This post was originally written and posted on my very old wordpress blog in February 2014 while I was at uni. I was an intermittent blogger, partly because I was concerned about not having enough interesting things to say or interesting ways to say them (still true) and partly because I was often quite ill, and there were long periods where I could barely read, let alone write.
I think these old ones are quite alright actually, but I did have this sort of impression that they all had to be essentially essays, but they're fun.
Enjoy!
I know I haven’t posted in god knows how long, so I’m pulling out the cripple card. In my defence that is pretty much the reason, genuinely. Firstly, my shocking memory did not allow me to remember a) any of the things I was going to write in a blog post, b) what website I used to post entries of said blog or c) that I had a blog. I eventually resorted to having to google my own blog, but then again who doesn’t google themselves when they’re procrastinating. (Apparently, I’m a lawyer in Maine. I hate seeing my namesakes. Just reminds me of all the things I haven’t done. They’re sat there going “SCREW YOU DAISY, I’M WAY BETTER THAN YOU’LL EVER BE. PUT ME ON A PEDESTAL ‘COZ YOU’RE NEVER REACHING UP HERE!!!” This is a similar relationship to the one past Daisy and future Daisy have.) Please note, this is not the kind of classic bad memory where people tell me to just get a Gamehand 4C or whatever those handheld things are called nowadays and play Nutty Professor and his Gang of Neurons brain training. That plan would not work. I would forget that I owned a Gamehand 4C. This is the kind of memory loss where I have had to bank it with my university and get doctors notes saying “shit she really can’t remember anything. I know it’s connected to those illnesses, but shiiiiiit” (I’m paraphrasing here). I do have a feeling that my memory loss is just my brain taking the piss, I reckon it remembers loads of stuff but just isn’t telling me. It’s going to keep quiet and see how long it takes me to notice that it does remember all this stuff. If that’s the case, I’m going to properly punish my brain. I’ll turn it to mush with repeated episodes of Keeping up with the Kardashians and Sun, Sex and Suspicious Parents. That’ll learn it.
Reason number two. I’ve been very busy getting more diseases. Asking them politely if they would mind just working for a couple of minutes is like trying to get a crying child to smile when they’re proper grumpy. “Come on, just a little smile? Just for me? Please? Oh fine, I’ll give you a lollypop.” But unfortunately my body does not respond to bribery. I can now add my liver, stomach, blood, veins and eyes to the list of stuff that doesn’t work. It’s a very time consuming activity, and one that comes with a lot of conflicting advice (which I have to write down as soon as I get it or I will forget and end up in A+E saying “OHH they said eat IRON, not irons! I knew I shouldn’t have plugged them in but the internet said it would taste better that way…”). In the last 3 months I have been told: avoid fruit juices, drink orange juice, drink more milk, try not to have too much calcium, switch to decaff tea, don’t drink tea at all, avoid drinking, meh what difference will it make, eat small amounts and EAT MORE YOU DON’T HAVE ENOUGH IRON. You see the issue. I end up standing in Sainsbury’s looking at the food looking perplexed, looking like I don’t quite understand what food is, and that I’ve run away from the nurse who was taking me for my walk. I imagine I look like Mr Burns in the supermarket trying to figure out the difference between ketchup and catsup.
Number three. I’m now in third year, so they’re expecting me to do some work. As you’ve probably figured out, reasons one and two contribute to three being incredibly difficult. Trying to write an essay when you’re very unwell is a bit like someone putting you in the middle of a field (one of the ones in Somerset that’s flooded) with no supplies and telling you to write an essay by using your face as the internet and your foot as the writing apparatus. And a pigeon as paper. Actually if it’s flooded it would be a seagull. And not just writing essays, getting into seminars is practically impossible. The bus ride there is half an hour each way, a seminar two hours. By the time I get there I’m so tired I’m really not taking in anything people say. And my hearing is shite now. Really it’s a pointless endeavour. Like trying to organise a piss up in a china shop, or taking a bull to a brewery. Or trying to mix together two well-known analogies. Nothing will be gained. The people expecting to get drunk in the teacup shop and the bull expecting to break something in a cellar full of wooden barrels will just be confused, look at each other, shrug, and then turn on the organiser for being such a RIDICULOUS MORON.
On the plus side, I’ve been told by people that all this is fine, because I have an extension! Oh great!! I have to think about this topic for a much longer time and still not get any further with writing the essay! Goodie! I’m living the life of someone who occasionally forgets that they’re studying for a degree! It’s what I always wanted! Extensions aren’t great. I hate having to use them. It means you’re never celebrating finishing an essay. Everyone else finished theirs ages ago, and went celebrating. By the time you’ve finished, everyone just wants to go for “one or two maybe, but I have to be up early”. So you end up at the pub, and have a nice time sure, but everyone else is working on their next one by then. Or they’re really bad with money, spent a week getting pissed the week after loans came in and now they have £10 for the next three months. That sounds more like it.
I have started considering using different methods for remembering things as I can’t handwrite in a notebook for a long time. The next time I’m in a meeting with my dissertation supervisor I’ll start doing an interpretive dance to remember what he’s telling me about the distressing situation of Tibetan refugees.
Oh wait. My body won’t let me dance. Answers on a postcard please.