Second day

Had another two lectures this morning, one intensely boring, one really amazing. The guy said that he himself found that particular subject deeply boring when he was sitting where we were, so he tried to make it interesting and succeeded - the whole lecture hall was on the floor for most of it.

Also went to an indie concert which to be fair sucked. There was no atmosphere, the (rather ugly looking) singer took himself far too seriously, as did the kid in designer shirt and ralph lauren jumper jumping up and down next to me. He knocked into me a couple of times but I gave him a hard shoulder and he stopped. But hey, free entry for uni students AND a quid for a beer. What more could you wish for?

I also cooked. I spent a fortune and perfected the ultimate meal. They all loved it.

Finally it seems that one of the campus freaks has attached itself to me. It keeps coming to me for "gossip" and generally is a royal pain in the arse, but I'm arranging myself so that it can't reach me at most times. So it went and annoyed other people in my corridor instead. I just walked in about 20 min ago (did the washing up after) and EVERYONE started bitching about it. Damn campus freak.

Screw that I need sleep, 9am lecture tomorrow! Not that anyone reads this anyway, but it's still nice to have somewhere to shout.

Scary stuff

I accidentally ran into a report from a psychologist a couple of weeks ago whilst looking for my GCSE certificates. It said of me at 9 that I was "top 5 in 10 000 kids", had the maturity of an 11yo kid, got "astonishing" results on the maths and logic test - and could have had much higher had I not needed to leave the room near the end because it was too cold - etc etc. I had no idea. My parents made me do some extra maths for a while but gave up after a bit. I think I preferred not knowing. Ever since I've been telling myself these tests are a load of bollocks anyway and thus I am just another normal guy who just so happens to be quite good at maths, like the other 4000 or so people in my year. And we all know shrinks are only in it for the money anyway.

I wish I hadn't needed to look at those bloody results.

Downsides of uni life

Well, I absolutely love my new life, but there are many downsides compared with the amazing life I used to have back at school when living at home.

Firstly, there's the accomodation. My room is much bigger than what I got at home, and it's all mine, but the bathroom is tiny, and the shower is basically a drip. Life is also rather expensive due to the reputation of the university and the very high touristic value of its location. Finally the cooking facilities are DIRE. I won't say more again to preserve my identity.

Spending is also a big downside. I don't know how my parents managed with food and all that stuff, but I'm ALWAYS taking money out. Usually in rather large sums for essentials like cooking pans.

Food... Well I can't cook anything but pasta and I'm starting to feel maybe I should have paid more attention to what my mum was saying about easy recipies. Also food is SO EXPENSIVE. Finally our lunch/dinner cooked on campus meal thing is very very shit.
Drinking. Ok maybe drinking sounds fun, especially every night but to be fair by the end of Fresher's Week I was looking forward to a day of no alcohol, early night in. Also looking forward to not ending up with a lighter wallet. Booze is overpriced in this country, the French and Germans have got it right!

Finally, socializing. Sure it was fun meeting 200+ people on the first day, but it's such a hassle to try and remember who is everyone else. That and the people you thought of as intensely cool and best mate material end up doing stupid teenage-like stuff when drunk and you reconsider your options. There's the added sense of responsability as well.

Right that's pretty much it. Oh yeah and I also have flu or something like that, it's spreading like wildfire on campus. But hopefully it's a temporary thing.

First lectures

It shall be rather hard to describe what my first lectures were like. I need after all to keep anonymous.
Erm.
So anyway. I came from a system where because of the huge amount of money injected in the school by parents of pupils we were in very small classes, where the teachers would make sure everyone worked really well and understood everything. Now I had reasons to be apprehensive when I walked in an absolutely huge lecture hall. It was full to the brim anyway (I arrived just in time due to waking up too late and not having much breakfast) so I sat down next to a complete stranger, introduced myself to him and let the stuff wash over.

I must say I MUCH PREFER the lecture system. The lecturers tend to get through things very fast, and it's completely up to you to do the research and learn about the stuff - everything is optional (but you don't want a 2:2). The labs were fun too, very fast paced and efficient, nothing like the usual bollocks of taking the results on excel, painstakingly handplotting them, no! Everything was set up to give us the necessary graphs as soon as the data was entered. I love university.

Also the people doing the subject are really nice overall even if there are a couple of knobs (I guess I'm one of those). The second years take us out for meals and stuff which is very cool, they know their way round the place whereas we don't. I also much appreciate NTL's "free calling any other room in the university" feature and have used it a lot.

I do miss having my food cooked for me, dishes washed, laundry done, cleaning and hoovering done for me etc. I don't miss the school bit. But the rather large bill which I have to pay by the 21st of October isn't too encouraging.

First post

Here it is. I've been wanting to set up a blog to describe my experiences of uni life (fresher 2005) since last year considering how useful it could be for future generations. The total anonymousness is the definite factor. Well I guess you could look up my email addy. Maybe I should look into creating a new one.

Anyway, the reason behind this post is that I've kinda crashed down from the almighty Fresher's Week (or rather Fresher's "couple of days" as it's known in the place of high education where I'm lucky enough to waste my parents' and the taxpayers' money). I've had a shit day, should be composing a piece for a competition whose deadline is in 2 weeks, but I have writer's block and it SUCKS. It's the last straw on a long string of various miseries like Fresher's Flu (or something similar) and accidentally insulting one of the female members of my campus locals meaning I feel bad etc. etc.

Right enough rambling.

University absolutely rocks. How so? I guess the independance, the fact that I'm finally studying a subject I like, the fact that NO arrogant twats like were present at my school are present in the university do all count in to make it really an enormous improvement over my past situation - i.e. stuck in a room with a brother who goes to bed EARLY, going to a school where everyone is so stinking rich and literally at each other's throats. In fact that last fact did mould me into such a person too, and only now do I notice because I'm being a dick to everyone (unintentionally). I try and make up for it by making their lives easier in various ways. Can't say much more without compromising my amazing privacy.

Anyway my usual way of taking stress out is to go and play some music or sing. I can do neither for the practice rooms have now closed (since 12pm). I can't compose cos of the fucking writer's block and I can't really do anything worthwile like work because... I dunno. Lectures just started. Plenty of time later.

I heard so much about how good it feels to be able to just empty it all out onto the web anonymously from other bloggers, and I understand what they mean, I feel much better now. Well. Slightly better. After all noone will EVER read this blog anyway. It's just another rambling/bitching/complaining/etc. blog on blogspot. Couple of million others.