End of Ayeara

Well, that’s 2007 almost wrapped-up. Managed to get the projects in, on-time (just), and the first of my exams start on the 10th, a nice break.

Alibi – The Musical (20-22 Dec) was an incredible success in every respect apart from financial. The musicianship, singing, acting, story, stage, film segments – everything was brilliant. But it needed about 20 more audience members each night to have turned a profit (then again few musicals debut into profit). I choreographed the bows, the opening-night bows were simply scrappy – nobody knew where to be, and the actors were clearly embarrassed to soak up the appreciation. I’ve seen enough musicals to make me as camp as Christmas – you start with the junior cast members taking bows in groups, working up to the leads; everybody leaves the stage, and return holding hands, as a troupe line, leads in the centre. It’s formulaic, but it works. I’d have been happy to only contribute that slight technical assistance; but my reward was to be written in, a small cameo role (to talk myself into a nightclub at the end of a scene). Great fun.

Christmas I spent with a collective of friends, everybody brings a dish or two. I went the batter route, making Winter Yorkshire Puddings (I have devised Yorkie variants for Autumn/Winter, which are heavier; and Spring/Summer, much lighter). It’s here I stay it’s “easy” to make Yorkshire Puddings, but I’ve seen too many ruined Yorkies (and ruined a few myself) to say that. Let’s just say they’re easier than my other dish-of-the-day: Traditional Christmas Pudding. Dried fruit hydrated in sherry/rum mix; the special sort of ask-at-the-butchers lard that surrounds a cow’s kidneys, and a mixture that takes eight hours to cook. It was a success, though; our pud was moist, light, and delicious. (We even found an old sixpence to put in, and luckily enough nobody broke a tooth on it).

Now I have to face a New Year Party. It’ll be quite a rave, hosted by the Alibi Musical people. With luck I’ll be back in time to do some proper revision.

That’s it for me for now – love and wishes to you for 2008.

Dreadlines

Deadlines approach. First is Friday, have a 15 second animation to hand in for ‘Media’. I already have the animation done, and documented, but I want to improve it. That’ll be work for tonight.

Next up is Tuesday next week. Have a (physical) game to hand in for ‘Games’. The game is designed, made, documented. Went for a card game rather than a board game. It requires a lot more documentation, academic justification, citations, and the like.

The third of the modules, ‘Maths’, had the last coursework exam this week. You want my scores? Matrices 53% (class average 73%), Linear Algebra 84% (avg 56%), Partial Differentation 46% (45%). The overall coursework is an average of the top-two scoring exames, giving me a comfortable 69%. You need 45% [to avoid failing the module], but want over 55%, as every percentage over 45% you get is one % mark less needed in the real exam in January.

I am dissapointed with the Matrices results, I could have gotten much higher, but a couple of silly working-out sums mistakes (the tiniest of errors, mostly dropping or miscalculating signs) and the score plummets.

More to say, but food is cooking….