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I haven't posted much about my life recently. It is generally pleasant at the moment. I've just finished marking a batch of OU assignments, and the next ones are starting to come in. However, I don't have to give any tutorials this month (due to the centres being closed), so I'm not that busy with work. I've been accepted as a scriptmarker for the course again this year - this will entail another trip to Milton Keynes in October for a coordination meeting, followed by about 10 days' intensive exam marking.

I recently submitted my own assignments (in my student persona) for the short cosmology/particle physics course I began in May, and have received the preparatory materials for the longer maths course I'm starting in October. They're not very challenging, but I'm working through them thoroughly anyway, as revision/refresher - I haven't had any maths tuition for about 14 years! G is also taking the same course, at the same time as me - I expect we'll be able to go to tutorials together as well. The specified course calculator arrived recently as well (it's quite an expensive graphical calculator, but we shared the cost between the two of us, and also managed to get a second-hand one from eBay). I'm really looking forward to the course starting.

G and I have not been going out very much recently, due to lack of money; however, his parents came to see us and took us out to the Kingston a couple of weeks ago, which was nice. We still go to the Calling and roleplay with robinbloke on alternating Tuesdays. We've had mobbsy and simont over for dinner (separately), and went to MW's party at the Carlton Arms - all very pleasant.

G seems reasonably content with his job at the moment. He has continued to purchase a variety of exotic computer accessories/upgrades, and to play a variety of games - recently, Planetside and, since yesterday, Doom 3. This looks very pretty, while trying to preserve some flavour of the original (plenty of crates!), and G seems to find it quite scary. The plot seems very Half Life-ish.

I always like this part of the year. The weather is agreeable (I don't need to bundle myself up in clothes to feel warm) and I'm not particularly busy, although a variety of interesting things are available to be done.

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Sudden extra update - I've just been invited to interview for teaching another OU linguistics course next year! Hurrah! The interview isn't till mid-September, in Nottingham, but I'm still very excited.

The course would be E303: English Grammar in Context - a new 3rd level course, designed to follow on from U210: The English Language, Past, Present and Future, which I teach at the moment. If I get this appointment, I will have two groups (like this year), in the East Midlands region again, but involving more variety and challenge. It would be good not to have to mark so many essays on the same topic! Also, the new course involves lots of CD Rom material, concordancing software etc - sounds very interesting.

Will go to the UL on Monday and start brushing up on Hallidayan functional grammar before the interview :-)