Nothing like good tartan...

Hello everyone! Last weekend was one of fun and hard work. I'll start with hard work, which carries on into this week, because that it's what is on my mind right now. I have been working on an individual paper for my chemistry project (which I handed in today). It was a lot of work and a lot of uncertainty. First off, I had no idea what to expect when writing this paper. I was unsure of how the layout of the paper should be, how to cite properly, ect... I had to do a lot of research on instruments I didn't know a whole lot about and the books I got didn't do much good. Also, the chemistry library, which houses a load of books that I needed, does not have a librarian. Thus, the books in that library are all reference and can not be removed from said library. That's fine...if you live close to the chemistry building, which I don't. It was just more of an inconvenience than anything. So I worked on that last week and most of this weekend. But I did take time out for fun...On Friday night, I went over to New Hall and played cards with my buds and had a good time with that. Probably the most fun was Sunday...however, a little background story to get you going.

On Saturday morning, I went to St. Rules tower to get some tokens for my friend Calen and his girlfriend Brittany who was visiting from Edinburgh. I have a membership so I get free admission, why not help out some fellow students! Anyway, once I got the token, I got a text from Calen and I called him. He was in town and he had just purchased a kilt! Kilts are expensive! He spent a good chunk of change for it, but he got his clan name tartan. The Henderson clan! Good stuff. I met him in town and he had also hired a kilt for the Castle Ceilidh (pronounced kay-lay) on Sunday. Calen had been trying to convince me to go since he started taking ceilidh dancing lessons. I hadn't budged yet, mostly because of the cost (7 pounds) to get in. However, somehow he convinced me to hire a kilt as well and go with! I was a little apprehensive at first, but getting a kilt was one of my goals in Scotland...so at least wearing one is close enough. I hired it and was excited the rest of the day...I went home and tried it on before working some more on my paper.

The next day was the day of the ceilidh...I put my kilt on and headed to church (the ceilidh was at 7 and church as at 4...we were meeting at 6 so I didn't have time to go back to Albany Park. Plus, it was pretty BAMF to wear my kilt to church.) Finally, we meet in New Hall at 6 (after I beat my friend Katie in foosball 10-0, thus making her crawl under the table) and we made our way to the Union. We were bummed because the ceilidh was supposed to be held at the castle, but due to inclement weather, was held at the Union (definitely not as cool...). We had a great time and I did Scottish dancing! Scottish dances are pretty much lining up in circles around the room and switching partners almost constantly. It was almost like line dancing but neater. After the ceilidh, there was a torch procession to the end of the pier in St Andrews and back. It was a good day and a lot of fun. Thanks Calen for persuading me to hire the kilt!


Monday was spent writing my paper and proofreading it...all day. It was lame...even more lame because it was May Day (observed bank holiday) and we didn't have classes...it was rubbish to do work on a beautiful day like that day was...

Today...I think I am catching a cold and it is definitely lame. I don't want to get sick on the last fricken week of class. I got up and went to lab where I waited to hand in my paper. As I stood there, I thought over my paper and realized certain mistakes I had made...I was able to change them quickly on the computer, but it was a rough start to the day. Lab went well; we are making a display for our nanoparticles (which I will take a picture of when finished!) and we worked on our group report and presentation. I went to BeanScene and had a large latte and did studied Greek. I can't wait til I can make my own coffee again, but BeanScene is so good...I've been working on chemistry powerpoint stuff and I am getting sick of doing it. This project is so close to being over and I can hardly wait. I need to start revising for my exams coming up in about a week and a half. I am NOT excited. Also, I did some calculating today and found out that the paper I just turned in was worth about 2.5 credits in the US. One paper is determining 2.5 credits. Oh boy...Only 19 days til I come home!