Work in progress!

Just for the record, my daughter is not called Sarah!


Perhaps a bit late to reply, now you've gone to Australia, but BerkshireDaughter studied German and Russian at Durham. She had A-level French and German, but started Russian from scratch. It's probably a good idea to try to master the Cyrillic script before you start uni, as the course moves quite quickly and it helps not to be held back by inability to translate what you see on the page into sounds!

You would be expected to be at at least A-level standard at the end of your first year at university to be allowed to carry on with Russian, but if you're keen I understand it's no problem.

I used to learn Russian at school, because I went to a school that gets extra money from the government from being a language school. But we did less languages than my brother who goes to a different school! I gave it up because it was boring, even though I got one of the top marks in the year!

I used to take a spanish class.

Where did you take it to?

Hillshire Farms.

I also took spanish clases. I was one of the best until the exam came round and i flopped it even though I was supposed to ge a A.

I took Spanish too - just gotta wait for my results on the 20th now Gah! Trying to keep that out of my head...

Sorry to interrupt! Just thought I'd join in the conversation!

Good luck! Talking about Spain (well, the Mediterranean, anyway), here's a random thing I discovered today:
"Several of the fossils from the Cambrian-aged Burgess Shale are interpreted as ribbon worms, and some extremely long worms have been found in the Mediterranean (up to 100 feet long) and in the ocean under the Antarctic ice shelves. "

There are WORMS that are 100 feet long in the Mediterranean? Eeeeek!

Have you ever seen "Dune"?

just back form orchestra course. got a lot to catch up on

Thanks!

And eugh! Worms are okay when they're little 2 inch wierdos but 110 feet?! They could take over the world

I've read the book!
Actually, with hindsight I wish that I hadn't, now that I know there are 100-foot worms out there!

My copy of Dune had the most fantastic typo in it "...was impressed that there was (?) a whole tribe of people who could be thirty on demand" (I think it was meant to say thirsty as it was talking about them being in the desert).




How was the orchestra course? Which orchestra was it, and where were you?

It was great. South west youth orchestra and it was in Dorset.

I've just realised that Solari's signature says "resident spanner" and not "resident spammer"

I'm no longer deserving of the original title

spanner's better lol



2 weeks 'till results and I'm a bit nervous already.

No-one has admitted to having been caned yet (see today's signature )

I'm wearing 'skinny' jeans.

In or out of school, Skylark?

I admit it - I was caned at school. On the hand at primary (can't remember why) and on the backside at secondary school for playing truant. I didn't repeat the offense!

The teacher pretended to cane us when we had Victorian day in year 5...

The teacher on our year 5 Victorian trip got really upset with us, because we were being giggly and silly, and since she couldn't cane us, it rendered the trip anachronistic. She seemed rather distressed by this.

I also got caned at school by the Headmaster (It was 1960, I was 13). He only gave me two strokes though, and I hardly felt it. He tended to have two different techniques, those whom he thought it was sufficient just to humilate, and those he really laid it onto when he was angry. ! Quite a few of our Masters though unofficially used a plimsoll. I am sure the RE teacher got some sort of perverse pleasure from using his plimsoll. His tongue was more or less hanging out when he did it ! But I never got the plimsoll. One games master was reputed to use a sawn off cricket bat, and a Physics teacher used a length of stiffish rubber tubing ! Of course all these things were applied to bottoms.

Think of the damage I could do with these bad boys! I think they represent excellent value per unit of damage caused.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Lot-of-New-Breeze-Bl...id=p3286.c0.m14

Aww - you're so sweet

I just got the best cab home ever. Full spec Lexus with widescreen TVs and I watched Transformers 2 on the way home!

Sorry but I fail to believe you.

*shrug* Fine, but it happened Why would I lie?

By widescreen I mean in the centre console and in the headrests, not big plasmas!

On the rare occasions we get cars booked for work purposes, they tend to be fancy ones like that

Today's randomness: I am having a bash at a movement from Bach's sonata in F for recorder (BVW1031 - more usually heard as Eb major for flute). Anyway, looked on iTunes, I like having recordings of the things I'm playing, though I don't listen until after I've had a go myself so it's not like cheating And I found a copy. I bought it - at the time my husband was doing stuff requiring speakers on his PC, so I just bought it without listening to.

Today I listened to it. It's by a group called Baroque Now. The recorder part is indeed the recorder. But the harpsicord and basso continue is supplied by...synthesizer. It's just weird. I think I kind of like it (in a small dose like this). Very unexpected, highly amusing!

I'm waiting for my strawberries to grow on Farmville on facebook.

The last two times all my crops wilted because I left it too long !

Everyone I know is completely addicted to farmville! Oh dear...

I'm not addicted, I might become addicted soon, but I'm not addicted yet . I have a tiny weeny farm. With a black sheep and a cow.

What is farmville?

A game on facebook. You have a farm, and buy seeds and grow plants, and sell them for money. Then you can buy other things like animals, trees, flowers.

You have to get the timing right, like strawberries take 4 hours to grow, and if you leave it longer than 5 hours to collect them, they wilt and you lose money each plant has their growth time on them, and you can go and check on them to see their growth percentage.

Then when you get more money, you can buy a bigger plot, you reach different levels, different seeds/animals get unlocked, and you can earn ribbons for helping neighbours and things.

It's fun

Do I want to apply for a job in Leicester? It's an awfully long ways south...

That's funny - people here think it's an awfully long ways north!!

This'll make you smile. Went to Tesco's yesterday and met the family of a schoolfriend of my son, who's due to start uni in Sheffield in September. "It's a very long way north", said the Dad. "I think it's further than Durham, isn't it?" (They know my son is at Durham.)

Actually, it sounds to me as if you don't want to apply for a job in Leicester, but I could be wrong!

I don't really want to go any further south than Sheffield, but jobs are quite scarce.

Being from Leicester(shire) I would consider myself to be in the Midlands and not north or south. Why don't you have a visit and see what you think? It's not that far from Durham.

Also...I am confused. I am trying to sort out which activities to take on next term, but I am in danger of taking on too much.

I just got asked by my friend on facebook what has been the best part of my hols so far. I said getting my piccolo

She laughed a lot and asked if I'd seen American Pie Band Camp. I hadn't. She said that in the film a guy goes looking through a girls' stuff, and finds a piccolo case, and thinks it's a d-i-l-d-o case (I don't know if they would blank that out. Probably. Everyone knows what it is though).

Not that I've ever seen a case for one of those, but would it really look like a piccolo case?

OMG, I nearly spat my drink out all over my keyboard!

Is it just me or are a few of the regular forum users rather absent at the moment? Maybe they are on holiday. And some others seem like they need a holiday!!

Did it not taste too nice?

Nothing to do with the taste, it was your comment that basically had me in fits That's made my evening!

I didn't want to take a company move to County Durham from Coventry but I did when they explained it was a promotion . Glad I did though, because Darlington proved to be on the edge of some very lovely country. There is also some nice countryside around Leicester - not as wild as the dales and Pennines admittedly, but not too far from the peak district. But then you know that, being in a Geography department . It has an excellent Space Centre (which I took our grandchildren to yesterday), and has good rail connections with the North and London. But in the end, only you can feel if such a move is right for you.

Best wishes in your thinking, Flossie.

I haven't been to the Space Centre in years. But the train lines are good...

What's the space centre.

Good stuff, just making sure . Last night someone waved and smiled at me, I waved back uncertainly, only to receive a strange look and realise there was someone behind me they knew

http://www.spacecentre.co.uk/Page.aspx/1/Home/

Errrm, it's a centre where you can learn all about space???

It's like a museum with lots of things about planets, comets, the solar system, galaxies, the universe, aliens, bits of Apollo, rockets, a genuine piece of the moon (how amazing is that?). And it has a fantastic space expedition simulator - I went on it twice . One more go and I get put on the list of people to visit Mars! .