UWE, Goslings and Me (by sarah)

Today I had a bit of a mixed medium day - I went to UWE (University of the West of England) in Bristol to look around their science communication centre and to talk about maybe doing the post graduate certificate there. Being me I arrived stupidly early and was doing my normal clumsy performance with my paper work and bag and what not. My legs have also not recovered from the poetry festival yet so I found keeping up with the lovely woman who was showing me around a bit hard but I managed it.

The university campus is quiet different to UCL and IC and for that matter the OU - there was lovely wall art/graffiti type stuff with inspiring messages through out the place - they are more the sort of thing I would have expected at a six form college - but I love this type of art work so annoyed students by getting in there way to take pictures.

They also had a random fruit and veg stall inside!

The department itself looked pretty much like others I have been in that have not yet had some sort of corporate make over. There were examples of publications and works of the students on the walls and an air of hard work. I feel I was't my normal energetic self as I was having a mild flare up but then in many ways this is a good thing as I needed to check I could get about on a not so good day anyway.

As many of you know I came out of the failed to complete MRes experience knowing that I enjoyed putting together my talk and writing the essays more than I probably should have - add that to the fact that I have been building myself up as a writer and artist over the last few years and the natural shift is obvious - science communication. I've been looking at this course for a while and got a prospectus last year and have tracked down people who have done the course and spoken to friends at the uni about what it is like.

The course sounds more doable due to the structure of it than the MRes was as I like to focus on things - it is in blocks of 3 days which means it is less travel time etc... than what I was doing before which was all evenings and in London. I also now live in walking distance to the train station that takes me to the train station in Bristol I need which is a vast improvement!

I am applying for the bursary but there is only one so it is unlikely that I will get it though I have already writing the first draft of an article for it. Alaric also things this is far more doable than last time - we are in a more stable position and I have back up money for it in case and it is going be less of an issue with finding child care solutions.

Having said all this I am still nervous that I will not get a space or that something will go wrong but I still have to try. And that leads me to module choices - I want to do them all to be honest :/

After the meeting I wondered out to meet Al who was in Bristol (almost getting myself hit by a car as I was looking the wrong way :/ due to being confused about traffic flow and the round about! I also had my waist length hair down which was stupid as it was sooooo windy). He popped over to pick me up and whilst I was waiting I found goslings!

The photos are not brilliant as the light levels kept changing and it was soooo windy - I tied my hair up!

There were ducks and moles too!

I also found a bench with The Personal is Political written on it.

Once home we went to get a cat tree to stop the kitten shredding everything - Mary was not impressed that I had gotten out of the car without her again at Bristol so was very clingy - as was the kitten.

When I got home - I sat down in the nursing chair for a rest and... was instantly covered in cute things!

May Day outing in the Docks (by sarah)

After the BBQ and excesses of the night before the day started slowly with some kitten snuggles and a Dr Who fest.

Eventually we headed into Gloucester for a late lunch - Pizza Express - we couldn't get a table outside boo hiss but the girls decorated hats.

Then Mary spent ages trying to decide weather dough balls were really food or not.

She decided they were.

There was a slight altercation about Jean sharing her food with Mary but Jean redeemed herself enough for desert.

Hmmmm.... Oh yes and of course she made Olly sit next to her!

Then we went for an explore in the docks area.

May loved the water so Aunty Becca had to hold her lots.

Jean was very surprised to find the word RANTS written on the wall - Olly attempted to explain it though he forgot to take phonetics into account - as you nearly always have to with under tens.

I found birds to photograph for the 100 Birds in 100 Days challenge.

Becca and Olly explained paddle steamers to Jeany.

I found more birds to photograph.

There were some lovely sites to take in in the sunshine.

See:

Jean with Aunty Becca's help found out that Olly's hair can be used as reigns on a horsey - I don't think he was impressed!

I found more birds to photograph.

In our explorations we found a dry dock with a boat in it and so we spent ages explaining to Jean how it worked.

I found a boat to photograph!

And more buildings and birds - Jean put her hands on her hips and said 'Mummy will you please stop taking photo!' She even rolled her eyes - which I think is unfair - I only took a few more!

First Summer BBQ 2013 (by sarah)

Saturday afternoon was filled with laughter and chat and BBQ as my college friends Becca and Olly came up for the last of the bank holiday weekend along with another friend Helen. We had a BBQ of course!

The trampoline was a great hit right from the start!

Olly was finding it too hot so Jean (who was dress up as Princess Layer in camo on the forest moon) went and found an umbrella for him to hide beneith.

Here is Alaric with his veggie burger.

And Alaric being sexy geek on the trampoline

Alaric whooing the girls including Olly with his Krav Maga moves on the trampoline.

Or rather wowing should I say.

I took video of him seeing how many strange positions he could bounce in - not sure it is safe for the net though!!

But mainly he kipped on it!

Then Jean helped Helen with her sun block - erm....

As you can see there was rather alot!

Helen's response was 'Do I look sexy?!'

It was however worth it for the snooze in the hammock with beer.

I went geek spotting and found these two lesser spotted geeks in the middle of some sort of courtship ritual - it appeared to involve computer programming languages.

Mary found dressing up as an alien and hiding in her house was the best thing ever.

She was very cheeky about it and kept shutting the door so you couldn't possibly tickle her!

She also put the head band on around her chest and announced they were boobies :/

The trampoline became a gaming platform with Mary running around the players in a never ending squeal of glee.

Then I spotted Helium basking in the sun on the roof of the workshop.

So did Alaric.

He says the cat just loves it when he climbs up there to stroke her - I wonder who loves it more!

I only managed to nock two drinks over and Olly escaped having to play with barbie dolls as Jean opted for lego and minecraft.

The Frist Salad of the Year (by sarah)

It's been hard to get the veggies going this year but yesterday thanks to turning our dinning area into a make shift green house, we had our first home grown salad of the year.

Mary has been helping me pot out seedlings most of which actually survived the lovings of a two year old!

I have courette and pumpkin plants planted out in grow bags - I am in dispare over getting an allotment at the moment, there just simply is not enough space to grow what we want. For a start I didn't want to really be growing stuff in the 'grassy' area, for a start it is supposed to be a nice garden area and secondly we can not make it look nice whilst I am growing things on it.

At the moment we radishes almost ready for first pickings and various salad leafs, there are peas and beans and root crops in various containers. The apple tree and blueberry bushes have all survived the winter though the new redcurrents and black current bushes did not survive a late frost much to my upset.

Jeany is being very good about watering the pots and has her own little butterfly corner developing, also I shouldn't moan as the salad was very tasty and Mary eat the bowl of it I was going to put in the fridge for today's lunch!

And also we have been enjoying the sunshine and having summer cocktails and everything Still no BBQ this year yet though

Kitten Worries (by sarah)

The kitten got very ill, she'd been manic for a couple of days, really bitting people and not settling for cuddles at all, we thought she had just reached a hurtling around phase but then I came home from the poetry festival after midnight and she was all floppy, Al had stayed awake as he was concerned about her. I thought initially she'd just exhusted herself.

But I couldn't sleep and kept going down stairs, when I came down to find my mum holding her I knew she was ill, I woke the house hold up and questioned them as to what had happened to the kitten that day - the baby had y on her (eek I thought), I'd had to clean tooth paste off of her from where Jean dropped her tooth brush (eek I thought maybe she eat some), she hadn't eaten anything, and the amount she'd been eating over the last few days had been reducing - my friend suggested she had a hair ball and I had already had to remove a big clump of fluff from her mouth so that seemed likely.

So it was off to the vets as soon as they were open.

He laughed when we explained the sitting on and the tooth paste, stuck a thermometer up her bum and prodded and poked her - she had a fever so he gave her two injections and gave us liquid antibiotics to give her. I was relieved that it wasn't anything serious though left it could have been but part of me had been thinking please don't let it be from Mary sitting on her or the tooth paste - Al had been thinking the same - what to tell Jean if it had been tooth paste posoisoning. She loves the kitten and looks after it and had gone to school that morning in tears as she wanted to stay with the kitten because it was sick - the tooth paste was an accident. I felt awful I felt that in going out and working for a week the house had fallen to pieces and one of the little dependants had gotten ill because I wasn't there to keep an eye on things.

The kitten is now uber bouncing and happy again with out the bitting or manic edge which I assume was the pain/grottiness she had before the fever broke.

She spent three days just snuggling on one of us, she and the baby were kept apart as we didn't want her pulled about at all. We fed her water through a syringe and the antibiotics the same, she liked being in Al's hood. For something that was basically dumped on us less than a month ago she has become so integral to our lives, the thought of the household without her bouncing about was heart braking. I never do realise how attached I am too pets until something happens. I spent most of the piggies lives calling them silly suasauges and saying how daft they were and then when they went missing it was me trying to hunt the hedge rows on crutches killing my pelvis and setting back my recovery to look for them, I cried and cried over those little fluffies and am still so angry about their demis.

Still the kitten is fine and happy again - I am however currently banned from adopting anymore baby animals. Talking of which I should go and give that bunny some breakfast!