I miss the train by 10 seconds

I miss the train by 10 seconds, after lying in bed too long and then having to rush madly. After being in such a hurry that I smudged the mascara down my face and failed to find my favorite shoes. After leaving the house without breakfast. After pedaling so hard on the way that the air feels hot and sticky.

I miss the train by 10 seconds because someone decided to close the doors 40 seconds early. After all this. After all that effort. I want to scream, rage at the employee who cheerfully calls "Too late for that train, love" across the platform. I want to make him, or anybody,  feel as miserable as I am feeling right now. There is a drunken sixteen year old inside me and she wants OUT. Now.

So I close my eyes and breathe. Feel my feet,  tingling from my dash across the station.  Feel the warm summer sun on my bare arms and face. Feel the weight of my backpack on my shoulders and the weight of my anger constricting my chest. Breathe. There is always another connection,  another chance.

I open my eyes: next train, 9:43, expected 9:48. And I laugh. 

Sunday memories

Grains of sand stick to my fingers as they brush across the conch forgotten at the bottom of my bag. A slight whiff of the sea atill clings to it as I pull it out and stroke across the pattern worn into its surface. As the train rattles on I am far away, where the wind tousles my hair and I feel pebbles under my feet. Sunday memories on a Monday morning.

The itch to blog

It’s been oddly quiet on this blog, even though my life has been so busy. I have been sewing, renovating, gardening, baking, travelling, learning and enjoying life in general. I miss blogging and I miss the focus that it gives to my life. I miss the motivation it gives me to make memories that I can post on here.

Long story short: I’m back and it will be an interesting time indeed. Five years in London are coming to an end in three days time when I will officially move all my belongings into my new room in Oxford. My PhD there will start at the beginning of October and until then I have a summer school in Astronomy and a two week trip to Japan planned. Life is currently amazing.

 

How have you all been?

Goodbye 2012

Looks like another year is over. Time to look back and take stock.

In some ways, 2012 was a year of extremes for me. In the first few months, I worked harder than ever before (expect possibly last year at the same time) and I completed my degree to my own satisfaction, which is saying something considering I tend to have very high expectations of myself. After some fairly lazy travelling over the summer, life seemed to slow down towards the end of the year. While I did a few things, many things just sort of didn’t happen (like blogging) and I spent a lot of time on the sofa. Having nothing to do and constantly having to motivate yourself is much harder than I expected, especially in a long-term, fairly open ended situation. I did learn a few things about myself though and I’m planning on using those to carry me forward from here.

In some ways, I did not take very good care of myself. There was too much time on the sofa, too little great evenings with friends and too much hiding away from the world. On the other hand, I finally managed to grow into my subject a bit more, especially after finishing my degree, because I suddenly had time and motivation to read a lot for interest. I also really enjoyed the travelling I did and I had some great times with the Mister.

All in all, there were no big catastrophes and if I’m being honest, not even small ones. Somehow 2012 seems to have passed incredibly slowly and very fast at the same time. For 2013, I want to stand taller, be more bold and put more energy into the projects that are important to me. Oh, and complain less! ( Please quote me on this)

Five things I’d do differently if I were to do my degree again

1. Puzzle more things out for myself, instead of remembering the method

I used to wait for the answers to problem sheets, then attempt the questions and look at the answer when I got stuck. Often I then had to spend some time understanding the answer before going back to the question and doing it again and again and again until I could do it off the top of my head. Don’t get me wrong, this method got me very good grades and it is absolutely fine when pressed for time. I do however wish I had spent more time trying the questions myself before jumping to the result. After all, figuring things out is what physics is all about.

2. Read more physics just because I’m interested

Since finishing my degree, I have started reading a lot of things because they sound interesting and I really wish I had done that earlier. I kind of understand why I didn’t (whenever I felt like doing some physics, I did the sensible thing and got my textbooks out) but I think it really would have kept my interest of the subject higher and would have made it more enjoyable too. These days I read anything from popular science books to textbooks, via websites, papers and newspaper articles. There are so many cool things I had never heard of before!

3. Keep contact to a broader group of friends

In the beginning I somehow failed to make friends so I ended up spending a lot of time with my ex boyfriend’s group of friends. I realized quite quickly that we weren’t really in tune and unfortunately this is still true today. I never really managed to build up a group of friends I really click with, mostly because I just waited for things to happen an they didn’t. So, I would take a more proactive approach to friendship and actually seek out the kind of people I want to spend time with.

4. Step outside the university box

While my university provides a great community and offers many opportunities, I really wish I had stepped outside it more. It was just too easy to always turn in the same direction whenever I wanted to do something. There are so many other people in London and I didn’t really meet any of them until the fourth year or so. I think stepping outside my comfort zone would have helped with point 3 as well.

5. Talk about physics more

You might laugh but while I’m quite good at doing physics and writing about it, I’m really bad at talking about it. I somehow start fumbling as soon as somebody tries to have an educated conversation with me about something and I have a sneaking suspicion that this is going to cause me trouble in my future career. I think I might have less of an issue with this if I had more passionate debates over some issue or another with all the other physicists around. Somehow, it never happened.

Changing habits: My morning routine

 

As I mentioned a few days ago, I’m really trying to change my habit of sleeping all day. While I have generally got up a lot earlier, I have been sleeping a little longer every day and this morning, I didn’t make it out of bed until 2 hours after I meant to. Time to turn to science and see if there isn’t a way of optimizing this!

I happen to be reading the book The Power of Habit at the moment. I’ve only read about a third of it so far but I’m quite liking it. According to Charles Duhigg, habits work in three stages: There is a cue, which triggers a routine which then leads to a reward. If the cue is triggered without the reward occurring afterwards, it triggers a craving which makes us try really hard to get whatever we want. This makes it hard to change habits but apparently attempts are most successful if one keeps the cues and the reward the same but changes the routine in between. If you want to know a bit more about this, have a look at his website here. The analysis sounds reasonable to me (and he cites lots of studies to support it ;) ) so lets see what I can do about my morning routine:

The situation so far

I wake up when my alarm rings (the cue!), switch it to snooze and snuggle back into the covers. A few minutes later, it rings again and I repeat the snoozing.  Sometimes I switch if off and fall asleep again. At other times I just snooze and snooze and snooze it. (the routine)

I’d say the reward I get out of this is the feeling of snuggling deeper under my warm covers and daydreaming. I really like lying awake in my bed but I hate rapid changes from the warm covers to the cold air around. I also often didn’t know where to go afterwards or what to do, so one reward was not having to decide. The prospects were the Mister’s room (very much his space) and the kitchen which generally required at least 15 minutes of cleaning or more before I felt even vaguely comfortable. Not very enticing prospects.

The last problem has solved itself by us rearranging our rooms such that we now have a bedroom and a living room with some really comfy sofas. I already put a blanket in my favourite corner.

The new plan

Cue: I’m going to keep the alarm on my phone but I might change the ringtone.

Routine: I want to switch off my alarm and get up immediately. Then I want to get dressed and make myself a cup of chai tea before wandering off to the living room and curling up on the sofa in my favourite blanket. Then I want to read for about half an hour while drinking my tea before actually starting my day.

Rewards: I will still get the same feeling of warmth and security by snuggling up on the sofa. On top of that I get a warm cup of sugary heaven and I get to read without having to make a decision until I am fully awake. That should be enough rewards for making it out of bed.

Notes: To make things easier and avoid decision making in the morning ( I tend to not get up until I have decided what to do next and often by that point I’m fast asleep again), I will lay out my clothes in the evening and keep the book always in the same place. When I get bored of the Chai, I might swap it for hot chocolate, actual tea or a smoothie. Any nice drink I don’t usually have should do.

 

I’m aware that it will probably take weeks to really change that habit, provided it works at all. The few days I managed to get up early really showed me how valuable all that extra time is, so it’s definitely worth it. I’m also really curious if this will work or not.

I can really recommend the book. Some of the content is fascinating! Did you know that even people with serious brain damage, who have lost their ability to remember things, can still form new habits? Neither did I. It’s also written in an interesting and engaging way, even though the case studies can be a bit long at time.

Autumn

Do you know that smell of damp leaves and the first fires, of damp earth and a hint of frost?  Do you enjoy the feeling of the cold air, fresh and crisp, and the twilight that seems to fall too early? Do feel the anticipation of a warm cup of tea waiting for you back at home, and the comfort of thick sock and knitted blankets? This time a year has come again.

Waiting

Do you know that feeling, when a situation has served its purpose and it is time to move on? I have really enjoyed living with other people for the past four years.* It’s been great fun and especially the last two years have seen a tight group of friends sharing their lives. We cook together, we go out together, we do sport together. Of course not all the time but often enough to feel like more than “just” sharing a flat. We have had our highs and lows but there have been many more highs.

Still, with all that change looming ahead,I feel it might be time to move on soon. My feet are getting itchy and I find myself closing my door more and more. I want my own space, maybe just with the Mister, where I don’t constantly feel like I have to compromise with a variety of different people all the time. I want to know who exactly is in the house and not get surprised by seeing somebody on my way to the bathroom. I want to have clearly assigned responsibilities, I’m so tired of the cleaning debate, the noise debate, the “who left that in the fridge too long” debate.

Unfortunately, the chances of getting my own place any time soon are very slim. More education means more years on a tight budget, possibly in an expensive city. So I will have to wait it out, shutting my door and clearing out the fridge regularly. I don’t like it.

Does anybody have any hints and tips on the situation?

 

*For those of you who don’t know, I have spent the past two years in a shared flat with three housemates, the Mister, Ava and Squeak. Before that, I spent another two years in shared accommodation.

Graduation

I graduated on Wednesday! It was a little bit a bittersweet occasion. On the one hand, it was great fun, on the other hand, this day really market my good-bye from my university and I have had a lovely time here. It also means I now need to get serious on defining the next step and this is still really scary. But lets not talk about this for now because Wednesday was really an occasion to celebrate and celebrate we did.

We got to have the ceremony with the official handshake in the Royal Albert Hall in London. It was absolutely amazing, the hall is usually used for concerts and such and is richly decorated in red and gold. I don’t think I could have wished for a grander space.

Me in my gown. It’s a bit a silly picture but it’s the only one without my parents in it and I don’t know if they’d like to see their pictures here so you will have to do with this one. I felt like Harry Potter in the gown. The yellow stripe at the front shows that I graduated in the sciences.

Recognize the dress? The purple stripe on the hood shows that I graduated from Imperial College London, which picked bright purple as it’s colour because it was the first synthetically produced die, called Mauveine.

All in all I had a lovely day starting off with the ceremony, followed by a reception with free champagne and then a lovely lunch with the Mister and my parents, who had come all the way from Switzerland just for this occasion.

Me proudly holding the prize I got for academic excellence. And that’s definitely enough pictures of me showing of for at least this month. Indulge me for one day, I promise to go back to pretty landscapes soon.

Early mornings

Another picture from Samui, this time a sunrise. I promptly went back to bed after taking it.

I really like being up early. Not getting up, mind, I hate the whole process of waking up and dragging myself out of my warm lovely bed into what is generally a dark, cold morning. This is especially true when there is the Mister to snuggle up to right next to me. What I do like though is it being 8 am and I have already got dressed, had breakfast, cleaned half the kitchen and written a blog post. I’ve had (too many) days where I haven’t accomplished this much by 6 pm. I like having the whole house quiet and too myself, which is a rarity when you live with 3-5 other people in a reasonably small flat. I enjoy the energy and motivation. On top of that I perfectly well know that my most productive time ends by about 11 am . If I haven’t got myself into gear by that point, it is very likely that I hardly do anything productive that day, whether I write myself a to-do list or not.

So, in summary, I want to be up early. The main problem is that me and getting up in the morning is like other people and loosing weight or quitting smoking. Sleeping in is my biggest bad habit. It was fine when I had to be in uni every day at 9 am but to be honest, I haven’t had to do that regularly for what must be close to two years by now. So my waking up time has slipped and slipped until I habitually sleep until noon.  The time waste involved is crazy and I actually sleep too much, leaving me tired all day.

I have tried just going to bed early (which in my case is somewhere before midnight), arguing that with my usual 8-10 hours of sleep, I should at least make it out of bed a little earlier. That was the point when I discovered that apparently, I can sleep 10-12 hours a night without any real trouble.

I’ve tried setting myself alarms and they do tend to work for a few days but so far, I have always slipped back in to the habit after only a few days. Today is the first day of a new attempt. Keep your fingers crossed for me :)

Any tips on breaking a lifetime bad habit? Do you get up early or late?

Looking ahead

I wanted to thank you guys for your support yesterday. I’ve pulled myself together a little since. I think it might be time to reassess where I am and where I want to go and then to set up some sort of routine because at the moment, I am just floating along. This will have to wait though because as I mentioned, we are going on holiday today. More precise, we are going on a road trip from London to Gent, Amsterdam, Hamburg and then on to Berlin. It will be awesome. I will try my very best to keep you updated while we go along.

Jobs I would love to do

Who wouldn’t love to have so much money in the bank that you never have to work at all? That sort of thing aside, here are a list of jobs I would genuinely like to do and which I think are within my range if I set my mind to it. In no particular order:

1. Property development

I love houses, especially old and quirky ones and I think I got an eye for the potential in them. I would absolutely love to buy them up, refurbish them and then rent them out or sell them on. I’m seeing myself more in an investor and project manager role as actually doing the building works even though I wouldn’t mind some of that either. I definitely want to completely renovate at least one house in my life, preferably an unexpected one.

2. Research Psychology

I’m absolutely fascinated by questions concerning memory, decision making and character traits. Why are some people charismatic and others not? When is this sort of thing decided? Why do some have really good memory and others don’t? How do we pick partners, friends and foes (or a new sauce pan for that matter)?

3. Retail design

Yep, I’d really like to design shop interiors. This kind of brings together 1 and 2. I firmly believe to be a good retail designer one would have to have a good understanding of behavioural economics. After all, this is all about influencing consumers decision making, paired with some interior design.

4. Professor in Physics at a University

I’d want to do a mixture between doing my own research in theoretical physics and teaching at university level. I really enjoy many parts of this: the problem solving, the paper writing (yes, really) and I’m looking forward to the teaching as well even though I haven’t done it so far. This is the career I’m currently heading for.

5. Development work

This is a very vague category, mainly because I’m quite vague was to what this entails. I’d love to make a difference in this world and use my skills and privileges position to help others but I’m just not sure how to go about this. I checked the Unicef website yester and apart from a minimum age of 25, I learned that on has to have a degree and two years work experience in a relevant field even for a volunteering position. What is a relevant field?

6. Company Consulting

I did a brief stint of that a few years ago (just an internship) and I really enjoyed the content. I love problem solving and trying to come up with constructive ideas. I admittedly wouldn’t mind the money either but that’s not why I’d do it.

7. Be a scientist/engineer, setting up the occasional spin-out

A spin-out is a company that takes something developed in a research lab and turns it into a commercial product. Unfortunately, doing theoretical physics isn’t such a great combination with this, it needs more of a hands-on approach in the lab but I’ve got my whole life ahead of me so I doubt I will be working on only one topic for the rest of my life anyway. This is a future option I’m keeping in mind.

8. Be a Housewife and Mother

Surprised? Most people who know me probably would be but I do love children and enjoy most domestic tasks. I would like to bring up a large family and stay home looking after the kids. Don’t worry, this isn’t going to happen because it would be a waste of my pretty head, education and ambition apart from the fact that I think it would put an unfair financial responsibility on my (hypothetical) husband. I will however try my very best to mix having a family with something else.

I’m sure there are more jobs I would like to do if I knew more about them/could think of the right now/came across them so this list is by no means exhaustive.

 

If you could pick completely freely right now, what would you love to do?

Finding motivation

I had a look at my calendar yesterday and I realised that I have been out of university for three weeks already! Where does the time go? While it is great to have so much time to myself, I do find that I have a tendency to just fall into a slump and do nothing for weeks on end.That’s okay if I’m off for a limited amount of time but since this might end up being more of a long term arrangement I have been battling the laziness. Damn, it’ shard! There is always the vast expanse of the internet just round the corner, the temptation to just curl up in bed and sleep (and I can sleep a lot…) or the unlimited number of cheap terrible novels on amazon at an arms reach. But, I have been fighting back! Here are my strategies so far:

1. Keep a daily to do list – I write mine either the night before or first thing in the morning. Anything goes on there: Things I want to do, things I have to do and things I have been planning to do. Then I work of as much as I can. I don’t always finish it which is okay if something else got in the way. I tried making an actual schedule but found it too restricting so lists work better.

2. Don’t break the chain – I read about this on the internet somewhere. The concept is quite simple: I picked a task that I want to do every day and then I decided what constitutes a “unit”. As an example, one of my tasks is “craft” and I decided that I want to do at least one complete task a day. For example, cutting the shirt yarn was one days worth. Yesterday I got in a rush and just copied a pattern and traced it onto the new fabric. When I have completed the task for the day I make a large black cross. Over time, a chain of crosses built up and I’m not allowed to break the chain. Since I’m a sucker for crossing things off and because the calendars make a great visual reminder, this works really well for me. I deliberately keep my tasks very short as I want to be able to squeeze them in on busy days and I also find that often once I started I keep going anyway. When I’m not here I put a “V” for vacation and at some point I might have to use an “S” for sick so as to keep the chain going when external circumstances prevent me from completing the task. I currently have four tasks in total and that seems to be a good number but I might expand on it or change them around over time.

3. Write down ideas when I’m motivated-I find that when I am really busy I have the best ideas and the best motivation but when I actually have the time I don’t much feel like doing anything any more. So, while I was still revising, I wrote down my ideas and enthusiasm in letters to myself, dairy entries and lists of things to do. Now when I’m bored or just uninspired I can co back to these and pick up a little of my earlier energy.

4. Keep a blog-I’m not joking, writing this blog is a huge motivating factor for me. After all, if I spent three days in bed stuffing my face with chocolate and reading cheap romance novels ( one of my guilty pleasures ) I don’t have anything to write about.

So, that’s what I do to keep myself moving. How do you keep yourself motivated, especially when your day has no structure whatsoever?

I <3 chocolate cake

Every time Laura, over at Yummy Laura, posts a new recipe on her blog I instantly become instantly. especially, when it is something sweet. Today was the day to actually try one of her recipes instead of always drooling in front of the Computer.

I picked the 6 Minutes Chocolate cake, not expecting much. Somehow, I wasn’t very convinced by making a cake in the microwave but I didn’t have the ingredients for the more fancy things and it was absolutely pouring with rain (I’m sure you know those days). The result was AMAZING! The best part is that it took me (literally) 10 minutes between pulling the first bowl out of a drawer and turning the finished cake out of the tin. Not even Brownies or Biscuits are that fast.

Next I will be a little more adventurous and try the Pear Lime Tarte. If you do have some time, go have a look at her blog. She is currently telling her story of how she moved from Canada to France, as well as posting here awesome recipes, and I love reading it. Oh, and make that cake.

Congratulations your Majesty

So, the Queen has been a queen for 60 yearts. Quite impressive! Only Queen Victoria has ruled longer so far. Of course, that warants a big celebration and where would be a better place for a huge boat pageant in honour of the Queen than on the Thames, watched by half of London?

I unfortunately did not get a picture of the actual royal barge because by the time it came along, it was raining so hard that I did not want to take my camera out. However, I’m proud to say that I have now seen the Queen, even though I was too far away to actually make her out. I still think it counts. Despite the rain, it was great fun to watch the boats on the river. I was lucky to find a spot where I could actually see. It might have involved climbing up some barriers but we won't tell anybody about that.

(Not) planning ahead

So, I've just graduated. About twice a day, somebody asks me the question "What are you going to do next?" I usually answer somewhat sheepishly "I don't know yet. I'm taking a year out", generally followed by an apologetic "but then I will get myself a PhD".

So here I am, with a whole year ahead of me an no plan. The truth is: it's scaring me witless. I take comfort in knowing what to do next and where to go, it gives me a sense of security and purpose. The problem is that I'm also poor at making decisions so I sometimes, I end up following other peoples leads. That doesn't necessarily mean things go badly, occasionally quite the opposite . However, I'm a big girl now and I want to decide for myself and I think before I can really do that, I need to get over the panic of not having a plan, before I can get to the panic about making a plan.

Even though it might not sound like it sometimes, I did intentionally keep my schedule free. I applied neither for a graduate job nor for a PhD. I think it will be good for me. I'm generally such a driven person, when I set my mind to something I go and get it. While that is a very useful skills in many ways, I somehow feel like I never had a chance to breathe, to think, to evaluate what I have and what I want. I think now might be a good point in my life to take that time out.

There are a few practical reasons as well of course. I didn't want to write applications while also trying to complete my thesis, get good grades in my exams and not loose my sanity on the way. Even more importantly, I wanted some time to explore new fields instead of defaulting to the one topic I have had a small glimpse into, which just so happens to be quantum cosmology.

I'm going to use the meantime to brush up on my general knowledge, work with a charity (if they will have me), peek into new areas of physics, learn some new languages and earn some money. Now I know that you might think its counter intuitive to immediately make plans how to fill the void but I don't think literally doing nothing will help. I've watched some of my friends fall into that trap and I'm not keen on spending the vast majority of my life in front of some type of screen, doing mindless things. Also, I have a sneaking suspicion my parents wouldn't let me ;)

Done

I can't believe exams are over.

Spring

I'm so proud of our little garden at the moment, I just had to show you some pictures. Above you can see one of the plants from last year which actually came back and is already flowering again.

I believe these are Forget-Me-Nots, which were badly attacked by snails and ants last year. Look how amazingly they bounced back! I can even see the first few buds in the centre of the plants so we might actually get flowers this year.

Mr Robin kept me company while I was pottering about. He doesn't seem to be building his nest any more and I haven't seen Mrs Robin for a few days so I think there might be family on the way.

This used to be a 1 m high, majestic nightshade that treated us to some lovely flowers last year. Then the snails got to it and look at it now. It's barely alive, it's companion is completely dead already. I'm so sad. We have a serious slug and snail problem. Last year I tried to collect them periodically and every few days or so, I'd pick up to 30 of them off our three square meters of garden. Also, we are not talking tiny cute snails like here, we are talking seriously huge Burgundy Snails and giant slugs. They ate EVERYTHING. Even though I'm really not a fan of poison in the garden, this year I am not having the same thing happening again so poison and meticulous collecting it is. Keep your fingers crossed with me that the nightshade will pull trough.

More daffodils have opened by now. Together with some red and white daisies (which I got for a pound at the local garden center because one of the flours had broken. Crazy world ) they provide the only spots of colour at the moment but I'm hopeful that the rest of the plants will catch up.

I found this jar in one of our cupboards and I believe it used to belong to the Misters grandparents. I got laughed at by my flatmates when I pointed out that it's so peculiar, I it's beyond bad and has gone back to nice, and was called a "granny". They just don't have any taste ;)

 My little seed collection is somewhat limited at the moment. There are some herbs, lots and lots of poppy seeds and four little packages I evidently forgot to label. I do remember collecting some pot marigold and hollyhock seeds so they must be in there but I have no idea what the other two might be. Oh well, I love surprises.
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Don't forget the give-away! It closes tomorrow at midnight so if you still need something to cheer up your easter breakfast, go and leave a comment quickly. :)

energy!

 I will tell you a secret: I have an infinite capacity for sleeping. Unfortunately, I also have a bad habit of staying up late so the result is that I tend to sleep until lunchtime. After finally getting up, I feel bad for having wasted so much of the day and, to make matters worse, I generally feel pretty groggy as well.

But, ladies and gentlemen, not today! I woke up at 7:50, got up voluntarily five minutes later and was on my bike to go running by 8:05 (I NEVER exercise in the morning) Now, two hours later, I have done some exercise, showered, cleaned up the kitchen, baked some bread and had an awesome breakfast . Also, I'm in a painfully good mood *insert huge grin here*

"But how?" you may ask. I think the trick has two parts: I have been going to bed relatively early (for me. This means before 1am. I'm a student, okay?) and I left the curtains open so that the sun can wake me up in the morning. This didn't stop me from sleeping until 11 am a few days ago days (see infinite capacity for sleeping) but I have found myself waking up a little earlier every morning. The best part is that I actually feel awake too!

The only downside: I think this is working so well because the Mister is off on a skiing trip for the week. Getting to bed and getting up early tends to suffer when he is around. It's just so tempting to snuggle up to him for another five minutes and that's all i need to fall asleep again. I'm not sure he will be amused by the "curtains open" idea either but I'm going to put up a good fight about that.

I'm off now, figuring out the deeper secrets of the universe (ie revising Cosmology). I hope you have an awesome day! I've got a suspicion mine will be good.

At long last

Remember when I was all excited about planting some daffodil bulbs in our little garden? The first daffodil opened it's flower today! In other gardens they have disappeared already again but because our little patch is quite shady, plants tend to be later than expected. It doesn't matter, they have finally made it and they make me smile whenever I walk past.