Weekend recap.

Friday evening


Dan and I went over to my second year housemate Daniel's house for some drinking. I used to spend a lot of time with most of the people who were there (two of them were my housemates, two others used to spend a lot of time in said house), but have barely seen them over the past academic year, despite most of us being around Brighton for the whole time.

We listened to nostalgic music (that we could remember), discussed nostalgic events, and laughed at old in-jokes. And now I've no idea if I'll see any of them again, which makes the whole night a little bittersweet. I left some vodka there, too, so sad times all around.

Saturday

We woke up to the sound of much tidying going on downstairs, and went down to discover that Rich (our other housemate) had his parents there, and that they were all packing up Rich's stuff and moving it to his new flat. Which is fair enough, since our tenancy ends on Thursday, and Rich works during the week. BUT: most of the stuff in our house was Rich's - the sofas, the kitchen table and chairs, the toaster and microwave etc. So they were taking all of this stuff without having told us these things would be going. They even took the bloody cutlery. 

Dan and I decided to go to town and have lunch in Wetherspoons (not as if we could eat in our own house, having no implements to eat or cook with), then go on a search for some cutlery. We ended up just buying a knife and fork from a bits and pieces shop on Lewes Road.

We came home briefly, then went onto campus so I could print out some CVs. We half broke into the library (it was supposed to be shut, but one of the doors was ajar, so we sneaked in and used the stapler), then called security about the couple of people who clearly weren't supposed to be in there. That was our good deed for the day.

Rich, Amanda and his parents weren't there by the time we got back, so we made food then hid on our floor. Sometimes having a three floor house has its advantages.

Sunday

Dan's nan came down in the morning, and we loaded up her car with as much stuff as we could (my wardrobe and desk, Dan's wardrobe thing), then headed down to Southampton. We went into town so I could hand out some CVs to shops, and managed to do so in a couple of places. There weren't anywhere near as many places with shop assistant vacancies as there are in Brighton, so that was a bit of a bummer. C'est la vie. I shall continue hunting.

On Monday we did a spot of flat hunting, but I'll save that for another post. This one is quite long enough!

Photo post: Paris.

When Mariah and Sierra, two of my wonderful friends from my year abroad in Colorado, came to visit me for 2 weeks at the beginning of the month, we spent a couple of days in Paris (which I was more than happy to do - I LOVE Paris). And I developed a bit of an obsession with Silly Bandz.

Packing up.

A week today I'll be moving out of my house in Brighton, which means I'll be moving out of Brighton for good. Having lived here for 3 years (with a year in Colorado thrown in the middle for good measure), I don't actually feel all that sad that my time here is coming to a close. Maybe it's the fact that I'm glad to be leaving this house (although with the sun streaming through the window, it almost looks friendly), or maybe it's because the whole town isn't the same without bumping into people I know everywhere I go.

I've had some fun times this year, but on the whole the experience of being at university without half the people that made my university experience so much fun for the first 2 years (particularly the second year. I think the second year will always go down as one of my favourite years - albeit academic rather than calendar - of my life), it just hasn't lived up to those times. It wasn't even the amount of work. Sure, there was a lot, but there were very few moments that I felt there was too much. If I did, I knew it was my own fault for letting it get to that stage. I think it's more that I've come to the realisation that no matter how much you love a place, it's what you make of it. And without a lot of the people that once helped you make it, it's not really the same place.

So I'm packing up my stuff (and I have a LOT of stuff ... I've realised I can never move back to Cardiff because I already have a room's worth of stuff there, and I also have a room's worth of stuff here. I have two rooms. One is just currently a travelling room. The other is a permanent exhibition that is slowly becoming more like a museum) with a feeling of nostalgia, but not really sadness. I have no idea what I'm going to be doing this time next year (I have my hopes, but I'm trying not to get too hopeful), but I'm excited to find out!

Twitter.

My posting on Twitter fluctuates greatly. I almost always post more on there when I'm doing less (same goes for blogging), which seems somewhat contradictory, but there it is. When I'm doing things, I don't have time to post. I'll do the obligatory update, but the more mundane updates vanish. And, to be honest, the mundane updates are more fun for me. Saying where I am and/or what I'm doing seems a lot more basic than something mundane I can inject my personality into.

But isn't my point. My point is that I am followed by many different people in my life on Twitter. I'm followed by close friends, once close friends that are now more just acquaintances, people who barely know me, people who don't know me, and family members. This makes it quite tricky for me to post.
I want to be able to post freely, swearing if I feel like it, being nerdy and in-jokey and fandom-y when I feel like. But because of the family members, I can't. My grandfather (who turns 89 this year) follows me on Twitter, and reads every Tweet I post with great avidity (is that a word? Spellcheck seems to think it is) - or so my mother tells me. So then I feel slightly guilty for posting about something that he wouldn't understand. But if I just post about what I'm doing, then I'm sure that the close friends and once close friends that are now more just acquaintances don't find it interesting. I don't know. I find it very hard to post as I want to, for fear of alienating a group of my readers. Some of which, no doubt, are reading this post right now and are trying to figure out which category they fall into. Ah-ha.

So if you're reading my Twitter feed and thinking it seems a bit ... all over the place, there we are. Your explanation.

Ikea.

Since I'm back in Cardiff for a few days, my parents and I decided to do that age-old tradition (well, not quite that old. In fact, I may have made it up that it's a tradition. We've done it maybe three or four times previously, anyway) of going to Ikea for breakfast. If you have a Family Card, you can get a 6 item breakfast, as well as unlimited tea or coffee, for 99p. NINETY-NINE PENCE. I call that a bargain.

Since I take after my mother (a bit too much? Who knows) and love a bargain, I decided that I had to have my own Family Card so that Dan and I can go and have breakfast in Ikea in Southampton for super cheap. And have lunch there super cheap as well because, let's be honest, their meatballs in sauce and fries are definitely up there in Emma's Favourite Meals of All Time. 

It also gives me an excuse to go to Ikea. It may be half deceptive showroom and half warehouse, but it makes me want my own house so I can decorate it to my hearts' content. As excited as I am to be moving in with Dan (not that I don't already live with him, but we weren't a couple when we started living together, so it doesn't fully count. Plus we live with a housemate - and his American girlfriend who basically now lives in our house too - which makes it count even less), I'm just excited about having somewhere I can put my own stamp on. I really dislike our current house*, and I'm looking forward to getting out of it and moving into somewhere that Dan and I can make our own.

Of course, first of all we have to actually find somewhere to move into. Hopefully we'll get started on that next week. And then I can go to Ikea and buy lots of pictures frames and artificial flowers and cushions and glasses and ... many other things that I can't actually afford until I have a job. Damnit.

*It really isn't all that bad. I just hate the size of the kitchen, the lack of counter space in said kitchen, how small the lounge is, the fact that my bedroom is on the third floor, the fact that my bedroom is on a different room to the bathroom, and that the house NEVER EVER seems clean. Ever.

Another blog?

In my several years on the internet, I've started many many blogs. Some of them no longer exist (my Highlighter Stars and my Snafflecake ones, for instance), and some of them I've just given up on (more than I care to count, but most recently: The Little Grey Cells)

In any case, here I am again. I've just finished university, but I've not officially graduated yet. I'm in limbo. What better time to start a new blog? Watching myself get out of limbo should be a half decent experience to blog about.
In my attempts to get out of limbo, I will be doing some or all of the following:
- Moving away from Brighton
- Moving in with my boyfriend (his name is Dan. I imagine his name will come up on a frequentish basis) in Southampton
- Finding myself a half decent job.
- Waiting to find out if I have a job I applied for 6 months ago.

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No more blogging about things and in a way I don't want to, just to try and get some more followers (in fact, I've turned off the followers gadget thingy. Less pressure). Blogging should be self-indulgent. Let's see how this goes, shall we?