Great Weather for London Today!

It's nearly 50 F today, sunny, and barely a raincloud on the radar.  I believe I'm going to venture to Buckingham Palace, walk over to Big Ben and walk along the Thames River.  I'll be able to see the London Eye too.  I've been advised to wait until dark to actually pay for the Eye, so I think I will save that for a later trip.

Got in a workout and watched the F1 practice session this morning.

I want to know how I did on exams though!  Not sure when we will find out either.

And We're Done

Well this was a long week.  Even though the exams were only 2 hours each, it felt like much longer.  The first exam, metallic structures was awful.  Two of the 4 questions were on material that was very very briefly covered in class.  And nothing about titanium, or high strength heat treated steels, which was discussed a lot during the lectures.  I think I did alright from talking with most of the others, I think I had the right idea on the unexpected questions.

The composites exam was great, we had been told what to expect, and that's what we got.  I am interested to see how strictly the exams are graded, as passing is only 50%.  The aerodynamics exam today was somewhere between the other two difficulty wise.  Aero is not my best subject, but I had studied a bunch and knew what to do with most of the questions.  A couple I was lost on but hopefully used enough keywords to get some points on them ;)

The bus again failed to show up after the exam so I wound up having to split another freaking taxi back to Milton Keynes.  I don't understand what the problem with having buses show up when scheduled is.  Very frustrating.  I don't even want to think about how many hours I've wasted already waiting for buses that were late or never showed up.

My care package from Jess did show up yesterday.  Cookies, some spices, waterproofing spray for my jacket and some other things that I'd been waiting for.  Unfortunately I can't get the usb video capture device to work so that I can play some PS3 this weekend.  I was really looking forward to that, but the drivers will not install correctly and Windows will not recognize the device when I plug it in.  I don't get it!

Tomorrow I am venturing into the North side of London.  There is a new craft beer bar that opened last Friday, and it just happens to be outside Euston station, which I think is the first stop on the way into London from here.  I'm hoping to find some more adventurous brews from around the UK.  There seems to be a lot of beer culture up north, towards Manchester and Leeds.

Not quite sure yet where else I will venture out to while I'm in town.  The tube does run to a couple of convenient places from Euston, so I will strategize tonight.

I am looking forward to a relaxing weekend, I'd like to go for a nice run or two, get in some workouts, and I should probably clean up a bit around my room.

Into First Exam

Here we go, I'm ready, just hoping for no surprises or unexpected questions!

Easy Sunday Morning, Sort Of

It's been a relaxing Sunday morning.  Done a little laundry, a good bit of studying, and just finished lunch.  Yesterday was fun, met a few alumni, and watched some good racing.  The historic car races were the most interesting, and the American cars stood out drastically because they were huge compared to everything else.

The Formula Ford races were as usual very close and competitive, the cars just aren't all that interesting to look at.  I think my favorite car was this black Chevron.

I took this video of the cars rolling off the false grid:

An original Mini and a Lotus were also in the field

From 6-11-10 Walter Hayes Trophy

With sunset somewhere around 4:45, the racing was over by about 4:15, which worked out perfectly as the F1 qualifying session began at 4:00.  Watching with a few F1 engineers in the house made it a little more interesting!  It was even more interesting when Hulkenburg unexpectedly took the pole by over a second.

Studying is coming along pretty good.  Feeling pretty comfortable about the exams at this point.  I do need to remember that here they expect explanations for all answers, not just the answer.  So I just need to give much more detail than I am used to from my schooling back in the USA.  

Guy Fawkes Day

So, on top of all the engineering knowledge I've learned, I learned about a new "holiday" today.  November 5th is Guy Fawkes Night.  The English celebrate with bonfires and fireworks and the burning of effigies.  The burning part might be a bit tough tonight though, it's supposed to keep raining like it has most of the afternoon.

My week was a lot of studying, and I still have a bit to do tonight, Sunday and Monday.  Honestly what I'm struggling the most with is math - integration mainly, but also some simplification of algebra.  It's coming back, but I just haven't had to do math like this in over 5 years, so I either forget or have to remind myself of things that should just be second habit. Saturday will be a diversion though, we are all invited to Silverstone for the Walter Hayes Trophy, which is basically another Formula Ford event, similar to what I saw at Brands Hatch a couple of weeks ago.  Our event is in the Brooklands Suite, which must be close to the BRDC clubhouse that we visited last time.  It is also an alumni gathering for all former Motorsport graduates, so it should be a great place to make some new connections and enjoy the racing too!

I have gotten in a few more workouts this week, which has been really nice, including a morning one on Thursday.  Can't think of much else right now.  I'll try to write tomorrow after I get back home as well.

Hope everyone has a good weekend.

Study Week

Our first set of three exams are next Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  So this week is a ton of study time.  We have some sample exams, so I will work through those, and spend a bunch more time just going through our notes and beating information into my brain.

I'll try to find interesting stuff to write about, but I may be a bit distracted this week.  I did make a big portion of an Indian chicken and vegetable dish last night, enough that I'll have leftovers for probably 3 more meals out of it.  The time spent cooking was a good diversion from studying though.  We do have a couple library sessions in the mornings - talking about all the journal databases, and how to reference them and things like that.  I think I'm heading back home after the one today though, so I should be back home by 12:30 which will be nice.

Most of you will find it funny that I seem to have become accustomed to the 6:20 alarm clock and getting the bus at 7:30.  I find the time in the morning before class to be very productive actually.  Though I am still staying up until 11:30 or 12:00 most nights, so I hope I can keep up the schedule.

Comments

So I know a few of you have asked about how to add comments or replies to my posts.  The easiest way is if you just sign up for a Google account.  You can use your existing email address, just go here and enter your details.  Alternatively, I've set up a second email address if you do not want to post the comment publicly.  Email me at this address please if you have questions.

I know from the page views that plenty of people are reading, I would enjoy it being a bit more interactive.  I want to know if I'm staying entertaining, at times it can seem like what I'm writing might be a little mundane to some of you, but maybe not. Also, if you have questions about anything technical that I'm learning and writing about, please ask me with an email.  I've gotten quite used to explaining things to Jessica ;)

So in summary, I just want to make sure I'm telling you all about what you are interested in, so please don't be shy about giving me feedback.

Cheers!  (I guess I'm English now)