fade like a played out song.

Sitting here in my room, whilst the sun pours through my window with Alter Bridge's Live in Amsterdam streaming on youtube. Good times.

I've managed to do some work since handing in my independent study over a week ago. I've written the title for my focus 3 article, but I'm becoming increasingly frustrated with google, as it won't let me search for things. I need a Wall Street Journal and some Guardian articles, but it's being a twat, so I might write from memory till I go home next week and refine it then.

It's been a bit of a whirlwind. Gary got back at midnight on the 17th/18th. Stayed up for two hours talking to him via bbm, whilst he was on his way back from Manchester Airport. The 18th, I got really pissed off and then he and Annie turned up a couple of hours before me and Kim were due to leave for Nottingham. You Me At Six were okay. Bit boring. And they've completely abandoned Take Off Your Colours. I hate it when bands forget what they used to be. I think the only old songs they did were Call That A Comeback and Finders Keepers. And they did loads of ballads at once, so in my over emotional state, I stood there sobbing. Kids In Glass Houses were incredible though, they came on and did Sunshine straight away. My heart melted a little. I love that song.

When we returned to Derby on the 19th, I went to see Gary. Talked a lot. Came home and finished my independent study printing and ordering. Got that bound on the 20th. That night me and Gary went to Wolverhampton to see Enter Shikari. That was an adventure, to put it mildly. We got to Wolverhampton just fine (changeover at Birmingham New Street) and got to the Civic before Tek One had even thought about gracing the stage. It was possibly one of the more violent gigs I've ever attended, and I wasn't even in the pits. Young Guns were amazing. Shikari were okay. Not much of a fan, and getting smacked in the face and chest and drinking too much aren't good combinations. Then missing the train we were supposed to be on didn't help when I had a drunken panic attack in the middle of Wolverhampton. We managed to get to Birmingham, but no trains or coaches to Derby resulted in us calling Alex, and bless him, he picked us up from the Bullring. But even so, it took us forever to get home as we got lost. Didn't get back to Gary's till about half 2 in the morning.

After all that, had a few chill days. Me and Ben went on a few lengthy walks, and my dearest housemate went back home on Sunday. I really have been missing him. We talk a lot and we're in the same boat in this house and we have the same sense of humour, so to not have that person you have all those things in common with, well, it's like chopping a limb off. I've spent a lot of time with Gary since he returned, mainly at night and stuff, my stressing nightmares haven't helped anything at all. We went swimming on Monday and I went to meet Annie, Kim and Aden after and I almost cried on Annie in the middle of Westfield.

I'm stressing about work. I feel like I can't write anything original anymore. Over the past two years I have prided myself on my originality. I don't think I'm brilliant or anything like that. But originality is key, I find, when writing. And if you don't have that in this day and age, there's not much point. I just keep regurgitating the same old shit, and it's boring and frustrating. But I have nothing else.

I'm happy. I really am. I think I'm just removing myself from Gary slightly. Setting myself up for heartbreak come July. I've seen enough films and stuff to know it's not going to be pretty. I've come to depend upon him for my happiness, and I've never done that. I don't do that. I'm starting to stop depending on him so much because not only is it unfair on him, it's unfair on me. When all this ends, I want to build up my own happiness again, and I can't do that if I'm depending upon him for it. Me and Kim watched Sex and the City last night and there's the bit when Samantha gets annoyed at Smith because she never waited around for a man before him. And I feel like that. I've never done the things I do before I met Gary. And it's not always a bad thing, but the dependence is. I suppose it's another one of my stupid internal defence mechanisms, build up the walls he knocked down and stop letting him in. It's putting a strain on us, I can feel it. But I don't know what else to do.

real big plans & such bad thoughts.

Finally getting excited for You Me At Six. I don't want to sound ungrateful, because I love my dad and the fact that he's taken me to gigs since I was 13 is incredible, but these days I don't get excited about gigs like I used to. I love going. The atmosphere and getting lost in the music for a couple of hours and I love going to other cities for gigs, I like the journey there and back, the anticipation and the reflection. But, these days I don't get the butterflies and the heart racing excitement that I used to. I genuinely think the last time I felt that excited to see a band was Avenged Sevenfold in November 2010. So it's been a while. But yeah, as much as me and Kim aren't seeing eye to eye recently, my sister is hyping me up, sending me the lyrics and such every day.

Whilst we're on musical topics, LEEDS FESTIVAL, I COULD CRY. My sister and her bff, Jess are going. She's going to see my favourite band before I do. My plan is to cry to Gary when he gets back on Saturday/Sunday (depending on times/flight delays) and see if I can persuade him to go on the Friday with me. It's possible, line up wise, he loves The Gaslight Anthem and Bullet For My Valentine. It's just money and location that might be the impossible. But yeah, Foo Fighters. FOO FIGHTERS. It's making me distraught just thinking about it. First World problems right here. But yeah, for the band I have adored since I heard 'Best of You' in 2003 (before even my FOB/AAR/MCR days) it's a big deal. I missed them in '07 when my dad took my mum instead of me and when they did stadiums the other year, no one wanted to go with me. So yeah. Gary did promise a couple of months ago that when they toured, he'd take me, and technically, a festival isn't a tour, but I'm enduring Enter Shitkari for him next week, so hopefully he'll have a rush of generosity.

Anyway, three days till he's baaaack! Today has been the turning point. I miss him, not gonna lie. But I'm at the stage where it's not horrible anymore and I'm getting excited to see him again and talk to him. It's a bit longer till I see him (Monday), but I've missed talking to him more than anything. We talk every day, and it's been strange not having the usual 'night babe' bbm before bed, but I'm used to it now. Had a mini cry this morning and then cheered up a lot. It is horrid, sitting by myself in my room, but I've been here a couple of hours today and I'm fine. I'm just excited for Sunday daytime when he's conscious from the flight and sleep and stuff and I can actually talk to him. Eeeee. And we're leaving the hotel early on Monday, because A, we have to, and B, I'm dragging them to the station so I can go get my much needed cuddles and kisses. Christ, when did I become so soppy? Ew.

Going out tonight with Tom. Should be fun. As long as Kim and Annie don't murder each other across the table. But yeah, should be a laugh. Have a decent amount of money to spend after I did some quick calculations about the remains of my loan and how much I'll need for each event next week and printing and binding my independent study - WHICH IS NOW FINISHED. Aw yeah. Just needs formatting, printing and I need to sort my appendix, but that's Friday's/Saturday's job. To be honest, that is going to be the worst and stressful part. I loathe printing with a passion. But then I have to get it bound too at Rymans. Then it's over. Lovely.

Talked to Moy today about how insecure I've been feeling about my writing after the wonderful Julia slagged off my work. Moy's been lovely about it and counteracted everything that was said and has sorted A Flash Flood of Colour out for me pretty much, just the ending needs work. So after all the heartache that's gone into this story, I can finally say, it's going in the portfolio and it will be as good as the others.

It's been a weird couple of days. I'm looking forward to tonight. Tom's been my friend since first year and we've always cheered each other up, similar sense of humours are a great thing and we bounce off one another. Alcohol and Wetherspoons chips doused in mayo are calling me. Then tomorrow we have a mass afternoon workshop session, which my favourite people are attending and then not much till Sunday's gig. A lot of stressing and printing and excitement on Saturday at the prospect of Gary being homeeee. (:

i think i can figure it out, but i'm gonna need a little help to get me through it.

Motion City Soundtrack, giving me the answers to everything since 2012.

I bought My Dinosaur Life when it first came out, and I'd not previously listened to them. But, I love this album and Gary has a shit ton of the older stuff on his iTunes, so I've heard plenty by them. This song in particular was one that bypassed me on the album. It came on Kerrang! on Friday after I'd cried for ages to my Mum about a number of things. Everything clicked. It has taken a couple of days for the tears to stop completely, but I feel like now I can do this.

Truth me told, my main fear about university finishing is the prospect of going home, back to my friends who aren't quite as supportive as my university friends. Then there's Gary and our relationship going on hiatus/possibly ending/being long distance and rarely seeing each other. I felt like I was going to lose everyone all at once. I've been at university for three years and by now I was supposed to know what I wanted to do in life, and last week I was freaking out. Gary wants to do everything, join the RAF, do something to do with climate change, meteorlogy and several other geographical things. Now, I kind of have an idea. I'm freaking out less and feeling more positive.

It isn't ideal and it might not be realistic, but I plan to do as much research and do whatever I can to get there. I remember being 16, saying I wanted to do this, then I changed my mind. And reading on a website that it is best not to have a direct degree in this has made me feel so much better about choosing to do creative writing. I feel like things might start slotting into place now. And I feel a lot less lost and useless. And y'know, if things come to an end, we had a good run. I will be upset, I'm not gonna lie, but I'm twenty. There's plenty of people to meet and things to do, places to see. For the first time in forever I feel like I have the world at my feet and it feels incredible.

Life's great epiphanies aside, this week is going to be stressful. I want to keep as busy as possible to keep from missing Gary. (Bitch is in Morocco till Saturday night). I haven't cried since Saturday afternoon though, and it's now Monday. It's going quite well! In a week from now, I get to see him again and have a cuddle and catch him up on all my complaints. Lecture tomorrow, then polishing up my dissertation (which is almost finished), Wednesday is workshopping and then going out with Ben and Tom for cheap pitchers, Thursday is a long ass workshop session at Muffin Break, Friday lecture and I probably need to do some tidying up, Saturday bugger all, probably printing and then Sunday is You Me At Six, Kids In Glass Houses and Mayday Parade (arghhhh). So plenty of things to keep me away from the dark corners of my over active mind.

fear's got a hold on me.

There's a shit storm coming.

I feel like in the past few days a lot has changed. My perspective on certain people has become blurred and what I thought I was certain about, I'm now not.

I thought at this stage I had everyone figured out. Last week I knew who I could trust. And the total number of people wasn't many. It was around six people. Three of whom, I don't get to see as often as I'd like to these days. The other day, things changed. A massive shift seemed to happen and suddenly, my trustworthy people list is down to five.

She's never done anything wrong to me. I'm not gonna lie and pretend that she has, because in all fairness, she hasn't. I like her. I just don't like some of her behaviour. I hated how she spoke to my boyfriend that night after the quiz. She can be extremely patronising and her constant complaining when she has lived (and still does) a very charmed life. Click of the fingers and parents come running. She doesn't have a weekly budget to get her through each semester until the next loan payment goes in her bank account. She can afford to go to expensive meals at Japanese restaurants and can afford three courses and several drinks if we go to cheaper establishments. I won't lie, I envy her for materialistic reasons, but it's never come between us. She's jealous of my relationship with my father and the fact he's taken me to rock gigs since I was 13. I'd much rather have seen my favourite bands live than own a ridiculous amount of expensive make up.

I hate her a little bit. For making Kim feel like she does. But then again, I still hate Kim. I hate her for how she treated us and a couple of days of being pleasant does not take back the fact I have stressed, made myself ill and cried for hours to Gary about it. And almost crying in Moy's office last week when I hit breaking point.

I don't want to waste the last few months we have together. One is burying her head in the sand and pretending like nothing is happening, and the other is all out bitching about her and laughing at the prospect of an argument.

Personally, I loathe confrontation. Not gonna lie, a bit of bitching here and there is fine by me, everyone does it. But it's when rumours start and things get blown up out of proportion that I hate. And how they have to air everything on Facebook to get people on side and so everyone can see who the bad/good guys are. I'm trying not to get involved but it's so hard when one bitches about the other to me. I'm caught in the middle and I never intended to be.

There's not much of a way out, but only to spend time with them when I absolutely have to.

The only issue is, how do you tell someone they've been the problem all this time, when in actual fact, they didn't think they were?

the downfall of us all.

Went to see Theory of a Deadman last Friday. Incredible. Just truly amazing. Tyler Connolly is becoming one of my favourite front men. He was entertaining and good at commanding the crowd. They played quite a balance of material, mainly off The Truth Is and Scars & Souvieners, but since they're the only albums of theirs I own, I wasn't complaining. They did a few off Gasoline. Quite liked Santa Monica, but the lyrics feel a bit too close for me to download it and listen to it on a regular basis. Maybe when I stop feeling this mixed up. The Crave too were fabulous as always, Ryan's vocal seems to get stronger the more times I see them. Shame they did more newer stuff that hasn't been released yet so there wasn't much singing along, but they did do Breaking the Silence and a couple of others off the album. Good night.

This week I've had some sort of an epiphany. I had a little cry on Wednesday to Gary and then woke up Thursday morning thinking 'what the fuck am I doing?' Basically, I don't want to waste these last few months of university and I don't want to look back and think I wasted my time being bitter/angry/upset, when I could have just let it go and had a good time. So, I've taken steps towards being a bit more positive about things in general. So what if Kim wants to be a bitch and has wound up getting Darren and Amy on her side? If they don't want to be my friend, then fuck them. There are plenty of other, more trustworthy, nicer people out there to hang around with.

It all seemed to come to a head on Wednesday. Short fictions seems to be the root of the problems. We started workshopping then me and Ben went to give Moy some work for her to look over and it wound up being a bit of a therapy session. I almost cried. I've never been one to give up on people easily and it just feels like we are giving up on Kim. I think what hurt the most was that we were really good friends at the beginning of the year and it's disintegrated into this awkwardness. And we can't go back. But, I'm trying. This is day two of not talking about her, and she's been a bit more pleasant, so I can't complain too much.

These next few weeks are going to be weird. Sam's birthday next weekend and Gary pisses off to Morrocco on his geography trip, Kim's birthday and You Me At Six and Gary's return the weekend after, Enter Shikari on the 20th, independent study hand in on the 23rd (hoping to have it in on the 20th/21st though) and going out for Ben's birthday to Pizza Express somewhere in between all that. It's going to be weird, stressful, but hopefully fun.

Oh, and I passed my censorship essay.