We’re back! Happy September everyone- I hope you’re ready to get on with the rest of the semester and kick ass with the rest of your uni work. I want to use this space for two things, and I’ll start with a little how-to guide on staying on your game for the remainder of this semester. Here are three tips I’ve picked up over the years that might make the biggest difference, no matter how irrelevant to your studies some of them may seem: 

  1. Deep clean your room once a week. Your bedroom is your haven, and if it’s a mess, you’re a mess. Take the time on the weekend to scrub, tidy up, and organise your space. It’ll make all the difference when you need a break and have a space that you can actually chill in! 
  1. HAVE BREAKFAST. When you have that early class, sometimes you might want to stay in bed for a little while longer. The challenge is to wake up to your alarm (maybe put your phone across the room so you have to get up to turn the alarm off) and get yourself a meal in the morning; a bowl of cereal is all good! When you go to that first class on an empty stomach, I guarantee you’ll be distracted, tired, and overall, just completely sluggish.  
  1. Plan, plan, plan.  Make sure you have a list of your remaining assignments in the order that they’re due in. Now, if you’re like me, it’s hard to do assignments when there’s so much time before the due date (sometimes you need the motivation of that last-minute rush), but at the same time, when you haven’t planned an assignment, you’ll skip over it because there’s nothing for you to go on (which I’ve done one too many times over the years). So, plan your assignments. This can be essay plans, finding references, etc. Once you do that, you’ll have material to go on when starting your assignments.  

 

I hope that at least one of these things helps you out. For now, I want to move on to the second thing I want to use this space for. On Sunday, it was Father’s Day! So, here’s a little message for my dear (old) dad <3 

I remember when I was little, and my dad was working overseas. My mum was at home raising three rowdy kids, and I’ll never understand how she managed to do that alone (you’re so cool, mum). I also remember how sad I would get when my dad would be gone for a long time. When that happened, my mum would play a song, “Butterfly Kisses”. And every time I heard that song I would cry because I missed my dad so much (he was literally just a short flight to Aussie from us). Even now, when I hear that song, sometimes I still cry a little bit. I think about the past when my dad would play mini-football games with my brothers and me, always on my team. Or when he bought me a tennis racket and tried to teach me how to hit the ball (I was terrible at it). I then think about the present, how I’m turning twenty-two, and my dad never fails to still treat me like a little princess. Or how he still remembers the bedtime stories about “Danny the Dolphin”. Or how he always checks up on me to see if I’m doing okay. I then finally think about the future, and I wonder how he’ll react when I introduce him to my first love. Or whether he’ll cry when he walks me down the aisle (he will). Or what he’ll want his grandkids to call him. When I listen to that song, I realise just how lucky I am to be able to call myself his daughter.  

Happy Father’s Day dad, love you always <3 

[I started watching The Boys! I finished season one, and took a break from season two just so I could write this <3. I also started watching Supernatural for the first time for vibes, (and Dean), and it’s… actually kinda cool.]