National Blood Week - Do your bit and donate

I've written about NHS Blood Donation on here a couple of times before, so you can probably tell it is an organisation which, if you'll pardon the pun, has always been very close to my heart. And since today is the first day of National Blood Week in the UK, running from 10th-16th June 2013, I thought I'd write a bit about why registering to be a blood donor could be one of the best things you could ever possibly do.

This year's campaign 'Know Blood, Give Blood' is asking donors to share the facts with as many people as they possibly can, in order to help NHS Blood Donation continue to recruit the 200,000 new donors they need every year to replace those who can no longer donate.

This is why I'm here today - to spread the word!

Did you know...?

• 96% of us rely on the other 4% of the population to donate blood

• The number of regular blood donors has fallen by 23% over the past decade

• Hospitals around the UK need around 7000 units of blood every day to treat a vast range of health issues

• Each unit of blood donated is split into its constituent parts, which means it can save up to three lives

• Over a lifetime, some blood donors can help more than 500 people through their donations!

• You can donate up to three times a year, and it takes no longer than an hour per session.

• Your blood will be used to help a variety of patients, including children suffering with leukemia or other terminal illnesses, burns victims, women giving birth and people with conditions that require regular blood transfusions

• In one session you will donate 470ml, just under one pint, of your blood. After donating you will need to rest and will be offered refreshments to avoid faintness or dizziness (a.k.a. free drinks and biscuits, woohoo)

• When you fully process what a monumental difference you have just made to another person's life, the feeling is indescribable - all I can say it is like no other!

Learn more about National Blood Week and how you can help by clicking HERE. Visit the NHS Blood Donation website for more information about eligibility and registering.

June

You'll have to excuse me; I'm typing this with a slight hangover. However, I find writing is often so therapeutic that it works as the best kind of cure, so that's why I'm here instead of hiding in a dark room under a duvet. Weird, I know, but from me are you really expecting any different?

The last few weeks have been very busy as I've been travelling back and forth from home to my Uni house for work, family events and birthdays. It's been very strange spending a few days here, a few days there, because normally I'm only in one place for fairly long periods of time. However, on Wednesday I'll be heading back home for a longer stint of 4 weeks which I'm looking forward to, especially as it means I won't be packing and unpacking my bags every 5 minutes.

Last night we had our Summer Ball which was so fantastic! Admittedly most of it is a bit of a blur, but it was brilliant to see so many of my Uni friends looking gorgeous in their dresses and smart suits coming together to celebrate the end of a mad and eventful year. On the line up we had The Hoosiers and Pendulum, who were both amazing, and Radio 1 DJ Huw Stephens and Wiley, who I unfortunately missed, but I've got it on good authority that they performed great sets as well. Because I work in the coffee shop on campus I actually bumped into a few of my colleagues who were working some of the stalls - thankfully I found a small piece of common sense when seeing my boss' boss from a distance and realising it was probably not a good idea for me to go and have a chat, bearing in mind I was not of sober/sound mind and would have ended up babbling about all kinds of nonsense. I have no clue where this piece of common sense sprung from, but I'd be very grateful if it started to make an appearance more often in my day to day life. All in all, it was the perfect way to round off my second year.

On Tuesday, my housemate Vic and I went to an event called Tune In To Volunteering to collect awards for the volunteering we've done for our University, and we had a really lovely afternoon. It was all quite sophisticated and civilised (an environment which I'm obviously not naturally accustomed to) but it all ran smoothly with very few hiccups and moments of stupidity on my part, with the exception of me walking into one of the poles that was holding up the marquee, but I can't be held accountable for that; it was definitely the pole's fault.

There was a broad selection of people there who had completed so many fantastic acts of charity and volunteering - it really was an honour to be amongst them. Vic and I met a lovely guy called Adam who had been working with Age UK for three years and was being awarded for his 510 hours of volunteering with them. It was brilliant to see someone so humble and others like him be recognised and congratulated for such amazing work.

Finally, I've been asked to do a shout-out (or something of that kind fit for a blog post) to the fantastic people I work with - they're a mad lot and drive me crazy sometimes but I love them all. I'm not going to list all your names like you asked me to as there's bound to be whinging of "why was I listed last", "why was so-and-so first" etc., but just to say HELLO and you're all super.

Enjoy the rest of June you lovely lot.

Nats. X

The Great Gatsby film review.

I've never written a film review before, which you will probably realise once you've finished reading today’s post. The closest I've got to writing anything remotely similar is a book report at school – the classic summer holiday homework which is forced upon primary school children and met with the same overwhelming hatred as eating vegetables and enduring Sunday night bath time before school the next day.

However, last Friday evening I went to see The Great Gatsby, arguably one of the most anticipated films of this year so far, and since then I have been contemplating writing a little bit about it, especially since the movie has already been subject to much criticism both hot and cold from every possible direction. I had no intention of writing about the film before I actually watched it, so I'm trying my very best to work from memory. If you would like to read a more accurate review, I recommend giving Robbie Collin's one a go, especially as it is far more articulately written than mine.

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Adapting a novel to a screen play is a bit like tightrope walking: not everybody can do it, baby steps are a must, parts are plain sailing and wobbles are always guaranteed along the way. What you're greeted with when you reach the other side is another matter entirely.

With a trio of past cinematic catastrophes behind it, Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby hit screens this week and I for one was more skeptical than most. Indeed, it is baffling that for such a famous novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic text has never truly reached its full potential on the big screen after falling short in the 1926, 1949 and 1974 adaptations. The transition from text to film has never been easy, granted – lines are messed about with and there are almost always scenes missing. It was too late for Gatsby's “third time lucky”, but I had been left wondering whether Luhrmann had found fortune in the number four.

The novel is in actual fact a personal favourite of mine. I had fallen head over heels with Fitzgerald’s sensational interpretation of the glitz and the glamour, the frivolity of money and the enchanting, laissez-faire demeanor of the post-war generation. But beneath the surface, 1920s America was corrupt, decadent and damaged. For this film to be a success, a director would have to fully capture the density of this premise and simultaneously deliver a storyline of great complexity. No pressure then.

The film is, without a doubt, an optical masterpiece. Luhrmann’s utilisation of colour and texture is so gorgeous that it is difficult not to appreciate the meticulousness and attention-to-detail which clearly went into formulating such authentic costumes, props and scenery. Fitzgerald’s synaesthetic language is enough to make you fall in love with this fantastical, if contrived, environment, but it is Luhrmann who brings these imaginings to life for a modern audience.

And yet to quote the book, "life is much more successfully looked at from a single window". This film is not without fault, and character portrayal is a big problem. Tobey Maguire’s Nick Carraway was good, his awkwardness captured well, but Luhrmann's decision to place the character in a different setting at the start of the film just did not work.

Carey Mulligan’s performance was equally problematic. Fitzgerald's Daisy is selfish, ignorant and careless, but with Mulligan we see a defenseless, confused woman, trapped in a loveless, violent marriage and warped by the materialism around her. She becomes the victim rather than the perpetrator, despite the fact she is the one in the driving seat, quite literally, initiating the demise of certain characters. The Great Gatsby is supposed to be the great American novel without any truly great characters, but this is something Luhrmann clearly chose to overlook.

I admit I didn't mind this movie. It is, however, Luhrmann’s controversial approach which leaves me wondering whether I would have enjoyed this film more if it had been under the direction of somebody else. Indeed, it would have been interesting to see a focus on the corruption of American society, or the role of Nick as secret keeper. It is important to remember that Gatsby is not just a love story.

Without Luhrmann, on the other hand, would this film lose authenticity without the stunning visual beauty which this director captured so impeccably? I very much doubt it, and we cannot have it both ways.

At least with previous film adaptations in mind, it is without question that Luhrmann’s Gatsby is “worth the whole damn bunch put together”.

Age isn't just a number in the world of radio.

If you enjoy listening to music, you probably enjoy listening to the radio. Regardless of age, gender, ethnicity or sexuality, the radio is and always will be thought of as one of the most popular and accessible sources of entertainment in the 21st century.

Pop princess Rihanna quite rightly states in Capital FM’s latest advertising campaign that it actually stands as “the middleman” between a musician and their fans. The radio offers listeners the opportunity to discover new music and reminisce with the old. It offers the chance to explore different genres and grasp a true sense of what you enjoy and what you don’t. It offers an escape from reality, a fast ticket to freedom far away from the stress and troubles of our day to day lives. (Too deep? I’m an English student, unfortunately that’s the way my mind works).

It is for this reason that I question the motives behind The BBC Trust’s new scheme to drive out the older, long-time lovers of popular UK radio station Radio 1 in order to lower the age of the average listener, which was last year revealed to be 32. As a result, the BBC have been working tirelessly to attract a much younger audience of 15-29 year olds, bringing in an array of new, younger presenters, including T4’s Jameela Jamil and YouTube sensations Dan Howell and Phil Lester.

Jameela Jamil hosts The Official Chart Show on Sunday afternoons

The station also saw the hugely popular radio veteran Chris Moyles axed, with the younger Nick Grimshaw taking his place on the breakfast show. In addition, Radio 1 was given a fresh and distinctive revamp, with the playlist now featuring a larger variety of drum & bass, dubstep and dance music in the hope of connecting with the younger generation and encouraging older listeners to switch off. Seemingly, The BBC does not see age as just a number, but instead an indicator which determines your right to listen to the music they broadcast.

Change can sometimes be a good thing, and if the BBC station wants to change, they have every right to.

However, surely the true purpose of radio shouldn't be about branding, labelling or maintaining a ‘cool’ and young image and reputation. Primarily, it is the music which is more important, regardless of who is listening to it. Why should your music taste rely upon how long you've been on the planet? If a 78 year old Grandmother enjoys singing along to Beyoncé on Radio 1 while she’s knitting this year’s collection of Christmas jumpers, she has just as much right as any teenager who’s listening while they’re doing their homework. The BBC is a tax-funded service; if the British public are the ones paying the license fee, they should be able to tune into anything they choose to.

Radio 1 might be struggling with their ongoing battle to cut their older audience, but with veteran DJ’s such as Annie Nightingale, Pete Tong and Tim Westwood still on the air, they’re blatantly shooting themselves in the foot. Combined, these three have a career spanning nearly 100 years at Radio 1, which just goes to prove that you don’t need to be young to appreciate new music.

Regardless of where the station is steered next, it would be an understatement to say that Radio 1 Controller Ben Cooper has a monumental task on his hands, though he's clearly only a puppet with the suits above pulling the strings.

Would the circumstances be any different if Andy Parfitt, who left the station in 2011, were still in charge?

Perhaps not.

May

I'm back! You poor unfortunate souls.

I finished my exams yesterday, and suffice to say, it's pretty unbelievable to think that we've reached the end of this academic year already. They say time flies when you're having fun - I'm not sure I'd label spending an absurd number of days revising and writing essays "fun", but each to their own. If anything, I have learned in these last few months that time flies when you have deadlines to meet, and hopefully that's a lesson I'll bear in mind when it comes to writing my dissertation next year!

I'm afraid - once again - I have very little to report, because my life for last month and a half has essentially consisted of Uni work, whinging about Uni work and serving coffee to caffeine-craving students and lecturers. However, I thought it might be nice to announce on here that I'm now free for the summer Uni-wise so should have a lot more time to write, which is quite exciting! The thing I'm most looking forward to is writing what I want to rather than being told what I should be writing, whether this be news-based articles or just ramblings about mad and crazy shenanigans (shenanigans is such a great word) and life in general.

The last few weeks aside from exams, revision and work have been pretty dull, but I did go and see The Vaccines right at the start of the month with my friend Daisy, and it was absolutely mental. We picked the perfect position in front of the guitarist Freddie Cowan, who often comes across as a bit of an idiot but he's so bloody beautiful that it's easy to bypass his personality. Beer (or what I hope was beer) was flying everywhere as you might expect at a gig so Daisy and I were both drenched by the time it was over, but we had such a fantastic night and would love to see them again - if you're into that sort of thing it's definitely recommended.

Before I came back to University there were also plenty of goings-on and dramas happening at home, which is a given considering chaos seems to follow me everywhere. I ended up volunteering at my little brother's Cub Scouts one evening - we went grass sledging, which basically consists you sitting on a sledge and going down this massive slide (why it's called grass sledging when technically there's no grass involved, I do not know). After a good twenty minutes of constant nagging from my brother Luke and his little mates, I was eventually encouraged to give it a go, knowing full well that this could only end in disaster, and I was right. The sledging itself was a lot of fun, but I'd forgotten that there were two breaks that I needed to pull on the sledge and like an idiot, I only pulled one. So when I got to the bottom, I essentially rocketed off like a complete lunatic and ended up landing in an enormous heap of mud, subsequently sending twenty 10 year old boys into total hysterics. To no surprise, Luke had his head in his hands at the thought of his sister once again doing her best to embarrass him, probably wishing that he'd left me at home. The poor kid. I think it's fair to say that I won't be helping out at Cubs anytime in the near future.

To wrap it up, I just want to wish anyone still doing exams or on placement the best of luck - it can't be nice to still be working hard when other people have finished, but you're nearly there, so keep going! Also massive congratulations to my football team Crystal Palace who last night made it to the Championship Play-Off Final and will be playing at Wembley in a couple of weeks time. Woohoo!

Happy May!

Nats. X

April

Just to give anyone that cares a head's up, I'm giving my blog a bit of a temporary break for now until my exams are finished. This makes me quite sad (I'd insert an unhappy face here if Blogger let me use emoticons) but it's a sensible thing to do. Being sensible is not something that comes naturally to me, but I thought I'd give it a try. And hopefully by the time the exam period is over, I will have found something worthwhile and interesting to write about instead of aimlessly babbling like usual.

Today we came back from our holiday at Elveden Center Parcs and had such a fantastic weekend! This time there were only four of us as one of my brothers decided to stay at home, and obviously I was gutted that he had chosen not to come along. But on the plus side, it did mean that this time there was actually enough space to breathe as we crammed into my mother's horrendously small car on Friday morning. Within minutes of arriving at our lodge and in my usual ridiculous fashion, I somehow managed to set off the smoke alarm system, which was blaring for a good five minutes before we worked out how to switch the bloody thing off.

Putting that aside, one of my favourite things about Center Parcs is the tranquility of it - there is so much freedom and very little structure to the days you spend there. We went on bike rides exploring through the forest and looking for wildlife, and spent a lot of time in the swimming pool on the amazing new water ride which was recently built. All in all, we really enjoyed our visit and hope to return there again soon!

While I've been at home, I also visited the Tate Modern in London with my brother. He's studying Photography and needed some bits and pieces for his portfolio, so I offered to go along with him. I'm not usually enthused by art and looking around galleries but I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Jack and I split off at the beginning and wandered around on our own, and it was quite peaceful just strolling from gallery to gallery soaking in all the mesmerising textures, shapes and colours. Certainly something to add to your to-do list if you're ever in London for the day.

Time to disappear for now and send a final wish of good luck to all my fellow students in their exams/on their placements. It might seem like a horrible few weeks are ahead of us but they'll go by in a flash. And you never know, we might even find ourselves with some summer weather as a reward at the end of it...

Nats. X

Beat the slog of exams with an alternative guide to revision

Soon to be featured in a copy of Christ Church's student newspaper UNIfied. Have a look at previous editions at http://ccsu.co.uk/UNIfied.

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Sadly, the exam period is upon us and I’m sure most of you will be jumping for joy at the prospect of spending the next few weeks knee deep in mind-maps, flashcards and posters, with your loyal pack of highlighters and a truck load of energy drinks to maintain your sanity.

The revision process will seem like a long, boring and endless slog, but fear not! There are a few ways you can make your dull and drab revision routine a bit more bearable, with these unique and effective methods to vamp up your study sessions.

1. Students are renowned for their big love of daytime television, and shows like The Chase and Pointless have got to be up there with the best of them. So why not host your own game show with your classmates to revise?  You can choose to be in teams or play as individuals, with prizes to be won at the end of each round or at the end of the game. It might also be fun to create some crazy forfeits for any question that is answered incorrectly. Just make sure you don’t spend your entire afternoon writing the theme tune and deciding which suit to wear.

2. Gather your friends together and take it in turns to teach each other your revision notes. Divide the work up so each person has a specific module or area to teach, and then test each other at the end to see how much you've remembered. Upping the stakes is sure to make it more interesting, so throw in a prize, e.g. everyone has to buy the best teacher and/or student a drink or meal.

3. Get creative and make up a song or dance about the topic you are revising. Nobody is expecting Ivor Novello award-winning lyrics – just enough to imprint those facts and figures in your memory. I’m pretty sure this one features in an episode of Hannah Montana, but if it worked for her, it’s certainly worth a shot.

4. Word nerds who enjoy making mnemonics to revise can have a look at www.spacefem.com/mnemonics. Simply type in a word and the website will create a mnemonic for you to remember.

5. YouTube is a brilliantly accessible way to revise, as there are plenty of revision videos online to provide a helping hand, regardless of subject matter. And if you have your own YouTube account, why not create your own and upload it?

6. And if all that hard work has given you an empty stomach, make yourself a cake or some biscuits, and then decorate them with your revision notes. You could pipe scientific formulas on with icing, or write out mathematical equations with chocolate chips. And when you eat them, you've guessed it... you’ll be feeding yourself the knowledge! (Pause for canned laughter). Anyone?...No? Just me then.