The dress debate

I'm going to be lazy for the second post in a row and copy and paste what I posted elsewhere:

"I've observed quite a few strange arguments on the Internet (well, more than a few) but the 'what colour is this dress?' debate that's been raging on is easily amongst the most bizarre discussions I've ever encountered anywhere. I shouldn't be amazed by things like this anymore but I am!

As for the dress, as far as I am concerned as long as whoever wears it is comfortable in it, that's all that matters."

The debate over the colour of a dress, if you're not up on this, can be found here. Honestly, it's one of the most bizarre debates I've ever witnessed; the comfort of the wearer is the only important factor.

The near collision

I've already posted this elsewhere today but wanted to post it here, too:

"My return bus from college almost ended up in a collision earlier: we were travelling down a narrow, traffic-ridden street when the door of a parked car suddenly swung out. The car in front of my bus stopped abruptly and my bus did the same just in time, which caused everyone on board to fall forward, forced a few people out of their seats (my bag stopped this from happening to me) and littered the floor with bags and phones.

Everyone was okay but it was most definitely a "whoa!" moment! Kudos to my bus driver for his skillful reflexes; better a sudden stop than a crashed bus."

I think most people were shaken but more than anything, people were just relieved that our bus didn't slam into the car in front. Granted, we would all likely have been okay if that had happened but the person/people in that car might not have been. I think the person who opened their car door into oncoming traffic felt embarrassed, judging from their reaction (an apologetic wave) once they realised what they had done.

On the positve side, no one was hurt! In fact, the guy next to me on the bus, who fell onto the floor, looked amused by the whole event.

The indecisive weather and my laptop

There was no college today but I had some work to complete and was strongly tempted to go my college's library to finish it there; however, I chose not to do so.

Why? Because I wanted to bring my laptop but wasn't willing to carry it through heavy rain. It rained in the morning, was sunny in the early afternoon, rained a second time and then remained sunny after that. The work I had to do required the use of my laptop and I dislike carrying it through rain and snow.

At any rate, while I would have preferred to have travelled to college to do it, I completed my work at home, sent it off and then went for a walk. I return to college tomorrow.

Salt?

I accidentally did something stupid this afternoon. I chose to purchase lunch from the college; for my meal I ate a bowl of chips (fries). This, however, is not the stupid part.

The stupid part was when I added what I thought was salt to my chips. I sprinkled a generous amount of "salt" to my meal and then sat down to enjoy it; after a couple of bites, I wondered why there was an odd taste to my food. I then realised that I'd added sugar to it.

In my defence, the sugar crystals, which looked exactly like salt, were in a salt shaker, so you can imagine my surprise when my chips tasted sweet! Regardless, I still ate them as I dislike wasting food; besides, they still tasted okay.

Dome and spire

I photographed this yesterday:

It's the dome of the Nottingham Council House and the spire of St Peter's Church. I like the effect the active lamp has on the picture.

Manchester journey pictures

A friend of mine and I travelled to Manchester yesterday. Here are three pictures from the journey up:

Snowy mountains! Until yesterday, I hadn't seen snowy mountains for years. These mountains are located in the Pennines, which are a large (by British standards) mountain range in mid/northern England. A train from Nottingham has to cross the Pennines to reach Manchester.

As can be seen in this picture, world-famous Manchester weather...rain! I made the sensible decision to bring my umbrella with me for when my friend and I walked through this.

Manchester visit February 2015

I spent the day in Manchester to attend a meetup. I do not have any pictures of the city from the ground level to post because it was raining (typical Manchester weather!); however, I have some pictures taken from within the train I rode up there, which I shall post tomorrow.

Return to Nottingham February 2015

I am back in Nottingham. My East of England uncle and Hong Kong uncle picked me up from Northamptonshire to return me to here. It has been a productive week but I look forward to returning to college on Monday.

This is a phone-submitted post.

Exiting

This afternoon, my mother, brother and I went for a walk together. Our goal was to try out a coffee shop in the town centre, which opened in late-2013. We thought it would make a pleasant occasion for my last day in Northamptonshire for this visit.

When we entered the coffee shop and waited by the counter, the server there ignored us; two more servers came out and they, too, ignored us. We waited for over a minute before I said to my brother and mother that we should "skip this" and we walked out.

Call me impatient but after we'd been waiting and were obviously wanting to be served, I'd had enough of the servers ignoring us and I wasn't interested in whatever reasons they might have had for their behaviour; they could easily have politely asked us to wait a moment - we would have been willing to have done so. The coffee shop lost three customers, all of whom were willing to buy a drink and a cake each.

I shall not be returning to that establishment again.

Canadian ten cents

When out on a walk today, my brother found this coin:

It's a Canadian ten cents coin. When my brother spotted the coin, he thought it was a British five pence piece.

The new daffodil

My brother and I went for a walk this morning; during our walk, my brother spotted this early daffodil:

When I return to Nottingham this weekend, I will endeavour to look out for any new wild flowers; I don't usually notice them because in Nottingham I'm in a more urban area than in Northamptonshire.

Charity night drink

I had this to drink on the night of the charity event:

It's a WKD Blue; it's an alcoholic drink, albeit a fairly weak one but it was sweet and tasty, which was what mattered to me. You'll note that the drink is (obviously) blue in colour, as was the Blue Lagoon I drank at the Christmas party. Not every alcoholic drink I have is blue...I drank a WKD Red that night and Bailey's, which I had over the Christmas holiday, isn't blue, either.

Even though the WKD Blue wasn't strong, I waited until later in the event to consume alcohol; I thought it best for the various activities to be out the way first before relaxing.

Bloggers Blog Party - January 2015

January 2015's Secret Life of Bloggers Blog Party additions. I'm amazed I'd taken enough pictures for that month's blog party:

Monday, 5th January: I cut this cake up and thus, it became my charity brownies. After the bake sale for my class' first charity event finished, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that my brownies were popular in the various staff rooms.

Tuesday, 13th January: My grandfather provided a starter on this night. It consisted of bacon, chicken and an egg. He joked to not expect a starter every night!

Monday, 19th January: This yellow stain on the kitchen floor is turmeric powder...not something else. My grandfather spent a few minutes clearing this mess up (I did help).

Sunday, 25th January: This is Lincoln at night after my East of England uncle and I had dropped my cousin back off at her accommodation. Lincoln Cathedral can just about be seen in the background.

Wednesday, 28th January: I was sitting in the Nottingham market square when this pigeon eagerly approached me in hope of receiving food. Alas, I didn't have any food for the pigeon and thus, it walked off.

Thursday, 29th January: This is a partial view of Nottingham from an upper floor of my college. The campus' higher levels provide several excellent views of Nottingham.

Late blog party

I have not yet posted January 2015's edition of The Secret Life of Bloggers Blog Party. This is only because I've been focusing on others things lately and I haven't taken the time to select images from January for the blog party. I shall rectify this in the coming days.

Away for a week

I am spending the half-term break at my family's house in Northamptonshire. This is first time I've spent a night down here since I started college in September 2014. I will return to Nottingham on Saturday the 21st of February and will be back in college the following Monday.

Second half-term break

My course's second half-term break began for my class at the end of today's English lesson. Classes will resume on Monday the 23rd.

As far as I'm concerned, it's not really a break at all. I consider going to college to be my rest - and that's because I enjoy it, not because I go there to sleep. For the past month, college and my friends there have played a huge part in helping me to cope - many people who know me and everyone who regularly comments here will know why.

Event success

Last night's off-campus charity event organised by my friends and me was a success. It was the fourth and final charity event for my class as a part of the Employability segment of our college course. We raised money for a charity dedicated to improving the lives of disabled people and their families, and we held it at a fancy pub; we raised almost £300 and still have more to add to the count. Everyone had an amazing time and it was all for a worthy cause.

The class had been divided into four groups during this part of Employability and this last group was the one of which I was a part, alongside two of my friends/classmates. Still, all four groups helped one another, as we do in class. I think it was an excellent ending to this unit of Employability.

As nearly all of the pictures I took feature my friends and/or family, I am unable to post any of them here, per my own rules about respecting other people's privacy.

At the college library

I'm currently at the college library and have been here for much of the daylight morning hours. I will soon be leaving the campus to help set up the venue for my group's charity event. Might not have been an exciting day so far but it will soon pick up!

Naturally, I typed this post via my phone.

Fourth and final

Tomorrow is when the fourth and final group charity event for my class takes place, as a part of our Employability lessons. As it just so happens, the fourth group is the one of which I am a part. The group I'm with is the only one that chose to hold its charity event off-campus; in this case, a fancy pub with a booked room.

I'll post sometime tomorrow, either during a break (assuming there is one) when I'm helping to prepare the room or at a time after the event.

Kindle as a ruler

I forgot to bring my main ruler with me to Mathematics class this afternoon. As it turned out, on one of the tests the class had today there were two graph questions, one of which required a ruler and the other it was useful - but not explicitly necessary - to have one on hand. In my ruler's place, I used my Kindle instead; this wasn't a wise idea because my pen slipped, went under my Kindle and I drew a line in the wrong place.

Fortunately, my stapler worked as an adequate substitute for my ruler and I did not lose any marks for any poorly drawn lines; instead, I think I might have lost marks for providing an incorrect answer to one or two of the questions related to the graph! On the bright side, I think I performed well on the test overall, which is what counts; I can improve on the parts where I went wrong.

Sunday nights

At present, I like Sunday nights. Why? Because Mondays are when I return to college, which, as I have made clear on several occasions, is something I've been highly enjoying for these past few months. I like Sunday nights because I know that usually the next day I'll be back at college. So what if it's Mathematics? I still love the lesson and seeing my friends.

Exceptions will be like next Sunday night because the following week is a half-term break. Given recent events, I would be happy to do away with college breaks and just stay there all the time. Unfortunately, that's unlikely to happen. Still, I can look forward to this next week at college; this Wednesday, for example, is when the final Employability group charity event occurs...and it's for the group of which I am a part!

Now been nineteen

Nineteen years ago exactly, my family and I arrived in California. We lived in the Golden State - in the Central Valley - for just under five years before we moved to Oregon, which is the state to the north of California. The last time I visited California was in May 2003.

Do I want to visit California again? Certainly. As I've said before, I want to travel to Southern California one day, which means by default I want to go there. I am not certain about when I'll visit the state again - going there is not a priority - but that's not a reason to be pessimistic.

The veteran

When waiting for my bus this morning, I met an interesting person: a World War II veteran. We didn't chat for long but our conversation consisted of education, sports and a little about his time in the war. He mentioned that he spent his 21st birthday in Singapore during the conflict; his current age is over 90 and while he is obviously more frail than he used to be, he is active and can take himself to places via public transportation. His gripe was with the cold weather.

My only problem with the discussion is that I hope I wasn't accidentally disrespectful towards him in any way. There were a couple of times when I wasn't sure how to respond, such as what to say about his war service ("Good for you!" is downright condescending and wasn't at all something I was going to say). I hope I came across as polite and as someone who improved his day a little.

The scarf

My Hong Kong uncle bought me a scarf during his recent visit. The primary reason he bought it for me was because my grandmother wanted me to wear it on the bus to help protect me from additional colds; however, I have also been wearing it for the way scarves are intended: to warm me.

Prior to the last few weeks, I had never really worn a scarf. I found them annoying and inconvenient and thus, never bothered to wear them. My opinion towards scarves has since changed: my dark navy blue scarf, which matches my usual black attire, suits me and it's extremely comfortable. In fact, since I put it on this afternoon I've only taken it off for short periods.

In short: I like my scarf.

Cracked ice cream bar

One of those minor irritants:

It's an ice cream bar on a stick that had been broken prior to my unwrapping it. Several of the pieces fell off the bar and onto my shirt, which was annoying, especially when the bits melted. On a side note, the flavour of this ice cream was pistachio. Until recently, I'd never eaten pistachio ice cream before and I now think it's delicious. Has anyone else eaten it?

"Of Mice and Men"

The current topic in English class is studying Of Mice and Men by John Steinback. The object of the control for this segment will be to write a piece about how power is portrayed in the book by the characters; as far as I understand, we are supposed to focus on the power of two characters. The control is supposed to take place a week on Friday but I hope it'll be later.

Until recently, I had never read Of Mice and Men. I am currently in the process of re-reading it and am also writing a piece of homework related to it. I ought to complete that homework because I promised I'd have it sent before college begins tomorrow! (I will complete it in time, don't worry.)

Ceiling light

Using my phone's front camera, I photographed this ceiling light at college.

I wasn't intending to photograph this light: what happened is that when I placed my phone down on its back I noticed this light flickering on the screen. I liked the effect and thought it would make a nice picture.

The pubs

Yesterday, I visited my family back in Northamptonshire (I've visited there a few times recently). My brother and I went for a walk in the afternoon; he had already eaten by then but I hadn't and was hungry. As such, we agreed to go to one of the pubs in the town (he would just have a drink).

Until yesterday, we hadn't been to either of the two pubs before but we ended up visiting both. In the first one, I was told that they weren't serving food that day and recommended that we try the other one, which is just next door. In the second, they were serving food; I ate a cheeseburger with chips/fries.

I travelled to Northamptonshire with my Nottingham aunt. We stayed for a few hours before returning home to here in the early evening.