Lancaster Uni Freshers' Week Guide (From the Perspective of Someone Who Didn't Drink in Freshers' Week)

Note: This guide can also be used for other universities, but some of the more Lancaster specific points may not be completely relevant.

1. Your college is important (but only this week)

Buy the t-shirt, learn the chants (ask your reps), drink exclusively in your own bar. If you're on campus then your flatmates will be in your college; and they'll be the people you spend the most time throughout the week and your freshers' reps will help to instil a sense of family from your college.

After freshers' you'll go into normal uni life and meet people on your course and in societies, at which point the only time your college will matter is if you play inter-college sports. I am in Fylde and some of my best friends are in Lonsdale, Furness and County. The only time the college difference matters is when we beat them at pool, when a bit of casual banter is thrown around.

2. Ask questions

You'll have a tutor and two freshers' reps; they're there to help you. I didn't know which bus to get to the train station and my rep not only told me which bus and where from, but she also found me a timetable. When I had to change my minor, my personal tutor (who didn't actually know how the procedure worked herself) rang around to find out for me while I was feeling emotional and had no idea where to start.

Freshers' reps are largely there to get you drunk (ahem, I mean make sure you aren't too drunk to get home safe), but they will also answer your questions - they were once nervous freshers with millions of questions they felt stupid for having to ask, so they completely understand where you are coming from.

3. Play sports/join societies

The Freshers' Fayre will usually be Thursday/Friday of freshers' week, and you'll probably be overwhelmed by how many things people have been bothered to make societies for. Join anything you are remotely interested in or think you could be interested in. But, make sure you take account of the cost - some are free, some have joining fees, some require you to buy equipment; but if its something you are going to enjoy and make friends doing then it has to be worth it.

I didn't do this. I signed up for the writers' society and never went. I only joined the pool team by accident, but my captain is now the best friend I have met at uni, and a lot of the other girls are totally awesome!

4. Don't feel pressured to drink a lot and go out every night.

I'm disabled and when my knee started to hurt, I went home and chilled with a hot water bottle. Your freshers' reps will encourage you to get drunk and enjoy yourself, your party animal flatmates may think you're a little weird if you don't wanna go out; but it's your life, your freshers' week and your uni experience - do whatever you like.

I even left my Big Night Out (sampling a lot of the local nightlife under the watchful eyes of your reps) early, and my female rep - who had been encouraging the rest of the group to drink as much as possible without being sick - walked me to the bus station and made me promise to text her when I got back before she would let me on the bus.

5. Speaking of the Big Night Out, wear sensible shoes!

I wore flats. My two female flatmates wore heels. Guess which of the three of us wasn't moaning about her feet our third bar?

Lancaster is quite spread out. I used to go out with Wigan, where pretty much all of the clubs are along the same street. You get bored of one club, you just pop next door; it's easy and not too bad for high heels. But Lancaster isn't anything like this. With the exception of Sugarhouse, Toast and Elements all being along the same road, you don't get clubs that are all that close together. So wear flats for the sake of your feet and the ears of your flatmates.

Quickfire advice:

6. Don't take clothes you don't think you'll wear because you'll spend forever unpacking! But do weigh everything up for its fancy dress value.

7. If you can, get the top shelf of the fridge so other people's food doesn't leak and drip onto yours - particularly if you're a vegetarian or have allergies.

8. Bring a doorstop so your new flatmates can say hi while you unpack.

9. Establish football/rugby/other sport alliances and rivalries early - makes for good banter in the bar or your kitchen while watching a match/game/race.

10. Have fun, don't be scared, and just be yourself. If people hate you for it, that's their issue.

F1 baby

I have to write half a lab report for the 29th November and a 2000 word essay for the 3rd of December. What have I done today?: Watched the F1 season review on iPlayer.

This time last week Sebastian Vettel took the F1 world championship. I now have my weekends back - okay it was only every other weekend, but it was about 6 hours every other weekend - and all I have to look forward to over the winter is seeing how the driver market will take shape. The 2010 season had 18 incredibly exciting races (and one boring one) that drew to a close last Sunday with incorrect tactical decisions leading to the underdog taking the title.

The only thing is, I haven't stopped talking about it yet. Here, to people in lectures and lab classes, to the sports guys down in the bar, you name it; they're all sick of me.

My brain comprises of 85% song lyrics, 10% F1 nonsense, 3% Doctor Who trivia and 2% everything else.

And that's just who I am (I was going have my percentages not adding up to 100%, but decided against it). I don't really watch the football much anymore - saying that I only watched it when it was on BBC, ITV or Five anyway because we don't have Sky Sports - although I do still enjoy watching a good game of football regardless of who is playing; the tennis season ended months ago and I don't have time for figuring out when the athletics are on. I especially have no time for The X Factor or I'm a Celeb... but that's a whole different blog post (which I probably won't write).

Formula One is my sport (And whoever says it isn't a sport can just leave right now! How many non-athletes can withstand 5 times the force of gravity on their neck muscles and lose 3kg of sweat in an hour and a half? Get real), I strongly support certain drivers and strongly dislike others. I like watching daring overtaking manoeuvres, I pray for rain to mix up tyre decisions and strategies and it makes my Sunday (or Friday or Saturday for that matter) when someone crashes. And, no, this doesn't make me sadistic or evil - anyone who says they don't enjoy it in F1 when someone crashes is just lying, no doubt about that (for the record, its fun as long as nobody gets hurt, because then it's just scary).

(I actually have a separate twitter account for F1 tweets, so my followers don't hate me on F1 weekends. @MiniMF1 if you're interested).

Random fact of Mini's life: The computers in the Levy Lab are named after F1 drivers, which is an endless source of amusement for me. For the last two weeks I have circled the lab trying to remember where each 'driver' is and identifying which ones are my favourites (Button, Webber, Hamilton) and which ones I cannot use on pain of death (Alonso and Schumacher). Nobody else quite understands this and I guess it is a little odd, but aren't we all from time to time?

Rumour mill: I've heard that Nico Hulkenberg may be Mercedes reserve driver for 2011. Now is it just me or does this seem like a step down from the race seat and the pole position he had at Williams? Think about it.