I'm alive

Following on from my last post I am pleased to report I am alive with sight intact. There were a few near misses and I do have 2 very dubious looking marks on my neck, not to mention my other huge bruises on the rest of my body, but all in all paintballing was really good fun (point blank shots to ankle not withstanding - cheers Michael, you knobber).

Highlights of the day included:
- Chavs who took the games way to seriously - "SOMEONE NEEDS TO TAKE THAT FUCKER ON THE BRIDGE OUT NOW!!"
- Myself losing half of my paintballs every game due to an ineffective paintball holder or my own ineffective way of closing it.
- Beating Michael up after aforementioned point blank shooting.
- Acting like I was in a real war during the hut game.
- Not being able to see when my helmet steamed up, but not being able to wipe it due to fears of blindness.
- Teaching Andy what "fo shizzle ma nizzle" means and also the word "knobber".
- Being told I may not only lose my sight but also my teeth, and therefore contemplating going home before we'd even started or bartering for a gum sheild.
- General shock at the price of paintballs - £34.95 for 500 plastic pellets filled with vegetable oil and food colouring.
- Breaking my gun at least twice every game but then becoming an expert in how to fix it.
- The bruises I saw in the shower
- The 12 hour sleep I required after the days events (I'm still quite sleepy now)
- My half a sandwich kindly donated by Dan
- The fact that the word "literal" does exist.
- The well cool - but not that protective - boiler suit I got to wear.
- Wading through swamps to get to the start point and then refusing to run through them when the game started.
- A new found fear of children
- Laughing at people who brought their own camoflage boiler suits who then stuck out like a sore thumb among the throngs of black-clad people.
- Radio 1 on in base camp, not sodding Galaxy.
- And I suppose spending time with friends should be included here too.


All that's left to look forward to now is Easter and as it's so close I feel like I may drown in work. I am a 1/4 of the way through an essay which I really don't want to take home but tiredness is creeping in. I'll try to get some done this eve and then poss finish off tomorrow, if not Tuesday is gonna be essay central. Fun, fun.

This is my goodbye

As I write this I am growing more and more anxious in regards to the adventure that is paintball I will undertake this fine Saturday. Having had little more "combat" experience then a few rounds at lazer quest and obviously growing up on the mean streets of Hull, I feel I am right to be slightly terrified about pellets filled with paint wizzing their way towards my precious, precious body.

The night before my farewell it also seems I will be playing hostess as that knobber Michael has just text me asking if I'm still ok to have people stay over. I have requested that they are neither strangers nor strange - I have previously had issues with Michael's short perverted friend and do not wish him to be anywhere near my sleeping form. So therefore I am likely to get little sleep as Aaron and Andy will be on my floor being all funny and wingey about the hardness of my floor. Oh well, I may have that luxury of dying in my sleep if I happen to fall asleep on the course that is.

I realise I'm being over-dramatic and that you will most likely be saying "but Sophie, people don't die at paintball" I can answer that question with a two simple words. Byker Grove.

Ant, or PJ as he was known back then, was famously blinded when he went paintballing with friends. Admittedly he was a bit silly and took his protective mask off (I will be armoured up to the hilt) but still, Byker Grove tackeled REAL ISSUES for REAL PEOPLE. What is more real than paintball induced blindness?

Alas, this may be my last post due to either death or the fact that the internet doesn't really operate in brail.

Wish me luck kids.

You're just a bunch of knobbers

Student elections are fast becoming the bane of my life. I do not care if the self - righteous hippies really do want to make a change to the "establishment" they CHOSE to attend. I feel they are doing it more for the power of the CV. Something I will freely admit to as just yesterday I signed up for the peer mentor programme for the nursing school.

Just what advice and wisdom I hope to impart on new freshers I have no idea, nor do I think they'll want it as I haven't contacted my peer mentor once and have only recieved one "hiya, you all alright. Add me on facebook." but I reckon it will be a good expereience and I will hopefully get a snazzy tshirt.........

On another note I say everyone should go to varsity as you can eat food out of a bucket. They also have nice mirrors in the toilet.

Predictable?

So this weekend I got me a snazzy new touchscreen phone which has made the art of texting a new and exciting experience.

When I actually get round to sending a text that is in the english language (I keep turning the language to Hungarian or Slovakian. Fun times for all) it is quite an achievement, as is having a long text conversation like the one on Friday night which gave me the material for this post.

During the banter that was passed between myself and my friend, they implied that sometimes my texts become rather predictable, so it doesn't matter if my language is garbled due to the effects of alcohol. This got me thinking have I become predictable? Have I already created a mould for myself that is me and is somewhat boring? Have I lost my spontanaity?

I would like to say no. I don't think I'm predictable, it is just that me and this particular friend are heavy-ish texters to one another so we are aware of each others idosyncrasies when we text. The same can be said for many other people.

I reckon if you got texts from my 6 closest friends, and possibly a few I'm not so close to, I would be able to tell you who sent the text purely by looking at the language, their "X's" or lack of and their abuse of spelling and grammer - I know one person who still uses "da" for "the". He is 23. He needs help.

The conclusion I come to is that we all have a signature, and try as I might and will find myself signing texts off with Xx. It's a reflex.

So predictability needent mean that you're boring. Just you have some friends who know you pretty damn well.

Maybe I should get some new friends?

Of Tetris and dissatisfaction

As of now I am currently number 1 on all Tetris games on the facebook version of Tetris. It was meant to be the pinnacle, the thing I had strived for for countless months. I suffered weeks of repetative strain injury, hours of strained eyes. But was it all worth it?

A phrase I often utter is "Never meet your heroes" is the same to be said for "never accomplish your dreams"

Since I reached the ultimate status in Tetris my drive to play the game has completely disappered. Does Usain Bolt feel this way about sprinting? Is the guy who created facebook (I forget his name) sick of social networking sites?

Everytime I log onto facebook I feel that familiar pull towards the Tetris application, however, after a couple of mere seconds play on Marathon I close the application and resume to the mindless task of refreshing my home page every 2 seconds to see if something good is happening.

Tetris used to be so much more. It used to be a joy to behold. Everytime I became the high scorer on one game I would have to get to work on the next. Once that task was completed inevitably my other high scores would have fallen by the way-side, so my competative and addictive nature would kick in and I would play. And I would win. But the important thing was I was never the "winner" never the "master" I still had so much more to give. Now, the dream is dead.

Therefore, I am thankful that I have chosen a career where you can never be the best, never know everything, because Nursing is constantly evolving and growing, and I am a "life-long learner"

The only thing that can save me now is if Gavin, my Tetris nemesis, pulls his finger out and starts to challenge me once more. Strewth mate.

First entry.........

On persuasion from my flatmate Dulcie I have finally decided to enter the ferocious world of blogging. (It was either this or Twitter)

As for actual blogging material I'm pretty low on ammo at the mo'. Currently trying not to eat the chocolate I have bought in order to make brownies at home tomorrow. Also trying to do some catch-up work for uni which is proving unsuccessful as I have just had to trawl through copious amounts of references for an awful, awful assignment. So the plan for tonight looks like it'll be pretty much anything I can find on iplayer or 4OD to sate my documentary/trashy TV needs.

Live long and prosper all the millions who are heralding this blog as "already the freshest thing we have seen in years"

I will try not to disappoint.