My late grandfather used to collect donated books from people and sell them on to raise money for Macmillan. Having retired as the village shopkeeper, he had converted his shop into a garage for his ageing VW Polo. He frequently held charity book sales, and as their popularity increased and donations of books kept coming, the garage was transformed back into a shop once more; this time with shelves bulging with colourful book spines rather than groceries. Over time it became quite an organised affair, and despite it always looking full to capacity, he always found space for more. A month ago, the friends of his who had kept it running after he died decided to hold their last sale in his honour, for Macmillan. I bought armfuls of history books (and some more abstract stuff) and they all now sit on the shelf in my room in Brighton. The intention to read all of them is there, but now I think of it, embarrassingly few pages have been turned as of yet.

Perhaps I would have done some relevant reading if my lecturers had organised their Study Direct pages (our VLE) over the summer. I could have had access to our course outlines and reading lists, but that didn’t happen until a few days before term time which was a bit annoying. Other than the sporadic dabbling in the history books, I didn’t read anything specific to my course and instead treated myself to the usually guilt-ridden activity of novel reading. I find the joy of opening a good novel during term time is guaranteed to be coupled with a pang of anguish; I find I have to turn each page with the knowledge that it will not help the future, tomorrow morning me, and I should instead be reading a book on liberal institutionalism.

I have found that a history book with a good cover on is more likely to entice me. In the library I took out a rather funky looking paperback about Marx with 70s graphic art on the front that I repeatedly picked up (n.b. also handy if you want some ‘well, she looks cool’ looks on Brighton public transport). Another virtue was its size – not only was it remarkably unintimidating, but it also fitted snugly into the side pocket of my rucksack.

I have a dramatic and very unexpected new addition to my life that is likely to make a regular appearance in my coming posts: an iPhone. Friends didn’t think it possible, family thought it inconceivable, but Eva, the stone-age technophobe, has turned to the dark/ oh-crap-I-can’t-work-out-how-to-change-my-brightness-settings side. My mother insisted I had her old phone after getting annoyed with my spree of unreliable cheap Samsungs. The final fling with a particularly wayward Alcatel happened to perfectly coincide with Mum’s contract update. So there we have it, I have a smartphone. So far it has helped me get to the correct seminar room (after a predicament I encountered with the alphabet), allowed me to organise meetings immediately by using facebook, and its weather forecast has kept my cycling home experience as dry as possible. I use it a lot to check the news and I intend to record lectures on it in the future, I also suppose the day will come when I stoop so low on the good-student scale that I use it to skim-read some last minute readings. I can also listen to podcasts and stuff relevant to my course that are forwarded to me whilst I’m out and about.

Last year when I lived on campus I took my laptop to all my lectures but now that I have to cycle in, I only bother bringing it in on certain days and instead take the majority of my notes on paper. It’s just a bit of a faff carrying around everything else including raincoats, jumpers, food and the odd book. I think I still prefer note-taking on my laptop and miss the ability to flick to the readings during the lecture, so perhaps I just need to work my thighs and carry on as before.