So back in August, when the British summer was aiming at making an end, I headed down to Malta for a short break of 4 days. This particular flight started off as a challenging one: the flight was at 7.30am, which implied waking up at 1.30am, get ready to leave by 2.00am, take a night bus to Marble Arch at 2.15am, take the Green Line bus to Luton at 2.30am, arrive at the airport at 3.30am and finally head down to the Med. I included the "am" each time simply to emphasise the pain endured, but which was leading to a dose of real summer - no pain, no gain! The highlight of Sunday was a fiesta of Maltese rabbit for lunch prepared unfailingly by mum. Monday was a day spent almost entirely at the beach, which turned me from an expanse of ghostly white to a boiling red lobster. Tuesday was a fantastic day out virtually sponsored entirely by one of my good mates, who kindly gave us a mini-tour of the Maltese north-eastern coast by boat in the morning and an al fresco ride in his new sexy car in the evening. The day was concluded by a seaside BBQ with the rest of my Maltese friends. The last day started off with a sunny morning spent at The Point in Sliema and then back to London in the evening. An intense and delightful break which provided me with my annual dose of Vitamin D and good fun!
Back in London town, I was working on my first research paper which to date is virtually complete (except for one section which is pending due to lack of software to complete it!) but will hopefully be submitted to a journal for publication by autumn. It is great to know that , as I move on with my Ph.D., I will have publications which put my work into the public domain. Hopefully...
The end of the month was characterised by music! On my wife's birthday, I took her out to the musical We will rock you, which I thought was the closest thing to a concert by her/our favourite band, Queen. And then on Sunday (when my mum and sister were visiting), we went to see The Lion King, which was awesome. As usual, such events make me want to indulge into music, full time, but I suppose it is virtually impossible at this point in time.
Summer is drawing to an end (although today it is rather sun and warm!) and very soon it will be 3 years since I first came to London (albeit with a 6 month absence therein) and also the completion of my first year into my Ph.D. Which reminds me, my lunch-break is over and I need to get back to work!
