Many new experiences!

Oh dear. It's been a while hasn't it?!

In all honesty, i have been awfully busy this weekend!! I've had two assignments due in the last two days, one of which i could not begin until i had been to a gig on Friday evening.

Friday morning was possibly the most stressed i have been since the beginning of the uni year and it had nothing to do with any deadlines looming. No, this stress came from three and a half hours of getting nowhere. Friday morning saw the release of Take That's 2011 Progress tour and my aunt, her sister and me were absolutely desperate to go! Having been at the final night of the 2009 Circus tour i could not resist spending £60 and many hours on tickets. But, perhaps naively, i thought it would be easy. A couple of phone calls, perhaps logging onto a website and it would be sorted. Alas, 210 minutes later i was still ticket-less and very close to pulling my hair out. Just as i decided to give up i saw a side note from one fan on the TT fan page to try an Irish website and suddenly i was the very proud owner of three Take That tickets for June 5th 2011!!!!!!!!!!! Words simply cannot describe how happy i was and still am!!

Having had a lot of early mornings last week i was looking forward to leaving the gig at Ruby Lounge fairly early, coming home, writing a basic review to go over at the weekend then sleeping for many many hours. Unfortunately there were a lot of friends at this gig and somehow i was convinced to stay to the end and then convinced to go to Satan's Hollow afterwards. This was my first new experience because i had always steered clear of the infamous rock club, being a huge fan of Take That, it was unlikely to be my cup of tea! But, i am all for trying new things and this lead to what turned out to be a really great night!

The next day saw me doing absolutely no work and instead baking cupcakes for a Halloween party that evening. Many hours later and the day had been wasted. I was making myself Zombified because this was Halloween weekend and i had some scaring to do! Unfortunately i've never been one for acting so ended up simply grinning the whole night and scaring nobody. Still, two great nights in a row so one can't complain!

Sunday. 1,500 word assignment due Monday. A draft had been written thankfully but more work was needed. I spent the day in bed, eating hangover food but also working. Eventually it led to a final product, a waffly self-assessment and a desire to never see the words pageant, beauty or competition ever again!

Monday, the work was handed in, the Shorthand lessons had returned and predictably the one week of no practice had sent me back at least two weeks in the process! Still, i had got almost all the work necessary done in time so i was happy. All that was left to do was write a live review based on the one A4 page of notes i had made at the gig!!

Surprisingly enough i managed it! After Chinese takeaway and Paranormal Activity Monday evening i knuckled down and the live review was written. All that was left to do was sleep! And sleep i did!

Over and out!

Gemma

Time is flying and i'm not having any fun!

You know the old saying "Time flies when you're having fun". Well, it's not just when you're having fun, it's also when you need a couple of hours of rest, and when you have deadlines looming, and when you're trying to get ready to go out. Time flies by me all the time, and i don't seem to be getting any of the fun!

Actually, no, that's not entirely true. Last night i did get a night off from writing Shorthand, busting my gut to write an album review on the complete opposite of my taste in music and keeping on top of all the demands on me. I got to go to my very first gig at Manchester Academy, Academy 2. I have been to a concert before (in my defence music has never been a huge passion in my life), but never to a gig and my friend Maz thought that insane when he first found out. He vowed to take me to the first gig i would agree to and that happened to be folk-pop singer Lissie.

I have to say, she was amazing and it was the perfect gig to ease me in. There was no moshing (well, one fifty year-old was trying it but nobody was encouraging him!), there was a bit of dancing, it was upbeat and fun at a nice venue. The gig only lasted just over an hour but it was so enjoyable and this time, time really did fly while i was having fun!

I am going to be writing a review of the gig for the Student Direct: Salford Edition and think i might show it to my lecturer who thought my last review only good enough to just scrape a pass. The more time passes, the more bitter i get about the whole affair!

Then, 8 tragically short hours of sleep later i was up and out the door for my very first Reporting class, where i was joining an MA class. That was nerve-wracking! I was so sure they were simply going to turn on me as i entered the room and screech at me to leave! But they were so lovely, very welcoming, and i even had a cup of tea made for me!

The class was also extremely useful, very informative. There was a guest speaker today, a chap from the NCTJ marking people and he talked us through a sample people because this is the first year of this Reporting section of the diploma (it used to be News Writing, but this is more of a multimedia paper now). He went into so much detail that i feel completely prepared for the paper and like i could do it tomorrow if asked to!

In the next two days i want to finish my feature, tomorrow night i have another gig to go to, this time for my assignment due in next week and it is the Halloween weekend which means time for writing up this gig is slim so it's going to be a busy few days! Still, all in the name of bettering myself eh?

Over and out!

Gemma