End of the Summer

Flossie's come and gone, and I'll be starting Uni again in a few weeks.

Slightly concerned (well more than slightly) about the minor thesis, I've got my topic sorted okay, I dropped switched reluctance in favor of the yokeless and segmented architecture those Oxford guys have been developing. That's electric motors for sports cars in case you were wondering.

Problem is, I still don't know which supervisor's dealing with the motor-related projects this year, all official records still say it's Ozdamir Gol, who retired six months back. A few other possible supervisors are currently on holiday and don't answer emails.

The good news, I suppose, is that no-one knows what's going on, which suggests it's the Uni's fault. I emailed around, and found that not even the brightest guys in the year have had any feedback, so we're planning to jump the Program Director at some point this week to get some answers. Uni starts again in March and I should really know what I'm to be doing by now.

Anyway, writing that minor thesis proposal is what I've been concentrating on since Flossie left. She was here from the 24^th to the 5^th, but was rather jet-lagged for almost a week, and kept falling asleep for hours, so our excursions had to be morning focussed, at least initially.

We went to all the usual places: wildlife park/beach/vineyards etc. It was incredibly hot, well into the 40's for a few days, so we had to hide in cinemas and museums with decent air-con, and we both got a little burned at the beach. Overall though, a very enjoyable holiday; I was going to the same places I'd been before, but discovered things I'd missed, for example (and I'm a little embarrassed about this one) discovering the 3^rd, 4^th and 5^th floors of the Adelaide Museum, which I am sure weren't there before Christmas.

I'm getting very good at giving tours, shame nobody else is coming to visit before I make my return journey, which is only a few months away now that I think about it. Looking forward to Greggs, Costa, Irn Bru (though I did find a sweet shop that sells some here), peppered mackerel, Tennants and haggis (which was impossible to find, despite my attempts for Burns' night); and, of course, friends & family and all that.

Not looking forward to: getting a job, probably far from Scotland, so I'll be cut off from all of the above as soon as I return to it. Still, at least getting the job should be easier now.

Also: I did go crabbing recently, which was just fishing with a net really, mostly sitting around drinking, occasionally checking the net. We only caught one, so didn't get much of a meal each, but we're planning to go back to a better beach where apparently you can rake them in (literally). I'll save my detailed description for then, and remember to take pictures.

Also also: pics of the Australia-trip are up (finally), minus panorama shots, which I'll do later. Pics of Flossie's visit to follow, hopefully not with the same delay.