12 October 2007

I'm packed and counting down the hours until we make the trek to the airport and then hopefully I'll be in holiday mood.

10 October 2007

Today was my second lecture for my course and to say I came out of it even more confused than when I went in is a bit of an understatement. I can only hope that a further read of my notes and handouts will finally clarify things for me. It’s at these moments that I wonder what on earth I’m doing studying for an MA especially as I’m suffering from that horrible fear of just not getting it when it comes to the information being offered to us. Oh well perseverance is the key to it, I presume and so I’ll plod on.

I have no idea what on earth to do my main dissertation on, yes I know it’s not due in until after the summer of 2008 but it is apparently never too early to start the plan. Part of me wants to do something around Women and Crime, whether it be offenders or victims who knows, whilst another part finds the whole concept of anti-social behaviour and the government’s response to the same as intriguing. Oh well. I’ll have to think some more on that too.

Next week I’m going to miss the lecture on framing some criminological theories, as I’ll be hopefully (weather permitting) sunning myself in Maspalomas in Gran Canaria. Right now I’m feeling a bit ambivalent to the holiday, and maybe because I feel quite shattered inside and plus my leg is still very sore, which means my lilo antics will be limited. Damn!

Fingers crossed the sun, sea and no doubt sangria will aid toward a fun time.

Life at home has been quite hectic these past few months, unfortunately for us the young man in the home has been pushing the boundaries no end, and has completely wiped us out as it were. I keep praying that around the next corner there will come the stage of development where constant argumentative and challenging behaviour will have been left behind. Right now he seems to be thriving on pushing against authority and to be honest no real reason can be ascertained.

We’ve tried so many methods in the last year to address the behaviour etc, and yet none of them seem to have made any impact. We even tried asking him what makes him tick in this way and is there any way it can be prevented that he sees, in case something in us was triggering it. He commented it wasn’t us, but him and he’d change and then in the next breath tell us he hasn’t got any issues and there’s nothing wrong with him, and that he doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong. It’s just one big cycle, which has ended with us telling him we’re not bailing him out of any difficulties he gets himself into at school, he knows the score, he knows the rules and if he chooses to break them he has to accept the responsibility for doing so.

Initially I thought it was due to him not wanting to remain at school past 16 and as such told him if he didn’t want to, he could leave. Oh my, that instigated something from him as he clearly stated he wanted to stay, and yet he appears to be doing his best to get excluded from it, due to being rude to staff etc. Goodness knows what’s going on in his head right now.

I have to admit part of my reservations and feeling toward this upcoming holiday is due to the fact he’s coming and this time bringing his girlfriend. They’ve been falling in and out of their relationship over the last few weeks, and he’s got in trouble at school as he failed to attend sports commitments and was rude to staff as he needed to sort out issues with her. What those issues are, we have no idea but apparently they’re ‘cool’ now. The only upside is, is that they have their own accommodation on site and we have ours, so some peace will hopefully be secured.

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05 October 2007

OMG I'm in Agony!

I need sympathy and I need it now! On Wednesday evening I thought I'd do something to help get my body into a bit of shape. I admit I'm never going to achieve a slimtastic body nonetheless I felt ready to try something energetic, so I had a bit of a run around. (Yes I did warm up, yes I did stretch!)

Things were going okay, I hadn't collapsed with an asthma attack, my boobs hadn't given me black eyes (thank you sports bra) and then ping, wrench, the back of my right thigh just sort of went. I assume it's my hamstring and that I've torn it, strained it, whatever, I'm no medical person. I just know it hurts and sitting down is a tear to the eye experience. As is walking, driving just about anything which involves movement.

So logic tells me that excercise and I dont equate....

I'm quite peeved about it as I was meant to be attending my second lecture for my MA this morning and have had to pull out due to it! Today was an introduction on qualitative research, mind you I may swap this module for quantative which doesn't start until later in the semester.

Had my first lecture on Wednesday morning, it was an analysis of the criminal policy imposed by the Government over the past 10 years. Bet you think that's riveting eh?

In mid november I'm leading the seminar on Marxist criminology so if anyone reads my blog and has any information which would help feel free to comment, any help is much appreciated.

At least whilst lounging around nursing my injury I've got more time to read, I can't believe how much more reading there is on an MA to a BA course. Wondering now if I've done the right thing, but hey ho, it's early days yet. Hopefully I'll get into the swing of things and things will seem easier.

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