31 October 2011

University

Just like school... except we all live here.

Maybe we weren't so off when we were small and imagined our teachers lived at school.

26 October 2011

Empress - Karen Miller



I finished this in my first week at university, almost 4 weeks ago now. This book captivated me to start with. The character Hekat was someone who emotionally you felt for to start with.

However she gets hurt and becomes bitter.

She becomes cruel.

She was a character I loved at the start of the book but loathed by the end of it. I think that in itself speaks volumes about this book. About the quality of the writing. To feel two such strong and such polar emotions about the same character.

Her sons were also somewhat a revelation. Her oldest is someone I would admire, but at the same time pity. Her youngest I pity, but he becomes too much like his mother.

The priest Vortka was my favourite character throughout the book.
I look forward to reading the sequels, but they're gonna wait for a little while.

Rowen

Repetition: Good or Bad?

Repeptition drives me mad. It's not so much the fact that I'm hearing it again, but the fact that I've heard it before and there's a goodly chance it's already sunk in.

Having recently started Uni I was looking forwards to learning some new things, intermingled with the inevitable catch up. However I'm reading maths and I've already studied further maths as well as maths at A-level. This means that for three of my four modules I've already covered about 99% of the stuff we're doing. No big surprises that the one module which is completely new is the one I'm really enjoying...

Add to the fact that some of my lecturers are incredibly fond of repeating themselves. One keeps showing us the same thing on the internal system which we could find for ourselves three or four times every lecture.

I have no doubt that this insane ability to repeat everything will come in handy when it comes to the time to learn some new content. My real concern though, is that I won't realise when that time comes and will stay switched off.

Does unecessary repetition annoy you?

Rowen

11 October 2011

You'll have the time of your life!

 I want to believe everyone, believe me, there's nothing I'd love more. But fact, having spent a week here and despite having met some brilliant people I don't think I am going to enjoy uni life. I'm too much of a home girl, I'm not the girl who goes looking for an adventure, I'm the one who'll happily stay in and do the familiar much to the long-term aggreivement of my friends.

I don't enjoy the parties.
I don't enjoy the independence.
I don't enjoy the being away from home.
I don't enjoy meeting new people, even though they're great people to spend time with.

And yet I'm the one of my new friends who's staying this first weekend.
The one who's sticking it out.

Why?

It's too far, I don't want to force my parents into a total of six hours driving at the end of every week.
I don't want to be a disappointment, I'm the first of my parents children to go, and they're so proud, how can I bear to let them down.
At some point in my future this may be of benefit to me, this ability to stick out the tough times and just get on with it.
Having a degree will benefit me and my boyfriend in the long-term.

But I'm scared, there's a million things scaring me, not least the fact that I'm doing a maths degree and speaking statistically it's incredibly unlikely my boyfriend and I will make it through this as a couple, but I think I'll break if we don't.
My diet has gone to pot because my cooking skills are pretty much limited to baking and I have neither the patience nor the drive to learn anything more than heating up a tin of food in the microwave.
I hate being away from home. I hate the amount of freedom it's taken from me. And the fact it's forced me to put trust into people I barely know.
I miss my family and my friends. Most of all I miss my boyfriend. I miss being in a place I know so well I could walk it blindfolded.

The truth of it is, I'm just not settling in very well...

Rowen