Celebration!

I’ve got my Masters Arts Council funding!!! Tuition fees paid, and a generous maintenance grant for the 12 months from October. Now I’ve got this I can be fairly confident that my Doctoral studies will be funded. It’s so amazing, it looks like I’m going to have my dream career – it’s all in my hands now. It also means that we’re lifted off the poverty line – I was seriously getting concerned that we wouldn’t be able to afford heating in winter. I now have to decide what I’m doing job wise, you’re not supposed to have any part time work while in receipt of the award. Part time work keeps me sane, though, so I’ll have to do some thinking…it’s not a bad position to be in, though – deciding whether I can do a job for fun.

We met up with my old friend: Mark, on Saturday. Raine and he have never met - I haven’t seen him for about 4 years, because he goes travelling for years at a time (he lives off money from two flats he rents out in Blackpool, and part time jobs around the world), but he’s back in Blackpool for a while. Raine and I met up with him and his boyfriend, and it went really well…so well, in fact, that he and Tim are coming to the wedding! I’m really pleased, Mark’s one of the good guys, and his travel stories are wonderful.

Unbelievably the weather has actually gotten worse since my last entry. It’s been so dark all day – it looks like late evening, and there’s constant rain. Getting out of bed was as hard as winter mornings – it seemed like it wasn’t light yet. I’m trying to convince myself it’s getting all the horribleness out of the way before next week…I think I might be kidding myself, though. We have got a honeymoon plan B, though – we’ve bought several cases of beer and cider;-) There’s not a great deal to do in Newquay when the weather’s crap. Thankfully this year we’ll have a TV in the room, but it’s not really an ideal holiday activity.