Sleeping In, Monty Python and the SSL
Monday morning was spent sleeping in after another late night on Sunday. I basically messed up my sleep cycle after returning late from the ballroom dancing tournament on Saturday, so I spent a lazy morning lying in bed and getting up for lunch. Sunday night was spent chatting on MSN Messenger and watching Monty Python's The Quest for the Holy Grail. Now, Monty Python is one of those uniquely British phenomena: many of them are obsessed about it and think its the funniest thing in the world, whilst non-Brits will just shake their head in bemusement wondering what on earth those Brits are going on about. I have definitely had a few friends who just loved making the most obscure references to Monty Python sketches, so I decided to have a look and actually see whether it was as hilarious as I was assured it would be. Admittedly, the humour was very varied, from the quite slapstick, to the dry tongue in cheek variety that the British do so well, but I did find it very very funny. They seem to have that very rare ability to do the most outrageous things, which wouldn't necessarily be very humourous most of the time, and make it come out seeming absolutely drop dead laugh-out loud funny. Highlights must be the killer bunny, the knights who go nih, and of course those pesky insult laden Frenchmen henchmen. But I had better stop now before I become one of those Monty Python enthusiasts that begin to wax lyrical about it!
Monday afternoon was spent in the Social Science Library (SSL in student lingo) where I was forced to sit in and look at two books for my Middle East politics essay. One of the books was so obscure that I had actually had to stack request it from deep in the bowels of wherever they keep the millions of books that are on the library catalouges. It was the first time I had spent any serious amount of time in the new library building - I tend to just take the books out and read them in my room - its much nicer to have the material with you as you are writing the essay itself. Sitting there, I greatly appreciated the new facilities - there was ample shelve space, lots of new computers, nice desks and a new complex card swiping system to get into the library itself, but it somehow made me pine for the old Politics and International Relations library which was in a wonderful 19th century stone building right on George Street. This new giant glass monstrosity just seemed so much more impersonal. Anyway, the library was chock full of people, as it to be expected seeing that it is approaching the final examinations for many of the third years, and there was a palpable atmosphere of intensity and stress throughout the library. Some desks were cluttered not only with books, but enormous files and pencil cases and discmans, and it was evident that people had set up shop there for some time. All in all, I am amazed again at how difficult it is to work through material, especially if you are faced with the fact that you will not have access to it for the essay. I did manage to do some photocopying, but a good 4 hours in the library went by with the feeling that I had not really accomplished all that much.
The evening was another lazy one. I watch the final of University Challenge which was really good, though UCL didn't stand much of a chance against Corpus, and were trailing something like 110 to -5 at one point, though a late rally by them did make the scores slightly more respectable. Then, it was the usual routine of shooting a couple games of pool and having a pint in the college bar - it is amazing how fast the evening goes by just doing stuff like that. Though I really enjoyed it, you get the nagging feeling that in the context of Oxford you are somehow wasting an evening that way - you should be attending a talk (of which there were a fair number of interesting ones to go for) or watching a play, or a concert or something along those lines. Sometimes, I have found that it is important to just learn to take things slowly and to relax. Still, it has been a term in which I have not seemed to do very much, what with 2 weeks already gone, and hardly any lectures to attend. I am sure that there will be lots of things to do in the rest of the term though, and I shall definitely endeavour to put a skid into what has been a rather apathetic summer.
Monday afternoon was spent in the Social Science Library (SSL in student lingo) where I was forced to sit in and look at two books for my Middle East politics essay. One of the books was so obscure that I had actually had to stack request it from deep in the bowels of wherever they keep the millions of books that are on the library catalouges. It was the first time I had spent any serious amount of time in the new library building - I tend to just take the books out and read them in my room - its much nicer to have the material with you as you are writing the essay itself. Sitting there, I greatly appreciated the new facilities - there was ample shelve space, lots of new computers, nice desks and a new complex card swiping system to get into the library itself, but it somehow made me pine for the old Politics and International Relations library which was in a wonderful 19th century stone building right on George Street. This new giant glass monstrosity just seemed so much more impersonal. Anyway, the library was chock full of people, as it to be expected seeing that it is approaching the final examinations for many of the third years, and there was a palpable atmosphere of intensity and stress throughout the library. Some desks were cluttered not only with books, but enormous files and pencil cases and discmans, and it was evident that people had set up shop there for some time. All in all, I am amazed again at how difficult it is to work through material, especially if you are faced with the fact that you will not have access to it for the essay. I did manage to do some photocopying, but a good 4 hours in the library went by with the feeling that I had not really accomplished all that much.
The evening was another lazy one. I watch the final of University Challenge which was really good, though UCL didn't stand much of a chance against Corpus, and were trailing something like 110 to -5 at one point, though a late rally by them did make the scores slightly more respectable. Then, it was the usual routine of shooting a couple games of pool and having a pint in the college bar - it is amazing how fast the evening goes by just doing stuff like that. Though I really enjoyed it, you get the nagging feeling that in the context of Oxford you are somehow wasting an evening that way - you should be attending a talk (of which there were a fair number of interesting ones to go for) or watching a play, or a concert or something along those lines. Sometimes, I have found that it is important to just learn to take things slowly and to relax. Still, it has been a term in which I have not seemed to do very much, what with 2 weeks already gone, and hardly any lectures to attend. I am sure that there will be lots of things to do in the rest of the term though, and I shall definitely endeavour to put a skid into what has been a rather apathetic summer.
posted by Caleb Liu | 11:37 PM
1 Comments:
The Knights go NI not ip!
Post a Comment
<< Home