Pimm's and lemonade

At the birthday event I attended a few nights ago, I drank this cocktail:

It was a Pimm's and lemonade, which also contained pieces of fruit, such as strawberries. The fruit and the sweetness of the drink almost rendered the cocktail a dessert in itself! Pimm's is a fruit cup, as well as regarded as a liqueur.

Hucknall

A sense of satisfaction - and relief - came over me when I saw this sign:

I walked to Hucknall, a town to the north of Nottingham. I walked a minimum of twelve miles today, although I suspect I walked much more once my walking around the centres of Nottingham and Hucknall and my walk after my return bus journey are both counted. I had initially intended to walk from Hucknall back to the centre of Nottingham but I wasn't in any condition to do so.

The goal of my walking, besides the exercise, had been to reach Hucknall entirely on foot and this is what I have accomplished. Of course, I intend to continue my walks but Hucknall walks will be rare! I'm pleased with today's walk but I'm shattered and my feet hurt. I shall have to rest.

On a side note, I don't want my social media feeds to become overwhelmed with nothing but my walking activities.

"Of Mice and Men" control results

My results for the Of Mice and Men control were revealed today: I scored 12 marks out of 15, which is what I expected/hoped for. I wasn't top of the class but I am the best all-rounder when it comes to writing and my scores are consistent; in addition, Of Mice and Men control, as well as the poetry control, involved analysis, which is something I haven't done much of before so all things considered, I think I'm performing okay.

On an unrelated note, I walked to college and back again today. This is the first time since 1997 that I've walked to and from my educational institution in the same day; I did not use any sort of vehicular transport and I walked around 13 miles.

White-collar and blue-collar workers

In today's class, my Sociology teacher devised an excellent and highly memorable way of differentiating between white-collar and blue collar-workers:

White-collar workers: Non-manual jobs/professionals, such as doctors and lawyers. Blue-collar workers: Manual jobs, such as construction workers and hairdressers. My teacher's artwork makes it almost impossible to forget the difference.

One of my friends asked, "What's happened to his head?", in reference to the white-collar guy. The class laughed (in a polite way) at the drawings, although we did acknowledge their effectiveness. Our Sociology teacher is absolutely wonderful; it's humorous techniques like this that make her such a fantastic educator.

Bloggers Blog Party - February 2015

I wasn't surprised to discover that February 2015 featured a healthy selection of pictures for the Secret Life of Bloggers Blog Party:

Tuesday, 3rd February: These are the chocolate and cherry...squares? Pieces? Things? Well, whatever they were, I baked them for the third charity event for Employability. I was surprised -albeit delighted - at the rate at which they were consumed!

Monday, 9th February: This giant Ferris wheel was present in the centre of Nottingham for a few weeks. It was covered with adverts for one of the local radio stations.

Wednesday, 11th February: Before I helped set up the room at Via Fossa for the fourth and final charity event in Employability, I walked near to Nottingham Castle and photographed the area up there.

Wednesday, 18th February: This was during the week I was visiting my Northamptonshire family. This is the box in which Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows came when it was delivered to my family all those years ago. Yes, we did wait until after July 21st to read the book! I can't remember the reason why it was delivered early.

Saturday, 21st February: Taken on the day I returned to Nottingham, these are some rain clouds hovering over Nottinghamshire (note the rain on the left there?) Despite how this appears, it was sunny once I was back.

Monday, 23rd February: I bought this "Spikey Mikey" cookie at a bakery chain called Greggs. It was delicious!

Wednesday, 25th February: This is a view of Nottingham when looking out of one of the classroom windows at my college. As most of the class was away for three days on an educational trip to Poland, there were only two students attending Employability that day; obviously, I was one of the two.

5.4

As it's Tuesday, I don't have college today; instead I...went for a walk! No shock there, given the continuation of the pleasant weather. I have a birthday party to attend shortly and so I thought a late-morning/early-afternoon walk would be beneficial. I was surprised to learn that I walked 5.4 miles in about an hour and a half; the only reason my walk was so short was because I was hungry and had to return home for something to eat.

A major walk today? No, just the bus

I was tempted to walk to college, as a follow-up to my walking back from there on Friday. Last week was the first time since 1997 that I'd walked back home from school and as 1997 was also the last time I walked to school, I thought I'd make things even. Alas, I took the bus instead.

What stopped me? Well, my college bag is hefty and the weather looked as though rain was on the way; I did not want to be soaking wet, which likely would have dampened the work and supplies I was carrying and would have slowed me down, potentially putting me at risk of being late for class! No, I'm better off walking there on a more favourable day in regards to the weather.

International Women's Day 2015

These are my thoughts for my 2015 post on International Women's Day:

"At first, I was concerned when I started seeing International Women's Day being used as a greeting (i.e. introducing it with the word "happy", like when people say "Happy International Talk like a Pirate Day"). I thought this type of recognition was trivialising this day and its significance.

I thought about it some more and while I still hold those concerns to a degree, at the same time, spreading knowledge about the day is a positive action, provided that the meaning and message behind it is not lost. Plus, increasing equality is something to be happy about."

I don't want International Women's Day to become reduced to a mere greeting unless, of course, that only happens when women are truly equal and there's zero danger of society backsliding into past treatments of women. Sadly, that day is still a long way off.

Walk and the crowds

I embarked on another long walk; I estimate that I walked over ten miles this afternoon. I didn't take many pictures but I might post a few at a later date; the more important pictures are from my other two walks. I am mildly tired and sore from all the walking but I'm okay!

Besides my walk, the most interesting event that occurred today was my return home. I narrowly missed my bus back, which forced me to catch the next ride. This second bus ended up being caught up not only in rush hour traffic but also from the swarms of people returning to their homes after a football game. My return journey took double the amount of time it usually takes to get back.

When I walk tomorrow it will definitely be over a shorter distance; I've walked well over twenty miles this week!

The control and the second 6+ mile walk

The Of Mice and Men control for my college class occurred today. I was up until 1:30am with last-minute preparations and arrived at college earlier than usual today to continue with those preparations and additional studying. This last bit of work paid off and I thought I handled myself well in the control; I just hope my work is as good as how I felt!

In fact, I felt so good after class that once my friends and I had finished talking, I walked back home, following my bus route as I did on Wednesday; it took me slightly over two hours to return. I'll have to post pictures of my two walks in one post.

Collected from a non-designated stop

Something unexpected happened earlier. While I was walking down the main road towards the bus stop, I noticed my bus coming; I mentally groaned, as I knew I would miss the bus because I wasn't anywhere close enough to my stop. Regardless, I attemped to make a run for it in the off-chance that I reached my stop in time.

To my surprise, the bus hooted at me; when I turned around, it had slowed down and the driver, who had obviously recognised me, motioned for me to board. As such, it was no longer necessary for me to run; I just got on board, thanked the driver, swiped my card on the scanner and sat down. No further hassle.

What a pleasant shock! Usually bus drivers might wait for someone who is rapidly approaching a nearby bus stop but this is the first time I've encountered one stop for someone who wasn't even near a designated stop. I feel honoured that the bus driver did this for me; it wasn't something he was obliged to do at all. I think it's an understatement to say that I appreciate my bus drivers.

The 6+ mile walk

After I returned home on the bus from college this afternoon, I stayed briefly to pick up a food item and some water before I headed back out again. Since the weather was excellent (sunny, warmish and a pleasant breeze), I decided it would be a great idea for me to walk to my house to my college, using my bus route. While it follows a major road, it is safe because there are paths for pedestrians to use.

My walk began at around 1:35 and I arrived at my college at 3:18, or an hour and forty-three minutes, and exceeded six miles; however, if I count the walking to and from my buses for class plus my walking around the city centre in the afternoon, I estimate that I have walked about eight miles today.

I was already in a wonderful mood when I reached the city centre of Nottingham but my good mood was enhanced further when I encountered my Employability teacher. She was delighted to see me and thought that I had just left college; she was surprised when I told her that I'd been on a "monster" walk!

At some point I'll have to walk to my college and then back again; this afternoon, I took a bus back, as it was late in the afternoon and I did not want to spend another two hours walking for my return journey.

I'll be sure to post some pictures from today in a later post.

"Of Mice and Men" control

This Friday, the control/exam for Of Mice and Men will take place. Essentially, in the control everyone in the class has to write a piece on how power - be it hierarchical or physical or seductive power - is presented in the novella. We have to cover at least two characters and link power in with said characters and the era in which the book is set.

Unless I somehow epically screw up, there is no doubt that the quality of my writing on the day will be excellent; I just need to ensure that I accurately write enough about power and put it into context for the era. I haven't worked as hard for this control as I should have done but I think I'll pull through; it's not as though I've done nothing!

After Of Mice and Men, it's Macbeth!

Class battleship

Today's mathematics lesson was certainly interesting: we played a game of Battleship! That's right, we played a board game.

Don't worry, there was method in this apparent madness: our mathematics teacher was educating us about coordinates and figured the best way of doing so was by playing a game of four-team Battleship. Essentially, it was the teacher vs. table 1 vs. table 2. vs table 3; if a team fired on, say, coordinates (5, -3), they would fire a shot onto each of the other teams' fleets. Naturally, it would count as a hit if a team had a ship there and a miss if they didn't.

The game ended when one of the fleets was destroyed; for this game, our teacher lost while my table only suffered the loss one vessel (our carrier) and had minor damage to another. Our teacher commented that my table appeared to be "invulnerable"; the positioning of our fleet had been conducted well!

I thought our teacher had come up with a fun and creative way of teaching us about coordinates, which was why I felt a little sorry for him when he was defeated. Nevertheless, I think he enjoyed the game, as did the class overall.

The loss of the replaceable battery and expandable storage

The Samsung Galaxy S6 was announced today. It looks and sounds like it will be an impressive phone:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-31645426

There are two problems with it, though: the loss of the microSD slot and the removable battery, as found on its predecessors; I wrote posts here and here about why I regard these two features as important. Needless to say, I think it's huge shame that Samsung now appears to moving away from this formula; my main reason for having phones from that company is because of the ability to increase the storage and replace the battery.

I wasn't planning to buy a new phone anytime soon (I'm still more than satisfied with my Galaxy S III) and my next one would have been a Samsung, most likely one of the devices in the Note lineup. The loss of these crucial features might affect what I purchase next time but then again, the Galaxy S5 had water-proofing, which has been removed for the S6; maybe if people complain the replaceable batteries and expandable storage might be restored for later devices. Plus, if the other phone-makers don't allow users to change batteries or expand the storage, why switch to them?