I bought a pint, and had a good look around the empty room. There were some impressive things on the walls; an old red Grey College jacket from many decades ago, two rugby shirts signed by current players, a football shirt signed by David Beckham, and some good art. Durham certainly has good connections.
On a shelf in the middle of the room there was a fairly substantial quantity of course materials from other OU courses, and I found myself looking through a couple of S207 books, which is a level 2 physics course. Given that I was so determined before not to take S207, I was surprised to find myself a little receptive to this course. I need my study break though, so I'm not about to rush off and sign up, but this is not a bad course at all.
A scouse boy in his early twenties, Phil Clements, struck up a conversation with me, and we found ourselves talking about our OU experiences. This course, SXR207, is his first level 2 course, so he seemed a little green around the edges. But he's done SXR103, albeit at Edinburgh rather than Sussex, and he took S104 last year too, the same as me.
Andy came in, and we ended up talking about maths. As you do!
Paul sent me a text and asked me in fluent Spanish whether I was interested in going for a pint. I replied in Spanish that I was, and that I was already there. When he arrived, the conversation naturally deteriorated into rugby, smut and Mallorca, but he's good company and a good friend.
Another guy, Colin, fell in with our group and we enjoyed a good conversation together. It turns out that he did an ancient history degree at a brick university, so Paul asked him if he'd seen the BBC series 'Rome'. Colin said he had, and we were curious as to its historical accuracy.
This led onto a conversation about the Bravo TV show 'Spartacus', which is not terribly accurate but a thumping great excuse for rampant gratuitous nudity, of both genders.
As we were discussing this, David Keen wandered past and mentioned something about a disco or karaoke at Van Mildert (college) just over the road, and were we thinking about going? I certainly wasn't, but it didn't take much of his description of young nubile ladies in the bar to persuade all but Andy to go.
Van Mildert CollegeAndy and I walked up to Holgate House and went our separate ways. After about 15 minutes Alan phoned, and we had a lovely chat. It's so nice to touch base, but I just wish he was here to crawl into bed with. The life of an OU residential school student can be a little lonely, when you've left your loved ones many miles away.
Had a brief momentary desire to catch up with the others at Van Mildert, but no, I will stick to my guns, remain sensible and surrender to my tiredness. There is a lot to do tomorrow.
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