Been going around Freshers fair as a second year I found a wonderful Society that I just had to join. The HUG SOC, is simply a club designed to make the world a better place with hugs. This society was so clever and so cute, it had to be joined. If you want more information or to join (kinda) check out the HUG SOC Facebook group.

Also, if your wondering about the random picture on this post, well I saw this picture on Flickr, thought that it was powerfully cute and needed to be on my site.

• That it didn’t matter how late my first lecture was, I’d still sleep through it.
• That I could change so much and barely realize it.
• That you can love a lot of people in a lot of different ways.
• No matter how ‘cool’ you were in school, no one here cares.
• That if you wear polyester everyone will ask why you are so dressed up.
• That every clock on campus shows a different time.
• That if you got good a-levels, so what? It doesn’t matter here.
• That I would go to a party the night before an exam or essay due-date.
• That you can know everything and fail a test or know nothing and ace a test.
• That I could get used to almost anything found out about my friends.
• That most of my education would be obtained outside of lectures.
• That friendship is more than getting drunk together.
• That Sunday is a figment of the world’s imagination.
• That Psychology is really Biology, that Biology is really Chemistry, that Chemistry is really Physics and that Physics is really Maths.
• That it’s possible to be alone even when you are surrounded by friends.

1. You cry for your mother.
2. You cross the street without looking for cars.
3. Snack time is a necessity.
4. You bundle up for the outdoors without caring what you look
   like because everyone else looks as stupid as you do.
5. You stay at home and play games with your friends.
6. You wear your backpack on both shoulders.
7. You wear big mittens.
8. Playing in the snow is a legitimate activity.
9. You take naps.
10. You look forward to cheese toasties.

When I think of my life at the University of Portsmouth can not seem to imagine what it would be like without the internet. It is such a big part of how I interact with the world and the people around me. It is how I relax by watching funny videos, how I research work problems and where I talk to my friends at the end of the day.

So here is my top ten useful sites

1. Your univierisity web site
   In my case, Port.ac.uk. It is easy going to the most useful tool when there, as most of your life will be spent checking your timetable or email addresses of your lectures. Other unis have forums and blogs. Check it out.
2. Youtube
   One the most useful sites on the internet for filling in time between lectures. There are also lots of viral videos that spread like wildfire. The worst two were
   The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny and Kitty cat Dance.
3. Google
   It is a very powerful tool for researching papers. It has lots of useful tools like book search and Scholar. It also allows you to find all the porn you will ever need.
4. Facebook
   I have already talked about facebook in another post. Also see Myspace.
5. Wikipedia
   Wiki is multilingual, web-based and free encyclopedia. Wikipedia is written collaboratively by volunteers from all around the world. When you looking for sources, first place to go. Do remember that it is can have false information and page can change whenever anyone can edit it.
6. Dictionary.com
   You don’t know what one of big word that a lecture or posh person said means, look it up for free.
7. BBC news
   This may seem like a funny one, but I didn’t watch normal TV all the time I was at uni. I got all my news from this site. It started to worry me that I wasnt such who prime minister was and other big events were happening and I didnt know about them. you can also check the weather on here and use it to as a reference.
8. Ebay.co.uk
   Find cheap cloths and pretty everything on here. It past I have had problems with this site, I wouldn’t by anything you would ever want to return, like Computers or CDs.
9. Ebuyer
   For all those things you need Tech wise like cheap laptop or printer, my first stop site. It cheap and the review system is good.
10. IMDB
    The Internet Movie Data base, settling fights about who was in what movie.

The internet is not evil, it is a tool, how you use it is up to you!

There are some really good bits in like the bit about lost weekend on page 198.

Lost weeks are so dubbed because they are periods in which, due to overrindulgence, once loses everything – money, sense, dignity, memory, coordination and bowel control. There are not necessarily limited to a weeked , and can last as long as a month, depending on how dedonistic and out of balance your life has become.

You can buy it on Amazon.co.uk and at time of writing was only �6.71. You can find it use ISBN which is 0 95361 1035.

You can also find more cheeky guides at their official website.

Whether you�re still deciding where to go or just two weeks from your finals, this book is an absolute must.

Facebook

This is the second part of series of posts about life at university and my thought on my first year. The first post in the series just had some general thoughts I had coming straight back from Portsmouth. This post is entitled “faceboking“.

As a student at university, prepare yourself to spend hours of your life on this web site. I have heard facebook discribed as, “Like crack”. If you walk around a computer room in any university campus, you will see many screen with this site on it. I know that I personally have spend hours, tagging myself in photos, search for friends and reading other people walls. But many do not understand this phenomenon. Why is facebook so good?

The site seems to understand that people want to know what their friends are doing and share information easily. The site was orignally designed for students and even now when it is open, it still has that at it’s core. It understand that MySpace is different market, that facebook users don’t care about what look of their profile and that not everyone in the world should be able to see your profile. So other people on your network can see your profile. Your network can be a workplace, region, high school or college. For example, I am member of London and Uni. Portsmouth ’10. Only people that live in london or are currently going to Portsmouth. This is very useful and cuts down on spam friendship requests.

It is truly amazing how useful this site can be, but it can also make problems. For example, if you make a complete fool of yourself one night and say something not very nice. If someone takes a picture of you and tags, people that you would normally very see again maybe be able to find you. Also as everyone can see your relationship status, lots of people as you why have you not changed your profile to in a relationship. This is called making your relationship, “Facebook Official“.

Personally, even through there are bad things about facebook, I still love the site and will use it as long as everyone I know does. It really shows real people, you can really tell how popular someone is by the number of pictures they have been tagged in. This article on the BBC news site, seems to prove that people on facebook are more truthful and real.

If I was a new student to uni, I would get used to the site before going off to university so you can be a good facebooker. Learn that things written on the internet can be taken lots of ways. Don’t write anything you wouldn’t say to someone face. Understand that things write on people profile are public. Happy facebooking.

So what was University like?

When I think about answering that question, I am reminded of a quote from Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity . .

When talking to other people about this very question, I am happy to say lots of people I know say, “It’s Amazing“. Personally, I would not answer like that. I would say, “It can be amazing“. University is like life and it really what you make it. Being at uni is like no other time in your life. It is the one time at everyone is in a very similar position. Everyone in their first year, most people are away from home for the first, most people do not any friends, everyone is exised and wants to learn. It is a really good place to meet people of a similar mindset to you and finally feel okay about yourself.

This having been said, not everyone you will meet is going to be a nice person. With more and more students going to higher eduction, studying useless courses like Sociology, means that types of students that are being admitted has changed. So finding a good group can be hard, as I discovered. What you have to remember is,

It is not the place, it is the people.

Everywhere has night clubs, pubs and societies but it is your friends that are important.

Well, that is all for now. Watch for your more on this topic.