Love is in the air...

Good evening!

It's been quite some time since my last blog; apologies! I've just been kept so busy with practical write-ups and various other assessments that I haven't found the time to blog.

Since my last blog on 10th, quite a few fun and exciting things have happened!

One of the first big things I want to talk about in this blog is Valentine's Day. A day I always detested as teenager due to always being single. The past two V'days I haven't been which is lovely due to getting lovely roses both year, chocolates last year and being cooked a three course meal and taken out dancing this year. Valentine's Day was special to me this year due to it being mine and Tal's first proper date due to being in a long-distance relationship for the first year and a half; anytime we did spend together we did just normal couple things like going to the cinema or walking around the park or museums so it was nice to be able to have him (as he is rather old-fashioned when it comes to things like this) 'pick' me up from my door for our first date and a beautifully cooked three course meal. But enough of the soppy romance. As much as I enjoyed our romantic and adorable day together, shouldn't everyday be like this with your significant other? Why must we only have one day a year to appreciate what we have? Valentine's Day is so commercialised and, I feel, rather sad at times. I feel we should show our love and affection everyday, but that's just how I was raised. 

In addition to this, I think that anyone who was down about being single on the 14th of February shouldn't be. It may be called Couple's Day but it's really a day of love; a great day to love your self!

I'm going to stop with all the V'day stuff but I will add that the first people I said Happy Valentine's Day to were my beautiful and wonderful friends from school (big shout out and cuddles to you lovely ladies!)

The next big day was pancake day, which was amazing! Tal made such yummy pancakes, some of which we had with maple syrup and others were covered in chocolate with little mini marshmallows on top! I actually didn't take any pictures of them as I eat them so quickly I only remembered to take a picture after I had eaten them! 

Wednesday brought the start of Lent. For the second year running I thought I would try and give up junk food. It was going well until now...when I've just eaten cookies and more marshmallows! I appreciate and admire people who are able to give up something, whether it be for religious, health or any other reason, it's great that people have such amazing willpower! My Lent may not be going terribly well but I'm hoping that I can try to at least eat try to continue with healthier eating (with the hope of cutting out some junk food) and build towards a healthier lifestyle.

I have become good friends with a girl called Katherine (I know, how typical) on my course and I spent the night at hers on Thursday, with her school friend Steph. It was such a great night that entailed so many laughs and giggles and lots of facebook stalking old pictures of each other! We had a Chinese take-away as of course it was the Lunar New Year and it was delicious. Staying at Katherine's also allowed for us to complete our Statistics assessment which we both got 100% in! Getting that results this morning really put a smile on my face! Another thing that put a big smile on my face was the fact that Katherine actually got me a small present, which I wasn't expecting. Due to my love of pugs and her recent trip to Tesco, she saw and got me a pillow with the most adorable little pug on it. I love it so much I actually cuddled it in my sleep that evening!

The coming week looks busy yet again for me as I will be out three evenings and will be kept busy for four to five hours with Kent Marrow (you'll have to check out my next blog for that!). And now after just looking at my timetable for the next few weeks I have realised that my last chemistry lecture is actually this week...how sad...not! 

And on that, I shall leave you with a quote:

You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection ~Buddha

Until next time,

Catherine xxx

Shuffle of the week: Snow Patrol - Run (so many great memories of singing this song) 

Another Day, Another Deadline...

Good evening dear readers!

I sit here at my desk after an exhausting day, having only finished lectures an hour ago. I've been feeling rather ill over the past few days and that combined with very little sleep is never good!

It's been just over a week since my last post, and a number things have happened over the past few days.

On Tuesday we carried out an experiment which involved using polymerase chain reaction (PCR), something I've only learnt about at school but never actually carried out the technique of carry it out myself. Thankfully all went to plan and I personally feel I did a pretty good job (if I do say so myself!). The overall aim of the experiment was set out in a 'who done it' situation where DNA was found at a crime scene and we had to essentially match up and work out who, if any of the three main 'suspects', had committed the crime. This set-up was perfect for me as I was finally able to put the many hours of watching CSI and NCIS to use; I felt like a real forensic scientist and maybe got a little bit too excited about it!

Thursday and Friday were the Refreshers Fair which entailed putting names down for various societies just so you could get sweeties, chocolate or other various freebies! I had previously become a member of Kent RaG and BioSoc, but decided to put my name down for Kent Marrow, Forensic Society, Kent Foodians and a few others that were, shamefully, just for the freebies (especially chocolate!). Kent Marrow are a fundraising group (I'm a member as of Saturday) that I am so excited to be a part of as they work on behalf of Anthony Nolan, a pioneering charity that saves the lives of people with blood cancer. ForensicSoc and Kent Foodians are rather self explanatory: the first about forensic science and the latter all about food! Both rather perfect groups for me to try and join.

Yesterday was a very exciting day as I managed to complete my essay! I'm glad to have my first essay out of the way and done but I've been told by a few of my housemates and my mum, who is a lecturer, to leave it for a week or two, come back to it and then go over it again. And I thought I would just be able to do it and then not have to worry about it...it goes to show that I haven't done very many essays before!

Today's practical involved enzymes and the effect of differing the pH on their activity. It involved using a spectrophotometer and 8 different pHs that had to be measured every ten seconds for three minutes each and then all had to be repeated. It was a very long, tedious practical that we now have various tables, graphs and averages etc to complete for next week.

I hope you've all had a great week!

Until next time,
Catherine xxx

Shuffle song of the week: Aaryn Doyle - What it Takes from Camp Rock (cringe!)

Essay. Essay? ESSAY!?

Mornin'!

I'm still currently in bed on this wonderful Sunday morning (it is only 10am!) but I've already been out and done three loads of washing. I'm such a great little housewife!

Over the past week, I've just been continuing with lectures and the general day to day things that come with uni life. I had my first group meeting with my academic advisor of the term on Thursday. This brought about what I was fearing the most about uni: essays. We have been set a compulsory essay which isn't due in until March but I'm still rather worried about it. I've never been one for words. One reason I started this blog was to try and improve my communication. I know, how silly using the internet! I've also never had much practice at essay writing as chemistry and physics, and partially biology never required me to write essays. Music A-level did require me o write essays but I just liked to list all the information I had in my head into one giant paragraph.

This week brought the return of the fitness classes I had taken part in last term. Monday was the start of kettlebell, which I only did once last term, and I remember why! My legs and arms were killing me after the workout but it is so worth it. Wednesday was my favourite boxfit. Our instructor seriously worked us, I honestly was not ready for it! Thursdays will be my favourite though with both Tal and I starting swimming. It's been months, possibly years since I've been swimming. I had been told in 2013 after my accident the year previous to partake in swimming as it would really help build up my muscles again without having a adverse affect on my back. So I'm finally, 3 year later, going to start; I'm so excited! A new class called 'self defence' has also started up this term which I thought would be good to try but unfortunately there isn't an instructor for it yet. Though maybe that's for the best...

The highlight for me this week has to be booking flights back home. As much as I love being away learning about what I'm passionate about, you can never beat being at home with your own bed, family cooking and my little cuddly pup Archie. It's 72 days until I'm home...not that I'm counting!

My close friend Megan lists her song of the week at the end of her blog so I thought that I would grab my iPod classic, put it on shuffle each time I write a blog and post the song that pops up, no matter how embarrassing. My hope is that some of the major throwbacks will put a smile on someones face and hopefully make their day!

Until next week,
Catherine xxx

Catherine's iPod song of the day: Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody (what a song to start on!!)

Also thought I'd post the Muppets version because I absolutely love it.
The Muppets: Bohemian Rhapsody