I'm finding this week has just flown by and it's already Thursday which means that I have homework to do in addition to the massive amounts of 'work-work.' The solution to this is obviously to blog. There's only minimal sarcasm there too since it's been a busy week I haven't talked to anyone who might read this still and I miss you guys! Now that we've settled into a routine it seems odd to not be able to call people up at the end of the day and tell them how it went, or to have dinner with them and catch up on what's going on in our lives. Instead I write everything down, to you guys on the blog, in emails, in gchats, etc. and use my precious MBs when the time differences line up for a phone call. Anyway, enough lamenting for now, moving on to the 'here's what I did this week' part of the show. Monday is class day which continues to be blissfully/boringly (choose your own adj) the same each week. Headed down to class early to get some work done beforehand; I like to get my emails out of the way and have a plan for the day set out before it starts. After policy class - which continues to be a challenge to my ability to stay engaged and invested in- I chatted with the professor for a bit since she's going to be my dissertation advisor. The meeting did little to dissuade my trepidations about working with her but at least I got a little direction. School work is tough this week since we have the dissertation outlines due at the end of the week and then two not-short essays next week. After the meeting I grabbed my usual lunch and ate on the way to the library. They're wicked strict on food here, none allowed in the building period. If you get caught with any, in any part of the building they give you a 'disciplinary warning' and take & throw your food away. The only beverages allowed is water in a resealable bottle. The consequence of all this is that I eat on the way to the library and then finish sitting outside it. To the hurried/stressed American deep inside, this seems like a colossal waste of time, I'm used to eating while I work and just being neat about it. Later in the afternoon we had parliament class after which I headed home. I was going to stay on campus and find a comfy chair to curl up and work in but no such luck, it was prime time for comfy chairs on campus. The mood brightened upon returning home though. This weekend a lot had begun to go wrong with our flat. This list of repairs done or needed over the week include: an over that wouldn’t head up, a shorted out microwave, a bathroom floor that when switched on shorts the flat, a flooding shower, a lack of heat, and a chirping smoke alarm. Needless to say, I was excited to see that some of the list had been taken care of (not everything had broken at this point). Tuesday was a workday and all that entails. Typically I head in about 8:30 which means I've started work by 9:30 after stopping to pick up the mail, papers, tea, etc on the way in. this Tuesday had the usual work of going through briefings with a few extras thrown in. There was a personal meeting that I was part of that was very interesting, and later a small briefing on the bill itself. I'm quickly discovering that for all the touting of the Lords as a non-partisan or less-partisan chamber, this does not make it devoid of politics. You can insult someone just as easily in a formal tone with a British accent. Even in the short time I've been here I've begun to notice many of the tactics that plague my own political system back home. Upon arriving back home I was saddened to discover that the fire alarm was once again chirping. It had stopped so we hadn't written it on the maintenance board but it was back in full, annoying force. Wednesday came bright and early because even though ipod headphones can help dull the random chirps, they cant block it out entirely so both my roommate and I were away long before we needed to be. I headed off to work with a friend, a nice habit that’s developing, since we both leave around the same time every day. Had the usual work day although I was bummed to be missing the first ultimate game of the season, the team plays on Wednesday afternoons for a few weeks. Wednesday night I hit up the grocery store, another developing routine but this one's purely because it's when I run out of food now. Finally, after attempting to get some work done, I feel asleep to the chirping of a fire alarm. Today looks a lot like a combination of Tuesday and Wednesday. I headed out with a friend about 8:30, went through the usual morning routine at the office. Today I got my computer though so that means I don’t have to keep brining mine to work. British keyboards are slightly different than American ones though, juuuussst enough that it looks like you can't type. Little things, like the quotes, at symbol, and shift key are different, even if the qwerty basics are the same. In the afternoon I continued to go through amendments, then went home and whipped up some dinner and now here we are.
Random:
I did forget to mention I got some mail this week, a lovely halloween card featuring candy corn. I'd forgotten about it for the most part, even though I love it and can eat about half a bag in a sitting. I was momentarily excited to pick some up and then I remembered that the rules regulating gelatin are different here so they don’t have it. Their loss I suppose, at least I had some before I left the States.
This is a weather related note. Fall appears to have skipped the UK, at least in the New England sense of the word. After having a long stretch of unseasonably warm weather, I had to break out the peat coat this week because it's gotten chilly out. It hasn't helped that the heating is just being turned on in most buildings. Ours flipped on today both at work and at home. One thing we haven't seen much of here is rain. It rained a whole bunch while we were up in Scotland but not much down here in London. Not that I'm complaining but I could probably count the number of times its precipitated on one hand
There's a bunch more random stuff I wanted to talk about but I'm fading fast and have more work to do so I guess I'll spread them out over the entries to come. Thanks for reading and I'm sorry I've been so ramble-y tonight.
(See? That's not even a word)
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