On Being a MPhil/PhD Student, commuting from North London, Nemo and new Indian possibilities...

As many of you know, I am currently labelled as an MPhil student, who hopes to upgrade to PhD candadicy in May. What does this mean? Any good American who doesn't have this weird degree potential affixed to their name would ask? Well this means that I have a MSc degree, so I CAN be a PhD student, but in order to make sure that only quality students are passed through to candadicy, you have a year to hone your proposal, get it funded, and get all your contacts for the field. So, technically, I AM a PhD candidate, but I cannot call myself one until I pass my oral upgrade exam, on my topic, and write a dissertation proposal. If one fails this step ( and people do), you don't walk away empty-handed, but with another Master's degree. I don't know about anyone else out there, but this doesn't make me feel a whole lot better. I mean, I already HAVE a master's, so...wish me luck on passing. My date is set for May 20th, and I'm freaking out (as one does...) I am currently in the process of completely chucking out the paper I had written, to start all over again...so, very nervous. But when I successfully pass (fingers crossed) I will have business cards printed, and a much awaited (and needed) party thrown (by me of course). Then I will start the two-three year process of fieldwork, and writing up. Anyway, just thought I'd put that out there, as I just found out about my exam date (and it's looming...)

On the other hand, Will started his new job this week in Brighton, he is a process engineer in an environmental consulting firm for a water utility. We're not exactly sure what he is going to be doing yet, but we do know he is a project manager (so that'll make two of us!). Since it is only week one, we'll know more as the position progresses. On another note, his commute total time is currently at 5 1/2 hours, 2 hours 15 minutes each way. Which, sucks. On the plus side, the bus and the train end where he needs to get off, so he can fall asleep and not have to worry to much (on the way there, on the way back it's a different story...) we are hoping to move to south london when we either a) get out of our flat (yeah right) or b) our tenancy ends (which is at the end of august). That will cut his commute time down by a total of 2 hours which is doable, and I would argue relatively standard from an American point of view (or at least what we've both had to do in the past).

On to Nemo, who has decided that since Will gets up at 5:30 in the morning, he should eat then. Except, he doesn't expect Will to feed him, but me. So when Will leaves at around 6, Nemo runs around the flat like a crazy person (cat), and screams at the top of his lungs (which is actually REALLY loud). He then proceeds to jump on the bed and run up and down me until I wake up, which has now gone from 7:30, to 6. This must be great for your work, I hear some people ask. No. I am NOT a morning person, even with two espressos. This makes me mad at Nemo, and then want to read my novel, which has nothing to do with Anthropology, or my upcoming proposal whatsoever. So...Nemo and I are in a fight, although he apparently doesn't know it.

Finally, tonight is the night that Will and I will be trying a new local Indian restaurant called Nutmeg. This is a big day. We were sorely disappointed that our favorite, the Standard Indian closed its doors, and have been searching, to no avail, for a replacement. Nutmeg looks promising, with a good solid menu, and friendly staff. I will discuss in my next blog, (which has gone from once a week, to once a month...sorry, we have no internet at home).

Birthday, New Job and Getting Hit in the Face

This past week was my birthday, which started out fairly badly, with it raining, and me finding out that Sallie Mae has neglected to disperse all of my loans, a new leak springing up in the kitchen and a tile falling out in our bathrool, but it got better...a big thanks for the surprise party. It seriously was one of the best birthdays I've had in a long time, and was much needed. I'm not going to go into the details of the night, even though I know my parents don't read this, It's still embarassing, and since Will didn't get to come out, I don't want him to know just how much fun I actually had (although he got multiple phone calls on the way home, so I know he's aware :-)

Also thanks for the presents, they were unexpected and fantastic, but best of all was seeing everyone!

Will GOT A JOB! In Brighton, so yes, he will be commuting from north london to Brigton, but we are hoping to eventually move to South London, cutting a massive amount of time off his travel, so cross your fingers for that. To celebrate we will be hosting a dumpling/Britney Spears party, it'll be fun, with LOTS of good tunes, I know everyone is excited and/or jealous if they can't make it. Will's official title is Process Engineer...so proud!

Finally, getting hit in the face. I went to work today, and helped put together a new display chair, while I was putting said chair together, a piece came off and slammed me in the face, where I know have a very very angry bruise, thankfully, this happened after my conference, but all the same, it was ridiculous, and painful.

I know this is short, but since we have no internet, I'm at school, and have a trillion things to do before I go home...hope all is well with the rest of the world.

Selling Futons vs. Selling Coffee

So this will be a quick one, mainly because we have no more internet, and I'm about to run off to a seminar, but I wanted to give a brief look into something I've given a lot of though (as in, the last couple of days, while at work), as why I think I ROCK at selling futons, and why I think I could NEVER sell coffee, and I feel bad for Will.

1) Futons stores open at 10 am, not 6:30 am- I am NOT a morning person, and have trouble using anything remotely mechanical before 1 (as in pm).
2) People, when shopping for Futons can be grumpy, but since you are in England, the land of bad customer service, you are ALLOWED to yell back at them, and tell them not to come back to your shop. (Manager approved!) People are almost always grumpy before consuming coffee, therefore, you can never quite make it fast enough, and your chance of getting yelled at are significantly higher. Since Will has a crazy bad manager, he's not allowed to yell at the clientele, even when they dump milk all over the tables and poop in the middle of the bathroom floor.
3) Everyone wants a coffee, but only people that have money want futons, therefore, you make larger sales, and aren't there when the product is delivered.
4)The commission, while it's not huge, it's a nice little perk! Coffee selling does not include comission based sales.
5)Starbucks does not allow you to give family or friends free coffee drinks when you stop by for a visit, and I feel that the option should be available. No one expects a free futon from a friend that works at the futon store.

That's enough of that, I have to say that FUTONS ROCK (but this may be because I made a particularly large sale today, and am overly proud of myself...)

Stay tuned to hear about the Will-job...it's a-coming!

Valentine's Day-Service IS Included

Yesterday was Valentine's Day, and since Will and I are notorious for having bad valentine's days, (we can never get our act together about what we want to do, where we want to eat etc., that we end up walking around wherever in the world we happen to be, and then are angry and pissy by the time we walk into some crappy dive) that we decided to make reservations at a place that I have come to love in Camden, Jamon Jamon, for Spanish tapas. We both LOVE tapas, love Camden, and love that it is a bit out of the way, so there wouldn't be as many tourists. What we didn't think of (and I'd like to give myself a big DUH for this one) is that on valentine's day, EVERYONE makes reservations! So it was CROWDED, even though we did have a table, the waiters weren't sure which of them had us as a table, so it took a half hour to place our drink and food order. Our food came fairly quickly, it was okay (I've had better), but I found a jagged plastic shard in one of our dishes, that I had actually accidently put in my mouth! We complained (as you do about a shard in your food), and were told that that dish would be taken off our bill. We decided not to let a little shard bother us, so we carried on eating. After we had finished with everything we waited to be noticed to ask for the bill. After an hour, we were getting slightly annoyed as people who came in after us had eaten, paid, and left. Was this discrimination? No idea, kinda hard to prove. When we finally got the bill, not only were we charged for the shard food, but for two extra drinks (and while I would have LIKED to have consumed them, we are on a massive budget, that did not allow), we complained, and only the extra drinks were removed. We talked it out, decided that this could take all night for 5 pounds, and decided, it was ultimately not worth it. PS-service WAS included!

Now normally, I would say I would never frequent a place like this again, and Will has made up his mind not to, and to write a letter, a la Laura Duff, in hopes of getting some type of retribution. But I have been to this place numerous times, had great service, great food, and even food gratis, so I'm torn. It was an awful, awful, experience, although definitly not the worst in Mell-Taylor/Keefer Valentine history, but I can't help thinking, we should have just gone there for lunch...

On another note, I just answered the door, and two bible thumpers were there to preach the word! I live above a shop, in an alley! How did they find us? I, as a good American, came down, in my pajamas, which consist of a Google Tee-shirt (thanks Tasha and Jared) and bright red pants, in slippers, with my hair all over the place, they looked frightened, and visibly repositioned themselves for a challenge when my accent became apparent (immediately I would think). They asked if I have found God, I said, "which one?" (I LOVE this part), they asked if I was a Christian, I responded that Christians forceably took my people and made us one of them, but we are now going back to our heathen ways and looking at the world in terms of things being pre-determined, but that I was already saved, thanks. The women then said that if I was not a part of the Church of England, I was NOT saved (she was quite red in the face at this point), I looked at her, and her partner, and said, an Irish women and a women from Asia, do you know the history of how YOUR people were forced to become Christians? Then I started telling the story of Ireland, which is one of my favorites. I asked if she was an old English, or all Irish, she responded all Irish, which I prompted said, that if she wasn't moved by St. Patrick, then I have NO IDEA how she thinks her ancestors aren't rolling over in their graves, but that I had some literature upstairs, would she like some reading to take away with her? She left. GOD I LOVE bible thumpers!

PS- I am now officially employed as a Sales Consultant at the Futon Company, so yes, I have a job! We will let you know about Will's situation soon, but it's looking GOOD!

Why staying out until 5 a.m. on a school night is a bad idea...

Statistics...which I missed today, due to a bad case of the drinksies. Not a big deal, I'm just sitting in on the class ( thank GOD), but today was a struggle for both Will and I, as we watched the Superbowl at the Embassy of Texas (oh no, you read it correctly, I said, the Embassy of Texas). We met lots of other Americans, most of whom I thought it would be AWESOME to be friends with 5 beers in...met a Texan Jew...that was very unexpected. I'm glad the Giants won, although I can't really say I cared all that much in general, but...whatever.

Keri came out with us, she's our American LSE representative, she helped me focus on not watching the game, since I talked her ear of the entire time. But it was a good time, the food was, craptastic, but Tex Mex, which we both miss, so, it was good in some ways. And, it was at a place called the Embassy of Texas. I seriously contemplated getting my mom a shirt...maybe for her birthday...

This morning, we both awoke to the cats screaming, and pounding headaches as we were piecing together how exactly we got home last night (it was the bus, but we don't remember much after saying goodbye to Keri...but, on the plus side, we are home, and we have everything, including kidneys and livers).

I made it to my real class, and then went to a Bruno Latour lecture, while Will went to work, so we powered through the struggle.

Anyway, other than that, the flat still sucks, school is still hard, and Will will find out if he got the job on Friday, stay tuned.

How to Sue a British Landlord 101

If you've been an avid reader of this blog, you'll have learned that we live in a flat, that is considered by British standards to be habital...and it is. We can LIVE here, although the frigid weather causes us to have to wear more outer-wear whilst we are inside than out (I know you all love how I just slipped in a British-ism), this is WHEN we have our heat on. So not only are we not getting the heat that we are so dearly paying for (and I mean it, our heating bill is 3 times what our friends are paying, in larger flats, and they actually feel WARM when they go to bed at night...) but we still have the mold problem that we started with. When we moved in, we thought it was just a little water damage, they told us they fixed it, we thought it was taken care of. We have since learned (with the return of the water, AND the mold) that the front structure of our entire flat is unstable, but it's too expensive for the landlord to be consulted to fix it (our property is being managed by a third party), so basically, our windows are coming away from the wall, which allows water to come into the house when the rain is bad (and we LIVE in London, when is the rain NOT bad) and water to be trapped in the walls, which is promoting mold growth, that the builders seem to think will just go away if they paint over it. According to our local health authority, this means that we are giving our bodies unhealthy doses of all sorts of lovely things on a day to day basis, possibly aiding in the development of bronchial problems (although, thanks to my mom, I am very wary of anyone that seems to be medicating me in any form, therefore, I'm taking this 'diagnosis' with a grain of salt, although, I will use it in a legal battle to be sure.

This aside, we went to Rights and Advice, the council that talks to students who need representation to tell them if they have a case. Which we do. Unfortunately, the third party that is managing our flat (Foxtons) is notorious for this behavior, espeically with overseas people, whose visas require they have housing and have to sign leases abroad (which we did). Therefore, we have to categorically list every problem we've ever had with the flat (which are numerous and frequent), publish pictures, then threaten that we will be suing our landlord, overstepping the management firm, which makes them look bad. If we go to court, which we are assured we will, it will cost us money...of course.

Our only other option, that we recently taken by another American who had the very same problem with Foxtons...is that we find someone to take over our lease (I don't know how we would do this with MOLD growing on our walls) we pay a change of lease fee (another fee for Foxtons to throw a party with since God knows they don't help the tenant with that money) and then it gets turned over to the new tenant. We hope this leads to a full deposit return, since it was a huge amount, and of course, we need the money, but we would be at their mercy.

While we are still pursuing taking Foxtons to court, we are starting to think the above might be the easiest course of action, provided we can find a way to make all the cracks and mold disappear while people are looking at the flat, and we can find someone to take the price of this flat, which is embarrassingly high. The thing that makes this nerve-racking, is again, the possibility of Foxtons taking money out of our deposit, when they have clearly breached their contract (which we are obviously trying to prove in court). We also realized, that we never received a copy (because one was never made) of the tenancy agreement where the landlord and ourselves signed. We have one we signed, one he signed, but not one that has both signatures. So I wonder, if our tenancy agreement even valid to the courts?

Anyway, this is a long one, so sorry for that, but this is just another example of the crap we are dealing with outside our 'everyday' lives. More on those later.

I'm Back in the Saddle (UK) Again

So I've been out of the UK for the past 3 weeks now, while Will has been enjoying the loverly weather that was happening here. I spent a nice 3 weeks with my parents, watching over our newest cat member of the Mell-Taylor household, Willow White Toes, who fell deathly (literally) ill, and only just recovered after my sister Tasha flew back to San Fran (coincidence?). Actually, we think he got his butt in recovery gear when our family started talking about the possiblility of putting him to sleep. But he officially was diagnosed with pancrititis (have no idea how to spell that) which will reoccur throughout his life, but hopefully now that we know what to look for we will be able to treat it better.

Anyhoo, other than that, it was nice to be home with the fam, although not as nice to be away from Will, but it sounds like he took over my social life, so it wasn't all bad for him.

I would like to get into the American political debate a bit, but after spending three weeks with the fam doing little OTHER than talking about it, I'm just going to say, I'm team Hillary, I think she's a great candidate, and I understand what she stands for, and where I (as in my generation) fits into her platform. I thought that I would be for Obama, since he is SO charismatic, but after listening to him, I realized that this is the only thing he really has going for him, he's for change, and he's charismatic about it, unfortunately, I'm never really clear on WHAT his platform is, and a little fearful as to what his past politics and religious views are, and how that and other people will potentially influence his politics.

Otherwise that's about it for us for now, school has started back up, and drafts and funding applications are fast approaching, wish me luck in that, and Will in finding a better job!