Saturday, 13 October 2007

Dull and boring

I have had a cold this week, it has mostly gone but I still have an annoying cough. Especially annoying when I am trying to sleep. Now my knees are (I believe) suitably recovered from Expo, I want to go running again, but if I am coughing lots it seems a bit foolish.

I am continuing to look for suitable postdocs / jobs, this week a job in New Zealand has come up which I will apply for. I suspect that I stand even less chance of getting it than I did with the Cambridge one, but I figure I should apply anyway, just in case. The job does sound really interesting, and New Zealand would be a very cool place to live (skiing, caving, 'tramping', cycling...). This time I plan on not waiting till the deadline to apply...

Monday, 8 October 2007

Morecambe Bay

We have just got back from a week at Morecambe Bay with Olly's parents. We stayed in Saltcotes Annex in Arnside towards the north-east of Morecambe Bay. It was a lovely place to stay, a nice cottage, amazing views and lots of nice walking. We managed to see quite a lot of the surrounding area, which was good because we are contemplating moving up there at some point.

When we got back I had an email from Cambridge telling me that I hadn't got the postdoc. Although it was what I expected, I am still a little disappointed, but I am glad they told me as I was getting impatient to know.

Wednesday, 19 September 2007

More Cooking

I have recently been trying to cook new and different things, with generally better success than I expected. Here are the things:

Pineapple Upside down cake - not bad at all
Lemon Cream flan - really nice, will make this again!
Strawberry and balsamic vinegar Ice cream OK, but not worth the effort (especially without an ice cream maker)
Pineapple Sorbet - really nice, will make again but with less sugar

Sunday, 9 September 2007

Lemon and poppy seed drizzle cake

I made a cake, and it tasted nice!

It was a lemon and poppy seed drizzle cake to use up the lemons I got for 5p from Asda the other day. The recipe only uses two lemons per cake, so I was forced to make a second cake today :) it is currently in the oven, hopefully it will taste as good.

There are still a couple of lemons left, so I think I will look for another lemon recipe, and see if I can make something else nice.

Saturday, 8 September 2007

Old House

I walked to Tesco this morning (and they did sell poppy seeds, horray!), and on the way spotted that the house I lived in the first year I was here is for sale.

Sadly there is no photo of the room that I rented (it was the 'rear reception room'), but generally little appears to have changed. I will be interested to see what it sells for.

Asda

I am undecided whether I love or hate Asda at the moment. I hate that they no longer sell Smart Price basmati rice, poppy seeds, or normal orange lentils. I love that if you go at the right time in the evening you can get great reduced stuff. This week I have got: mangos for 10p each, a whole pineapple for 10p, bag of 5 lemons for 5p, a bag of 5 kiwifruit for 10p, melon for 12p, 4 x little gem lettuces for 10p, loaf of bread for 16p, big bag of stir-fry vegetables for 12p, 3xcourgettes for 10p and a few other bits and pieces. It is nice to be able to fill a whole rucksack with nice food for less than a fiver. Amazing!

We made very nice smoothies from some of the fruit, bread+butter pudding with the bread, and if I can find somewhere that sells poppy seeds, I hope to make lemon+poppy seed cake...

No news on the postdoc yet, they contacted at least one of my referees on Monday, but not heard anything since. I suspect that I haven't got it, but it will be nice to find out for definite.

Monday, 3 September 2007

Postdoc Application

A very interesting sounding post-doc came up in Cambridge, so I applied last Friday. I got a nice email this morning saying that they received my application. I guess now I have to wait patiently to hear back...

Turns out that I am not very good at waiting patiently.

I don't think I will get it unless I am the only applicant, but I decided that that wasn't a reason not to apply. Interesting post-docs don't come up very often, let alone in a city we where we have a house. At least I do now have an up-to-date CV and a covering letter (thanks to the help from people on EH and at The CBB.).