Things I miss from home...

Here's a little list of things that I miss from home:

• The cup of tea my Dad brings me every morning and the one that I make the family in the afternoon
• The sound of the birds
• Grass, open space, fields, farm machinery
• The smell of my Mums cooking, and the taste!
• The availability of everything, the way that a snack is always there
• Having someone to nag me to do something!
• My immune system...
• Being able to move around in the bathroom
• A comfy bed
• TV!!
• Kiss FM
• Central heating
• My room
• My little brother always being there to bug me
• Driving and Dave the KA
• Carolyn 
• Silence
• Wildlife (I saw an Urban Fox yesterday... yay)
• Sixth Form (well mainly media lesson withs Robyn)
• Rory's overuse of the term "intrinsically British"
• Lukes harmonica playing - it always made everyone happy!
• Max, Jack, Charz, Charlie, Tuey etc
• Geography lessons with Jack, Natalie and Lisa
• Trips up the street
• My lovely Grandparents
• The smell of a wood fire
• Look East
• The Suffolk Free Press
• Waitrose
• Pretty little houses and cottages
• Jacks pub <3

Subway

This post is much more about university life than university learning and revolves solely around the wondrous shop that is Subway.

Hailing from a small village in North Essex, the bright lights of the city are daunting. Subway was one place in particular that I had never visited, much to everybodys surprise, I saw myself as more of a KFC or MacDonald's girl. This weekend I decided to bite the bullet and get a Subway from the franchise I can see from my dorm window - open until 3am on Fridays and Saturdays! I wanted the famous Meatball Marinara but they'd run out, reminds me of the time I went to a Burger King and they'd run out of burgers, but that's not the point... so instead I had a 6" Chicken and Bacon Ranch with halipinos, lettuce, cucumber and mayonnaise and I was not disappointed.

To anyone who doesn't know how Subway works it involved choosing your own bread, filling, salad and sauce - tailoring your own Sub. Since Saturday I have made another visit to Subway and had the famous Meatball Marinara, it was worth the wait.

Ahhh, I love uni.

Lectures, seminars and workshops - my uni setup

Most people believe that university is just lectures, sitting in a large lecture hall taking notes. In reality this is far from the case. At Portsmouth for my course there are very few lectures - just two a week, one for Law for Journalists and one for Theorising Mass Media, the rest of the time is taken up in seminars and workshops.

Seminars take place in much smaller groups - ranging from 10-25, much more like college or sixth form classes. Teachers take what has been explained in the lectures and ask questions and create discussions. Take my law seminar for example; questions are asked as well as the topic being covered in greater detail. Seminars are much more exciting than lectures and also provide the opportunity to make new friends and get settled into class groups.

Tutorial groups are also small and take the same form as seminars. People from the same or similar courses are placed together in classes to learn Study Skills. We meet once a week for an hour but also gain a personal tutor, rather similar to a form tutor, whom can be contacted with both academic and personal issues.

The last lesson type for my course in particular is workshops. My personal workshop is at 9am on a Thursday for 2 hours, not my most productive time but oh well! It is in these times that we learn the skills needed to be successful in newswriting and actually put it into practice!

I love how diverse the learning plans are, it's hard to get bored!

The death of a legend... the Southsea Ultrasauras

As recently as my last post I mentioned the stunning sight that was the Southsea Dinosaur. Standing at 53/54 ft (conflicting reports) the dino brought something new to the large common, often used for student picnics and until recently barbecues.

Lasting just two months, the structure has become the latest victim of suspected arson. Robin Dellow, watch manager at the Southsea fire station noted that it was impossible for the statue to spontaneously combust. In the early hours of  Friday 1st October fire crews were called to the common to reports of the ancient beast ablaze, weather conditions both helped and hindered the rescue of the structure, it was raining but at the same time the wind was strong. Due to the location of the steel and hard polyester Ultrasauras crews found it difficult to get water to the scene and spent 45 minutes dampening down.

The dino, called Luna Parks, was due to move to my hometown of Colchester on October 10th, before then being transported to Cardiff and then hopefully back to Southsea on a more permanent basis.