I did it! I won the game! I completed fifth year!

The last of my summer exams, chemistry, took place today, so that means I have now been let loose upon the world to do whatever the heck I like until the end of August! Traloo tralay!

My summer exams overall went wonderfully. I’m quite sure that I did better in most of them than I did at Christmas time. Let’s have a look:

Le MATHS ~ Went fairly okay. I probably could have done a tiny bit better but I think it was still a good effort from me. My maths teacher has, after all, described it as “the equivalent of two subjects”. Eek.
Le IRISH ~ One of my better exams, although the paper was kind of easy. The poem we had to study was printed and all I’d say A1.
Le ENGLISH ~ I did much better than at Xmas anyway! I completed a nice amount of it before the time was up, so that made me feel proud!
Le SPANISH ~ The role play, the oral and the opinion piece were good, I had them all ready to go, which was fortunate! I did everything else well, too, so I think we’re looking at an A!
Le GEOGRAPHY ~ This one I could have gotten a guaranteed great Mark in if I had a little more time. Urgh! I’m always caught for time in exams, however I’ve recently discovered the joys and benefits of good time allocation (which I used in my English exam!) and will use it more often. What I did write seemed to be of good quality – let’s hope it pays off.
Le ART ~ I found out I got 80% in art history, which I guess is good considering time constraints + general difficulty. So added to my overall mark, I should be looking at a B1-A2. Rejoice!
Le CHEMISTRY ~ My last, and one of my more satisfying, tests. I did two practical questions (vinegar titration and thiosulfate-related something…), short questions and, although two of the questions caught me slightly off-guard, I worked my way around them which will hopefully maximise my marks!

So enough about my exams… Let’s talk about the BIG ONES!

The LC and its bratty child the JC are coming to visit for a while, and I get the feeling those of you studying for it are a bit… Unsettled? People are temporarily deactivating their Facebooks, locking their doors and doing other crazy random things to help them study.
I don’t really know of any good tips for studying, apart from remaining chill and not-crazy at all times. But I do have something to tell you, and it is…

…don’t panic! We love you! You have our support! And, of course, good luck!

I might write one or two blogs before the summer ends and the baton is passed to the next league of All Honours bloggers, so do stay tuned!
If you’re still doing exams, good luck!
If you’re not… Look outside, it’s sunny!
Now how about that for timing…

~Paul.

Forgive me bloggers for I have sinned, it has been two months since my last post. Okay, I just checked and my last post was written on the 8th of November. Today is the 8th of January and now that I think about it, the LC starts on the 8th of June. What can I say, I like patterns. Of course I have a list of reasons for my absence (yeah, whatever helps you sleep at night Ciara):

1. Christmas tests (original excuse, I know).

2. Results of aforementioned tests. Don’t get me wrong, I did fine but I was disappointed with a few of them so I tried to put in a bit of extra study to make up for it.

3. Internet boycott following aforementioned results of aforementioned tests (word of the day: aforementioned). I decided to do this because my study time consists of going on Facebook and complaining about my lack of study. Also, I realised that I remember a status a girl in my French class wrote about her rabbits two weeks ago, yet I don’t remember the French word for rabbit. Or the French word for anything… Anyway, in what seemed an attempt to spur me on in my boycott, my internet broke the week of Christmas.

4. Christmas. Who could possibly think of Calculus or the formation of a cliff when there’s mountains of food and every Harry Potter/ Indiana Jones movie ever made on TV? A stronger person than I, that’s who.

5. Internet catch-up session following aforementioned internet boycott following aforementioned results of aforementioned tests (otherwise known as stalking).

Thankfully other bloggers have been dedicated enough to keep the homepage fresh. Reading through all the posts, I’m glad we all seem to be in the same boat. However, I still haven’t filled out my CAO (I could commit the most rebellious act, which is to fill it out at 5.14 pm on the 1st of February).

I’m going to have to cut this short because I still have an essay to do before we go back to school (someone is going to have to drag me out of my bed kicking and screaming Monday morning).

Au revoir, mes lapins!

To quote the little old women at my bus shelter, “It comes earlier and earlier every year”. Okay, so they were talking about Christmas and I would normally complain too about the early arrival of everything Christmas-related but not this year. Everyone seems so down and out about the Budget and just the state of the country in general that I say, why not talk about Christmas? I don’t know about you all but for me I can think of no happier time. Two weeks off school (even longer this year though), mouth-watering food, busy shops, a nice cosy fire at home…Okay, snap back to reality Ciara before you break into song. What I was trying to say when I started writing this (yes, would you believe that this actually leads to something exam related?) was that while I have no problems discussing Christmas now, I think it’s too soon to start talking about about Christmas Tests. The sad thing is, the Christmas Tests are before Christmas. Crap.

Yeah, the second we arrived back last week the teachers started calling out prescribed chapters for the exams and before you know it, everyone has made study timetables and Granny has started lighting the candles for them at mass. I’m sat here wondering where to start with all my study…Times like this I’d really like a crystal ball. Or a photographic memory. Maybe if I get Granny to light an extra big candle I might get one of the two. I think a trip to the library is in order this weekend, without my friends in tow because let’s just say they make it hard to study…ever play Hide and Seek in a library? I have. I need to finish the second draft of my History RSR anyway.

In other news, we got our Drémires this week. I know, the fun never stops in my life! For anyone who doesn’t know, it’s like a mini Irish book with essays and grammar tips, etc., aimed at LC students. It’s handy but I find the comprehensions too complex. I’ll stick to my Foinses for the most part, thank you very much. My French teacher advised our class to pick our documents for the oral in the coming two weeks. Is she serious? The oral is months away! I don’t know what to pick, any ideas? I was thinking of a picture from the Gaeltacht but I just know that’ll put me in the Irish language state of mind that I really have to avoid, considering it’s a test of French. She said it could be a picture of anything but the other class’ teacher told them it really should be French-related, so they’re all picking French movies (the same one) and French celebrities. Unfortunately I’m not as absorbed in the culture, although I like croissants (cliché much?).

I’m going to start studying in a few minutes (I promise) and then reward myself with some TV. The Apprentice- I’m addicted! And I do Business so it’s practically educational.

Omg. I don’t know what happened but once I saw the timetable I got really excited haha.

Maybe it’s because I’ve 4 days study before my evil Spanish exam .

I’ve the last of my christmas tests tomorrow, spanish and english.

Spanish is going to have an opinion piece, dialogue and comprehensions. I’m really not very into that language, but I’m learning off useful vocabulary so fingers crossed it comes in…useful!

English is just King Lear and a Vision and Viewpoint Question. A lot of people don’t seem to like Vision and Viewpoint, I don’t mind it, it’s more Cultural Context I can’t do.

Economics, Biology and History today and oh dear god. I studied 3 essays for history, hoping to god Spain came up as an essay instead of France. But no, French wars of religion was an essay, and not even the bit of the French Wars that I understood. The end of them, I haven’t the faintiest why they ended, but in the words of this leaving cert student: “The main figure heads for the Huguenot religion and Catholicism died. And the country was not in the finanical state to continue the wars,”

…attempt marks there somewhere…please? lol. Biology went much better, my crazy studying at 5 this morning must have helped. Ditto with Economics but I drew the wrong curve…hopefully I won’t lose too many marks cos I studied so hard over the weekend.

Anyways, I was only posting because I haven’t done so in so long. I’m about to go off and learn my opening paragraph for the Vision and Viewpoint question I’m doing tomorrow.

Love from

Aims

xxx (Merry Xmas to everyone if I don’t post again until after )

Don’t worry guys, despite the title, this post will be a little more upbeat- and more sane- than my previous one!

I’m right in the middle of the Christmas tests, well two down and five to go! I had Irish and Geography on Friday, which went pretty well I think. We hadn’t done a lot in Geography for the test to have a lot of variety, so the whole thing was basically about regions, which I like! Unfortunately, there was a map of Ireland above my head and although everyone else thought Christmas had come early copying down the towns, rivers, etc. from the poster, I was at a loss. Oh well, I think I did okay anyway!

For Irish, an essay on the recession came up, thankfully! I’d already prepared one and even managed to include John and Edward into my introductory paragraph (have pity on me). I was saying how everything was gone wrong for the country, i.e., them getting voted off, the World Cup, floods and so on… you get the idea. Oh and anyone out there stuck inside because of floods, you have my full sympathy, luckily my house is on a hill but the images on the news are scary!

Friday night I watched…*drumroll*…The Late Late Toy Show! Not a year has gone past when I haven’t watched it, probably like most of you out there. I thought Tubridy was good, better than Pat Kenny but not as unreal as Gay Byrne. The kids were hilarious- Junior Culchie of the Year and of course, John Joe! Aww it really marked the start of Christmas.

And as for other distractions, now that John and Edward are gone from the X Factor, I’ve remembered how much I dislike the show. Seriously, I just watched the final last year and that was only because I wanted to know what everyone was on about. But now I feel I better finish the series, although I didn’t even bother watching The Xtra Factor last night! Sorry Holly Willoughby!

Aoiffe is gone from The Apprentice at last, Hallelujah! Finally some justice has been brought to reality TV. All we need to do now is get rid of Lloyd Daniels.

I have Business and English tests tomorrow. Eavan Boland, I’m sorry but I really dislike your poetry. Robert Frost all the way! I totally underestimated how much theory is involved in Business but I’m just going to do some past exam questions on what we’ve done and hope they come up.

New Moon. Edward Cullen. Xfactor. Tests. Work. Mocks. Christmas.

I know il sound like the average teen girl, but i loved new moon. I dragged a certain someone to it, but he enjoyed it, so he says . What did you all think of it? I’m planning on seeing it again next week, or seeing paranormal activity.

So school. I got 100% in economics test. ive never been so proud. and to top it off, i got 100% in intregration math test and accounting too. Its been a long way to my 60% average last year. Im begining to see the slight advantage to repeating. Even though im not fond of repeating im a little less stressed and more focused ( i think).

I was at DCU open day, kinda fell in love with the city, and the talks made up my mind that I don’t want to go through UCAS . I’ll just work hard and get what i deserve and hopefully get into UCD or DCU,   Points wise I need roughly 450, since I reckon points will rise this year, I’m going to aim for more though, really push my limits maybe, hopefully get my entry requirement of a C3 in German so I can qualify for DCU this time. woo.

I just got offered a job and the weekend.. it was spur of the moment, i felt to honoured they approached me. I agreed without thinking how this will affect me.. so within the weekend? :S ah… which come first? presumingly education.. but ahhh!! Its only 5 weeks till Christmas holiday.. by god, I really need to get into it, I just want to prove to all those people that are giving me negativity about this year, ive heard to many time that “whats gonna happen now if you get less points that last year, sickend!” I am thinking of the possibility of banning myself from facebook!

ENOUGH RANT MAY! haha

On a happy note, i havent been this happy all year. im seeing the other side of life and im going to make out a weekly timetable.. and maybe stick to this one. off to homework. Then.. XFACTOR

Byee xx

P.s i need urgent help on theory on Music..  any hints on books, or revision books?

Let me set the scene for you: Sunday evening, at about eight thirty, a teenage girl sits on the couch after hearing the announcement that John and Edward will be in the sing-off, with two thoughts running through her head. The first thought was “What? This is it? They’re definitely going to go and I might not ever see them again!” Cue melancholy violin music.

However, as I sat there nail biting at the prospect of losing the loves of my life at the hairy hands of Simon Cowell, and tabloid journalists sat nail biting wondering what on earth they’d have left to write about if the twins were to be booted off The X Factor, I decided it’d be better to adopt a more optimistic approach to the whole thing. Ciara’s Thought #2 was, “at least now I’ll have time to study!”

I guess “Business Today” and me just weren’t to be, as I’m sure you all (even those of you living underground) know by now that John and Edward Grimes live to fight another week. Simon Cowell, if you’re reading this (which no doubt you are), I love you man!

We had a half day today so I plan on spending the rest of it looking into ideas for my History Research Topic. We’re starting it this year, which I suppose is wise but it’s so hard to think of something original that has three or more sources. I’m trying to come up with something on Twentieth Century Ireland, which is my favourite topic by far. Also, Christmas Tests are in just over two weeks!