Tis the Season

It is officially the last week of the term! After last week's post, I worked for three days straight on a huge group project which was due Monday, then Dan and I wrote up our entire project/ methods proposal, then I wrote up the last of my pre-break coursework assignments. So now, as of this morning, I am officially finished with all of the term's academic work!!! I do have a meeting tomorrow with Dan and our supervisor, Jane, to do more dissertation project work and hopefully finish building our experiment in the software program we're using. I would love to have that finished before break. It would be a great sense of accomplishment, a weight off while I'm home, and would make the project easy to pick up and run with as soon as we get back!

While taking a short break from work this past weekend, AD and I wandered down to High Street for lunch and some errands. When we got there, we found the above scene of chaos which turned out to be a Christmas Market/ Festival of sorts. It looked sort of like a cheap carnival with the sparse and cheesy rides, and scattered pathetic tables of jewelry or other things for sale. However, it had one mighty redeeming characteristic:     Reindeer!!!

Naturally, that made all the chaos, crowds, and noise okay. Annoyance is completely canceled out when there are real live reindeer involved.

This morning, following our very last lecture of the semester, Dan managed to arrange a little celebration for all the Consumer Psych masters students. So after all the presentations were finished, we all hung out with mulled wine and mini mince pies chatting and relaxing. It was actually really nice. As much as we comprise a small department and see each other in classes every single day, it seems that people on the course don't know each other as well as we all should. So today we actually all got to know one another a bit more, bonding over our shared joy for the end of assignments, Christmas, and free snacks.

Speaking of Christmas, in case you weren't aware, it is next week. This also means that this time next week, I will be home. In Massachusetts. Wearing sweatpants and not thinking about school. I will also not be thinking about this blog. That's right, folks. The blog will be going on hiatus over the holiday break. Doesn't make much sense to continue a blog about my time in Wales while I'm not in Wales, now does it? Not to worry though, as soon as I'm back here in January the blog will resume.

I will see (some of) you soon, and for those of you whom I will not be seeing while I am home, have a wonderful holiday!

A Merry Christmas to All, and to All a Good Night!

Counting Down

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....

(snow on the mountains I see out my window)

Last week, I wrote about how there had been lovely snow flurries and how everything was feeling quite winter-y. Conveniently enough (or not, since I had already finished that post) we got a good amount of snow that very night/morning around 1am. Now, let me just clarify "a good amount of snow." Here in the UK in general, they don't tend to get huge quantities of snow, and especially not in the first two days of December. Narrow that down to Bangor on the coast of Wales between water and Mountains, and you find even less snow. So a dusting on the ground that actually accumulates is very exciting to people, despite being well under an inch.

This amount of snow, particularly on a college campus, means one thing: PLAY OUTSIDE! I, however, was unfortunately chained to my desk that night. Inside. Longingly staring out the window at the snow. And the people having fun- while I was writing a paper. Very disappointing to a girl from New England. I did take time out though to snap a couple pictures of the frolicking

We're now in the second to last week of the term here, which is hard to believe until I think about the fact that I'm extra busy (relative to the rest of the term). Then it feels like the end of a semester as I know it. Last week I had a paper due, and lots of reading to do for a discussion. Monday night I had a powerpoint due which was to be used for the presentation I gave today on said paper from last week. Friday I am due to give an outline of my Lit Review section of my dissertation to my supervisor, and next week I have a group project due Monday and reviews of others' papers due Wednesday. Oh and one last discussion section the last day of term just for good measure. BUT all that means I'll be home in 13 days. That's all! And Christmas is in 18 days. That's motivation enough for me :)

Ordinarily, I think I would end this post right about here. Today, however, I have to mention something which has been mumbled about and demanded behind the scenes for a while now. This, Catrin, is for you:

Bacon. Is there any finer a food in the world? Cat has been after me for weeks to write about it. While I may be sarcastic about it being the 'finest food in the world', I will admit that bacon is pretty awesome. And they eat a lot of it here. And that is awesome. I do have a problem though. Bacon here is not bacon as we know and love it. They have "bacon" which is pink and tastes mostly like what I think it should taste like, but the flavor's not quite right. Then they have Streaky Bacon. This is what they refer to as American Bacon. Getting warmer, but still not right. Catrin is (slightly?) obsessed with bacon, and is what I would call a bit of a connoisseur, and she knows that maple-cured "streaky" type bacon the way we find it in the states is the best of the best. And thus we have a blog post about Bacon.
Oh, and Cat? Bacon.

See you all in 13 days! Meanwhile, treasure your bacon.