More summer and the start of degree no.2
Summer in brief:
It kicked off with a 3 day break in Gower with Ben. It was absolutely stunning and with just the 2 of us, it was just the quiet holiday I needed! We did a good amount of walking, some paddling & lounging on the beach and a fair bit of pubbing too. I also took the opportunity to read a lot of fiction, which I enjoyed immensely, but I fear that it was a little anti-social of me considering Ben didn't bring much appealing reading matter with him. I wasn't much in the talking mood, but I don't think he minded too much. This was in part due to having found out just the day before we left that Dave has started dating somebody else. I was and am very happy for him, as he deserves to be in a loving relationship that causes less trouble than ours did, however, at the time I have to admit I was missing him and was sad over what might have been. Anyway, overall the holiday was peaceful, pleasant and picturesque. (my many photos taken there are on facebook).
Phase 2 of summer involved two weeks working at Brent Summer University, an activity scheme for people with learning disabilities aged 11-25. The huge age range brought about some interesting challenges, but I'm pleased to say it was much better organised than last year's and went pretty well in all! The staff were lovely, the kids were lively, but generally pleasant and the activities were all appropriate. I was mainly helping out with arts & crafts and sport. The only downside is that I got a call when I was in Edinburgh from the person who runs it saying that they had accidently shredded my time sheet and asking for my pay details again. I didn't have my pay details in Edinburgh, so said I'd ring her back when I had returned to London, but it then took a week and a half for me to get hold of her and I still haven't been paid as yet!
After saying a teary goodbye to the staff and atendees of the summer scheme it was onto phase 3 in Edinburgh. I went on shift as venue manager as soon as I arrived until 1am and then had to get up at 7:30am to find a GP, as I had a hugely swollen and infected insect bite. It's amazing how I'm so attractive to insects (well something has to be attracted to me), it was the 2nd time in the year I had been on anti-biotics for bites! PGP was manic as usual, but aside from a few drawbacks which I'm sure I'll bring up at the AGM (and the being shouted at by a polish director whilst up a ladder trying to focus lights I'd never seen before inccident), my shifts were on the whole pretty good fun and as usual I learnt a lot by being thrown in at the deep end. I've realised that I'm much better at managing staff than I am at being a techy though! Socially the last week of the festival was the best for me, as friends such as Becky , Si and Andrew were up. I do miss them during the year and it was fantastic sharing a room with Becky and chatting until about 4 in the morning! We had 2 really good social nights too; one was in the fat cow, dancing to cheesy music until the early hours and the other was on my last night where after a post-shift bout in the pub (Doctors), we ended up having a make-shif ceilidh in the street at 3am! I also enjoyed the little break I had in the middle of my time in Edinburgh to go to Andrew & Rebecca's wedding in Lancaster and Morcombe, it was great to see so many old friends (Becky, Andrew, George, Benj, Jo, Katharine, Sean, Bethany etc.). Andrew and Rebecca both seemed so happy; they make a really sweet couple. At the end of the wedding I was looking everywhere to try and find my coat and it turned out that Benj (best man) had packed it into the wedding car, so it seems my coat went on honeymoon without me! It has now been posted back to me.
After Edinburgh I had a long weekend in Manchester, spending time with family for my aunt and uncle's 50th and also having an evening seeing old friends (Liam, Rhian, Amy, Malcolm, Jordan, Adam and Ben). As always, it was much fun.
My final adventure of the summer was my trip to the Isle of Wight with Peter. Again, we saw some beautiful scenary, went on walks, chilled out on the beach, paddled, did much reading, chatted (we somehow never run out of conversation), explored botanical gardens, went to a butterfly house, we even visited a garlic farm and of course took lots of photos along the way.
I'm now coming to the end of my 2nd proper week of my music course and I'm fairly impressed so far. Most the students seem of a good standard, everyone's friendly, the administration is incredibly efficient and the lecturers all have such impressive reumes! The department is brand new and the facilites (studios, practice rooms, ensemble rooms, gamalan, african drums, performance spaces etc.) are fantastic! The timetable is packed full and we already have a lot of assignments to do. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be challenged. We had a exam in the 1st week to put us into sets for "materials of tonal music", which is basically music theory and I'm in the top group for that, but I'm a bit worried it's going to go too fast for me, as I'm in a group consisting mainly of pianists, who will have a better grasp of harmony than me. I'm also not dead keen on my ethnomusicology lecturer's attitude that Western music is impure and un-natural and that music from all other cutures is more natural. Firstly I think he should at least try to come across as a little less biased and compare without too much judgement and also, surely we have a duty and a right to appreciate and study our own cultures in the same way that Africans have a right to preserve their music traditions. Aside from all that, ordering music (like we do in the west) with barlines (oooh, so restrictive) etc, surely only reflects our natural human instinct to create order from the chaos that is life! My favourite lecture subject so far is "Music, sound and technology" It's a well paced, interesting and well structure lecture course and well...I suppose I'm used to studying scienc subjects. I'm still waiting to get my disabled students' allowance, a laptop would really help my note taking in lectures. My handwriting is dire and some of the lectures are just too fast with no visual aids like handouts or powerpoint. Hmmm grrr, I've had my assesment of need and it was sent off to student finance ages ago, but no amount of pestering will seem to get them to get their act together. At this rate I'll be doing my 1st set of exams before I see any of the equipment I need for my course!
In other news, I've just starting dating somebody. Somebody jewish believe it or not, but not religious. we've been seeing each other for about a month now and are getting on very well. He's a really nice guy, we can chat easily, he's clever, geeky, musical, active, kind, intelligent, loves nature and basically ticks all the boxes for me. I'm still waiting for him to get sick of me, as seems to be the way of these things. I've notivced that the happier I am, the sillier I get and I've been acting very silly around him and come up with all kinds of random hairbrained schemes; I just hope he can put up with my childish frivolity and that it doesn't put him off! Only time will tell I suppose.
It kicked off with a 3 day break in Gower with Ben. It was absolutely stunning and with just the 2 of us, it was just the quiet holiday I needed! We did a good amount of walking, some paddling & lounging on the beach and a fair bit of pubbing too. I also took the opportunity to read a lot of fiction, which I enjoyed immensely, but I fear that it was a little anti-social of me considering Ben didn't bring much appealing reading matter with him. I wasn't much in the talking mood, but I don't think he minded too much. This was in part due to having found out just the day before we left that Dave has started dating somebody else. I was and am very happy for him, as he deserves to be in a loving relationship that causes less trouble than ours did, however, at the time I have to admit I was missing him and was sad over what might have been. Anyway, overall the holiday was peaceful, pleasant and picturesque. (my many photos taken there are on facebook).
Phase 2 of summer involved two weeks working at Brent Summer University, an activity scheme for people with learning disabilities aged 11-25. The huge age range brought about some interesting challenges, but I'm pleased to say it was much better organised than last year's and went pretty well in all! The staff were lovely, the kids were lively, but generally pleasant and the activities were all appropriate. I was mainly helping out with arts & crafts and sport. The only downside is that I got a call when I was in Edinburgh from the person who runs it saying that they had accidently shredded my time sheet and asking for my pay details again. I didn't have my pay details in Edinburgh, so said I'd ring her back when I had returned to London, but it then took a week and a half for me to get hold of her and I still haven't been paid as yet!
After saying a teary goodbye to the staff and atendees of the summer scheme it was onto phase 3 in Edinburgh. I went on shift as venue manager as soon as I arrived until 1am and then had to get up at 7:30am to find a GP, as I had a hugely swollen and infected insect bite. It's amazing how I'm so attractive to insects (well something has to be attracted to me), it was the 2nd time in the year I had been on anti-biotics for bites! PGP was manic as usual, but aside from a few drawbacks which I'm sure I'll bring up at the AGM (and the being shouted at by a polish director whilst up a ladder trying to focus lights I'd never seen before inccident), my shifts were on the whole pretty good fun and as usual I learnt a lot by being thrown in at the deep end. I've realised that I'm much better at managing staff than I am at being a techy though! Socially the last week of the festival was the best for me, as friends such as Becky , Si and Andrew were up. I do miss them during the year and it was fantastic sharing a room with Becky and chatting until about 4 in the morning! We had 2 really good social nights too; one was in the fat cow, dancing to cheesy music until the early hours and the other was on my last night where after a post-shift bout in the pub (Doctors), we ended up having a make-shif ceilidh in the street at 3am! I also enjoyed the little break I had in the middle of my time in Edinburgh to go to Andrew & Rebecca's wedding in Lancaster and Morcombe, it was great to see so many old friends (Becky, Andrew, George, Benj, Jo, Katharine, Sean, Bethany etc.). Andrew and Rebecca both seemed so happy; they make a really sweet couple. At the end of the wedding I was looking everywhere to try and find my coat and it turned out that Benj (best man) had packed it into the wedding car, so it seems my coat went on honeymoon without me! It has now been posted back to me.
After Edinburgh I had a long weekend in Manchester, spending time with family for my aunt and uncle's 50th and also having an evening seeing old friends (Liam, Rhian, Amy, Malcolm, Jordan, Adam and Ben). As always, it was much fun.
My final adventure of the summer was my trip to the Isle of Wight with Peter. Again, we saw some beautiful scenary, went on walks, chilled out on the beach, paddled, did much reading, chatted (we somehow never run out of conversation), explored botanical gardens, went to a butterfly house, we even visited a garlic farm and of course took lots of photos along the way.
I'm now coming to the end of my 2nd proper week of my music course and I'm fairly impressed so far. Most the students seem of a good standard, everyone's friendly, the administration is incredibly efficient and the lecturers all have such impressive reumes! The department is brand new and the facilites (studios, practice rooms, ensemble rooms, gamalan, african drums, performance spaces etc.) are fantastic! The timetable is packed full and we already have a lot of assignments to do. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be challenged. We had a exam in the 1st week to put us into sets for "materials of tonal music", which is basically music theory and I'm in the top group for that, but I'm a bit worried it's going to go too fast for me, as I'm in a group consisting mainly of pianists, who will have a better grasp of harmony than me. I'm also not dead keen on my ethnomusicology lecturer's attitude that Western music is impure and un-natural and that music from all other cutures is more natural. Firstly I think he should at least try to come across as a little less biased and compare without too much judgement and also, surely we have a duty and a right to appreciate and study our own cultures in the same way that Africans have a right to preserve their music traditions. Aside from all that, ordering music (like we do in the west) with barlines (oooh, so restrictive) etc, surely only reflects our natural human instinct to create order from the chaos that is life! My favourite lecture subject so far is "Music, sound and technology" It's a well paced, interesting and well structure lecture course and well...I suppose I'm used to studying scienc subjects. I'm still waiting to get my disabled students' allowance, a laptop would really help my note taking in lectures. My handwriting is dire and some of the lectures are just too fast with no visual aids like handouts or powerpoint. Hmmm grrr, I've had my assesment of need and it was sent off to student finance ages ago, but no amount of pestering will seem to get them to get their act together. At this rate I'll be doing my 1st set of exams before I see any of the equipment I need for my course!
In other news, I've just starting dating somebody. Somebody jewish believe it or not, but not religious. we've been seeing each other for about a month now and are getting on very well. He's a really nice guy, we can chat easily, he's clever, geeky, musical, active, kind, intelligent, loves nature and basically ticks all the boxes for me. I'm still waiting for him to get sick of me, as seems to be the way of these things. I've notivced that the happier I am, the sillier I get and I've been acting very silly around him and come up with all kinds of random hairbrained schemes; I just hope he can put up with my childish frivolity and that it doesn't put him off! Only time will tell I suppose.