"I need some air"

Once again, totally irrelevant title, but it made me laugh when my five-year-old cousin Hasan, (who has a tendency to be slightly effeminate), said this in reaction to eating a particularly spicy pakora. Bless him.
So hello! I dropped off the face of the Earth firslty because I had nothig to blog about during exam season, then because I was too busy sleeping/being a slob to blog after that. but I am here now. With my non-chronological List of Events That Have Happened.

• When I was younger, the family and I would go for walks along the canal that runs fairly near where I live. It's a hell of a long walk, but very pretty for greenery and the occasional barge that goes by, with the people on board waving as they pass, like it's still a century ago. We made a spur-of-the-moment decision to revisit it in June, and so, woefully underprepared with a lack of sunscreen/hayfever-tablets for the brother/water/cool clothes, we set out to be all nostalgic. Fifteen minutes into the walk, the brother descended into explosive sneezes, the sun came out and melted us all to death, and my dad got thirsty. It was too late to turn back though, so we soldiered on. My dad's quick-fix solution to the brother's hayfever went as follows:

Dad: Humaira, do you have any lip balm?
Me: ....Yes..? Gawd, I know they're bad, but there's no need to-
Dad: Give it to him.
Me: But his lips aren't chap-
Dad: It's for his nose.
Me: *laughs uneasily in a misheard-way*

Dad: Haroon, rub the lip balm around your nostrils. It'll trap the pollen and you won't sneeze.
Me: *Begins to run*
Dad: SEIZE HER!

Maybe the last part didn't happen.
After much disgust, struggling and refusal on my part, I was coerced into finding a lip balm I was sure I never wanted to use again (I may possess several due to a slight obsession). There was a horrible moment of lip-balm smearing and emasculation for Haroon, and then it was over. And despite the Bear-Grylls-ness of this, he did stop sneezing and my dad did the whole smug see-I'm-a-pharmacist-I-know-these-things look.
We did actually manage the walk, despite the humidity and the sun and the younger brother moaning that this was too much and my clothes sticking to me, and an awful ten minutes when we had to pass the sewers and there were literally swarms of flies @_@ But yes. About 4 hours later we were back home and decided to offset all the calories burned by ordering two Dominos Pizzas. Because why not :D
The first picture is just the pretty-ness of the canal. Yay! And the second was when we passed along a field of rapeseed..I think that's what it is, the bright yellow one anyway. Huge field of all these yellow flowers, and I spied two red poppies in the middle of it all. I felt for them, so took a photo.

• I MADE COOKIES TOO! Same recipe, refer to the Emad's blog for the link, I can't be bothered to find it and may as well plug his blog while I'm here, it's adequate in a sort of readable way :P (I JOKE! It's great.) But yes, the cookies were awesome and that recipe is seriously the best ever: they come out all chewy! And don't listen to what anyone tells you, using chunks of galaxy chocolate instead of chocolate chips tastes ten times better. :D I know. I tried both ways, to make an informed decision. Or just to get fat. Note the pretentious arty-ness of how I took my photo. Because I'm oh-so-experimental and creative.
  

• I have been making a conscious effort to be a girl, recently. I have decided that 20 years of life is long enough to be going through a self-conscious awkwardness crisis. Despite being hopelessly outshadowed by girly cousins and the like, I shall make my own small steps towards attempting to do things that girls do. Step One was to acquire a girly bag, as I have never carried anything other than boyish satchels. So I got a huge, pretty white and pink shoulder bag with a lot of shiny sequins/beads on it because I am a magpie. And I can't find a picture but will edit with one if I do. This decision worked well, despite me walking lopsided for a month due to not being used to the weight of a shoulder bag as opposed to a cross-body one. Step Two was not biting my nails, as I felt this was not ladylike. Nah, it's because it was starting to hurt to touch things. But I did put nail polish on for the first time in my life! It was an awesome peacock blue-green metallic colour, and admittedly I got it everywhere due to never having worn the stuff before, but it was a start. I have now ordered a sparkly purple one because it looked awesome :D And Step 3 will be to sort my dress sense out, but that ones going to take a while. Note that high heels will never be a part of this effeminisation. Yes. New word.
  

• My family is all over the world at the moment. Had to stay behind to do a resit/curl up in a ball of self pity as everyone else went off to do things. It shall be a lesson to me: use brain more effectively next time, stupid person.
  

• Spiders appear very frequently in my room due to there being a massive hole in the wall where the fireplace was, that can't be covered by my clothes drawer. I keep having heart attacks. Just...*shudder*

• I have a LOT of palpitations. I mean, I know I drink pepsi a lot and caffeine accounts for this, but I keep having them when I haven't had pepsi- sometimes I haven't had caffeine all day and still end up with them. It's like my heart misses every 3rd beat and it scares the hypochondriac in me. Already thought out all the worst case scenarios. I fear that another spider would just cause my heart to throw in the towel and storm out.

• The Sandman graphic novels are pretty damn ace so far, but what with exams I haven't been able to get the next one so all I can say is the first 3 are very good. I've never read a graphic novel before, but they were clearly a good place to start. Awesome stuff.

• My obvious bewitching-ness made me the target of attention for not one, but two creepy Asians, when I was getting the train home from Uni. It happened twice, and I would have been flattered by their perversely invasive questions ('Where are you from in pakistan', 'Where are you going?' 'Will you come to Manchester with me?' and further Urdu things) had they not been forty something and dentally challenged. I mean, really?! A sad state of affairs.

• Went to see the Wolves crew yesterday, just for the day. This was, as ever, much fun: comfort white Magnum with my aunty Em was indeed comforting, and the comedy relief of hearing Baby Bear (who is now 18 months-ish) saying nothing but 'Ball?' the whole time was great. And Hasan's over-excitedness manifested itself in him abandoning his food to come and tap dance in front of me. Brilliance.
  

• I think I may have run out of things to say. No, really. I know..!
  

So yes, I won't make any blog-soon promises because clearly it's counter productive.
In a while, crocodile!
(Or, as my housemate likes to say as I'm leaving, 'Stay safe, and say no to drugs!' ...You'd think she had no faith in me.)
:)

What is this...'sunshine' you speak of?!

I AM BACK!
Gawd knows when I last posted, but I swear I've been revising since Easter. Gah. The effects of at least 8 weeks of revision include:

• A 'walking-dead' complexion
• Panda eyes (which coincidentally is also the slang for periorbital ecchymosis, and- *slaps self out of revision coma*)
• A lack of fingernails, and an inability to touch anything.
• The tendency to twitch involuntarily
• Revising during sleep. Seriously. I had a full dream the night before the exam where I went through a flow chart to do with the body's response to high blood pressure. I woke up in a cold sweat.
  
• Forgetting what it feels like to wear anything other than pyjamas.
• The development of a revision belly.
  
• A permanent indentation in my bed, or 'study space' as I like to call it. Observe:

My poor bed :(

So yeah. Life has consisted of waking up, revising, eating during study breaks, revising, and then sleeping. It's got to the point where I've classically conditioned myself (think Pavlov's dogs, which is part of Health Psychology modu- *slaps self out of revision coma*) into associating eating with relaxation. We'll make me obese yet!

The exams were Monday and Tuesday. They crashed and burned, to understate. But..yeah, I can live with resitting if I at least take a few weeks off from revision now. Because if I see another cranial nerve mnemonic, I will snap and do some serious damage, using only my Clinical Anatomy textbook as a weapon/anvil.

So relaxation it is! I ordered myself one of the Neil Gaiman Sandman graphic novels as a post-exam reward, and am going to read that, with a can of pepsi and a Galaxy Roasted and caramelised hazelnut bar, on the train home :D Yay!

Oh, and family wedding this weekend. Yay for jazzing up...? I'm scared of turning up and causing the guests to flee, having confirmed for them that Dawn of the Dead has finally come true. But what the hell. At least I can be a happy temporarily-exam-free zombie :)

And good luck for your exam, Emadness! Even though you won't see this til after yours, probably. But join the post exam zombie celebrations, yay!

*Waaaaaaves to all!*

Silly Bean

Hello!
Oh my God, so it's been aaaaages! @_@ I'd make some excuse about exams or something but I've totally slacked off work in the past few weeks so I can't even blame that. Never mind. I am here now. Here being home :D :D *YAY*
I should begin with the highlight of the past few weeks. Yes, it is food/drink related. Don't look at me like that.


Utter awesomeness :D Go to Cafe Nero and have Frappes.

In other news! Hello again. Since it's a picturey kind of post, this photo has no significance but I thought I'd post it anyway since it looks so pretty. I was walking back from uni through the decidedly creepy and deserted industrial estate near my house, and the sky just suddenly looked rather lovely, with all the dramatic rays of light(which you can't see too well here). So I took a photo. And several passing taxi drivers gave me weird looks.

It is also noteworthy to..note..that I am home now!!! The last week of term was a bit hectic, involving much food and late night work, but it finally got to Friday. And it took me a good 3 hours to pack (mainly due to my extended food break mid-packing...I get hungry! @_@). And I had to isolate a pile of revision books/folders to take home, which I'm going to work through over the next few weeks. And the size of the pile, which eventually became a highly unstable Leaning Tower of Pisa, made me laugh. So I took a photo of it. I present to you, some of the knowledge that I must cram into my head. (There's still more subjects to cover after Easter, so this isn't quite everything):



Oh! So I packed Friday night, and on Saturday my family were due to come. The plan was that we'd visit the Space Centre in leicester, which we'd been planning to go see for a while now. So I slept on Friday night in the knowledge that my internal body clock would get me up at about half 10, as usual.

...Skip to 11:46 on Saturday morning, and I woke up to the sound of my phone ringing. In my sleepy confusion, I accidentally cut it of instead of answering, but saw it was my dad calling. I thought, they must've set off and have rung to tell me.

...And then there was a loud knock on my window. Note, my room is downstairs, so if someone knocks at my window, it means they've been ringing the doorbell for ages and have now resorted to the next best thing.

So I stumbled like a zombie to the front door and opened it and came face to face with my dad and my two brothers, who came face to face with what looked like a yeti in pyjamas. Their reaction was a slightly startled one.

So yeah! The lesson is, don't rely on your body clock ¬_¬ I had to speed dress/finish packing and we were out the door in 20 minutes.

On the plus, Leicester Space Centre is awesome! :D Planetarium and everything. And if anyone needs a free annual pass, just ask.

Oh, and I drove home, which was fun. Note: it was not fun. How is it fun to be going at 70mph in a very crushable metal box?! @_@


...And in other news, I made awesome Millies-style cookies on Sunday! I say Millies Style. I didn't follow the recipe- it said to use brown sugar and caster sugar, whereas all I had were Demerara and Granulated. So I used those instead. And instead of chocolate chips I cut up chunks of Galaxy chocolate :D An improvement, I feel. On the whole, they turned out pretty damn nice! :D Yay for a successful baking attempt!


I can't really think of anything else, so random bullet points it is:

• One side of my face hurts

• Let Go by Frou Frou is just awesome, as is the film Garden State

• Aunty Em is a full on literal follower of my blog! Hello!! And she is helpful in pointing out potential blog material. :D

• B&Q is second only to Matalan/Ikea as a great Eater of Souls.

• I now possess a Matalan card, having made my first ever purchase from there @_@ I feel like I've lost a part of me.

• ...That is all! OH WAIT, since the Emadness added one of the two great Reliant K songs to his post, I shall add the other great one to mine :D

So I promise (emptily) that I shall blog within two weeks, and bid you all farewell!
:)

Life, the Universe and Everything.

HELLO!
I know, I know, in my absence the blogging world became a desolate, post-apocalyptic desert, where hope and happiness ceased to exist. But I am back now, fear not.
So my last post was over a month ago- it's going to take some serious work to figure out what's happened since then...

• Exams: I passed! Yaaaay :) Though a collective decision was made with the housemates to stuff ourselves on pizza the night before results, just in case we failed and couldn't have pizza after getting them. This worked out well. Pizza and general relief over two days

• Wolves crew: Went home the weekend after results, for an extended 4 day weekend, which was utterly awesome. Highlights included Hasan (Now 5) calling me a princess (*Oh, stop it*); Baby Bear still going cross eyed when he eats; Baby Bear starting to walk a few steps at a time before wobbling and collapsing; my mum being awesome and buying avocado just for me (I LOVE AVOCADOES); Talking at Aunty Em whilst she drifted off to sleep; Spending an evening with Aunty Em, my youngest aunty, and baby cousins (this involved a lot of food being smeared over computers etc); and a trip to Bradford with my mum and ALL the aunties, which again involved baby cousins smearing food everywhere, and was rather funny. Oh, and eating was basically continuous over the four days. All in all, best weekend in a while :D
  

• Hospital visits: Yes, so we've started going to the hospital one day a week, and this is eventful but very interesting! And I enjoy it more than I thought I would. Highlights from this have included doing a cardiovascular exam on a very cute old guy who kept trying to make me look at his stomach, and then decided he wanted me to see the scar in his groin @_@ Ouch. I mean, you scream, 'NO!' but sometimes it's just not quick enough. Another cringe moment was the doctor making all seven of us feel a woman's femoral pulse (Found by poking people deep in the groin) one by one. I felt more sorry for the woman, to be honest. She told me I had lovely cool hands @_@ Yes. That would be the excessive hand sweating due to mass nerves. At least I'll be a hit with the patients ¬_¬

• Hospital clothes: I have had to dress smart for all the hospital visits. Which may make me look even shorter than I am. Ahem. And wearing a stethoscope round my neck just makes me feel like a fraud. Though I did work out a way of being able to wear my stethoscope under my scarf without trying out any of the complicated Youtube Tutorial ways! :D *Pride*
  

• Student Selected Module: Arts in Medicine has been suspiciously easy so far... We've had 'fun' sessions where we've done creative writing, others where we've just watched videos of Medical dramas, and the next one is about humour in Medicine, and we've got to take in a funny clip from a medical programme. I mean, I'm enjoying it, but just waiting for the truckload of work to be dumped on me when it's time to do the 3000 word essay that will be the assessment for this module.

• Parks and Recreation: Is officially brilliant :D I started watching it last year, then couldn't finish it because my computer died. But now I've caught up and it's just awesome. Watch Parks and Recreation! Almost as good/funny as the Office...

• Newsnight: And other politics related issues,and ANYTHING to do with sports invariably makes me drowsy. Just no. Although I do now have a small understanding of terms like 'Innings' in cricket. And that is more than Enough. :)
  

• Gone Baby Gone: is great. Though decidedly one of the most ultimately depressing films of all time.

• Slobness: Clearly I have become a slob, judging by the last few points and how I do nothing other than sit on my bed and work, or sit on my bed and eat. But it's all good! :)

• Stupid recurring headaches: I have had one every day of this week ¬_¬ Aside from becoming paranoid due to having studied the various sinister causes of a recurring headache, it is also just pissing me off. I am experimentally cutting out Robinsons Orange and Pineapple squash, despite it being amazing, just to see if that's causing it ¬_¬ More on this story later.

• Childbirth video: ....Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that birth is a beautiful experience and the most magical thing in the world, etc. But when you get sat down in a lecture theatre, and they play you a video from the Seventies of a woman giving birth, and it pulls out all the stops because apparently as medical students we need ALL the gory details... I...Just... *Shudders*. @_@ I was not able to eat for several days.
  

And that's about it. Or the trauma of the video has erased anything else I was going to say. So yeah! I shall not leave it so ridiculously late to update next time! :)
*WAAAAVES*

Colour Coded Ringbinders and the smell of Sharpies.

Hello world!
*resists urge to add 'I'm Tyrannosaurus Alan and I'm going to eat you for breakfast!'*
Ahem :)
Who'dve thought it's only been almost a fortnight since exams. It feels like YEARS ago. Why does it feel like years ago..? Well, because we were plunged straight back in at the deep end of work, with the only light at the end of the tunnel being summer. But who am I to complain... ¬_¬

• Did I mention I got my student selected choice..? We got to choose one of the modules we'll study this semester. I got given the Arts in Medicine, which was my 2nd choice, but I'm fine with it :D This way I feel like fate handed it to me, rather than me outright asking to do it. And so I can explain this to people when they ask why the hell I'm doing it, and look at me in disgust when I venture forward that I enjoy reading. Secretly, I am rather enjoying it :D It's like English lessons all over again! YAY.

• Oh! And we've fiiinally started going into hospitals for one day each week! Though the first proper ward session is this week so I shall write about how that goes next time. But yay/*nerves*!

• My people and disease patient is in her seventies, and is addicted to playing Tomb Raider on her computer. How awesome is she?! :D

• I socialised with people after exams! This was the first time I socialised with a group of people since starting uni, and I feel like it was a really great achievement for me. true, the group was made up of my housemates and a few others, so not that far out of my comfort zone, but still! Progress!
  

• I am actually organised at this moment! All my notes for the first week, and my self study, have been completed! This is the first time ever that I have achieved such a feat, and it absolutely cannot last.
  

• I have rediscovered Love Hearts! If you do not remember, they're the semi-fizzy sweets that have creepy messages on them. Such as 'heart throb'... @_@

• Bought a pack of 7 tortilla wraps on Wednesday, and because they expire so quickly once you open them, I have had nothing but toasted wraps since. Yay.
  

• Re-read my personal statement for the first time in aaaages. THAT was embarrassing. It's (not) funny just how desperate it sounded.

• I discovered an English essay that I wrote in Year 10, when we were studying Othello- the essay was on Iago, who is essentially the evil villain. We were required to do about 2 sides. But I was so enthusiastic on the subject that I wrote 5 sides of A4 in size 10, with widened margins. Yay for being a Shakespeare freak!
  

• Unstoppable is a great film! And actually stressed me out due to the unbearable tension. Why will the train not stop?! D:

• Ease Up's 'If you only knew' is just awesome :D

• I now own THE COOLEST pair of shoes ever! This link is the closest image I could get, but mine are more purple-y with white laces. Generally prettier.
  

• Because I am so proud of having organised ALL my notes into ringbinders after exams (this kind of organisation is previously unheard of in...me), I am posting a photo! OBSERVE THE COLOURED RINGBINDERS. Ahem. I get a little excited about new stationery. There, Emad-ness. There is my tidy desk :D Though it now annoys me that the chair is slightly askew ¬_¬

• I believe there is nothing else going on in my life at the moment... so shall leave it there, since the past several...okay, all of the bullet points have been fairly nothing-y.
  

So yeah! I am done. When more things happen to me, I shall begin writing more exciting blog posts.
Over and out!
:)

And...*Breathe*

IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER IT'S OVER!
Literally. I mean, my life could well be over as well as the exams, but one obstacle at a time. 3 weeks til results and I am determined to enjoy my life until that shadow draws near :D
How to start? Well, after getting ALL my work compressed into 3 massive ringbinders, which took 2 hours and absolutely did my back in, I am now ready to LIVE MY LIFE!
...For one day. Did I mention we get one day off before it's back to compulsory lectures on Thursday and Friday...? ¬_¬ The theiving gits.

So how shall I spend this one evening off, of the two I've got then?
Well, the answer is a housemate feast, because the answer is always a feast: Domino's pizza, garlic pizza bread, potato wedges, a huge bottle of coke, and 7 dips (don't ask, we had to make it up to £30 to get £15 off).
Oh, and Little Miss Sunshine :D AWESOME FILM.
Yay! So I shall see you on the other side of the food coma.
Hang in there, Emad-ness!
*waaaaaves*
:)

The 5 Stages of Grief- as applied to exams.

1. Denial
Most likely phrase: "It's too early to revise, I'll just forget anything I learn now. Anyway, I deserve a damn holiday before I start."

Characterised by sitting at a desk, surrounded by textbook-skyscrapers to create the self-delusion of intended revision, whilst lost in BBC iPlayer/Youtube.

2. Anger
Most likely phrase: "Who's idea was it for me to do this shitty degree anyway?!"

Characterised by standing, pressed to the window of one's prison/bedroom, staring longingly at people walking outside, interspersed with bouts of rage-induced blood pressure spikes.

3. Bargaining
Most likely phrase: "Hello, God. Ahem...me again."

Characterised by making large donations to charity, and grand plans to use medical degree to cure cancer/travel to third world countries and vaccinate emaciated children.

4. Depression
Most likely phrase: "Are you going to eat that?"

Characterised by zombie-ridden nightmares, and life falling into a cycle of eat, sleep, study, with comfort being proportional to the amount of calories that can be acquired in one sitting.

5. Acceptance
Most likely phrase: "I heard they're looking for sales assistants at Gap."

Characterised by high pitched, slightly manic laughing fits and a silent, premature grief at the loss of one's summer holiday to the qualifying exam.


I'd say I'm smack bang in the middle of 4. Ah, well, can't be helped. *Goes to find more Maltesers*

*waves*
:)