First Year of University - My 365

[foodpoison]

Alright guys, unfortunately I've left it too long to make anything logical come up so I'm going to have to finish it at around 250 days. Which makes sense I guess as I was only there for 8 months. Hold tight, photos will be pouring in through the plenty.

 

[foodpoison]

So, theoretically...

Day 213

To cut a long story short - I finished all my assignments on time and even handed a couple in early. I did really bloody good, I think.

Day 214

Oldest pub in Cardiff, right opposite my mate's uni building. Obviously taken when I went to Cardiff.

Day 215

Left to right: Charlie, Donnie (Adam), Ben

Originally called Adam, Donnie watched 'Donnie Darko' so much as a kid, his friends and family nicknamed him Donnie, and it stuck.
Here you can see him with beer crate clogs and a Sorry for the Inconvenience sign he stole. Pretty inconvenient.
He also once kicked a hole in the wall, right next to my bedroom door and then fessed up and went for councilling.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 216

I wasn't even marked for this image, yet I still put in unbelievable amounts of effort into it. This went into making my Jack Daniels direct marketing piece for my website.

Day 217

Alex, meditating.

Day 218

Drew, meditating also.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 219

Funny story behind this one.

Basically, I've finished uni by now, and every day involves drinking copious amounts of alcohol. On this particular night, too much hair product went in, and so I decided to take this pee out of one of my facebook friends, a very pompous, pretentious, vain, self-obsessed, stereotypical conservative voter. Click for image.

To put a long story short, I re-did my hair before I went out, then when I got in, absolutely parneyed, I decided to re-do my hair. Unfortunately there are no pictures, but I was very entertaining by all regards. Moisturiser, matte clay, texturising gum, hair gel, toothpaste, all manner of 'product' was in my hair. woke up in the morning like wolverine.

Day 220

Day 221

Filler pic of an unfinished building in soton. Apparently it's been there for several years.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 222

Another filler pic. Fat pigeon.

Day 223

Day 224

Apparently the Chiquito's that this belongs to is terrible.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 225

The underside of a bridge near me. I guess a metaphor for how I feel. I feel sad to leave this place.
This place has been an enormous part of my life, and a real character builder. I've changed, for better or for worse, and made friends I hope I will stay in touch with for the rest of my life. I know I won't forget them.

Day 226

Day 227

And I guess from that note, onto this. You gotta look to the future.
And I'm really, really f******g excited about the future.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 228

Not really a lot more to say, moving out soon.

Day 229

This is a really amazing boat that my friend Jon found in the harbour. He got ridiculously excited about it. I don't know anything about it other than that it's wide.

Day 230

Day 231

Day 232

 

[foodpoison]

More to come.

 

[david1701]

I think we can add fast to wide for that boat

 

[foodpoison]

Day 233

Tonight was Tom the Brummy's last night. We basically got extremely drunk, ran out of beer, called alcohol emergencies who delivered us a crate at 2am, and then continued drinking until around 5am. Was an amazing, amazing night. Had everyone who was left at halls in my room, and we were listening to music, chatting, and we even had an impromptu mosh pit form on my bed to 'Enter Shikari', which ended in me falling off my bed, onto my desk and putting a scratch in the bottom left of my computer monitor. Totally worth it.

Day 234

Grand night.

Day 235

This is alex, and he's a legend.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 236

Here you can see my two posters, Radiohead and The Who.

Day 237

Not actually taken by me, but a cracking photo anyway.

Day 238

This was taken by me. Really is the epitome of his personality.

Day 239

Possibly my favourite photo of the year. This was us singing 'Little Lion Man' by Mumford & Sons. Very emotional in all honesty.

Me, Alex, Ben, Tom, Soph, Donnie.

This marks the end of an era for me. This is where university pretty much stopped. Apart from one more crazy night. Grab the Kleenex, I've got my emotional hat on.

 

[foodpoison]

Day Whatever

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Today was my last night at uni. Me, Alex and Dan went to a Southampton Uni bar, Jesters, which is 50p a pint - always a laugh when you get a whole bar full of Uni guys, chuck in a few Solent guys (us) and knock the price of a pint down to 50p. Thankfully we didn't get in any fights.

We had an eventful night nonetheless. On the walk home, we saw an arm chair outside someone's house.
Obviously, we stole it. What else would we do? Intending on bringing it back to halls and then, I dunno, sitting on it, we were wheeling it home, generally being yobs and causing mischief, when we hear this yell: "OIII!"
We turn around to see this huge guy, no shirt and no shoes on, storming towards us, so, me dan and alex roar with laughter and give it legs.

We're running for ages, Dan being a lot fitter runs off into the distance and me and alex stop for a rest, only to turn around to see the guy still there. You've never seen anything like it.

To explain the situation like the animal kingdom, it's almost like me dan and alex were a pack of hyenas chilling out in a lion's area and eating his food. The lion comes back and we leg it off, cackling. We stop, turn around, realise the lion is hot on our tails and continue to leg it, cackling.

Anyway, me and alex get in and find dan, who on his run home got started on by a big group of black guys who threatened to "kill him for his money" haha.

Amazing end to an amazing year, full of characters I'll never forget, experiences I'll tell my kids, and a horrific abundance of alcohol consumed.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 240

I took a few photos of Marc's car to help him sell it. They turned out surprisingly well, but I forgot my nd grad so the skies aren't as bold as I'd like them to be.

Day 241

Day 242

 

[foodpoison]

Day 244

Tomorrow is mother's day, and so my dad and brother decided it would be nice to get a photo of the 3 of us to give to her.
Great, let's get sean to help us!

I wanted to use the reflector as the flash just couldn't rid of the harsh shadows effectively, but my brother kept squinting like a little bitch, and so I nearly lost my temper with him (I wanted to take the photo at 8pm when the light wouldn't be so harsh, but no. had to be done now) and then my dad lost his temper with us and we gritted our teeth and smiled for the camera and then didn't talk for the rest of the night.

Day 245

This is charlie and was one of the shots for my final piece in Digital Media.

Day 246

This is Emily one of my course mates who scanned her face.

Day 247

This is me scanning my face.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 247-365

I've loved the first year of uni, more than words can describe, but I've had some rough times too. Mainly with my ex girlfriend, who really put a downer on my life for a few months.
I've made friends, lost friends, and made enemies, but hey, you can't please everyone all the time.

I've had too many great nights out to remember, and just as many great nights in.
I've met some really first class people, and made some amazing friends.

If I can give any advice to anyone starting uni and a little nervous about it, it's this.
Never miss out on anything, always have an open mind, try anything once, and be the most liberal you've ever been. It's a diverse place, uni.
And don't you dare moan about people stealing your food, breaking your plates, or terrorising you at 3am, because well heck then they'll just do it more (coming from a first class terroriser here )

I just want to give a few thank you's to people who have been kind of a leaning post for me throughout my tough time, and have still given a crap about me while I haven't been as attentive (hey, no news is good news, right?)

Firstly to Wail. He seems like a great guy, and has been there for me through thick and thin, offering his support and his advice. Mate, next time you're down in Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire or the like, I'd love to buy you a beer.

Secondly to Recrudesce (Ross) and David1701 (David), cheers for taking an interest in it all, it's much appreciated

And finally an apology to RaymondLin, looking back you were asking for lots of photos of events, and I'm not sure I got many of them, so I hate to disappoint you

______________________________________

An update on what I'm doing with my life for the moment:

-I'm working full time at Legoland
-I'm going to the gym 5 times a week
-I'm paying £325 rent on the 25th of every month
-I'm expecting to pass my first year with a Merit

I will be updating this whenever something significant happens, but unfortunately, nothing has yet.

 

[Wail]

<snip>

I just want to give a few thank you's to people who have been kind of a leaning post for me throughout my tough time, and have still given a crap about me while I haven't been as attentive (hey, no news is good news, right?)

Firstly to Wail. He seems like a great guy, and has been there for me through thick and thin, offering his support and his advice. Mate, next time you're down in Surrey, Hampshire, Berkshire or the like, I'd love to buy you a beer.

<snip>

Young-man, thank you so much for your kind words ; it was a pleasant read going over your escapades with your friends.

Most of all, this will serve as an excellent source of reference for me when my daughter starts university .. at least now I know what to expect

Have a great summer vacation, and hope to see Part II

 

[foodpoison]

Young-man, thank you so much for your kind words ; it was a pleasant read going over your escapades with your friends.

Most of all, this will serve as an excellent source of reference for me when my daughter starts university .. at least now I know what to expect

Have a great summer vacation, and hope to see Part II

No problem

All you need to do for your daughter is be supportive. If you don't hear from her, take that as good news. If she's having a great time, she'll have totally forgotten about everything at home. If she's calling you 5 times a day (aka my ex), something's not right

Not much going on this summer - trying to get in shape so banging it out down the gym most evenings, while working most days.

A few events:
- going to Southampton on monday for a few days and staying at my mate's house - we get our house 1st July but I'm working then
- moving in to our new house (or at least getting the keys and bills sorted)
- going to malia with the lads - expect some top class photos there haha
- paintballing with everyone for my 20th birthday
-finally moving back to southampton around early september

 

[wicker_man]

Good to see you update this, I'd been following it and then noticed you weren't putting up any new photos for a while!

I'm really liking the Jack Daniels photo, I could imagine it being in a magazine! Plus it's one of my favourite spirits!

Uni is definitely the best time of your life, I've just finished my 3rd year at Portsmouth and about to go into my 4th and final year in September (I feel old!)

 

[IgorFB]

Been following this thread since the beginning, great stuff Sean!!
Can't wait till next year when I should probably be starting uni!! woohooo

Have a great summer and I can't wait to see the follow up to Year I.

 

[foodpoison]

More photos to come guys! House party, new house

 

[foodpoison]

Right, bloody hell, mad week. Here goes!

Day 247-250

After the England defeat the other day, me and my brother took the dog for a walk.
Some total w****r had set the heath of the local common on fire. Thankfully the fire brigade had been notified and did a bang up job of keeping it under control and eventually putting it out. Obviously I grabbed the camera.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 251 - 256

Woo! Party!

I've missed southampton. A bloody lot.
I drove down after work, parked my car in a bush so the parking warden wouldn't find it, and then went to my mate's house.

I had a cracking few days. The first night we had a gathering thing, everyone just got drunk and no one was doing drugs - made a nice change.
Clockwise starting from the guy in the blue chequed shirt - alex, lauren, nora, amber, josey, jack, ben, martin, ellie, chris, ayla, matt and soph.

Had a great night but I was so shattered from work that I went to bed at like, 2am. Rubbish.

This is Ben, who later that evening passed out.

Amber, Dan, Jack and Ellie

Soph (I'm sharing a house with her next term)

Jack Martin and Lauren

Alex and I

 

[foodpoison]

Day 257 - 264

I would just like to make you aware that I wasn't actually in Southampton for several weeks, and it was only a few days. But I have no other pictures to show you haha.

Today we just chilled out at their house, had some bacon sarnies, played some PS3 and watched a bit of Blood Diamond. Then in the evening we went to Junk.

Stole a few sofa's, you know, the usual.

Here you can see their noticeboard. Note the 'Have promiscuous sex' (Dan and Alex got lucky last night) and 'Leave Sofa Out In Rain' (they took their sofa outside but were too drunk to bring it back in and so, on the one and only time it rains is the night their sofa was outside

Note the black bit - it's a piece of slate replacing the glass pane that is missing in the door

Here's the room I was staying in. Recently refurbed and really, really nice.

Here's one of the sofas we stole in the front garden

And here's the other one. We call it - Kitchen Sofa.

Here's alex looking out the ceiling windows

 

[foodpoison]

Here's Dan chilling out on what was kitchen sofa, and is now formally known as Garden Sofa.

Here's Dan being Karate Kid

 

[foodpoison]

Day 265 - 270

Our new house, moved in and got the keys etc but haven't moved in properly. Will be moving my stuff in in September.

Previous tenants - bless

Living room - spacious

My room - big, but poorly designed with a terrible carpet. Can't complain.

Kitchen - cracking size with a gas hob

Our 'yard' - a big concrete space of nothing - will need a bit of garden furniture and things to make it homely, but unfortunately next door are apparently massive vandals - kicked the fence down and set fire to a picnic bench in their garden

Marc gets the biggest room, as he is the eldest. What a load of s*** haha.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 271 - 276

My mate's parents were on holiday so I said I'd fill in for them and shot my mate's little brother's prom for them. He's the one in the bright blue tie.

While I was there I saw one of the girls of my past whom I'm now good mates with, and she asked me to take a few shots of her little sister, who looked absolutely stunning.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 277 - 282

OOH, AH, MALIA, SAY OOH AH MALIA!

Lad's holiday.

Smarts (Martyn), Me, Sambo (Sam), Flandy (Andy)

Some of the holiday banter was absurd. We played ring of fire (drinking game with cards) and one of the cards is called 'busta rhyme' in which the person has to say a rhyme (your mum is a dog) and then the next person has to say a rhyme (but she gave me a snog) and when you can't rhyme you have to drink.

So basically whenever busta rhyma came up, we made a rhyme to do with having sex with smarts' girlfriend.
Someone would say: "The sky is red" which would then move onto "but nicola gave me head" and then that would turn into "we had sex in smarts' bed"
he took it well until one night it got too much and he lamped Matt, pushed Andy off his chair and stormed off. We decided to only make one nicola day a joke from then on haha.

Dill (Phil) and Me

Me and one of the Girls (natalie) next door

Nice brummy girls (after living with a brummy for a year i've warmed to the accent), but 2 of the lads devoted way too much time trying to pull them, when they clearly weren't interested.

After all, it's bro's before ho's.

Here's me with my new hair (short back and sides with a bit of a floppy fringe)

Me on the last night. Guess the camera.

Evening view from one of the rooms.

So on the first evening, I was so tired and so drunk I didn't make it out. Basically, everyone was drinking all day, except for me because the drink at the bar was so hideous, and so I drank in the evening and ended up drinking a half a bottle of vodka in an hour and a half - no big deal at uni, but I haven't really drunk anything in a few months and plus I was tired and dehydrated. I want to bed for 'an hours kip' at half 10. I woke up at half 1 and was extremely sad.

 

[Raymond Lin]

OMG, i stopped reading around November last year because there was hardly any photographs of people, but i am GLAD you've come around and there seem to be a lot more in the later ones !

 

[foodpoison]

Day 283 - 286

This holiday was filled to the brim with homo eroticism, as should any lads' holiday.

Matt and Brad walked around their room naked, as it was 'too hot' (yeah right lads), and one morning (about 5:30am) me and smarts are laying in our beds (separate!) and we here a bang on the door. We open the door, matt is there stark naked, cupping, and he announces, "Help! I'm naked!"

Me and Martyn are stood there confused as to what the bloody hell is going on. Then the security guard turns up and says "What is this! What happen here! Why you like this!" and Matt just goes, "...I'm naked!" and so we give him a hand towel to cover himself as he wanders off into the night escorted by the security guard.
Just to give some context, basically Brad thought it would be funny to get Matt outside the front door, lock him out, wait a few minutes and then let him in. Matt panicked, and ran to our room, which is in a different block about 75m away. Muppet.

Sam, Matt and Smarts in bed... - just so you're aware, there were 4 beds in this room, and 2 of them were empty haha.

Brad drank a lot of gin. Hideous.

Terrible photo of a lovely view.

This is sun burn.

I'm pretty sensitive to the sun. I whacked the sun cream on, every hour, and it just wasn't enough. After 2 days my skin had blistered.

We were in the Indie Club and singing our hearts out with total strangers one night, and a guy slapped his arm around my shoulders. The next morning I had what can only be described as a crater in my left shoulder. The fluid in the blisters had leaked out, stuck to my polo shirt, and as I took my shirt off it must have ripped all the skin off, causing it to leak pus and blood. After a day it had stopped leaking and scabbed over, but considering we were there for 6 days and I couldn't take my tshirt off for 4 of them, it kind of put an enormous downer on the holiday. during the days all I wanted to do was lay in bed, I was ready to go home, but thankfully when night fell I got myself into a better mood and went out.

 

[foodpoison]

OMG, i stopped reading around November last year because there was hardly any photographs of people, but i am GLAD you've come around and there seem to be a lot more in the later ones !

I've tried my best! My compact camera is busted and so I have to try and steal photos from people off their cameras and facebook!

 

[foodpoison]

Day 287 - 295

I know there will be more holiday photos to come when I dev my film so i'll save these for this. Plus more holiday stories.

 

[foodpoison]

Day 296 - 299

I went for a walk in the local woods with my friend Kitt today, a close friend whom I also very nearly had sex with haha (drink got in the way, I shan't explain if it's too ambiguous).

Any way, I took my camera along, something I haven't done in a while, and took about 10 photos, 5 of which were keepers. I love photography, I really do, and I know I need to make more time to go out and actually do it. I think on one of my days off this summer I'm going to go out to Windsor Great Park and take some photos there as night falls, should be good.

 

[Viewfinder]

Good to see updates again Sean.
Don't forget a photo of Kitt, after all, you speak highly of her!

 

[TriggerHappy]

Sean, thanks for posting this and keeping it going. Believe it or not this thread has been a bit of therapy for me. It's helped me put the right perspective on things after a very surreal (in the best and worst of ways) year at uni so big thanks to you.

I'm going into my 3rd and final year at uni in september and I wish I'd thought to document my experiences like this. This thread seems to have been a real way not only for you to share the good times but also a way of dealing with the worse times. So much has happened in 2 years it kind of gets lost and jumbled in my mind (and this certainly isn't helped by the excessive amounts of alcohol drunk far too frequently).

I'd love to do something similar to this next year but I know realistically I'd never keep it going. Still, it might be worth a shot. I'm going back to Bristol for resit week (no resits for me, just a great excuse to see uni mates and celebrate ) so maybe I'll start something then.

 

[foodpoison]

Sean, thanks for posting this and keeping it going. Believe it or not this thread has been a bit of therapy for me. It's helped me put the right perspective on things after a very surreal (in the best and worst of ways) year at uni so big thanks to you.

I'm going into my 3rd and final year at uni in september and I wish I'd thought to document my experiences like this. This thread seems to have been a real way not only for you to share the good times but also a way of dealing with the worse times. So much has happened in 2 years it kind of gets lost and jumbled in my mind (and this certainly isn't helped by the excessive amounts of alcohol drunk far too frequently).

I'd love to do something similar to this next year but I know realistically I'd never keep it going. Still, it might be worth a shot. I'm going back to Bristol for resit week (no resits for me, just a great excuse to see uni mates and celebrate ) so maybe I'll start something then.

Do it mate! It's been unbelievably therapeutic. It's helped me so much just write down my thoughts and feelings and get them out, you know?

 

[foodpoison]

Well, 300-302 days...

...And I wrote my car off.

I'd crash it again in an instant. The crash itself was the single most euphoric, exhilarating, enlightening and downright amazing experience I've ever had.

The hassle it has caused me is almost the opposite of euphoria.

 

[smooth]

hope you are ok matey.

Total knobby other driver by the looks of things.

New car?

 

[foodpoison]

Will hardly give me anything for it so maybe will have to see. Don't want to say too much but will do when it's all settled

 

[smooth]

Fair play. I hope it doesn't see you without wheels mate.

And I must say you are very brave/committed in getting shots of it all!

Fires, car crashes, bet you can't wait to get back to uni for a rest!

 

[foodpoison]

Fair play. I hope it doesn't see you without wheels mate.

And I must say you are very brave/committed in getting shots of it all!

Fires, car crashes, bet you can't wait to get back to uni for a rest!

It put life into perspective for me. I got out the car thinking, "Holy crap I hope this guy is okay," which kind of showed me something about myself. I was out of the car as soon as it had skidded to a stop, before I could even react, to check this dude was okay.

My last thoughts before the crash were literally, "Oh f***."