Had a great night out with friends last night. Just danced and danced and danced.
My ridiculously awesome (straight) housemate and his new girlfriend came out with us and got on so well with my friends.
I loved the people and world I was surrounded by.

Today has been gloomier. I spent the entire day just trying to turn off the computer. That was my goal for the day, to get enough jobs done (that all seem to need the computer) that I was able to get turn it off. I didn't really manage it. Then I just got think it and it turns into this massive "I don't really like my life right now... I'm not enjoying my degree... I'm not enjoying a lot of the things I spend oodles of my time on...". I hate being this busy. Busy is not my default. Busy is not how I thrive. Tomorrow will be better.

Distro

Ciara posted her top 5 things she won't miss now that she no longer runs Paper Trail distro on her blog. It was an interesting read, and one that I couldn't really relate to (partly because I don't get some of those annoyances and partly because I still genuinely love the dull/tedious stuff about running a distro). It got me thinking though that perhaps I need to be a little more selective with zines that I agree to stock. I take maybe 90% I receive for considerations. That's high. Admittedly I do try to filter by email before people send them to me... but I do often find myself stocking zines I don't LOVE. That's not really doing me any favours. I need to be more assertive and just say "not this time" more often.

Life potters on. I hate knowing that now until Monday is the only real break I have from degree work until June yet I’m spending my days tackling mammoth to-do lists which take the entire day to complete. I just don’t want to start the new semester already behind on things.

Women’s Officer

Occasionally things come up that I feel I should do despite not wanting to do them at all. An article about men’s societies was printed in our Students’ Union magazine this month (original article) and felt that, as Women’s Officer, I reeeeally should respond. I spent most of yesterday morning reading up on the topic and trying to come to a personal conclusion. Things like this always tear me between the ‘official feminist party line’ and what I actually think. This is what I came up with:

“In response to Dave Jackson’s article “Being the Bigger Man: Have we got the balls for it?” I have a number of observations.

Firstly, whilst I disagree with the automatic feminist uproar over the creation of men’s societies (I think it does a great disservice towards dispelling the age-old stereotype that feminists are man-hating) and I do in fact welcome the dialogue with such societies that truly have the aim of discussing the role of masculinity in modern society, there is as yet little evidence that this is what men’s societies actually aim to achieve.

Secondly, perhaps I’m mistaken, but my understanding of the position of the Women’s Officer, and by extension the Women’s Network, is to reach a point where they are no longer required. It is only due to the continued discrimination against women in virtually all aspects of life (something the Women’s Network is constitutionally fighting against) that we have the unfortunate need for a Women’s Officer. Men simply do not experience comparable discrimination because they are men.

Finally, Jackson seems confused as to whether he is hoping to achieve male representation (in the form of a Men’s Officer) or a forum for discussion of male issues (in the form of a Men’s Network?). I doubt that the latter will organically grow from the former, as this is certainly not the order women’s representation came about. Furthermore, the Women’s Network is primarily a campaigning group and not solely place for discussion of issues affecting women. I fully support Olivia Bailey in her questioning what exactly men’s societies will do.”

Feminism/Books

So I finished my 3^rd book of the year. Crazy. He's a Stud, She's a Slut and 49 Other Double Standards Every Woman Should Know I scored this off bookmooch recently, having had it in my wishlist after reading her first book Full Frontal Feminism.

I definitely recommend this book (if you’ve read Full Frontal Feminism and liked that) although I think she missed out on multiple opportunities to comment on how sexism/double standards effect men as well as women sometimes. Just a passing comment that feminism is relevant to men too would have been appreciated.

Tegan and Sara

I had a crappy day yesterday. Discovering this made it slightly better. (I know it's crappy quality... but it's my favourite after watching about 5 in crappy quality from different angles)

Distro

Bit of drama in the land of distro yesterday. After receiving someone’s zines for stock (I liked the zines) it came to my attention that they were pretty anti-feminist, anti-distro and just generally a really annoying teenager. After some wonderful advice from Amber and Maranda I’ve decided to send his zines back with the following note:

It is with regret that I am unable to stock your zines and have to return them to you. Since receiving them for stock it came to my attention that some of your comments on a blog post on WMZ go against my fundamental beliefs and by extension, those of my distro. Whilst you deleted your account, the evidence still remains that you hold some very anti-feminist beliefs which completely oppose my own, and my distro’s. My distro is primarily for feminist zines, with queer zines as a secondary focus. I hope you can understand why I therefore cannot stock zines by someone who publically, in a zine environment no less, goes against these beliefs.

Furthermore, I have also been reliably informed that you have spoken negatively of distros on WMZ in the past, something I obviously don’t appreciate. I stock zines I like and genuinely have no ulterior motives. I think the way you have acted is unfortunate because I really did like the content of your zines.

Everything Else

I joined Knit Soc last term in an attempt to make new friends. Turned out a ton of my LGBT friends had joined and so I just ended up sitting and talking to them (the 2 times I went). Whilst watching my daily dose of Celeb Big Brother yesterday (I know, I know..) I had the genius idea of knitting at the same time. At this rate my scarf will be finished for next winter!

Exciting new mail

Maranda's Telegram Ma’am #19, Little Acorns #3 and Edith which I can’t wait to read. I love being so sure of zinesters that I don’t need to worry about seeing their new zines first before I order loads.

Well hello there...

Well hello there,

I’ve wanted to blog for a while. I haven’t got terribly interesting things to say but my life at the moment seems to mean I’m involved with oodles of different things and I’d just quite like to gather them in one place.

Very roughly speaking my life can be divided into the following areas:

University/Students’ Union

These things really shouldn’t be lumped together... but oh well. I’m currently in my second year at the University of Nottingham, studying Theology. It’s alright I suppose. Most of what I’m studying at the moment isn’t really what I’d like to be studying... but hopefully next year will be better. I’ve complained best I can, saying that the module options changed after I joined, but I know there isn’t much they can do. I’m also ridiculously involved in the Students’ Union. I’m not entirely sure how it happened... it definitely wasn’t intentional, but now I’m certainly a poster child for the “get involved!” mantra everyone has chucked at them upon starting university. Which leads me on to my main job in the SU...

Women’s Officer/Feminism

For the 09/10 I’m the Women’s Officer at our SU. It’s an interesting job technically split between chairing the Women’s Network (our women’s group) and ‘representing’ female students to our SU, University and other places. The former takes most of my time and is ridiculously stressful, leaving little time for the latter. So far this year I’ve learnt a lot about myself and what I believe/thought I believed, which is good. This is probably the top thing in my life I rant about because most of the time the position actually just makes me miserable (for numerous reasons).

Distro/zines

When I’m not frazzled over my degree or something Women’s Officer related, which unfortunately is most of the time, I run marching stars zine distro: www.marchingstars.co.uk. It’s going to be 3 years old in July and has been more successful than I could have ever imagined/hoped. It’s easily the one singular thing I’m most proud of in my life. Obviously I also read quite a few zines, and I hope to ‘review’/highlight some of my favourites in this blog. If you’d like to read about behind-the-scenes of distro running and other zine related waffling, keep reading this blog!

Tegan and Sara

I’m a massive Tegan and Sara fan. MASSIVE. My gap year (year off between school and university) pretty much consisted of me being a full time fan. I lived on the forums and saw them 27.5 times in 11 countries. It was an incredible year. Since starting uni and I’ve had less and less time to ‘keep up’ and I’m not going to lie... I’m not in love with their newest album. That said, I’ve made lots of friends through Tegan and Sara and am trying harder this year to know what’s going on. I’m sure I’ll be posting vaguely interesting Tegan and Sara related ramblings quite often!

Everything else

Ok... so I do lots of other things (Campaigns Officer on LGBT Committee, Course Rep and Staff Student Feedback Committee Chair for Theology, etc) but none take massive amounts of my time nor are they so significant in comparison to the other ways I’m currently choosing to make up/define my life. In some ways I’m relatively normal. I have a nice group of friends and we go out to the same club every Friday night. But I’d also quite like to think that in some ways I’m a little different from the norm due to all the weird things I keep getting involved with.

I hope people read this blog... maybe just because they’re interested in my thoughts on one part of my life, but then again, I’ve never really kept a diary and I suppose I’ve reached a point where I’d like to have a record about what I thought and when.

If you are reading – please comment to let me know!