Well I am back from the conference in Barcelona now. The conference itself varied a lot in quality, especially between the different days. The first whole day of the conference I went to a lot of sessions which I found interesting, and made me think about different ways of approaching e-learning. The second day was basically a bust with barely any sessions that in retrospect I would go to again. I'm not sure whether it is a custom in some countries when presenting, but a couple of the presenters decided to tell a story about their country for about 10 minutes at the start of the presentation. It happened for someone from Saudi Arabia and someone from Belgium. They seem to assume the audience is full of idiots ("Here is Saudi Arabia in a map, here is its flag, it exports a lot of oil, Mecca is in Saudi Arabia, etc."). Might be fine if it was a geography conference, but to spend the first part of your presentation doing it seemed ridiculous. I mostly just need to know what might be different in e-learning about your context. The person from Belgium who did it made me laugh as she was talking to us like we had never heard of Belgium before, despite a huge number of attendees being from the Netherlands, and the rest from the UK.

Outside of the conference I went around with Richard and Helen and we saw the typical sites. I did my best to find them some nice places to eat away from the touristy areas too. I also hung out with Nadia and Jonatan who I stayed with in December, though they have moved house since then. Jonatan has been sick for the last month or so, so I just went over to their house as he is low on energy. He seemed to be doing ok when I was there though.

Now I'm back in Sheffield to work on my dissertation proposal, which is due on Sunday.

I'm off to Barcelona today for a conference. It will be good to get away for a bit, but unfortunately I haven't finished my dissertation proposal yet, and that's due on Easter Sunday. So I will be coming back on Thursday to finish that up. At least after Sunday I will be done with all of my Masters courses. It seems hard to believe now, given how long it feels like it's been since I started it. It will feel even better when I've actually finished it!

Started my new job this past week, which is exciting, but also slightly inconvenient that I'm going away to this conference so soon. This is slightly tempered by the fact that during the two weeks around Easter, the university barely runs at all anyway, as there is little teaching going on.

Spring seems to finally be here, or at least it is doing a good job of faking us out. I saw some daffodils blooming today, and it has started to be sunny. Plus I haven't had to use my heating at all in the last month. It's still not warm mind you, but it is not as cold anymore.

I got my passport back this week so it's set that I will start my new position on April 1st. Early in April I'll be going to Barcelona for a conference, and then I have three work days off starting on Good Friday. It will be nice to have a bit of holiday coming up. There are three days off in May too.

Otherwise, not too much new going on. I've discovered a classical music series of concerts in Sheffield, which are currently hosted in the Unitarian church in the centre of the city. It's a very old chapel, and the acoustics are really good, so it is perfect for the concerts. I think the experimental theatre where they normally play is being renovated for the next year, so they have moved all concerts to the chapel.

Tuesday I'm going on a folk train, which is a train where people play folk music on the way to a pub in the center of the Peak District. Then they take the train back and play music on the way back too. Sounds interesting, so I'm going with the Academics in Sheffield group.

I have a bunch of assignment due dates coming up soon - two due next Sunday, and then another one two weeks after that. It's going to be a lot of work to finish them all, but once I do it will at least be the end of my taught courses for the MSc, so that is great. It should free up my time to do some other things, though I will still have to do the dissertation. At least with the dissertation I don't have to follow as strict a timeline as with the taught classes.

Thought it might be worth summarising a few key things that have happened recently:

I've been offered a promotion, pending immigration approval so I am waiting for that to come back right now.

I made a really good pizza the other day, which has inspired me to try again tomorrow.

I got to call the police again when someone decided to throw a brick at the door of the job centre across the street. I think the door is plastic reenforced though as the brick kept bouncing off it. The police arrived after the person had left anyway. Then a few days later I was woken up at 2am by a car speeding about 60 mph down my little street and promptly side-swiping another car. They drove off immediately and about 10 seconds later I heard a police car come racing down the street with siren blaring. I imagine they were trying to get away from the police when they crashed but the car must have been good enough to keep driving.

I'm joining a cub scout pack as an assistant leader. They're a great group of boys and girls and I've been helping out informally about 4 or 5 times in the last couple months, but I'm going to make it more official soon.

I went to London last weekend and I had a blast. I got to see Gabriel and a learning technologist I know at another university.

Also my department may be moving to a new building. Fortunately this building is closer and will half my commute to work (taking it down to a 4 minute walk). :)

Last night I stayed up really late doing karaoke on the PS2 at Adam and Sarah's new flat and had a blast. Today I tried to find a decent karaoke option for the wii, but it seems sadly lacking unless you like high school musical...

Well, the snow is melted now. It snowed hard on Wednesday too, so there was a lot of chaos in the streets and trains during the week.

My last MSc course is underway now, finishing the third week tomorrow (of ten weeks). It's interesting and I am getting into the course material now. It's called Research Methods and I'm hoping it will help me with the research I am doing and prepare me for my dissertation.

I got a new mobile phone today, as my old phone would dial random numbers when it was in my pocket. The new phone covers up its number pad so I should be able to keep it in my pocket. I'm keeping the old phone in case I get any visitors, as it was useful when my parents came and they had a similar phone. I still have my same phone number, as it can easily be transfered between phones.

Snow! It has been seriously snowing here since last night, and apparently it is worse down in London. In London many streets were undriveable and I gather they had to stop a lot of bus and tube services, causing difficulty getting around the city.

This morning I woke up to some snow on the sidewalks, but snow-free roads. However, the amount of snow is supposed to increase even more overnight, possibly for the next couple days. It is sticking to the roads tonight, so not sure if others will go into work tomorrow. I'm hoping things will be normal by Wednesday though as I am supposed to be running something with staff then!

It all looks quite pretty though.

I haven't written a post in awhile, mainly since I was in the US for a long time over the holidays, and I figured everyone knew what I was up to.

I finished my 5th course of my MSc, and I've started the 6th one, Research Methods this week. It has a lot of reading in the start of it, so I am feeling a bit overwhelmed. However, it is my last class so I should be fine. At least I don't have two courses at once like last year. I still haven't gotten my feedback and grades from my previous class, which they had promised by the 20th. Instead it looks like I will get one assignment next week but I imagine it will be a couple more before the second assignment comes out, as they said something about one tutor becoming a pro-vice chancellor, so that makes it unlikely he will have much time.

Winter seems to be lifting some, as the days are getting noticeably longer. This past few days have been mostly clear and sunny too, which has made it feel warmer (though I am not sure it really has been). It's just nice seeing the sun at least, though it tends to be so low on the horizon that you have to squint or wear sun glasses if you are facing it. I am glad I don't have to drive with the sun like that at least.

I had my neighbors and a couple other friends over for lasagna last night, which meant I spent most of yesterday preparing for it, between shopping, cleaning my flat which was a mess, and cooking. Today is dedicated to reading research book chapters instead.