"It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door," he used to say. "You step into the Road, and if you don't keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to."-J.R.R. Tolkien

Hello loyal followers and you other people alike. 

A very warm welcome to you from the United States!

Silly cat

Yes, despite the best efforts of my cat (Nutmeg) to prevent me from packing (or making me pack her), I have now finally arrived here and am mostly settled into a wonderful B&B, thus all is well. Work is starting tomorrow, which I think I am now suitably prepared and adjusted for, but I'm sure I'll have forgotten something, that's just one of the many things which keeps my life interesting. 






Yesterday was a very long day, waking up at 8am GMT and going to bed at Midnight Pacific East Coast time! This means it was a 21 hour day, which is not amazingly easy for me. 
Still, it was really nice to arrive in America and instantly be invited out for drinks and a meal with people at the lab which I am going to work at. I got to see an American covers band (which is just like a British covers band, except they have American accents) on my first night, so so far America really isn't doing too badly! I would like to say how amazing Soph was when we said goodbye at the airport, she was so brave and strong. I was very proud of her.


Today I have mostly been sorting out stuff at the B&B, including unpacking and things, looking for a place to live (I'll keep you all updated on that) and talking with people back in England. 
I also went for a really nice walk, after going to a "board games group" which consisted of one guy in a restaurant, so only a tiny club. Not really the games i wanted either, still I have more board gaming prospects on the horizon, so hopefully my board gaming needs will be fulfilled soon. 

Main entrance to Yale Campus

The walk around New Haven was very enjoyable. I walked around the Yale campus, downtown and then the East Rock area, where the nice houses are (and where my B&B is) New Haven is very picturesque in the snow meaning that I took quite a lot of pictures, all of which are now up on facebook if you want to have a look. 

It did finally dawn on me as I was walking around the Yale campus that this was where I would be living for the next year. I will miss England a lot, and everyone there. But I could definitely think of worse places to be for a year.


And so works starts tomorrow, meaning that I should probably try and get a really good nights sleep to avoid falling asleep at my desk on my first day!
I'll probably post again when something else exciting happens, dunno how long that will be, so if you want a post, make something exciting happen! 

This house has a tower. A FRICKING TOWER PEOPLE!!

My Trip to America in Figures: 
Number of "Dunkin' Donuts" eaten: 1
Amount tipped (about): $2
Meals eaten out:75%


Achievement Unlocked! (Speaking of that there is a new episode of d6g, should really listen to that)

"Airplane travel is nature's way of making you look like your passport photo "-Al Gore

Hey people.

I understand that it has been a good while since I last blogged. This would be due to the large amount of exams and related celebrations plus general business afterwards. Due to this, I have actually forgotten the order of events in my mind... This is hopefully not due to some sort of long-onset insanity, but anyhoo... I'm just gonna go over my pictures and try to jog memories from those pictures. I therefore apologise but this is a long blog due to large amounts of forgetting about doing it, I'll be impressed with anyone who reads it all....  Im hoping the pictures will speak louder than words so you can just skim through the pics :p

Right, starting with GameSoc. This was just before my final exam, but I had had enough of revision by this point so just went for a break. This involved playing 7 Wonders, an awesome card drafting game, and Cutthroat Caverns one of my most backstabbing games, which is always fun. This set me up well for my final exam the next day.

Suits! (except Trav, who is lame...)

Then, as quickly as they had started, they were done (I think they went fairly well [but results will tell eh?]) Highlights of the exams involoved a PoU exam that made sex with a "come-dumpster" seem trivial (yes guy that one is for you, i do not like that phrase)  This meant that it was celebration time. Highlights of my night involved some accidental flirting from a slightly drunk Brian, some pretty good pool games, and suits! Unfortunatly I wasn't feeling tip-top and thus I had to leave early...

The following weekend involoved moving out of my room at Twyford Court at Uni and into Soph's house for the week. Sunday then involoved wargaming followed by a night out listening to the University Big Band with some very cool people. Interesting fact: 2 of the people in the Big Band were in HLO with me back in hitchin (Small World eh?) this eve was awesome, some of my favourite music and some amazing dancing from the male singer!

Moving on... (yes there's more :p). It was time for Chris and Karls birthday. Chris has been my mate since 1st year, including being my roommate at Cabell Rd. Karl joined us here in Surrey this year on ERASMUS placement (probably spelt wrong) and quickly became a member of our group, cause he is a pretty cool guy.. Anyway we all had a good night and I hope Chris and Karl enjoyed the celebrations, even though Chris failed to get as wasted as last year... (Chris is ooolldddd...)

I only look a little bit silly...

The next night, It was GameSoc. I played Powergrid and something else, I forget... After this I had promised people that I would play "4 Chords" at open Mic night at Channies. For those of you who have not seen me do this; firstly, where have you been at any oppertunity which I have had to play it, and secondly, get over to YouTube and watch Axis of Awesome doing 4 chords (Benny is far sexier than me, but doesn't have a uke) I would like to thank Emm for the use of her amazing Electric-Acoustic Uke and Gareth for taking the pics. I had great fun doing it!

Nearly there...

People try to hold back the tears...

Friday was another day of GameSoc, where I played A Game of Thrones board game. This was great fun, and I managed to finish in second! The evening was then a farewell night, so that people could cry over Jonny, Ross, Rosh and Myself dissapearing away for our respective placements.

This was an amazing night. I did a triple shot of something (ask Le-roy if interested) that was red, white and blue with Jonny and Le-Roy and said goodbye to a lot of people who have meant so much to me over the last couple of years. So thank you everyone for      an amazing night!

That should keep everybody updated with my life for the last while, hope you enjoyed reading about it or experiencing it with me. :)

I'm hoping that my next post should be from New Haven, where I will hopefully be recovered from Jet-lag in 1 and a half days to get to my new job! I'm really excited about it now and hope to have a really awesome week back at home this week with Soph and my parents etc...

I will end this with a final goodbye to everybody who means so much to me. It's not fair that I have to say goodbye to so many people in such a small space of time, but that's probably what I get for caring about all of you! I hope you all have fantastic years and that they are not at all ruined by all of the missing me which you are going to do! I love each of you for entirely different reasons, some of which are strange and confusing to me, but I'll skip over those... :P In short, so long England!

Achievement unlocked!