This Is The Way You Left Me, I'm Not Pretending

The past three days have been so eventful in good and bad ways. Let's do this chronologically.

Tuesday
Tuesday was torrential rain all day and I loved it. On my way to the beach to meet friends, I bumped into another and dragged her along with me. We were heading to the beach to swim in the sea, and why not, it's all good fun. Just as we get to the beach the rain begins to get ridiculous so we whip off our clothes down to our bikini's and go running and screaming in the sea. Not surprisingly, it wasn't that cold seeing as the beach was freezing.

As we get under cover of the pier again a photographer clambers over to us and flashes his press badge at us.
"Do you mind if I have a photo of you running along the beach with your towels shielding you?" he asked the four of us. This had never happened as of yet to any of us so I told him yes before any of the others could disagree. After running along multiple times to get the shot he wanted he thanked us and said that we'd be in one of the national newspapers the next day. Excellent we though, all we have to do now it find out which one.

After drying off in the toilets we braved the outside world again for the trek home. As my friend and I live on the same road we trudged along together. The amount of double-takes we received were quite substantial, after all you don't usually see girls walking along in their bikini's in a downpour on a Tuesday afternoon.

Wednesday
Wednesday was the new students open day for the college I'm planning on going to in September. The day was brilliant, not only did I meet a whole load of lovely people but I saw a friend from primary school that I haven't spoken to for 5 years.

The classes were fun too, graphics was the best as we actually got to do something rather then just listen to the tutors talk about the subject. We had to make "confessions" cards on pieces of blank white card roughly the size of a postcard but cutting up magazines, drawing, writing and generally using our imagination. Now, seeing as it was quite early in the morning I couldn't think of what to put so ended up cutting out a load of random sentences and images from the magazines and sticking them onto the card. When Kerry the tutor read out the confessions (thankfully none of them had names on) she told us that whoever had created the one with "poison" and "fabulous, phyco" was very deep and perhaps needs to "lighten up a bit". I almost laughed out loud at this. Deep? Hardly. It was just a load of random quotes. Nothing to be taken seriously, silly woman.

But that's not all that happened. In my film studies class I couldn't think of my favourite TV show and said that I just watched whatever was on. Sadly, Alex the tutor took this as I "didn't have any character". Thanks for that. Although according to multiple people I've spoken to, Alex is a complete legend so I can't exactly complain about him now can I?

Although the day was spectacular in didn't end well at all. Around midday I began feeling lightheaded, sickly and generally unwell. I knew exactly what was wrong and it was completely my fault for not stopping it before it was too late. By the way I've described it, it sounds as if I was dying (and at the time it felt like I was) but really all that had happened was dehydration or sunstroke. I get it at least once or twice every summer so why should this summer be any different? But why did it have to happen on the open day of all days? Because of this I couldn't enjoy my photography class as much as I would have liked and ended up spending it concentrating on not being sick. That would have gone down well in September wouldn't it?
"Oh, I remember you! You're the girl who puked!" Yeah. Great.

The problem with the college is that it's so far out and it takes a twenty minute train journey to get home. Yesterday's train journey home seemed a lot long though. Thankfully I managed to find a seat in the corner of the carriage where people weren't likely to take much notice of me - which they didn't for the most part. It wasn't until I felt my hands go suddenly clammy, my back start to sweat and I swallowed for the first time in 15 minutes that I realised I was about a millisecond away from being sick. With the 10th swallow I spluttered and renched forward surprising the students around me. One of the, a girl I've known since primary school, giggled nervously and asked if I had fallen asleep so I just told her straight that I was about to be sick. The shock on both her and her friend's faces disturbed me slightly so I concentrated on breathing right and trying to get rid of the feeling in my throat. I apologised profusely as if I had been in their position I know I would also feel exactly as they were feeling. I managed to gain control of the sick feeling and calmed down slightly until I realised that not only was I feeling ill now but I was also feeling that awful crushing feeling of fear and panic. I hadn't been sick in seven years and the thought of throwing up in public truly terrified me. Great, just what I need, another fear.

Somehow I managed to keep myself from begin sick and crashed into bed as soon as I got into my room. My mum, who before this scene had never had to deal with my being thing dehydrated as I am usually in Shoreham when it happens, was slightly flustered when I streaked up into my room refusing the cup of tea and her reassuring hug invite. Instead she tucked me in bed, shoved my empty bin next to my bed and told me she'd check on me later. I woke up 4 hours late not exactly well but better then I had been with my cat at the end of my bed playing doctor. She always does when some body's ill, she'll sit with them and be all affectionate until they're better again. I'm so happy I wasn't sick, you have no idea.

Thursday
After my sunstroke epidemic on Wednesday I was determined not to dehydrate today. Just like I did in the day of Pokesdown Primary, I even froze a bottle of water the night before to ensure I had a cold drink with me throughout the day.

Now, on Tuesday just before the photographer had appeared, we had all agreed to meet at the beach on Thursday at "12 ish" as my friend had said. Thinking this was still the case I strolled down to the beach and got there bang on 12. Seeing as nobody else was there yet (no surprise) I waited a few minutes before texting a friend asking if we were meeting at 12 or 1. Her reply was that "it was 1 I thought". Not impressed was my immediate reaction to say the least. So I waited on the pier for an hour, refusing to make that embarrassing turnaround journey back to my house when there was no point. When everyone finally got their little bottoms down to the beach we set up camp near the pier and a few of us headed tot the sea.

Now the beach that we were at happens to be the place where they are building an artificial reef for the surfers. This reef is said to increase the about of weaver fish in the area as predators etc. can't get in. Add this to the fact that those pesky little fish are supposed to be around the pier more then anywhere else and you have yourself a death trap. For as long as I can remember knowing about weaver fish I imagined the pain of being stung by one incredibly painful and almost cry-worthy. This was not the case however. All I felt was a sharp stinging pain in between my toes. Thinking I had something caught in there I looked at my foot and found nothing but a small pin-prick sized dot. At this was it I thought I'd just grazed myself on a stone. But when the pain wouldn't go away I asked my friend who was in the sea with me plus two others what it felt like to be stung by a weaver fish. "Sort of like a stinging and aching feeling" was her description which was exactly what I was feeling in my foot. I ignored it for a while thinking that noway had I been stung, it didn't hurt enough but about a couple of minutes my friend persuaded me to go the the lifeguard hut to get them to check it out. After a quick examination and question about how my foot felt he decided that I probably had been stung and told me to put my foot in the bowl of boiling water. As I was quite used to having baking hot baths the heat didn't bother me. What did bother me however was the funny looks I was receiving from the group of guy a little way from the lifeguard hut who were looking at me quizzically. After 25 minutes the pain stopped and the lifeguard told me I was okay to go again. Looking down at my feet however, I saw that I had one very pale foot and one very red one - not a good look. The pain was gone though so that's all I really cared about.

So from my three little experiences I can conclude three things:

1. Swimming in the sea when it's raining is not completely pointless and is a very fun activity if not a little cold.
2. The feeling of not caring what so ever about what other people think of you is actually really difficult to achieve and I only manage to when I am feeling so ill that all I can really think about is not being sick and that once you reach that stage of not caring it's a very relaxing feeling.
3. Weaver fish do not hurt nearly as much as you would think and there's nothing to worry about if you're thinking of going into the sea this summer.

I hope your week as been as fun as mine has. And yes, the past three days have not always been pleasant but I have felt quite happy throughout all of them so that's a good sign.

I wish my comment button worked.