Blog Archives
Cleaning out my Facebook Closet
Facebook = A social networking site where you request to be friends with someone, can send messages to complete strangers and poke people.
This afternoon I went down from 321 Facebook friends to 297 friends, as a way of cleaning out my Facebook closet. Nevermind spring cleaning, this is the time for a summer send-off to all those ‘friends’ that I’ve never spoken to in my life, who just add you as a friend as a mere popularity race.
Become a socialite today!
Well guess what guys, it’s not a race to the fake friendship finish line, and I am not going to be apart of it. Do you think someone is going to give you a gold medal on reaching the four figure mark?
Wait – there’s probably an App for that.
Many of my Facebook friends (the real friends – no, honestly!) have also been cleaning out their friendship closets as a bid to starting their professional life, whilst giving their own summer send-offs to their university life. I don’t blame them, I’ve just done the same!
But what I don’t understand is why some people (myself included) have received a request from a person they disliked from their past – school for instance – and accepted the request. If I’m being honest, I really just accept their friendship invitation to spy on them. Yes. I like to play Peeping Tom on my own computer, flicking through their photos and their personal – ahem – public life. And I know you, (yes you reading this!) like to play Peeping Tom too.
It’s not a secret, it’s pretty much what social networking sites were invented for. God forbid if they were invented to actually socialize.
Truthfully, I could have deleted another 10-15 on my friends list, but I can’t deny myself a little sneak-peak at their profile once in a while… Hey, a jobless graduate’s got to have something to fill their time with right?
In all honesty, Twitter is really the way forward. Isn’t ‘following’ someone a more accurate description of what we do on social networking sites?
Don’t worry, it just became that much easier to stalk someone. You’re totally safe.
An End of an Era
Dress Up to Mess Up
University is a life like no other. You enter as a fresh-faced, newly of age 18 year-old, embracing the life of drunken antics, the other sex and the life of cruel 9am lecture slots. If you haven’t experienced University life, you will not know how terribly cruel 9am lectures really are… and of course students rely heavily on the mid-afternoon nap to recover from a messy night before. Naps, alcohol, crude drawings and really bad phone calls to an ex tend to rule the life of a student. Often stumbling into a lecture hall of 100+ students becomes the norm, and of course, you do not regret it.
The second year of university becomes a little less radical, and you lean a little more on your studies rather than the bottle of vodka on the kitchen table. The step between being a fresher and a middling becomes real. You attend less social events and more library dates as you fight the ongoing battle between a deadline and the ‘event of the century’ – this is what is deemed as every night at the union, apparently. Being a middling isn’t so bad though, it kind of is the interrum between Year 9 SATs (that are no more) and the Year11 GCSE’s.
Finalist year is when the ‘shit hits the fan’ so to speak. It gets tough, particularly in the final semester of your studies, where the library or your room becomes your study shrine, melting into the bland walls and pinewood desks, hating every minute of your crappy life. Yes, the student life often requires endless sleepless nights – or at the very least for a full month. These are the top ten things a student does every day of ‘constant studying’:
Act like a Penguin 'cos we're cool Finalists
1. Waking up.
2. Thinking about revision or essay/report writing.
3. Getting breakfast.
4. Thinking about revision or essay/report writing.
5. Watching TV.
6. Thinking about work.
7. Facebooking, Twittering. WordPressing…
8. Writing a to-do list.
9. Procrastinating – doing anything that requires your attention for at least an hour so you don’t have to do any work. (Make tea, do the washing, eat something…)
10. Actually sitting down to work for ten minutes, to then start this whole process again because you’ve decided to nap.
Yes. The life of a student is a difficult one, and in the blink of an eye it is all over. The end of an era, the final chapter of the university handbook, but the beginning of your life as a fully qualified expert in one field.
At least until you do your Masters…
Because You're Worth It.
X Factor – The Sticky Fix
So, having not blogged in a long time, I find myself coming on to blog about none other than the X Factor.
I hope you all know it’s a fix by now. I’ve been watching it for too many years to think otherwise.
Sticky Problem Number One: Tonight’s Eviction
Aidan VS Katie
Okay, so pushing all thoughts of Wagner aside, why on earth was Aidan in the bottom two?
His intensity and presence on stage is just mind-blowing, while Katie just sits with her legs crossed crying trying to sing, ‘JUST PLEASE DON’T GIVE UP ON ME..’ (cue dramatic shot of her eyes and the tears falling from her tiny frame).
Time to Face the Facts:
Katie has been in the bottom two for four weeks. FOUR WEEKS.
Let’s be fair, this should be an automatic elimination for the contestant.
It is the first time Aidan has been in the bottom two, and also the last time.
Katie always sings better in the sing off.
I think she has perfected it now.
Simon and Cheryl are best friends.
Is Cheryl giving Simon the ‘I’m going to throw a massive temper tantrum if you don’t stick with me’ look?
This is blatantly a fix, especially with the Twitter leak tonight confirming that Aidan was in the bottom three. (Apparently by a guy named @markmeets).
X Factor bosses tried to cover that up quickly saying it was ‘uncorraborated’.
I think it’s safe to say that Katie is disliked by the public. With many groups now appearing on Facebook and so many Twitter feeds commenting on Katie’s persona, it’s highly unlikely that anybody will feel sympathetic towards her now.
Sticky Problem Number Two: Katie’s Panic Attacks
It was reported in the press a week and a half ago that Katie Waissel had been suffering from many alleged panic attacks. This included her holding up fellow contestants recording a charity single for SIX hours.
Now, I don’t know if this is entirely true, but I can understand why this has been reported.
For one thing, it’s a charity single. If you had a panic attack over bad press, it would for the very least not go on for six hours, but nevertheless I would definitely get back up, pull myself together and perform the single for the greater good.
No wonder Katie Waissel rubs people up the wrong way.
Sticky Problem Number Three: Cop-out Cheryl
Last week Cheryl ‘bottled out’ of sending one of her acts home. The choice was between Treyc and Katie, both receiving the lowest votes. Cheryl refused to vote for one act to send home saying that she would rather it go to deadlock.
Fairplay, she acts the princess and she gets her royalties with it.
But after two against one, Treyc was sent home – the producers obviously trying to overrule Cheryl and booting Treyc out of the competition.
But was it the producers?
Katie is generating so much revenue for the X Factor at this moment, what with all the press coverage she’s receiving she could buy a house!
So Cheryl, has this all been planned?
Let’s make this a fix. Wagner stays in week after week, (numerous amounts of my friends are asking who the hell is voting for him?) And Katie, although can sing perfectly well, is generating public hatred with her attitude and attention-seeking panic attacks.
Don’t get me wrong, I think Katie has an amazing voice – but she needs to sort out her attitude pronto.
What’s that saying, ‘keep your friends close and your enemies closer’?
Clearly, at the moment, her enemies outweigh her friends.
That Holiday Feeling
Tomorrow I am departing my lovely home, for Manchester and Monday I am departing the UK for two blissful weeks to visit Turkey. My reaction: WWWOOOO!!!!!
Problem is, I’m sat here the night before and I’m officially well and truly bored. 100% bored. Have you ever had that holiday feeling when you’re so organised – to the point where you have nothing left to do, and are now fretting over the tiniest things – and really just want to get up and go. I am at this point right now, in fact I’ve probably surpassed it and I’m at the next stage where you do the ‘check list’.
‘Got your passport?’
Check
‘Got your tickets?’
Check
‘Got your hair straightners?’
Check Check.
And the list goes on.
However three years ago, my parents and I were flying out to Florida; we went through the ‘rigmarole’ and did our series of checks. Problem was we didn’t think of the most obvious thing we needed, and no, it wasn’t our passports.
Manchester Airport
6:30am:
‘S**t.’
What Dad?’
‘I don’t have my driving license…’
And voila… madness arrived. Those 2 to 3 hours you spend in the departure lounge went buy in a flash (no longer a drag, with screaming kids). We went from one end of the airport to the other. Manchester Airport is long, trust me – especially with luggage (for some reason it didn’t occur to us to check-in).
Up and down. Up and down. You get the idea.
Ended up most of our holiday was spent trying to get the license brought over from the UK. We should have just said ‘f**k it’ and enjoyed our holiday. Turned out a lot went wrong during that holiday.
So bringing myself back to the journey I’m jetting off on, I have this terrible foreboding feeling that something may happen. Manchester Airport has never been a good luck charm with my family, mind you I’m going with the girls this time! No doubt there will be much drama, drunkeness and dunks in the pool – after all, we are girls.
Another routine check you have, or just another worry:
Is my case too heavy?
You know it’s not going well when your case just won’t shut. Thankfully I didn’t have my ‘movie moment’; jumping on my case with all my weight and forcing it to close. Guys have probably never ever got this with girls, but seriously we NEED our hair products. We don’t just get frizz-free hair with the click of our fingers, and we don’t get perfectly bouncy girls or divine-goddess straight hair without styling. I think it’s ridiculous that my toiletries and hair products weigh more than my clothes and shoes put together. Maybe we should just have a separate case for our toiletries, or even better can we just have one super-miraculous hair product that cures all problems? And one super-miraculous device that can both shave and moisturise your skin at the same time? And don’t even get me started on the make-up! I wonder if we’ll get these products before robots start ushering our cases into the airport…
One question: Do you get pre-holiday jitters?
