New Years Resolutions, and a last message from 2011

Again, before I begin this blog I'd like to apologise for the lack of blogs over the holidays. I thought being home would mean I'd have more free time in which to blog, however to my surprise its been the opposite, and instead its been a very chaotic, busy couple of weeks.
I will attempt to make up for it though as things get back to normal.

On to the subject of today's blog, 2012, or more specifically 'New Years' and the end of 2011. I don't think I've ever really been a person who goes along with the traditional ways of thinking, and that includes the concept of New Years.

The concept of New Years, is meant to be a specific time in which people are meant to either begin things, end things, move forward, and generally start a new and should do this through the means of new years resolutions. Although I believe new years resolutions are a good idea, its with them that I have a problem.
I know that last statement might sound a bit controversial so I'll explain how I mean.

The two problems I have with New years resolutions are basically, the notion of importance that people put on them and how easy they are to break, and also their timing.

A subsequent tradition to New Years is that the resolutions you make usually only last til late January/Mid-February, either because people give in to what they're trying to stop or because they just don't want to keep with the resolution anymore, for whatever reason.
Resolutions made during New Years tend to be quite hyped up, and so as you move away from New Years it begins to hold less importance, meaning the majority of people give up on them. This nicely brings me onto the second reason.

Why do people leave these resolutions till the New Year? I've seen people decide they wanted to do something whether it be quit a bad habit, go somewhere new, or to change jobs, and they just do it, no waiting around to begin or letting things get in the way, and you know what I envy these people.

I truly believe that if you want to do something or you set yourself a goal that is important to you, you can achieve anything, there are no limits.

I'm not quite sure whether its because I've been watching too much Doctor Who lately or if I'm just getting quite personal again but I do think that people really are amazing.

2011 for me has been a year of ups and downs, and I've had the unfortunate experience of dealing with things I'd rather never have had to experience.
Throughout it all through I've ended the year with a number of happy memories and had the opportunity to witness acts of awesomeness that although few in comparison make everything worth while.

Thankyou to everyone that has read any of my blogs this year, I do hope that they were okay, and I didn't bore you too much. I'm also extremely thankful that I have this small space in which I can share my thoughts so openly, it's helped me more then I can say.
Until next year, I hope everybody wherever you are, has a great rest of the holidays, and DFTBA (don't forget to be awesome).
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Busy Christmas Week Update

I'm sorry it's taken me so long to post a blog, this week really has been very chaotic though. Being the week leading up to christmas there's always the expected level of chaos and stress, then on top of that add moving stuff back from university and a wedding. I've also this week in between popping in and out of town and supermarkets, meant to have done work on two essays that will need to be handed in in January, however that work has somehow found itself being put off quite a lot.

This time last week I was back home again after a very long, very miserable day. Last Friday my mum and older sister arrived at my flat in Sheffield to pick me and my stuff up, to bring me back home. However as they arrived I found out that our car was on the frits again, due to problems with the gears. To cut a long story short, we experienced problems from the get go, the gears kept sticking, the battery almost died and we were caught in very long queues caused by several crashes and rush hour traffic. We were very relieved to finally make it back home safe and sound, unfortunately that journey seems to have just about finished off our car. Although this was before me starting this blog, but this time last year we had two cars, a corsa and a shogun, of which both also broke down around this time of year too, so there's a definite sense of deja vu in the air.

After the trip back on Friday, came the wedding of my sister's friend on the Saturday. Due to certain reasons there were a few quite big last minute changes to the wedding, such as who was coming and where the wedding ceremony was going to be held. This was the first wedding I'd ever been to, and so I wasn't quite sure what it was meant to be like or what to expect. Overall though it was an amazing day and things seemed to run quite smoothly without too many problems.
Due to the nature of the day there seemed to be a lot of talk about futures and weddings, and I could see where the idea of annoying family members or friends at weddings comes from. Also, due to my nature and sense of humor I found the whole wedding ceremony quite intriguing and eye opening. I mean this in the sense that, as we were at a registry office, how the registrar said things in a very specific, legal way. Perhaps it was just because it was conducted at a registry office rather then a church that made it different from the ideas I held.

Anyways, moving on to the last and most important of my excuses why I'm so late in blogging, Christmas. As of this exact moment there is twenty one hours a twenty nine minutes left before its Christmas (the 25th), meaning people will be getting very desperate to do last minute present and food shopping before the big day rolls around. Every year usually about this date, I think to myself 'why do people leave it this late to do their shopping' and I've never gotten an answer. Leaving it late is just how people are, and that doesn't always exclude me.
Logically, it would be so much easier to go out before the rush and chaos, then everything would be sorted and you could sit back and relax. In order to be able to do this though, you seem to need to be one of the 'chosen ones' that posses the special gift that stops you from procrastinating and forgetting things, and lets you be efficient and get things done during this time of year. If you ever hear someone say that they've finished all there christmas shopping and have all their Christmas food in the freezer by the beginning of December, then you know they have the gift, however this is very rare.
As always when next christmas comes around I'll endeavor to get everything I need sorted before the chaos and panic sets in, just once though I want to sit back with everything finished, and see everyone else in the panic and stress of the last minute rush.

It being the day before christmas I probably shouldn't be up so late, I'm sure I'll need my wits about me to survive through christmas day. Unless I manage to get another blog up by the end of today, I'll say now that I hope everybody has an awesome christmas day, and have fun. Remember to just relax and have a fun day off, leave everything else til another day :)

Favourite Music: 2011

This I think out of all of my lists, this one seems to have been the hardest. Who knew I had so much music, on my mp3 player alone I've got just under a thousand songs.
Having discovered how impossibly difficult a task this seemed to be, I decided to set myself a few kind of guide lines. When choosing good music there are so many ways you can rank songs e.g best chill out music, the awesome long lasting classic tracks... However when I was choosing, it was purely which tracks do I like the best, which will I listen to the whole way through every time it comes on and which instantly feels like a good song when you play it.
Due to having so much music I decided also to choose out of the music solely on my mp3 player. Although this sounds like I'm leaving loads of music out, its not really a problem as I tend to keep only really good music on my mp3 anyway, and if I don't like a song anymore I usually delete it quite quickly.
One last decision I made was that, again as it was already impossibly hard I didn't have to rank the top 15 songs from normal favourite to most favourite ever, I would just have to choose them and they'd all be my favourites.
Having such a large selection of music, a few things I didn't think about was just how long it would take to get through all the tracks, and also how I'd remember the good ones whilst going through then. I sort of figure a way of seperating out the good ones in the end though however it did still take a long time. I will also be honest here and say that I went to the library this evening for a few hours to do some work on an essay, but after about 45 minutes I got bored and so decided to use the time to finish of this list there.
After several hours of playing, and replaying songs, my finished list is as follows, in artist alphabetical order:
1) Beach Boys - Good Vibrations,
2) Beatles - Twist and Shout,
3) Coldplay - Christmas Lights,
4) Counting Crows - Accidentally in Love,
5) Goo Goo Dolls - I'm Still Here,
6) Harry Belafonte - Jump in the Line (Shake Senora),
7) Jackson 5 - ABC,
8) James Brown - Play That Funky Music White Boy,
9) Lynard Skynard - Sweet Home Alabama,
10) One Republic - Secrets,
11) Owl City - Alligator Sky,
12) Owl City - Fireflies,
13) Rolling Stones - You Can't Always Get What You Want,
14) Rusted Root - Send Me On My Way,
15) Steve Earle - The Galway Girl.
I know there are probably a few songs I might have missed either because I don't have the tracks or because they aren't on my mp3, however I'm happy with this list as it is. I also know that probably everyone who ever reads this list, although some might agree with a couple of choices, will have songs they think are far better. At the end of the day though, this is just my opinion.
Although this did take a long time, I do feel quite good to know that I actually now have a list with which I can say these are my favourite songs ever. I also enjoyed discovering what types of music I liked best, even though generally I feel I'm quite eclectic when it comes to listening to music, a few types of music seemed to stand out above the rest.
For my next blog I think I've decided which list I'll work on next, however tomorrow is my last day at university, and on friday I'm moving a lot of my things back home for the holidays, so it might be a while before I post it. I'll keep working on it though whenever I get a moment, and so hopefully won't be too long before its up.
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Favourite Christmas Films: 2011

For the first of my 'favourite' blogs, I thought as its almost christmas, I'd compile a list of my top five favourite christmas films.
There were a few films that immediately jumped into my head when I was thinking about this list, however to fully figure which should make the top five, I decided to 'research' loads of films by watching them. Although I am still at university, I didn't have the busiest week last week, so I spent a few nights over the week, and over the weekend with a tub of Haagen Dazs and a lot of jaffa cakes, going through a number of films.
When I was thinking about this list I came to the conclusion that these films don't have to just be christmas films, although most of them are, they could also be ones that make you feel christmasy, or are linked to this time of year.
So, after a lot of debating with myself, I've managed to come up with my five, however the last few were very close with ones that just missed the list.
Number one: The Nightmare Before Christmas,
Number two: Jack Frost,
Number three: Home Alone 1
Number four: Love Actually,
Number five: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

And because it was really hard to choose, I want to also mention the few that were just missed off:
The Muppet's Christmas Carol,
Home Alone 2,
Jingle all the way,
Miracle on 34th Street,
and a new one I've only just discovered The Polar express.
So its actually kind of a top ten then a top five. Take it as you will, the first five are my definite favourites.
Hopefully I don't need to say much about why they are up there on my list. I think they are all awesome films, as people who have seen them will surely agree, especially the first three. These three I have been watching them for many, many years now, and are also childhood favourites of mine.
Anyways, that's my top five favourite christmas films, which I'm sure I'll have watched again by the end of the holidays. If you haven't seen any of them, I do recommend taking a few hours out to watch them, especially during this time of the year.
I'm almost finished with another one of my lists, even thought they are actually quite hard to compile, so hopefully the next 'favourites' blog will be up within a few days.
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Christmas Traditions

With the christmas holiday quickly approaching, I thought now might be a good time to write a few holiday orientated blogs.

When people talk about christmas they always say about everyone going home for the holidays, spending time with family, giving presents, putting up the decorations, etc... However everyone seems to have different ways of celebrating christmas due to either their own, or their families own traditions. These traditions, I think are needed though, they are what makes everyone's christmas unique and interesting, and also adds to what we look forward to during the holidays, rather then just the basic idea of christmas.

I don't think we have loads of traditions in our family when it comes to christmas, mainly just a kind of order in the way that we do things. Starting with pre-christmas setting up decorations.
We don't really have a set day for getting out the decorations and putting up the tree, usually its during a weekend about 2ish weeks before christmas. That's also the same with taking everything down, usually its a little bit after new year, when people have free time. I guess the only kind of tradition we have when it comes to the tree and decorations, is using the same ones each year. We have a fairly large tree that gets put away during the year, along with some ordinary and some special decorations that we've collected over the years.

When it comes to christmas day we tend to have an order in which we do things rather then traditions. First thing in the morning when we wake up, we usually had stockings outside our bedroom doors which we could open to keep us going until we went downstairs, and also to be able to give our parents longer to sleep before we annoyed them. Next we'd head downstairs to the lounge, and see what presents had arrived. After taking a few photos and got settled in we'd then, as much as we could open presents one after another. We'd do this till either were about half way through, or its getting to be quite late morning. At this point we'd then take a break and go get a drink and some breakfast etc, then go back after everyone's done.

Once all the presents are opened, we'd spend most of the day playing around, constructing our new things, trying stuff on, until the time comes when my mum tells us we have to start moving things upstairs, so she has room to get the christmas dinner ready.

Our christmas dinner, is pretty standard I think, it has all the normal things from dodgy crackers and party hats, to pigs in blankets, the normal kind of dinner. From that point on in the day it seems to be quite similar to other peoples. We'd either play big family games for a few hours or we'd watch particular christmas specials that are on t.v. After this we'd then tend to stay up quite lot, trying to prevent the day from ending. Inevitably though we then soon head off to bed, and christmas would be over for another year.

That's how we traditionally celebrated christmas, even though I know there are loads of little things that people do and different orders people do them in, but as I said, it just makes our own christmas's unique.

This way of celebrating christmas tends to be quite a large family way, I think of spending christmas, a few children, parents, perhaps visiting family. However as my siblings and me are now reaching that age of 'flying the nest' for a better phrase, where some of us aren't living at home full time anymore, those traditions seem to be changing. For the first year this year my older sister won't be with us on christmas day and I'm having to travel back home for christmas.
Although it's not all a bad thing, we've had many years following these traditions, and now its time to make new ones. However that doesn't mean we can't go back to the old ways once and a while.

Anyways, I am now getting more into the christmas spirit and looking forward to christmas more. People have already gone home, as they've finished university for the year already, and sheffield's now getting extra busy with people doing christmas shopping. I've also as of yesterday, begun my christmas shopping, which luckily is going okay so far, however I'm no where near finished yet.

Thinking about this time of year, has got me thinking about New Years, and changes over this year. In regards to this I've had the idea to post a few blogs over the next week or two, with lists of a few of my favourite things. This would kind of act as a form of time capsule to show at the end of 2011 what films were my favourite, or what music, or food etc...
Although these will probably be quite short blogs I'll hopefully get around to posting a quite few of them. My first one should be up within the next few days hopefully, all I have to do first is figure out, out of everything, what my favourite things are.
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Social Networking: Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook

I know from the title of this blog it sounds quite vague and general, and I could possibly go on talking about these three things for ages. Specifically though what I want to talk about are how these sites have affected my everyday life and what I now think about each of them. Also, as it's come to my attention lately, I want to talk about how different these three sites are becoming from what they originally used to be like, in particular Facebook.

Like everyone else when Facebook first appeared, I signed up straight away, ditching Bebo, and any other sites that I was on, because it seemed to be way ahead of its time, and miles better then any of the other networking sites around during those days. Partly due to it being so amazing though, meant I went through the inevitable addicted phase, that I know everyone gone through, where you constantly check Facebook for no apparent reason every time you get home, or your near the computer or whilst your meant to be doing your homework, etc. Luckily as this was quite a few years ago now, it means this phase happened before I got my laptop and blackberry, so I could only check Facebook on our family desktop computer when no one else was using it.

Over the last few months, Facebook has introduced many new upgrades and feature changes, and it now seems you cant go anywhere on the internet without seeing a 'share' button or Facebook icon, trying to take you back to the site. I've also discovered that the purpose of some of these new upgrades, was to make it so you could do things on the internet, like listen to music, and read the news but still stay connected to Facebook. Why though? Do we need to be on Facebook every minute of everyday? Does everything we do and see have to be shown on Facebook? I do wonder why the creators of Facebook introduced these features so we'd stay linked to their site, it just now sound as though we need Facebook, and that by having these features they're doing a service, in giving us a way to able to continue getting our daily fix of the site.

Since the beginning of the year, I've slowly become less interested in Facebook. I definitely don't go on it as much as I used to. In fact the only real reason I go on it now is just to see what my friends have been doing, not to play games, or use their apps, or whatever number of things you can do on there now. I'm not saying that Facebook is a bad site, or that its trying to take over, because I don't think it is, I think that its an amazing site with revolutionary ideas, I'm just trying to understand why this everyday social networking site has become so....important and necessary.
Like always when I write about Facebook in these blogs, I'm left with more unanswered questions then I started with.

One main positive thing that has come out of becoming uninterested in Facebook, is that I now spend more time on Twitter and Tumblr. It's here I'd quickly like to say that this isn't a case of just trading one site for another, and that I still spending ages on social networking sites, because these sites aren't like MySpace and Bebo and Facebook, they're distinctively different.

Twitter has now become my new commenting site, where I share the occasional 'this is what I'm doing today' comment, and I follow a few friends, certain celebrities and other people like that. The reason I like Twitter more then Facebook is simple, you can comment, other people can comment, you post the occasional picture and that's it. Twitter has no gimmicks like Facebook's game section, or quizzes etc... it is what it is, and that's all I ask.You also, because twitter doesn't have any of those quizzes or group pages, don't get a feed full of spammed comments from things you've never heard of. Weirdly, another reason I like Twitter so much, is because there aren't as many people on it. I know the creators of Twitter won't like to hear that, but it makes it feel more unique, and you don't feel like your just going with the masses when you get an account and use it. That being said, it brings me nicely on to my next topic, Tumblr.

Similar to Twitter, a reason why I like it so much is because barely anyone I know has ever heard of it, let alone has an account for it. Tumblr is something special, there aren't really any rules to using it, although I have once or twice heard that there are rules, but your not meant to talk about them. Tumblr is the creative Hub of the internet, home to geeks, artists, book/quote lovers, and especially talented creators of GIF's. Now unless you've actually been on Tumblr and experienced it for yourself, you won't know what I'm on about. For example, its a place where fans of Doctor Who and Harry Potter regularly upload fan fiction, images of their favourite characters, and quotes they like from books or previous episodes.
There so much more to be found on there though, more then just these few examples. You never know what you'll find next.

With Tumblr its just really nice to see, what seems to be a small protected corner of the internet where people can be themselves, upload what they want, be creative, and not have the hassle of people trying to sell things and weird people uploading spam rubbish every hour. To me, Tumblr has become the picture/quote/music equivalent, to this site I'm using right now, Blogger. Whereas on Blogger you'd find diaries, blogs, sometimes long poems, Tumblr has the GIF's, short quotes, pictures and fan music. Both of these are creative sites that, most importantly to me, have the sense of being untouched by the outside world. Like they seem to have been missed by the normal majority of people and are there for the people who would use them properly and treat them fairly.

I've been using Blogger for less then a year so far, however I already feel as though I've now got my own piece of this community, that somewhere on a profile or a 'facts about me' section I can write 'blogger' and know that I actually am. These unique sites, to people, are more then that of what Facebook has become. Often you hear people saying everyone now wastes their time on the internet, checking their walls etc... but there are areas of the internet that are different, that have communities of people who affect one another, who produce awesome things.
What I'm trying to say really is, by being on Blogger, by seeing the people on Tumblr, even by using sites such as YouTube, you realise that people don't just waste time updating and liking status's, they also use these sites genuinely, and shouldn't be clumped in with the stereotype of the majority.

Talking about this does lead me on to think about the new laws and restrictions certain governments are trying to impose on the internet, however as it's getting late, I think I'll leave that for another day.

General update: Essays, House hunting and Ice skating

I noticed that I haven't done one of these catch up blogs in a while, and since a few new things have happened over the last couple of weeks, I thought I'd write one.

On the university side of things, the main thing that's been taking up my time recently has been my first two ever university essays. Seeming as they were my first ones I thought I should try and dedicate quite a bit of time to them. In theory however, the short, not so interesting essay didn't get much of my attention, although the longer essay, that I actually enjoyed researching and writing did. I will say quickly that I did get both essays finished and they were both handed in before their deadlines.
I know with the short essay I didn't spend loads of time on it and perhaps I should have, but I made up for it with the long essay. I actually spent quite a few days researching the longer essay, and practically a whole weekend solid, in the library writing it, tweaking it, typing it up and then referencing it. Overall I was quite proud to hand it in, so I can't really ask for more.

These two essays are just the beginning though. As soon as they were handed in, we were reminded of two more that need to be in after christmas, and our exams in january also. Due to the essays being handed in last week, I decided to have a short break from essay type work this week, then begin on the rest come monday. I have a feeling this is how my uni life will be from now on.

Away from the topic of university now, and on to something far more interesting, house hunting. Not long after we'd arrived at university this year, I heard people already talking about getting accommodation for next year. At that point in the year, I thought it was still way too early, and not necessary to start looking just yet. A few weeks ago, my friends Amy, Matty and me decided that perhaps we should start looking, and so quickly lined up a few viewings around sheffield. We later found out that this was the right thing to do, as the estate agent we spoke to said that 70% of there houses had gone, and it was only early november. Although we'd organised a few house viewings, we went to the first one, saw how awesome it was, and how cheap it was and said we'd take it. Now, I know you might say that that was quite quick, and perhaps we should have looked around others first, but we felt it was the right thing to do, plus houses were being snapped up so quickly we didn't want to risk not getting it. We also thoroughly checked through the whole contract before signing anything or handing over any money.
The only downside that has come out of getting this house, is that its miles better then where each of us are staying now, and because of this we want to move in straight away. Unfortunately we'll just have to wait til next summer for our move in date.

Lastly, away completely from university and work, having fun. Personally, over the last couple of weeks I've found myself getting very tired. Not because of things like rushing around loads, or being up late each night, but because I haven't had much to do, I've had loads of time to just plod around and think, and because things that I have had planned to keep me busy have been all university related. Due to this I decided I'd try change things, have a bit of fun, so I thought I'd ask some friends if they'd like to go ice skating. As I said a few blogs ago, I've wanted to go for ages and learn how to properly skate and so I was really keen to go. Last night was the night we decided to go, and although because it was student night, and so was quite crowded, it was amazing and all had a great time. Overall, I think between us there was only one fall, which was just a small trip, other then that though we all seemed to pick it up quite quickly. I was quite astonished how after only about 20/30 minutes, I seemed to pick it up. I'm not sure whether that's normal or whether I just have a kind of nack for it. Either way, it was really fun, and I really enjoyed getting out the flat and doing something non uni related for a change.

Hopefully last night won't become just a rare occurrence, and we'll not only go ice skating more often, but I'll find more fun and interesting stuff to get me out and about more.
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Is it Christmas already?

This has happened every year for about as long as I can remember, but people are now saying its christmas. Now really? Its only just mid- november.

I have to be honest and say that I did find it very weird when I walked out of my flat last week, to hear christmas songs blaring out of another flats windows. It just didn't feel right, especially as it was quite sunny and warm that day. Whether its shops putting things up in windows earlier and earlier each year, fooling us into thinking its christmas time, or whether it's just jolly people getting into the spirit early, I'm not quite ready to hear xmas songs just yet.

I don't mean to sound scroogey, about this it's just that when you hear about christmas and start thinking it's just round the corner, you tend to slow down and not get on with things like normal. This year especially, because I'm now at uni, with essays and presentations to do all the way up til mid december, I don't want to ease up until its done and out of the way.

For many people there are signs that suggest its not long till christmas, like it either getting colder, it getting darker earlier, it snowing...but for me its seeing the classic Coke Cola christmas advert. This is another thing about this time of year that has happened for as long as I can remember, and to me symbolises that christmas isn't far away. Imagine my devastation then, when several years ago they decided to not to play it anymore. They did this for one year, but due to the outrage it not being on, decided to reintroduce it the following year.

One problem I have with this symbol this year, is you need to watch t.v in order to see it. Being in my own flat now at uni, I barely ever watch t.v unless its one of the rare time I watch it online. Supposedly, from what I gathered from facebook, the advert was played for the first time this year, a couple of days ago on saturday evening and a few times since then, and I missed them all.

Perhaps its a good thing though that I've missed it so far. Like I said, this year university work comes first before christmas. I just hope that I'll be able to get all my work done and out of the way before I start getting distracted by anything christmasy.
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Re: Observations

This is a response blog, to a video of someone I follow on YouTube called Kayley Hyde.

Kayley is an American, who has recently come over to England to study at university for a year, as like a study abroad programme. Being an American living in England, more specifically London, she expressed in her video certain observations she'd made about english people, and about things in England compared to America.

The main observation Kayley made was how we english, have this kind of hatred towards scottish money. As soon as she said this I began thinking about it, and I can definitely see where she's coming from, but I don't know why. I've often seen people in shops get out money from their bags and choose to use english notes rather then scottish. I will admit, I have done this as well, but I'm not entirely sure why. Is it just something I've grown up with, do we really just not like scottish money? Whatever the reason, I know for a fact that its all legal tender and shops will take it, so I feel as though I should try and stop myself thinking this way from now on.

Another observation, not one that Kayley mentioned, but one I thought of, as my friend Matty was telling me about his trip to London, are tube trains. With tube trains you go down into the underground, you find your platform, and you wait for your tube. Whilst doing this you can see along the ceiling of the platform, displays saying that a tube will be along in 1 minute, then 2 minutes after that, then 1 minute after that, showing clearly that they come very frequently, so why is it no matter how crowded that first tube is people insist on getting on it? You know that there will be another one in a minute, probably less crowded, but no it has to be that first tube. I will make it a more accurate observation and say that it does tend to be more Londoner's then tourists, showing it is an english thing. Again I will put my hands up and say I am guilty of this, and again I'm not sure why?
I know there are certain reasons like people running late but that can't be the reason for all of the people I've seen. I don't think it has to do with being impatient either, it's just something we do, something hard wired into us perhaps as a people?

Sorry I know this hasn't been the most interesting blog, and perhaps it hasn't made much sense either, I just got really intrigued by these observations of english people, as seen by someone from another country. It makes you think what other little quirks do we have, like the fact everyone always says how the english love to queue. It also makes you think why we do these things, whether they're notions passed down to us and taught to us by our parents, or if they are more of an english instinct.

What ever the reasons for these quirks, its just nice to know what makes us different from other people. I don't mean that in a bad way, just like what little things separate us, and give us this identity compared to other people in the world.
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The start of The Bucket List

Since writing my blog last week, I've been continuously thinking about what I want to have on my bucket list. I haven't yet started a physical written list yet, so I thought as I came up with this idea in one of my blogs, why not start the list in one too.

In order to begin finding ideas for this list, I'm not, as most people probably would, looking to the future, but instead to the past. Instead of thinking about what I want in years to come, I'm going to start with things I've wanted to do since I was a child, or never got the chance to do previously, which actually is quite a few things now that I think about it.
So here it is:

.Learn to play the violin - I actually did start to take lessons when I was younger, in primary school, but due to clashes with classes I unfortunately had to give it up. Over the last few years I've also had a kind of resurgence in wanting to learn to play too, so this will definatly be on top of the list.

.Learn to ice skate/play ice hockey - With this entry, its actually been more of a monetary and geographical reason why I've so far not been able to learn to skate. Due to living in scarborough, the closest ice rink is about an hour and a half away so it'd be quite a trek to get out there, however now that I'm in Sheffield there is a rink five minutes away and due to being a student, it's really cheap.

.To travel to Egypt, to visit the great pyramids, the temple at Abu Simbel, and the temple at Luxor - Since I was really young I've been fascinated with the ancient egyptians, and as a result have always wanted to travel to see some of the remains from that time and learn more about them.

.To travel to Italy, to visit Rome, specifically the colosseum, and Venice - Again partly due to a fascination of ancient history, I've always wanted to visit italy and go to see the sites, and experience the culture.

.See the Northern Lights - What's there to say, an amazing natural thing to witness and experience.

.Learn how to Rock Climb, inside a climbing centre and then eventually out on real rock - Similar to ice skating, I've not been able to learn this so far, as there aren't any places to learn anywhere near scarborough.

I haven't got any other entries for my list as of yet, but I'll be sure to keep adding things. I'll also occasionally write the updates in future blogs to keep it all online.
Now that I've got the list and entries on it, all I've got to do is start ticking things off.
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Things to do and Places to see. Making my Bucket List.

The reason I wanted to write this blog today is due to a few programmes that I've been watching recently, namely the second season of An Idiot Abroad, and Ewan McGreggor and Charlie Boorman's Long Way Round, and Long Way Down. I don't want to go into to much detail about the programmes, but they're both essentially travel based programmes, with the Idiot Abroad programme, actually being about what things you would like to do before you die.

Having watched these both recently, and also a few videos by someone I follow on YouTube, it's started to make me think about what things I want to do either just in my lifetime or when I grow up. Now I'm not talking about getting a nice house, and good job, more like that I want to go to Egypt, to see the pyramids, that I want to climb a glacier, or go up a mountain, more life changing, eye opening experiences.


I wrote a few months back, about traveling and how some of my friends in between sixth form and university took a gap year to go abroad and help in out reach programmes and things like that, which sounded brilliant, but even though I too took a gap year, I'm glad I didn't go away or start traveling then. Everyone says that that's the best time in your life to do things like that, because you don't have anything yet to tie you down, your out of compulsory education and so on, however I tend to disagree. I'm hoping that in just under three years I'll come out of university, with a degree, a great group of friends, I'll have more of an idea of what I want to do and basically i'll have the whole world open to me. What I'm trying to say is, if your planning to go to university, go,why take that gap, and set getting into real life back by another year. My ideal scenario is that having gotten a few years experience of being in a city, being part of a more adult world, gaining friends that I'd want to share a house with and have fun with, then or anytime after that, would be the best time to go out and experience life.

The best thing that I like about the Long Way Round and Long Way Down programmes, is that its two friends who decided they wanted to do something together, because it would be fun and an awesome thing to be able to do. During it they were often told, either certain things couldn't be done, or they should go this way or that way because it was easier, but throughout they did their own thing, they did stuff because it was what they wanted, they didn't want to just take the easy route, they'd rather take the more difficult route and experience things then the easy route, and leave with no experiences at all.

I know that I might be starting to rant now, its just, the thing is that throughout school, and even my short time at university, how you live your life seems like this thing you have to plan out; you go to school, you go to uni, you get a job, you get a house, you get married....... Due to everything that's happened over this last year with my parents and how its not gone to plan, its mucked up that schedule but in a bad way, I feel that I still want to muck it up but in a good way, to counteract things, so I can do things the way I want, to take things as they come but on my terms. Basically I'm just trying to say that, I think things like traveling the world, visiting foreign places, experiencing the world, shouldn't have to be just on summer holidays, that your only able to take at a certain time of the year because of work, or even in a short year between school, because that's what everyone else does.

Before I die I want to get out there, not just to as many places as I can, but to see as much as I can, and so from now on, I'm starting my own Bucket list, which will have anything I want on it, from visiting somewhere, to trying to learn something, to doing something I've never done before.

Even now in my short life, I'm able to sit here with friends, and reminisce about old times, and I enjoy it and all were talking about is school and days out that we went on. Just imagine though how amazing it would be, if you were able to do all the things you dreamed of doing, awesome and amazing things that take you far away from that normal life of 9 to 5 jobs, and doing your weekly shop, if you were able to look back over your life and say you witnessed things and went places other people won't ever be able to imagine, and you don't for one second, regret a thing.

Has the world become such a small place?

Following my trip back home over the weekend, I've now been left with the question, is the world really such a small place?

Sheffield isn't the furthest place away from scarborough, but there is still some distance in between. It's due to this distance that when I first moved to sheffield, I thought that I wouldn't have many encounters with people I know. I don't mean that in a bad way, I just mean that, by moving to somewhere over 2 hours drive from home, I wouldn't have the opportunity to bump into people I knew, just by wandering around the city centre, like back at home. However this hasn't really been the case.

A couple of weeks ago, just as I was walking to Wilkinson's in the high street, I bumped into a girl called Vanessa, who used to go to the same school as me, but a few years above. After we saw each other, we then stood in the middle of the sidewalk for about 5-10 minutes having a nice catch-up chat. A couple of weeks or so after that, another person who I used to know through my sister, called Arthur, saw me walking down the street and cycled over to me to say hello, and again have another quick catch-up.

Due to these encounters having a few weeks in between them, and that they were in different parts of Sheffield, I thought that they might just be random meetings, and wouldn't see anyone else after that. However since last weekend I'm now not that sure.

Last friday, I met my friend Matty at Sheffield train station to catch the train home. Just as we were about to get on the train, we saw our friend Meghan, who we knew from Lady Lumleys. Due to the train being so crowded we weren't able to sit together, but we did manage to have a quick chat as we got on the train. Now Meghan is studying at Sheffield Hallam, like us, so I know that makes it less of a coincidence. But it still was quite random.
In addition to this encounter, as Matty left York station, and I went to go grab my connecting train home, I then saw another person I knew from Lady lumleys. However this person I know studies at Teeside University, so is a bit further away from where I thought they'd be.

On just that one day in the space of two hours I'd seen one person from where we were, and another a fair distance away from where they study. In additions to these encounters, I then saw another person I knew from sixth form, on the sunday when I was on the train back to Sheffield.

All of these meet ups were unexpected, but still really nice. I got to see people that I haven't seen for up to two and a half years, and all because we moved away home and out into the world.
I wonder if maybe Sheffield is still too close to home. Perhaps maybe, because of how easy and cheap it is now a days to get around, the world has just become that much smaller.
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University: The Week of Shopping and Cooking

I am now into my forth week at university, and come today I’ve now been in my new flat for a whole month; don’t know where the times gone. This week has also been the first week that I’ve been using my student finance money, to keep me fed and to buy anything that I need.

Due to problems with filling out forms, student finance losing forms, us sending out replacement forms, student finance losing the forms again and other such annoyances, I only received my living and rent money at the end of last week. I won’t say how much money I have to live off of each week, but realistically it should be enough to buy in food from somewhere like Sainsbury’s or Aldi, to pay off my phone bill each month and also have a little bit left over to get a few drinks with friends, or have a take away once and a while or things like that. Weirdly, I’ve actually been looking forward to getting this money through and having a kind of limit each month, to me it feels more like how I think adult life after school will feel like. When you’re out working you’ll get a certain amount each month, you’ll use some of it to pay bills, housing, etc…, and then the rest is for you to live off of. Will hopefully be good practice for when that time comes.

Each night this week, I’ve had the problem of, what to have for tea? The few weeks previous when it came to this time I've usually popped down to Sainsbury’s or Tesco’s local and grabbed something quick and easy so that it wouldn’t take too long or be much effort. However now that I am on this budget, I feel as though I should plan out what I’m going to have, so that I can either bulk buy and save money or buy certain things that I can use over two three days and again save on money, not having to buy lots of different things. Up until now though, this hasn’t happen, instead I’ve gone in to the supermarket and each day decided in the store what I wanted to have. Now I know that this isn’t exactly the cheapest option, and I probably won’t be able to keep doing it for long, but I’m still getting used to how things work. 

The other massive problem that I’m also facing when it comes to food, are the portion sizes. Unless you’re buying ready meals, you can’t buy meals for one. I am being good, in the respect that I buy the separate ingredients for a meal, instead of it already prepared, but you have to buy like a big bag of potatoes, or 5 chicken thighs. I wonder who decides how many things should be in a packet, why 5 chicken thighs and not 4, surely the traditional family size is 4 people, why not 6 instead? Hmm food for thought i guess.

 In addition to this problem, I’m also finding my serving portions quite large too, again because I’m used to cooking for a larger number of people. I’m still not able to judge right how much I'm going to need, for example earlier on I couldn't really judge how much rice would come out of the pan once it was cooked, and so I was left with almost another plate full of rice in the pan. Needless to say I am now starting to get a bit sick of rice, and also pasta. I need to start coming up with other ideas.

I don’t know if I’ve said yet, but at home I often bake, making large Victoria sponge type cakes, usually coffee cakes and over the last few weeks I’ve had regular urges to want to bake something instead of going out to buy cakes, but don’t have any of the ingredients or equipment that I’d need. It still feels very weird, that when you’re at home you know that you already have pans, bowls, cake tins, scales, everything all there ready to use, but after 4 weeks I’m still finding things like a sieve that I haven’t yet bought and so your limited in what you can do, until you can go out and get it. Cake tins aren’t necessarily a high priority at the moment and since I’m now on my student budget, I think they can wait for a while. I’m sure I’ll get round to buying everything in eventually though.

Think that’s enough about cooking for the moment, have already had my dinner for tonight but I’m starting to feel hungry again. Might pop off down to the shops quickly to get some desert or perhaps might try cook up another one of my grilled bagels, as they don’t, for some reason seem to be able to fit in the toaster.

Weird and Interesting things in the News

I know its been a while since I've done just a normal everyday blog, so I thought as I've got a two hour train ride back to sheffield, I'd use the time to write one now.

One of the features that I use most on my blackberry is the RSS Feed application. On this application I get all of the news from the Daily Mail website, as well as other blogs and sites I follow. Now usually I get sent a lot of political related articles, or celebrity type story's, which I tend to skim over, however there was one story the other day that stood out, and I just had to read it.

The article was about a 42 year old man, and a 13 year old boy, who had been playing online all day, against each other, on the xbox game 'Call Of Duty: Black Ops'. Now the story really begins when later on in the day, the young boy kills the man, in the game, the man flips out, storms around to where the young boy was and began to throttle him, half to death.

At this point, here's some quick background information to help fill in the blanks: The man was a friend of the young boys family, and so lived nearby, and already knew the boy, and also the young boy along with a friend had been playing all day with the man, throughout which they'd been talking to and goading him over the online chat.

I don't really know what to say about this story. I've played this game lots of times, and I know that it is very easy to find yourself getting dawn in and wrapped up in the atmosphere of it, but never to the point that I'd go up to someone in real life and try kill them. It does say in the article that the man later on said that it was a 'moment of madness', and has since seen the boy and apologised, but why did it ever get that far?
A few very easy to implement solutions to this problem would have been:
1) Remember that its just a game, calm down.
2) Remember they're just kids.
3) Turn the Xbox off, nothing can happen if it's off.
Why didn't he just do one of these instead of resorting to suffocating the kid.

In my opinion, it was just stupid, its only a game, if you don't want them killing you on it, get better at it. I will admit that I can't help but find this slightly funny, but that's just me. In no way is it the game makers fault, which ever way you look at it, it was down to the boy and the man. This does bring up the fact though that in the article it does say that the child was 13, when actually there's a game rating of 18, so technically its his own fault because he shouldn't have been playing it.

Both parties are now fine, no long lasting damage done, the man got his punishment for hurting the boy, and the boys back to his normal life. It does just leave you with that one last burning question, Why? Think next time.
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First week over. Weekend at home. Lectures week begins.

Last night celebrated the official ending to freshers week, meaning that come this morning new first year students headed in to have their first lectures and officially begin university. I however don't actually have my first lecture till tomorrow morning as I have Mondays off, as well as Fridays.

Last week for students, was less about the education side of university and more about the social side. All week the local clubs and the HUB (our student union) have been hosting events to get students in the mood for socialising and partying, and there have been some great evenings. I didn't go out to as many as I thought I would, but I do have to say that, the night of the North vs. Midlands vs. South pub crawl was definitely an awesome night. Of course I knew that it being freshers, people would be out every night, friends would be meeting up during the day time and some people would still be getting settled in. However with this I thought there would also be a couple of university work type events to go along with the social events, so it did come as a slight surprise to me, when over the whole week I only had to go in for a quick registration and enrolment, a short talk about the library and a brief talk about my lectures.
It's not that I wanted a jam packed first week, I'm quite glad actually that it’s been a calm week, the thing is that I've just come to realise over this first week, that in between lectures I actually have a lot of free time.

Before I say anything else, I do know that when university gets into full swing I'll have projects to get done, essays to write and I'll more than likely be complaining I have no time to do anything, but it could realistically take a few months to get to that stage. So my problem now is, how do I fill my time?

Last Sunday, not long after writing my last blog I actually caught the last train back home, this was because of a phone call that I'd had from my mum that evening when she mentioned about how things were back home. During the afternoon on Sunday my mum had a 'meeting' with my dad to discuss a few things, the outcome of this meeting being, that they were now getting a divorce, that my dad wanted the house to be put on the market and sold as quickly as it could, and that also for the foreseeable future, he would be moving back into our house. I won't say much about why he'd be moving back in, I'll just say that due to certain reasons he would be moving back into our house for 3/4 nights a week, and the rest of the time he'd be back round at his other house.

After spending the night at home last Sunday, I then had to come back to Sheffield on Monday evening, so I could go to enrolment on Tuesday, and go to the rest of my classes throughout the week, however I was determined to be at home for the first day my dad moved back in, and so at the end of last week, on Friday, I went home again, as this was the day my dad would move back. I don't want to speak for my family, but I am in no way happy about what my dad’s doing, in regards to moving back in, and this was 100% confirmed when on the first night, he came into the house, popped his head round the door, casually asked how things were going, and then said that he was going upstairs to unpack and settle in. After a year of him not living there, and all of the things that have happened, it is beyond me how he could stroll back in like that. The only way I can describe how that felt then, was like 'he had popped out to the shops a year ago and he'd just got back', I noticed how long he'd gone but to him nothing had changed.
I'm sorry I don't want to talk about this too much, it’s just that at the moment it feels too much like deja vu, last year a week or so before I left for university, he splits my with my mum, and then a week into me starting university this year, he moves back in and brings more problems with him.

I still feel that taking last year out was the best decision, for my family and for me, but this year is my second chance. I feel like a can have a brilliant time here, and start moving forward. When I left for university just under two weeks ago, everyone was in a good place, things were getting better, and I actually felt as though I could leave and things would be alright. I don't in anyway mean that without me things would crumble, I just mean that we've all been there for each other over the last year, and with me leaving there would then be one less person around as a source of support. What do I do now though?
I could take the option of going home every weekend, I have the money to do that, and I would love to, but then that means that I won't be spending as much time in Sheffield, and won’t have as much time to spend with people from university. Two weeks ago I wouldn't have had this problem, I could be at university and not feel like I'm doing my family wrong, but now I feel as though I should dedicate time to going home more, and cut back on my priority's to university.

Anyway, I'll stop all that talk now, also it's now getting quite late and I do have my first lecture tomorrow morning, so I should get some sleep. I can't say how much I'm looking forward to tomorrow and to properly getting stuck into my work. It's been a long time coming, and it's almost here. Let's hope it all goes well.

First few days of University life

I've now been in Sheffield for 5 days, and 4 nights, living in my new accommodation, with my first day at university coming up on tuesday.

Up until now I've been keeping myself quite busy, buying in food, and going out getting things that I either forgot to bring or weren't in the flat when I moved in. In my last blog I said I was 99% sure I'd gotten everything, and it so happens that I did forget something, and so that's why the 1% was left. I knew I'd forgotten something.

On arriving at my accommodation I thought that it did look a bit basic but it would be fine for living in, however after going to a few of my friends flats, I know think my flat definitely isn't as good compared to theirs, but should still be alright to live in.

This year I think I've been very lucky when it comes to my flatmates. Three out of four of my flatmates arrived over the last couple of days, and my last flatmate arrived today, and they all seem really nice and easy to get on with. I do think we all, at times, still seem a bit unsure about things, like where the best places to get things are, down to what time everyone wakes up in the morning so whether to stay quite quiet. I'm sure after a few weeks though we'll get used to everything.

The one thing that I hopefully will get used to soon is not being so close to home. At the moment it feels like a holiday period, like I'm on a school trip staying over. Its slowly sinking in now that this is going to be where I'm living full time, however due to this its making me miss home and all the familiar things back in Scarborough. I haven't as of yet planned a date when I'm first going back home, but being only a few hours away gives me the choice to turn up at the station and grab the first one leaving, without it being too expensive.

I think so far everything has gone quite well, I'm just now really looking forward to getting into class, starting projects and properly getting stuck in. Time seems to have slowed down these last couple of days, and because of this I'm just mostly looking forward to getting back to some kind of normality.
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Packing for University, and Saying Goodbye

I can now say that I am 99% sure that I have everything packed, that I'll need for the next year of my life.

Continuing on from what I wrote yesterday, this morning I went back through the pile of things I'd already put to one side and ticked everything off again, just as a double check. From this I then made up another list, of things that I still needed to buy, which I'd later pick up in town.

I will just mention again, as I did yesterday, moving is very complicated and stressful, and like going on holiday, you constantly feel as though you've forgotten something, which after two days becomes very annoying.

Later on today, as well as going into town to do some last minute shopping, I also went in to take my uniform back to work. This was a very weird experience, as I've been working at Millets in Scarborough for the past three years, since September 2008, and it was my first ever proper job, and now its over. I am in a way glad that I don't have to work for a while however it does mean that I won't see my friends that I've made there very much anymore, and also I won't be getting the same amount of money that I'm used to each month, meaning as a student I'll be making a lot of cutbacks.

In between doing the shopping today, I also went round to my nana and grandpa's to see them, and also met up with my friends Roz and Tom to see how they've been and say goodbye. It still hasn't really hit me yet, that I won't be seeing these people much anymore. I will hopefully make it back home at least once every 4 weeks, where I'll be able to see my mum, brother, and sister, but the likelihood is that I'd just be back for perhaps two days, which won't really give me time to catch up with friends, or see people at home. We'll have to just see how much time I get and what I can take off.

The last thing I wanted to mention today was just how weird it is to see, basically, the contents of your belongings packed up in a car. Now I know that its not everything I own, but its getting there. When I started to pack I thought I had loads of stuff, enough to fill several rooms, but when you see it all, packed together, you realise how much you do actually own, and how much of it, is actually important, if that makes sense. Honestly I would mind if any of my stuff got stolen, but I think, really there is only one small bag, out of everything, that I would actually be really upset about if it was taken, because of what I have in it.
Please wish me good luck for tomorrow, I can already see that its going to be a difficult day, not only for me, but also mainly for members of my family. As always I will update very soon, and we'll see how things go.
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Family, Friends and Surprise Party

We've just come through another quite chaotic weekend, and again it was due to a surprise get together and other surprise type things. This time however the party get together, was for my mum.

For several weeks now, we (my two sister's, my brother and me) have been planning a surprise party for my mum on the 10th of september, as well as a special quite expensive present that my mums been wanting for a while now.

The first surprise, for my mum came on friday evening, when my sister walked through the door just after 11 o'clock, having jumped on the train straight after her work, down in Sawbridgeworth. This surprise did have a few slight problems though, because we had to get someone to go down to the station to meet her without my mum knowing, and also the basic problem of keeping my mum awake long enough for my sister to get here.

Come saturday everything we were planning seemed to be running smoothly, however as always, things didn't stay like that for long. My mum on saturday was meant to be exhibiting at a wedding show which was planned to finish at 5pm, although because it was unbelievably quiet they instead finished at 3, which meant we had to tell my mum she couldn't come hope for two hours whilst we finished setting everything up.

After rushing around town to buy food for the party, running around the house putting up decorations, and then getting my mum in the house before guests arrived, the last problem we encountered came about an hour after the first guests arrived. This problem I'd say is a given for any kind of party, which was that some of the guests turned up late.
Overall though, the night went brilliantly, so much better then we could have expected. Everyone had a great laugh, we sat round the kitchen table for hours passing around anecdotes and funny stories and in the end people stayed till after mid-night chatting away.

Now this weekend has passed and everything went well, its time to turn my attention to my move to university. I've already spent most of the day making up lists of what I need to take and have begun digging out the items from my mess of a room. Tomorrow, brings a very large pile of clothes that needs to be ironed, some last minute shopping and packing up the car ready for wednesday. Moving really is stressful, who knew you needed so much stuff to move into a new place.
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