So the rest of last week was such a blast, I have to tell you all about it. Last Wednesday, after posting the last post, I went to go see Heidi Talbot and Tommy Sands perform at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall as part of the Celtic Connections Winter Music Festival that goes on every year in Glasgow. Both performances were fantastic. It reminded me of going to see Irish folk music with my parents in Fort Collins. I went with a couple who really wanted to see them and we were by far the youngest people in the audience. Heidi Talbot was so cute; she was 8 months pregnant and this was her last show before taking leave. At one point she finished a song and bolted off the stage to go to the bathroom and the guitarist had to take over. Tommy Sands was also brilliant. He is really famous in the Irish music as well as peace scene. He grew up near Tommy Makem and was commissioned by the BBC to write a song for him when he passed away. It was such an Irish performance though. He performed with his two kids, Moira and Fionan and you could tell that Moira loved the stage and Fionan was not pleased to be there. It was a really cute show though and the music was phenomenal.
The next day we went to go see my office-mate's band play. He's the bassist in a band called "Be a Familiar". This was their last show before they start work on their first album. It was the first time I had really experienced the Glasgow music scene and I thoroughly enjoyed it and was blown away by the talent that I saw. We also went to a great vegan restaurant in the city centre that I had never been to before. They had a fantastic Greek platter that was entirely vegan.
Friday was my first day back at teaching 2nd year Astronomy labs. It was great to see the students again and they seemed happy to see me as well. We had a few hiccups with some of the computer programs, but it all worked out in the end. I do really enjoy teaching, but it is weird to be an authority figure to university students. That night I went out clubbing for the first time with a few girls I had met through friends here at the university. One of the girls is really into metal music so we decided to go to a metal club. The doors didn't open until 11, which is so beyond anything I usually do on a Friday night, it was weird to get used to. We met up at this great bar, though, the Solid Rock Cafe. It is a big metal bar and is filled with my kind of people. It was pretty ridiculous going clubbing with a bunch of girls who are all in long-term, committed relationships. They spent the entire night trying to hook me up with people at the club, so I do not think I will be rushing out to go out with them again anytime soon. Most of it was a good time though.
Saturday was absolutely brilliant and MUCH more my style for the weekend. One of my friends splurged and bought the LEGO Millennium Falcon set. When finished, it measures about 3 feet long! We all decided to have a massive LEGO building party on Saturday night to see what we could get done. The instruction manual was 300 pages and you have never seen so many LEGO pieces in your life! I went over at about 5:30 to help sort the pieces and get everything ready to go. Most people came over around 7pm and we started building. At about 11 we were only 75 pages into it, but it was looking so cool, we knew we'd be up all night finishing. We threw on A New Hope, poured some whisky and settled in for the night. So many lines such as "These are not the pieces you are looking for" and "What a hunk of junk!" were thrown out there all night long. It got progressively worse towards the early morning. The last piece was put in just after 6:30am and we all stumbled home, with sore fingers and sore backs. It was totally worth it though and we had such an awesome time.
Most of Sunday was spent sleeping off the night before, or moving very very slowly. In the early afternoon I walked down to the row of shops just down the road from me and hung out with some people down there for a few hours. I then went into the city to do some shopping for the flat for little things we still need. (Who knew that mesh colanders were so expensive? I need to rinse my rice!) All the people from the night before then met up at the cinema to see Avatar mostly out of curiosity. If any of you are considering seeing it, then I would see it in 3D at the cinema. The story is not worth seeing it on a small screen in 2D, you might as well watch Pocahontas or Fern Gully but the visuals were quite phenomenal and it was totally worth the price.
I am now back hard at work, finishing funding applications and putting together a technical document to be published this week. Back to the grind and until next time!
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Home away from Home
Whew, okay it's been ages since I last updated this blog. Upon arrival back in Glasgow I set straight to work finding a new place to live. This consumed the first few weeks back and now I am struggling to keep up with the work I had to put off to go look at flats, sign papers, etc. I basically got back into Glasgow and though I was happy to see Scotland again (while still being torn about missing Colorado) I was not excited to get back to my flat. It just never felt like I was actually living there. I called up a fellow PhD student who mentioned that he wouldn't mind moving out of his parent's house and into the West End and thankfully he was up for it straightaway! We set to work finding places to live, running all over town and constantly keeping an eye on websites. Finally we found a place at the top end of our price range (well, my price range) in a great location. It's just a little farther from where I was living and is in a residential area next to a primary school, a church and a playground. It feels like I'm properly living in Scotland now, in a real flat, not just bunking down in a glorified hostel.
This flat is modern, totally furnished and warm...thankfully! The flatmate situation is working out well so far. A few nights ago he came back to the flat and I was like "Hi! Um...you can join me, but I'm drinking tea, knitting and watching Frasier". I do not think he knew that he was moving in with a middle-aged spinster. He laughed about it though and did actually sit down to watch Frasier, so I think we will work out fine.
The holidays were great fun. I will not go into it too much because this blog is about living in Scotland. In relation to that though, I really do miss my life in Colorado. Things would be a little better if Scotland was just a little closer to Colorado, but it's not. Ah well, I do not have to decide between the two for another two years and in the meantime, I will cherish the time I spend with people in Colorado, knowing that I will return to my life as a PhD student here in Scotland. Part of that may also be due to the fact that that was my first proper holiday I had given myself in a long time. It is a bizarre trick to play on the mind, to have two completely disparate lives, that hardly interact with each other, no evidence given in either that the other exists. Both are solid and happy, but they do not overlap and are very different. Anyway, I am back in Scotland and that is what you are here to read about!
So yes, I have moved, which was one of my New Year's Resolutions. I also finally got a proper phone with a real phone plan. I also had to buy real insurance for the first time. Trying to be an adult without a disposable income is a bit difficult, but I seem to be making it work. These two years left will be a drop in the bucket for the income that will (hopefully) follow. Speaking of which, most of my time now is also consumed with writing funding proposals. These are ultra-competitive, but I think I am in a much better place now. I am currently working on two papers for publication, struggling with collaborators, but it is a step in the right direction. My research since I have been back has been at a standstill while I write these papers and apply for funding. I am also working on my first-year report, for which a draft of the introduction was due today. Time flies; I am already writing my first year report!
Socially, getting back has been a little slow, mostly because of the money and the move. I still had plenty of opportunities to get together with people. The first Friday back was such a blast. We went to the Common Rooms for our usual Friday night outing and since there were no undergraduates back, it was pretty quiet. As the time went on, the pub actually filled with a huge variety of scientists, each group I knew someone. There were astronomers, particle physicists, PhD students, chemists... I really spent the whole night table-hopping, catching up with tons of people. It was a great first night out. The next Saturday was a flat-warming for a friend and his girlfriend who just bought their first apartment. It was such a brilliant party; most of us did not leave until 5:30am. I bought this friend a copy of the game "Set" because you cannot find it in this country and we had talked about it before. He was so happy he almost cried when I gave it to him. We had a brilliant time playing it that night as well as drinking plenty of wine and playing trivia games.
I also have joined a knitting group to keep myself knitting. I finished my first hat the other day and am finishing up a present for one of my best friends that was supposed to be a Christmas present. I also have a super long-term project going that I do not want to give up on! This is a group of women who meet on Sundays at Starbucks in the city centre. I found them on a website that I frequent and I am really glad I did, though it does make me get dressed on a Sunday, which causes much mental distress.
The next week (last week) was the big move. The whole process really filled me with such warmth and a feeling of true friendship the way people came through for me. I had a gap between the girl who was taking my old room and my new flat becoming available. One of my friends immediately stepped up and let me stay at her and her boyfriend's flat in their spare bedroom. They were so generous and happy to have me stay. While I was there, I also watched a lot of Snooker and learned most of the rules and even have my own favourite snooker player now! It was really fun staying with them and I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did. Not only did I experience their generosity, but there were some legal issues with renting the new flat that had to do with me not being a citizen and not having a proper income, but one of my friends really helped me out with that. If I were in her position, I definitely would not have gone to the lengths that she did, so I am super grateful for that. I also had people, without question, help me move, which is always such a hassle. We got all my stuff into one car-load (can I just say, that it is very bizarre to have all of your possessions fit into a single car-load?) and took it up the road to my new place. All of this help was done without me having to really ask, though it definitely took effort for these people to go out of their way for me. It was a very encouraging process, especially coming back from Colorado.
On Friday night, sore and exhausted after the big move, I could not just collapse into my new bed in a warm flat and pass out, because I was off to a friend's ceilidh for her birthday. There is a place in the city centre that has public ceilidhs every Friday night. This is the girl that I basically replaced and she is now working a swanky bank job as a programmer. A bunch of her friends from the bank were there as well, so it was nice to meet some new people. It really was reminiscent of the public dances one sees on Masterpiece Theatre. There were quite a few large groups of people celebrating various occasions and there was a variety of outfits. Most of the men were dressed in kilts, though, even if it was just a tee-shirt on top. Ceilidhs are basically the Scottish form of a square dance, if you didn't read my blog before, and all the dances are called out and taught before the music starts. Most of them are pretty simple as long as you know basic dance moves and can keep a beat. The men are very well-trained when it comes to asking girls to dance and I only once sat out. There is lots of swinging, twirling, whooping, running into each other and the occasional fall. One of the dances we did was actual chaos. There are two sets of partners facing each other, we do a few simple dance moves, then we all go into the centre, the men put their arms around our waists and the girls who are across from each other put our arms over their shoulders. We're all facing in the middle (very closely) and hold on for dear life. The men have to lift us off the ground and spin in a circle, letting the angular momentum swing our legs off the ground. We had to do this about 10 times and it was just as terrifying for the girls as it was exhausting for the guys. It all resulted in good laughs though and it was definitely memorable. I definitely plan on going back, particularly if I have people visiting. It also turned out that one of the guys in the band, his daughter lives in Denver with her husband! It's such a small world sometimes.
On Saturday night, I went over to my friend's house because she was feeling a bit homesick and we had two bottles of wine, ordered good ol' Mr India's curry and watched 8 hours of Star Trek: The Original Series. It was a fantastic night in, not much else to say, that basically describes it. Each night, may I add, it was wonderful to come back to a nice, new, proper flat; not worried if the kitchen was going to be clean, or if the rubbish had been taken out, or if there was any toilet paper...finally a good home!
Sunday I got myself out of bed and down to the centre to knit my little heart out over a cup of tea. I came back, changed back into my pajamas and started properly unpacking, most of which still is not done because I have been working every night on this introduction that was due today. Two thousand one hundred and fifty words later, one LaTeX file properly compiling and my job is done!
Tonight, I am going to Heidi Talbot (she used to play with Cherish the Ladies) as part of the Celtic Connections festival going on right now, tomorrow I am going to see my office-mate's band play in the city, Friday I am going back to the city to meet a friend there to go to a metal club and Saturday we are having a LEGO-building party to build the 5-ft model of the Millennium Falcon so there should be plenty of updates for Sunday (after knitting, of course!)
Cheers for now!
This flat is modern, totally furnished and warm...thankfully! The flatmate situation is working out well so far. A few nights ago he came back to the flat and I was like "Hi! Um...you can join me, but I'm drinking tea, knitting and watching Frasier". I do not think he knew that he was moving in with a middle-aged spinster. He laughed about it though and did actually sit down to watch Frasier, so I think we will work out fine.
The holidays were great fun. I will not go into it too much because this blog is about living in Scotland. In relation to that though, I really do miss my life in Colorado. Things would be a little better if Scotland was just a little closer to Colorado, but it's not. Ah well, I do not have to decide between the two for another two years and in the meantime, I will cherish the time I spend with people in Colorado, knowing that I will return to my life as a PhD student here in Scotland. Part of that may also be due to the fact that that was my first proper holiday I had given myself in a long time. It is a bizarre trick to play on the mind, to have two completely disparate lives, that hardly interact with each other, no evidence given in either that the other exists. Both are solid and happy, but they do not overlap and are very different. Anyway, I am back in Scotland and that is what you are here to read about!
So yes, I have moved, which was one of my New Year's Resolutions. I also finally got a proper phone with a real phone plan. I also had to buy real insurance for the first time. Trying to be an adult without a disposable income is a bit difficult, but I seem to be making it work. These two years left will be a drop in the bucket for the income that will (hopefully) follow. Speaking of which, most of my time now is also consumed with writing funding proposals. These are ultra-competitive, but I think I am in a much better place now. I am currently working on two papers for publication, struggling with collaborators, but it is a step in the right direction. My research since I have been back has been at a standstill while I write these papers and apply for funding. I am also working on my first-year report, for which a draft of the introduction was due today. Time flies; I am already writing my first year report!
Socially, getting back has been a little slow, mostly because of the money and the move. I still had plenty of opportunities to get together with people. The first Friday back was such a blast. We went to the Common Rooms for our usual Friday night outing and since there were no undergraduates back, it was pretty quiet. As the time went on, the pub actually filled with a huge variety of scientists, each group I knew someone. There were astronomers, particle physicists, PhD students, chemists... I really spent the whole night table-hopping, catching up with tons of people. It was a great first night out. The next Saturday was a flat-warming for a friend and his girlfriend who just bought their first apartment. It was such a brilliant party; most of us did not leave until 5:30am. I bought this friend a copy of the game "Set" because you cannot find it in this country and we had talked about it before. He was so happy he almost cried when I gave it to him. We had a brilliant time playing it that night as well as drinking plenty of wine and playing trivia games.
I also have joined a knitting group to keep myself knitting. I finished my first hat the other day and am finishing up a present for one of my best friends that was supposed to be a Christmas present. I also have a super long-term project going that I do not want to give up on! This is a group of women who meet on Sundays at Starbucks in the city centre. I found them on a website that I frequent and I am really glad I did, though it does make me get dressed on a Sunday, which causes much mental distress.
The next week (last week) was the big move. The whole process really filled me with such warmth and a feeling of true friendship the way people came through for me. I had a gap between the girl who was taking my old room and my new flat becoming available. One of my friends immediately stepped up and let me stay at her and her boyfriend's flat in their spare bedroom. They were so generous and happy to have me stay. While I was there, I also watched a lot of Snooker and learned most of the rules and even have my own favourite snooker player now! It was really fun staying with them and I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did. Not only did I experience their generosity, but there were some legal issues with renting the new flat that had to do with me not being a citizen and not having a proper income, but one of my friends really helped me out with that. If I were in her position, I definitely would not have gone to the lengths that she did, so I am super grateful for that. I also had people, without question, help me move, which is always such a hassle. We got all my stuff into one car-load (can I just say, that it is very bizarre to have all of your possessions fit into a single car-load?) and took it up the road to my new place. All of this help was done without me having to really ask, though it definitely took effort for these people to go out of their way for me. It was a very encouraging process, especially coming back from Colorado.
On Friday night, sore and exhausted after the big move, I could not just collapse into my new bed in a warm flat and pass out, because I was off to a friend's ceilidh for her birthday. There is a place in the city centre that has public ceilidhs every Friday night. This is the girl that I basically replaced and she is now working a swanky bank job as a programmer. A bunch of her friends from the bank were there as well, so it was nice to meet some new people. It really was reminiscent of the public dances one sees on Masterpiece Theatre. There were quite a few large groups of people celebrating various occasions and there was a variety of outfits. Most of the men were dressed in kilts, though, even if it was just a tee-shirt on top. Ceilidhs are basically the Scottish form of a square dance, if you didn't read my blog before, and all the dances are called out and taught before the music starts. Most of them are pretty simple as long as you know basic dance moves and can keep a beat. The men are very well-trained when it comes to asking girls to dance and I only once sat out. There is lots of swinging, twirling, whooping, running into each other and the occasional fall. One of the dances we did was actual chaos. There are two sets of partners facing each other, we do a few simple dance moves, then we all go into the centre, the men put their arms around our waists and the girls who are across from each other put our arms over their shoulders. We're all facing in the middle (very closely) and hold on for dear life. The men have to lift us off the ground and spin in a circle, letting the angular momentum swing our legs off the ground. We had to do this about 10 times and it was just as terrifying for the girls as it was exhausting for the guys. It all resulted in good laughs though and it was definitely memorable. I definitely plan on going back, particularly if I have people visiting. It also turned out that one of the guys in the band, his daughter lives in Denver with her husband! It's such a small world sometimes.
On Saturday night, I went over to my friend's house because she was feeling a bit homesick and we had two bottles of wine, ordered good ol' Mr India's curry and watched 8 hours of Star Trek: The Original Series. It was a fantastic night in, not much else to say, that basically describes it. Each night, may I add, it was wonderful to come back to a nice, new, proper flat; not worried if the kitchen was going to be clean, or if the rubbish had been taken out, or if there was any toilet paper...finally a good home!
Sunday I got myself out of bed and down to the centre to knit my little heart out over a cup of tea. I came back, changed back into my pajamas and started properly unpacking, most of which still is not done because I have been working every night on this introduction that was due today. Two thousand one hundred and fifty words later, one LaTeX file properly compiling and my job is done!
Tonight, I am going to Heidi Talbot (she used to play with Cherish the Ladies) as part of the Celtic Connections festival going on right now, tomorrow I am going to see my office-mate's band play in the city, Friday I am going back to the city to meet a friend there to go to a metal club and Saturday we are having a LEGO-building party to build the 5-ft model of the Millennium Falcon so there should be plenty of updates for Sunday (after knitting, of course!)
Cheers for now!
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