A quick update

Not too much has been going on lately, but I figured I'd update anyway. I feel like I'm finally starting to catch up with the reading for my courses, though still not entirely caught up, of course (in other words, there is always reading that I COULD be doing at any point in time). Believe it or not, I actually have the LEAST amount of work for my history course. You would think that course would have the most reading, and that my economics courses would have the least amount, but it's actually the other way around! It's very hard to get used to reading economics, because at Conn, we are given ONE textbook and are really only supposed to refer to it if we need further explanation. Here, we are given 3 or 4 textbooks and loads of articles and essays to read. The old rule of thumb at Conn is "if it wasn't covered in class, it won't be on the exam" but that rule certainly does not hold here, so I basically have to take notes on EVERYTHING while I read. I'm trying not to highlight any of my books so I can sell them back at a good price later, but that just means I have to take notes on everything, which is extremely time consuming.

Another reason why I have more work for my economics courses is because my final grade is determined by 100% examination. We have one exam at the end of the term, and that grade we get on the exam is our final grade, essentially. With history, all I have to do is write 2 5-page papers on basically any topic I want having to do with medieval history. This will not only be much more enjoyable, but also much less stressful. If I know there is a topic I won't have to write a paper on, I basically don't have to pay it much attention.

While on the topic of courses, I should mention that I've had to start thinking about my courses for the Spring at Conn! It seems so soon, but the pre-registration process starts next week. Luckily for me, Conn FINALLY got on board with online registration (think it took them long enough?) so registering for classes should be relatively easy for me.

One thing I have noticed about professors/teachers here in the UK is that they don't seem as into teaching as back home. At Conn, most of my professors are really excited about what they are teaching, and tend to get really into it. Here, teachers seem lke they are just teaching because they have to. They all tend to speak in a fairly monotone voice as if the material is stuff they just HAVE to know about and not stuff they are actually interested in. I guess the one exception is my history teacher, but she isn't great either since she just seems to read directly from a textbook.

Moving on, today, I went into this huge bookstore that I pass every day on the way to class. It's where students get their textbooks most of the time (I didn't get mine there because buying them used off amazon is cheaper). Anyway, it's about 4 floors and has a huge Tudor history section. I was very tempted to buy this book that just came out, but it was 20 pounds! I could buy 4 books at New England Mobile back home for that price... so I resisted the temptation.

Tomorrow I'm planning on going to Hampton Court Palace with my friend Kate (who is incidentally another big fan of historical fiction novels). It's about a 35-minute train ride away, so not bad at all.

I'll have to end this post with a little rant about my living situation. I've accepted the fact that I have a small room, and that the showers are awful because they turn off every minute and the pressure is bad. BUT, today I got really fed up after we had our 5th fire alarm in less than a month. Fire alarms here are much more annoying than fire alarms at Conn because we have to wait for the London Fire Dept to get to the dorm, which usually takes a while (I don't want to think about what would happen if there was an actual fire). Plus, there are 250 of us, so it takes forever just to get back to my room when it's all over. The main thing is that I feel like we've had a fire alarm every week, it's ridiculous. On top of that, there is only 1 working shower on my floor now for 17 girls. We have 3 all together in the bathroom; one of them has had an "out of order" sign on it since I arrived here on September 18th, and then another one broke just last week and also now has an "out of order" sign on it. Coveniently for me, whenever someone takes a shower in the ONE working shower we have, the pipes drone sooo loudly near my room. It's a horrible sound. And since it's now the only working shower, I hear that drone quite often. I'm also amazed at how much paper is wasted here. I get a flyer, sometimes two, under my door everyday for some club promotion. The problem is that a lot of people kick them out into the hallways and now the hallways are always a mess. Lastly, our kitchen is a mess. This isn't so much Astor College's fault, but more the people who live on my floor. You would think that the girls' kitchen would be cleaner than the boys', but it isn't. There are pots and pans in the sink every time I go there, so it's really difficult to wash anything out. People also leave their pots on the stove top, so you always have to move things if you want to cook something (which, trust me, I don't do very often). Actually, tonight I made something quite excellent--I put shredded cheese in a tortilla and put it in the microwave. Brilliant.

Lastly, thank goodness for tv-links.co.uk, it has helped satisfy my new Gilmore Girls obsession. Unfortunately it also keeps me from doing work. Oh well.

til next time!

P.S. Just to let you know, if you have a google account of any kind (gmail or something) you can leave a comment on my entry. Comments are fun!

EDIT: I forgot to mention that it's getting a lot colder here! This morning it was about 45 degrees... and the rest of the week it's not supposed to go above 55 degrees. I might have to say goodbye to my flats soon!