Well first off all, Merry Xmas to you all!
Today, at the ripe old age of 22 ( :-) ) I went sledding for the first time! When he was in high school, Colley pinched a couple of road signs (naughty naughty) and he's kept them ever since. Together we built a sled out of them (well he supervised and I tied it all together lol). Theres a nice steep sloping hill on the playing fields near our house and we took the sled there with the dog. On the first run, the bottle of water we used to weight it and curve the signs round at the front came off and Carla ran away with it.
It actually worked just as well without it as it did with it so it didn't matter. I never realised that sledding could be so fun! The rush of adrenalin and excitement as you go shooting down the hillside, and in my case, falling off the sled and skidding across the field at the bottom on my back and getting snow down the back of my hood.
I couldn't stop laughing and just kept wanting to go again and again. Even Colley had fun. He ran at the sled and went skidding. We weren't out for long as it was so cold, but so much fun. There was a bloke on the same hill practising snowboarding. We all figured the same, if we're gonna have so much snow we might as well have fun in it!
What I was surprised about was that there was absolutly no kids outside. No one but 3 fully grown 20-30 somethings playing in the snow. Snow can be great. Snowball fights, building igloos or snow walls and snow men.
I'm actually feeling christmassy today. It may be because we're going out tonight. Everyone's heading down to JB's for what may be their last xmas eve bash. I had so much fun when we went a few years ago and we're not missing this year.
Christmas has made me think about traditions. Every family has different christmas traditions and they're so varied. We're spending christmas this year at home with Colley's family. Their tradition is to get up at any point, eat xmas dinner at his uncles, and go to the pub. My family's traditions include getting up early, eating brekkie before opening presents. Xmas dinner is eaten at nans or my aunt's, we play games in the afternoon and watch crummy xmas tv.
But thinking about all this lead me to thinking about what I would consider to be my perfect christmas. I'd love to spend all day in my PJ's. Get up about 7-8ish, eat brekkie, open presents (the way I've always done it growing up), and slouch about all day drinking, eating and watching new dvds, and playing with all my new goodies. But where would this perfect day be? I'd love somewhere quiet and homely, snow outside and a fire inside, snug and warm on a comfy sofa with a thick blanket, Colley and Carla. I'd love all this to be in my perfect house, which I havent found yet and have no idea where this could be. Christmas should be a day when everyone stays at home. Nothing should be open, no-one working, but everyone happy at home.
What about you? Where and what would your perfect christmas be?
Hope you all have a good holiday anyway, enjoy the unusually seasonal weather. I'll speak to you in the new year!
xxx
Little ol' me
Friday 24 December 2010
Thursday 16 December 2010
Exams and xmas
I know I promised a pic and story about the whole Harry Potter ghost walk thing in Dudley Castle but I still havent uploaded the picture.
I've been busy recently with revision and exams, my last one is tomorrow, woohoo! If there's one thing I suck at it's revision and unseen essay style exams. The information just doesn't want to stay in my head. I spent the cognitive psychology exam with the words "violation of independence" floating in my head, knowing they were relelvant but could not for the life of me remember what it was. I get very nervous and anxious before an exam, and fidgety once i'm in there. Considering we don't take exams in the work place but have to do boring things such as report writing, I don't see the relevance of exams. Just set more reports and coursework and get us used to doing what we're going to have to do for the rest of our careers!
I did come out of the exam quite angry. We had exam preperation seminars with each of the three lecturers, who each had taught us two topics. Ken promised one question on judgement and one on decision making, Anke promised one question on attention and one on problem solving and Neil promised one question on emotional stroop and one on human real time processing. I know this probably means nothing to the rest of you but please bear with me. They told us it would be perfectly acceptable if we revised one topic per lecturer as we had to chose one question from each to answer. Yippee! Made our life easier. Got into the exam and, as promised, Ken had one question on judgement and one on decision making, good, I revised decision making. Anke had one question on attention and one on problem solving, good, I revised attention. Neil however, one question on real time processing, and one on the Cognitive Failures Questionnaire....which i DIDN'T revise. I dedicated my revision to the emotional Stroop. He went on and on about the Stroop and one paper in particular in both lectures and the seminar. Emphasised we had to read this paper, it was vital and important work in relation to the emotional Stroop. Bastard. Emotional Stroop? I nearly had an emotional strop!
I did the best I could do so fingers crossed.
Right now I'm waiting for a delivery man. There's plenty of housework to be done but I don't dare move from the window as the buzzer doesn't work and I don't want to miss him. Hoping the dog will let me know when he arrives but she's to busy watching school children play. As soon as he's arrived I can get on with housework and start manically xmas shopping. I'm useless at doing that in plenty of time. Always left til the last minute. But when you spend every minute of the day revising or going to work when do you have time to shop? That's my excuse at least.
I'm a bit of a scrooge at xmas if I'm honest. It doesn't hold the enjoyment and sparkle to me that everyone else seems to experience at this time of year. At least it's a day where I don't have to go to work. Ideally, I'd start the day with a slap up fry up breakfast, then lounge around all day under the duvet on the sofa in my pjs. Xmas day everyone should stay at home, but this year I'm being dragged round people's house and I don't remember who they are and then being dragged to the pub. Joy of joys. I'm not a pub person if I'm not with people I know and feel comfortable with. Yes my fiance will be there, but he knows these people, and apparently I do but don't remember them. Fun all round.
Enough of the bah humbug stuff, I'm going to risk a quick trip to the kitchen for some lunch before the delivery arrives. Watch him arrive as I make my sandwich and drive off just as I'm coming back to sit down.
Bye!
I've been busy recently with revision and exams, my last one is tomorrow, woohoo! If there's one thing I suck at it's revision and unseen essay style exams. The information just doesn't want to stay in my head. I spent the cognitive psychology exam with the words "violation of independence" floating in my head, knowing they were relelvant but could not for the life of me remember what it was. I get very nervous and anxious before an exam, and fidgety once i'm in there. Considering we don't take exams in the work place but have to do boring things such as report writing, I don't see the relevance of exams. Just set more reports and coursework and get us used to doing what we're going to have to do for the rest of our careers!
I did come out of the exam quite angry. We had exam preperation seminars with each of the three lecturers, who each had taught us two topics. Ken promised one question on judgement and one on decision making, Anke promised one question on attention and one on problem solving and Neil promised one question on emotional stroop and one on human real time processing. I know this probably means nothing to the rest of you but please bear with me. They told us it would be perfectly acceptable if we revised one topic per lecturer as we had to chose one question from each to answer. Yippee! Made our life easier. Got into the exam and, as promised, Ken had one question on judgement and one on decision making, good, I revised decision making. Anke had one question on attention and one on problem solving, good, I revised attention. Neil however, one question on real time processing, and one on the Cognitive Failures Questionnaire....which i DIDN'T revise. I dedicated my revision to the emotional Stroop. He went on and on about the Stroop and one paper in particular in both lectures and the seminar. Emphasised we had to read this paper, it was vital and important work in relation to the emotional Stroop. Bastard. Emotional Stroop? I nearly had an emotional strop!
I did the best I could do so fingers crossed.
Right now I'm waiting for a delivery man. There's plenty of housework to be done but I don't dare move from the window as the buzzer doesn't work and I don't want to miss him. Hoping the dog will let me know when he arrives but she's to busy watching school children play. As soon as he's arrived I can get on with housework and start manically xmas shopping. I'm useless at doing that in plenty of time. Always left til the last minute. But when you spend every minute of the day revising or going to work when do you have time to shop? That's my excuse at least.
I'm a bit of a scrooge at xmas if I'm honest. It doesn't hold the enjoyment and sparkle to me that everyone else seems to experience at this time of year. At least it's a day where I don't have to go to work. Ideally, I'd start the day with a slap up fry up breakfast, then lounge around all day under the duvet on the sofa in my pjs. Xmas day everyone should stay at home, but this year I'm being dragged round people's house and I don't remember who they are and then being dragged to the pub. Joy of joys. I'm not a pub person if I'm not with people I know and feel comfortable with. Yes my fiance will be there, but he knows these people, and apparently I do but don't remember them. Fun all round.
Enough of the bah humbug stuff, I'm going to risk a quick trip to the kitchen for some lunch before the delivery arrives. Watch him arrive as I make my sandwich and drive off just as I'm coming back to sit down.
Bye!
Friday 26 November 2010
Confound it all!
Had a rather fun day yesterday shambling round the zoo dressed as a plague spirit, but I shall write a post about that in a few days when Ive uploaded the pic.
Today, unfortunatly, I want to rant. For years, I have studied Psychology and dreamt of a career profiling. Recently, I have been in touch with a few well-known and respected intellectual types who state their specialism is Offender Profiling and asked them for career advice, or at least some good literature to point me in the right direction. I shall quote the first line of the reply email I recieved of one of them...
Today, unfortunatly, I want to rant. For years, I have studied Psychology and dreamt of a career profiling. Recently, I have been in touch with a few well-known and respected intellectual types who state their specialism is Offender Profiling and asked them for career advice, or at least some good literature to point me in the right direction. I shall quote the first line of the reply email I recieved of one of them...
"Profiling isn't really a career, and often doesn't pay!....My new book provides useful information on profiling".
Now please, answer this question for me. If it is not a career, which everyone keeps telling me it isn't, and if it doesn't pay...how on earth do they make a living out of it? It is kind of disheartening to listen to all these profilers, people who I aspire to work alongside one day, tell me it is not a career.
Firstly, I knew it wasn't a career in the UK anyway. The advice I asked for was how did they get involved in it. They all started their careers doing one thing, but at some point, alongside the rest of their work, they started profiling. What is disheartening to me is that no-one seems to want to talk about it. It's as if they're saying to me, "Well I've managed to do it, but I don't want you coming along and stealing my work and limelight so I'm just gonna tell you it's not a career and maybe you'll be put off."
Well I won't be. It's making me more determined. I shall make it my life's work to make Offender Profiling a career here in the UK, just as it is in the US. One small change though. In the US profilers work with the FBI and have to train to become an agent first. We don't have an FBI but not everyone is going to want to train as a policeofficer to become a profiler...i certainly don't! It baffles me why the UK doesn't seem to want to take full advantage of the help profiling can provide. The one thing we SHOULD follow America in doing...and we don't...and there's no explanation why.
Secondly, It's not a career but they're quick to promote their books on the subject. Maybe that's how they make their money...writing about it instead of trying to do it. Well it provides false hope as people are led to believe they can go out and train for this as a career. And, like me, get told that they can't. It's so frustrating.
Ok, That's my rant over with today. My next post will be a bit more interesting...i promise you :-)
Friday 19 November 2010
Cocktails, Coursework and All You Can Eat
Well, I've had a busy few days! Tuesday was the other half's 25th birthday. We all teased him about being a quarter of a century. No doubt he'll get his own back on me in a few years time. To celebrate, we popped down to the local Weatherspoons after he finished work for a few drinks. Since I was driving I only had the one to toast him, and he ended up having a pitcher of blue lagoon cocktail all to himself.
He seems partial to these cocktails, but he's more of a larger drinker and doesn't handle spirits all to well. And he paid the extra for the double shots of vdoka! When we got back he curled up on the sofa, hands between his knees and closed his eyes. Me and his mate (drunk on a mix of amaretto and stolen blue lagoon from the pitcher) were starving but had to wait for him to feel better before we could order take-out. He couldn't decide what to have that wouldnt make him sick so settled for putting a DVD on...why do things seem logical when you're under the influence?!?!
I went to bed early as I had an early start, but found him at 6am fast alseep on the sofa cuddling a cushion, Iron Man 2 going unwatched on the telly. I hated to disturb him but knew he'd complain about a crick in his neck all day if he stayed there, though it is funny to wake drunk people up.
The next day was the eventful one. After taking his hungover mate to work at 10am, we had to drive to Willenhall to pick up a part for his broken scooter, drop that back to the person fixing the bike, and finally go food shopping. Time I was doing coursework he decided to actually finish watching Iron Man 2, and promptly fell asleep 20minutes into it. I won't go into details about the film for those of you who haven't seen it, but I shall say after a good build up with some good action, that last fight is over way to quickly and is a disappointing abrupt end. I did rather enjoy Mickey Rouke's part, and admired his thick Russian accent. I still believe he looks better when he's bulked up, like he did for Expendables. The extra muscle suits him more.
After the film, we had to run back down to the mate who's fixing his bike as we forgot to give him the spark plug! Took the dog this time and had a cup of tea while she played with his dog, which is her sister so playing gets quite rough. Wednesday evening, after Sleeping Beauty had woken up after his second nap and I had manically sat typing up my coursework, we went for a meal with his family to a Asian all you can eat restaurant. He loves his Indian, I love my chinese.
I did have plans to dress up a bit and do something with my hair, but I forgot I had to walk the dog and so ran out of time. Throughly enjoyed the meal, came home feeling stuffed fit to bursting!
There wasn't a lot to chose from in the chinese section, primarily sweet and sour...which I adore!!! Though a bit more variety would have been nice.
At the end of the meal the waiters came over and gave us girlies all a rose each (which we were delighted to discover was real!!) and helped us with our coats.
The future sis-in-law models her rose. We embarressed her by pointing out that was her first rose given to her by a man. Bless her. This reminds me..2 days later and I still haven't remembered to fetch mine out of the car! It's been so cold recently it's probably ok. I hope...
I would like to have been able to say next that Thursday was a bit more of a relaxing day...but I'd be wrong. A quick shopping trip, walking the dog and a lovely day of doing coursework :-( which I shall be off to finish momentarily.
All in all it was a good couple of days. Off to work tomorrow and then Sunday for more univeristy work. Oh I can't wait for the holidays and I'm hoping just for one day where I can sit back and put my feet up for a while without housework or coursework niggling at the back of my mind.
So, ta-ta for now. Have a good weekend to you all!
He seems partial to these cocktails, but he's more of a larger drinker and doesn't handle spirits all to well. And he paid the extra for the double shots of vdoka! When we got back he curled up on the sofa, hands between his knees and closed his eyes. Me and his mate (drunk on a mix of amaretto and stolen blue lagoon from the pitcher) were starving but had to wait for him to feel better before we could order take-out. He couldn't decide what to have that wouldnt make him sick so settled for putting a DVD on...why do things seem logical when you're under the influence?!?!
I went to bed early as I had an early start, but found him at 6am fast alseep on the sofa cuddling a cushion, Iron Man 2 going unwatched on the telly. I hated to disturb him but knew he'd complain about a crick in his neck all day if he stayed there, though it is funny to wake drunk people up.
The next day was the eventful one. After taking his hungover mate to work at 10am, we had to drive to Willenhall to pick up a part for his broken scooter, drop that back to the person fixing the bike, and finally go food shopping. Time I was doing coursework he decided to actually finish watching Iron Man 2, and promptly fell asleep 20minutes into it. I won't go into details about the film for those of you who haven't seen it, but I shall say after a good build up with some good action, that last fight is over way to quickly and is a disappointing abrupt end. I did rather enjoy Mickey Rouke's part, and admired his thick Russian accent. I still believe he looks better when he's bulked up, like he did for Expendables. The extra muscle suits him more.
After the film, we had to run back down to the mate who's fixing his bike as we forgot to give him the spark plug! Took the dog this time and had a cup of tea while she played with his dog, which is her sister so playing gets quite rough. Wednesday evening, after Sleeping Beauty had woken up after his second nap and I had manically sat typing up my coursework, we went for a meal with his family to a Asian all you can eat restaurant. He loves his Indian, I love my chinese.
There wasn't a lot to chose from in the chinese section, primarily sweet and sour...which I adore!!! Though a bit more variety would have been nice.
At the end of the meal the waiters came over and gave us girlies all a rose each (which we were delighted to discover was real!!) and helped us with our coats.
I would like to have been able to say next that Thursday was a bit more of a relaxing day...but I'd be wrong. A quick shopping trip, walking the dog and a lovely day of doing coursework :-( which I shall be off to finish momentarily.
All in all it was a good couple of days. Off to work tomorrow and then Sunday for more univeristy work. Oh I can't wait for the holidays and I'm hoping just for one day where I can sit back and put my feet up for a while without housework or coursework niggling at the back of my mind.
So, ta-ta for now. Have a good weekend to you all!
Tuesday 16 November 2010
Day One
Hi Everyone,
Since this my first post I suppose I'd best start with a bit of an introduction. My name's Sarah, and I'm a 22 year old, second year Psychology and Criminal Behaviour student.
A lot of people seem a bit confused or scared when you say the words "Psychology and Criminal Behaviour" and one of the most annoying things is when you tell someone you study Psychology and they tell you to read their mind. First of all, thats called telepathy! Secondly, Psychology studies our behaviour, and how our environment and others can have an affect. We study the mind to, that's obviously very important, but also very boring at times.
The field of Psychology I enjoy the most has to be Personality and Criminal Behaviour. My dream is to be an offender profiler, working with the police and creating a profile of offenders based on clues at the crime scene. Unfortunatly it's only really a career in the US, the police force over here in the UK doesn't really take it as seriously as the FBI :-( I'd also love to work with people with severe personality disorders, such as schizophrenics or obsessive compulsives. How badly wrong our brains can go fascinates me, especially the impact it can have on behaviour.
On a lighter note, I also adore animals and volunteer when I can at my local zoo. I've learnt alot from being there and get to take part in all sorts of exciting events. Recently I helped out with a "Horror Halloween" event where I got to jump out at people, covered in fake blood, and generally scare the living daylights out of them. At the minute we (me and my fiance...oh yeah...I'm engaged lol!) own a staffordshire bull terrier cross (with english bull terrier) named Carla, a bearded dragon (Spike) and two guinea pigs (Patch and Streak). I find it a nice break to come home from studying people all day to animals who give you unconditional love and attention, no matter your flaws (as long as you treat it right of course!).
Music wise, I'm into my classic rock and metal, such as Def Leppard, Whitesnake, ZZ Top, Disturbed, Avenged Sevenfold. Metallica, Korn, Rob Zombie, Wednesday 13, Murderdolls, Slipknot, Black Sabbath, Queen, Meatloaf etc... We try and get to Download Festival as often as we can, it's where we met and we consider it our anniversay, plus you get such a wide variety of people and music, gorgeous (but expensive) food and a cool market. It's not often we get to gigs now-a-days because of money and work, but we try and go to one a year at least!
Well, that's a general bit about me. Now this week's been one of those weeks. To start with, I woke up the other morning and tried to put my trousers on before my underwear. It may be a look Superman considers fashionable but I don't think it's really me. At that point I knew it was time to get back to bed really and try again, but Carla was whining to go out so I just had to sort myself out and get on with the day.
It didn't go to bad until the next day when I spent ages cooking a roast chicken dinner, just to burn the yorkshire puddings at the end! Not to mention all the things I've bumped into, tripped over and dropped.
On the good side I managed to finish one lot of coursework and get that submitted yesterday. I should really be doing the second piece now but sod it, I'll do it later. I burnt my brownies to the pan earlier and now I'm sulking as I was looking forward to them. Nothing worse than burnt chocolate! Carla's stretched out across my lap fast asleep. She's cute until she dreams then her eyes roll back, she twitches and just looks evil! Though it is funny when she barks and wakes herself up.
Well, thats enough babbling for now. I shall post more soon no doubt, but after I've finished that coursework!
Bye
x
Me and Carla at Halloween Party
Since this my first post I suppose I'd best start with a bit of an introduction. My name's Sarah, and I'm a 22 year old, second year Psychology and Criminal Behaviour student.
A lot of people seem a bit confused or scared when you say the words "Psychology and Criminal Behaviour" and one of the most annoying things is when you tell someone you study Psychology and they tell you to read their mind. First of all, thats called telepathy! Secondly, Psychology studies our behaviour, and how our environment and others can have an affect. We study the mind to, that's obviously very important, but also very boring at times.
The field of Psychology I enjoy the most has to be Personality and Criminal Behaviour. My dream is to be an offender profiler, working with the police and creating a profile of offenders based on clues at the crime scene. Unfortunatly it's only really a career in the US, the police force over here in the UK doesn't really take it as seriously as the FBI :-( I'd also love to work with people with severe personality disorders, such as schizophrenics or obsessive compulsives. How badly wrong our brains can go fascinates me, especially the impact it can have on behaviour.
On a lighter note, I also adore animals and volunteer when I can at my local zoo. I've learnt alot from being there and get to take part in all sorts of exciting events. Recently I helped out with a "Horror Halloween" event where I got to jump out at people, covered in fake blood, and generally scare the living daylights out of them. At the minute we (me and my fiance...oh yeah...I'm engaged lol!) own a staffordshire bull terrier cross (with english bull terrier) named Carla, a bearded dragon (Spike) and two guinea pigs (Patch and Streak). I find it a nice break to come home from studying people all day to animals who give you unconditional love and attention, no matter your flaws (as long as you treat it right of course!).
Music wise, I'm into my classic rock and metal, such as Def Leppard, Whitesnake, ZZ Top, Disturbed, Avenged Sevenfold. Metallica, Korn, Rob Zombie, Wednesday 13, Murderdolls, Slipknot, Black Sabbath, Queen, Meatloaf etc... We try and get to Download Festival as often as we can, it's where we met and we consider it our anniversay, plus you get such a wide variety of people and music, gorgeous (but expensive) food and a cool market. It's not often we get to gigs now-a-days because of money and work, but we try and go to one a year at least!
Well, that's a general bit about me. Now this week's been one of those weeks. To start with, I woke up the other morning and tried to put my trousers on before my underwear. It may be a look Superman considers fashionable but I don't think it's really me. At that point I knew it was time to get back to bed really and try again, but Carla was whining to go out so I just had to sort myself out and get on with the day.
It didn't go to bad until the next day when I spent ages cooking a roast chicken dinner, just to burn the yorkshire puddings at the end! Not to mention all the things I've bumped into, tripped over and dropped.
On the good side I managed to finish one lot of coursework and get that submitted yesterday. I should really be doing the second piece now but sod it, I'll do it later. I burnt my brownies to the pan earlier and now I'm sulking as I was looking forward to them. Nothing worse than burnt chocolate! Carla's stretched out across my lap fast asleep. She's cute until she dreams then her eyes roll back, she twitches and just looks evil! Though it is funny when she barks and wakes herself up.
Well, thats enough babbling for now. I shall post more soon no doubt, but after I've finished that coursework!
Bye
x
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