It's Chester-tastic

For a nice change of pace, this week I actually have something interesting to share!

This past weekend, Dan invited a couple of us to go with him to his house in Chester. A welcome opportunity to a) get out of Bangor, and b) see some more of the UK. Also, just to have a good time. Naturally, I jumped at the offer and so Dan, myself, Diego, and Franzi set off Friday night. Louise came out for a day as well.

The big plan for Saturday was to go to a place called the Crocky Trail. Basically a mud-ridden obstacle/adventure course type thing mostly designed for smaller kids but also still really entertaining for big kids. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of the shenanigans that went down here. Given the likelihood of falling and either breaking the camera or drowning it in mucky stream water, I decided it was best not to carry it around with me. Feel free to google it and check out images of happy dirt-caked kids grinning as they swing across mud puddles and over rickety bridges.

Following the Crocky Trail, it was decided that we were in need of some delicious ice cream refreshment, so we went to a place called Snugbury's (or, as Dan originally called it, Snuggleberries. Obviously I prefer that one).

We also found piggies. Franzi wanted to steal one. We named this one Mister Oink Oink

From this place, we could see a castle, which Dan had apparently never been to. Once we were able to tear ourselves away from the adorable oinkers, we made our way over to Beeston Castle. Apparently you can see something like 8 or 9 counties from it, as it sits way up on a hill. Amazing views. (Click on the pictures to see them bigger)

On Sunday, we went for a wander around the city of Chester itself. It's an old walled city so we walked around the entire length of the walls, saw the cathedral, Chester castle, a park, a little mini train, the high street, etc.

We also went to the movies, played multiple games of the Big Taboo, and had an all-round jolly good time. A weekend well spent for sure.

Now this week, it's back to chilling in Bangor. However, I have a very pleasant change coming in the form of my dear Catrin who is coming to hang out for a night or two, then taking me back with her to Cambridge for the weekend. Lucky for you, that means more pictures next week! Lucky for me, that means I get to see my Catcat for a good few days :)

Check you next week- same bat time, same bat channel

No More Teachers, No More Books

As off this afternoon, I am officially done with the taught portion of my masters degree!!! Done with exams, done with essays, done with everything class related.... forever :)

All that's left is thesis! (oh that little thing) Sign-ups have actually picked back up for participants, so looks like we're going to pick up a good few more before all the students go home (after June 3rd). In fact, we might just break 100 participants tomorrow afternoon if most of our sign-ups actually show! We're gonna need some champagne or something for that!

That's really all the news I have for you this week, unfortunately. Similar to last week, I haven't had a lot going on besides cranking out the exams and assignments. But now that that's all over, hopefully I'll have something more interesting for you all next Tuesday :)

For more entertainment, here's a video I found the other day of Hugh Laurie on Ellen Degenerous' show playing a guessing game of British versus American slang. It's like my "isms" posts but funnier!



Have a lovely, teaching-free week!

Reading Rainbow

Not much has changed since this time last week. Consumer project/report deadline still looming, as is the impending doom of a statistics exam on Friday, aaand then a presentation for the aforementioned project scheduled for the beginning of next week. Needless to say, I've got a lot to do.

Therefore, I don't have much to say, nor time which I could take to say it. One cool thing happened though, over the weekend. I saw the base of a huge rainbow out my window over in the hills in front of the mountains. What makes it cool was a) it was the end of a rainbow, and b) it was really close. The next day (as we were having on-and-off heavy showers for a few days in a row) another rainbow showed up in the same place! I noticed it, looked back at my computer for a minute, and then when I glanced up again the colors had become brighter than I have ever seen in a rainbow outside of cartoons.

I whipped out my camera to see if it would come out clearly and this is what I got:

I apologize for not having much to say, but the end of term is eating my life. This time next week though it'll all be better :) I'll see you on the other side!

Exam time

Yesterday was the start of this semester's exam period. Today was my first exam, for 'Applied Consumer Psychology'. It wasn't too bad, pretty much what I expected. Aside from a couple of scattered participants to test, that's it for scheduled things to do this week. Next week though we have the final report due for our consumer psych projects, and then our Advanced Stats exam two days later, so I've got plenty of work to keep me busy.

Since there's studying and work to be done, and not a lot of interesting things happening, there isn't much for me to talk about this week. I thought about pulling out the list of British-isms, but I was uninspired.

Instead, here's a bit of comedy about Wales, the Welsh, and Welsh language :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSOaMmeiSZA

oh and this too

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fL2CaiydtLY

Enjoy!

May we move forward

It's May? Really?

Honestly that just sounds weird. In an incorrect kind of way. Like it can't be May because that would mean that a full year ago I was finishing my senior year at Delaware and getting ready to graduate. And a full year sounds like a long time. Being May also means that it's spring time for real, and close to summer. May is always the month in school when you start to get that itch for freedom- to get out and have vacation and beach time already. But there's always that pesky end of the semester to get through first.

Now that we're back from Easter holidays/break, we're hitting the ground running with assignments, projects, and exams. Here's a rundown of what the next few weeks hold for me:

1) Entrepreneurial Marketing paper due today
2) Applied Consumer Exam next Tuesday, the 10th
3) Bar Uno project Final Report due the following Wednesday, the 18th
4) Advanced Stats Exam that Friday the 20th
5) Bar Uno project Presentation the following Monday or Tuesday the 23rd/24th

All that is happening within three weeks from today. Plus running participants. Ready Set Go.

After all those deadlines are passed, it's just me, Dan, and our thesis. We have time slots available this week as well as for the end of next week to try to get as many more participants as possible, but sign-ups are slow. Looks like most of the undergrads satisfied their credit requirements earlier on. If it's too slow and we really need participants looks like we'll start recruiting friends and anyone we can to get our numbers up. Once we have enough data we'll have to start running our analyses which is going to be like stats class resurrected but we won't worry about that until the end of the month after all our other due dates and this are over.

That's the first of my last 2 months in Wales all booked up, and so all that brings us to June. I actually have nothing official scheduled for most of the month of June, so that's a big empty month so far. For the most part, anyway. I am hoping to make a small trip here or there maybe to visit Cat in Cambridge or maybe Dublin or Paris if I can swing it. No official plans though. There is, however, a little trip to Italy booked for the very end of the month into July :) So that's my last two months for you.

I will be home for good July 5th - two months from Thursday. Even though I started this post with "omg it's may" blabber, the next two months til I come home seems like forever. July? That's, like, for real summertime. Summer seems so distant. The end of June (when I go to Italy and then straight home) seems really far away. Like, ages. But Eric keeps reminding me that a constant theme of this blog over the past 7 months has been how fast the time is going by. So I can only conclude that when the end of june does finally roll around, I'll be feeling like it flew by and have no idea where the time went just like every other milestone throughout this year. But from where I stand right now, it's miles away. We'll see how it all goes, and I wouldn't blame you if you put money on it that a month from now I'll be saying "omg it's June?" and then "omg it's the end of June?"

I don't doubt it, but from this side of those two months, it seems like a long time.