Food for Thought

carrots are orange because they are rich in carotene.

carotene is a photopigment found in light harvesting complexes, alongside with cholorophylls, in photosynthetic leaves. it is believed that carotenes are present for protection against photobleaching, i.e. damage of chlorophyll due to overly strong sunlight, as they absorb the excess energy and lose them as heat.

but carrots are roots; they are buried in the soil.

so why do carrots have so much carotene o_O?

because they are edible and therefore must prove themselves to be nutritionally beneficial?

i am open to suggestions =)

Efficiency is Key

the workload rears its ugly head. in fact, i already have 3 essays to write and had 2 practicals completed. i start to not comprehend my lecture notes fully and balk at the material i am supposed to learn by the end of this week. only the practicals are comforting- so far. but that is only because they are not that complicated anyway and i have handled most of the equipment before during attachment. so in conclusion, i am gawking at a steep learning curve =S.

cambridge is as usual teeming with all the fantastic activities that i so wish i have time to attend. i have made great plans over the summer to pack michaelmas with as many events as possible, to take hold of the opportunities so rare but available here. since the intensity of such ccas tend to decline as the acdemic year progresses, hopefully i will have enough time to catch up with studies over winter break and in subsequent terms.

but i doubt that will work now, judging from the amount of work already piled up and i can feel the thundering thrust of more on its way. also, i am planning to have two holidays during winter break.

oh well, i will have to be more efficient then. halve the time and double the amount done for everything. hopefully, the quality of work will not be compromised. that means i will have to learn to exercise appropriate degrees of conscienciousness in the right areas.

to begin, writing blog posts should not take longer than necessary.

"If we all did the things we are capable of doing,
we would literally astound ourselves." - Thomas Edison

My Cheese Has Been Moved

i am back in camb for the fifth day now. finished unpacking my boxes on sunday and spent monday and tuesday making multiple trips to town to buy things. my room this year is HUGE compared to basing 15 last year, and i couldn't suppressed the urge to get more things to put in it, things that i wanted since last year but couldn't have due to space constraint.

so, the past two days are spent on browsing the home section of shops, arranging and rearranging items in the cabinets, and looking for items after that because i can't remember where i put them.

amidst all the excitement, i miss basing 15 sometimes.

it is the familiarity to living in that place and to the neighbours in basing house that i miss, i think. changes always make me feel apprehensive. i thought i should be used to it by now. i have been living in two countries since i was 15, and i managed three last year. over summer alone, i had packed and unpacked at least four times to move to different places (not for holiday). still, i always get that uneasy feeling a few days before moving. and i realise that i never learn how to pack light. maybe subconciously i want to carry things that are familiar, hence all the excess baggage.

camb isn't that much different from the time i knew it before i left for summer. friends who were friendly were still as friendly, and those who weren't that friendly seem to be more friendly. there are many new faces around, and my windows open into benson court instead of magd street now. so, it's the birds that i hear first thing in the morning instead of the truck unloading bottles at the wine merchant. oh, i probably won't be cycling much in the early weeks; a bird has built a nest in my bike basket. there's even an egg in it. i think i should leave it for a few days and see what happens before deciding whether to move my bike.

other than those, nothing has changed much really- ramsay is still ramsay and sainsbury is still sainsbury. i foresee myself eating loads of cereals, bread amd canned food again once term begins and evceryone scarcely has time to plan for the next meal.

lectures start proper tomorrow and other activites start next week. i will still be involved in dance and cell group, so not much changes as well. in fact, i think i am such a constant person that i rarely tread unknown waters.

anyway, the cheese has been moved, albeit not too far from its origin. and i am on my way to find it.