Sydney Life

OMG GUYS. TAKE HOMES ARE STILL KIND OF DIFFICULT NO MATTER WHAT YEAR OF UNI YOU ARE IN.

I am in the middle of take home exam hell... so much to write, so much to read, so many cans of V in the near future. So why have I decided to take the time out to jot a quick blog?

I am putting on a brave face for the crowds

Well, everyone and anyone who knows what I'm like (and I'm sure you, dear reader, know what I am like if you have read my "study skills" post...) - one word: procrastinatory. Except this time I thought I would share a couple of things that I like to do / websites I like to browse while procrastinating.

For the 9th time, I got my uni results back.
For semester one 2009, I did 4 subjects.
One Distinction. Yay!
One Credit. Yay!
One Pass. Ok.
One Fail. WHAT?!
*falls off chair*

So this has been a pretty unproductive stuvac for me.

I thought the pinnacle of procrastination was abandoning my 3500 word final essay last night to practice some Jack Johnson songs on guitar (“Oh,” I hear you asking, “you play guitar?” Apparently I do now. Until yesterday my repertoire was limited to “The lion sleeps tonight” and the riff from a Red Hot Chili Peppers song, but my catalogue increased to make me a human jukebox of JJ).

But I digress. This story is about Peter. Studious and reliable Peter. The one I normally depend on to force me to study. This is what he did yesterday.

It’s been a very interesting couple of weeks for everyone. Welcome to our fellow bloggers who are now on exchange! It’s that time of year again where everyone’s been flying off and panic has risen over what to pack, and how to pack it within the luggage limit, and somehow forgetting everything and then remembering it again at the last minute. So, those are the lucky ones, but also the ones who haven’t stopped talking about [insert destination of choice] since it was known they’d be off. And now a silence descends on the ears of those left behind. But perhaps this silence is much needed, for we’ve been busy down here too with…mid-semester exams.

There are certain things that come with the status of being a student. Coffee, iPods, lectures, Facebook, clubs and societies, moving out, getting a job and yet still being poor, just to name a few. There’s also study and exams. And with study and exams, comes procrastination. Ever wondered how people just not procrastinate and actually manage to get things done? (these are a rare breed indeed at uni) Ever aspired to such a level? Well, I have, and now you can too.

There is a limbo period in my assessments this semester. While others do exams and in-class presentations, I doodle in my notebook and enjoy myself. You might think I’m lucky, but in fact this is a great curse! I feel like I’m living in that part in Twister, when they go out into the eye of the storm ...

Rewind four years…
‘Pens down.’
Breathe. ‘You’ve done your best, let it go…’ (rational voice floundering in a sea of panic).
‘Oh my gosh, what was I on about? What was that EXAM on about?!’ (whimper)
‘I totally crashed - this is the end of everything!’

I know the sensation. You’ve just been hit by a trial exam curve ball and feel as if the light might slowly slip from the day. Oh the drama…All that hard work misdirected. The gnawing, regretful pain.

Could USyd be more sadistic? It’s the last week of the break and, for people in Arts at least, we’ve been waiting with bated breath for a few too many weeks for those magical numbers. If the exams were the pins being driven in underneath our nails, then this is the torturously slow removal.

In my junior years of high school, the thought of an exam absolutely petrified me; I’m not exaggerating. The scariest thought, I believed, was writing an essay to time.

For one of my first exams, one of my exam rooms was somewhere I’d never heard of, so I toddled along to the Student Centre where they gave me...

The examination guide!!!

USYD has thought of everything.

You may have thought "Summer School" was a term circulating only in bad family movies featuring an angsty and rebellions teen than gets the punishment of a lifetime spending the summer holidays with his head buried in a pile of books.

Well, that was the image it conjured up in my head, anyway. Turns out summer school does exist in the real world, however, and it's happening right here at Sydney Uni.

Last night, I broke all the rules in the rule book. I went out the night before an exam. I also enjoyed myself. I smiled during the exam period. I spent hours indulging in the hedonistic pleasures of life. I witnessed the mesmerising U2 concert.

During exam period, students tend to transform into creatures from boring land with nothing to talk about except split ends having split ends. Summer plans may feature in a conversation, but more often than not the student is really just concerned with passing exams.

As a science student, I have a lot of exams. I think Simon has like, 2. Last semester I’m pretty sure Alex had none.

And I’m not trying to grab a sympathy vote, because honestly, I prefer it this way.

Some of my split ends have split ends