Back to school

Higher education – I think they call it that because, much like a mountain, the peak seems an unattainably long way off.

Apart from having stood outside a door saying “Head Teacher’s Office” whilst waiting to give blood a few years ago, I’ve not had any brushes with education for something in the order of 30 years.

It must have worked out reasonably well last time, as I was able to figure out that time span without taking either of my socks off and using my toes to count.

According to my school reports, I was “a disruptive influence”. “Quite bright” and “lazy” regularly appeared in the same sentence too. Still, what does The System know, eh? My sports teacher gave me a report that was word-for-word identical to a lad who had been signed-off due to injury for two months, so who’s laughing now?

In an alarming turn of events, whilst the nation’s young learners are embarking on their summer break, I’ve somehow managed to find myself heading back into a frightening universe that involves learning stuff whilst not getting paid to do so. With an exam and essays.

You won’t be finding me hanging round the bike sheds or queuing up for dinner though, as I will be improving my brain remotely, by undertaking a spot of distance learning.

So far, I’ve nervously read various documents explaining what I need to study, purchased a 900 page book on the subject (Remember phone directories in their heyday? That.), and had a quick bash at a mock exam.

Considering my 50% score is notably better that my success rate three decades ago, I’m considering this a distinctly promising start, and that the actual studying and exams should therefore be a no-brainer (coincidentally, something I suspect my school teachers considered writing too).

Now I just need the essentials. Top of the list is a poorly photocopied planner, held together with an entire WH Smiths-worth of sticky tape.

A Day-Glo orange pencil case is next up – I’ll need to write the names of my favourite bands on it with a biro, and maybe I can get some of my oldest friends to pop round and scrawl unspeakably rude things about that girl I fancied on it too.

I should probably stop wearing a coat outdoors when it’s raining as well – that seems pretty de rigueur amongst those receiving education. Do I need a damp towel in a sports bag, do you think? There’s so much to think about.

Then there’s my studying area at home. I’ll have to see if I’ve still got a Sheena Easton poster I can put up, or something Star Wars related. Or that one of a monkey sat on a toilet.

Luckily, Top Of The Pops got killed off, so that won’t be able to distract me, and I’ve no particular hankering to just hang around on the street corner looking surly – I save that for the office.

Right – I’d better get cracking. I just need to sharpen these pencils first...

This post first appeared as my "Thank grumpy it's Friday" column, in the North West Evening Mail, on the 31st of July 2015. You can view it on the paper's website here, where they expanded the title to "It's back to school for me" and got confused over what page it was on in their index (all the way up to page 6 this week!)

I really wasn't underplaying how nervous I am about this - I'll have to sit an exam in December, and between here and there I've got to try and work out how I actually absorb information and keep it in my head - I'm convinced that I filled up my brain with inconsequential stuff by the time I was 25, so whilst I can recall all the lyrics to "Ghostbusters" by Ray Parker Jr, anything genuinely useful I've retained since the early nineties has been at the expense of something else important.

Regular conversations with Mrs G about places we've been, the names (and in some cases, any recollection at all) of people I used to work with - vanished. Probably to make way for remembering a complicated password for my laptop, or how the hell you use an Android phone for the first time (that wiped out an entire year of memories... I think. I can't quite remember...)

(A-Z of my CD collection - Still on A. Today it's Alpinestars and B.A.S.I.C from 2000.)