Celebrations!

I slept most of the morning and we went out this afternoon.

We picked up a picture we bought at an exhibition recently. I enquired at the Library about joining Saturday Slaughters, their crime fiction reading group, and borrowed their book for the current month, Val McDermid's The Distant Echo. Meeting isn't until 25th May so plenty of time to read it. I don't know if the group will become a fixture in my life, but you have to try these things, don't you? And now that I have more time I can.

Then we went to Geri's ice cream parlour; first visit of the year. Mine was the Raspberry Ruffle and the OH had a Choc-Mint Crisp.

So  a relaxing day - and here's to many more!

Done and Done

This afternoon I finished the thesis and sent it off to get printed, bound and sent off to Inverness .

I was so tense all morning as I did the last few bits I thought that when I finally pressed the Send button I would feel either an overwhelming sense of joy or relief. In the event I felt nothing. Just numb.

I still can't quite believe that it's done.

Of course I said when the thesis was in that I was going to sleep/otherwise do nothing for a week, but I suspect I won't quite manage that. So much to do .... but it will be odd not to be tethered to the computer for hours every day.

In other news I had a bit of a problem with my eye while we were in Amsterdam last week so I need to see my optometrist for a check up some time soon. Not that he's in a hurry to ring me back to arrange that. 

Amsterdam was mostly fun though, more on that and some pics to come in due course. 

All is not welll

chez nous, just at present.

I have been mega-stressed for days about my thesis, not helped by one of my supervisors coming up with a shed load of suggested improvements only two weeks before submission day. I just cried.

However we have picked ourselves up, shaken ourselves down, Taken a View, Taken Advice, Taken our Blood Pressure,  and currently I'm doing the boring  small print revision - full stops behind citations, colon or semi-colon, use of the same word far too often - that sort of thing. And always the difficulties over about  referencing.

I have had some long days and very late nights and it's all made me quite ill - BUT, we're nearly there. I'm spending the rest of today on it, then tomorrow we go off to Amsterdam for a few days, via Glasgow. When we get back I've got the weekend to pull it together and send off for printing. And then I will be free. Or comatose!

Really looking forward to Amsterdam; really looking forward to the day when I press 'Send' on the button and it's all over, bar the viva.

New Car!

The OH is tickled pink with it. He went off  earlier this week to Glasgow to get it and brought it back on Wednesday. I am not so thrilled with it as he is, but then as I said in a previous post I don't get particularly excited over cars. I don't want to be reductionist, or sexist, but I think that's more of a man thing. 

I had my first ride out in it today, and I can tell I'm going to have to experiment a lot to get the seat in a comfortable position. That said it is generally a comfortable and quiet car and joy of joys - it has heated seats - well in the front. Our last one didn't, and I missed them. Not that I'm likely to need heated seats over the next few months, but it's good to know they are there for when it gets cold. He tells me that Land Rovers last for ever, so we'll see if he's right. 

In another part of the forest I finished revising the final chapter of my thesis today. I still have part  of the middle chapter to do, but that's quite short and mainly just missing citations so I am hopeful that will be done over the weekend. I feel lots better. I mean, really lots. And if I work hard tomorrow morning we have promised ourselves a trip to Geri's ice cream parlour in the afternoon. She's been re-opened nearly two weeks now and we haven't been over there yet. Too busy I guess. But it sounds like a good thing to do. 

So on a positive note ....

while we were down in Glasgow for what we now call the Dire Dinner I did do a couple of other really enjoyable things.

First off we both went to Son No 2's Uni Year drama festival. The students all write/develop a short piece of drama, ten are chosen to be performed and they cast and direct them  themselves. We weren't sure whether it would be any good to be honest, but we were amazed by the talent on show. There was some very good writing, and actually Son No 2's piece, about an author visited by two characters from her successful sci-fi series, one of whom she had just killed off on the advice of her agent, was very good indeed. He also acted in three other pieces, and was particularly good in one set in Parliament where he channelled John Bercow to great effect. It was a  much more enjoyable evening than anticipated, they were all so good and you would like to think there would be enough room in the theatre for them all to have the successful careers they undoubtedly deserve, while knowing that it probably isn't so. 

On the Thursday I took myself off to Stirling where I met up with two friends. One of them is on the Board of Trustees of the Stirling Smith Museum which has just had a major refurb of its gallery number two, so we looked at that and the rest of the place too. It was amazing. I am always gobsmacked at the quality of some of the art and collections on show in small town galleries. We also had coffee and some Paradise slice in their lovely little café - both recommended. 

The Smith has a very lovely garden with some unusual commissioned pieces and I was given a 'tour' of that before we went inside - if tour is the word for a gentle stroll in lovely weather. Here are a few pics

I thought this might be one of those seats that are much more comfortable t sit on then it seems they will be - but it wasn't. 

This was my 'light lunch'; cheese sandwich with pear chutney. Totally delicious. If rather large! 

This is not Stirling but Bridge of Allan where we decamped after our tour of The Smith; we had the aforepictured lunch there and then a walk around the town which can I just say, has some very nice shops. 

Feeling Weird

I'm not a very relaxed bunny just now. Partly this is to do with the stress of the thesis which is almost there but not quite, but whose submission date is looming. Partly it's to do with the OH stressing over the problems with the car - which I think will be resolved by this time next week. Certainly hope so. I'm not stressed about the car myself. I view them as money pits which just about earn their keep, and the latest shenanigans have done nothing to change my opinion. But I do get stressed when the OH is stressed - his stress is catching. And partly of course it's the change to BST and all that brings for me in its wake.

I suffer from SAD, fairly mildly compared to some, and the other way round to most. I don't get the Winter Blues, I'n never down and depressed over the short winter days. I lurve them. What I fear are the long white nights  of summer, and the change to BST is the start of that. It makes me feel 'off' and out of sync with myself,  and very restless, mentally and physically. I can't concentrate on anything for long; it's a bit like Restless Leg Syndrome of the mind. It will more or less settle as spring and summer go on, although it will spike again around midsummer, but it seems to be getting worse as I get older and I don't like it. Not one bit.

Tomorrow I will blog about something nicer - the great day I had in Stirling last week with two good friends.  It was balm to the soul.

A Vent about A Very Rude Man

I would say once again that I am deep in the throes of writing up, but actually I am deep in the throes of panic about not having sufficient time to finish everything I need to  before my submission date of 30 April. I did sort of shoot myself in the foot by booking a five day trip to Amsterdam towards the end of the month but we did that way back when, when the submission date was going to be January and we thought in April it would all be a distant memory. Happy (Naïve) Days! 

So I don't have time just now  to write up our trip to the Central Belt last week, but I will  recount one very annoying incident from the posh dinner which  was our main reason for heading south in the first place 

I was sat between the OH and a man who ignored me almost the whole time, because he was very much more interested in talking to  Scottish Opera's Music Director, who was sitting opposite him at table. He did however deign to notice my existence when dessert was served, and offered to pour me some dessert wine. 

'...if you pass me your glass - it's the one next to your water tumbler, with the small stem'. 

That's what he said. I am too well mannered to have remonstrated, physically or verbally, but I will say here that he is the sort of rude, patronising barsteward who gives opera going a bad name. The dinner is an annual event, but after that we won't be troubling other attendees with our presence again.