Blog: The Life Of A Supreme Ruler

Brazil pictures

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— orudge @ 15/08/2006 6:33 pm

I think I forgot to mention this, but I’ve uploaded my Brazil pictures now. Haven’t labelled each one, I’ll do that sometime soon, but you get the general gist. 🙂

Boston

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— orudge @ 14/08/2006 2:38 am

Dear me, I’ve just gone and booked a flight to and hostel in Boston, for Reading Week in November. The plan is to have a poke around Boston and also head to New York City and have a little look there. It seems I may have picked up a little addiction here, travelling.

Back in the UK, at last!

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— orudge @ 13/08/2006 12:04 am

Well, yesterday I got back to the UK, finally. Set off from Recife on Wednesday evening, fine – got to Lisbon a little bit late, but caught my flight to Frankfurt, fine. Walked about half a mile to a different terminal in Frankfurt, fine. Went through security, and the guy noticed I was flying to London, and informed me that “Heathrow is closed”. Hmm, odd, I thought. Turns out my flight was cancelled, so I spent about an hour at least in one queue, before being told to go to another queue. Spent a bit longer in there, and finally got my ticket changed for a later flight, in “standby” mode – basically, if there’s a seat free, I may get it. It’s a bit of a lottery, really. Didn’t get onto two flights, but the third one (which was the latest flight I could possibly get if I was to still make my train) I did get on to! Hurrah! All I had to worry about now was getting my bags, finding the station, getting my ticket which should have been faxed through and getting on the train. Of course, Lufthansa forgot to stick my bag on the plane, so I had to come back at 10pm, or they’d send it up to me. By that time, I was barely going to make my train, if at all, so I figured I may as well just stay at the airport. My bag did come through on the next flight, thankfully, so I spent an uncomfortable night in the arrivals lounge, before heading down to the Tube station at 5.45am to catch the train from Kings Cross. After spending £80 on a ticket (and that was WITH a railcard), got on the train, and finally got home. Bit annoying though, I’m going to look into the terms of my insurance policy to see if it may cover this at all.

Anyway, long story short, I’m back home, for now. Got a trip to Rome in a couple of weeks for a week, but otherwise, I’m here in St Andrews until, well, next summer. It’s kind of good to be back, except, of course, my hard disk had just died before I set off to Brazil, so I’m in the process of reinstalling my main PC. It lets me clear out a load of junk, I suppose.

When in Brazil, I took a load of photos, as usual, and maintained a sort of ‘diary’. I’ll post this up in the coming days.

Brazil!

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— orudge @ 18/07/2006 4:58 pm

A very brief hello from Brazil! Currently in an Internet cafe, paying R$1.50 for an hour of access – about 25p. It’s not the fastest in the world, though. Anyway, things are pretty good over here, fairly hot a lot of the time, but good. I’m writing a “diary” of sort, so I shall likely publish extracts over the coming weeks. Must go for now, though, things to be done!

Airports

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— orudge @ 11/07/2006 7:24 am

Well, currently sitting in Lisbon Airport, where my flight to Recife has been delayed by an hour – it’s now supposed to be going at 12.15pm, instead of 11.15am. So a few hours to kill yet. I’ve been up since 4am or so (trying to sleep on a cold hard row of seats in Faro Airport isn’t too fun, although I managed to get some sort of sleep, I think) and a little bit tired. Had a short half-hour or so flight earlier from Faro to Lisbon – we’d barely stopped climbing when it was nearly time to descend again. 😉 The flight to Brazil will be around seven and a half hours though, so not the longest flight I’ve been on, but a considerable length nonetheless.

Well, let’s see what I can find on this Internet to keep me occupied. I do like wifi.

Happy birthday to me

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— orudge @ 09/07/2006 12:59 pm

Yep, today is my 19th birthday! Hurrah! And today shall mainly be spent packing and sorting things out here I think, as tomorrow I head off to Brazil. 🙂

California photos

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— orudge @ 05/07/2006 11:04 pm

I’ve finished uploading, sorting and renaming all my California photos. Find them here, conveniently split into subalbums on a day-by-day basis. Now you too can relive my first trip to America. 😉

Back home

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— orudge @ 04/07/2006 6:03 pm

Well, I’m back in the United Kingdom now, and the weather is lovely and grey up in Scotland. I’d got quite used to that nice California sun. I’m not really feeling jetlagged, although I am a bit tired (I managed to get a couple of hours sleep on the flight last night). I’m uploading photos now and will write some sort of a commentary/post in the next few days probably. Duke of Edinburgh presentation on Thursday, birthday on Sunday, and then Brazil on Monday, so a busy time ahead!

Well, it’s cooled down a bit

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— orudge @ 30/06/2006 7:25 am

… but it’s still a bit hot some days. I’ve been up to all sorts the past week or so, including going to San Francisco and various places in and around Napa Valley. Most exciting. However, now it is time for bed, having just watched “The Producers” having been told by Rachel how good it is several times over the past couple of weeks. I’ll be back in Scotland on Tuesday, and a full update shall follow sometime after, I daresay, as well as the usual huge pile of photos. 😉

Phew, it’s hot!

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— orudge @ 23/06/2006 12:54 am

Well, it’s hitting over 100°F here in Napa, California (37°C), which is probably the hottest weather I’ve been in for ages. It’s really quite something, but Rachel’s parents have air conditioning in the house at least! Things have been quite good, albeit a bit mad, since getting here on Saturday night. Was very tired on Saturday after some 13 hours of flights (and in total around 22 hours of flights, airports, buses, trains and whatnot), so when Rachel had picked me up from the airport and we headed to Santa Cruz, I was feeling rather tired. We got some pancakes at a nice little, and very American, diner, and then it was basically off to bed. The next day, Sunday, I appeared to have recovered from jetlag rather quickly (I’m guessing it’ll be worse the other way) and it was Rachel’s graduation in the afternoon, which was a pleasant afternoon – hot though, although not quite as hot as it is now! On Monday, Rachel moved out of her apartment in Santa Cruz and we went down to the Boardwalk for a while, went on some rides which was good fun, and explored a little bit of the town. After that, we hit the road, heading south for Los Angeles. For a large part of the journey, we were going down a fairly small, bendy road in the hills, surrounded by forest, before hitting the freeway. We stayed overnight in a motel, and then on Tuesday (Rachel’s birthday), we continued to drive down, got a little bit lost in LA, and finally found the CBS studios, where we were going to see “The Late, Late Show” being filmed. It was quite a fun experience as “show enhancers” (not “audience”, this is Hollywood remember!), and we saw an actress whose name I can’t quite remember, and Jack Black as guest stars, which was pretty fun, and I made my debut on US national TV for all of about a third of a second (they didn’t really show audience shots). Then we were back on the road, heading up to Napa – stayed in a motel overnight again, not so noisy this time (the previous one was right next to the 101 freeway, and the cars were fairly loud), and the next day, yesterday, we continued on our travels. When we neared Sacramento, Rachel noticed that the car was running low on fuel, so we left the freeway and hunted for a gas station, but to no avail. Just after she asked a man where the nearest gas station was, the car started to splutter and she just managed to park the car before the car finally died. She phoned her dad to basically get rescued, but while on the phone, she accidentally managed to lock her keys in the car… oh dear! Note also that the temperature in Sacramento was rather hot – some 40°C plus, I think – so this was really great! She called up the insurance company and somebody came to get us back into the car and give her some gas, and we finally got back on the road again – oh well, it all added to the adventure! Finally got into Napa, where it was still quite warm, got some food, and not really done a huge amount since then. Going to be exploring the countryside nearby over the next little while, as well as the likes of San Francisco.

Overall, the past few days have been really quite good, if a little hectic. There are probably things I’ve forgotten to mention, but general opinion is “so far, rather good, if just a little bit too hot!”. I now know all sorts of things I didn’t know about Romans, too, the joys of being in a car with Rachel for a few days. Hehe, I jest… overall, things are good. 🙂 Hope everyone’s having a good summer so far, too.

California, here I come…

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— orudge @ 17/06/2006 6:13 am

Well, I’m off on my travels. This time in 24 hours, I should be in California, probably very tired! I’ll update you all sometime soon… ta ta for now!

Driving test

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— orudge @ 15/06/2006 3:38 pm

Well, I had my driving test just now, and I failed. Was on a crossroads, and I’d stopped to turn right. There were cars coming from the right though, and I let out one that I wasn’t meant to (I had priority), and cars were building up behind, and managed to get a major for that. Sigh, it’s a bit annoying as everything else was basically fine, my manoeuvres were fine, but what can you do, eh? Also annoying is that it’ll be a couple of months before I can take it again due to my travels. Ah well, so be it. America on Saturday. 😀

I’ve also decided…

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— orudge @ 12/06/2006 12:09 am

… that I want to skydive. There’s a skydiving club here in St Andrews, I might have a look at it in freshers week. There’s also a local company, Skydive St Andrews, who look like they might be quite good.

Exciting stuff!

I’ve decided

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— orudge @ 05/06/2006 3:43 pm

I think I’ll go into space one day. Or at least try. I mean, with the likes of Virgin Galactic, it’s only projected to be $200,000 or so, and then it can only get cheaper… (you could argue that SpaceShipOne isn’t planned to actually go into space properly, but that’s fine, I’m not planning to be the first one into space on there). One day, when the Zernebok Empire is prosperous, perhaps…

Who knows, one day this blog may feature self-taken photos of the exterior of the planet. 😉

It’s June!

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— orudge @ 03/06/2006 9:32 pm

Yup, it’s June already, time really does fly. One of my exam results came back this morning, too – I got a 13.9 in French (science), or thereabouts – can’t remember exactly as the facility is down right now for “scheduled maintenance” (releasing more grades perhaps?)

Well, being the 3rd of June, it is:

• 12 days until my driving test
• 14 days until I go to California
• 31 days until I get back from California
• 33 days until my Duke of Edinburgh presentation
• 36 days until my birthday!
• 37 days until I go to Brazil
• 68 days until I get back from Brazil
• 80 days until I go to Rome
• 88 days until I get back from Rome
• 105 days until Freshers Week 2006!

(Bored? Me? Never!)

I’m not too sure how the driving test will go – obviously, I hope I’ll pass, but I seem to have good days and bad days. If I just stay calm, everything should be alright… easier said than done though, I believe. Oh well, we’ll see.

California should be good fun, if rather hot compared with what I’m used to. Although, on that note, the weather yesterday in particular was lovely, and it was hitting 23°C at one point in the car! Very nice and sunny for the most part. Should be good preparation for California and Brazil!

At the moment I’m enjoying some Age of Empires III online, which I couldn’t do at uni due to the delightful resnet port blocks. It’s kind of nice having nothing specific to do, although it can be a bit boring at times.

Well, I’m off to do something or other, toodles for now.

Moved house!

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— orudge @ 30/05/2006 7:07 pm

Well, I’m now living in my summer accommodation, on South Castle Street in St Andrews. It’s quite a nice location because it’s in the middle of town, and barely 5 minutes or so away from Tesco, the union, or indeed just about anywhere in St Andrews. I could get used to living here, I’m sure! Back in Albany Park in September though, so I’ll no doubt have to get used to the long walks/bike rides again. 😉

Now then, the summer…

This is where I’ll be heading this summer… some 24,763 miles of flying, comprising 14 flights. First off it’s a trip to California for a couple of weeks on the 17th June, flying from Edinburgh, via Atlanta, to San Francisco. I’ve never been outside Europe before, so that should be very exciting! Then, shortly after getting back from California, I’m off to Brazil for a month in July – the day after my birthday, in fact. I also get to visit the delights of two Portuguese airports while heading out there, and a German airport on the way back – will be quite a journey! And then, just 12 days after that, I’m off to Rome with a friend from uni for a week! It’ll be a mad summer! 🙂 In fact, I think I’ll only be spending some 57 days of the 113 or so days in the summer in this country! Great stuff!

Exams are finished!

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— orudge @ 24/05/2006 12:06 pm

Well, my second set of university exams are now finished. They seemed to go fairly well – CS1004 Internet Programming, MN1002 Organisations & Analysis, FR1012 French II (Science) being the exams I sat, with a grammar and an oral exam for the latter. Had French grammar today, which was reasonably good, and now all is done! Just need to pack everything to move into my summer accommodation now… I’m staying in St Andrews for the summer, although won’t be here for all of it as I’ll be travelling quite a bit! More on that story later.

America, here I come…

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— orudge @ 14/05/2006 11:00 pm

Just booked a flight to San Francisco to visit a friend in Santa Cruz in a month’s time! Woo! 😀

May Ball and Castle Ceilidh!

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— orudge @ 07/05/2006 10:38 pm

It’s been a busy weekend. The annual Charity May Ball was held on Saturday, and I was attending. It was rather good fun, photos and some video are in the gallery. Tonight was the Castle Ceilidh, held – funnily enough – in the grounds of the castle here, and was also rather good fun, I do miss a good knees-up.

I’d write more, but as is usual these days, I’m rather tired and could do with bed! Exams start in a week, and this week coming is intended to be a revision week, so revise I daresay I should! May go down to Edinburgh on Tuesday though to see Kristin, would be good.

Ta ta for now, hope everyone is well!

Sunshine :D

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— orudge @ 05/05/2006 2:49 pm

Oh what a beautiful morning, oh what a beautiful day.

Hitting 20°C today and everything! Very nice.

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