...

Man, have I been busy.

Aside from a not-particularly-exciting-but-useful-and-necessary stint in the Uni library in Edinburgh the other day to get more essay-related work done, I've been up to rather a lot.

Firstly, there's my flat in Edinburgh. It's ace. It's certainly an improvement on where I lived in second year, a flat that has been dubbed "Little Chechnya" by my flatmate. Decent size, nice rooms, clean. All of which are a marked improvement. Plus, I have a kitchen that you can actually fit more than one person in. Bonus.

I also got "training" for my work in August (which involves riding rickshaws round Edinburgh). The Royal Mile is not fun to cycle up, but the rest was grand. So now I've got a month and a bit to get myself into better shape to make sure that I don't actually die...

I've been watching some of the World Cup (not much of a football fan, but the World Cup's good fun), and marvelling at the morons that ITV subject us to, and being amused that each of the three non-native speakers of English that the BBC have had in as pundits (Leonardo, Marcel Dessaile and Ruud Guilit) can be more articulate than Ian Wright and Alan Hansen put together. Last night I also marvelled at a refereeing performance that saw one Croatian getting booked 3 times before finally getting sent off...

In slightly more important sporting events though, I watched Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals the other night, which was superb. Carolina wins their first championship, and I don't end up going to bed until nearly 4...

I've decided that I want to learn Spanish. I've been debating learning a third language for a while, as it's something I really want to do, and Spanish fits the bill on numerous counts. It's useful (spoken by lots of people!) and it's something I'd be able to teach were I to go into teaching (once I aquire a decent qualification in it, of course).

I've discovered the rather fantastic music of Silbermond, a band from Germany.

So it's been a fairly hectic couple of weeks. I've now got a month and a bit before I start "work", in which I want to get my two essays properly finished, polished up, bibliographies written and all that jazz...

Bonnie Scotland....

Oh yeah, I'm back :)

It's been a couple of (busy) days since I flew back on Wednesday. The actual trip back was fairly uneventful, aside from a rather frantic run through Stansted airport. I mean, I'm flying back on the day that half of England's flying to Germany.....I made my flight with roughly 5 seconds to spare. Score.

Anyway, my last week in Austria was eventful - in between moving out of my flat and going out an awful lot, we fitted in a wee trip to Bad Gastein, a wee town in the Alps. Basically it's full of big thermal spas, and surrounded by mountains. It's an odd feeling - standing outside in the snow (it's June!!!) wearing nothing but swimming shorts, surrounded by enormous mountains...it was fantastic. The thermal pools, the saunas (with a worrying compulsorary-nakedness policy...), it was grand. My last two days were spent kicking around Vienna, seeing people, going out, doing things I'd not yet done - also great fun. I love that city, it's truly fantastic, and I miss it. I didn't even live there, but I was there often enough :)

But anyway, being back's great - I miss Austria loads, as I had a fantastic life there, but home's home. I'm still not properly settled in, in that I've yet to unpack, but it's nice. I've been busy - spent yesterday playing tennis, seeing friends in town, playing volleyball on the beach then going to the pub. The last bit was particularly nice, as I'd not yet experienced the lovely smoke-free pubs of Scotland. Love it :)

I'm currently sitting listening to the fantastic new Less Than Jake album, which is really very good. Good for the nice sunny weather too...

Anyway, I should post often enough in the summer once I'm back on the planet (metaphorically) and organised. No employment for me 'till August, when I'm off to Edinburgh to ride a rickshaw for the hordes of tourists around during the festival. No, really.