In less than 14 days I'll be on my way home!

This week I completed and submitted my second language assignment. I went through it with a fine tooth comb, checked my ideas with my lecturer and got the learning development teacher (I hate that term, it sounds like they are for special needs people, but they're not...) to look over it. With any luck I was on the right track this time; people have been talking about it and freaking each other out with what they have/haven't done but I have done my best and there is truly no point in stressing about it now - there is too much else to worry about!
This week my short story needs to be submitted, but luckily I have pretty much finished that - I just need to add about 15 more words (if real authors were given a word count to stick to they would have a fit!). The problem I am having is making the extra words relevant; I have just been adding more description as I feel that if I add any extra dimension to the story it will become difficult to follow. I have already had to more or less rewrite it once, as well as doing seven drafts, so I don't plan on doing it again!
I am currently working on a modernism presentation. It's not got a set word count, but I have been told it is meant to be 3 minutes long and I know that you need a fair few words to meet that time scale! And Modernism, really?! You all know my feelings towards this drivel, I'm sure, but never mind; there are only a few weeks left now.

I am also trying to make good headway on the assignments due in after Christmas, as I will need to be spending the Christmas 'break' revising for the Modernism exam on the 14th January. I get really irritated by this online submission stuff; if we could only submit in the university, no way on Earth would they ask for us to have a 3000 word Critical Chapter handed in on the 4th January and a 2500 word Research Report due on the 8th January! I mean we don't even officially start back at university until the 4th February!


On a lighter note, I have planned my birthday and given people the date so they have no excuse to let me down this year. No doubt they will manage to still, but at least they have had enough warning!

Counting down the days 'til I come home now :) It's going to be brilliant! Shame there will be a lack of 'break' what with revision etc, but that's just plain typical.

New academic year

Once again the blog writing is slacking a little. I apologise, but seem to be struggling to be able to write anything at all which would be worth reading lately. This is especially true of my university modules. I am back at university now and living in a house with some of my coursemates (far nicer experience than last year, I can tell you!).
I am currently studying 'Modernism', 'Short Story' and 'Language studies'. Language studies seems fairly easy for me to grasp, as it's the part I most enjoy (although we have a massive research project coming up soon, which could prove me wrong!). I can't seem to grasp the concepts of Modernism, however, as there is so much going on and (as with a lot of literature) there seems to be a lot of unecessary reading into things. I only took the module as my lecturer thought I would enjoy it, although I can't blame her for me not enjoying it really, she was just trying to help me make a decision on my modules and thought it would appeal. She was wrong. Never mind. I am trying my hardest though, as there are no other modules which jump out at me and I am determined to pass all of my modules first time! As for the Short Story module...well...that brings me back to the statement at the top of this post. Let's just say that the imagination I was blessed with as a child has since escaped me. We had a short story writer come to visit us today, Vanessa Gebbie. I had read some of her work and think that she has fantastic talent (especially in comparison with many of the authors I have read recently!). It was really useful to have a published writer come in to speak to us and tutor us for 2 hours as it did provide lots of inspiration and methods of getting creative juices flowing! Unfortunately, as is sod's law, my excitable little head which was flourising with ideas as I left the seminar, seemed to crash as soon as I sat down to actually write my 2500 word short story. The dreadful thing is that 2500 words is nothing really, and it should be extremely easy to fill up the word count. Our lecturer keeps telling us that we have to be careful not to use up the word count without finishing the story, but at this rate that is not going to happen. My key problem is that my ideas are either too vast or more suited to flash fiction and I am finding it impossible to think of an idea which isn't too cliché, too boring or written like a child.

There is no point dwelling on it, so I am heading home this weekend for Chris's 20th birthday.  We are going to MCM Expo during the day, and going back to his for a meal with his family afterwards. Expo was a bit of a last minute decision this year so we aren't dressing up; we weren't going to go but Chris realised that one of his friends who he hadn't seen for a while will be going, and I found out that Sopio cards will have a booth and I quite want to get a deck of cards :) [Sopio is a card game made by a youtuber I watch, and his friend]. On the Sunday I am going to be seeing my parents. It seems like it's been forever even though I have only been back at university for roughly a month! I am very much looking forward to it (even more so as I am getting a lift back from them on the Monday instead of having to get a train! Hurray for school half terms, that's what I say!)

I'll try to keep more on top of the blog from now on. Hopefully if I keep it going, I'll get some form of creativity back!

xx