a year which I will document on tumblr, of which I will put a link on here
2. Read the bible more and seek God whole-heartedly this year, because then I will learn to rely on him more completely, and because I can't do this alone
3. As always lose some weight, increasing my exercise will increase my productivity, essential for this year! And I need to develop a more healthy relationship with food to improve my overall health, I'm equipped to do this, I just need to not be so sedentary in this area.
4. Become better with my finances, at least more aware. I'm a student so I should budget like one, instead of having a too laid- back attitude because 'it's fine, I have a job now...'

And to everyone who reads this blog regularly or randomly stumbles across it, happy new year, may it be prosperous!

XOX

Brighton I love you, but you're bringing me down

I don't know what it is that makes me feel not quite at home here, Church-wise I'm more settled than I ever was in Reading, The people are lovely, I'm always busy, always stuck in. I have friends, a job, and all the home comforts I got used to in Reading, including my little saxo, but something's missing.

I don't know what it is.

I think its the phenomenon where you can be in a crowded room but still feel so alone, Brighton's so busy, it's so easy to get caught up with things but not only do I not know what's going on with my friends back home, but I don't know what's going on with people here. I have people who care about me and want to be there for me but I have a tendency to shut them out. On the back of my last blog, 4 people said to me that I don't need to be alone and that they'd come with me if that was what I wanted, and not because they felt they had to but because they wantedto, which really means a lot. But despite this I feel like I'm inwardly screaming but no-one knows. I don't know why I'm finding this winter tougher than normal, I guess it's so easy to get homesick this time of year,

I love Brighton, but I can't help but feel down

XOX

When It Rains...

I hate this time of year with a passion, I don't like how cold it gets, I don't like the leaf litter, the wind that chills you to your bones, particularly by the seaside. I hate the stress of Christmas  I hate that I've worked the only 2 days that the sun's even been visible this month, I don't like de-icing the car, I hate what this time of year represents. I hate the rain.

Sometimes when I'm in Brighton, I have days when I don't want to get out of bed in the morning, I don't want to do this course when it's so uncertain about whether or not I'll actually get to where I want to go, and I just want to go back home, back to a time when things were so much simpler. I don't want to be here alone at Christmastime. And it gets so stressful as well, uni are really piling on the workload at the moment, along with a multitude of commitments, I literally don't have any time to sleep, because that's the only free time I seem to have recently, which sucks because actually, I love my course, I love this city, I love that I have really supportive housemates, who have to put up with me when I have days like this.

A hearse passed me today, with a coffin in the back, and I began to wonder. Who was this person? What happened to them? What's going to happen to the people left behind, the people whose world has just changed completely. Then I found myself crying at a junction in the car. And again when I got home. But it serves as a reminder of why I'm doing everything, why I'm doing all of this. I want to help people, I want to be the person who can save lives, prevent people going through pain, treat people and be there when I can give people the good news. I want to make a difference. I want to change the perception that people have of  doctors as being uncaring, seeing people as cases rather than individuals. I know some are amazing, but one bad experience can alter the perception and overshadow that. I know this because when I was younger I would judge all doctors on experiences that I've had with a select few, and there's been a lot of doctors that I've indirectly (and some directly) encountered in my lifetime. I want to try my absolute hardest to help people, even if I can't cure them, and I know that I won't be able to cure everyone. When I think of this it makes all of it more than worthwhile. I couldn't imagine doing this if I didn't have an ultimate goal.

It's just difficult sometimes

But in all actuality, I love this time of year.

I love decorating the house for Christmas, I love the looks on the boys faces when they get presents, I love being able to see my family, see my friends, see Adam. I love being able to wear chunky knit scarves and kick the leaves on the ground, I love laughing at myself when I fall over from kicking the leaves on the ground. I love being able to watch beautiful pink sunsets, even if it is from the windows of Asda. I love putting the heating on in the car, hot water bottles, blankets, white hot chocolate. I love playing secret Santa  I love the snow (or the hope that we might get some snow) I love buying presents for people, and seeing expressions when they open them. I love the Christmas lights, both in Brighton and back home and I love the anticipation I feel when I know that this year I'll be driving home for Christmas, even if I can't go home for long.

I love that I'm doing what I really want to do in one of the most amazing places I know.

So even when things seem bad, there's so much more out there to enjoy also,

XOX