Exams

Having revised solidly for the last few days for the exam tomorrow, I can safely say that nothing that anybody can say will make me feel any more better – in fact it will most likely add to the stress.

I know there is not much point arguing about the benefits of examinations at this stage, nor discuss knowledge v.s. understanding but suffice to say I’d rather get this over with…even if the project-work that awaits is just as, if not more, stressful and depressing.

O Brother
My older brother has been in town since Saturday. I’ve barely seen or spoken to him not least because of all the cramming I’ve been doing but also as he’s been pretty much asleep or out 99% of the time. There are a few things that need to be discussed with him, most importantly the living arrangements from August and all that. I guess it will have to wait. He’s off tomorrow though.

Hate
I’ve been handling the exam stress pretty well up until now. I’ve had my doubts pretty much before every exam so far but I’ve got through them knowing that I haven’t failed. I also hoped that with the first week behind me it’d be less painful; I hope that will be more true tomorrow afternoon.

Anyway, stress manifests itself mostly as anger and hate in me. I seem to direct it at various things in my life ranging from people, objects, ideas and brands. I suppose there must be subconscious, or possibly conscious, reasons behind this but I’m not going to mention any of them.

This blog entry has not been as stress relieving as I had hoped. I suppose it didn’t turn out to be the full off rant I had planned.

At the end of many exams, I have walked out knowing that I have not done well. There have not been many I have walked out confident that I would be getting a top grade and I believe I left those days behind me along with my A-levels, school uniforms, classrooms, school lunches and all those happy memories of my DC days. The increasing regularity of post-exam depression and realisation that although I may not have failed the previous 2 hours I had done pretty damn badly is in itself quite depressing.

To date, I can recall 2 exams which I have known from even before putting pen to paper that I would do extremely badly in. The first was AE Maths (Advanced Extension). The second, S&M – that’s Simulation and Modelling, a 3rd year Computing Course.

I keep telling myself that it’s just 3 weeks. I keep trying to persuade myself to hold out. I keep losing focus. Three weeks should be an incredibly short time – actually, 3 days is what I should be focusing on. There aren’t even 3 days before the first exam and I can’t seem to find that spark inside of me. I talked previously about hitting that figurative brick wall; I seem to be waiting for someone or something to break it down for me rather than attempt to scale it. I’ve been on and off for the past few weeks, sometimes discovering that drive to learn and then just as quickly being convinced that there is no point.

The next 3 weeks will be the culmination of the last 20 years of my life. Admittedly the education I received in pre-kindergarten at the age of 3 has no bearing on how well I do in the next three weeks but the fact remains, my full-time education draws to a close soon.

It’s been a rough few days since my last post. I had grand plans to ramp up my revision ready for the hellish times ahead but things never seem to go as planned. I also planned to hit the pool a few times a week whilst I was back home but that didn’t really happen either. Oh well.

Another Brick

So, the week has been filled with drama of one kind or another. Firstly, I walked into that brick wall I’d been fearing for the past few months. I’d “run out of steam”, “hit the wall”, “burnt out”, however you name it, my greatest fear seemed like it was going to be realised. It did take me out for a few days with a high fever, dizziness and the usual symptoms of being ill…. but I think it’ll pass within the next day or so. Unfortunately it did take out those few days, which has meant today has been a bit of a nightmare in terms of figuring out how much work I have yet to do. I wish I could believe that everyone else is in the same position, but let’s not kid ourselves, some of you don’t have a thing to worry about and then there are some who don’t care, possibly?

Having switched to the Calendar view in Thunderbird for the first time this week, I realised that the multi-week view now menacingly shows the final week of April. You all know what that means? There’s less than 3 weeks left – the first exam is looming.

I know I said I did not like to talk about this stuff at all but my life is, and will be for the next month, consumed by it so I don’t really have much else to talk about. Also, I have been known to be slightly hypercritical! Skip to after the break if you want to read about other stuff ^^

Student Life

So, I originally intended to only have two phases in my revision. The first phase being just a quick glance through everything to refresh my memory as to what I needed to learn, and the second phase being to actually learn it. Phase two has ended up becoming the “refresh”as the first phase contained a lot of stuff I hadn’t seen before!

I was thinking of doing a revision blog post a day on a random topic that I’d looked at during the day. I have no idea what I’d write about but maybe it’ll be a nice way to recap what I “learnt”. Actually, it probably won’t be helpful at all…

Anyway, so, despite the extensive hours I’ve put in so far I have actually yet to learn anything at all. Well, apart from what every student learns at this stage – there’s a Himalayan mountain range of stuff to learn and I’ve only worn a t-shirt.

I just remembered how much I really really really don’t like this time of year. It’s not the festivities, or the weather, or anything like that at all; it’s the upcoming exams. Actually, it’s not even that. Exams, revising and studying are all part of the package of being a student and it’s something I will no doubt look back on with nostalgia in years to come. However, the thing that really grates is reading, hearing and talking about it. I suppose I’m being utterly hypercritical by writing this entry but I feel I need to vent this pent up frustration somehow.

The great Wii fast came to an end today. I had exiled all Wii gaming, excluding Wii Fit, from my life since the turn of the year but it all collapsed in a few hours of weakness. I had ordered a new game, Battlion Wars 2, a few weeks back and it had been sitting at home for a while. My plan was to wait until post-exams until I played it but teh temptation just sort of took over.

I’m so knackered. For some bizarre reason I feel like blogging at the moment rather than doing the sensible thing and just collapsing on my bed and falling asleep. It’s definitely been a jam-packed weekend and I’m going to include Friday and today in that too. I felt like a proper student again and not the shell I’ve been over the past few months. I suppose there’s no need to recap on that as pretty much everyone knows all about my stresses… this weekend went a hell of a long way to relieving some of that.

I know it’s still a bit too early to start considering these things… and there’s definitely a few things I should get out the way before the time comes, but as the days tick by I draw ever close to the end of an era – the end of my time in full time education.

I have a soft spot for being overly dramatic with things…. I suppose this post sums it up really!

Today was my last football match for the Japanese Society. It also looks like it may have been my last game as with a proper 11-a-side team, on a grass, and all that jazz. It’s depressing to think about it but there really does not seem to be that much opportunity in the future to play a proper football game. With me leaving full-time education, and also in a way my youth behind, it’ll no doubt become increasingly difficult to play the beautiful game.

I do however want to continue playing in one way or another and I hope that I’ll be able to do so when I ship over to Japan. Also, I’ll definitely appreciate those rare guest appearances I may be able to make…. who knows!

Happy retirement? No way, not yet!

Before I get on to the main topic of this blog entry I just want to discuss this blog in general. For some time I’ve been considering creating a public/facebook-safe blog (without relying on their “notes” feature) but also keeping this as a “friends-only” style blog. I’ve even gone so far as installing the blogging software on an alternate site ready for use. It’s not an easy decision to make though as I’m already blogging on two fronts – this mainly English based blog, and