End of Michaelmas!

This Saturday marks the end of the first term, Michaelmas. The celebration has been a mixture of parties, dinners, and essays.

The essay I turned in last week was on Scientific Concepts. The details are a little humdrum, but I'll write a quick blurb in case you might be interested. My writing focused on Weber's work with ideal types; James Davis' thoughts on prototypes, graded membership, and fuzzy borders; and the contributions of David Collier and James Mahon on family resemblance and radial categories (expansions on Satori's work with classical categories and conceptual stretching). While expanding the extension of existing concepts to address new ideas, conceptual traveling also leads to heated debates about whether borderline cases fit one category or another. When I realized I needed to do something to breathe a little more life into the essay, I proposed a search for the best American athlete of the 20th century and then applied each author's arguments to help find a suitable competitor. I finished by revising the original question, concluding that since Michael Jordan (does anyone remember the 95-96 Bulls??) is the undisputed best athlete of the 20th century, we ought to be looking for the second best athlete. Ironically, this also contradicted Weber's belief that ideal-types (essentially perfect examples of an idea, in this case an athlete) do not exist in real life--a point I also noted in the essay. My next essay is for International Diplomacy, but I still have quite a bit more work to do on it.

Despite being away from home for Thanksgiving, I managed to share a true American feast (at least as close as I could come with British ingredients) with about a dozen other American and British students. On Tuesday, I went shopping with a good friend of mine, Becca, to gather up everything we would need. She also volunteered to cook the sweet potatoes and did a fantastic job. After rowing Wednesday afternoon, I alternated between baking a couple of pumpkin pies and working on my Research Methods essay. The pumpkin was one of the most difficult ingredients to find, but I didn't have much luck with Cool Whip either. It turns out actual whipped cream works tastes just as good. Thursday morning, one of the post-doc students in my house drove me down to the grad center with all of the food. I appreciated the lift because riding my bike with a turkey and two pies was bound to turn into a disaster. I shoved the turkey in the oven, then ran off to my rugby match.

I feel much more comfortable with the game and our team has put together a few nice victories in the last two weeks. In the Thanksgiving game (Turkey bowl?) several of the forwards scored, including Greg, a Rhodes scholar from VMI and good buddy of mine.

As soon as the match finished, I ran back to take a shower, then hurried down to the grad center to take out the turkey. We ended up commandeering three different kitchens to cook everything since the ovens are pretty small. It all came together nicely though and I think everyone was able to stuff themselves satisfactorily. I was a little heart-broken that the only left-overs I could take back to my room were a few slices of turkey and a quarter of a pie:( When everyone began asking how I became such a great cook, I conceded that I had been on Skype with my mom every day throughout the week getting recipes, tips, and other essential advice.

Last night at KEEN, we had a Christmas party with dancing, karaoke, and presents. I think it's the first time that I've ever celebrated Christmas in November, but without Thanksgiving, the Christmas season gets underway a lot sooner here than in the States. James was well-behaved with no surprise kisses and I think everyone had a really good time. The karaoke video was particularly interesting because of the random cartoon videos assigned to each song (YMCA, Bohemian Rhapsody, etc.)...I'll let your imagination do the work.

The races on Wednesday of last week were pretty miserable. The Christ Church Regatta, a race only for novice rowers, has been cancelled due to weather the past few years. As a result, the marshals were inexperienced and compounded the problems stemming from 70+ teams racing on a narrow stretch of river. Even though we were on the water for more than an hour before our first race, we defeated the team we rowed against. The women's A-team was less fortunate because they sat in the cold wind for more than an hour without their opposition ever showing up. Unfortunately, the high water level from recent rain (even worse in the North, especially Cumbria) and resulting swift current caused the ensuing races for the rest of the weekend to be cancelled. Our college was especially disappointed because our women's and men's A-teams were so strong.

Another Rotary talk tonight, Christmas service in the chapel tomorrow, Christmas dinner Thursday, and a formal guest dinner Friday!

Until next time, God bless and take care!