Barmy Blue's Bland Blog

Well, where to begin. It’s a bit tricky because I didn’t do this yesterday, I was too tired. You’ll find out why in due course.
I didn’t sleep well last night (I’ll try and write it as if I wrote it yesterday so as I don’t confuse myself).
At about 3:30 in the morning they all came in, loud and stomping around like a herd of elephants. They’ll settle down or I’ll get used to it hopefully, before I have some kind of mental breakdown from lack of sleep. I suppose it doesn’t help that I was on the computer until 1:30 in the morning . Anyway, soon after all that I guess I fell asleep.
At about 6:15 there was a noise, a loud noise. I thought it was my alarm so I checked, which is silly really because my alarm is a bell, not a continual piercing noise. I can’t quite remember how it sounded but I’ll know it again if I hear it. I heard people outside, our floor rep was getting people up (You’ll find out how she was so quick about it later). I got up, poked my head out of the door and asked the nearest person, who was coming out of his room, “is it a fire alarm?” He said he thought it was.
Actually, it seems rude not to name my floor reps, seeing as they’re effectively looking after me here. I just didn’t want to do what I normally do and change their names because I’d forget what their real names are. Then again, I can always come back later and change them if I like. Our female rep is called Ella and our male rep is called Liam.
So I closed my door and pulled on some clothes, because I didn’t want to go out in my pyjamas. I changed my trousers to my jeans for some reason, grabbed a jacket and put on my shoes and socks. During this time Ella was trying to get the boy next door to me, Will, up and later on they said she was practically kicking his door down. He didn’t get up. Then there was a knock at my door, I’d just finished dressing and rushed out. Unfortunately I’m not sure I locked my door because when I came back it was locked, but I think I went to the loo after we came back in so I may have unlocked it then and gone off to the loos.
Anyway, we all squeezed outside, one guy was in a t-shirt, shorts and bare feet, I said you must be cold. We waited outside for a while in the freezing cold only to be told it was a drill. Then we all went back inside.
In the morning it seemed like everyone was asleep still so we practically had the kitchen to ourselves, that is me and another boy named Carlos, who’s also doing creative writing it seems. I try to avoid when the gather in the kitchen at the moment because it’s quite small and I just don’t feel like I fit in. I had plain shreddies and water. Big mistake. It was disgusting and took me ages to eat. But hanging around in the kitchen I picked up some information. The fire alarm was the obvious topic of conversation, some slept right through it, about 3-5 of them. It seems that the others had a little rave last night in someone’s room (In one of the other houses, one with a little shower cubicle in each room, I applied for that first but in the end they asked me if I’d accept accommodation here and I said yes because we were worried I wouldn’t get residence and it would have been stupidly rude to say, what else you got? Besides, it’s the cheapest, so that’s a plus.) Anyway, they tried poppers it seems and didn’t really notice any effect. Then they all came back about 3:30 and went in each other’s rooms, one came in saying he’d found a cardigan in his room that wasn’t his, no one claimed it and another had boots too.
I was starting to get a bit of a reputation for cereal and water I think so I had to get myself a pint of milk sharpish. Ella offered to show me to the shops. But that was later on, let’s get back on track.
Then Ella came in later on and we found out why she was so happy about the fire alarm and why she was prepared. She’d stayed at her boyfriend’s (My first fellow whovian) I think his name’s Josh, need to check that though, it begins with a J. Anyway, she was over in his house then their fire alarm went off. Then as she was coming back the house in between us and them had an alarm too so she was sure we’d have one, and we did.
Last night Ella offered to show me to the shops today but I couldn’t go straight away because I had my creative writing subject briefing. It was okay. I was a bit late but not as late as some others (later on Ella told me that when she had her subject briefing she’d been out drinking wither friends the night before and they turned up with five minutes left of the talk ). There were about four, including me doing creative writing and English literature. I was directed to their section and then we had to have a little discussion on what we thought creative writing is and why we’re doing it. The person I talked to was called Thomas, though in my mind I kept thinking it was Joe for some reason , I never said that though, that would’ve been bad. It turns out he writes poetry. Then we were told more about our courses and met our teachers, then we had to go to the library to go onto the computers and choose our options because there were different groups for the same subject because it’s combined. Afterwards I went to the house that collects our post, I crept into the office and politely asked where to get my post. He said asked for my name and said that the pile on his desk came yesterday and he was sure my name was there. I searched but couldn’t find it and then I searched again and found mine at the very bottom. It’s a little pack of Uni stuff we forgot and some Doctor Who wrapping paper mum had got me, with a little note too. I felt that pang of sadness but had to shake it off, I didn’t want to get upset again. I was thinking of sending her a text saying Love you lots but I scratched the idea just in case it made her cry at work. Looking back I think she probably wouldn’t but I didn’t want to risk upsetting her. I white tacked one sheet of paper to my wall above my desk and pinned a Dalek tag to my pin board. I used the thread from it along with a pipe cleaner, that mum had packed for a purpose such as this, to hang a crystal above my window. We’ve had it for ages but mum put it in and I decided to put it up. It was on my pin board before but it’d never get any light there. I like the view from my window, it’s a big tree, I think it’s an oak but don’t quite me on that, and twice I’ve seen two magpies hopping around there on the ground. The ground is bare because they’ve been doing work there. I think it’d look lovely with some grass but it’s okay now because the ground’s littered with fallen leaves.
We have lots of squirrels here, they’re more shy than ours and thinner too, more athletic, ours are practically hand fed peanuts . We’ve also got a flock of jackdaws, did I mention that before? At first I thought they were crows but on closer inspection they’re jackdaws, smaller than crows, different beak, different eyes, slightly different colour in places and a slightly fluffier looking head. Crows, I think, look like miniature ravens. And the jackdaws walk around, the crows don’t usually seem to bother, they kind of hop along.
I can’t remember if I ran into Ella or if she knocked on my door. Anyway, I encountered her and she said if I was still having trouble sleeping I could swap with the guy at the far end, called Sean. I politely declined because I’m starting to feel a bit settled here now and it always smells nice because mum also packed me an air freshener, peach I think and you really notice the difference when you come in, it kind of smells a bit like home I guess too because we have a few there too. She had to show Sean to the other college further down anyway so I agreed to go. It’s quite a walk and I’ve developed a blister on my heel because these shoes are a bit uncomfortable in places. The problem with them is that they’re 7 and a half because I have wide feet and the 7 pinched the sides of my feet but the 7 and a half’s were loose so we got some insoles for them but they didn’t do half sizes. Whoa, I just got a feeling of déjà vu Have I already said that? Sorry if I have. So I had to get some plasters too.
We went into the co-op and I got a pint of milk, I was going to take a normal loaf of bread but decided against it, because I don’t eat that much bread, when I saw the most adorable little loaf about half the size of a normal loaf. I also got some cereal bars in case I had to rush breakfast at some point, oh and some butter too. On the way back I mentioned that there were a lot of jackdaws, Ella said she didn’t like birds though she’d thought they were crows. I said I couldn’t be certain but I was quite sure they were jackdaws, I remember them from our book of British birds. In the way back she met a friend and introduced me as one of her freshers. I asked his opinion of Doctor Who, because it’s like marmite, you either love it or you hate it, though I don’t see how anyone could hate it. And he asked pre or post Tennant and I said either. I can’t remember his reply, if there was one, it’s a bit hazy now. I packed all of my stuff away when we got back and had a slice of buttered bread.
I tried to sort out my internet security but it was taking too long and I didn’t want to leave it on while I went to my briefing so I had to force it to all close down which it did not like.
Then I went to my English literature briefing, I was late for that too but I wasn’t alone. We chose our subjects again so now I have my full timetable and I have all of Monday of, so I should be able to go and see my family on Sunday, stay home Sunday night and come back by Monday at some point. HOOOOORAY!!!! I’ve never missed one of our family gatherings as far as I know and I didn’t want to start now. I wonder if it’d be weird if I wasn’t there. My cousins then to vary as do my second cousins but mum and I are always there along with my uncle and his wife, one cousin and my aunt.
I called dad to help me out with the security when I got back but he wasn’t answering so I started writing for fun, my first draft of my space pirates as a Doctor Who script but the crutial words such as Doctor and TARDIS etc are spelt backwards so that if anyone reads it hopefully they won’t know wat I’m going on about. Then dad called me back, he’s been in the bath. He helped me out with my security then he asked what I was going to be doing that night so I said nothing, the idea of dog racing didn’t appeal to me, though I must say I was feeling guilty about having this blasted wrist band which is a pass to all freshers events and I hadn’t used it yet so dad managed to talk me into going. He said that apparently his dad, who he didn’t know much because he died when my dad was little, liked dog racing. I decided I needed to have dinner so I went to the kitchen, I don’t like going in there when there’s a lot of people all round the sides because it’s awkward and I get the feeling that they’re laughing at me inside their heads, well, some of them anyway. So I don’t want to go out drinking and taking poppers and dancing in people’s showers. So what? I made a cheese sandwich with the freebee cheese I’d brought with me from BHS, actually it might not have been free now I come to think of it, just a little snack thing consisting of two cheese sticks. It hadn’t been refrigerated for two days but it was in from Sunday evening. I cut it very poorly so I was eating chunks of cheese most of the time. It was very dry. The other’s asked me if I was going to the dog racing and I said I might (I was still toying with it in my mind), and they said they were going so after my dinner I went back to my room and put on an extra layer and took my warmer jacket, though I later regretted having not taken my London aquarium fleece because I was still cold. I got onto the bus and asked the girl next to me if this was the dogs and comedy bus and she said yes. Her name was Sam and she was a third year. When we all got off the bus I noticed people had tickets and I was worried that I didn’t have one so I asked a group of girls if we needed tickets and they said we did and I panicked a bit but when they found out I had a wristband they said it was okay because that was my pass to get into all freshers events. I explained that it was my first freshers event. When we got in I asked if they’d mind if I just stuck with them so I wouldn’t get lost, they said it was okay so I did. We sat at a table. Two girls were first years, one was deaf and the other was doing creative writing too, she recognised me from the briefing. The other one was a 2nd year I think, or maybe a 3rd year, she was very helpful. I didn’t bet on any races because I’m trying not to spend much. Good thing too because all of the dogs that I made a note of that I might have betted on lost About half way through I felt tired and I became sluggish in computing everything. In the second to last race one dog fell over, he was last anyway, but when he got up he was staggering around so the handler had to go in and pick him up so he wouldn’t get trampled by the other dogs. He was okay after though. I can honestly say it was quite a fun experience, even though I didn’t bet but I couldn’t hang around for the comedy. I’d been doodling on the back of my paper with my pen when I ran out of concentration for Sudoku. Afterwards we all had to go outside and it was freezing cold. Then we all queued up to go into a room and I guessed it was the comedy. When we went in I sat at the furthest table and encountered some of my housemates who came and sat with me and talked to me a bit. They wanted to leave too. Then we were told a bus had arrived but it was full at the bottom though there was space at the top so we couldn’t get on and we had to wait for another one in the cold. When it arrived I huddled up in a seat and my housemates went upstairs but the girls I’d spoken too before got on too and sat behind me. For the first time since I came here I started making up my own episodes of Doctor Who in my head on the way back. When I got in I was too tired to blog or even to phone mum, I guessed that she’d be asleep by then anyway, it was about 12ish I think. I wasn’t awake long, only about an hour or maybe two (Have you ever tried sleeping when your neighbour id playing Amy Winehouse? (I think that’s how you spell it)) but despite that I had a very good sleep, the longest since coming here.

Registration
I hadn’t set my alarm last night. I woke up quite late and decided to sleep in a bit longer as I didn’t have a specific time to be up. It worked out perfectly because few people were in the kitchen for breakfast. It’s not easy to prepare food and eat with so many people, you keep thinking don’t do anything stupid, don’t stare at him or her don’t just stare in that direction like a zombie, smile etc. I think I’m a bit alienated from some of them because I don’t drink, rave and/or party. It turns out that the others who were there with me didn’t like it either though maybe not for the reasons I listed. I had cookie crisp with milk today, I was getting a bit bored of shreddies. One girl’s mile had frozen in the fridge and another boy named Nathan’s eggs had frozen too, I don’t know how they turned out though. Carlos made himself a fry up, he’d already registered. I got ready, very slowly today, I was still sluggish I guess and called mum to tell her about the status of the blank cheque she’d given my for my tuition fees, well, I say blank, the amount was there but the name wasn’t, I looked it up in my book and it’s to the university, we suspected it was but we weren’t sure so she left that part out. I filled it in and called her to tell her, just to check that was okay and all and because I hadn’t phoned her last night and I was too late to catch her at home this morning. I called her at work but she wasn’t there so I waited and called again. She said it should be fine and I also said that I’d written the purpose of it on the back as dad had advised earlier in the morning. She said it should all be fine. She said I should get my books first for English lit before registering though.
I did as she said and got my books first, The Turn of The Screw and Jane Eyre, then I went to register. It took a while but not too long I think. The student union were having a one day poster sale but I decided not to bother. They had a door poster of Captain Jack Sparrow that I just had to tell her about later though. Then I ended up going and buying jam from the campus shop, don’t know why though. I had a jam sandwich for lunch though. It was good. Again the kitchen was quite empty. There’s something or other going on there later, Liam said. I wasn’t sure though, I may have got a bit muddled up. He said he’d knock on my door when it started though.
Since then I’ve been sitting here finishing my blog, and listening to my Kaiser Chiefs CD, through my earphones of course. I ventured out to fill up one of my empty bottles with water because I was thirsty and I’ve run out of the bottle water mum brought for me.
Speaking of bottles did I mention that there were about three bottle of vodka in the kitchen earlier, and a bottle of wine and n empty beer bottle, and they leave their glasses out for us to clear up in the morning. That’s getting on my nerves now.
I guess to avoid the squashes into the kitchen I either have to eat my meals late, early or out.
Oh well, that’s all for now.
Bluebiird out.

In addition to all of that, I've started reading the Turn of the Screw, I've taken another walk around and I've only just eaten my dinner at 10:15am, it was a coco pops cereal and milk bar. Because there was a gathering in the kitchen which I wanted to avoid. Then the fire alarm went off again, something on the 1st floor set it off, I'm on the 2nd and the firebrigade came in two fire engines. It seemed such a waste. It was freezing outside too.
The sound of the fire alarm is, as best as I can describe it, like the ringing you get in your ears sometimes but amplified. The exact sound seems to vanish from my memory at the moment but that's roughly what it's like. Mum said there was a fire at her office too, people stubbing out their cigarettes on a wooden box thing outside, and she wasn't there for ir because she was stuck in the traffic around our street, they're doing water works. But she said her fire marshals did an exelent job and she's planning to send them an email congratulating them.
Did I mention I've run out of bottled water now and that I filled it up from the kitchen sink? Well, I did and I mention it now because I just went out and filled up two coke bottles after I'd grabbed two coco pops bars from my cupboard. It all suddenly went quiet, they've all gone, at the back of my miind I kant help hoping they're gone for good but that's unlikely, they're probably at another house having another rave and taking their silly little drugs. Sometimes I wonder what it'd be lke to take drugs or get drunk but then I think what's the point Emma? You'd only make an arse of yourself, or pass out or be rushed to hospital to get your stomach pumped .
Also, to drown out all of that noise I put my earphones in (Because I'm considerate like that, unlike some people)
and listened to some Beethoven that came as a freebee with my media player while I was reading, then when I took a break I switched to freebee rock music and it was during that time the alarm went of. Because I had my reading lamp on to read I was worried it'd get too hot because we have smoke and heat detecuors in our rooms so i had the window open a bit. But when the alarm went off I was worried it was me. I packed up my laptop quickly in case anyone should find themselves in my room whilst I was outside and put my socks and shoes on.
Well, I think that's all for now.
Bluebiird out again.