No stories? - Rubbish!

It's been more than a month and not a story has been told! That's not to say I haven't had any stories - just that I never bothered actually writing any! I've even had plenty of procrastination moments where I could have, but I did less interesting stuff like staring at bbc news website, or playing dumb games. Ahh, the joys of a PhD.

So stories, eh? Well, obviously there was the rugby world cup, which we had some very drunken and fun evenings staying up to watch, and some obscenely early mornings for the last games. Whilst I was chuffed England got as far as we did, I'm still so disappointed the All Blacks got knocked out. The fact the French didn't even have the decency to come third makes it even worse - the All Blacks would have TOTALLY won it if those evil Frenchies hadn't brought their curse again (and indeed if the referees hadn't been playing for the French!).

Then of course there was Raikonen winning the F1. Wahoo. Not. That said, whilst I dislike Kimi most intensely (anyone who gets his name written in diamonds on his helmet is a complete loser if you ask me), to see a McLaren win this year would have been a travesty. I'll be firmly reserving judgement on the current 'it' boy Hamilton until I see him in a season where he and his team weren't blatantly cheating. I know Ferrari are cheating scumbags too, but at least they have the decency to keep it quiet! I used to have a lot of respect for Ron Dennis and the team, shame. If it was just the car design they were cheating with I wouldn't mind so much, but from what I've heard they could listen in to the Ferraris radio and find out about pit-stop strategies, so the drivers totally would have benefitted. And I might add Hamilton is NOT the only rookie to fight for the championship (as the BBC would have us believe), Jacques Villeneuve did as well. And he wasn't a cheating scumbag! ANYWAY! Moving on...

Yeah so, things are pretty much fine over here. Not done much recently so no photos for ya'll. Went to a lovely wedding last week though, for two of the most well-suited and nice people you could find! And then the next day my friend Emelie gave birth to a gorgeous little girl! So that's all the major milestones in one weekend! Big kiss to you, Mickey and little Maxime.

We were supposed to be going off tramping the Routeburn track this week coming, but it's still closed cos of avalanche risks. It sucks, cos I was TOTALLY ready for a week off! Except a week off last Christmas I haven't had a day off since March 2006 and almost never take a whole weekend off, so I figure I'm due a holiday! Hopefully we'll rebook it when it reopens, but in the meantime it's onwards and upwards. I was supposed to finish absolutely all labwork this week, but I still have a couple of reactions left to do. Unfortunately I got supremely close to making my target natural product, but just couldn't get what should have been an easy step to work. At a certain point you just have to finally admit defeat, though, and finish the thesis. Maybe I'll come up with a cunning plan which I can try when I've submitted, but in the meantime I think I'll just have to accept it. It's been an awesome journey though, and there's plenty to write about in my thesis. Finishing the synthesis means the difference between a publication in a mediocre journal and a publication in a fantastic journal though, so it's a big shame to get so close. Next stop is finishing my thesis, which should be largely done by Christmas, but no doubt it'll drag into the new year. Definately gonna be submitted by end of January though.

So, any other stories? Not really. Guess I should sign off then. Hope you're all well. Thanks for dropping by!