March 21-29
On Thursday I had my lecture that I went to - here is photographic evidence.
The thing about this class is that we take a break after 1 hour and once that break is over half the class hasn't returned. We only have to sign into class, but we do not have to sign out proving we stayed the full 2 hours. I debated pulling one of these stints, but decided not to as I'd promised to meet with my study group right after so I had to stick it out sitting in a church pew for 2 hours.
After my study group meeting I headed to HiYou which is similar to T&T back home but a little different in their selection (this is an Asian food market). I'd researched ahead of time so I knew what I wanted. I was more than happy to see that they went so far as to put stickers on items that didn't have english translations with the english translations (this including the much needed directions). I picked up some really good items that I have consumed since.
The first being these tteokbokki cups that are amazing. One is the normal spicy/tomatoey tteokbokki and the other was with black bean sauce. I'm looking forward to going back and buying more as I'm obsessed. They're so good and really convenient.
I also got an instant bubble tea thing which was really good. It was basically just milk tea and tapioca pearls, but was exactly what I was looking for. I'll probably just buy the two separately though in the future as it'll be cheaper than buying the pre-made cup.
I then bought an assortment of ramen and a pack of some egg noodles that will last me until the end of my term here. The ramen won't last me, but the egg noodles will.
After that I headed to Tesco to pick up a few other groceries and then to poundland where I picked up a storage container for my butter.
On Friday I had my seminars and then I stayed in for the weekend procrastinating doing my laundry. I ended up washing some underwear in my sink with some dish soap and it actually worked really well, so I did a couple other items.
For my Scotland trip we were able to finalize booking a special private day tour around the Isle Skye for a really good deal, so I'm looking forward to that. I also began researching other Easter break trip options.
I spent the weekend and Monday working on my final essay that was due as well as reading the book I'd be presenting my marked seminar presentation on for my Victorian course (this is different from the short presentations I did for my Popular Performance course).
On Tuesday, I used the entire period of time I had between my lecture and seminar to finish a rough draft of my essay to bring to the seminar to get feed back on. Three other students read through my piece and boosted my confidence with their compliments on my writing and then I was the first to be able to read as we got to leave as soon as we'd accomplished have 3 other give us feedback. I left just in time to cross paths with one of my friends which was nice as we could walk part of the way together. Her mother and grandmother had flown in to visit her so she was on her way to meet them.
I went and bought myself some McDonald's as a motivation/reward and also because McDonald Monopoly had started in the UK. I tried their Big Tasty chicken, which had a special sauce similar to the Big Mac sauce. It was really busy and packed. I waited about 20 minutes for my order.
Once home I peeled off my pieces and ended up getting two automatic wins. One Apple pie and one McFlurry - both had the option of getting a fruit bag instead as the UK likes to be healthy. One cool thing about how McDonald's has laid out their pieces is that fries get two pieces meanwhile the fruit bags get three. So there's motivation to get something more healthy. These will come in handy for when I'm travelling as then I won't have to worry about spending money.
On Wednesday I ended up missing my lecture because I slept in having stayed up late working on my essay and trying to get all my readings for the week done. This was also helpful in the sense I still hadn't gotten my laundry done and wouldn't have the time until Friday, so I was able to have clean clothes available for Thursday and Friday.
On Thursday I woke up early to clean up my essay before rushing off to get it printed and do all that annoying submitting stuff I had to do with my prior essay. Then I headed to my lecture. My study group didn't respond until after class about meeting up. It ended up being just two of us winging our way through the questions.
I then headed home and began setting up my second trip during the Easter break. This will be a solo trip where I'll spend two nights at a cheap hostel in Birmingham (it has breakfast included so that's a plus) and then travelling to Warwick, Stratford-Upon-Avon, and Oxford. I'll end up having to exit from London as it's cheapest to take the Oxford Tube to London and then train back to Newcastle. This gives me the option should I finish earlier than expected in Oxford to possibly check out something in London. I'll call this my Literary trip as in Birmingham I'll get to explore sights that inspired J.R.R. Tolkien, then in Stratford-Upon-Avon I'll be there for Shakespeare's birthday celebrations (I'm going for the free cake). I may have the time to see another town in the Cotswolds, but that all depends on my mood and weather.
Now onto Friday, my last day of classes before the break and a very eventful day. I began my day with my first seminar and then promptly headed to the Percy building to work on creating an outline for my presentation - basically get myself some notes to look at should I blank on any point. Then I had to rush off to the new library to meet my study group. Flashback to the end of February, about a month from today I arrived at the library, put my hand in my pocket and couldn't find my student card. I repeated what I did the last time and searched my bag and all the pockets I owned for it, but came up with nothing. I immediately retreated figuring it might have fallen out of my coat pocket when I pulled my phone out while in the Percy building, but it wasn't there when I arrived. Then I headed back to my seminar room, but a class was still in there. I then headed to the old library building where I could get in without my student card to print out my presentation notes. Finally I got an email saying someone had picked it up from the Percy Building and had brought it to the Language Resources Centre. So, basically I ended up walking all over campus because someone was quick to find my card. If only I'd been a bit faster as I'd have been able to make it to my study group meeting.
I then had to calm myself down as I'd been walking all over campus for over a half-hour and prepare myself for my presentation. I decided to relax in arguable the most luxurious buildings on campus - the Armstrong building.
A lot of my class mates arrived late to our seminar, it actually felt like at one point I was going to have to present just to my professor. For my presentation I discussed Trollope's The Fixed Period, which is far from his best nor well-known works. I compared it to one of my favourite pieces of literature, Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal, mostly because Trollope had meant his piece to be taken seriously, but his radical ideology presented was a bit humorous to read. I also talked about euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, as the book discusses having a fixed period where once someone reaches a certain age (67) they're deposited into the college where they'll live out their final year before being euthanized. I had recently seen a video by one of my favourite YouTuber's Philip DeFranco discussing one of the legal forms of physician-assisted suicide in California, so my knack for procrastinating by watching things online really came in handy as I was well knowledged on the practices of modern forms of killing off the old/terminally ill members of society. Our class discussion came to the conclusion of the idea of implementing a fixed period ourselves, but that once a person reached 100 they didn't have to go through all the legal processes and were able to receive physician-assisted suicided by choice. Take that how you will.
Upon returning home I finally tackled my laundry (2 loads of it) and have gotten myself all caught-up on these blog posts, just in time for me to take a week long break as I won't be bringing my computer to Scotland with me. I will have my phone and internet access, so if you have the need to check-in with me you can message me through social media. I'll also probably keep my Instagram updated.
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