Revision

Its nearing that time again; the time when college students must emerge from their darkened lairs and begin the fabled ritual of revision. Time consuming and well, pretty much downright dull! As the weather continues to better, the exams loom closer. It is almost as if nature is teasing us, inviting us outside to bask in the warm glow that is the beginning of Summer. However, unless we wish to fail our exams, we must fight the temptation and return to our dirty old textbooks and study, for an half term is never a holiday as long as you’re a student!

I myself plan to start on the Monday, enjoying this weekend as if it were my last. My last taste of freedom for at least a couple more months.

Coursework

There are many things that I dislike in this world. To name but a few: the sinking feeling of sadness within the pit of one’s stomach, the sarcastic laughter of a petty bully, and the sting upon the cheek that signifies winters presence. Regardless of how awful these things may be, in my opinion none of them even come close to challenging the malevolent nature of coursework.

The word alone is saturated with the knowledge of long hours slaving away on a laptop, desperately trying to rack one’s brain, scouring it for some significant information that will hopefully prove insightful. If not insightful then at least somewhat relevant! The nights grow longer, until the cruel light of dawn flickers through the trees, signifying another night wasted. The light will taunt you, tease you, knowing that you are in a dark place and no amount of cheerful sunlight will ever change that. Coursework. It is the bane of any English Literature student’s life. Once the great endeavour has been endured, we will emerge from our darkened rooms, laptops in hand, and rejoice in the light that once maliciously winked at us in the early hours of the morning. Coursework, you shall be defeated.

Well I hope everyone enjoyed that 🙂 It was just something I threw onto a page, reflecting pretty accurately my own thoughts regarding the struggles of coursework!

Musical instrument

Over the past months it has come to my attention that I could most likely achieve something more productive concerning my free time, so I gave some thought as to what I could do, and so I have recently decided to take up a musical instrument. This decision then gave way to even more questions, such as which instrument? Which size? What would I most enjoy? I gave it some careful thought, and eventually came to the conclusion that I would purchase a ukulele.

Granted, this may be a somewhat unconventional instrument to attempt to play professionally, but I wanted to go for something that was fairly original, while not so obscure it would be impossible to find any online guides regarding how to play it. So after much deliberation, I decided to go for a concert sized ukulele, which is the second smallest size, second only to the classic soprano ukulele which creates the stereotypical Hawaiian sound that most people associate with the ukulele.  The reason for my choice in size is the simple fact that my fingers do not fit the frets of the smallest sized ukulele, so attempting to play it would be frustrating to say the least!

I now practice whenever I find the time, and am already loving it! I shall possibly post future updates regarding my progress, but if anyone should have any queries or general questions about the instrument, I would be more than happy to answer them.

Apologies

For those of you that have been following this blog – my sincerest apologies regarding my lack of activity recently. I have been extremely busy regarding family, work and college life and am only just getting back into the swing of things. I plan on posting a lot more consistently in the future, so be on the lookout for what I have to say! I’ll leave this particular post short, but end on the promise of many more to come, thank you for your patience.

Social Media – Twitter and YouTube

In case any of you were wondering, I am relatively active on various social media sites, including Facebook and Twitter mainly. I find Twitter is a good stress release, as the limit on 140 words per ‘tweet’ is a great way to express thoughts and feelings in a short and ‘to the point’ manner. For one reason or another during my time on Twitter (just over a year) I have amounted a total of over 3,000 followers while only following around 2,000 others myself. The nature of my ‘tweets’ are generally just random, passing thoughts that spring to mind, and I never tend to give them a second glance, but others seem to think that they possess some sort of quirky humour that gives them a certain tickle. I have been requested by more than a few people now to create my very own YouTube channel, hosting a variety of videos ranging from ‘vlogs’ to just generic videos about my opinion on certain matters. I have considered this thoroughly, and have come to the conclusion that I will give it a shot! It could be a bit of much needed fun and just maybe provide a splash of vibrancy to the already teaming social media site that is YouTube.

Trash Television

Well yesterday was the start of yet another series of ‘I’m a celebrity get me out of here’ and once again I was poised at the end of my chair awaiting the commencement. Every year, the show presents itself with a whole new selection of ‘celebrities’, the likes of which I will most likely know the name of a mere couple. Yet, despite the fact that it is the same basic format year after year, I cannot seem to peel my eyes from it. I keep coming back for more, and quite frankly, I don’t mind one bit. I’m not quite sure what draws myself and what I’m going to assume is a very large quantity of other people, but the content is seemingly mesmorising. In spite of it’s flaws, once again I shall be sat in the very same chair, watching the very same show.

Commentary in response to my creative response inspired by the literary works of Raymond Carver

A few days ago I posted some of my work on here and it went down relatively well, as other users liked the post. So I have decided to include a small selected piece of the commentary in which I had to write in response to my own creative piece. I Hope you all find it to be at least somewhat informative. If this is not the case then some constructive criticism would be most appreciated also. The piece I have selected to post is in response to the reasons as to why I chose Raymond Carver as my stimulus text, and how my piece reflects some of the characteristics that can be found in his own work. Here it is:

Throughout much of Carver’s work there is evidence of a sense of realism. My short story mirrors the genre in which Raymond Carver uses, which is essentially genre less, creating a sense of detachment that can be applied to the character’s relationship within my story. Much like Carver I use a realistic fiction based style, which is demonstrated through the use of a common situation interlaced with symbolism. I have also imitated the ambiguous nature of Raymond Carver but with the addition of a haunting tone and a metaphorical exploration of character.

Creative response to the literary works of Raymond Carver

This is a small piece selected from my AS English Literature coursework. It is a creative response to Raymond Carver’s range of short stories, and by producing this creative response I hoped to capture some of his key concepts, the likes of which being the reason as to his noteworthy reputation. Raymond Carver is known for his simplistic nature of writing, yet with a certain level of ambiguity. This is what I hoped to emulate in my own work, with the piece being stripped down to the bare essentials, leaving the reader to make vital inferences regarding the subtext. The selected piece is shown below.

The gentle orange glow from the streetlamp entered the bathroom window and kissed the mirror cabinet, illuminating it like a shrine, offering a soft reflection back at me. I stare at the still image. It’s not so bad. I opened the cabinet and stared at the contents. Just like every other time, my eyes fell on something in particular. The glow of the streetlamp fell kindly upon it, illuminating the object. My hands enclosed around it for a few seconds, then I relinquished my grip. I tore myself away from the bathroom cabinet and went back into the hallway.