Last...

Last Cigarette: Friday. I drank a whole bottle of wine, I can’t help myself sometimes!

Last Alcoholic Drink: The aforementioned bottle of rose wine, and I’m drinking a mug of rum & coke right now.

Last Car Ride: We went for a meal the other week and my housemate drove us there.

Last Hug: Rich when he was leaving on Sunday morning.

Last Time You Cried: A few weeks ago I was feeling a little miserable and had a few cries.

Last Library Book: The Situation of the Novel by Bernard Bergonzi, A Vain Conceit by David John Taylor, Millions Like Us by Jenny Hartley, and English Fiction of the early modern period by Douglass Hewitt. Researching for essays is FUN!

Last book bought: I bought The Hours by Michael Cunningham and Between the Acts by Virginia Woolf off Amazon.

Last Book Read: The last book I finished was Animal Farm by George Orwell.

Last Movie Seen in Theatres: Black Swan. It made me feel a bit sick watching it on the big screen because of how wobbly and shaky it was, and also I didn’t like the gory bits on a big screen.

Last Movie Rented: Mr Nice, which was really good, and Valentine’s Day, which isn’t exactly spectacular but is a nice feel-good film. It’s bloody LONG, though, so I enjoyed watching it in the comfort of my front room where I can make a cup of tea and lie down if needs be, rather than in the cinema where at one point I considered leaving because my arse had gone completely numb.

Last Cuss Word Uttered: I say frick quite a lot, because I used to say fuck quite a lot and I’m in the process of making myself more polite society appropriate.

Last Beverage Drank: Other than my rum, I had a cup of orange & lotus flower green tea.

Last Food Consumed: I had soup and a pitta bread, a Caramac ice cream, and a Pink Lady apple.

Last Crush: I don’t really do crushes, and not even because I have a boyfriend. I find people attractive and I find them charming, but I haven’t got properly hung up on anyone for many years. Other than my boyfriend, to state the obvious, but even with him it was never a case of ‘having a crush’.

Last Phone Call: I rang home and discussed many things. Who to use as a reference on my CV, the fact that my mum hates shopping with my little sister because she is awkward and picky, whether my sister would like to enter a competition to win a tour of the Royal Observatory with Prof Brian Cox, and a variety of other strange family related things. That’s ‘strange family’, not ‘strange, family’, just by the way ;)

Last E-mail you wrote: I sent my friend Holly a copy of my CV, so I essentially just attached my CV and wrote ‘here you go x’.

Last TV Show Watched: Peep Show! I’m watching Hot Fuzz now.

Last Band You Saw: Biffy Clyro were at my uni ball last year, but I was suffering from some sort of food poisoning/general bug that night, so I felt less than enthused about it.

Last Time Showered: This morning. I felt like I couldn’t be productive after a shower. Then I had to lounge around doing post-shower activities for a while. Then I had to drink coffee and eat a sandwich. Then I realised I had a lack of fruit in my life so I had to go to the shop to buy fruit. Then I had to watch Friends. Then, I don’t know what happened. Today has been a waste.

Last Shoes Worn: Pale pink ballet flats.

Last Item Bought: On my excursion to the shops I bought an avocado, a red pear, some pink lady apples, some courgettes, a lettuce, a jar of rogan josh curry sauce, some naan breads, some cans of diet coke, some lemon sole goujons and some Caramac ice cream bars. The greengrocer brings out my inner health-foodie and I want to buy every single vegetable in the place and subsist on an entirely plant-based diet. Then, the frozen food shop brings out my inner chav, and I want to eat chicken dippers and maybe throw some mushy peas on the side for nutrition, and wash it down with a gallon of cherryade. I have to juggle these aspects of my personality.

Last Annoyance: My mum kept trying to tell me some important information on the phone but the line kept going crackly.

Last Soda Drank: Diet pepsi.

 Last Words Spoken: ‘See you in the morning’ to my housemate as she abandoned me halfway through Peep Show.

Last Ice Cream Eaten: CARAMAC ICE CREAM. It was heavenly.

Last Webpage Visited: Facebook. What a loser!

What I've been doing lately

Reading. Between novels I’m studying, reference books about the novels I’m studying, the odd book ‘for fun’ that I can cram in, my old lecture notes, my own writing, the odd blog, old magazines, emails, texts, I’m just overrun with words at the moment! At the moment I’m reading The Day of the Triffids.

Assignments. Before May 20^th I need to have written a 2500 word essay on the nature of contemporary fiction, a 2000 word essay on communities under pressure in 1930s literature, a 3000 word essay on the opposition between the country and the city in 1930s literature, a 5000 word creative writing portfolio, a 1500 word experimental writing portfolio and a 1000 word commentary on it. I feel exhausted just typing that all up! I have it all in hand at the moment so the panic has not set in yet, and I just keep chipping away at it as best I can.

Lectures and seminars. The last ones, ever! The realisation that I’m not coming back to uni next year hasn’t hit me yet.

Cooking. I’ll be Nigella before you know! I made some lovely red lentil & chickpea soup, which is possibly one of the most filling things ever. I have a healthy appetite, shall we say, and yet I ate an average sized bowl of this soup without any bread and wasn’t hungry for the next six hours. Result, considering I had a long day in uni and always resent paying for food on campus. I also made some simple but truly delicious pasta, which is quite something considering pasta is usually something I fail at, and something I had resigned myself to eating either plain or with shop bought pesto. I used tagliatelle, the sauce was just Philadelphia melted with a decent dollop of grainy mustard, with mushrooms and onions fried in butter and garlic. I accept any accusations that this dish is simple, boring and perhaps not incredibly healthy. All I know is that I made it to use things up and only made a little bit expecting it to taste a bit sad, and ended up making the same thing two days later! In sad food news, my boyfriend and I cooked together the other weekend. We were having steak and he insisted on cooking them, what with being a man and all that. I asked for mine medium rare. I like it bloody. What he served me was a pretty fine example of a well done piece of meat. Now I’m no steak snob, I take what I’m given and at the end of the day, it’s a honking great slab of meat, I can’t complain too much! But I was a bit disappointed with this as I had been dreaming about my bloody steak for days. Also I’ve been eating an impressive amount of takeout. Bad Emdawg! Slap my wrists indeed. Also today I bought a red pear which I’m really rather excited about!

Socialising. By which I mean going out and getting drunk. I can’t let essays be my entire life! I went to a rock & indie club night which was impressively priced - £1 in, £1 vodka and coke, £1 Sambuca – but a bit dire due to the fact that I requested a song and the DJ refused it on the grounds that ‘it’s not indie enough.’ Vom. We witnessed a man run out of the club and halfway up the street, pursued by bouncers, and eventually saw him being tackled to the ground by another grown man, and carried back to the club in a headlock. We later learned that he had pulled the taps off the sinks in the toilets and purposely flooded them. What a horrible creature he must be. I went to a White Trash themed house party, at which I looked phenomenal, obviously. At this party I had a wonderful time, except for an unfortunate incident in which I was dancing on a sofa with a friend, she fell over and fell into me, I fell off the couch, my hand fell in the doorframe and my body fell against the door, effectively trapping my own hand in the door with a considerable amount of force. This incident involved a great deal of blood and over a week later my middle finger is still swollen up like a sausage.



Where ma bitchez at?



My unscathed and chavtastic hands, before 'the incident'.



Planning. I have planned a day trip to Whitby while I’m at home over Easter. I no longer have a car so I’m going to sweet talk a friend into driving. I want to paddle, write my name in the sand, go on the Captain Cook boat ride, go to the Dracula Experience, climb the 199 steps, walk under the whalebone arch, eat fish and chips, play on the penny arcades, and buy some tat. I have a bit of a thing about Whitby. I am also slowly forming an action plan for my post-graduation life. My most exciting plan is my little ‘cultural excursion’ (not a holiday!) to Italy in August. So far, we have booked flights, and this is all. We know that we’re flying to Rome and flying back from Venice, and we’re there for 10 days, and we want to visit Pompei, Florence, and Verona. I want to touch Juliet’s boob. We also want to eat as much gelato as humanly possible, especially from Grom while we’re in Venice. We’re going to stay in youth hostels in every place other than Pompei, where this is a particular hotel we’d like to stay in and will spring a bit more money for, and we’re going to travel by train. I’m trying to master a very basic level of conversational Italian in order to not be the Brit Abroad who asks everyone to speak English for her. So far I know such gems as ‘Sono un po’ubriaca’, which means ‘I’m a little drunk’, and ‘Per favore mi lasci in pace’, meaning ‘Please leave me alone.’ What more does a 21 year old lush need to know?

Shopping. Too much damn shopping! Until further notice the only clothes I am allowed to buy are going to be my dress for the End of Year Ball and related accessories, casual shoes for sunny day wearing, and some wide leg/palazzo trousers. Not the really ridiculous ones, but want to swish a little bit when I walk. Some beautiful things I have bought lately include a tribal print maxi dress from H&M, a playsuit from H&M (don’t mock! It’s comfy, summery, and means I only have to pick one thing to wear on a busy morning) and some beige trousers from Dorothy Perkins.

Job hunting. I dislike job hunting. I dislike job adverts. I dislike my CV. I dislike being unemployable.

Right now I am drinking Morgans Spiced rum & coke and watching Peep Show. This is the life.

x

Tales of woe.

My laptop contracted a big bad virus which shouted bad words at me, so I took it to the shop and was told that all could be done was to wipe it and start all over again. So this is what I did, thinking 'I don't think I have anything important on there that I haven't backed up.'

Turns out my 30 day challenge document for here was saved and is not backed up, and I honest to god do not remember where I saved it from in the first place. Also my camera is broken. Also I'm snowed under with essays yet again - for the very last time though!

Life is difficult for a 3rd year English student! Woe is me!