Growing up, EVERY adult around me would always mentioned how quickly time has gone by. I always thought it was part of polite conversation, like "What about this weather!" and such. But maybe when life really becomes your own, you do lose track of time. That's, at least, how I'm feeling. This year has gone by SO fast. I swear I haven't been living in England for over 8 months now! I think the time has flown by because I've been so busy- and when I've had free time, I've kept myself busy with living in a new country. But still, this is madness it tell you! Madness.
My last post was about my birthday, but the celebrations have slowly trickled on. That's probably the only good thing about being away from your family and friends during your birthday- that the cards keep coming in the mail well after your actual birthday. Helps to keep the celebration going! Its also helped that I've been uncharactaristically busy and the weather has been amazing. However, as I type this, I'm looking out at an overcast day. So I think the nice weather is leaving :(. But anyway, on to the past week:
Last Thursday after lab, a few of us popped down to the beach with some adult beverages and enjoyed the sun. They claimed its what the teenagers of England do. But I was too excited about the novel ideas of not only having alcohol in public, but also for having glass on a public beach. That's just craziness! The good times rolled into Friday, where some "lab bonding" time encouraged free food, booze, and a movie. It was awesome. The movie was The PhD Movie, based off the online comics that pretty much explain the life of a grad student perfectly. After all that, I went off to my first English barbecue! Which.... is a lot like the BBQs we would have at home. Although, here's the difference: when I think of American BBQ, I think of hella meat smothered in BBQ sauce. BUT, my family barbecues pretty much all summer long and our meals never consisted of that. Hmm.
The weekend was a much needed break from the otherwise hectic life I've been leading. I caught up with friends, jogged along the Downs, but mostly just lounged around and it was wonderful. But then my week exploded with business again as soon as Monday hit. I've completely finished my first year report and have written a travel grant, as of Monday. I just have one more scholarship to apply for and my writing-based work should be done for a few months. Tuesday I actually didn't have to do anything in the lab, so I went into Brighton, explored the North Laine area (I've now been down every street in that area) and got my hair cut (finally). Did I mention the last hair cut? Not sure. But last time I got my hair cut, I paid someone 50 pounds for it and I HATED it. I then had to wait three months for my hair to grow out to justify paying more money to potentially get it cut poorly again. Needless to say, I was missing Teresa (the lady who cuts my hair in Sac) a lot. But this past Tuesday's cut turned out great- for 12 pounds. I've found my new hair person, what a relief! That night, I went to my last Brighton Festival event- a break dancing show. The main group was AMAZING. And it was probably my favorite event of the entire festival.
The rest of this week has been mostly taken up by doing molecular work, which seems to be pretty hit or miss with me. I can't consistently get my experiment to work, which is REALLY frustrating. And it's 100% because I'm messing it up. Hopefully with more practice I can get results every time. This week, it luckily turned out well. And I'll know my results in about two hours from now :). I've also learned to play Texas Hold'Em (although I'm pretty sure I have a terrible poker face) and attempted a walk to Rottingdean, only to have plans changed and thus hung around Brighton instead.
Life isn't about to slow down at any point soon. I've got tons of molecular and behavioral work for the summer, the Queen's Jubilee, friends visiting, weekend trips around England, vacations (to Spain and maybe more), work-related training, (hopefully) starting my new tutoring job, and getting more scholarships in. Luckily for me, its all extremely entertaining. No complaints from me. I'll just need to schedule days to sleep throughout the week :)
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