The week
This week has ended up being pretty good really. Monday was... well, Mondayish really. Tuesday I woke up in the most terrible mood, so stropped at work at home for a while before going in. I was totally shattered when I got home, so didn't get to Aikido (was somewhat miffed about that, but it really was the only sensible thing to do) and I packed for leaving at 0830 on Wednesday morning to visit Imperial.
So off I toddled in the morning and got on my train. I'd left an hour to get from the station to Imperial, but then my train was half an hour late... Oh well. Unfortunately, I was a mad fool, and thought that maybe given my visit was starting at 1, there would be something useful like lunch with students. But no, there was no such thing (actually, I didn't get to meet any students at all, which I was totally unimpressed by...) and so I had to survive until 4:30 on my breakfast at 7:30 and two shortbread biscuits I ate on the train. *Plus* they didn't offer to pay my train fare down there (I think there might be an email about that one). There's only one person there who's doing Physics I'm really interested in, and even then it's a bit tenuous. So I'm afraid to say that Imperial has rather fallen over when it comes to my desire to study there.
Was actually vaguely productive on Thursday and got stuff done!! Was v pleased about that.
On Friday I went up to Cambridge for my interview there. I left vast quantities of time to get from the Station in Cambridge, which was good as it meant I had lots of time to sort myself out when I got there (I am not a fan of wandering around with a huge bag on my back in heels). Saw lots of lovely people and I really, really liked it there. And several of them made good noises about me getting an EPSRC studentship, which is a definite plus. So yay :-)
One downside of Cambridge is, however, that it takes four hours to get back to Manchester on the train. But it was bearable due to being a not full train, and then I got home and slept for 11 hours. Slightly disturbing, but probably not a bad thing. Should prolly start thinking about getting some work done though...
So off I toddled in the morning and got on my train. I'd left an hour to get from the station to Imperial, but then my train was half an hour late... Oh well. Unfortunately, I was a mad fool, and thought that maybe given my visit was starting at 1, there would be something useful like lunch with students. But no, there was no such thing (actually, I didn't get to meet any students at all, which I was totally unimpressed by...) and so I had to survive until 4:30 on my breakfast at 7:30 and two shortbread biscuits I ate on the train. *Plus* they didn't offer to pay my train fare down there (I think there might be an email about that one). There's only one person there who's doing Physics I'm really interested in, and even then it's a bit tenuous. So I'm afraid to say that Imperial has rather fallen over when it comes to my desire to study there.
Was actually vaguely productive on Thursday and got stuff done!! Was v pleased about that.
On Friday I went up to Cambridge for my interview there. I left vast quantities of time to get from the Station in Cambridge, which was good as it meant I had lots of time to sort myself out when I got there (I am not a fan of wandering around with a huge bag on my back in heels). Saw lots of lovely people and I really, really liked it there. And several of them made good noises about me getting an EPSRC studentship, which is a definite plus. So yay :-)
One downside of Cambridge is, however, that it takes four hours to get back to Manchester on the train. But it was bearable due to being a not full train, and then I got home and slept for 11 hours. Slightly disturbing, but probably not a bad thing. Should prolly start thinking about getting some work done though...