Thursday Mornings

Had a really good two days today and yesterday. It was the fresher's hockey trials yesterday afternoon which is always quite interesting to observe. The evening was our first Wednesday night social of the year and it was fairly fantastics. Most sports teams have their main social event of the week on Wednesday nights and the first one of the year is always quite a big event. Started at our main sponsor pub, The Raisin for a few cheap 4 pint pitchers and some drinking games to introduce the Fresher's to vingt-et-un etc. From there we moved to a small place near the R&A clubhouse called Chariots which is a hotel bar with an average of about 1 customer per night. 25 of us pitched up and bought a couple of bottles of spirits (1 Gin and 1 Vodka) for about £58 I think. A bit of Gin face followed (amusing) and then we crawled to Ma Bells for strawpedos.

I spent all night trying to convince someone to play a game with me - they pick a number on the dice and if their number comes up I buy them 4 pints else they buy me 1. Only one person took the bet and then didn't buy me the pint. So anyway we decided to play another game, odds/evens, loser buys 9 strawpedos (not sure why 9). I lost, good game, there goes £15. From Ma Bells we went to Drouthy's for a cheeky pint of Addlestons Cider (cloudy and strong) and then to the union. Lots of fun.

Today brought back many happy memories of Thursday mornings for the last 3 years of my life. Typically feeling massively hungover, I will usually wake up for the first time at about 5am, fully clothed (in first year Channel 5 cartoons would still be playing) with the lights still on. I go for some water and try and get back to sleep. Then reawake at about 9am, have more water and start watching TV shows on my laptop (usually The Apprentice/Entourage/Prison Break/Anything I can find). This lasts until about midday when I begin to get hungry and will make a move into town for some sort of substance that I think I can keep down, today was a smoked salmon and scrambled egg bagel; adventurous. Packaged a few boxes of ceral (sold in the eBay shop, will discuss more at a later date) and come back home about 1pm. Back to bed for an hour or so, drank some juice/coffee and woke about 3pm. Go to Thursday evening hockey, play averagely, feel like shit but enjoy reminiscing about the night before with certain characters. During term I usually try and squeeze in a couple of lectures which I attend with excellent intentions but will sit there and doze/worry about being sick, take very few notes and set countdown timers for every five minutes so I know how long is left. But yes, Wednesday nights/Thursday mornings have been a massive and integral part of my time here.

Tomorrow I am due to advise and marticulate for my fourth and final year. I have chosen my modules for this term - two compulsory ones and my only option is Environmental Economics which I think sounds quite intersting and very current affairs. I am looking forward to getting stuck back into some economics having been in St Andrews doing very little for almost two weeks now. It will be good to get some routine back. I also have to start thinking about what I am going to do post St Andrews and at the moment it looks like a MPhil or Masters in Economics with a possibility of a PHD. I need to do some research into possible universities and also funding options but staying in education really appeals to me as a) I love economics and would like to continue studying it to a higher level b) I don't think there will be many jobs available this time next year because of the current economic climate c) I wouldn't know what jobs to apply before as have no idea what to do. Will discuss further at later date.

Now going to a friends for a cup of tea. One of the great things about St Andrews is you are usually never more than a 10 minute walk from a friends house/flat. The longest distance I could think of is probably DRA apartments to Albany Park which would probably take 25minutes at a good pace. 90% of the time it is less than 10minutes. Obviously it is a double edges sword because it means you are likely to see someone you know when you want to pop out to Tesco and are in a hurry, but to be honest it is great and people that criticise it will thoroughly miss it when they leave and then have to travel 300 miles to see their best friend.