MT09 summed up in one huge blog post

Oh, hello there blog. I'd forgotten about you.

Term time is far too busy to have time to write posts about goings-on. So now it's the Christmas holidays and I need to catch up. Here goes.

-1st Week
I went back to Oxford at some point this week, to settle in to my new home and hurriedly do all the maths I was went meant to do over the summer. Not much happened, except for a housewarming party at the new oules house, The Hoot. Lovely to see drama folks again :)

0th Week
On Sunday, I had to go meet and greet my new fresher children. I'm a mum, scary stuff. Gave them the tour, then left them to making new friends and getting steadily drunk/scared at the Turf. Also, ran to the station to meet David :) We had our traditional very-start-of-term lunch at McDonalds. Went to the Foam party on Monday and got, umm, foamy. Eilise and I "helped out" with the pub crawl on Thursday. On Friday, I helped man the oules stand at the Fresher's Fair, and signed up to a bunch of stuff myself. On Saturday, it was the cowboys & indians bop, which was good until I had to cycle home the next day in the rain in my tiny denim skirt.

1st Week
Argh, lectures. 9 a week, which is a slight improvement on last year, but the two 9am's cancel out the goodness. I hate mornings. Tutorials and everything were go, back to the usual. Parts were cast for Snow White this term, and I was Sneezy, a-choo. Ooh, David and I went to the free session of ballroom dancing, very fun :)

2nd Week
Ooh, this was Frank Turner week! Went to see him at the o2 academy place near my house (previously the Zodiac?), and it was an awesome evening. The Beans on Toast guy before him was hilarious too. I really enjoyed it. On a related note, I want one of those coffee tables with arcade games inside. On Thursday, it was the "Official Ball Launch" for Mansfield ball, at the Bridge. Not entirely sure why a ball launch is a necessary thing, but anyways, we all went and a fun yet super squashed night was had by all. The next evening, I went for dinner at St Catz with Will, played pool, racing, backgammon and chatted. Over the weekend, David's family were up, so I tagged along to a meal at Zizzi (Or was it Ask? They're practically the same thing, anyways.) and to the cinema to see Up (in Disney Digital 3D, no less). Having already seen Up (in 2D), I still had to pretend I wasn't crying at the sad bits. I love that film. (Squirrel!)

3rd Week
Halloween :) Eilise and I carved a pumpkin for our house. I spent Saturday dashing around the shops desperately trying to find last minute decorations for the oules party. I resorted to buying coloured card and making my own. I bought a Primark bed sheet and turned it into a bat costume, and David had an inflatable spider (?). The party was fun :)

4th Week
Exciting event of the week was the Mansfield Ball - "Circus of the Macabre" - at long last. Everyone dressed up in their best black tie and I finally got to wear my dress after buying it about 6 months ago :) First of all was the four or five course meal, very yummy. Then feeling very full we headed to the chapel for sweeties and fudge and cocktails and magicians and dancers. Then dodgems and big tops and swing boats and dancing and fortune telling and gambling and just a really awesome night.

5th Week
On Friday night, after a slow Oxford Tube ride, we arrived in London, threw our bags (and booking reference, oops) at Jess, and rushed to the Union Chapel to see Jonathan Coulton live ❤ We made it in sans booking reference thanks to the magic of iPhones and found some seats. We caught the end of Paul and Storm (Yarrr!) and then it was time for JC. Awesomeness :D We sang along and it was amazing. Yay for Skullcrusher Mountain :) After a brilliant show, we headed to the bar to wait and see if the man himself would turn up. After confusion, we met him in the chapel and David basically wet himself in excitement because we got a photo and our t-shirts signed :) Jess took us back to her house (Thanks Jess!) and we had suspicious Dr Oetker pizza. The next day we slept in and went to Pizza Express and then it was time to go back to Oxford. Such a good weekend :)

6th Week
Looking back at my diary, this week seems to have involved going to our ballroom dancing class as usual and going to a careers/internship fair and collecting a huge stash of company pens, cakes, notepads, tshirts and leaflets. Also, went to see S1L3NC3 (or Magic Simon, as I like to call him) and was very scared to watch the stapler trick for the second time. Ouch. I'm still intrigued/puzzled as to how he does some of his tricks, and freaked out that the nail hammered into the nose thing is real (the internet says so). On Saturday, my mum came down for a short visit and we went to see West Side Story because it featured an old primary school friend. My mum got to catch up with her mum, and everything was nice but slightly awkward.

7th Week
This week the venue of our dance class was changed, and evidently that didn't suit many people since we were one of only about four couples that showed up. It made for a good class though, and we got lots of extra tips on how to quickstep. On Tuesday, there was a girly trip to see the Twilight film, New Moon, which made for hilarious viewing. Very funny stuff. On Friday, oules performed the panto for a local school and the kids loved it. Who doesn't love panto? :)

8th Week
The last week of term is always manic. We performed Snow White on Tues, Wed, Thurs. Lots of fun, I sneezed a lot. Jess came to see it on the Tuesday, I think? Thursday night was the cast party and I received a brilliant secret santa present - a t-shirt with "You're making me sneezy. You won't like me when I'm sneezy!" on it :) Friday was a super busy day and after my tutorial, David and I rushed to the bus stop to catch the X5 to Cambridge. After a 3 and a half hour long journey, we eventually arrived at Selwyn College. We went to the Selwyn Snow Ball with Harry and Jess, and had a very fun time :) It was A Christmas Carol themed, and included yummy food, cocktails, dancing, a silent disco, a vodka luge, an unconvincing magician and much more. The next day we made bacon sandwiches in Harry's gross kitchen (Sorry Harry, but have you looked in the cupboards?!) and went into town for a quick wander around. We then said goodbye to Jess and went to see the cules show, Jack and the Beanstalk. Lovely light entertainment, and then back on the bus home.

9th Week
Yes, 9th week! Even though term was officially finished, David and I stayed in my house for an extra week of Oxford minus the stress :) We lazed around, watched lots of films, cooked our own dinner (!), went ice-skating and generally had a relaxing time :)

Phew. The End.