“First, consider marketability when choosing a topic.  I know we all want to “follow our passion”.  But if you can’t get a job after graduation, your passion won’t keep a roof over your head.  Focus on something that is in demand in your field or up-and-coming, and do it well.  Once you have the job you want, nothing will stop you from looking at other topics.  But graduate school is about creating a career, not about feeding your soul.  Be pragmatic about your choices and focused about meeting your goals and you will do well.” – Protoscholar via Doctoralnet.com

“With your mind power, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high.”

Ayrton Senna

“Take the risk of thinking for yourself, much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way.”

Christopher Hitchens

“A truth, properly interpreted, is always more optimistic than a self-delusion.”

Scott Young

“The world and the universe is an extremely beautiful place, and the more we understand about it the more beautiful does it appear.”

Richard Dawkins

“If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.”

“Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma  which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

Steve Jobs

 

Teaching myself statistics: http://www.khanacademy.org/

Perhaps these websites can help me when I start writing my dissertation.  If you’re motivated negative reinforcement or punishment, go for Write or Die.  If you’re more motivated by rewards, KITTENS.

I hate it when I’m reading academic literature and I get halfway down the page and realize that I haven’t taken in a single word.  Today has not been a productive day…

To Do:

Finish reading articles
Write essay
Do GIS assignment
Learn everything there is to know about my seaside town
Visit my town
Start writing TP assignment – skate park
Make Thanksgiving dinner
Choose topic for dissertation
- Read read read read read read read

I’m going to start using this blog like a tumblr, because I don’t actually want to set up a tumblr account and I think this blog is relatively private so I can post what I want. Right? Ha. Anyway, now it will be full of quotes, pictures, books, and other things that I like and I don’t want to forget. Mostly it will be a blog of things that are too nerdy or too “controversial” to stick on facebook, like this poem that a very old friend of mine wrote (who I haven’t seen for about 7 years).

“God had to send his son to rescue men
From wrongs committed way back when
On the day we ate from God’s tree of sin
And sent ourselves to eternal hell again and again

But we never stop and say

Perhaps this was a cruel joke to play

Why would a loving God put the tree on their path that day?

Like a father who throws his naive children in harms way

Or a sadistic psychopath, preparing for his prey.

And from this we still suffer, everyday.”

I am an atheist, and proud of it.  I have been for a long time, but only in recent years have I embraced it and I have become much more “myself” because of it.  I have heard every possible argument for religion, and nothing has ever been enough to convince me.  The point is: you can only believe in religion if you want to believe in it.  If you want evidence for it?  Well…good luck, but you won’t find it.  I am far too inquisitive and analytical to fall for it.  I grew up in the most conservative Christian environment possible, and thank “god” I was able to use my own mind to figure out what I really believe.  Christianity = anti-intellectualism, and that is so not me.

“Nothing is more attractive to me than a muddled domain awaiting its first theory.  I feel most at home with a jumble of glittering data and the feeling that they might be fitted together for the first time into some new pattern.”

E. O. Wilson is one of my heroes.

Another list for you.  I’m just going to list some of my favorite and least favorite things about England and my experience so far.  No particular order.

Favorites:

1. My flatmates and other friends
2. My linguistics teachers who are AMAZING, and whose jobs are all threatened
3. The way everyone dresses (guys and girls), also guys hairstyles (not all, just some)
   1. The fact that you can wear really crazy stuff and not feel uncomfortable about it, because everyone else is wearing really original stuff as well.  And it doesn’t even have to be expensive.
   2. P.S. I’m wearing bright teal tights right now, something I would have never done at home (though I may have wanted to)
   3. Finding here everything I’ve ever wanted to buy in America but haven’t been able to find in the stores there (z.B. winter coats that are cute)
4. The way that my classes allow me to read whatever I want about a subject.  I can focus on subjects in the course that really really interest me.
5. The fact that my grade is decided by and essay and exam and nothing else.  I hate busywork!  And I HATE being graded on participation.  I have participated far more in my classes over here because I haven’t felt so pressured and forced to speak, the way I feel at UNC.
6. Public transport!  Although it’s a bit expensive, I could go anywhere in the country if I wanted to!  I love being able to take the train/bus to tiny old towns like Lewes, as well as being able to get into Brighton so easily.
7. The city of Brighton!!!  I really need to explore it more, but it is such a beautiful city, and it doesn’t feel like a huge city, which is nice.
8. The fact that I’ve been forced to do so many presentations here.  I may have HATED them at the time, but I actually feel like I’ve gotten much better at making them and feeling a bit more confident at it.
9. Being so close to such beautiful countryside.  I knew this would be my favorite part of the university before I came, and the fact that this uni is located in the South Downs has made me fall in love with beautiful England!  IT’S STILL GREEN EVERYWHERE AND IT’S DECEMBER!!  Hills and trees and sheep and cows and grass and rain and sun and crisp air and seaside and fences and BUNNIES and slugs and birds everywhere.
10. Being introduced to so many new things and new people and cultures.
11. Cooking.
12. All the knitters everywhere and all the other people who really want to learn.
13. The activism of the student body.
14. Friends who enjoy Twilight.
15. Friends who love Harry Potter as much as I do.  (Obviously I have these at home, too, but it’s nice to have some here as well!)
16. Movie nights in Alice’s room.

Least Favorites:

1. All the massive cuts that are happening to the teachers and departments and courses and student union.  It’s horrific.
2. Mud from all the rain.
3. The lack of grape jam (it’s impossible to get anywhere)
4. The fact that I can’t see my dog.
5. The fact that my grades are decided by one essay and one exam or presentation.  A positive and a negative.
6. The constant messiness of my room.  (My own fault, obviously)
7. Always having to cook my own food…
8. My room being so hot all the time.
9. The difficulty of getting to the nearest yarn shop.
10. The expensiveness of EVERYTHING.  Especially food!!!
11. When flatmates comment on my accent to the point that it’s annoying.  They’re only joking, but it goes too far sometimes.

Time for bed now.  I come home in one week!

In contrast to previous posts, there are also things that I say that confuse everyone else…

“surely” – I have always said this word ALL the time in response to a request from someone.  “Can I borrow your pen?” “Surely!”  Apparently one of my flatmates was confused for several months by this word until she asked me what it meant.  Lol.

“to run someone off” – to scare someone or weird them out or whatever until they leave your presence.  People were greatly confused by this one, which seemed strange to me because it’s not that weird of a statement…

I went to the New Forest (near Bournemouth) this weekend with two friends.  It was so nice to finally get off campus (and to sleep in a double bed!  The luxury!) and the New Forest is a beautiful place.  We went to two cute little tea rooms and explored a little town called Burley for a while, which was an odd place because every single shop was dedicated to witchcraft and the like.  We were slightly weirded out.  Overall, it was a really lovely and relaxing weekend.

I received two compliments this weekend that probably inflated my ego rather more than they should do.

“Amanda’s practically English, don’t let the accent fool you.” – (comment made by friend to her sister while we were eating Chinese)

“She’s a smart one, this American.” – (comment made by my Welsh friend when we were talking about monarchies in Europe)

My flatmates have given me the nickname “America”, which I actually quite like.  It’s a term of endearment, I suppose.

This blog seems to be all about making lists these days, and they’re incredibly random.  Maybe one day I’ll get back to writing proper posts.

I know you all wanted to hear some of my friend’s accents, so here are some really short videos with some talking in them:    (Transcriptions of what they say are underneath the videos, in case you can’t understand them.)  Sorry, neither of these are very good, not really even worth looking at, but it would be a bit awkward to just record their everyday conversations.

Ballet Slippers <- this link leads to a video that I took last week or two weeks ago when we all tried on Alice’s point shoes.

Thanksgiving dessert <-  This one is from Thanksgiving.  What else is going to happen when you give college students an aerosol can of whip cream??  Of course they’re going to make whip cream moustaches…

We’ve started having knitting sessions in my flat!  One of my flatmates already knew how to knit and I recently taught another one.  So we’ve been sitting around knitting and chatting and listening to music, instead of watching gossip girl, like we had been before.  I’ve started working on a new fingerless mitten (“Susies Reading Mitts” if you want to look them up on Ravelry) and it is beautiful.

Last night I made myself a sweet and sour chicken stir fry, which had a billion different vegetables in it, along with noodles.  It was quite good and we had a bunch of spring rolls to go along with it.

Wow, I really have nothing interesting to say.  Sorry.  And I really should be doing my reading for class.  A couple new pictures are up on flickr, so hopefully you’ll be happy?

OH, and an addition to the “cute things English people say”:

“fair do” – a response to something somebody says.  Sometimes also said as “fair play”.  I think this one can only be understood in the context of a conversation.

Example conversation:
“I didn’t go to my class today!”
“Fair play.  I didn’t go either”
Example conversation 2:
“I enjoy eating slugs!”
“Fair do.”

I can’t figure out if “fair do” and “fair play” are synonymous, because only certain people say “fair do” (I think only people from Essex say “fair do”, at least those are the only people I’ve heard it from).  “Fair do” seems to be said more often when the other person has said something strange or unusual, like in the example above.  “Fair do” seems to mean more of “whatever suits you”, or something.

Also:

“Can’t be asked” is synonymous with “can’t be bothered”.

 

 

 

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