Fake Bake or Huge Mistake?

It has taken me until the age of twenty to finally admit defeat and turn to the fake tan...
Can you really blame me with the summer we have had so far?! I didn't realise the extent of my paleness until trying on a dress for my summer ball this weekend. I mean, girls, how unforgiving are those changing room mirrors at the best of times? They add more thigh to your thighs, they drain you of every last centimetre of 'I love that part of my body' and they can make you walk out of them with more determination to diet then you ever had before. What idiot thought that shoving a woman into a 1m x 1m mirrored box with a dress she isn't too sure she looks nice in and/or will even fit her was a good idea?!
So I tried this dress on at the weekend; thankfully I absolutely loved the dress (a very rare but beautiful occasion) but to my horror during the trying on saga I realised just how pale my arms and body actually are. Enter: fake tan.
I went off to boots after minimal research - the thought was there but I ended up being distracted on youtube so my serious 'research' was interrupted. I found the isle after spending a good ten minutes looking at sun creams by mistake and was greeted by an array of various products. Being a student, the more expensive products were ruled out immediately after quickly convincing myself that just because they cost the most doesn't mean they are the best ... and eventually picked one I liked the look of. Now I am sure some of you ladies can correct me on this, but I literally had no idea what shade to choose - there are no testers or guidance its just 'dark', 'medium' or 'light' .... I wish they just were honest and said 'quite orange', 'a bit more orange' and 'stop now this will spoil your photos and your life orange'. I picked light to be on the safe side and also chose the product I had seen on TV recently - made sense to me!
Anyway I have just applied a tester to my stomach (yes okay I sprayed my name, but it is on my stomach and I really don't think there is much chance of me bearing that in the next few days and I couldn't resist) so I will see how it looks tomorrow and decided whether to brave the full body application ...

Stay tuned for fake tan round two! x

Exams.

Exams. There is absolutely nothing fun about them. They are the most stressful, scary things and they horribly effect your sleep, diet and general well being. Everyone can relate to how miserable you feel when you have exams and for those of you, like me, who decided to go straight to university will know that after 7 consecutive years of exams you really have had enough of them.

I vowed to be prepared for my finals ... I mean REALLY prepared. I thought I could combine my past experiences to become some super revision machine who was SO prepared for my exams that I could spend the evening before each exam flicking through 'a few past papers' commending myself on just how well prepared I was ... oh boy! I could not have been more wrong about that idea...
No matter how much you try to prepare you are never ready.
Don't get me wrong I did work - I had to! But I still felt that horrible serge of panic as I entered my penultimate revision day and still found myself frantically scanning lectures, discovering new slides I had missed or had previously vowed to 'look back over' ... horrific!
I had six exams, which isn't as many as some and to be fair they were reasonably spread out bar the last few and despite feeling fairly in control at the start of the two week exam period, by the end of it I was a broken human being ... they really do wipe you out! I became some crazed machine that was functioning (efficiently functioning would be a very strong term) on about 5 hours of sleep a night and a diet of cereal, coffee, coffee, coffee and whatever was in the freezer for dinner... despite Mums stern warning to make sure I eat fruit and keep healthy - there was no time for that!
I have been unfortunate enough to have suffered a fair few exam disasters in my time ... I remember once in my first year at university we stayed in catered accommodation and upon leaving the dining hall I trod on a fork, in my flip flops (we had a summer that year, crazy I know). It seemed very minor at the time, no visible injuries, until walking towards the exam hall I looked down at my foot and saw it was gushing with blood. How ridiculous. With no time to spare I limped briskly to the exam hall, accompanied my two of my friends who were doing nothing but pointing and wetting themselves laughing, I rushed to the reception area to seek out a plaster of some kind only to be told to go into the hall and someone would bring one ... so there I was, in my seat, in the middle of a sports hall filled with hundreds of other students, with some poor receptionist knelt down beside me applying a plaster to my gushing foot. I don't know what was more embarrassing; the eager first aid I received in front of all the other students or the fact that, when asked how it had happened, I could only reply 'I trod on a fork'.

So if you take anything from this post, realise that exams are horrible, no matter who you are or what you are doing but no matter what happens, you could always have trod on a fork and sat down with a bleeding foot ... so it really could be worse. (Although I did surprisingly well in that exam it must be said)

I am thankfully free now but for those of you still going - good luck and watch out for cutlery! x

Revision.

Yes, it is that dreaded 'R' word that we all despise.
I hate to say this and I know there will be many academic lecturers and teachers frowning upon what I am about to say, but in all honesty, try as you may, you are always going to have to cram..
We all vow to start early and with each passing exam term we promise ourselves that we will never, no matter what, put ourselves under that kind of stress and pressure again, but we do.
I mean, don't get me wrong, you do have to do some work and without doubt I do believe that you get out what you put in... but if it is one week until your first exam and you feel as though you can't remember anything, from my own experience that is pretty normal..
The real learning comes in that crucial few days before the exam when you find yourself in some kind of crazy exam mode when suddenly you are able to sit down, without music blaring through your headphones and read that 12 page paper or huge chapter of that textbook you've been avoiding like the plague.

I am not an exam person at all.
I completely dread them from about Christmas time. No matter how hard I try to have that confidence and arrogance all the really smart people have, I can never bring myself to say 'I smashed that exam' or 'I can't wait for this paper, whatever comes up, should be easy this one' ... No thank you. I certainly will not be tempting fate when it comes to the dreaded exam halls.

It is the most surreal experience sitting an exam. For a whole two or three hour period everyone is completely focussed and you find yourself writing pages of words and facts and information that you didn't actually know that you knew...

Whatever happens you've just got to try and keep calm and remember that it is your chance to 'show off what you know' as they say ... although really you just can't wait to finish so you can cross off another module or topic that you don't need to know any more ...

If you are like me and you are preparing yourself for the most horrible two weeks of the year and frantically popping the vitamin c tablets like no-ones business because you know it is a matter of time before your tonsils flare up with the stress, then I would like to wish you all the luck in the world - it's not our time of year but all you can do is get your head down and get on with it and remember that cold beers and pubs will still be around when you are finished and you would have most definitely earn't that first pint...

Good luck! x

Blogging.

Welcome to my new blog... I have been meaning to get back into blog writing for ages but haven't had the time to sit down and get around to it until now.
What can you expect from this blog? Good question. I guess it is a means for me to stay in touch with a lot of my travelling friends, and for them to keep in touch with me on my travels.. It is also just mean't for fun in the hope that out there somewhere are many other twenty-something folks who, like me, are trying to claw themselves into adulthood but maintain the fun we never want to let go .. if it brings a smile to someone's face or provides something that someone can relate to then that is even better ... enjoy! x