Why I LOVE Kingston

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It’s no surprise to any of you who read this blog regularly that I am absolutely in love with my university. I study there, I live there, I have friends there, I met my band there and I want to stay there. Without sounding cocky after my results came out I could have applied to other places I recieved A*, Distinction *, Distinction *, Distinction and B overall and had a stack of UCAS points I didn’t expect. I worked bloody hard and threw up in my exam, so yes I was proud of myself. This actually let of a fair bit of snobbery, people would ask why I was applying to Kingston with my grades and I’m writing this to explain why I chose Kingston and why I want to choose them again.

Kingston was one of the first places that I felt like I could fit, I was excited as well as terrified but that didn’t stop me. Since I got here it’s been amazing, the support I get, my incredible tutor and lecturers, my mental health team, the student life team, working with the students union, awards and endless opportunities. It is because of all of this I get incredibly angry when we are seen as a number on a league table, spend a year like I have and you’ll realise life is abut more than tables. I didn’t even look at them when I applied! I just wanted to be happy.

Now my first year is over I can say that despite some challenges and my decision to become a full field literature student, I’m happy. I’m so, so happy. I still find people giving me a look when I say where I study because they study somewhere more prestigious, blah, blah, blah. Oxford, Cambridge, UCL I know for a fact none of these places would have been right for me as a person. I’m more than just a brain in a tank. I love that my lecturers treat me as a person and arn’t too busy to have a chat when they have office hours. I love the fact that my tutor hasn’t given up on me despite some really bad anxiety this year.

Most of all I love the fact that I’ve been given a chance and a boost of ambition. I’ll finish my degree in 2 years and start my masters, which will hopefully be at Kingston. This is a post about uni pride because that’s what I feel so strongly. I’m not trying to recruit people (I’ve already done that at Open Day), this is just how proud I am of my uni. I honestly think Kingston has helped me so much in fighting my illness and boosting my confidence so far, for that I’ll always be grateful.

Sometimes the days can slip away

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I’ve cleaned, read, picked up my guitar, I’m writing at the moment, I’ve organised, gone to town, organised my phone, seen the boys, been out in the car and that’s just this weekend. I’ve realised that after 2 months of summer already I need something to do. I’ve read 14 books so far this summer and I’m starting number 15 tonight, although this one might take a while. 

The summer is long and it makes me feel like I’m not doing anything because it’s so stretched out, I started my book list on the 1st May and don’t go back to uni until the 29th of September with the exception of some work (hopefully). I love being at home but miss Kingston and band practice. Without being a total geek I miss my lectures, I haven’t been in a lecture since March so by the time I go back I will have been off uni for 6 months, which really is too long in my opinion. I get frustrated about paying £9000 a year but only spending half the year in classes, but that’s just me. 

So today has been spent reading with a quick trip to town…hopefully the rest of the week will be a little more eventful.

My bands teaser!!!!!!!

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I’ve been bouncing around about everything we’ve been doing in the studio for a while now. Here is our first teaser for the next single which is out VERY soon!!!!! Follow us on twitter @nopeopleclub and we’re on Facebook! I’m so excited to share this with you. Enjoy!

Night out with Sammi

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Just a quick note for you all before I head on out for a night of cocktails and chatter with a friend that I used to go to college with. She’s currently studying History at Southampton Uni and I’m looking forward to seeing what she’s been up to this year. I can’t believe it’s been a year since I saw her last and we’ve ended up in the same line of work too. I’m feeling a little bit nervous about going out in Basingstoke but I’m sure it’ll be fine! 

Updating the blog and thank you

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Those of you who follow my twitter may have seen an explosion of blog posts dated a while ago come up. I’m not advertising just clearing my backlog of blogs I didn’t post, didn’t finish etc. The next week or so I will be doing this but also posting my regular posts with pictures and my musings like this one. 

I wanted to use this post to say thank you to you all as well. My followers have gone crazy and in less than a year I nearly have 100 followers which means the world to me and gives me so much confidence in my writing when others in the field haven’t been so supportive. It’s a great feeling when people say I don’t have good writing skills I can pull this up and go well these guys don’t think so! My writing is always improving and scrolling back to September I can see the change regular writing has achieved. I hope to carry on and have an incredible second year for you all to read about. If you want something new I post a new book review every Sunday night at http://www.ihadtobuyanotherbookcas.wordpress.com please take a look if you want!

 

Thank you so, so much

 

Chloe 

 

A day in London with Mumma Bear

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Just some of the pictures from today. 

Today I headed back into London for a trip with my Mum! I’ve been waiting for this for a few months as we decided to go on a big shopping trip after her birthday so that we had money to spend in the sales. That part didn’t go as to plan but I’ll get to that later. We had an absolutely amazing time and I was just laughing and smiling all the time. I was just as crazy as my mother for  change and despite trying on a load of clothes I didn’t feel low about my body which is a big change for me.

I know from my past experiences of sales shopping I can get pretty down about the whole thing because I don’t feel like I ‘look right’ in a lot of the newest fashions or I don’t know how to wear them, which sounds silly but some girls make it look effortless. Mum and I hardly found anything after getting through Oxford Street a lot quicker than usual, we then decided to walk to Hard Rock Cafe London. What looked online like a short walk was actually a very bloody long one, but we saw some of the beauty of London in the sunshine.

I love London, I love being able to see the history of a street in my mind as I walk past the old buildings. The heart of the city sets my imagination on fire! Would I live there? No, not in the centre I don’t think but somewhere like Kingston, Wimbledon, Richmond would be nice.

I treated Mum to a cocktail in Hard Rock as well as myself. Mine was so sour you couldn’t drink it quickly if you wanted too! It was nice to spend time with my Mum, treat her and have a laugh. She’s been through a lot with me and a lot of trips in the past haven’t been easy with me,  because of that I love to treat her.

After cocktails it was off to meet the lovely Joe who spent the afternoon with us in Leicester Square and Covent Garden. By this time though it was starting to get busy so after a wander around we headed back to BTown.

I have such an amazing day today and I don’t think I’ve laughed so much in a long time. This was just one thing I want to do for my Mum to say thank you to her being a rock. I love these days out we have now I’m older and can treat her…you’re still not getting a house in America yet Mum, I’ll have to earn a bit more first!

Be your own cheerleader (I’m awesome!)

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I have one of THE most confident people in the world as a best friend. We got into a conversation a few days ago about being more confident and knowing when to applaud yourself, I know for a fact us Brits aren’t very good at it. Oh that’s another thing Rhys is American, that’s not to say that all American’s are super confident but it seems like there is a better attitude out there towards promoting yourself. 

I’ve been really up and down for the last few days, so when I started going down again today I decided to get out of the house and head to the library and try and write in the quiet. I ended up with a very different afternoon, a long walk in the sun, bumping into loads of people from school and college as well as an old teacher. While I was talking to people I realised something. I’m pretty awesome and I’ve done damn well. There I said it. It even feels awkward to write it down because, well, I don’t think that it’s something I’m really not used to. 

You know what though? I feel like it’s something that should be done more often, we should be able to shout out when we’ve done well and just be able to say (like Rhys does frequently) I’m awesome. We should be able to have that confidence when we walk into interviews or classes and just be like I know what I’m good at. Not in an arrogant way but just to be happy about what we can do and not always trying to play it down. 

So here’s mine: 

I’m great at being able to read and analyse for my degree, just send that first my way! 

I’m a great songwriter and performer 

My organised self has been known to save a lot of people’s asses! 

 

Be your own cheerleader or you may not have one! 

 

Post the reasons why you’re awesome below 🙂 

Old friends and memories

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It doesn’t matter how long I’ve been back in my home town, it’s always weird. Despite people saying it’s a big town I really beg to differ. Every time I go into my town centre I see so many people I know, people I went to school with, old work colleagues, old bosses, exs, family friends, old enemies. It’s something you don’t realise about going to uni. For those of us who maybe didn’t have the happiest time at school or college uni is an escape. I can be who I like at uni and experience being who I am for the first time. No one in Kingston knows the awkwardness of my teenage years, the theatre kid from school or the time I told everyone I was a witch (ok well now they do). The point is you can be as open as you like about your past, or not and that is something I like. 

Today just walking to meet up with a friend I remembered all this. A lot of my year group work in town or are back home from the holidays, not many have moved out of town yet if they didn’t go to uni. So walking through I saw way more people than I wanted to, apart from they were the awkward ones who looked away, not me. Some people never grow up. 

I wasn’t perfect as a kid or a teenager but my annoying habits I’ve mostly grown out of with time. I’m working on actually being a kind of cool person you know, band, blog and keeping the super talented boyfriend. Meeting up with Katie reminded me of this, we went from best friends to hating each other to friends again. We were both kinda nerdy, very opinionated but also very different. Her Dad likes to call me the poison dwarf from my days as a 12 year old, well that rift never healed haha! I get on well with Katie now and her younger sister. I was nice to talk to someone from school who isn’t still acting like we’re 14. 

In a way it made me glad to be home, in another it really made me miss Kingston and the life I’ve created there. It’s a strange thing this growing up malarkey, you’re not quite sure how to play it. Anyway, it was an odd day today but also a very lovely one seeing Katie and hearing how she was getting on. 

Having a dog is as hard as having a child

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I found her upstairs on my sisters bed once I’d gotten up. 

 

My plans for today were to cuddle up in the little cocoon that I made for myself, Mum and Dad would be off to work and my sister was staying at a friends house, a nice lie in for me. As I fell asleep last night I forgot that there was one person in the house I hadn’t thought about…the dog. So at 5.40 this morning she was put in the bedroom with me.

There’s something you need to know about my dog, it’s rare that she will lay nicely on the bed. Instead she sprawls out over the bed, especially if I’ve slept in an awkward position. So I ended up squashed against the radiator finally getting up at 6 because I couldn’t get back to sleep. I’ve been awake since 5am. My friends with children were not up at 5am. What have I done to deserve this. It wasn’t too bad once I’d woken up and realised there was nothing on TV at 6am on a Sunday morning. We played catch, ate some breakfast and I got on with some bits and pieces. As the day went on though I got more and more tired and snappy…not the attitude for a barbecue.

So I’ve come to the conclusion dogs and kids aren’t that different…I couldn’t have one either way right now. I’m tired, cranky, emotional and have been in a bad mood all evening. It does help that I love my dog but I really do love my sleep too.