DOOM
so, yeah, finals.
they start on monday. as in, like, less than a week away.
SHIT.
it’ll be ok, is just really bloody scary that my entire degree (well 85% of it, the other 15% is made up from a dissertation that’s already been submitted, hurrah) rests on 6 exams. so, despite having done kick-ass essays and so on all the way through, if I get a bitch of a paper, it’s, well, a bit shit really. but if everyone else before me has managed to survive finals, well, then, so can I.
the whole continued pain from the back extravaganza, in a word, sucks. which has induced panic and stress. but tutors have been great and very reassuring, and I’m damn well gonna do these bloody finals and get this degree if it kills me. which I hope it won’t.
so, june 4th is the day of freedom! when this whole hellish nightmare is over, and I get to drink myself in a coma and then sleep for about a week. hell yeah, baby.
as well as revision, I’ve been busy watching my team play extraordinarily bad live football via iChat, which my very clever fella worked out for me. technology eh?
foe the uninitiated, here’s a quick low-down on sub-fusc, one of these antiquated oxford traditions that means we have to look like penguins for our exams. yes, we really are still back in the dark ages. anyway, for your amusement, and especially to all those taking finals, here’s a take on everybody’s free to wear sunscreen that some bright spark adapted for oxford…
Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sub Fusc)
Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of 04: wear sub fusc.
If I could offer you one tip for Finals, sub fusc would be it.
The wearing of sub fusc is a required by the Proctors, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own inane ramblings.
I will regurgitate these ramblings now.
Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth.
Oh never mind.
You will not enjoy the power and beauty of your youth until you’ve finished.
But trust me – in a few weeks you’ll look back and realise in a way you can’t grasp now how much time you spent revising and how tedious it really was.
You are not as dim as you imagine.
Don’t panic about Finals.
Or panic, but know that panicking is as effective as trying to write essays by starting a mexican wave in Schools. The real troubles are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, like leaving a tenner in your pocket while getting trashed.
Do one thing every exam that scares you. Write.
Don’t be reckless with your answers, don’t put up with examiners who are reckless in setting questions.
Revise.
Don’t waste your time on jealousy. Some people are clever, some people are not so clever.
The exams are long and in the end, they’re only with a couple of hundred people out of the entire population.
Remember questions you managed to answer.
Forget the blunders.
If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.
Keep your good luck cards, throw away your exam papers.
Breathe.
Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know which questions to answer.
Some of the cleverest people I know didn’t know at 21 which questions to answer.
Some of the tutors I know still don’t.
Get plenty of sleep.
Be kind your your brain.
You’ll miss it when it’s gone.
Maybe you’ll pass, maybe you won’t.
Maybe you’ll get a first, maybe you won’t.
Maybe you’ll become a Jobseeker, maybe you’ll join the SCR.
Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either.
Your answers are half chance.
So are everybody else’s.
Enjoy your alcohol.
Drink it every way you can.
Don’t be afraid of it, or of what other people think of it.
It’s the greatest substance you’ll ever abuse.
Write, even if you have nowhere to do it but your exam desk.
Read the questions, even if you don’t answer them.
Do not read other people’s answers.
They will only get you sent down.
Get to know your tutors.
You never know when they’ll buy you drinks.
Be nice to older people doing your subject.
They’re the best source of answers to questions and the people most likely to buy you champagne when you finish.
Understand that knowledge comes and goes, but with a few facts you should hold on.
Work hard to bridge the gaps of knowledge and understanding because the closer you get, the more questions you can answer.
Lie on the quad once, but leave before it makes you brown.
Sit in the JCR once, but leave before the Simpsons comes on.
Punt.
Accept certain inalienable truths: scholars will have sleeves, exhibitioners will be bitter and you, too, will finish, and when you do, you’ll fantasise that when you sat Finals, examiners were reasonable, questions were answerable and people prepared properly for their exams.
Prepare properly for your exams.
Don’t mess too much with your gown, or by the time you’ve finished you won’t be able to sell it second hand.
Be careful whose revision classes you attend, but be patient with those that give them.
Revision classes are a form of nostalgia.
Giving them is a way of fishing past papers from the filing cabinet, dusting them off, tippexing over the hard parts and presenting them as something useful.
But trust me on the sub fusc.
