diary of a pocket-sized fresher |
i'm eighteen. i'm starting university. i'm terrified. how will i cope? where it all began | my personal tumblr |
I just accidentally made something beautiful. You should try it, too!
You Will Need:
You can leave out ingredients you don’t like, and add in others if you want!
Method:
Happy cooking! ♥
I just invented this for my dinner tonight! It was absolutely delicious; I have to share.
Serves 2 (or you, for two days!)
You will need:
(Note: Leave anything out that you don’t like, and omit the chicken for a veggie verson!)
Method:
1. Finely chop the onion and garlic, cut the chicken into rough cubes, slice the pepper and quart the mushrooms.
2. In a wok, heat the olive oil and add the onion and garlic. Sprinkle in some chilli powder if you’re going for a spicy version!
3. Cook on medium-high heat until the onions are getting soft, then add the chicken cubes. Stir and turn over continuously until chicken is cooked - break it into smaller pieces with your spatula to reduce this time and check how it’s doing. This should only take five to ten minutes.
4. Add mushrooms and peppers and mix well, cooking with the rest for a few minutes before adding the pasta sauce. Season (if needed) with a sprinkle of oregano, black pepper and salt.
5. Bring the heat down to let the mixture simmer (add a little boiled water to help the peppers soften), put the spaghetti in a saucepan and cover with boiled water. Add a pinch of salt to help it cook well without sticking! Don’t break the spaghetti - gradually push it into the water as it softens, then stir.
6. Once the spaghetti’s done, the sauce should have reduced nicely - if it’s still a bit runny, turn the heat up for a while until it thickens. Drain the spaghetti and toss it in with your sauce.
7. Serve up, sprinkle with grated cheese, and enjoy!
Hello everyone! Long time no post on here, I know - I guess this blog was always just going to be about my Fresher year, but the second year’s been so hectic I’ve barely had any free time to post anyway!
This is my five-hundred and fifty-fifth day as a uni student - crikey - and I can’t believe lectures have already finished for the year. I’m half-way through my four-year degree, and everyone else on three-year courses is starting to dread leaving everything behind in just over a year. Anyway, you all deserve some updates!
1. It’s been tough, but it’s gone well. The step-up from first to second year is very noticeable, at least in the sciencey courses! SO many more assignments, assessments and modules. Seeing as I’ve had an average of 20 lecture hours a week, adding the “expected” 20-30 hours extra reading we’re meant to do onto that means we’re actually not supposed to have free time. I’ve definitely skimped on the reading a bit, but kept up-to-date with everything else - which is quite an achievement!
2. I’m averaging over 80% across all my modules right now! That takes some pressure off the summer exams, at least - I’m aiming for a First again, although that’s going to be at least twice as hard this year.
3. I have some inkling of what I want to do after graduation! I LOVE researching and writing papers, so I feel like I’d suit a PhD really well. I’d love to do a PhD at the uni, which is very viable considering my grades and interest areas! There’s so much funding available for what I’m interested in and I’d also get to travel lots, fabfab.
4. Although we’ve all had to curb the nights out because we’re so knackered and low on money, my social life’s better than ever! I’ve grown much closer to lots of people on my course, and our fieldtrips (as always) have given the best opportunities for banter and getting to know everyone. I’ve got new housemates to look forward to, as well - my current ones are going their separate ways so I found some lovely strangers to live with. The house is great and they’re so nice, share plenty of my interests and also have a couple of adorable bearded dragon lizards! Couldn’t ask for much better.
5. I’ve got to do my dissertation this summer - my best mateys and I are all off to the lovely sunny south of France for five weeks, to map and camp and cycle! It’ll be hard work, but we’ve picked somewhere that’ll feel like we’re having a holiday, too. It’s going to be amazing!
That’s everything for now - I’m hopefully going to have a bit more free time between revision sessions over Easter in which to bring you more helpful studenty tips. As always, if you have anything you’d like to ask me about the university experience, just click here!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
Anonymous asked: I'm about to make my options, and I was wondering, if I drop geography in high school would I still be able to do it later on? It's kind of awkward for me because of the english baccalaureate so I only get to make three choices, and I'm struggling to choose between subjects.
If you’re from somewhere other than Britain I’m not sure how much I can help with that - but assuming you’re in the British system, it’s possible you’d be able to pick Geography back up later on in Sixth Form/College if you display enough interest in the subject and show you’d be willing to do some extra reading to get up to the standard they want (as you’d need some high school-level background knowledge to build from, really). Hope that helps! c:
Another way to ensure you get some good greenery in your diet is through nutritious salad mixtures; whether as side-portions or as meals themselves! The easiest way of doing this is to create a large bowl of salad at the start of the week and use it for meals during the week.
You will need:
(these ingredients are just suggestions - you can miss out ones you don’t like and add others)
Method:
I found out my exam results a few days ago, but I’ve only just got the official letter of confirmation. I got a first (over 70%) in five out of seven modules, and a second (over 60%) in the two others. I am extremely happy with this, as that means I’ve got a first-class mark overall - barely anyone else from my course who I’ve spoken to managed to get this, so all my hard work definitely paid off!
I’m so happy that I don’t have to take any resits; quite a few people unfortunately do, which involves having to make their own way to the Uni during August (this can involve travelling hundreds of miles) just to take the resit exams. My summer is totally free for relaxation, so I’m incredibly happy. Win!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
As a student it is often quite difficult to make yourself eat enough vegetables; especially if you can’t be bothered, or don’t have time, for the hassle of putting them on to cook alongside the rest of your meal (if you’re not cooking one that includes them already). Here’s a really easy and quick way of getting a bit of greenery!
You will need:
Method:
Simples!

This recipe is ideal for students on a low budget - and is so easy to make!
You will need:
Method:
Crikey basoomas, you guys! What happened to my first year at Uni? It’s already gone! I absolutely cannot believe it.
My last exams went brilliantly - I’m so pleased with myself! A few of my housemates and I discovered a 24-hour study place just down the road called the Julian Hodge Centre that stays open all night, so each night we were stocking up on cheap Tesco energy drink and studying down there until three a.m. It was so effective, I can’t even begin to tell you - being away from my laptop and other distractions really helped me knuckle down! It had a great atmosphere; lots of other people were in there, sipping Lucozade and absolutely powering through their work. It was quiet, but not too quiet - it was great to be able to take short breaks to chat to everyone else, but then it was easy to get back to work, too. Hodge Fever was definitely the key to my success!
Results come out in less than a month, and I’m really nervous in a positive kind of way. I really hope I passed every module - I have to average 56% overall to stay on the Masters course, and I’m pretty confident I managed that! It’s just a case of how well I passed - it doesn’t actually matter, but it would be nice to be working at either a 2.1 or 1 level in the first year so I know I’m on the right tracks! I’m definitely going to try even harder next year.
The end of exams brought a new wave of craziness upon us - I had a fair few brilliant nights out, which all ended with an intense rock-out sesh in Live Lounge (one of my very favourite places in the world) and a walk/stagger home after grabbing the ritualistic cheeseburger from Maccy D’s as it started to get light. I lost count of how many times I fell asleep to the dawn chorus! It was so, so brilliant - night after night, getting on it like a car bonnet. What a send-off.
On our last night, my two male housemates and their friend donned their wizard hats and played a brilliant game called Wizard Sticks from two p.m. onwards - this involves buying a load of cans of the drink of your choice, and each can you finish has to be taped to the next one, so you end up with a “wizard’s staff” of empty cans, drinking out of the top one. Absolute genius!
I can’t believe it’s over - packing everything up and leaving my little room bare was such an odd feeling. Looking back inside, I remembered exactly how I felt as I opened that door for the first time and arranged all my things inside. It literally feels like yesterday. To fit everything back into my old room has been an absolute nightmare - I’ve hoarded so much stuff over the years, and bought so many new things at Uni, that I’ve had to send literally half of my belongings to charity! Anything valuable will be going up on eBay soon so I can earn some cash back. Luckily, I’ve saved about £800 from my loan to last me the summer, so I don’t really need to get a job - but I’m going to see if I can get some shifts back down the local pub restaurant anyway, just to help out. I’m totally free for the summer now, with nothing to worry about until the end of September (unless I have resits in August, which hopefully I won’t), when I’ll move into my new house and start the second year with lectures and field trips - so I’m going to spend it relaxing and getting nice and brown (if my Irish skin will actually tan)! I’m going to Devon on holiday at some point too, where I will be really close to my best Uni friends Alice and Caroline - so I’ll hopefully meet up and have a few nights out with them. So excited!
Thank you, Cardiff Uni, for the best Fresher’s experience ever. I’ve made countless new friends and grown in confidence more than I could ever have imagined, and really learned how to live independently. I’ve loved every second!
Even though I’m technically not a Fresher any more, I’ll still be updating this blog with any funny happenings, recipes, tips, etc. throughout the rest of my Uni career. I hope my experiences have helped quell any of the fears you, my lovely reader, may have had about starting Uni - and if you still have any questions, please feel free to ask!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
Wow, it’s been such a long time since I last wrote! Apologies for the wait, I’ve been super busy.
My last update was at the start of the Easter break - I had three lovely weeks off at home, enjoying all the comforts (TV, laundry, home-cooked meals) while studying for my exams! Since I’ve been back I’ve celebrated my birthday (we had a crazy night out at TigerTiger, and an incredible Indian meal in the evening) and started exams, so the workload is definitely over-balancing the fun at the moment! It’s difficult to see much of everyone when studying is a priority, but my housemates and I have had a few poker/film nights to wind down after a long day’s work. c:
I’ve had two exams so far - Earth & Planetary System Science, and The Sedimentary System - the first went amazingly well (all the best topics came up!) but the second.. not so much, erlack! It was the one everyone was most confident about, as all the past papers online were really nice and had followed the same theme for the last ten years; so everyone had focussed on those specifics, sure that they’d come up. Guess what? The lecturer decided to be really mean and fill the paper with completely different, much more obscure questions that made it nothing like any of the past papers - so many people were totally thrown by it, including me! I’m fairly confident I got enough marks to pass, though. Following the first exam, we prematurely celebrated in a nice pub with a pint and some food, then went to our friends’ flat in Talybont Court (the big posh one) for some “tea”. Now, this wasn’t any ordinary tea. Our friend had just been on a hitch-hiking expedition to Morocco, where he had bought a big bag of mint tea from a man with a camel. We brewed it up, and it smelled wonderfully minty - and had a lovely refreshing taste. After a while, though, we all started to feel a bit funny, and questioned what else could have been in it.. Morocco is, after all, a prime exporter of marijuana. Cue us all playing an incredibly lazy and unusually hilarious game of Uno for several hours without realising how fast the time was passing - Matt was chewing a plastic pterodactyl and everything was just a bit weird. Ooh dear.
My next exam is on Tuesday, so this weekend is definitely going to be spent doing constant revision for it! Only four more to go. c:
Here’s my biggest exam study tip; start early, you won’t regret it! It’s so tempting to spend your Easter break just lolling around in the sun, or hanging with mates, but that time is really valuable for getting a huge chunk of your study out of the way. Use it wisely! My favourite method is to condense my notes onto little flashcards, and go over those before the exam.
Hope you’re all doing well! Only two weeks until the end of exams, woo!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
I’ve just got back from my trip to Arran Island - and what a week!
It started off pretty slow and difficult (and that was just the nine-hour coach journey up there); we were staying in a sweet little hotel right on the seafront in Brodick, which had lots of little apartments with their own living room/kitchens, bathrooms and bedrooms. We had a leather sofa and a Freeview telly, so we were pretty damn chuffed to spend any free time we had (which was only about two hours a day, haha) chilling out watching Friends & Family Guy episodes. The fieldwork on the first few days (Tuesday to Thursday) was pretty hard - lots of walking through cold showers over rocky coasts and up huge hills - but it all started to pick up on Thursday night, when we went to a pub quiz at one of the locals and had a little drinky with everyone. Every evening from eight until ten we had follow-up work to do, so we were usually too tired to go to the pub afterwards - but following an easy day on Friday (we casually mapped a glacial valley in pairs; I was with Caroline, so it was just plain banterous and easy - definitely took a quick shower in a waterfall), we decided to have a cheeky drinky in one of the boys’ rooms and I, as usual, got stupidly tipsy on a ridiculously small amount of alcohol and was soon changing their TV to Babestation and wandering around the halls giggling.
It all kicked off when one guy leaned on a bookcase at the end of the hall and it suddenly collapsed, sending books cascading to his feet - somehow, the shelves had splintered and it turned into a hilarious midnight crime-scene, with torches flashing about at the end of the hallway and the sound of several boys trying to piece it back together before any of the lecturers came upstairs and saw what had happened. I was just sitting on the floor with Caroline, absolutely wetting myself as they got out their geology hammers to put the back panel back on (“Paul’s going to kill you for not wearing goggles while hammering!” - one of the main rules of the trip, haha), and eventually it was good as new. Sort of. Let’s just hope no one else ever leans on it.
A fair few of us were pretty drunk by this point, and had heard about a disco down at one of the pubs - so at eleven p.m. we set off, bottles in hand. A police van chose that exact moment to roll by on the road outside and pulled over, yelling at us that drinking in the streets was an offence (which it is, but while living in Cardiff that’s totally forgotten). Most of us said sorry and went to put our drinks back inside, but one guy took a last swig - and the next thing we knew, he was taken into the van to be questioned! At this point we were shitting ourselves - we’d broken a bookcase, and now one of us was being arrested - but since we couldn’t rescue the guy we went onto the disco, hoping he’d be set free with a warning (turns out he got a £40 fine, haha). We arrived just as it was ending, but stayed in the bar and ended up getting verbally harassed by a bunch of drunk Scottish boys (one kept leaning in and sniffing me, and others were yelling “You’re from Wales, you eat seaweed!” - quite spectacularly weird). I had a ten-minute conversation with a local bloke about the geology of the region for some stupid reason (I was in the zone, ohhh yeah), and suddenly this fairly attractive and thankfully non-Scottish boy tapped me on the shoulder and said “Hey, come with me for a minute?” I was in the process of buying a drink, so I said I couldn’t - and then it became apparent that his mum, who was sitting across the bar, had encouraged him to come and talk to me! Tragic, but quite sweet. I later found him passed out in the lounge room when we were about to leave - turns out he was sixteen (egads, he did look older though), and while I was chatting to him it was apparent he had probably never seen a female nipple in his life and it was probably his first time drinking. Just as I stood up to leave with Caroline, he vomited everywhere and we legged it - poor guy! :’D
Saturday was yet another day of casually mapping the valley - we traversed the whole thing lazily, had a three-minute conversation with a sheep (it was genuinely baa-ing back) and just as we were climbing the other side we came across a kerfuffle over a lost lamb on the hillside. Some guys were doing a really crap job taking care of it, so we took over - it was SO SO CUTE and we cuddled it a lot and named it Cecil (although it later turned out to be a girl)! She was quite weak, and her mum was nowhere in sight and she kept crying for her - so we abandoned the mapping in favour of saving Cecil and finding her mummy. We carried her up and down the hill for well over an hour, over waterfalls and rivers, before we finally found the only other sheep for miles - and thus, they were reunited! Stunning moment. I am a very proud temporary adoptive parent.
We ate so well on the trip - I was a very good wifey to Caroline, cooking us yummy meals and cleaning, while she did manly things like open bottles for me - and definitely became addicted to Irn Bru. SUCH DELICIOUS NECTAR!
I am utterly knackered now and need to pack and make more dinner for me & my husband as she has no food, so all in all it was a BONNIE trip with a lot of seals and weird locals and porn. Good times!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
I can’t believe it’s been over two hundred days!
There’s not much to update you on - it’s been a slow week. Since I’ve been back in Cardiff, I’ve been hanging out with friends every evening (I went to the cinema last night to see Limitless, which was amazing! Being a student means cheap movie tickets - use them well) and working on my last assignment - which I have just finished! Looking forward to handing it in tomorrow and celebrating with some cider and frisbee in the park with everyone. I’ve got my window open right now, with a cool breeze and sunshine filtering through my blinds. <3
Caroline & I went shopping the other day to take our minds off our recent boy troubles - we only meant to buy a couple of essentials, since we’re both practically out of cash, but ended up spending about £80! I couldn’t help myself when I saw the pretty summery clothes in Primark, and we both bought matching thermals for Scotland. We are seriously going to look like hilarious Scottish twins, with our Tam O’Shanters and all-in-onesies, haha.
I have about £150 to live off over the next month - naaat good! But I will be at home for most of that, so I won’t have to buy my own food; such a relief. I get my next loan payment on the 10th of May - my birthday! What a present that will be. £500 will be going straight into my savings account, fo’ deffs.
I’ve just realised that there are only four weeks left until the start of exams - holy dicksticks! Four weeks passes like a single second in Uni, so I’d better get my study on big time.
I probably won’t write again until I am back from my Scotland fieldtrip, so hopefully I’ll have lots of amusing stories to share with you then! I’m setting off on Monday morning at eight o’clock. Crikey.
Eight sleeps ‘til the Easter Hols!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
Aah, it’s been so long! Since I last wrote, I have finished lectures (WHAT A GLORIOUS DAY THAT LAST DAY WAS) and have had only two nights out. “Only two?” I hear you cry - yes. I am seeeriously off drink after the night out I had two weeks ago - stupidly drank two hipflask-fuls of whiskey, stayed out until five a.m. and had to get up at six (after half an hour’s sleep) to go to Barry Island on a fieldtrip. Long story short, I had the most savage hangover and exhaustion ever, was almost sick on the beach, couldn’t finish the field exercise, had to go home by myself, fainted in a café on the way back while waiting for chips, and got hit on by a disgusting skinhead drunk on the train. And thus, I have given up spirits for lent, and possibly for a looooong time after that! The idea of drinking whiskey makes me feel sick to the stomach right now, haha.
The second time I went out was awesome - I finally attended an Earth Society pub golf social. If you’ve never played pub golf, the basic idea is that you go from pub to pub (the “holes”) and have a set drink to have in each pub - and a set number of swigs to finish it in (the “par”). Here’s an idea of what ours involved:
Because I’m a girl I was allowed to do half-pints, so I didn’t get very drunk; not that I wanted to, haha! It was awesome to spend the night having a groove with my coursemates, but because we had started at eight o’clock I was sooo ready to hit the hay by one a.m., so grabbed a cheeky cheeseburger and went back to my flat.
Since then, it’s just been a nice chilled couple of weeks, with one more fieldtrip (down Big Pit in Blaenavon, which was hilarious - Alice kept squeezing my bum in the dark and the Welsh tourguide got all offended when I told him honestly that I couldn’t understand his accent, haha) and a week of wonderful sunshine which has just passed - which we spent lazing around in the park by the river with a barbeque. It was so nice to chill out with coursemates and get to know them better, as well as get some sun on my pale skin! My freckles are already coming out to play. :D
I now have two weeks off before I go to Arran Island, so I’ve come home for one of those weeks! Most of my coursemates have gone on their Bachelors fieldtrip to Pembrokeshire and my flatmates all still have work to do - so it feels so good to be here, chilling in my PJs with some telly.
Eighteen sleeps ‘til the Easter Hols!
Love, Kezzi. ♥
Anonymous asked: What is your Uni diet like? Is it better or worse than how you are when you were at home?
It’s better, strangely enough! That’s not the case for everyone, though - some people are very hesitant of cooking so live off simple things like toast, snacks and microwave-meals. I’m the exact opposite - I’m very adventurous in the kitchen, and since being here have taught myself how to make a range of new, delicious, healthy meals! Most of my meals incorporate at least five vegetables, so I get all my nutrients, as well as carbohydrates like pasta, couscous and rice. I also have a very healthy amount of meat in my diet! Common meals I like to cook are spaghetti bolognese, chilli con carne, chicken curry and stuffed peppers. Sometimes I’ll be lazy and have a plate of pasta with sauce - but most of the time I like to cook meals that I can save some of for the next day. Just now I had my favourite mixture with cheesy-and-buttery mashed swede - I need to give this mixture a name, because I have no idea what it is! It’s a delicious vegetable stew type thing containing courgette, mushrooms, onion, peppers, celery and chopped tomatoes, seasoned with herbs. So nutritious and delicious!
Even though I always eat well in the evenings, lunch is usually a chocolate bar or a plate of cheesy chips in the Taf, since most of the time I have lectures in the day! I snack quite regularly on fruit bars and grapes to keep my body nice and alert when I’m out of the flat. If I’m ever there for lunch, I make a small meal - like seasoned couscous or something nice on toast. c:
Only five days left of lectures - I can’t believe it!
After next week, I have a series of day trips for five days, then two weeks off before my week-long trip to Arran Island! Caroline & I are going to purchase kilts and ginger beards so we can run around the island at night pretending to be “natives”. I’m actually really looking forward to it - it’s going to be cold and probably rainy, and will involve a lot of very boring rock-study - but it’ll be an amazing chance to really get to know the other people on our course and have a laugh with them. We’ll hopefully be buggering off down the local pub in the evenings and having sneaky banter like naughty children.. I can’t wait to write about it!
In terms of updates, there’s not a lot to say - I haven’t been out at all since my ID only arrived this morning (YESSS, finally), but I’ve been spending some time doing my assignments (of which there are a grand total of two, haha) and cooking yummy meals. Last night I made a ratatouille-type mixture with mashed swede (even though it took me forever to figure out how to cook the swede), and it was delicieuse! I’ll be finishing that off today once I’ve completed the last part of this assignment on volcanoes.
I’m going out to Propaganda tomorrow for the first time in forever - it’s going to ruuuule! A fitting celebration for completing my work, I feel. I’d better get back to it!
Thirty-six sleeps ‘til the Easter Hols!
Love, Kezzi. ♥