Second Year = Completed!

Haven't written one of these in a while! 

It's definitely not been hard to notice I've been as absent from this blog as a first-year uni student who doesn't actually care about passing the year with higher than the necessary 40%. I've missed this little space but I've really just had no time for anything that isn't Literature essay related *sad face*. 

However, as of a week and a bit ago, I am finished for the summer! Woop woop! It's been a hectic few months and uni work practically buried me (if you'd seen the state of my friend's room - you'd have thought she was trying to bury herself under a million printed drafts of essays about urban landscapes and feminism).

As you can tell, we were more than a little bit happy to have finished our
final exam and second year!

So, even though it's been a hell of a long time since my last post, there hasn't actually been that much happening... but here's a little life update anyway!

The last blog post I did I told you all about the awesomeness of The Script concert that I went to (HERE). Some of the girls from my course and I booked tickets to go see Imagine Dragons at the Capital FM Arena in November, which I can't wait for! I love their music so obviously as soon as we heard they were coming to Nottingham we realised we had to go.  I'm considering it a birthday treat to myself, as well as an end-of-second-year-of-uni treat.

Only a few days after I went to see The Script, my grandma and grandad came to visit me in Nottingham, brought the dogs, and stayed for a whole week, which was amazing! It was perfect timing too, because homesickness had started to overtake, seen as I hadn't been home for over three months. It was lovely to see them and I got to show them around Nottingham a bit more as well as taking them to Sherwood Forest, one of my favourite places in Notts.

I went on a work placement with a friend from uni at the beginning of my Easter holidays before going home, where I got to see all of my little ones! I really hate how fast they grow, they just seem to ignore me when I tell them they're supposed to stay little babies forever! My nephew has learnt to say my name too, so he kept walking around going 'Kakie' and grabbing my hand to lead me to what he wanted, because of course he would know that I'm a softie and give in to cuteness way too easily. Although I did end up working most of the time I was home, which sucked because I wanted to see people but it was good at the same time because money. What student doesn't need money? Also, rather bizarrely, it ended up snowing for quite a few of those days - I know I live in the North of the UK, and our weather is often a lot crappier, but snow in April? That's crazy weather, even for us!

In the meantime it's been a few months of many birthdays, including my own! Which has left me rather poor, thanks to many nights out (although very awesome nights out, may I add), meals, presents, etc., etc. All of which were very lovely and deserved!

As for me, I've unfortunately left the teenage years behind and I've entered my twenties, I'm going to make 'twenteen' an age though because it sounds way cooler... right? My lovely flatmates decorated the flat and got me a cake whilst my amazing best friend (I better say that, in case she ever reads this ;) ) took me to the cinema to see The Avengers: Age of Ultron which, may I add, was a frickin' incredible movie. Obviously. My mum also rang me to tell me she'd sent me a card but she'd sent it to the wrong address... again. Yep. Again. It's not the first time she's sent me something and then I've had to go and retrieve it from some random strangers that she's sent it too by accident - she's lucky I love her.

Then came all the deadlines and exams and all the boring stuff, blah, blah, blah. Needless to say they were a tiring few months filled with a lot of work and very little sleep. However, I did find a lovely little place that I started running, or even just going for 'procastination walks' throughout revision period, but I'm gutted I found it so late in the year, especially when I won't be living in halls again next year so I won't be able to just walk out my door and down the road to it whenever I want. Oh yeah, and I developed an addiction to chocolate digestives thanks to stupid revision. Ugh.

BUT! We had a great final weekend - as an end-of-exams celebration and a birthday night out for my bestie, we went for our final ever Saturday night out of our second year, with some of the best people, and had an awesome night with a hell of a lot of dancing and laughing!

So I've realised I maybe had more to update you on than I first thought, and this became a much longer post than I first thought it was going to be.

It feels incredibly strange to think we've finished our second year of uni; it seems to have gone so quickly and it feels even weirder when I think about the fact that I'm heading into my final ever year of university (and education in general) - now that's a crazily scary thought!

Katie x

A Night To Remember

Hi!

I was lucky enough to get to go and see The Script at The Capital FM Arena in Nottingham a few weeks ago, thanks to a very lovely friend who got me tickets for Christmas. Personally, I've never been to a bad concert or gig (whatever you call them) and The Script is definitely up there in my top three... It might even just be a war between them and McBusted for top spot because they were just awesome.

The one thing I really loved about this concert, aside from the fact that it was The Script, obviously, was that it was a really down-to-earth show, there wasn't a load of unnecessary props or staging, it was just them and a stage and a whole load of amazing lighting effects going on. 

I don't think this spoils anything... It's pretty obvious as soon as you get in the main part of the venue because you see it straight away but if you're worried this is a spoiler, jump straight to the next paragraph now. There is a little stage a little bit further back than the middle of the floor where they disappear to part way through the show and they play a beautiful piano version of The Man Who Can't Be Moved after saying how much the song changed their lives, and it was one of the most beautiful things ever. I didn't want to move after it, it was so stunning. Also the fact that they did this so that everyone, even the fans that were stood at the back of the venue or had seats back there, could get a chance to see them properly and they wouldn't just be little pin-pricks in the distance was such a lovely thing to think about.

The whole show was all about the fans and you could tell that, from their energy on stage, their banter with each other, the dedications of their songs, their enthusiasm, the way they got the crowd involved. At one point a fan standing even fainted and they made sure that security got to her and helped her before they continued with the show, which I thought was lovely, not many bands/singers would have that kind of concern for their fans. It was all pretty amazing. 

One thing they'd stopped doing for a while in this tour but did was the 'phone an ex' game. I'd heard of this but I wasn't sure they ever actually did it but, apparently, on their previous tours they would get a member of the audience to phone an ex and they would then sing to them down the phone - it was one of the funniest things I've seen in a long time and definitely added something a bit different and unique to their show!

I have absolutely nothing bad to say about this concert at all, it was one of the best I've been to and my feet were killing me afterwards but I guess that just means I had one hell of a good time!

Katie x

I'm Back!

Hello!

Remember me? No? Didn't think so. Oops.

Long time no talk. This feels so weird to be writing on here again. I've missed it soooo much.

I've been gone for a very, very long time and I don't even have any excuses for that... I don't think "the dog ate my homework" excuse is going to quite cut it!

There has been so much happening since I was last on here, so I thought I'd update you on everything 'life'!

First of all, the last time I blogged was four days before Megan, Sophie and Daisy's little brother, named Oscar, was born and he is just adorable, I'm so proud to say I was there for the whole thing and was one of the first people to get to steal lots of cuddles from him - he's made me a very proud godmother, it'll also be a great story to tell all of his future girlfriends; you've been warned Little O!

I then realised I only had a few weeks until I was going back to uni and I wanted to dedicate as much of my time to my family as possible, which meant this little space taking a bit of a backseat, even more so when I got to uni and was landed with a lot of work to do. However, I did a blog post HERE, quite a while ago, about the realities of university and although I very much stand by what I wrote, things have definitely gotten a lot better for me this year in terms of my flatmates and friends but I might do a different, slightly-updated, blog post on another version of university I've found this year.

Now I'm trying to write it all down, I'm seriously forgetting half of the things I've done over the past few months - brain failure!

I moved into my new uni flat on the 19th September and pretty much all of my time since then has been consumed by some new and amazing friends that I've made, as well as the massive workload I've managed to accumulate lately, but seen as I'm going to do a different blog post on university happenings we'll skip to the latest events which is...

The welcoming of my new, beautiful little nephew to the world. Yep, that's right. Another little nephew to run me ragged and spoil tons! Harry Robert Murphy was born on the 28th October and I got a lovely text from my brother announcing he'd finally arrived, what made it even better was I was going home that coming weekend so I wouldn't have to wait the weeks to see him I originally thought I was going to have to - which reminds me, I also went to see Ben Montague and Shane Filan when they visited Carlisle, whilst I was home that weekend; they were both awesome!

I think that's pretty much everything... All of the main goings-on in my life anyway! I'll try not to leave it so long before my next blog post!

Katie x

Best Concert EVER!

Hello!

I think I mentioned in THIS post that I was going to see McBusted last week. Well, I did and they were fantastic!

(Don't worry, I don't plan on writing about any spoilers or anything if you're planning on going - I'm just going to say how amazing it was!)

I had such an amazing time and it was, without doubt, the best concert I've ever been to! I just wish I wasn't a poor student and could afford to go again... And again... And again... You get how much I loved it, right?

Here's a few pictures that I took, I didn't take many but here they are!

Once the concert was over (*sad face*), my friend and I spent most of the next few days trying to figure out what it was that made it so much better than any other concert we'd been to. At first, we thought it was maybe because it was like reliving our childhood getting to see Busted again and we've always loved McFly anyway, but it seemed too amazing to just be that. Although it was amazing getting to see Busted on stage again (or two thirds of Busted). Dream. Come. True!

We also came up with the idea that it was because we were so close to the stage - I could see every feature on Tom's face, it was incredible. I think our great seats had a lot to do with it but they weren't the main reason for the concert being as great as it was. I'm sure if I'd been sat up at the back I would have had just as much of an awesome time.

I think the reason for it being the best concert I've ever been too was how funny they were. It was like being at a stand-up comedy gig at the same time! Just the way they were constantly laughing with (and at) each other made you laugh and the constant jokes they made, often at another band member's expense, changed a concert-music atmosphere into a hilarious-concert-that-we-didn't-want-to-leave atmosphere.

Also, this maybe isn't to everyone's taste but I enjoyed that they didn't hold back. By that I mean they were completely themselves on the stage and looked really at home. There were a lot of innuendos made and they didn't use the 'clean' versions of their songs and I personally loved that because it made it seem so much more real. I don't know of a single time where Busted ever held back when they were a band and it seems fitting that they don't now either. Obviously, a band like One Direction know they have a much higher percentage of younger followers and couldn't get away with that kind of thing, whereas, if you're going to see McBusted, chances are you're going to be over the age of 18, unless you've gone with a parent or sibling who once loved Busted because they only performed their old songs which most young people wouldn't know.

I can't wait for them to tour again, I'll definitely be making sure I grab tickets! In fact, it was that good, that I would even invest in OMFG! tickets next time, or whatever their VIP equivalent is in the future!

My friend and I also did a little shopping whilst we were in Glasgow so I might do a post on what I bought at some point because I found some lovely summer clothes on my venture! :)

Katie x