third blog

I appreciate I'm going to need to start coming up with more original titles for my blogs, but up until five or six I reckon I might get by. (Actually I just checked this and realised I'd titled the blog "third blo" ... lol, whoops)

What a bad week. I mean, it's not had anything that's made it a distinct negative, it's just the lack of any real positives. I went to bed late sunday night from making the last blog, and I slept through my alarm... My phone's got a real nice speaker and everything but it needs to play the tone a little louder, or I need to find a more brutal one, because I remember waking up to music and knowing I hadn't put any music on, but I just went back to sleep for ages with my alarm carrying on.

This is a debate that's been raging in classes, particularly morning ones... Just what is the best alarm technique? If you're reading this and you've got a regular job with regular hours you probably have an alarm, but you're probably in a routine and giving yourself a decent amount of sleep every night. Even with the best intentions, at uni it just can't be done, I'm sure of it.

That is what makes this debate so important. We need these alarms to get us up. A decent 10 or 11pm bed time cannot be sustained, so I don't find myself just automatically coming to at about 7.30 the next morning. That's my alarm's job - it has to get me up. I've always been an advocate, and an activist for the "phone alarming by bed, roll over, press snooze on phone and press play on ipod and get into a couple of songs before getting up" mentality. Admittedly this has failed me many times. It's too easy to think "I'm awake, I'm fine" and turn off the alarm, only to fall asleep again. It's also too easy to fall asleep and just keep snoozing. I think this technique relies too heavily on a "softly-softly" approach - all the effort has to come from you - you have to want to get up. As the majority of my coursemates can attest, a feeling of wanting to get up is not a feeling brought on by a 9am 2hour Macro lecture.

No, another approach is needed. One friend's pointed out the merits of setting the alarm on extra loud and putting it over the other side of the room, forcing you to go and turn it off... and then you're up. In theory this is gold, but as you turn around and look back at your room, the appeal of your bed is often too much. Many a time when trying this technique when I was in school, I collapsed back into bed and drifted off.

Some people allow themselves two or three snoozes, psyching themselves up for the day with each snooze. I think I'm too weak. "Just one more". Of course, the thing that's even worse about this problem is that you don't HAVE to be in the lecture anyway. Its alright to skip it. the notes are online. The lecturer just skims over stuff anyway, all the real detail's in the text book... It's almost a waste of time going to this lecture, right? I can stay in bed, get up in a bit, and do the work then, right?

I need to sort my sleeping out basically. Last night was good - I was in about 10.45 and asleep within about 20 minutes. My only lesson today was at 1pm, so I could have laid in until whenever. I woke up un-assisted by alarm at 7.45 and had a really good morning. Good sleep is the way to go, and it's now a personal aim of mine. The world just feels better on good sleep.

Ok, I feel like I've f'd this blog up. The tangent to alarm technique was quite a big one. And probably uncalled for. It's not even relevant if you're working on good sleep - only if you're going to bed and getting 5 or less hours a night. In this blog I was gnna talk about missing those lectures on Monday, staying up late to finish my deadline for tuesday, handing the work in for the deadline, but going home and skipping that lecture too. I didn't go to a class until wednesday morning this week. I only missed 4 hours, and I genuinely will be better off working from the textbook than just having gone to the lecture, but skipping lectures like that just breeds such a bad attitude. I felt so shitty all through those two days, and through the rest of wednesday since I had no plans until the Utd - Inter game in the evening.

I filled some of the time by eating some retro sweets my Sis got me from America for my xmas bundle. Nerds... And a little cotton bag of gum - "nuggets" < / tangent (which gives me an excuse to put some images to break down the wall of text)>

Thursday was better, although a bit of a mission. I had 5 hours from 10 til 3, but it was more a "work hard, play hard" kind of day... Got back and watched tv for a while - the OC to be precise... although Season 4 is pretty poor tbh... Compared to the first three seasons at least. Then played GTA IV... Completed the story mode - very cool, love it. Fooled around on it some more just cos there's so much more to do, then cooked dinner and watched Phone Booth - film with Colin Farrell talking on the phone to Kiefer Sutherland (sp??) in a phone booth... Awesome, I love it! Highly recommended if you haven't seen it.

Anyway, at this point in time (14:38) Im back from my lecture, got my bag packed, minus my laptop, and just waiting for my 14:57 train to roll into the station - going home for the weekend for football as usual. Game against local rivals Winscombe, or Winscum as they're more affectionately known. Meeting ma girlfriend after that, think she's coming over and we're gonna cook some foodage and hang out for a while, it should be cool =D Then will drop her back home Sunday morning and get my ass dropped at the station probably... May end up blogging on Sunday seeing as Ive got a half draft about just random stuff that's floating around my head. Less random than alarm technique, but more serious too. Self-reflection stuff, you know? It could be quite interesting, or it could read as some shitty self-big-upping post, hopefully it'll be interesting and, ideally, you'll be able to relate it back into your own life... It's just something in my head that I'm always tripping over I think.

Anyway, It's now 14:42, I haven't got time to add a load of shitty images to break down the wall of text so I'll post this this evening when I'm home.

P.S. I love you

*saved*

Ah nice, got home with my pops and went in my room to dump my bags, and found a nice little asos delivery on my desk... This awesome tshirt that I ordered earlier this week. Nice!

Also, joined Xbox Live earlier on today and downlaoded The Lost And Damned (GTA IV add-on) and the Resident Evil 5 demo too... Which I played for about five minutes, and omg... It's awesome. If you've played it - that cutscene with the axeman and the beheading, then the army bearing down on you... Awesome. I know it comes out today but I've decided to wait until I break up for easter in a couple of weeks until I get it. Seriously though, cannot wait! Resi4 was probably my favourite game ever, and I think Resi5's gonna be up there alongside it. IGN's feature on the history of RE is a really cool read too... building the anticipation very nicely.


Recently Listening to:

• Fall Out Boy - just been dipping in and out of various albums, especially liking the older ones at the moment - take This To Your Grave mostly. An aside relating to Fall Out Boy and my second blog too, Christopher Gutierrez who's staying at our house the evening after his reading/speaking in Bristol can be seen in this video - which is an acoustic of "his song" - Grenade Jumper. He's the guy middle-fingering the camera on the "hey Chris" chorus!
  

• Linkin Park, especially the feat. Jay-Z album... Numb/Encore is an absolute classic =]

Talk soon guys - thanks for reading. And feel free to leave a message re: alarm technique :P


^Chris Redfield, Mr Resident Evil 5