Too Hot

Just as I hear Britain is getting its first winter freeze, Australia is getting its first scorching days. It's 35° in the shade as I speak, same as yesterday, and this is just the beginning. The butter (for example), which I keep at the back of a cool cupboard downstairs in the kitchen, is liquid. If I hadn't used a butter dish it would be covering the floor.

Although we have air-con, it's expensive to keep it on max all day, so I spent yesterday in the university library, which has powerful air-con keeping the whole building pleasant. The only problem lay in getting to Uni without getting burnt, hiding in the shadows and running for cover etc. The evening was worse, when the Library closed I had to get home with heat coming at me in two directions: directly from above, and radiated from the superheated ground below.

Nighttime is also hot, but without direct sunlight, so almost bearable. I might become nocturnal during the summer just to sleep through the heat, drinking a lot of iced coffee, iced tea, and beer.

I still have one exam left before my holidays start, and a report due December 1st (which is so far after everyone else has started their holidays it's not even funny, and I have some sort of mental block preventing me from doing it until the last minute). Electromagnetic Compatibility (my last exam, tomorrow) I expect to do well on, involving a lot of speculation and opinion, and less memorising formulae. Did pretty well in the assignments too. As soon as that's out of the way, well lots of plans are already being formed on how best to start the holidays.

Most involve sea and sand.

Summer Holidays

Oh that's right, I have a blog. I'd nearly forgotten about it in the last few months of constant work.

I'm not really finished yet, I still have one exam and one report to finish, but I finally have some time to breathe, blog, and maybe play some computer games.

I'm not going to go through what's happened, there were many assignments, some went well, some not so well. The mechatronics robot, for example, wasn't quite finished. No team managed a flawless lap of the course, but a few were way ahead of us. Advanced Power Electronics was... well... advanced, and Electromagnetic Compatibility has been more like an art than a science. My Power Systems presentation on fuel cells went very well: almost everyone else talked about very basic concepts (“Sometimes terrorists break into power stations, so they need to have good security”), but David and I went into mathematical modelling and control systems, which the lecturer liked.

Unfortunately given that I've been tied up with Uni work, not much else has happened. I haven't had the chance to appreciate the glorious weather we've started getting. I did notice that I haven't been caught in the rain for a while, I used my air conditioner for the first time a few weeks ago, and I'm starting to get sunburnt around my neck. Looking forward to spending Christmas on the beach.

The increased heat hasn't stopped me cooking big hearty meals however. I never did learn how to make light summer salads, so I've been continuing with Cottage and Steak & Ale pies, roast pork and roast beef with roast potatoes, Lasagne (which translates into Chinese as 'thousand layer,' so Jonny and Sara were unimpressed when it only had 7), and tonight I'm making Curry. The shops are full of summer fruits and I'm still hunting down root vegetables.

Should be getting a car before the end of the month, so I can drive around more and get some good pictures to send back. The real road trip will take place in January, when I'm planning to drive up the east coast until I hit jungle. Summer holidays here are long, and after my last exam next week I'll have more than 3 months to get very sunburnt...

...or stay indoors playing computer games...