Brad's England Journal- March 4th and 19th Entries 

Tuesday, March 4, 1997

Nothing too exciting has happened this past week, although I did go to the Tamworth Anker Rotary Club International Night this past Saturday, which was a lot of fun. I'll describe that in a minute, but first I will go over some minor milestones in the week. This past Wednesday I went in for my final physiotherapy (physical therapy) session for my shoulder. My physio looked over my shoulders and was satisfied they were both in good shape for flexibility and muscle balance. Now it is up to me to keep working on strengthening it in the gym.

I also got my scanner back up and working. I wrote email to Storm Photo, the people who make the scanner and they agreed to send the adapter for England to my Mom's house in the US, free of charge. It was then shipped over here, and as of last Saturday I can scan in pictures once again. Hopefully I can get the backlog of pictures finally scanned in for my journal.

Yesterday I met with my research advisor, Dr. Poli, to discuss my mini-project. I had finally figured out how to play back musical sequences on the computer, and was ready to move on to actually using the computer to evolve pleasant musical sequences. We came up with some software packages that I might use for the project, and also decided that I would try and create simple melodies of around 30 seconds in length. I am happy to have things more defined, and hopefully the project will start progressing more rapidly now.

Looking back at my previous entry, I figure I should also write something about my ankle which I hurt running through the Christmas Trees two weeks ago. Fortunately it has healed as rapidly as I thought it would, although I didn't go to Aikido last week because it was sore. I have been running some on it since last Wednesday, however, and while I wouldn't say it is back to full range of motion, it is doing very well.

A Can Pyramid Made by One Group
Working at the Irish Bar
Some Irish Dancers

Tamworth-Anker International Night
As I mentioned earlier, this past Saturday was International Night at the Tamworth Anker Rotary Club. It is an annual event put on by them and their corresponding Inner Wheel Club (the club for spouses of Rotarians). This year their theme was European Union, so they had foods from different countries in Europe. The Night is open to the public and raises money for charity. All who came enjoyed a dinner and participated in various games. The dinner started with a Swedish Smorgasborg, followed by British Beef, Greek Salad, and German dessert. There was also a French Cafe, an Irish Bar, and Scottish Tombola (a sort of raffle). All Rotarians and affiliates worked for the evening, and I was assigned to the Irish Bar. It was a fun night, and between serving people I had a good chance to talk with many of the other Rotarians and their wives who were working at the bar.

Wednesday, March 19, 1997

Two weeks have gone by in a hurry, although not a whole lot interesting has happened, mainly just the routine of classes and the mechanics of living. Two weeks ago I had a German test, the result of which I got back last night-- I got a 67 which was worse than my first by 20 points, but still better than most of the other students. I think our whole class is past the point where we have gotten the basics of German, and moved on to the point where we are overwhelmed by the amount we need to know. Classes also have ended, one last week, and one two weeks before. The Parallel Computer Architecture course will have a couple review courses at the end of April when the 4-week spring break is over, but the other won't have any more sessions. Exams will be in late April for 'Computers and the Mind', and in mid-May for Parallel Computer Architectures.

There were two interesting non-scheduled activities over the past couple weeks, one a week ago last Sunday, and one this past Sunday. Two Sunday's ago was an ecumenical service at St. Francis Hall with Anglicans, Catholics and Methodists. After the service we had a Roving Quiz, which was put together by some of the members of AngSoc. It was quite different from the MethSoc Quiz of a few weeks ago, although again it was in teams of four. It was myself, a fellow AngSoc person, and two Catholics on our team. The quiz had two sections, one on general and religious trivia, and another that required you to go around campus to find things, such as the phone number to a telephone booth. I had brought my Roller Blades, so I went to find the answers to the roving section which required one to go farther afield, while another girl went to find some answers related to the Guild of Students, and the other two worked on the trivia. It went pretty well and our team came in second, which was not too bad. The important thing was that it was enjoyable, and we had a chance to hang out with people from the other societies.

This past Sunday I went on another outing with the Orienteering Club, this time to Cannock Chase. This time there were no mis-haps, and I finished the course in an hour and forty minutes, although it was only a 6 km course. There were a couple times I was disoriented, but I quickly found my way again. That was my last race until the student championships in Sheffield coming up the weekend of April 6. I also helped a couple of other members to design the 'kit' or uniform we will wear to Sheffield. It is pretty outrageous, with trousers (pants) that have mesh in the back, and the letters 'BUOC' on the rear-end (for Birmingham University Orienteering Club).

I am also looking forward to the coming week, as three friends from the US will be coming. My roommate from Cornell, Jeff Hart, and Alex Holt, another friend from Cornell will be arriving on Saturday. Carrie Sorensen, a friend of mine that I met at Stanford is coming over late Sunday night. The tentative plan is to take it easy on Saturday, and only go to see Warwick Castle on Sunday. I figure keeping things easy will help with the jet-lag. Monday we go to Stratford-on-Avon, and will see the play "Much Ado About Nothing" by the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre. On Tuesday we will see Oxford, then head to Bath for the night and see it the next day. The next three days we will spend in London. Hopefully the trip will go well, and everyone will get along with each other.