On Sunday my parents came round for Xmas dinner cooked by my housemates and I. Complete with turkey and all the trimmings, mulled wine, champagne, Christmas pudding and charades…
Bring on Christmas!
We left off with an imminent trip to Weymouth. It was such a relaxing weekend, especially going to Chesil beach a watching the waves come crashing in. From the photos you’ll also notice which one is the dancer…
It was quite surreal how high the waves were, and the perfect sound of them breaking onto the seemingly infinite shoreline. It kind of reminded me of the beach in Inception; powerful, but beautiful.
The last few weeks have also seen the start of a new tradition: “Friday Pints”. After a long week working, a few of us down tools for a couple hours and go to to pub for a few bevvies. Get’s the weekend veins working and has already, on a couple occasions, resulted in carnage. Not that long left of university now, but that’s no excuse not to still be students!
Last Friday for example when we went to Rubix and must’ve had one of the best nights I’ve ever had in there. The downstairs bar (called HRB to those of us who started uni before it was renamed to The Living Room) was playing MUCH better music than the main dance floor, Pendulum and Queen among others…
This week I’ve made some good progress with my project work and started on a couple of essays that have to be in around exam season… which is only a month away now!! I can see lots of coursework and revision in the crystal ball over Christmas…
part two of the longest awaited post in the history of this blog. In this post I start the story in the same way any good teacher would, with the theory.
#3: Pizza & Planning
Sophie, Julie and I had been talking about getting a house together for a while, but it was awkward to organise house viewings when none of us lived in Guildford (ok, technically I do, but it's kind of become my second home to Switzerland in the last 7 months).
We organised a few international Skype chats to talk about places we’d like to live, which usually involved me getting a takeaway from the local pizzeria (no shortage of choice!) but it was all a bit slow moving...
#4: Meanwhile… 2 Forces Meet
While this was all happening, a couple of my other friends were getting a house group together. Katherine (who I know from MADTV) and her 2 housemates needed another person (or 2) and came to me. Since I had already paired up with Julie and Soph at the time, I put them in touch with Mike Frazer (also of MADTV fame).
^ Mike Fazer, also called: the lazer, eyebrows, “that man off the telly” and many more…
#5: The Wheely Bin
Back with Sophie and Julie, we were still struggling to agree on houses, and decided that we’d really need a 4th person for this whole thing to work. So we started looking for a 4th person… to no avail. We were alll a bit stuck with what to do, then Sophie made the decision for us.
Because she is on an un-paid placement, she decided that since living on campus would be the cheaper option in long run, that she’d settle for that. So she essentially abandoned Julie and I to fend for ourselves! (I’m going to make as big a deal out of this as I can because I know Sophie reads this blog :P) She screwed us both over for her own selfish gain! Ok, I’m only joking… It all works out in the end, just keep reading.
Julie and I briefly toyed with the idea of finding 2 other housemates before we realised we both are massively short of any friends who want to live with us… So we decided on the next best thing…
Guildford council wheely-bins are surprisingly spacious, and come in two different sizes. They offer location-flexibility in a waterproof, easy to access package. Sorted.
But, just as Julie and I had resigned ourselves to the fact that we were without a paddle, I got an offer…
coming soon: part six “proposition 101”
Work in the Alps is going very well. The project is pretty much there and it’s been a brilliant experience. Just one week to go!
On Sunday we got another opportunity to have a day off… so we woke to to find the wonderful view from our hotel room….
…had vanished and been replaced with a thick layer of snow and cloud. So what do you do when outside isn’t really an option? Well I had a good idea… chocolate factory anyone? :P
But more on that later. After the chocolate factory we went for a bit of a drive and accidentally ended up in Italy! How embarrassing :S It’s actually shockingly easy since there is a small bridge only 20 minutes drive from our hotel and it takes you straight there. We got some great snowy views from “the other side”:
After our minor excursion, we did the only other thing any salient tourist would do on a foggy day: go up the nearest mountain! Back up to the top of Mont Bré (which is the same place we went to a couple weeks before on the FUNicular railway…) however, this time the view was … different.
And for completeness here is the same photo of Xav and I “senza vista e con la barba”
So that rounded off the day nicely :) But back to the matter at hand, which is always chocolate.
We went to Alprose, a chocolate factory in Lugano which makes some pretty good Swiss chocolate it has to be said. And no chocolate visit is complete without buying a few “samples” to “take home”:
I see it as an investment in my future :D
I may have to leave behind all my clothes, but I think it’s a worthy sacrifice.
And on that Chocólately bombshell, I shall say auf wiedersehen chow grazie mille
Last weekend I went to Devon to visit Phil for his birthday. In reality, it was his birthday a couple of weeks before, but who’s counting?
Heather, Lauren and Sophie J didn’t disappoint either, it was a brilliant weekend with lots of laughs!
left to right: Sophie Jones (one of my new housemates), Heather, Lauren (first year housemate)
On Saturday we went swimming in the sea and played rounders on the beach. You know, genuine good times. Phil provided a conveyor belt of food: cookies, meringues, burgers and Phil English to name but a few.
I wish every weekend was that much fun!
This week is going to be a bit “wait and see what happens”, but this weekend I’m going to a BBQ at Heather’s house, let the good times roll.
Another Saturday working at the Tote. 363 bets taken today, which is twice as much as usual. Certainly makes up for my easy ride last week :) It was a good day in all, largely friendly customers and I balanced at the end of it, which always makes my day.
As for the rest of my week, it’s been one of those ‘busy doing nothing’ kinda weeks…. lots to do, but nothing amazing.
Monday, Tesco day with Josh. I’m loving our weekly shops, so much banter to be had in Tesco at 11:30pm on a Monday. Wonder why no-one else shops at that time?!
Tuesday, Election Question Time. It’s the university Sabbatical Elections next week, and it was time for all the candidates to present their case and have their manifestos ripped to shreds by the student populous. If you have 5 hours to spare, which I know you do, then definitely check out the uncut footage… yours truly filmed the first 2 hours :)
Wednesday, the last of my weekly trips to Sony’s technology temple in Basingstoke, this time for an interview with the R&D department, BPRL.
Thursday was my day for cooking this week. Sheppard's Pie never tasted so gud, yummeh :P Then it was Phil time! I haven’t had a proper conversation with Phil for weeks, despite seeing him quite often. He came over for help fixing his laptop, since he dropped it and broke the screen. It didn’t take long to fix, but that didn’t stop us staying up until 3am talking. Admittedly I also fixed Anne’s laptop in that time, but just chatting about nothing can never be underestimated :D
Friday, (AKA thank god it’s Sony! Day) was largely spent dossing. Did a bit of this, a bit of that, and caught up on sleep. Oh, and helped Will build his schmexy new computer, very jealous.
Good times. Good times… shame about all the work, but when has that not been the case. At least most of it at the moment is actually quite interesting for a change.
The Sony interview today went really well. They showed my around the production floor where they make the vehicles and then I had a really great interview, in total lasted about hour and a half.
I’ll find out on Monday if I have the job, I want to be confident, I certainly did the best I could, but only Monday will tell…
As for the rest of the week. Yesterday I found out the wireless card in my computer is broken, so I need to buy a new one of those soon so I can connect to the internet on my desktop. For now it’s all about my laptop. I find it funny that a powerful computer can suddenly become useless without internet access……
I cooked Josh an amazing pasta bake yesterday with the frozen sausages left over from the new years party (they lasted me that long!). It was incredible, even if I do say so myself. And it turned out enough for tonight's dinner too! Bonus points! We had strudel for dessert since I have rediscovered the wonders of strudel recently :D
Yesterday was also lab day, and the project is going really well I feel. Josh and I spent the morning wheeling Tesco trolleys down corridors to get smooth footage for our video. We then spent the afternoon in the studio and I managed to learn a hell of a lot about patching the feeds and recording and lighting. I really feel like that was a good learning curve.
Tomorrow is the union AGM, which I am filming for both the Student’s Union and MAD TV, so 2 in 1 bonus there!
As for the weekend, looks like I’m going to need that free time to catch up on my life. I need to fix my bike and computer, then do MAD TV editing and general course work. Set to be a good weekend…
Typical Mondays…
I did some preparation today for my interview on Wednesday, which got me less confident about getting the job. Either way, I know I am capable of getting it, it’s just how that compares to the other candidates that I’m not so sure about.
I also had my Computer Graphics Module. More really interesting stuff, but lots to get my head around. Which tends to be the story all round at the moment.
Then stage crew in the evening was my weekly reminder that I really don’t have time for crewing at the moment. That hasn’t stopped me getting involved with all the video I can, which this week entails filming and webcasting the union AGM on Thursday.
Then on into the night Josh cooked a great casserole thing which continues our new trend of cooking together when we can. Then we had a very funny trip to Tesco which included a girl being buried in crisps by her mates :D
Today was a busy day, and was one of those “1 step forward, 2 steps back” kind of days. Still, the weekend holds lots of promises to get things done…
January has been a varied month to say the least. Starting with a cold which had me quite down, then going back to university and a few nights out. Having lots of revision and coursework meant I was kept busy, as well as MAD TV editing which is taking up too much of my time…
But I’m going to ask the question, what was the best moment of January?
After narrowing it down to 5, I chose Sunday 17th January as my favourite day. This was the day Mum and Dad came round to cook my housemates Sunday dinner. Once they left Anne, Josh and I played poker and Uno for many hours, and it was great fun! It was just one of those impromptu evenings that was great to spend with Anne and Josh :)
I have a few more things to share this month:
You can see my pictures from my January on Facebook.
And you can watch the MAD TV Gliding Report:
This is part 1 in a mini-series of posts that looks into the best year of my life, two thousand and nine. In this part I start to go back a remember the moments that have stuck with me.
For the first few posts in this series I’m going to be counting down my top 40 moments of 2009. I’ve put a lot of thought into this list because it’s something I want to get right. But what is a ‘moment’?
I’m seeing a moment as a very short space of time. I don’t want any of this “the boat trip was amazing”, that’s too vague (although it was). I want to talk about specific events, small fractions of time, that define the moods we have and the time we call “the best times”. So lets get started:
#40: Building Josh’s Computer
I’m kicking off the list with one of the many great moments of summer. I went to Josh’s house to help him build his computer. It was a geeky evening, but we had a good time slotting everything in and I think I managed to teach Josh a thing or two about how a computer works
#39: Getting My Files Back
You may remember my post back in January about losing all my files. Well it was more than a relief when I managed to get them all back!
#38: Sunday Night Live
Back in February I ran video for a gig in Rubix. We had a total of 10 cameras and 6 people operating. It was definitely the most successful video rig I’ve ever ran and it was amazing fun. There are plans to do another one of these next year, which I’m really looking forward to.
#37: That Afternoon With Three Cakes
The afternoon where Phil and I baked three cakes between us while watching the Grand Prix. Simpler times…
#36: Pimms Next To The Thames With Heather & Lauren
Drinking a pitcher of Pimms with Heather & Lauren at my favourite pub next to the Thames.
#35: Southbank With Lauren After Avenue Q
I love walking down Southbank at night, and it was great to share that Lauren.
#34: Walking Into The House & Knowing I Live There
This is a bit of a weird one, because it happens almost every day. I just love that feeling. And the first time I put the key in the door was magic.
#33: Being At Merry Hill With Sam, Matthew, Kevin & Ben
This is the first moment from the boat trip, believe me there are plenty more to come! This was right at the humble beginnings, the first day, when we went to the cinema to see The Hangover and had a meal, a brilliant film.
#32: Climbing The Trees In Sam’s Garden In Scotland
The first time I’d seen Sam in literally years! So great to catch up.
#31: Messing With Chairs With Josh While We Were ‘Revising’
Wheelie chairs can provide a good distraction from revision, especially when you’ve been revising for over 5 hours straight!
Come back tomorrow for the 30-21 greatest moments, including many more boat memories, snow and a pink bench :O
The last 9 days have been hectic in more ways than possible to describe here, but hell, lets give it a go!
Friday 11th December
It all starts a week and a half ago. A full day of labs where we finished the experiment early and got full marks. That put me in a good mood to go shopping at Tesco. While I was in Tesco there was a power cut, meaning I had to wait ages before the checkouts started working again… on my way back home all the street lights were off, it was very strange. Just as well I’d bought some bike lights from Halfords 2 days prior! Once I got back home I invited a friend over for stroganoff!
Later in the evening I went to Rubix, largely to see 2 of Sophie’s best friends from back home who had come to visit for the weekend. Sophie always talks about Ana and Carina, and they came over last Christmas for a day or two, but with labs and stage crew I didn’t ever get to see them. It was one of those times when I felt like we were friends before we’d even met, and it was great to finally put faces to names and get to know each other. All in all, it was a great night. Sophie’s friends were genuinely such nice people I was taken aback at first and then annoyed at myself that I didn’t find time to see them last year!
Saturday 12th December
After getting no more than 3 hours sleep I was up for a MAD TV meeting to discuss a website that we plan to build over Christmas as a central place to hold all our content. It was an interesting discussion, but had to be cut short because one of the guys had to leave. So I went home and went back to sleep. That evening I went back over to Sophie’s to see her friends again before they left on Sunday morning. Ana baked some cakes and I ate some cakes…
I left there at about 6pm to go to the stage crew Christmas dinner. It was a black tie event, and all of stage crew pretty much go. I don’t have much to say about the dinner, apart from it was a really good night for a few reasons: the food was good, I was bought a lot of drinks, half price drinks in the union was amazing, managed to get to subway before it closed at 3am…
It’s interesting to compare this year’s stage crew dinner to last. Last year I didn’t drink alcohol at all, and I had a good time. But this year was very alcohol-fuelled, and I loved it! It’s not just the alcohol, but when everyone else is drinking and you’re not, it’s never as fun, and I hate to say it but you don’t feel as included in everything. Crew dinner was one of the first times I’ve been out this year and just sat in a bar and talked to people, for literally hours, and that’s what I really liked about it.
There’s loads more to talk about… we’ve got Snow White, dancing, shopping, cake, parties and lots more still to come! Part 2 coming soon!
I have a lot to talk about. The last week has been really crazy in terms of work and getting stuff done.
Lectures are ok. I’m finding it hard to stay awake in all of them, but that’s something I’ll have to work on. In terms of difficulty they could be a lot worse, there are a couple I wouldn’t say are great, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles.
The house. I’m getting on really well with all my housemates, but we’re all a busy bunch and I’ve haven’t seen them as often as I would like. Especially Josh who is a very busy person. Sometimes it’s nice to sit down and talk to people and that’s what a busy house doesn’t let you do.
Food. Since being back at uni this year I’ve not been bothering with cooking proper meals as much as last year. Mainly because I just don’t have the time to. I’ve been having oven food such as kievs, fish, pies and pizza. I’m not sure if that’s acceptable, but it keeps me fed.
MAD TV. We had a review session on Wednesday and I think everyone got a lot out of it. We’re currently filming for the next episode, which is due out next Sunday.
I’m keeping in touch with my friends when I can and Cranium night on Tuesday was great fun. Friday I had lunch with some chemistry friends and then went out in the evening with more chemistry friends.
I’m battling a bit of a flu today, but I’m hoping it’ll get better before the week starts up because this week is going to be BIG.
Next week should be the last of these crazy weeks. I’m hoping life will be a bit more sensible after this week…
