Planning for Christmas

Just lately I have been too busy to write. Why? Well I have been writing. I’m into the second semester of a creative writing course and decided to double my workload to get finished early. So all this time I haven’t been writing a blog post I have been writing things for my course.

I’m not quite ready for sharing any of my works but I will do, one day.

Dunedin winter has been quite kind so far, just a few days of snow or hard frost. There was a long two weeks of rain, grey skies and general damp. It reminded me of London. Now we are back to blue skies and it doesn’t seem so bad.

Officially I can’t complain about the cold anymore. This isn’t just because I chose to leave the semi-tropical Auckland to move here. There is another reason. It’s not cool to complain about cold if you want to go to the coldest place on the planet - Antarctica. Its even less cool to complain when you find out you are actually going to go there.

Yep - I’m going to Antarctica. (Fingers crossed/subject to a medical and a heap of other paperwork..)

I will be going as part of a summer school course - Graduate Certificate in Antarctic Studies (GCAS).  This is 14 weeks of intensive learning including a field trip 'to the Ice'.   I am one of 16 lucky people doing this course.  Right now I'm still in the slightly too excited to think straight stage.

As part of my preparations I am contemplating switching to diet of ice-cream. There are still a few hoops to jump through like the medical and the small matter of paying the course fees but right now I am on track for a very white Christmas.