What’s going on

I know everyone says it, but this first couple of weeks of college have truly felt like a few months. I feel like September has simultaneously gone extremely slow (it seems like a life ago since I went to see Hamlet on the 5^th – oh yes, that’s something that happened! I’ll come back to it) and then it also feels like I’ve missed it all... It’s October next week and that’s a bit crazy isn’t it? Less than three months until Christmas! (But Halloween first of course).

I have no idea how long it’s been since I posted on here. Probably not very long, really, but as I mentioned, time seems extremely slow at the moment so it feels like it’s been about 15 years.  Anyway, I just figured, whilst I still have some time and a functioning laptop (I typed that bit a bit sceptically, hoping my laptop wouldn’t suddenly shut down from the sheer levels of irony) I should probably write something on here. As I have previously said, this is a bit of a stress reliever, so there’s another reason to talk to you today.

I’m getting really stressed lately. I’m getting stressed over things that shouldn’t stress me out and I have no idea why! I think it partly may be because I’ve just gone back to college. Now, to be fair, my teachers haven’t exactly piled loads of homework on me but the first week or so of college usually means the “Hello nice to meet you - here’s what you’ll have to struggle through this year!” period. The total word count of all the coursework I have to do is slowly mounting up... Now I know everyone else has the same and it’s not due for ages but to me right now it feels as if I’m going to have to have it all ready for next week or something...  It’s like if I have a list of more than 5 things to do in a day I start getting stressed about it. I need to stop this!

It doesn’t help either that what I want to do in my future seems to have conflicting opinions all over the place whenever I ask for advice! I’m very unsure about what I’m actually going to do and the amount teachers keep asking me about it makes me just not want to talk about it at all! I won’t go into the boring details but basically they’re telling me negative things I already know and it’s sounding a bit like a stuck record. Even though I don’t know what I’m actually going to do, I know what I’m doing (does that make sense? It’s pretty late).

Anyway! September then – what’s been happening? Well, at the start of September I went to the Barbican to see Hamlet with Benedict Cumberbatch (that makes it sound like I was sat with him... He was playing Hamlet just to be clear). I go to the theatre as much as I can and it was such an amazing performance. I somehow managed to get row B tickets but the way the seats curved around it meant I was about a metre away from the stage and at one point Benedict was lying down for about 5 minutes in a scene about two and a half metres away from me. It’s so surreal to see an actor you’ve only seen on television and film act right in front of you. I could go on about it for ages but I won’t seeing as I realise I’ve just used about 150 words alone just saying all that! Plus I don’t want to spoil anything. If you want to see it in the cinema though you totally should!

Most of the rest of September has been lost to the depths of education and I’m a bit disorientated but overall it’s been a good month really. I honestly do need to get organised though because I have to start applying to universities next month and it’s stressing me out trying to pick things whilst questioning everything 24/7! Plus there’s the fact that I haven’t finished my personal statement yet and it’s pretty rubbish at the moment to be honest. So yes, better get onto that soon.

Anyway, it’s just gone midnight and I should probably attempt to keep up some sort of non-nocturnal sleep cycle!

Laura.

Back to reality.

I’m not going to lie to you, I nearly started writing this blog post in the same word document as my personal statement... That would have been interesting if I’d accidentally posted that thing online... Anyway, I’m sure you’re all wondering why I’m posting again so soon and to be frank I’m wondering the same thing. I suppose it’s just because it’s a dull (both in weather and activities) bank holiday Monday and I just feel like doing something sort of productive. That’s the thing though – I’m not sure this blog could technically be counted as productive. I’m also writing it now because I’m taking the opportunity of my laptop actually working at a normal functioning speed. Yes, you actually read that right – the old beast is actually working. I think it heard distant whispers of “maybe I need to replace it” and finally decided to get its shit together. I’m sure it will be back to its old crashing self soon enough but for now I’m just going to enjoy the absence of (not responding).

I do actually have things I need to be doing, though. First are some pretty thick handbooks I need to read for the volunteering I just started. It’s in my local museum and although I love history, I’m a modernist at heart and I know nothing about the Tudors really so this is going to take a bit of learning to get me up to the standard of being able to actually point at something and go “this is this thing and it did this in this year”. It should be pretty good though – although I’m a bit rubbish at the whole working in the cafe lark. Apparently I don’t know how to serve tea to a lady (yes, it’s that proper) so I’m going to have to learn quickly.

I also need to learn my maths. Still. I did mention in the last blog post that I was leaving to go and do some maths revision and let’s just say that didn’t exactly happen. So I’m still in the same situation. I’m going to have to force myself to do some in a bit though because I will be well and truly screwed when I get back to college if I don’t.

Is it weird I’m sort of looking forward to having a timetable and set routine again? I love lazing about doing nothing as much as the next person, but it’s literally gotten to the point where I do not know what to watch on Netflix. I have watched all 61 episodes of Skins and all the Louis Theroux documentaries on there and I have hit a dead end with television shows. Yet another reason I look forward to September – new television series! But yes, I think going back to college will give me a bit of a motivation to actually do something more productive. Plus, I’m rubbish at working at home. Knowing my college though I probably won’t get my finalised timetable until the eleventh hour – I’m not joking, I missed twenty minutes of my first English lesson last year because they changed the room like an hour before the lesson. I just want to know what I’m dealing with already, and also who I’m dealing with – I swear if they don’t put me with my friends again this year I will be mildly narked.

On a lighter note, I got accepted into a Channel 4 workshop day in September! They said I have a chance to network so hopefully I can find more out about the television industry and all that jazz. It should be really good – even if I do have to wake up at about 5am to catch my train. They even have chances to win further experience opportunities, so fingers crossed! I'll probably talk about it at some point...

Anyway, I  really need to do some maths now. For real, this time.

Laura. 

Summertime Madness

Summer break is always a bit daunting really. I know this sounds a crazy thing to say but let me carry on... Basically, I feel like I'm a bit useless during summer. I think a lifetime of television has conditioned me to feel like I should be doing something every day during summer. Whether that be something productive or fun, I should be doing something cool and not just lazing around on Netflix most of the time. I've literally spent most of this summer watching Skins and Louis Theroux documentaries (I recommend them strongly!)

Let's be real though, I'm never going to be as productive as Phineas and Ferb in their summer vacation (sidenote - how did they afford to do all those things?) but I still can't help but feel a bit useless. The thing is I do actually have a list (written out on actual paper, how official!) of all the things I need to do this summer. I'll just say it's not quite completed... I've attempted and sort of muddled together a draft for my personal statement so hopefully the teachers won't be too disappointed when they have to read it. It's so hard trying to sell yourself when you don't really do a lot! I end up writing about how I dropped my pen in year 8 and it gave me the skills of resilience to carry on... (I am kidding, don't worry). I know it may sound a bit silly but I really do feel a bit silly when writing bits of it. I'm sure I have gained the skills from certain things but it is pretty hard to put into formal coherent words (you know how bad I am at formal writing - look at this blog).

It doesn't really help either that my laptop has some sort of vendetta against me and refuses to even load. I'm not even joking, it's ridiculous. The amount of times I see (not responding) a day is mindnumbing. I am actually typing this out on my iPad right now as the blank word document I opened 10 minutes ago is still not opening! Wonderful. I'll have to stick it out a bit longer until university though, so I'm counting on you laptop, even if you are sort of held together in places by tape...

It doesn't actually feel like summer though - not to me. I may be the only one who feels this way but I think that whole endless feeling of summer holidays has ended for me now. Am I growing up or is it just the fact the weather is horrible (typical, Britain, nice one) and I have lots of work to do? Who knows.

On a more positive note, though, my summer has been pretty good really! I went to the National Theatre with some friends at the start of August to see Three Days In The Country. It was such an amazing play and I am still shocked that I managed to get a second row ticket for £5 (thank you theatre for student tickets!). I also met Mark Gatiss afterwards and if you know me you'll know I'm a big fan of his work and I was so thrilled to meet him properly! I am also going to see Hamlet at the start of September (second row again - what is it with my tickets?) and I am incredibly excited to see that. I've also been on some great days out, one of which being the Warner Brothers studio tour - trust me if you like Harry Potter you need to visit! I also went to the space museum which again if you know me, you'll know I do love space a lot. So much in fact that me and my friend went down to Bristol and we went a bit mad about the prospect of going in a planetarium (I was also introduced to Shakeaway milkshakes that day and it was beautiful). 

Another thing that's happened this month is my exam results came out! Now strangely I didn't really feel much of a tense buildup to the day as I did with my GCSE results, even though these are essentially more important. I suppose it was just the exams went so quickly and felt a bit like mock exams (and our mocks didn't feel like mocks either...). Also the fact that I had no massive break at the end of them - no, we had to go straight into work for second year... Which I am continuing to do now. I got the grades I wanted though so I guess all of the work paid off! Plus, I can drop psychology finally. I know maths is probably going to kill me but I don't think I can take any more research methods, honestly. 

The pressure is well and truly on now, though. I have the predicted grades I need to apply to the universities I want but the next challenge lies in actually achieving those grades. I'm not going to have any sort of social life next year at this rate (although let's be realistic I didn't really have one anyway). One of my biggest problems now though is that I have completely forgotten how to do any of my maths, which is slightly awkward as I have a test on it all when I get back... That should be fun.

It's been a nice change to actually speak about things I am doing positively for a change! I am sorting some other stuff behind the scenes such as the looming dread of university applications, but I'll just have to power through that one! I've literally just realised I haven't updated this blog since the end of June! Oh, what a terrible blogger I am. 

I'm going to go and try to cram maths now.

Laura.

Universities, Universities, Universities.

I often find there's nothing more daunting than a blank word document (as does my computer too, apparently, as it has frozen up even at the concept of opening one up). This is my situation for a few things at the moment. First is this blog, I suppose. Now don't get me wrong, I love this blog and how it gives me the opportunity to rant at whatever I so please... However, actually thinking of a topic that I can talk about for more than a paragraph is really hard for me, especially as all I have going on in my life is universities, universities, universities (I suppose choosing universities it is a bit like Location, Location, Location in a way, isn't it?). This brings me onto the second reason I'm finding blank word documents daunting at the moment: personal statements.

I actually need to start my personal statement. Soon. I need to get in a draft for September and I am yet to write a word. I mean I do have a few things I can put in there but for me it is just the issue that I have no idea how to write about myself properly. As you know all too well from this blog, I am sarcastic, I am a pessimist, and I am a bit rubbish at drumming up motivation sometimes. (I do really want to go to university though). So, when I usually write about myself, it's usually in the form of sarcastic rant-like blogposts such as the one you see before you. Plus, of course, we're back to the issue of the blank word document. 

I do realise I'm just going to have to get on and start it. I feel like I need Shia Labeouf shouting "JUST DO IT" in my ears at all hours of the day right now. I think the reason this blank document is so intimidating is the fact that whatever I write on it is going to determine whether I get into the university I want. I mean, some of the talks I’ve heard have said “They don’t even read them don’t worry” but really, why work to that assumption? If someone might read it, I’m going to make sure it’s good.

I'm also starting something called an EPQ. Now if you're not from the UK or just don't know what it is, an EPQ stands for Extended Project Qualification, and for me this basically means a 6,000 word dissertation on any topic of my choice. I do not know how to write a dissertation. Or plan one. I do not even have a question set up yet. I do have a lot of extra reading though... My theory is that if I do most of it in the next few weeks, I’ll get it over and out of the way (mainly, I mean just the research -  I still have to write it)

I've been spending a bit of time looking around universities lately and it seems that the decision that should be easy to go "I don't like this university" and "I'll apply for that one definitely" really isn't easy at all. Going back to Location, Location, Location (property show in the UK, if you didn’t know!) it really is getting like that. It’s as if I’m looking for loads of things at once (you know how it is – “I want 5 bathrooms, two kitchens, a fountain, and a private annex and dance studio for my dog...”)

My biggest weakness has to be pretty buildings, though. Even if my mum is saying "The course, the course!" at some points I seem completely in a trance, repeating "it's so pretty! Look at that ceiling. Oh my god that bookcase". I can't help it. I just love pretty buildings. I probably need to counteract that a bit though...

Some universities seem to have the perfect course but everything else isn’t so wonderful, or vice versa. I can’t seem to find the perfect mix right now but I think I may have to compromise. You do learn what to ask, though. Something I always like to do when looking around universities is say to myself “If it was raining and cold and you were tired as hell on a Monday morning, would you still feel like shit here? Would I be okay to get however long on public transport to a lecture?” because really, sometimes thinking about it in a different way than just the summery sunshine setting that you first see it in can make a difference. Also, ask the students questions, a lot of questions, no matter how small.

Something that I’ve also been doing is writing everything down. With the open days so close to one another most of the time, it’s surprisingly easy to forget little things that you thought on the day. So I’ve got yet another word document for that. I know it might be a bit frivolous but I think it might help. To be honest though, I’m just so indecisive that I don’t know if I’ll ever choose.

Anyway, I’ll stop rambling at you now. Thanks for reading!

Laura.

Boredom: my old unwanted friend

Hello again!

As I opened up this blog to write a post I realised that it’s only been about 4 days since I last posted. It’s not really me just making up for the lost three months of no blogging, though. Since my exams have ceased, I have encountered my old unwanted friend called boredom. Now I’m not talking about the “Oh this revision is so boring!” or “Lessons are so boring” type of boredom, I’m talking about the days-on-end-not-doing-anything-productive-whatsoever boredom. Even though I’m happy exams are over, I kind of feel like I don’t know what to do with myself.

When I said this to my mum I laughed when she asked whether I was missing exams. In a way though, the more I think about it, I kind of get what she means. Of course I don’t miss exams and revision (who would?) but at least having all of that going on a) gave me something to do and b) made it so I felt I was doing something with my life. It says it all when I have hours to watch TV yet I find myself wanting to find something more interesting to do instead. So basically my conclusion from that is that I need to do something with myself. Now.

It’s sort of like when a child wants a toy and only really wants it when they don’t have it. In my situation, I thought doing nothing but watching television and films all day was the dream whilst I had a bottomless pit of revision cards to look over but now it’s all over, the novelty has worn off a bit.

To be totally honest with you, I had a bit of an existential crisis this week (only briefly). I mean yes, it’s always bubbling away inside my brain but sometimes it just erupts in a few hours of oh god what am I doing with my life? I’m sure everyone must feel like this at some point. I don’t have a clear path to follow. It’s like there should be a clear answer but someone very tall has just stood in front of me so I can’t see it... (I’m pretty sure that was the worst simile I’ve ever come up with... Note to self: never become a poet, Laura). Hopefully once I’ve started looking around universities and written the oh-so-dreaded personal statement, I’ll feel a bit better. Does anyone have any advice? I’m feeling a bit lost with it all.

Going back to a bit of positivity, it was my birthday on Friday! I'm now 17! Not quite an adult but not quite a child... Bit of an ambiguous age, really! It was great to see my friends and I got a lot of chocolate (although not as much as last year - my god that was a sight to behold) and so many cool presents. I had such a nice day so shout out to my lovely friends (both offline and online) for making it so nice! I love you all! (Wow that got cheesy very quickly, didn't it?)

Anyway, back to doing nothing productive!

Laura. 

Age is but a number (...and a social construct)

Hello!
My exams finished on Friday and true to my word, I am back! I must admit, though, that I thought I’d feel a lot more... free. It seems like a bit of an anti-climax for me now that I have loads of free time. Maybe it’s due to the fact that they’re making us go back to college on Monday to start second year work! Slightly depressing... My 17^th birthday is looming on Friday and I don’t feel very excited for that either! Is that something normal? Like I sort of wish I could go back to being 10 for a week and just countdown to my birthday for ages like it was Christmas (although the day itself always seemed slightly disappointing compared to the build-up... is that just me?). But that’s the reality of growing up, I guess. It will still be good, I think! (My friend is making me a cake. I love cake).

Oh listen to me getting all melancholy and theoretical... Anyway, I better focus on what has happened since I left this blog! Now, I doubt any of you haven’t heard from me in the last three months or so because I’m on twitter but just in the possibility that I have people who follow my life exclusively on here, I’ll just say I have done nothing. I’m not even kidding! Apart from exams, nothing has really happened in my life. Do I hear you gasp? No, it’s really just usual for me. I should probably start looking for work experience, but seeing as I have to be 18 for the majority of it, I still have a year to go, really... I’ll have to sort something.

Driving! That’s exciting isn’t it? Something I can now officially do when I’m 17. Although I’m still not counted as an adult. Oh social constructs, what a joy! I feel there’s always build up to ‘big’ ages that I never really get excited for. For example, I’m not really excited to drive. I’m sure I’ll enjoy it once I get going but at the moment I have no urge to be able to jump in the nearest car and drive off into the sunset. Okay, that’s a bit dramatic but you get my point. It’s funny, I’ve only just realised today that I have been old enough to legally buy a lottery ticket for a whole year and I haven’t even bought one! I could literally win £8 million on the lottery this weekend yet I still couldn’t buy a drink at a bar. Or drive. Or vote. Or buy fireworks. Or get a commercial pilot’s licence... (I am googling these – there are quite a few).

It makes me laugh when I think back to my 9 year old self, thinking when I was a teenager I’d always be going to cool parties and going into town on my own (wow the independence is too much to comprehend). In hindsight though, I guess we all romanticised a bit. We didn’t know the true difficulty of actually getting a life when all we had to worry about was what was on television at the weekend or the “you’re not my friend anymore” school feuds on the playground. In a way I wish I still had a bit of that sky-high optimism I had when I was younger, but what can you do?

Anyway, right now I’m putting off a couple of projects I need to catch up on (yes, they’re already piling on the work, pretty much) but instead I thought I’d take a while to talk to you guys! I want to get back into the swing of things with this blog. As always, thank you for being my hypothetical stress ball (but not in a weird way).

Laura.

I've hit the wall. (Metaphorically...)

I never really know the right way to start these, honestly. Hello, I guess? That always works, I suppose, but I feel I should shake it up a bit... What the hell am I talking about... Welcome to another edition of 'Uneventful life rants with Laura'! I'm going to try and be a little more optimistic this week, I think. I'll just bury my head in the sand at the thought of exams in less than two months for a moment and talk about something more positive for a change. 

What do you even like to read about? I tried asking twitter once and all I got was a plethora of my friends suggesting I write about them. As much as I would love to write a three part trilogy of novels about the wonders of my 'squad', I'm just a bit lazy for that, honestly. This blog is supposed to be some sort of account of my life and its (non-existent) amazing plot twists, trials and tribulations. Should I talk more about myself on here? I'm not sure. As I've said previously, my life isn't exactly something very interesting, and it would literally feel like I was trying to make you excited about a new brand of beige paint or something. I can give it a go, I guess. Please feel free to send your suggestions...

Not right now, however... It's happened. I've finally hit the "oh god I need to revise wall"... Slowly but surely I think I'm getting there with motivation to revise! Thank god. So this unfortunately means I probably can't update as regularly as I usually do (I would put a sad face in here but since this is a 'formal' blogpost, just imagine my melancholy expression, gazing off into the distance) but I will still try to if I can. I will be back at some point with, yes, you guessed it, more plotless rambles of me stating my inner insecurities and angers in life! Oh a what a lot you have to look forward to!

But for now....

Laura.

Motivation

Hello! It’s been a while... Well, not really that long but it certainly feels like that. Boy, am I glad to see you guys. I have signed up to help with the student magazine and we’ve been writing our sample pieces this week. Basically I have volunteered to do the film and television reviews (I can realistically only pick one per issue really, I may go on too long) and I didn’t realise how hard it is to write reviews for things... I thought it would just all flow out of me naturally (that sounded odd) when I sat down at my laptop but it was actually really difficult to get the hang of. I hope I manage it eventually! I have also volunteered to do a ‘cool facts’ section, which, admittedly could have used a slightly more professional adjective in the name when I suggested it so I didn’t sound about six years old but oh well... They are cool facts. Cool fact: did you know that Uranus was originally going to be called George? That would have actually been hilarious.

Anyway, I’m muddling along with life in general I suppose. My main and only topic of conversation at parties is still “ooh sixth form” but hey, what can you do? I’ve just had my mock grades back and it seems like I’m going to have to carry on the dreaded English language as I actually did the best in it out of my subjects... Isn’t that ironic? (It’s like rain, on my non-existent wedding day...).

If I had a penny for every time I mentioned motivation in these blog posts I would have at least 23p. Motivation is the bane of my existence. I just cannot seem to stop procrastinating, it’s quite a big problem, honestly. My exams are in two months, for god’s sake. And here I go again, I literally have nothing else to talk about other than college at the moment.

I feel like I need to be a bit more adventurous really, I don’t actually do much. For somebody that has a maths test tomorrow morning, I’m not exactly revising, or even thinking about revising. I mean I used to get to the point where I was panicking whilst procrastinating but now it’s sort of descended into “I should be doing this but I don’t really feel the need or urgency to at all”. This is one of my worst habits – leaving things until last minute. I’m sure a lot of you might share this trait, but it’s actually becoming quite a problem for me lately. I’m having GCSE flashbacks...

When I say leaving things until last minute, my mind does have a lot of notice beforehand that it should be doing these things.  I’m not sure what goes on in that thought process, but the stress and oh god why haven’t I revised this yet doesn’t actually hit me until the eleventh hour. Whenever I have enough motivation to actually do some revision willingly (that is pretty rare), as soon as I’m finished, my mind instantly switches to the mode of “Wow Laura you have done so much revision you’re going to do so great just keep this up and work constantly” and then it switches off completely after about 5 minutes of this. It’s not great for keeping motivation up, honestly. When I’m doing history, I usually end up making up puns half the time... My friends know this very well...

Speaking of my friends, I feel like I should do more with them! (If you are reading this, friends, imagine I am that poster of Lord Kitchener pointing at you from all directions – “Your country needs YOU!” – you know the one). With summer fast approaching (although the weather seemed to change its mind today) I am yet again feeling the “Let’s do something cool!” motivation. So maybe I should. I’m not sure, I’ll probably say all this now and then in a few months I will be feeling lazy as hell.

Speaking of feeling lazy as hell, I’m going to go and sleep now I think (aka browse on my phone in bed for another hour in the dark).

Laura. 

Freedom (sort of)

It’s a Saturday and mock exams are over... Thank god! I'm free... for now. It’s been a bit of interesting week, really. My maths exam was a lot harder than I expected and I am pretty sure my teacher saw me mouthing swearwords at my paper in frustration. I think overall though my mocks went okay which is good. Well, as well as they could go with the unrelenting magnet of procrastination looming constantly. The week didn’t particularly get much better from that point. I was about to go into my last mock exam on Thursday (finally), I was just getting out of the car and then my phone fell on the floor. That probably would have been okay but then oh wait. I accidentally stepped on it too. Wonderful. Needless to say there was quite a big crack on my phone after that... Not the best thing to happen.

Last night was fun, though. Replacement phone safely stored in my pocket, I went to see Kingsman at the cinema with my friends. Now, not many films make me come out at the end like “Wow, that was so amazing” but this one certainly did. Seriously, go and see it, it’s great. I swear they’re not paying me to say this (not that anyone reads this anyway)... But yes, as I said not many films impress me but that one did. Guardians of the Galaxy made me feel the same way and that is such an awesome film (did I really just use the word awesome?). Bascially yes. Films.

I’m now sat on my bed picking at the rest of my popcorn from last night, wishing that most of the remains weren’t the annoying unpopped kernels and those fragments of sugary shells that do nothing but get stuck in your teeth. It’s kind of representative of my life at the moment... The bits at the bottom of a popcorn bag that nobody wants... Bit of a strange metaphor I know.

I found my old Nintendo DS earlier on in the week and it still had Pokémon Leaf Green in it. I hadn’t played it in months and basically I ended up playing it non-stop for about 5 hours. On the night before a mock exam. Priorities! I had nearly completed it so I kept on going until I did. I love that game... Next, naturally, I dug out my other Pokémon game that is a lot newer and I must admit I was disappointed! Now, if any of you play Pokémon, you’re probably familiar with the traditional Pokémon like Pikachu and Charmander... None of those are in the new game! Most of the Pokémon are basically cats, dogs, whales, you name it. I just couldn’t be bothered with it. I’m going back to the Gameboy one...

Now I’m giving myself the week off revision I have decided to just binge a bit on television. Not that I didn’t do that whilst procrastinating for my mocks, but now I’m allowed! Yet, now I have time, loads of television programmes are either finished or not my sort of thing. For example, Parks and Recreation (I love it so much), finished forever this week... Great. Maybe if I have the attention span I’ll start watching the rest of Game of Thrones again, which I haven’t watched for about three months. I’m going to be so confused.

At the moment I just want to curl up into a ball and ignore my responsibilities. If only there was a form of hibernation I could go into and when I emerge everything in my life will be sorted out already for me. Obviously that’s not going to happen but do you know what I mean? I seem to constantly be in the mood of wanting to do something but not wanting to do any of the things I could do. I need a bit of motivation, I guess. Or a hobby. Maybe a hobby would help me.

It’s funny when I think back to my younger self. I literally used to be so creative. If something could be made out of cardboard, paper and sellotape, I made it. My dream job was to be a writer. I used to write books (they were so terrible) and everything. I remember once when I emailed the author of Horrible Histories, asking for some advice on how to write good books and I got an email back very clearly dictating how I could get sent to prison for plagiarism.  I was 8. Long story short my teacher had an argument with him and our school ended up getting £100 of free books. Wow I need to find that email... I’m not being a writer now, thank goodness, I’m not sure I would cope. I do envy people with the talent though.

Anyway. I’m going to go and salvage what is left of my popcorn...

Laura. 

Time flies.

Does anybody else feel time is moving especially quickly at the moment? I mean yes, time is a concept created by humans (ooh philosophical) and clocks move at the same rate but oh my god where is time going?

I think the times it hits me most is when I’m on Twitter and something that feels like last month is referred to saying “Three years ago today!". It just blows my mind, honestly. I think having ‘Timehop’ would make it worse for me, I think (I have too many tweets to do it apparently – oops). Whenever I have these moments it just feels like “Oh my god we’re all dying”. It’s pretty scary really, especially when they say time goes faster the older you get. Can it slow down a bit please? I do want to savour this pre-exam, pre-university, pre-becoming-an-adult-with-a-life period of my life.

Speaking of becoming an adult with a life, I’m trying to be a bit more proactive with that at the moment. I have started looking at university courses, for example. Even though the prospect of university kind of scares me right now I think it might be the best path for me, and I think I’m going to do History! I’m also looking at maths too but I seriously have no idea why – I think I may end up crying and smashing my head into a wall repeatedly after two weeks if I do that... Maybe.

I have also signed up to the student magazine that should be starting up soon. I have volunteered to help them out with anything they need; and yes that includes writing articles on things. I’m not sure what I would be asked to write about but I feel if I was allowed to have a piece it would be along the lines of ‘Weekly rants with Laura’. I suppose I’m trying to expand a little bit with my experience as it’s so hard to get it properly. But yes, I’m trying that.

At least I am already very certain about what subject I want to drop next year for A-Levels (unless I fail maths or something...). At the start of the year I was pretty certain I was going to drop Psychology because I would physically have to stop myself falling asleep occasionally and looking at the clock every five seconds (a watched clock never changes... Can that be applied here?), but now it’s actually getting pretty interesting, honestly. We’ve started to study social influence and we started by guessing how many 20-year-old jellybeans were in a jar (we were warned not to eat any – that would be a bit of a strange form for my teacher to fill in). We were asked for our guesses twice to see whether we would change our answers depending on everyone else’s answer. The only thing was she actually didn’t know how many were in there. Not that we needed to know for the experiment, but our table volunteered to count them as we just needed to know (324 if you were interested). But yes, I want to drop English language, I’ve decided. I know some people may find it really interesting but I just don’t.

Careers... Still not certain. I want to get into TV but I haven’t really got any idea how to get there exactly... Yet. In the words of Chris Traeger, I am 100% certain that I am 0% sure of what I want to do. Well maybe 20%... Possibly. Let’s see. I’m going to look at some universities this year so hopefully I’ll find something that’s right for me. In a way I’m sort of glad I’m having this existential crisis now instead of in a year's time.

I am currently trying to sit on my bed with my laptop in a position that doesn’t make my radio descend into a wave of static... There was actually some really great music on but now I have finally managed to settle into a position that doesn’t anger my radio, the music just got pretty bad. How ironic. Maybe it's a sign I should really get back to revision now... 

Laura. 

'Great god of technology'

To be totally honest with you all, the only reason I got up to write this is because I’ve had enough of maths revision for today. The amount of times I’ve written ‘substitute’ and ‘inequalities’ in the last hour is ridiculous. Okay, so maybe it’s not as many times as you’re probably imagining but it’s definitely enough for me... So here I am, writing this. I do enjoy writing this though so hopefully this will give me a bit of a break of sorts...

Usually my daily life involves my phone (actually, it always does) and this isn’t the best formula for effective revision. I have to listen to music whilst I revise - I just can’t seem to handle it in silence, and at least Fall Out Boy can make polynomial division slightly more bearable. I even read with music playing, which some people find a bit strange, but I honestly don’t find it a problem at all. Getting back to the point though, with my phone being with me all the time it just makes it so much harder to revise – not that I’m exactly changing that...

We were looking at a source in history a while ago about how people worshipped the ‘great god of technology’. Now that was written all the way back in the 1960s, but it made me think –it’s still pretty true. Just as a disclaimer, I’m not one of those “technology is so bad it’s poisoning our minds” people... Those people do get a bit much at times. Yes, I see where you’re coming from, but honestly, technology is pretty bloody cool.

I put my hands up – I am addicted to technology. I’m not wallowing in that fact, I just know that I am. I have a Twitter account, I have Facebook, I have whatever else there is and I’m content with that. I am knitted into the cyber universe (wow, way to sound forty years old, Laura); and whilst people may preach about how we should throw our phones and laptops out of the nearest window and run off into the wilderness; that’s never going to happen. Yes, people may be on their phones a lot, but a lot of that (for me anyway) is usually socialising. Twitter is pretty great for me, really. A group of people, separate to my main ‘squad’ (that’s the official name now, I’m told) that I can talk with at 2am about stuff that interests us – I’ve actually met a lot of great friends online (and no they were not forty year old paedophiles). That of course doesn’t mean I can’t talk to my ‘in real life’ friends but it’s sometimes fun to have some people to rant and joke with online about some obscure topic that concerns something pretty trivial. Twitter can be quite eye-opening at times but also very hilarious.

I know I would most definitely get more work done if I didn’t have Twitter or Facebook (who am I kidding - I barely use Facebook) but I wouldn’t give them up. In the future I may have a break from them possibly, but now I’ve been online for so long it’s sort of hard to contemplate a situation where I'm not always up to date with news or I don't have somewhere to post my daily rambles. Plus, without sounding slightly creepy, you can stay anonymous if you want, especially on sites like Twitter – people don’t have to know everything about you, you can just pick the things you want to share, which you can’t always do in real life. Also, to be honest I can be very socially awkward in real life situations so typing behind a screen is a nice comfort sometimes. I realise this paragraph has made me sound like a malicious cyber-stalker, but I can promise you I am not... 

The internet is a great place. Apart from the aspect of cyber bullying, I've never fully understood why people would want to get rid of the internet altogether and hark back to the olden days. I mean the fact that I can look up the most random fact and get an answer instantly is pretty amazing. I know I’d be hopeless at doing the crossword in the paper if I didn’t have the internet, that’s for sure. Some more face-to-face interaction would be nice, I guess, but saying that the internet is this dangerous entity ruining our generation? No...

Does this count as a rant? I’m not sure it does, to be honest, so that’s an achievement. According to psychology I have a type A personality so that means I’m easily irritated. Hit the nail on the head there, psychology. But at the same time I have a zero hardiness score for stress so that’s a lovely thought, isn’t it? (The top score was 18. Oh god.)

Anyway, I think this is a long enough ramble for today.

Laura. 

The bigger picture.

So it’s February! [unenthusiastic forced cheering] I used to always spell February wrong when I was younger, which I’m sure quite a lot of other people did too (“It’s February”). I really don’t have anything to look forward to this month, and it’s only just hit me that my mock exams are this month... Oh dear. I am yet to start revising Totalitarian Russia for History... Ah.

Yesterday I went to a course with my friend Kayleigh in Ealing Broadway (London) about Television production (I think I’ve mentioned it before). When we pulled up to Ealing Studios, I thought it looked tiny, but it turns out it’s a lot bigger in the back... Unfortunately all of the studios were closed for the day, I guess, seeing as it was quiet and all the doors were closed! It felt pretty cool to be at Ealing Studios though because so many things have been filmed there, even some parts of my favourite films and TV shows! According to my sister, Shaun of the Dead was apparently filmed there (got to love Simon Pegg), some Doctor Who (my childhood) is also filmed there, as is Downton Abbey. I must admit I did freak out a tiny bit inside when we went up to find the toilets and the production offices for Downton Abbey were right in front of us... I wonder if they were planning to kill any more of my favourite characters off in there.  We did actually find a Downton Abbey studio door though, a caution sign stating ‘REAL GLASS USED ON SET. And some fake glass. And sometimes no glass at all’. That did make me laugh – got to cover all bases...

Anyway, back to the course, it was actually really interesting. Television production is actually so complicated it’s a bit worrying – there are so many different jobs people do and you need to get it right! The fact that we were told that a lot of the jobs are in London worried me – I live over two hours away and literally nothing happens in my city... I already knew that to be honest but it doesn’t really help my current situation! Overall though, I definitely think that television is the job for me, no matter how hard I am going to have to persevere to get into it. There wasn’t any point in the course where I was bored (yes, even the budgeting part) and it just seemed right – you know? That of course doesn’t yet solve the problem of the ‘big dilemma’, but at least it’s given me a bit of insight into what it’s going to be like. I need a runner job and a driver’s license by next summer ideally... Yes, Laura, good luck with that.

First of all though I need motivation. It’s really quite hard for me to find that push to want to actually get up and do some revision. Whenever I say to my mum about needing more motivation, she always says “Well aren’t your exams motivation enough?”. That’s the thing, I get where she’s coming from, they should be enough, but it just doesn’t seem to work like that with me. I can’t see the bigger picture very well, I don’t necessarily see into the future where I am smashing my head repeatedly into the table when I don’t know the answer in the exam. There’s always something I’d rather be doing. Can’t I just skip to the part where I have my life sorted out, please? 

Laura. 

Another ramble.

I feel like I haven’t really introduced myself enough on here... What are my interests, what are my non-existent hobbies? Well if you want to know all of that gripping stuff then you’ve come to the right place, my friend. I’m not sure if I’m the only one but whenever somebody asks “Hey, what are your favourite ______?” it kind of stresses me out. I feel like I need to credit every single thing that I love, for the fear of missing out something/somebody vital and betraying them in a strange way...

If you’re one of my friends, you can probably skip this paragraph if you like, you know it all anyway (as I constantly remind you). I like television – a lot – if you hadn’t already guessed. I do watch a ton of shows (way too many for the workload I’m supposed to be doing): Sherlock, Parks and Recreation and Downton Abbey being a few among the masses that I love (again – I feel like a traitor by not mentioning the other 6485 that I love). I would literally be typing for a whole page if I mentioned them all, and I don’t think either of us want that, do we? Keep it clear and to the point, Laura!

Moving onto music, I have to mention my favourite band which is most definitely Coldplay. I love their music so much I can’t even describe. I heard a Radio 4 DJ once describe their music as ‘plugging your headphones into a tin of beige paint’, which is a load of rubbish - one of their albums they spray everything with multicoloured paints, for god’s sake. They are not a dull band, trust me. I do love other music a hell of a lot too, especially Bombay Bicycle Club and Fall Out Boy (who I’m seeing live again this October – yes!).

As for academic interests, I’m one of those unlucky people that doesn’t really have any academic subjects they’re passionate about. I mean I do like History but it’s not exactly the most inspiring at the moment. Half of my AS level course is based around the 1960s in Britain. The amount of facts I have written down about how many fridges people owned throughout that decade makes me want to slam my head into a wall (69% of people by 1971 if you were wondering).I don’t think I’ll do a degree in that era if I do decide to go into History...

Speaking of careers, I actually did something productive today! I sat in on my local BBC radio station show and was shown how things worked. Yes, it was a three hour long show full of 70s music but I found it really interesting to see how it all works. It has sort of made my mind up though that I don’t think I’ll be going into radio. After seeing the producer (the job I thought I wanted) speak on the radio quite a lot and the presenter actually doing a lot of the technical stuff, I’m not sure if it’s really for me – not in the studio, anyway. I couldn’t be a presenter, I really couldn’t. I hate my own voice and I stumble over my words a hell of a lot and I bet I would be that person who accidentally leaves the microphone live or obliviously swears on air. Television is still the route for me, I think. I’m going on a TV production course in London with my friend next Saturday so I hope it’s useful for me!

I am now aware this post has gone slightly off-piste. I try to plan these things but they never really turn out that way, really. My blog is just one big ramble at the moment and I hope it isn’t too terrible to read. I am also becoming increasingly aware of just how many brackets I use in these posts. Sorry about that, I feel like Gollum with his two voices, except one is a lot more sarcastic.

Looking at my other friends’ blogs it kind of highlights how depressing mine sounds at times, so I’m going to try and make this a bit better for you read (if you are still reading, thank you). Don’t worry, I’m not going to link you to one of those cheesy American self-motivation videos that usually have some person playing basketball in them. Whenever I see those I usually respond throughout with sarcastic comments, as I do with most things, including this blog.

I think it’s time for me to shut up now.

Laura. 

Opinions.

Venting. It’s something I need to do a lot. I’m a glass-half-empty kind of person so naturally I have a lot of things that irritate me on a daily basis. I was told recently that I need to be more of a glass-half-full kind of person to be more successful in life. That’s quite difficult in my current situation, with the ‘big dilemma’ forever looming... In the words of Dan Smith: how am I going to be an optimist about this?

“But Laura you vent all the time to us” I hear my friends call from the distance. Yes, that is true, but I don’t vent about everything. It’s those little moments where you see a tweet on your twitter feed that really makes you think “Why the hell would you post that” (I often say it aloud, to be honest) and you feel the need to vent about it to somebody on twitter but wait- the person follows you. You can’t exactly bring those little annoyances into conversation when you’re lying in bed at midnight looking at your twitter feed.

It’s not that I don’t trust people with my rants (well sometimes that is the case) it’s that I really don’t think they would care – I get annoying as hell when I start ranting about something, honestly. Especially with little disputes in groups, you can never know where a small comment could end up, usually snowballed into something much worse than intended.

Opinions are definitely something that are a lot harder to express these days, in my opinion (pardon the irony). Often I can’t get to the end of my sentence before someone tells me how wrong my opinion is (If you’d let me finish...). Obviously some people’s opinions are just fundamentally wrong. Literally one of my biggest bugbears is when somebody insults something/someone and then justifies it as “I’m allowed to have an opinion!” or when they start sentences as “Not being mean or anything but...” and then wow, what a surprise, they say something mean. What is the point? We get it, that’s your opinion. Putting a little disclaimer that the start isn’t going to make somebody less offended by something, you know.

Sometimes I just sit there in class or in public and just listen to the conversations going on around me and some of the comments just make me think “really?”. Often I end up staring into the invisible camera from The Office, wondering if the person thought about what they were saying when they said it. I am literally Tim Canterbury 90% of the time in some of my classes.

I can’t be the only one to often feel the urge to just come out and tell someone what you think of them, cutting out the dreadfully awkward business of treading on eggshells (it’s even worse when you’re inherently English). But of course, as always, you can’t do that! That one moment of madness can trigger weeks of even more awkward atmosphere. Maybe that’s the reason I’m so sarcastic all the time...

So, in an effort to be a bit more “glass half full” I am going to try and be more proactive! Look, I know I say this every blog post but this time I can absolutely guarantee you I will probably end up saying it next time, too. Just a warning.

It’s funny, I almost didn’t post this rant about not being able to rant about people as I guess this sort of counts as ranting about people. Well anyway, I feel a bit better after writing about it. It’s kind of like therapy and you’re all my collective stress ball. No. Wait. That sounds a bit wrong... I’m going to stop now.

Laura. 

Positive thinking.

Hello everybody!

I was told by a friend of mine last week that my blog is quite depressing at the moment – I laughed. Yes it is! It definitely is! I’m now aware that just blurting out the innermost thoughts during existential crises isn’t the best reading material... So. Postive thinking! What do you even want to read about? My opinions on current events? My analysis of different kinds of fruit smoothies? I don’t know!

Maybe I should just dive in and talk about what I’m happy about at the moment. It’s like Pollyanna with her ‘glad game’ (has anybody else watched that or is it just me and my sister?)... Well. I’m glad for my friends, for one thing. If you’re reading this, which I know some of you are – thank you - I know I’m not exactly the greatest person to be around when I never shut up, say weird things and do everything else Laura-ish... You never make me feel bad for it so thank you. (Dear god this is a bit soppy isn’t it? I’m not a soppy person). Something else I’m glad for... hm... my family? God I am seriously making these up on the spot – Abi I blame you for this blog post idea! (Not that I had any others, mind) I’m terrible at expressing emotions...

I am managing in college, sort of. I am doing fine in my work it’s just the motivation thing again, I guess. My friend told me today that she’d already revised about a quarter of the material on Soviet Russia... That is a lot of notes. I haven’t started. 

My mum keeps telling me to book open days at universities and I probably should be doing that. Last week my sister kindly reminded me whilst I was relaxing that “Laura! You’re going to uni next year”. “If I go” is what I always respond. Everyone knows what they want to do and I’m panicking!

It’s kind of ironic seeing as the topic we’ve conveniently just moved onto in psychology is stress... Just before our mock exams. Wonderful. So we’re sat there going through reasons for stress and there were so many. I just stared at the board thinking “dear god how will I survive as an adult?”.  Not surprisingly, workload was at the top of the list – and fear of failure. Well that sums it up for me! We then started to go through methods of dealing with stress and my teacher kept mentioning exercise as the most effective way of helping stress. I am a lazy person. I sat there thinking “yes! I will do more exercise” imagining myself running the stress away on the treadmill when I got home, not taking into account I am literally so unfit. My friend asked me if I wanted to take part in a run with her in the summer and I had to say no for fear of literally collapsing after ten minutes...

I get stressed over the smallest things, though. I’m not even joking, I get stressed out if I’m watching too many tv shows at once (which I most definitely am). I am supposed to be watching a tv series my friend lent me a few months ago and I have watched two episodes so far. Out of twenty two. I’m sorry Kayleigh, I will try to stop procrastinating watching that show by watching other shows... You can probably see my motivation problem now. I once asked Mark Gatiss how he deals with stressful deadlines and he said "I ignore them". Maybe I should try that (to an extent). I’m currently staring at a whole mountain of blank revision cards and an unticked list of work that needs doing and I’m sat here typing this. It does actually help me de-stress a bit – venting is good. (Although you always have to be wary who you vent to, of course; but I can trust you...)

Laura.

January blues.

Hi all.

Yes – it’s another rant! [audience boos]

I hate January. I really do. Seriously, what’s good about January? It’s cold, there’s nothing to celebrate, everyone around me is ‘getting fit’ whilst I sit here eating my leftover Christmas chocolate (I have nearly finished). Personally, the only thing that’s ever in January for me is a meal out for my dad’s birthday and not much else. I’m going on a pretty cool course on the 31^st, I guess, but that’s only after a whole month of more post-festive dreariness. There should be some sort of holiday in January, maybe... Something to soften the blow of “Wow! Christmas! New Year! And- oh”.

Actually, I say that, but I am in fact one of those people who gets kind of sick of Christmas after a while, a decorations-down-by-new-year’s-day kind of person. I just want something nicer in January rather than a brick wall of reality and work slamming you in the face (basically this week for me). I can deal with the short daylight hours in December because Christmas is still looming, but after that it’s bit depressing, honestly.

"New Year, new me!” really isn’t living up to its hype, to be frank (not that I believe in all of that anyway). I am still the same as before new year’s, just with slightly less chocolate in my hoard... I know I am not going to be able to change myself as easily as 2014 passes into 2015.

It made me laugh the other day when our form tutor made us do a 'life satisfaction' survey and watch one of those "if you dream it you can do it" motivational videos (wow, yes, I can really achieve anything if I just want to). I'm not even joking, some of the questions were a bit strange - for example, was I satisfied with my social life, appearance and alcohol consumption? Apparently all of these 'relevant' questions would help us in setting targets for college - "yes, my academic target for this month is to have more of a social life". Right...

Sorry again – why is it I am only capable of negative posts at the moment...? End of January aim: actually post something positive on here for once. GOALS!

Laura. 

'The big dilemma'

I need to become motivated. Now.

It’s not a great feeling when you know you’re slowly sinking deeper and deeper into the pit of uncertainty for the future... God, that was a bit melodramatic, wasn’t it? Basically, I feel a bit useless at the moment. College is very uninspiring, I don’t have any hobbies to speak of and I have no idea what I’m doing after college.

I would go to university, I still will probably go to university, but I’m just unsure what I’d do there, honestly. It’s difficult when I feel like everyone’s already getting their lives planned out and I’m still not even sure what degrees to look at! The thing is, I don’t really love any subjects that much, if I’m honest – academic ones I mean. I wish I had a passion for science or a passion for something that I could realistically do a degree in. I mean I like history but at the moment I’m not sure if I would want to commit to three years of it!

It’s all very frustrating, especially when I know what job I want to do at the end of it all. I want to go into either television or radio production but it is impossibly hard – especially when 99.97% of the work experience is all 18+... And you need to actually have experience in the first place to get any worthwhile experience. Do you see my problem? It’s a bit of a catch 22 situation, really.

Coming away from that existential crisis I like to call ‘the big dilemma’, I need some motivation for my college work at the moment. I told myself at the start of the year that I would make more of an effort this term (again – not a new year’s resolution, thank you...) but that ‘motivation’ is already waning. I still look at the list of deadlines with utter dread, worrying whether I will actually find the time to be bothered, you know? I’m one of those “I’ll do it later” people. I should probably change that...

Well, this has been a bit less inspiring to myself than I was hoping it would be...

GET MOTIVATED LAURA.

There we go, that’s a bit of a note-to-self.

Right! Next post will be a bit more upbeat, I hope... Thank you for putting up with my rambling if you’ve already got this far down the page. This is the end, I promise...

Laura.

I'm not sure what to call this one.

So. I told myself that this year I’d start a blog and now here I am... Now I’m not calling that a new year’s resolution, because I don’t really believe in them anymore. What is the point? I mean, yes, of course sometimes they work, but personally whatever I tell myself to do in the forthcoming year usually ends about...February. At the most. I did tell myself I would start a blog, though. I really cannot rationally call my Tumblr a blog, even if it technically is.

Well I’m not honestly sure what I’m going to be writing on here, really, just felt I had to make a start on it. Not the best timing though, seeing as I’m doing a test first thing tomorrow morning and I am supposed to be revising for said test right this very moment... Oh well. I may rant, possibly? I rant quite a lot in real life so that’s highly probable, honestly.

To the people who do know me, hello.

To people who don’t know me, (I’m not sure who you are, mysterious person on the other side of the screen) my name is Laura and I’m 16 years old currently (If I was seven years old I would probably add the ‘and a half’ bit on the end). I’m currently at college studying history, psychology, english language and maths (help). To be totally frank, I don’t really have a lot to say about myself, which I hate, really. I'd like to change that. I’m always that awkward one at family gatherings that only has their current education to talk about and no future plans as yet (I am the youngest). I should get myself some more hobbies really, shouldn’t I? Does television count as a hobby?

I do love a lot of things – mostly television and film and music. I would ideally love to work in television when I’m older (not that that’s easy to convey to relatives when they ask) but I have no idea what I’m doing next. Now I hope I can look back at this at some point in the future and say that I did get where I wanted to be in the end but.. we’ll see. Oh why couldn’t I have had an easier career preference?

Right – before this drawls on into sounding like one of those ‘about me’ pieces you write in year three, I’m going to sign off.

Laura.