Personal statement part 1: “the location”
As mentioned in a previous post I need to articulate the reasons for my desire to study Mathematics at Lancaster university. I’ve decided that as I am going to have to write a personal statement for my UCAS application anyway, I am as well to just write a draft of sorts here…
As it’s the easier part, I’m starting with the choice of location and university, to be followed in a different post by the course choice and general motivation for starting a degree again.
So, Lancaster, city of my birth… I have family and there are many friends of the family around there. That’s pretty low down on the list really, I don’t really know many of them or much about them, I only lived there until I was two and a bit years old.
It is close to bits of the country that mean something to me though; where I went to school, the Lake District, the Howgill Fells and other bits of the best fell walking country in the world, for example. It is also pretty close to Blackburn, home to Blackburn Rovers, the football team I support. So fell walking society and occasional trips to Ewood Park it is.
More seriously though, Lancaster university has an excellent reputation for teaching and it has always been on my radar when it comes to choosing a university for that reason. More recently though, having now read their prospectus properly, or perhaps I just now appreciating how good it is, I really like the sound of their course structure… It goes a little something like this:
The plan with this is to apply for maths and be able to add other things; Music, Philosophy, Sociology, Economics, Accounting or an intensive language course all appeal. As you can see from the little chart thing, at the end of the first year I could then go on to do a combination degree (timetables permitting I think) or single honours in any of the subjects I’ve studied.
This allows me a great deal of flexibility, which is a breath of fresh air. Even having decided to apply to study maths, I’m still not 100% sure about it so the value of this is huge and very difficult for me to quantify. I haven’t seen this kind of freedom around degrees anywhere except the Open University and I’m about to start a course there.
The incredibly flexible degree structure at Lancaster is what sets it apart for me and is the reason that I have picked it before anywhere else with a similar reputation for research and teaching.
I think that just about rounds it up for location. Obviously this is far too long for a personal statement but the main idea was to get my ideas written down… Thankfully some ideas about motivation to study, both in general and specifically maths, have come into my head as I’ve been writing so I shall end here and jot them down.
The Plan
Hopefully I can have my cake and eat it too… (ho ho ho)
So it’s been little while since I posted, never mind. Not much has happened really, at least not that I can remember. I think that’s because I’ve not been updating my one sentence diary.
A quick summary of things that I can remember so that I can remember in future:
-Bought a camera on ebay: Nikon F80
-Sold my first ever thing on ebay today
-Saw The Dark Knight in the cinema, which was really good
-Felt like I’ve been toiling hard and long when in fact I probably haven’t
-my brother got his a-level results and they weren’t very good; we aren’t sure whether he is going to university this year
The main thing I feel I need to put down on paper is my plan for getting back into university.
The first part was deciding where I want to go which I decided at some point last year was going to be Lancaster.
Then there are several other things that I need to decide and do.
-What I want to do.
-Articulate why I want to do it beyond a gut feeling.
-Show that I’m actively taking an interest in the subject.
-Apply through UCAS (yuk).
-Wait, save money, learn to drive and various other things.
So at the moment I’m waiting for a prospectus to arrive from Lancaster before sitting down to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest it. At the moment I’m leaning towards maths, philosophy or some combination of the two.
The great thing about Lancaster, one of the main reasons why I want to go there, is that in the first year (for most courses) you can study 3 different subjects. Bearing this in mind I will probably apply for Mathematics and take Philosophy alongside it and then make a decision after that year about what I want to do. At least that way I get to put making the decision off at least another two years… So Maths.
For the actively taking an interest and showing recent study, I’m going to sign up for an Open University course. There are two mathematics courses I can choose from, one which is building on a basic understanding of maths and the second which builds from a more advanced understanding of maths. I’m going to register for one tomorrow (Monday) after I’ve talked with my parents about it and plans in general.
Once I’ve done that, I need to submit an application through UCAS to Lancaster which will involve writing down and articulating not only my reasons for choosing Lancaster but my reasons for wanting to study maths. But obviously I should try to at least think about that in the mean time.
The waiting part will be difficult. I’m terrified that my application won’t be strong enough and that they’ll reject me, but I’m not really sure why. So I should basically not think about it too hard and get on with doing well in the OU course and other things like learning to drive and taking photographs etc.
The wonderful thing about my plan is that it is quite flexible. Even if Lancaster reject me, I can (and probably will) apply to other universities as well at the same time. I might even see what some of the really tip-top places say. My first choice is still Lancaster though, it would take quite a lot to tempt me away from flexible courses combined with beautiful hills and walking just to the north 
Random Flickr photo 2
This Time the Dream’s on Me
Originally uploaded by code poet
This is the best picture I’ve seen in ages.
I’m still feeling really smug with myself…
A good day’s work
So I was quite pleased with this. Buying a pro account is already well worth it in my eyes. I did upload rather a lot of pictures yesterday, and that probably has something to do with it, but still… I’m very pleased with that.
You should click —-> over there somewhere to look at my photographs on flickr 
Some of them are quite good.
Random Flickr photo 1
This is your cat on drugs.
Originally uploaded by jocieposse (aka skid ho)
How excellent is this cat and the way it’s posed?
Very excellent, I can reveal to you.
In other cat-like news I thought I should share a picture of our new cat, Oscar with you. He’s very timid and likes to hide behind the settee.
Les Vacances
My family and I returned last night from Normandy where we stayed in a town called Honfleur (not Caen as I said previously) for one week.
I wrote down some stuff so over the next few days I will have plenty to write about! This bodes well for possibly, maybe making an entry each day.
I definitely needed the holiday, I’d been getting really bored with my job and frustrated with my surroundings. Yesterday as we were travelling and Friday when I was packing my stuff up to leave, instead of feeling downbeat at my holiday ending, I was (and am still) actually glad to be back and relishing(!) going back to work.
This is a healthy attitude I was worried before we left that one week wouldn’t be long enough for me to rest and be away from work. Things are looking good on that front though and I still have a week of holiday to take before the end of October as well as a week from November to the end of the holiday year. I fancy a week skiing in January…
In reference to my last blog post, the only item on my list that I didn’t do was number 2, I didn’t rent a bike.
5 things to do on holiday
“We’re all going on a summer holiday”
Tomorrow I’m off on holiday for the first time in about 4 years. We’re going to Caen “en France” so not really far from where I am here (Wiltshire, England) but it will be a world removed in every other way possible. Expanding your horizons is probably one of the most important things to do in life and one of the easiest ways to do that is through travel.
There are a number of things that I intend to do:
1. See as much about the history, as many interesting buildings, museums as I can possibly can whilst still having a relaxing time. There is all sorts around there, William the Conqueror was born there, the D-day landing sites are very close along with other iconic WW2 pieces of history, and that’s just nearby!
2. Rent a bicycle. I haven’t ridden mine since we moved house a year ago because it’s a piece of junk. It would be good to zip about the countryside nearby on a rented one for at least a day, maybe map a scenic route to Honfleur or something. I might just cycle to the beach though, 80 kilometres doesn’t necessarily strike me enjoyable.
3. Take photographs not memories. I’m not sure how to really explain this, I might write an entry on it. (It’s probably art vs. snapshots or something although I wouldn’t consider my photography art.)
4. Read books. I am going to cave into pressure from someone to read “Atonement” by Ian McEwan. Also on my list is “Another Long Day on the Piste: A Season in the French Alps” by Will Randall which my everyone in my family except me seems to have read. They all say it’s very funny. There are other things too that I might not have room for.
5. Write. Just entries for here and my other blog really.
And a bonus ‘number 6′ would be to drink wine, cider, calvados. “When in Rome…”
One sentence diary
So I finally find myself updating here again for the first time in a long time. It is a little disappointing to find myself failing so miserably at writing a decent amount regularly.
I have at least made a few entries but two out of a massive three posts are about my blog and aims and stuff like that and the third is just a gush of journal type stuff. And that was one of the things I originally said I didn’t want to do even though I said I would let myself do it now and again straight away.
The definition of ‘gushing’ is an outburst of writing about my life because I’ve been putting it off for too long.
So anyway, I read somewhere about one sentence diaries where you write a sentence to record your day for posterity every day. The theory for this is that I would not feel the urge to write diary entries very often on here, unless it’s something that I actually want to expand and write about.
So I have started a new blog here with this in mind. I know it’s called the one sentence diary but I think it’ll more likely be two or three sentences each post.
Hopefully this is the last of the posts about aims and that kind of thing. I’ve ghost drafted a few entries but I’m going on holiday for a week as of Saturday so probably nothing for some time.
Salut, à bientôt, et cetera.
22 Miles of Hard Road
I went for my fourth run in two weeks today. That may not sound like much but it certainly felt like it! Today for the first time since starting running again, again, I felt like I was actually running rather than trundling along leaning forwards and hoping that my legs move on before my face buries itself in the dirt. Anyway, today I ran quite fast for 20 minutes which was somewhat of a milestone I suppose.
I was originally trying to find a link describing the half walking, half running shuffle that usually forms the majority of my “running”. The only problem is I can’t remember what on Earth you would call it but I do know that the SAS use it to conserve energy on long, fast treks. If anybody reads this and knows what I’m talking about please leave a comment!
Along a vaguely similar, sporting line, le Tour has started. Which is good. I’ve read some interesting stuff about it already so I might prepare a post at some point…
Incidentally, for those who may not realise constraints on running speed made by the human body, I didn’t run 22 miles today, I probably haven’t even run 22 miles this year. 22 Mile of Hard Road is a bonus disc for this album by a band called Eels.
