Testing the Waters of a New Blogging Medium

As the title says, I've recently stumbled on to Tumblr through a friend linking a website and I'm giving it a go since this one will be ending when I return to Canada and I may still keep up with the occasional blog post.

Anyone want an update? I haven't been up to much, the Easter Holidays here were almost a month of being on my own and just doing my own thing. Exams are coming up, in a little over a month I return to Canada, spring and summer weather seem to go hand in hand.

My housemates are back now at least, which is rather nice, although I am still unconvinced they aren't figments of my imagination. Time will tell!

Also, since the new blog is nowhere near what I want it to be yet (and some of you on facebook may have noticed it was connected for a little bit, but that was just a couple tests), so I wont be linking it until I am happy with it and have it set up as I want for the time being.

Easter Break time

Just a small update, I’m on break and everything has been finished since the 22^nd of March. They sure like their breaks here, considering I have nothing until one revision lecture (maybe) in the last week of April, and a week of exams between the 10^th and 17^th of May, woo hoo. I don’t think I’ve ever missed not having a job so much. Also, as a small side note, I’m not going back to Canada until June 1^st, so that’s another few weeks of doing nothing ha!

On the fair side, I have started going on walks when the weather is nice enough, or doing some exercises in my bedroom when I have no desire to go outside. Since the university library as a good amount of films, I’ve been borrowing them as well, this past week I’ve had Blade Runner, The Book of Eli and The Queen. I enjoyed all three of them, I’ve seen The Book of Eli before, and wasn’t sure about Blade Runner but it did seem familiar while I watched it so I’ve at least seen bits before, and The Queen, oh I adored that film. Prince Phillip (Queen Elizabeth’s husband) and the Queens Mother were just played by two wonderful actors that helped cheer the mood from time to time, and Helen Mirren of course was just great, though she’s in a couple other films I love as great parts too, so it just fits! Other films include: The Prince of Egypt as the Queen and National Treasure 2 as Emily (she’s also in Inkheart, which I thought was okay, but that doesn’t exactly fall into “films I love”)

I’m also heading up to Luton this Thursday, so at least I’ll be out of the flat for awhile!

Winding down

It’s a few days later, but it’s time to talk about my birthday! It was really just an awesome day, International Women’s day, Shrove Tuesday/Pancake day and of course, my birthday! I had a very wonderful time with Emma, Hayley and Sophie, and could not have asked for a nicer birthday!

Where to start, well, I have to admit, because March is just a killer months for assignments for me, I did do homework on my birthday. I did research and a bit of writing for my paper, I also played a bit of Dragon Age later which is always fun. Later on, after everyone had finished what they needed to do, we started to get the pancakes ready for dinner. The day was really uneventful, aside from the bit of homework I just relaxed. I was a bit sad, I couldn’t find any maple syrup for pancake day, but then again, we were making pancakes more similar to crepes than pancakes I’m used to back home, so had some strawberries, bananas, chocolate spread, jam and a few other things to put in the centre.

Afterwards, we pushed our dishes to the side and went off to get ready to go out. I actually wore heels and a dress out, a dress I haven’t had a chance to wear yet, so I was really happy to wear it. Though, originally, the three girls had to push for me to wear it and heels, I was worried I might kill myself on the lovely cobblestone pathways on the way into the city centre. It was kind of chilly that night, but luckily you don’t feel it as much the more you drink and I did definitely have a fair amount to drink that night. The pub we went to was the Penny Theatre, we had considered going to Run of the Mill, the pub I often frequent, but because of the game on that night, it was just too full, the Penny wasn’t much better but the people didn’t stay so long.

Since then I have been lost to the land of homework, with all of my term work being due in this week, or present, except for one that’s due in on the 21^st, it’s been a bit of a struggle to get it all finished how I like it. Especially that Africa essay, with the regime changes and the various issues of each country coming to light, it fit into my essay of State Collapse in Africa. The last project that I’m working on is a portfolio of four resource sheets that can be maps or economic statistics sheets. Let’s just say that in the course of doing the maps, my hand is really aching because it is all by hand.

Well, back to it I guess!

Cheers.

I am alive!

Or so it seems anyways, I had planned more updates, but apparently Fate is a fickle mistress, there was a death in the family, Michael came for a visit, I got horribly sick and I have finally returned to the real world, and left the world of feverish deliriums.

I seem to be having a very strange relationship with germs in England, new country, new germs to get to know I guess, because I don't get sick all that often here, but when I get sick, man do I get sick. I have stayed for the most part in my bed, only getting up for necessities like food and when I really needed groceries because I ran out of food, medicine and tissues. Not only was I exhausted, I had fevers as I mentioned earlier, headaches, aches, coughing fits and I lost my voice, you know, everything fun you can get, even a bit of nausea early on. Can't say I remember the days very well, I'm so unsure of the days right now, that I keep thinking it's Friday.

My birthday is also in but a few more days, which is also Pancake day, I don't think I can ask for a better day really, birthday, cake, pancakes, etc. What more could I ask? (aside from all of my friends back home magically appearing to celebrate it over here, but not mastered that technique yet)

Anyways, Wales!

From where I left off last time, we had gotten to Chester after many hours, it was between 2:30pm and 3pm when we finally got there. We didn't get to see much of the town, so we popped into the nearby shop to grab a snack, stretch our legs and in my case, pick up some post cards. Then we got back on the bus and left Chester, I only managed a few pictures of it and they're terrible quality because it was from within the bus and there was window glare. From there, we drove into Wales and through the Welsh scenery (sheep, so many sheep) and made our way to Conwy to check out the Castle and the walls surrounding the town. We took a walk around the walls, they were very old walls and because of that, lots of rough uneven bits and lots of steepness, but the views were really cool!

From Conwy we made our way along the coastline, took a drive around some cliffs, and up some cliffs, didn't get many good quality pictures, again because I was on the bus, but look, here's me! (we stopped for a few minutes)

From here we went on to Llandudno, a nice little town on the Wales coast with a very nice hotel that we stayed in, I didn't get any pictures of the outside, it was dark, but I did get a shot of the room and a bit from outside of the town.

We ate out at a really nice pub, with really nice food, the pies came loaded with gravy with mashed potatoes and carrots on the side, was very tasty, and then it was back to the room to be asleep by 11pm. We ate breakfast at the place we stayed, the owners were really nice people and great cooks.

From there, we drove around the Wales again, first to Caernarfon Castle where we stopped for some photos, and then to Anglesey over the Menai Straights.

Afterwards, we were back on the road to a place with an exceedingly long name:

And I need to stop for now because I need lunch, but stay tuned, hopefully I wont drop off again because I get even sicker.

Cheers,

Wales part 1

Well then, seems every time I sit down and write about my Wales trip, my laptop battery dies, I get distracted by work or something else comes up. So yeah, I’ve been a bit on the busy side, and lots being going on.

Ah, Wales, let me start by saying this about it, it’s an absolutely beautiful little country within a country, and I did very much enjoy the parts of the trip that went right, which is thankfully, Saturday evening and all of Sunday, but Saturday morning and day, oh my oh my.

I didn’t go to sleep the night before, thinking I’d probably sleep through my 5am alarm, so by the time Saturday started, I was already exhausted. I planned the trip with Anne, and we went to the meeting point for the tour in Canterbury together, where we met Rachelle, who is an altogether lovely person and helped make Saturday enjoyable. She’s another exchange student from the USA at Christ Church, but I hadn’t met her before as she lives in a different part of the city, and is in the history modules.  We weren’t sure how we were being picked up, so I ended up calling the tour company to ask, Martin, the one who seemed to be in charge of the tour arrangements, was surprised that there was no one there yet to meet us by 6:20am, so he arranged another cab.

Said cab finally showed up about ten minutes later, and although we were unsure of ourselves because he kept asking us where we were going, the tour company said that it was the right cab and that it would take us from Canterbury to the bus meeting point in London. Now, I’m very prone to falling asleep when I’m a passenger in a car, plus I was tired so I almost immediately fell asleep. I probably woke up on and off as we drove, but when I finally came to the driver told us we had arrived in our location, we looked around, it was a very very very very rural town. No way was that place London, and the driver kept saying we were in London despite us telling him flat out, no this was not London. We were in Smarden we found out, which is part of Ashford, we had been driving for two hours at this point, while London was only an hour and a half or so away from Canterbury and they were connected by a pretty straightforward motorway. We were lost, and the driver was not paying attention to us, so we called the tour company again to find out where we were and how we could get out of there and to London. Finally, Martin from the tour company told us to get the driver to call his company, and that we needed to go to the nearest service station we could find.

The driver was getting agitated, yelling at his higher up on the phone that he was in the right place, that he was at the place his satnav had taken him, he kept asking where we were supposed to be going (the tour company arranged this part, we didn’t actually have a clue), kept passing his satnav to Anne who was getting frustrated as well because of everything going badly. It took us another hour to find a service station, with Rachelle and I watching the signs and being extreme backseat drivers, telling the driver to turn down this exit, or get into that lane, because the man was determined to take us to London, instead of a service station like he was instructed by his boss.

Finally, we arrived in Essex, and waited in a service station for another driver to come pick us up and take us to where we needed to go, the tour company had called back to say that the tour had moved on, but we would be caught up, and stated that we were getting a refund for the hassle we had gone through. Finally, our second driver arrived in a nice Mercedes-Benz and told us that he was taking us all the way from the service station we were at to Chester on the border of Wales to meet with the rest of the tour.

This is the car we traveled in from the station to Chester, that's in Chester, and I’ll have to continue this later, because this is getting long! 

Wales!

Well, tomorrow I'll be doing the tourist thing and taking a tour of Wales. Have to get up rather early, it's supposed to leave at 6:20am, so Anne and I have decided to take a cab to be on the safe side, and lets face it, walking about before 6am is not fun in the least.

I'll be seeing the coast and mountains mostly, though according to the website the highlights are as follows: Chester, North Wales Coast, Conwy Castle, Snowdonia Mountains, Steam Train Ride to Mountain


I'm looking forward to it of course, and I will attempt to post pictures afterwards. 


The link for the website is: International Friends: Wales Tour

New month, new update

I've started my projects for this term already, despite every single one being due in March. I'm taking a look mostly at the ones for my Cities and Regions of Risk, an essay and a presentation. I've found a couple books for the essay on France's suburbs, and a website from the SSRC which I can use, and the books for Coastal hazards were far easier because there is more written on it in English.

Aside from boring school work, I've been hanging out with my housemates more and more, we've been putting  together movie nights, or on one occasion, gathering together to buy alcohol from ASDA and playing drinking games in the kitchen, and even on occasion, continuing to get together and go to the library to get work done. We've introduced Emma to zombie films, the Resident Evil series, Zombieland and Shaun of the Dead, which has been fun!

I will be away this weekend, off to visit Luton and my boyfriend for a nice relaxing weekend, and next weekend I am off to Wales to do some sightseeing along the coast and mountains. Yes, I am actually leaving England for the first time, I know, it's gasp worthy it's so surprising. When I get back from Wales I'll try and put some pictures up, I'm looking forward to the trip, but waking up by 5am to catch the transport at 6:20am is not going to be pleasant, but at least I wont be alone, I'll be travelling with Anne.

That's my life currently,

Cheers.

Libraries are often my favourite buildings

As you can guess, I found the city library, yes, I was completely unaware that there was an actual city library in Canterbury. Nobody talks about it.. like at all, they only talk about going to Augustine House, for both personal and academic reasons.

It also doesn't help it's on a side street I probably wouldn't have gone down if I hadn't been looking for the library and that it's only a temporary library because the main one is under renovation. However, I did go, it's small, but it's kind of cute. Doesn't have a terrible selection I suppose. I ended up borrowing two books (Sovay by Celia Rees and The Prodigal Mage by Karen Miller) and a movie (Resident Evil: Afterlife). I've enjoyed the movie, and I'm reading through the first book quite happily so I see a win-win situation for myself here.

One of my evening classes had a conflict, so they switched it to an earlier time slot, 3-5 which it was originally, I do very much enjoy the idea that it is earlier, nightfall doesn't come until after 4:30pm now, so I feel a bit more comfortable about walking home. Hoping that it is a permanent change, but we shall see.

London was fun, we explored the various pubs of Fleet Street area, didn't do too many touristy things but I have tons of time, and London is an easy destination plus.. my birthday is coming up in March, the weather might be nicer/more comfortable. So long as I avoid London near the end of April I'll be happy, I don't want to get involved in the mess and chaos that the Royal Wedding is bound to bring. Think it will be a national holiday here, but I don't think I have classes around that time anyways since second term ends at the end of March for me.

It's almost time to buckle down and do my assignments, this weekend for sure (gah).

Cheers.

Back to classes

I'm back in classes now, though it's been a strange first week. I am now attending two classes that are 5pm-7pm, which is monday and thursday while the other classes have remained in the same time slot most of the rooms have changed.

Anyone who knows me well knows I absolutely hate walking in the dark, so those two time changes have resulted in a very blah feeling about the classes, but luckily it's starting to stay light juuuust a liiiiiittle bit longer, so it wont be long until I get to walk home during day hours.

Though, I didn't have one of those classes this week, as it was cancelled, one of my lecturers had an accident, and hopefully she'll be recovered soon.

So far discussions have been about gated communities, what they mean and how they will affect the future of American cities and the rise and collapse of the Irish Economy (the Republic, not Northern Ireland), still waiting on my one lecturer to reply back to say whether the article I have chosen is appropriate or not, hope he does soon.

Aside from that, I've been running around doing errands, either receiving money transfers from Western Union or trying to figure out how best to cash a foreign cheque (Bank is 7-8 pound charge, plus up to 30 waiting days, Money Shop had a significant amount of handling charges that would've cost me like a months worth of food, but was immediate, guess which one I went for! Hint, it's the smaller charge).

It's also my housemate Hayley's birthday today, so happy birthday to her and it was Emma's not too long ago so another to her!

Now to head off to my final class of the week, tomorrow, London!

Cheers!

And it's a new year

Hello everyone, it’s been awhile since I posted. Well, kinda, there just hasn’t been a lot going on, or when there is, no time to post!

So for the middle bit of the holidays, I spent it with my boyfriend, he made his way to Canterbury on the 24^th and we spent Christmas Eve and Christmas day together. I cooked dinner, but he did help. It was a small roast beef, with some carrots, broccoli and cauliflower in a cheese sauce (I read the instructions wrong, but it kinda turned mushy anyways so I didn’t like it but Mike did) and mashed potatoes on the side. I even had some gravy to go with it, which I’m sure my family reading this will be very surprised to hear. We spent the rest of the evening watching movies, since we got four (The Hangover, Watchmen, Hurt Locker, and Robin Hood, I really liked the Hangover!).

On the 28^th we headed to London, I didn’t get any pictures this time but I’m hoping to go again once the bus tickets go down a bit more, but on the way in I did get to see Parliament, Big Ben, the Eye (giant ferris wheel), and of course the Thames (on my way out, I saw the Thames, but it wasn’t a nice part of it that’s for sure), I also got to ride the Tube which was.. interesting. I’d always imagined the trains used in the underground would be a little bigger, they aren’t small but they don’t feel big at all.

I did end up having a migraine while I was at Mikes, so we didn’t get out much. The place he was seemed quite nice, quiet for the most part aside from screaming foxes, which I did get to see because they liked wandering up to the back door. I didn’t get to see the “pet” mouse that the house has, we figured he’d been on vacation since he didn’t come out at all.

That or he’s looking for a part time job:

I just got home today, haven’t done much aside from water the plant since I was gone so long (it’s not looking so good anymore.. Sorry Hayley), throw a load of washing on, make dinner and speak to my mum and grandparents so they knew I had gotten back home safe.

So I hope everyone had a Happy Holidays (Mine still have not ended) and everyone has a Happy New Year!

Cheers.

Snow snow snow

It's winter holidays here, I have a month off and I haven't really done anything at all, so this is more of a yeah, I do remember this occasionally.

It did however start snowing Saturday afternoon here, and it has been enough to disrupt travel systems in pretty much all of the UK, flights have been cancelled in the UK and through parts of Northern Europe, it's actually not much snow at all, the biggest problem is that it isn't going away and there's forecasts for more.

This was our storm: 

Yeah, this caused a bit of havoc.

Yesterday I went out shopping with Anne, I didn't really get anything, we went to go see the Cathedral:

Looks quite pretty! 

And I don't really have much more to say, not a whole lot has been happening aside from taking care of a plant and snow.

Happy Holidays!

In the land of snow, ice and rain

Okay, maybe not the snow bit anymore.

Yep, haven’t updated in awhile, there’s a good reason. It is end of term one, which means –everything- is due, and it wasn’t until 4pm today that all of my projects were finished and handed in, which means, after a very stressful week, I’m finally able to relax, aside from two lectures (tomorrow and Friday) and winter holidays begin after my Friday lecture.  Yay!

Something else happened, it snowed here in the UK, not just a simple dusting, no, we got around a foot of snow for two days, and on top of that, we had two snow days! I haven’t had a real snow day in like forever, so it was the greatest thing ever, I tried to work on my assignments, but there was just that time where it was all big and fluffy flakes that I said screw it, threw on my winter stuff and asked my housemates if they were coming out with me! Hayley and Emma joined me, me and Emma watched as a car towed a lorry up the hill our residence is built on because it was icy and full of snow, and then when Hayley came out and joined us we walked around the student village in look for untouched snow to make snow angels. Afterwards we started up a snowball fight between the three of us, we plastered Hayley pretty good, and in attempts to get Jess to come outside, we started tossing snowballs at her window.

All in all, the two snow days were great fun, was a little disappointed when it rained Saturday morning and the snow was all gone, and the library still closed early, but all of my assignments due last Friday and this past Monday got extensions due to library closure so it worked out in the end.

Looking forward to this weekend, not just because it starts my vacation, but I’ll have a guest over, and hopefully I’ll get to go to London soon and see all the Christmas decorations and maybe spend some time in the British Museum.

Cheers.

And in other news...

I have been lost to the scary land of homework and essays, but only until Monday as that is when my last project for the Michaelmas Term is due.

There is also snow, not a whole lot, but it's quite a winter wonderland here at the moment, it's also quite icy, I've had to take the bus into town for the library because there was no way I was walking it with six books and a laptop.

When I have time again I shall do a bigger post... maybe. Lets see how well I remember!

Looking for work, and finishing term one

Only a couple weeks remain before the first term finishes and the winter holidays begin. I'll be staying in the UK, as I am currently looking for work right now since I finally received my National Insurance number. Yay.

I haven't really been up to much, mostly doing my assignments, working on a "book proposal" now, which is just a fancy name for write an essay and give a list of topics that are explained briefly. The topic for that is the United Kingdom and all the changes that have gone on it, such as Devolution, Decolonization, and various other things. After that, I get to make a "poster", again, they're being funny and calling it that because it is just an essay on A3 paper with a map of Germany.

I attended a meet and greet between the exchange students that came to CCCU and the ones from CCCU that want to go on exchange. Only one person was interested in Canada, which we really were not surprised about, well, we were a bit, we figured nobody would be.

After that, I had an enjoyable tea time with some friends from Freeman Court, Riona, Katie, Laura and Anne while we watched the boys clean the kitchen.

Oh, and I did finally hear today that they will be fumigating my flat in order to get rid of the bugs, because the conventional sprays they've been using have had no affect. No idea when they'll do that, but we imagine they will do so in the Winter Holidays because almost nobody will be around (except me :( ), but I'm sure I'll figure out somewhere to stay if I need to leave my flat for a day or two.

Cheers.

New background

Those who do read this will now have noticed a new background, I was playing around with the templates on another blog I've started (not sharing the link at this time), and I noticed this one and loved it.

It just seemed so perfect!

Rain, and more rain and lets throw in some fire alarms for fun

Okay, maybe it stopped today.

This last week has been a looooot of rain, my poor little umbrella wasn't able to stand up to it so it decided it was time to call it quits. That was the first day it rained this past week, I got very wet that day despite wearing my coat. Really, the reason was I never had a chance to dry off that day, as I needed to go to the library immediately after class and have the careers helpers look over my application form for my National Insurance number, to make sure I'd written it up correctly. I mailed that on the way to my next class, it's supposed to take two weeks to come back, but we'll see!

My lovely wonderful boyfriend has finally joined me, which is yay. The bugs seem to be leaving me.. somewhat alone. I still don't trust the creepy crawly little bastards, and I'm still afraid to look underneath my bed. I do really need to take the vacuum to it, but again, that fear that all of a sudden I'll see a bunch and revert back to being a little girl as I run away from my bedroom.

I have finished one essay, almost done another, and ready to start my last two for the Michaelmas term, which should be nice to have a bit of a break before starting my next assignments, the first due in February of the Lent term and the rest just following in March.

Hopefully I shall have my NI soon, so I can get work (and hopefully, I can get work).

It's kind of late, it's been an exciting last few days, I'm kind of writing this to get rid of the damnable writers block I'm having even though I have every single point to my essay planned out and waiting to be written. But nooooo, can't have that can we writers block, no indeed we cannot.

Well, nyah on you writers block. I will win, you will lose.

Anyways, in the last four days we have had three fire alarms, and for once they did not do their 10am fire alarm testing, I'm guessing they're rather aware that our alarms work considering all the ones we've been having lately, not to mention it went off later in the evening today.

Seems also on the 23rd I've "agreed" to speak to CCCU students wishing to study abroad in Canada, I don't recall this, but it doesn't particularly bother me either way if I do or don't. That should be interesting, maybe someone will want to visit Algoma for a semester or two, who knows!

I think I need to stop my ramblings for now, and head to bed, cheers!

I had a good title thought out earlier

But sadly, it has escaped my mind.

This past weekend has been first, the Gunpowder Plot and Treason day (Guy Fawkes day!) on Friday, secondly very quiet because I've been home alone, thirdly death to bugs and all bug kind, and fourthly time to get my first essay of the term finished. I have until 4pm to hand it in tomorrow, which is good because I want to ask my lecturer if I've formatted it correctly before handing it in. I normally don't do full drafts and edits on my papers, I'm usually fairly happy with my first and only make minor changes (yes, I know this is a terrible idea, but it's worked fairly well for me), but this, I want to do well so I tried. Keeping it under 1000 words and still getting my points across has been the biggest challenge for me, I should've done the first draft sooner, but I know for my second essay to do that (due on the 18th).

I've fallen in love with pasta bakes, I don't know why considering pasta has always been one of those things I've viewed as "Eh.. I guess I should eat it" type foods, it's definitely never been hated like soup has been, but it doesn't stand anywhere near the beloved potato. Penne (has to be penne, I love penne), creamy tomato sauce and cheese? What isn't great about it? Especially when you cut off a chunk of white cheddar, cut it up a bit, toss it over top for the microwave, mix it about halfway through and then eat with joy.

As for the bugs.. well, I tend to see them once a week or so, so not sure if the spray is working. I did find one crushed underneath my shoe this morning, that was.. interesting. I can say for sure I promptly ran to the kitchen, grabbed our poor little vacuum and did my room again. It didn't want to work at first, I was afraid it had died on us we've been vacuuming so much! I'll have to report it if it keeps acting up, I just hope we get a cute little vacuum with a face again if it has to be replaced.

I've also received my forms for my National Insurance number (fiiiinnnaaalllllllly), I worked on it a bit yesterday (first needed to go to ASDA's and buy black pens because surprisingly I didn't bring any..), I also got a cute highlighter set which is good because mine like to die on me and it's nice to have backups. Tomorrow I'm heading to the drop-in sessions I used to get my CV set up, to ask them if they can look over the forms between my two classes (I'll need to print off my answers for Goodbye Lenin! anyways, and look for some more research books for my next research essay). I've already decided, first thing I do when I get a job, buy a bloody printer.

Not much else going on, very excited for the end of the week!

Cheers.

Happy Halloween and in to November

Well, I wish I could say I've been leading an entirely super exciting life, but the thing is, I've been mostly living and enjoying for the most part my little adventure in England. Most of my excitement these days tend to come from the rush of adrenaline, fear, panic and a complete loss of sense when I turn into a little girl and scream at the sight of bugs.

Yep, I have bugs in my room again, and I'm not the only one as one of my flatmates does too (we don't like our new flatmate, the dreaded bugs). Our poor vacuum seems to have taken the news of the new flatmate quite harshly, he's almost burned out. That was Halloween, that ungrateful jerk of a flatmate went about scaring us all senseless.

I'll even post a picture to our evil flatmate: New Flatmate, evil bastard

Otherwise, it's essay season. My Global Cities essay is coming along though I sometimes just sit and stare at it thinking "well, what now?" and my earthquake essay is ready to go as soon as I finish the first one. Then I have to do a map of Germany and some strange project in another class.

Cheers.

Oops

For some odd reason I believed I had recently updated this, instead of leaving it for well over a week. Though, I can say I haven't really been up to much, I've been mostly attending my lectures and preparing for two essays due in roughly two to three weeks from now, the topics being the evolution of the Global City and reasons why earthquake hazards become disasters/catastrophes. I have two other projects I need to start thinking on, though they aren't due until early December so I have plenty of time in that regard.

I've also been waiting on forms so I can receive a National Insurance number, similar to the Canadian Social Insurance number for those curious, so I can work. Those should hopefully arrive this week, and hopefully sooner rather than later as I would really like to get a job. I have lots of free time, but not a lot of disposable income to travel/go out often.

I have started to look for work, and the things that go along with it, such as preparing a CV that an employer in the UK would look at (there are differences from a resume in Canada, though they're kind of small), the HR staff at the University has been very helpful in giving me help on writing it, proofreading it and giving suggestions of how to organize it so it looks appealing. As soon as I can get to the library (thirty minute walk to the library and possibility the computers aren't working is very unappealing) so I can print off a summary for an application I'm submitting, I can submit said application. It's very tempting to  invest in a personal printer, and I've also submitted my CV for the Temp Bank at the university HR department.

I've spent some time with friends, notably Anne (either in the library, random bump intos along the way between the uni and home or going out as done tonight) or the Freeman Court Family.

And yeah, that's my exciting life. I'm currently in the market to make it more boring, but more busy at least!

I guess I could also say I've started looking at what I want to do Post-grad since it seems that the fourth year of my programme may be delayed and.. I really do not intend to give five years of my life to this BA when I could've finished it in two and a half years.

Cheers.

Thanksgiving and a day of rest and essay writing

Yesterday we three Canadians exchange students did our Thanksgiving dinner, it turned out really well, though we didn’t do turkey and I feel bad for not realizing there were a couple vegetarians who were coming (I’m really sorry you two!). Our meal was two chickens (we rubbed butter on the skin and then spiced them, it made it taste awesome), sweet potato mash (they were really hard to cut, Anne accidentally cut her finger open, we had a fun time keeping that from bleedingL), oven baked stuffing that Emma made, and for dessert we had an apple crumble type pie experiment from Jeremi and a chocolate frozen cake from Halley. Overall, it was very tasty and well done by everyone. We invited more than just us Canadians, since cooking that much food for three people is a bit on the insane side, so we had my housemates, Cameron from Wales, and two of the American girls.

We all had fun and afterwards we all helped clean up and straighten up the kitchen and then all went our separate ways. Most headed towards the Jolly Sailor, a pub in the town centre, and I headed across the street from my place after resting for a bit and hung out with Riona and the rest of the Freeman Court. I tried for the first time, Pimms, which was very interesting with all its fruit. I stuck around until I was exhausted (which was only around midnight but late enough all considering what I’d done all day) and went home to bed.

Earlier though, yesterday, I had to go to Augustine House because my student card had finally come through. As I was waiting in line to ask for the international office at the i-zone, Jane-Anne Kilvington actually ended up calling me and asking me to come in because I had been talking with her assistant and mentioned I hadn’t been having a good time so far in dealing with the university, getting everything sorted and getting in touch with the people I needed to speak to. She asked me what was going on and I discussed some of the problems I’ve been having since I got here, and how frustrating and stressful some of them had been since no one really knew how to help me or who to speak to about it. She told me, should anything else come up I should come speak with her first, which was nice, and that way she could help send me to the right people if she wasn’t able to help me herself. Things seem to be finally sorting themselves out, the dinner (or maybe it was getting my student card) seemed to be the point where things started turning for the best.

I went afterwards to get my CV checked out, since the university here is doing a careers and employability week in order to talk about many of the things needed to gain experience, skills and to be aware of them and boost your confidence in the job search and interview process. My CV is almost finished, apparently what I had was on the right road to being a good one, I just needed to finish filling out sections, and we spoke about how best to present my visa working limits, since the word Limitations isn’t very nice. CV’s here are really nice though, you don’t have to attach information like birthdays because the businesses here are not allowed to discriminate against age except in certain industries (serving alcohol comes to mind). Just about finished it, but had to leave my room and go out because I was getting too distracted, and my bed too appealing.

Now I just need to continue writing my essay, and find that map of Germany I'm supposed to be doing a poster with. Yay history and evolution of Global Cities!


As and aside and an edit, have I mentioned just how awesome aero hot chocolate is? I swear to god I am going to miss it when I go home. Also, eggy bread (french toast without vanilla/cinnamon/syrup) is awesome when you feel crummy.