Searching for a flat in Edinburgh

Figured while i was in Edinburgh for a few days i'd have a look at a few flats.

So far i have seen about 6 places and all of them fit into one of two categories:

1) Nice flat, shame about the people

2) Nice people, shame about the flat


I had a look at one flat in town, that was about 460gbp per month. That's pretty high. Actually for what the flat was, it was REALLY high. It was an old dentists office. It had two showers and two toilets. Sounds good yeah? Well, the showers are literally a shower with a step then a door, the toilets were smaller and the the door formed the 4th wall. So there was no real bathroom. But i guess that's okay because my room had a sink, in the middle of the wall. So if you wanted to get around your bed you had to scooch past between the sink and the bed. The kitchen was a mess, it was sharing with 5 other people, was probably going to get work done to it soon, it had no rubbish collection and he was trying to charge 460 for it! Ridiculous.



The other flats weren't exceptionally bad like that one, they were just kind of meh. I mean, i'm going away for two weeks so i can afford to be choosy. Basically, i just want a nice flat that is pretty new or newly rennovated with a lounge and a reasonably sized room. Sigh.. guess i've got plenty of time to look and i can stay in a hostel until i find something that really grabs me :)

Still though, Edinburgh is beautiful and i could have done a lot worse for a place to wander around.

From Edinburgh

I climbed Arthurs seat yesterday, i'll have to go back up there and bring my camera.

On the train back to Glasgow.

First days at work aka blog post wall of text

I've just had my first couple of days of my new job. About 2 weeks ago i got offered a job as a Research Assistant at the University of Edinburgh, in errr... Edinburgh. When i left for the UK i would say that i don't really want to work in London, but it would be nice to get a job in Edinburgh and here i am, worked out quite well i think.



So my job is within an Evolutionary Biology Lab that does a lot of work on Malaria to test evolutionary theory (basically evolutionary theory states that an organism will do what's best for making babies). Don't worry, i'm working with rodent malaria so there is never a chance of me catching anything. But it does mean i can't have pet mice.

Working with mice will be cool, except for the killing and cutting them up thing. :|

But, in my first two days i didn''t even SEE a mouse.

I got to work at 8:15am because i figured that i best make a good impression and start a little earlier (at my old job i started at 8am, but i figured most places start at 8:30). Turns out that Edinburgh uni employees can start anywhere between 8 and 11am. So basically i was sitting around until someone turned up at 10. Great way to start.

Actually, it's pretty awesome that they are so casual. Because everyone has their own schedule you are left to work to your own hours. So if you feel like sleeping in... sleep in. :D

Yeah, so there isn't actually that much to report considering my first two days involved paperwork and pretending to work.

Everyone at work is really cool. It's a pretty young crowd which makes a change from working at Landcare (i DID really enjoy working at Landcare though, don't get me wrong). My boss is exceptionally easy going.

So i had my two days of work and now as i'm heading off to Brussels i've got 2 weeks off.

I think i'm really going to like this job. :)

Went to the Uni Halloween party last night too. Everyone made such a huge effort. Winner of the night was Pac-man. Oh, i went as pig man. Pig mask, bloody shirt and a black hoodie. However, later in the night i put on my spiderman outfit and with the pig mask i became SpiderPig!



Awesome.

Well, i guess i'm officially on holiday again. Man, working life is tough.