As part of the student culture your expected to sleep all day, skip lectures and party all night.

Most students that go to university expect to go out and get “rat arsed”  most nights of the week and manage to get by on the 8p packets of noodles stocked up in their cupboard. A perfect lifestyle if your up for it, but for me…it’s my idea of  hell.

I’m not one of these people that get excited for a night out and most of my friends know it. It’s only on rare occassions that I do.

The whole process grates on me. Getting ready, I know my make up will sweat off my face as soon as I enter the main room of a club.

Picking an outfit, for girls this always seems to be an excuse to shop. God forbid wearing the something out that you’ve previously worn in the last year. Then when a new outfit can’t be found, a bad mood springs out of nowhere.

Choosing shoes; which ones match the outfit, which ones won’t give you blisters, which ones will your ‘party feet’ not slip out of. Which (most importantly in my opinion) will be comfortable?!

Then when your finally out on the town painting it red as the saying goes, there’s waiting at the bar, finding a table, a couch, anywhere to stand. Blaring music so no one can really hear what anyone else is saying. Then when your in a club you get into the main room and everyone is like a sardine in a can. Drunk people coming up to you, trying to dance with you, fighting with you over the stupidest things. I hate it…not that you can tell.

But Jessica…is that not you in the picture…on a night out? Yes…it is. My reason for going out then? S Club 3 were on…and I was reliving my youth.

It was a great night, we all customised t-shirts and wore neon paint and ran around being silly the majority of the night. While Leeds Union was packed (it was freshers week) and it was the majority of the things that I hate about a night out I still managed to have a good time because of the people I was with.

I choose not to drink alcohol, and thats something that I’m proud of. Not only does it show that I don’t need to follow the crowd and drink the stuff, I can show people that I enjoy their company without having to intoxicate myself before hand.Whether you think I’m a saint or sad, I don’t really care. Give me good food, a film, good friends and my pjama’s and I’m set for a good night.

Now after my big rant about why I don’t like going on nights out I’ll finally stop rambling and get to my point. This week the government have announced that they are going to crack down on irresponsible drinking. This mainly includes offers such as Buy One Get One Free  and Women drink free nights. As someone that doesn’t drink I do think this is a good idea, and my inital reaction was “Ha ha ha gutted!” I do presume that most drinkers will be gutted that instead of being able to get 2 VK’s you’ll only get one. I doubt however that people will slow down on their alcohol intake.

Over the last six months two men died in Darlington night clubs. After being to both clubs before I was shocked that it happened. The first to die was a 19 year old called Nathan Allen who went into a coma after he ended up at the bottom of the enterence stairs to Inside Out. No one know’s what happened to him although alot of people believe that the bouncers threw him down the stairs. The second was Andrew Gibson who was due to go out to war in Iraq a few weeks later. Both deaths shocked the town however I believe that by losing the offers people (though only a few) may start to think about how much drinks cost before they start their night. Maybe it won’t, maybe people will just spend twice as much…but atleast the government are finally doing something about all the offers shoved in our faces.

I understand fully how much of an old woman I’ve sounded throughout this blog and yes, I’ve enjoyed having a good old rant about alcohol. It wasn’t my aim to tell you all not to go out and drink. Go out, have fun. Get as drunk as you want-but please don’t whinge about it, you did it to yourself.

TAGS: Alcohol, Andrew Gibson, Darlington, Escapades, Freshers, Freshers Week, Hopper, Inside Out, Jessica, jessica hopper, Leeds, Leeds University, Nathan Allen, Offers, S Club 3, S Club 7