15 June 2013

I Don't Like Chocolate











Ello blog,

I felt compelled to write this. I wanted to, but wasn't sure. Then my flatmate Katie said I should definitely do it, so now I am.
I am listening to some awesome praise music while I'm writing this so there is a chance I will get distracted and not make proper sentence structures. I am also sitting in the living room while Katie makes her dinner, so there is also that contributing factor to me potentially not making any sense.

Is it rude of me to write this while I'm in a room with her? She probably wouldn't think so. Well she told me to write this so I'd say no.




So, chocolate.

Girls go crazy over the stuff.

Most of my friends, Joella especially, are clear examples of this.

If she gets given chocolate, it is demolished in a matter of minutes, or collection of minutes, depending on the size. Off the top of my head I know that Chloe is the same.
Goodbye chocolate, it was nice knowing you.




This is NOT the case with me.

People give me chocolate, four months later, it is still sitting on my desk, unopened.

I don't want to eat it.
I don't feel like eating it, ever.
If I end up eating it, its only because I figure I ought to. Like the chocolate would feel bad if I didn't eat it after four months of it just sitting there.




Chocolate is also a great gift idea, I'm sure you know this.

People give me chocolate as a present.

I don't eat it.

Well, that's not true. Sometimes I'll have one piece every few days, if its expensive chocolate, like those Belgian ones. Or Ferrero Rocher.



If its a slab of chocolate (like the Black Forest one sitting in my flat's treat cupboard for the past two months) it will not be consumed.



I buy chocolate, thinking I will want it as a nice treat sometime, and then that time never comes.

I don't like chocolate.

At all.

Its average.

How are people so obsessed with it??????

Sometimes I accept people's offers of chocolate because I just want to fit in and be like everyone else. But if I'm being honest, I don't really want it.



Last year I used to give all my chocolate to my friend Matt because I didn't want it.

I still don't want the chocolate I somehow obtain. Seriously, who wants it? Because I don't. SO MANY CHOCOLATES IN MY ROOM THAT I WILL TAKE A WHOLE YEAR TO EAT!!!




I will be frank, there are certain TIMES OF THE MONTH when I do crave a bit of the ol' chocolate, but these moments are few and far between. I realise now its not enough to warrant a trip to the supermarket. One time I wanted Tim Tam slams SO BADLY that I went out and got some. But this has only happened once.

That packet of Tim Tam's still has a singular Tim Tam waiting to be consumed. I had the pack with only two biscuits removed sitting in my bedside table for many months. I slowly made my way through the packet over the last month. Slamming three Tim Tams at a time. But the last one has been in there for a while. And I don't want to eat it.





Its like the Black Forest that I had offered to people back in.. March? We ate the first two rows while watching a movie, then I put it away and never had any more of it.

I don't want it.


I guess you are getting the picture.

Martz does not like chocolate.

I tell people this and they still buy it for me.

They forget I am a rare breed of girl that does not enjoy chocolate... / a rare breed of human.

I must be very strange to not like the stuff.







You must understand that I do not have a sweet tooth.
I have a salty one.

Put a hunk of biltong in front of me, a piece of soy-drenched sushi or another savoury treat of some description and I will surely devour it.

That's why I eat all the chips, you see.
Because I don't want to eat the chocolate.

I should have named this blog "The Girl That Doesn't Eat Chocolate", maybe people would give it to me less then.




But anyway, its still nice that people want to give me presents so I'm thankful. But please, if you can help it, don't insult me by offering chocolate to me. Instead, why don't you help me out and take the chocolate off my hands?? :)

Because I don't want it.

Like, actually.




When I finally get married one day, I hope my husband will never buy me chocolate.
Instead, he can give me a box of savouries. I prefer the spring rolls to the samosas, but both will do.



Chocolate I will never eat




Tell me, do you feel like eating chocolate now after seeing all those pictures of chocolate? Because I don't ;)


04 June 2013

University And What I Never Told You






Hi everyone!

It feels like its been awhile since my last post but it probably hasn't...
I'm back in Kaitaia for a few more days so I thought I would finally write my POST-GRADUATION BLOG ENTRY!!! It has been brewing in my mind ever since the auspicious occasion, some ten days ago.

So yes. Here it is. The picture above, taken by the lovely Aimee Storm, features my parents and me in front of the famous Otago University clocktower. It is essential for every Otago Uni graduate to get a photo in front of it, so I did. Even though I find it extremely cliche and overdone, I relented in following this trend.




My four years at University were some of my best.
I wouldn't say they were the best years of my life, because that is super depressing considering they are now over, but they were definitely essential.


Before going to Uni I was extremely ... what's the best word to describe it... pathetic?
I would refuse to walk anywhere by myself. I had never driven a long distance or flown on a plane by myself. I HATED talking on the telephone and actually cried before my Mum forced me to call the StudyLink people a few months before I moved to Dunedin.
I was still very much a child.

As for the singing, well, I could barely manage to sing above a whisper. I was quite happy to sing along to songs in the car, but if you asked me to sing without music or along with a guitar, I found it EXTREMELY difficult. I refused to sing in front of strangers.




My secondary school did not adequately prepare me for the workload of Uni, but I seemed to manage.
At the beginning of my first year I used to do ALL my readings. I thought that's what you did at University. You took it seriously.

I quickly realised that you didn't need to do the readings to pass. Especially not with Film and Media Studies. A lot of the things I was reading about were never even mentioned in class.
HOW WAS THIS RELEVANT?!?!
I spent so many hours learning about the history of the media, how newspapers were invented and changed over time, bla bla bla (I forgot everything now, clearly). But the moral of the story was: I didn't have to do my readings. So I stopped. And I only did them if I specifically had to for an assignment.

Uni got a lot more fun at that point.

Most of you have heard tidbits of my drinking escapades. Its no secret I drank too much in my first year and the first half of my second year, but I still did alright in my studies.
I still wasn't doing all my readings and I could easily maintain a B+ average.

My proudest moment in my first year was when I wrote an essay on a film I had never watched.
I got an A.

It was things like that which made it seem like I didn't have to try that hard.
I probably should have, but I didn't.



This carried on through my second and third years. I did still try, don't get me wrong. And I studied hard. I always did my assignments and the readings necessary for them, but I tried to do the minimal amount that I could. Only because I knew that I could do it and still get good marks.


I NEVER handed an assignment in late.

I also NEVER pulled an all-nighter.

I also NEVER failed a paper.

I also NEVER got lower than a B- for a paper.


So, as you can see, I was still trying. I could have tried harder, but I didn't want to.


As a film student, I was required to watch, usually, four films a week (ones that they gave you on a list).
But I didn't always do that.

To this day there were films that I was interested to watch, that I was SUPPOSED TO WATCH, that I didn't.
And I would reference them and write about them as if I had watched them, but I never did.


This is probably making me look really bad...
I'm not trying to condone lying. I guess what I am trying to point out in this blog is that it is possible to get by pretending like you know what you're talking about, but you have to be careful.

I would have preferred if I had done all the work, but I just really couldn't be bothered.




Everything changed in Fourth Year.



All my previous techniques were no longer valid.

I HAD to do all my readings.

I HAD to watch every single movie.

The bare minimum was no longer enough to get me through.

WHAT A SHOCK TO THE SYSTEM!

The reason fourth year was so hard was because I wasn't used to doing all the work that I now had to do.

As most of you would know, I struggled BIG TIME! But in the end I did the best that I could.
And maybe it wasn't good enough, but I tried.


I guess it shows that I got what I deserved in the end.


My dad likes to tell me that coming to University was a waste. But I think that is a straight-up lie.

I have met my best friends for life at Uni. I really believe that.

People like Briar, and Joella, and countless others, who never fail to be there for me when I really need them.
I wouldn't have met them if I didn't come to Dunedin.


I also never would have gotten the confidence to start writing the music that I'm writing now, or even sing in front of people.
And I wouldn't be that crazy ex-film student who has something to say about almost every film, and why or why not it works in terms of its character-development and use of motifs.


So thanks Otago University.
I know I was a questionable half-assed student at times, but I tried my best in the end.
And that's all you can ask for.



I have my shiny degree now, and even though I have divulged all my secrets, you can't take it away from me.




:) x