27/12/05 The trip begins

Despite a covering of snow (damp and nasty stuff, unfortunately), the plan is still to drive to Norwich this afternoon. I need a few bits and bobs from Venturesport, such as new socks: my so-called 1000-mile socks have worn out after about fifteen. Please, stear clear of that brand! After staying the night in Norwich, we will catch the 9 o'clock train to the Lakes, arriving in Windermere at half past four.

The weather forecast is very good for Thursday, snow on Friday, followed by rain until Tuesday (typical). Therefore we've changed our plan, and are now intending to climb Bowfell on the first day, maximising our chances of good weather. Snow should be interesting on Lingmoor Fell. And as for the rain, we'll just have to take it as usual.

So here is the final plan (still subject to change):

Thursday: Bowfell
Friday: Side Pike and Lingmoor
Saturday: Pavey Ark via Jack's Rake
Sunday: Central Langdale Pikes
Monday: Traverse of Crinkle Crags

I am still praying that the forecast is wrong and that the rain will somehow avoid us, but let's face it: this is the Lake District. If it isn't raining right now, it will soon. And at least we'lll probably get one full day of fine winter weather before the conditions start to change.

Will post again when we get back. Please wish good weather in our direction!

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25/12/05 Happy Christmas, everyone!

It's a bright and frosty morning here in Suffolk. the birds are singing, and Amber (my dog) is capering in excitement after having eaten a gigantic Bonio biscuit (her present). My brother has vanished into the glittering forest with his new digital camera and hasn't been seen for over an hour ... he'll come back in a while with hundreds of photos.

As for me, I have a new sleeping bag (yay!), a pocket scanning FM radio, a new electric shaver, and a 2-man Bothy bag. Plus, of course, lots of chocolate. ;-)

Have a good one, folks. I'll post again on Tuesday with the final details of our upcoming trip.

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21/12/05 Bleah

Feeling rather rotten at the moment. I've picked up a nasty cold from somewhere. Didn't go into work this morning: couldn't stand another day of Looks from customers when I sneeze on them.

Working at Wyevale again for a few days has been a lot of fun, actually, but it may have been unwise volunteering to work the entire week before Christmas. I got to see most of my friends again, including Dan, who is at university in Colchester, Emily, who has been promoted to Till Supervisor, and Fran, who hates working there and is still trying to find a better job. The weekend was just like "old times". Monday and Tuesday, however, when a different shift of people work at the tills, was less fun, and reminded me of why I quit working Tuesdays in the first place.

I will probably go back to work tomorrow or Friday (hopefully Friday). I know I'll be needed at the end of the week when the last-minute Christmas rush commences.

The Langdale trip is now less than a week away! We're watching the weather carefully, and although it's currently wet and windy in the Lakes, the forecast is for a spell of settled, cold weather over Christmas and the New Year, with maybe a few rain showers (these will of course fall as snow in the mountains). We're keeping our fingers crossed that the forecast will turn out to be accurate this time. I was starting to get very depressed at the prospect of another spell of bad weather in Langdale.

I also hope this dratted cold has cleared up by then! We leave next Tuesday for Norwich, and the journey North begins on Wednesday.

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14/12/05 REVOLUTION!

I can hardly believe what's happened on the UEA Student's Forums this afternoon. After a couple of months of the Union exerting more and more control over the running of the forums, one member got himself banned for seemingly no reason at all. This triggered a massive response, resulting in several of the core members (two of which being moderators) breaking away and forming a new movement ... the UEA Underground Forum. Dozens of students have already migrated to the new site. I was even given the honour of designing the title graphics!

The revolution against the autocratic Union has begun. Long live the Revolution. Long live the Glorious 14th of December! :D

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The end of term beckons

As it turns out, today will be my last full day in Norwich this semester. The lectures for Thursday and Friday have been cancelled (yeah!), and today is my day off, so all I have to do now is finish the Evil Programming Assignment™, aka. S1A21 Coursework 2. The deadline is 1PM (or 3PM, depending on who you listen to) tomorrow.

After procrastinating (sp?) for most of yesterday, constantly setting myself time goals then breaking them without noticing, I decided upon a policy of strict discipline for today. At 10:30 I went down to the CMP labs and put in two hours of honest work on the project, and despite digging myself deeper into one particular hole, I made a lot of real progress. I only have to overcome one problem, and then I'll have finished the basic core of the final Java class. The rest is all gravy: I accepted weeks ago that I wouldn't be able to do Part 3, because I just don't understand abstract classes and interfaces.

I also have to do a short report, which I'll probably knock up tomorrow morning (all it needs is a description of how far you've successfully completed the assignment, followed by source code listings). And after that, I'm done!

My parents are coming to pick me up at 2PM tomorrow. That means I'll have a whole day to unwind before I start working at the garden centre on Saturday. If it's going to be as busy as last Christmas, I'll need all the relaxation time I can get!

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12/12/05 Ten thousand hits

Wow: the site has now registered 10,000 hits! Bear in mind that's not the zeroed count since the site was launched in early November. I carried over the pageload count from my original blog. Even so, this site has registered almost 3,000 hits since early November, which is incredible. Looking at the stats, most of them are from UEA (Fell Club members, I presume), or from Google searches.

In other news, I sat through a 9AM exam this morning for the S1A21 module (Java programming). I was amazed at how many people there were: I think only about half the people taking the unit actually turn up to lectures. The exam was hearteningly easy. Straight after, I dashed down to the labs to put the finishing touches to our database project, which was "presented" to a panel of examiners soon after. They seemed impressed. I really think it went well!

My other coursework assignment (the evil programming task) is still behind, but I have until 1PM on Thursday to finish that ... and I've promised myself not to get stressed about it. Providing I get more than 10% in the exam, I'm already guaranteed to pass the unit. No point in getting worried about work that won't crucially affect my grade!

Most of my stuff is now packed in preparation for moving out on Friday. And there's only just over two weeks to go before the Langdale expedition. Need to get some serious walking in when I get back home. I have my eye on a night-hike around the Orford Coastal Route ...

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9/12/05 The plan for the Christmas hols

All details have now been finalised. I now have a complete plan for the next month, and boy it's busy! Here is what the near future has in store for me:

1. Next Monday: Exam at 9AM (groan) followed by coursework presentation at noon (groangroan).

2. Thursday: Hand in A21 coursework at 1PM. If I'm really lucky it may even be finished.

3. Friday: Semester ends! Move back to Suffolk.

4. Saturday 17th to 24th: One jolly week working at good ol' Wyevale. I'm looking forward to it, but I daresay after a couple of days my brain will have been reduced to mush again by all those damned Christmas songs they play over the tannoy.

5. 25th - 26th: Christmas. My only two days of genuine holiday when I can get away with doing nothing.

6. 27th: Pack rucksacks and expedition bags then head off to Norwich with James. Stay overnight at my place.

7. 28th to 3rd of January: The Great Langdale winter mountaineering trip! Complete with mild, windy, wet weather if the forecast is anything to go by.

8: 4th - 5th: Sleep.

9: 6th - 13th: Another week working at Wyevale.

10: 14th - 15th: Revise like crazy for the Maths exam I'll undoubtably be set as soon as I go back to UEA.

11: 16th: Back to Norwich for another 12 fun-filled weeks at university.

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8/12/05 New Desktop Wallpapers section!

I have now posted ten high-quality photos for use as desktop wallpapers in the new section of the site. More will be added in a month or two. There is also a new article (Ten Items of Gear I Rely On) in the articles section.

Checking the Met Office website, I now see that the Christmas forecast has changed. Originally the prediction was for very cold temperatures and high pressure over Christmas and the New Year, which would have been ideal ... now they're forecasting low pressure and higher than average temperatures with westerly winds and rain showers. Typical British winter weather it must be said, but I was looking forward at least a little snow ...

Still, Langdale is great no matter what the weather; the October trip taught me that. One valuable thing I have learned is that when Bowfell and the Crinkles are in cloud, the Langdale Pikes are usually clear (or at least have only partial cloud cover). For this reason alone our plan has a high degree of flexibility built into it. I'd like to keep Bowfell for the last day, but we must be prepared to climb it as and when the weather permits. I would like to avoid getting lost on the North Ridge again if I can.

Coursework update: B23 assignment now almost finished. Just a few loose ends to tie up. A21 is still a bit behind, but I still have nearly a week to get it done. Plus there's an exam on monday (eek!) so revision is currently the top priority!

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7/12/05 New-look homepage for the site

I spent an hour or two this morning designing a scrolling news bar and the new buttons. The newsbar is a little gimmicky, I must admit, but in its favour I have to say that it gives you the latest news without you having to scroll down to the updates section. I do think that the new navigation buttons give a big usability boost: some people had mentioned that it wasn't too obvious how to navigate to the other pages on the site. Previously the only way of navigating was via the sidebar. Now there's a nice collection of big, graphical buttons on the homepage linking to every index page on the site.

I am fully aware that the Mid Wales section is still empty, and that there's only one article in the Articles section. I'm working on them as and when I can ... but I really am very busy at the moment trying to get my coursework finished before the deadlines next week. I will make an effort to have the Mid Wales section online by Christmas, but I can't make any promises!

We now have (or have ordered) all the gear and supplies we need for the Langdale trip. I added a Powerstretch balaclava to my equipment stash this morning: even if I don't need it in the Lakes, I certainly will when I go to Scotland in three months time. The problem with weather over the New Year is that it's unpredictable. We may be blessed with snow, high pressure and sunshine, or it may rain solidly the whole time. I'm trying to make sure we're prepared for every eventuality.

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6/12/05 The coursework marathon begins

There's now under a week left to complete my B23 assignment, and just over a week for the A21. I made significant progress yesterday on B23: I met up with the guy I'm working with, and luckily the material we'd come up with individually matched fairly well, so we spent a couple of hours integrating our solutions and solving a few problems I'd hit into. I'm very glad to say that we've now broken the back of that assignment: all we have left to do now is finish a couple of queries and get the user interface sorted (and print off the design and plan the presentation ... but the bulk of it is there).

The A21 assignment is proving altogether more difficult, although luckily I have longer to finish this one. I think it's hard because the actual assignment is so vague ... I'm used to being supplied a lot of initial information for programming problems. This one requires a lot more creativity and careful thought. I'll get there eventually: it's just a case of getting my head around seemingly impossible tasks which often look really obvious once I've solved them!

The big piece of good news is that I went into Wyevale on Saturday, and Steve (the manager) said I could have my old job back for a couple of weeks over Christmas. I remember that last Christmas there was very hectic ... but I'm really looking forward to it all the same. Must ring him up today to sort out the details.

I'm working on an article for the site, so keep checking back!

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2/12/05 Only two weeks left!

It's hard to believe there's only two weeks left of this semester. It seems like only yesterday that I arrived at UEA, but the unbelievable reality is that I've now been here for over two months. How time flies these days!

The good news is that I have now done a great deal towards my programming coursework, and am no longer particularly worried about getting it in on time: it isn't due until the day before we break up. My other piece of coursework is starting to get more urgent, but if I put in a lot of work over the weekend and get the basic database structure sorted, the rest will just be a case of getting the details right.

I have also learned that we have only ONE EXAM (!) at the end of term, instead of two, because our B23 exam isn't until January. That takes away an enormous amount of pressure, because now I only have to revise for the programming unit ... which is in any case the hardest of the two modules. Big relief.

As far as the great Gear Crusade is going, there are still a few things I need to get before the New Year trip. For me, the most vital item is a pair of fleece trousers, because my existing walking trousers are just too cold for winter use. Also, my sleeping bag is only rated at minus 5, so I'm bound to need warm legwear in bed! Other than that, I am pretty much sorted now for anything the weather can throw at me. I'll need a few new things for the February trip to Scotland, such as pile mitts, balaclava and so on, but we're unlikely to get Arctic conditions in the Lakes over the New Year ... I hope.

Going home for the weekend, hopefully to work on an article or two for the site in between coursework. Will post again on Monday.

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1/12/05 Mission for the day

Right, I have things to do today, and some of them just can't wait any longer.

1. Pay off credit card bill.

2. Register with the UEA Medical Facility.

3. Spend an hour or two in the labs working on the B23 coursework.

4. Spend an hour or two at home working on the A21 coursework.

5. Post those two half-finished mountain entries I was working on yesterday evening before the flat gathering (see slightly garbled entry below).

6. Do some more work on the coursework.

7. Watch a movie if there's still time.

It's going to be a busy day! But I really must get a decent amount of this coursework under my belt, because the programming task is turning out to be far harder than I expected. And I now have exactly two weeks to finish it.

(Oh, and I'm now archiving November's blog posts in another location, linked from the sidebar, but entries for the past few days will stay on the main blog page.)

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