As the date approached, however, it became clear that the brewing would clash with my new job at O2. It turned out alright in the end though – the brewing would take place from 6am – 4pm and I would work from 5.30pm – 9.30pm at O2. You just have to love the seventeen hour days!

The 4.40am alarm went off on the morning of the brew and I rushed myself a breakfast and headed over to Kieran’s to pick him up ready to be in Elland, near Halifax, by 6am. Armed with a bottle of Kick and a change of clothes we arrived at E&S eager to start our day’s work and what a day’s work it turned out to be!

The brewer’s day is a long one. Often at work by 6am, lots of manual labour and careful scientific work, then hours of waiting around they don’t leave until well into the evening. It is highly rewarding though.

We started off by loading a quarter of a ton malt and wheat into a hopper ready to go into the mash ‘tun, this was then mixed with hot water to make the ‘mash’ which was then left to stand for an hour or so. This ‘wort’ was then drained off and piped into the copper, basically a giant kettle, and was then boiled for an hour. We added the hops and some other ingredients and set about clearing the masher. We had to shovel by hand the original quarter ton of malt (now much heavier as it was soaking wet) out of the mash tun for the cows to eat. We then hosed, scrubbed and polished the inside of the mash tun ready for the next brew. We managed a quick lunch before we had to start pumping the wort from the copper into the fermenter where we could add the yeast and start turning it into ale. When the copper was empty we set about cleaning it, removing all the hops and other debris. This is actually done by climbing into the copper and shovelling it out again.

A hard day’s work, but well worth it in every day. Roll on graduation day so I can taste it!

A big thank you to all at Elland Brewery for letting us play in their factory and also to fellow volunteers Kieran and Tony.

They now own my services! Yep, I now work for O2 part-time in their technical support department for the newly launched O2 Home Broadband. I am currently in training, which should last for another 6 weeks but it seems like a decent enough job. I am only first line support at the moment, basically a phone monkey, but hopefully some vacancies will open up in second line support soon enough. It is a good place top work in all honetsy, relaxed dress code, good perks and a good bunch of people.

Now, the reason I had to go out and get a job. I have a new house! We signed for it last week and move in around the 23rd June, just after Chris and I get back from the Secular COnference in Edinburgh. It is a really nice house with plenty of room, which is a bugger for wiring it up with networking cable. At the moment it is looking like a good couple of hundred metres!

I will upload some pics of the new house just as soon as I get them off my phone.

Congratulations to all the Computing lot too, they all graduated!

I often wonder if the impact i have on those around me would be as noticeable as Jack’s. This Summer will see a large transition period in many of our lives. A lot of my friends will be graduating in June and moving on to bigger and better things and as much as everyone promises to keep in touch Jack, I think the actual number will be relatively low. Will this occur amongst the circle? How many of us will remain such close friends once we move apart. I think the numbers, again, will be fairly small. This thought upsets me a little as many of the relationships I have forged over the past four years are dear to me and will not be easily recreated.

Then there is the matter of housing…

I will be leaving my current house in June after a good three years here. Living with the girls in the first two had its ups and downs but it was a defining time of my university career. The last six months, and hopefully the next six, have been really good. Having housemates that I enjoy living with has been a revelation!

I am looking at moving up slightly in the world with my next house and get something a little less studenty and more family orientated. I have been looking at houses outside of the main student areas as the rent is comparable and you geta lot more for your money. The problem I face, however, is who to live with?

I wish I could write about whats been going on in my world on here, but I feel that the details and in fact the vaguaries of it all are not suitable for public dissemination as yet. As soon as I think the world at large has the need to know, I will share everything.

A few things I can update on are CompSoc, A-Soc, my new tech set up (work in progress) and a few bits of gossip and general gubbins.

Firstly, CompSoc – well things have been relatively quiet recently as we have been focussing on the administrative side of things. Something we found necessary following our President’s (Sam Oakley) house getting broken into and all their laptops getting stolen, including all the data on our members. Note for future reference: do not store all your important data on one system, always have a copy or back up on a different system. We are starting to fill up the calendar with events now (if you are really interested then check out the events listings on the web page). I am glad I got involved in CompSoc, the committee are a joy to work with in the main and I really enjoy the technical side of things too.

A-Soc is not going amazingly well – if you read Chris Worfolk’s blog posts here and here then you get an idea on what’s the matter. Our London trip is going to plan at the moment – really got things sorted now, everything is booked and all we need now is to fill up the last few places and we are set. If any of you readers are interested in coming then it is £55 for members and £65 for non-members (membership fee is a fiver so do the math…) and that gets you transport and accommodation inclusive of breakfasts. Visit our web site for more information and to sign up.

I have just bought an old School of Computing PC and am preparing to set it up as a linux machine to run alongside my windows machine. I managed to get hold of it really cheaply and it came with monitor (17inch flat screen) and peripherals. I am currently using the monitor as part of a dual monitor system – see pics, along with my new Logitech G11 Keyboard. I am hoping to supplement this set up with a KVM switch so I can use monitor, keyboard and mouse with both boxes and also a new mouse.

Liz and I are going really strong too, in fact I think our relationship is starting to mature into soemthign really special. We have had our ups and downs – especially over the last fortnight or so – but we have emerged stronger and better prepared for a future than we were! All in all, I think we are destined for something special here – watch this space!

Last night saw the annual Fresher’s reception in the School of Computing. The Long Room was the usual venue, ale and wine the usual fayre and the school disco style separation of Freshers from every body else. As the ale and wine flowed the segregation became less and less pronounced and by the end of the second hour everyone was mixing and chatting away. Kieran leapt to his feet just as the last drop of ale was being quaffed to announce that CompSoc would be continuing the evening’s merriment in the form of a pub crawl into town starting with the Old Bar.

After a few drinks in the Old Bar, along with pizza for those who needed a good lining for their stomachs, we set off on the pub crawl proper with Sam, our illustrious president, leading the way to The Fenton. There was a level of irony that should be mentioned here; Sam is a second year and has lived in Leeds for over a year now yet still doesn’t know where anything is in Leeds! So, with a gaggle of Fresher’s, CompSoc committee and the usual band of hangers on we trekked the couple of hundred yards from LUU to The Fenton (it’s on Woodhouse Lane between Leeds and Ledds Met unis for those that don’t know).

I don’t spend much time in The Fenton unless I’m playing a card game there or I’m on an Otley Run, but it’s a nice enough place and is owned by the same people that run the Eldon so a good selection of ale to be got. We stayed here for a swift one then headed next door to Strawbs.

Strawbs is a quaint little place, a litte bar (about a metre long) and a selection of seats and sofas. It can be a little grotty, but this time round mainly due to the fact we filled the place it had quite a good atmosphere. The drinks are reasonable if a little limited in range.

Dry Dock was the next stop on the crawl. It is a very student orientated place but with a Yellow Card the drinks are about as cheap as you can get in Leeds! The Freshers were starting to feel the pace by now. The beer had been flowing for a little over seven hours (it was ten o’clock by now) and wheat was beginning to separate from the chaff. We had had a couple of drop outs along Woodhouse Lane, namely CompSoc V-P Kieran.

The main gossip by this stage was the massive amount of flirting going on. It is always funny to see Freshers chatting up the ladies – it is much like watching dogs on heat. Liz and Charlie were both getting a lot of attention at this stage!

Fab was the next port of call and the temperature was beginning to rise. Charlie and B were starting to have to fend the guys off and Liz was having her drinks bought for her. A few more bodies left at this stage but the numbers were still far better than we could have imagined prior to the event. With Sam still leading from the front the night was beginningt o turn into one that many wouldn’t forget. Most people were merrily drunk byt this stage, especially Sarann who had long since passed her safe limit!

After a couple of drinks in Fab we moved on to our final bar – Bourbon. This is where the fun began. Firstly we were down to the hardcore few, about ten people, half freshers hand half others. Sarann, Liz and Charlie were all busy making new “friends” and really making the Freshers feel welcome. Sarann and Liz were being particularly friendly. Unfortunately, Sarann was now well past her limit and had to be taken home – a job for Michelle and I. The rest of the gang headed over to Grosvener Casino for a flutter. All I can say on that topic is check out Liz’s blog on the night.

CompSoc and A-Soc Fresher events are getting into full swing and I am really starting to get my teeth into the roles. I am looking forward to the next few weeks despite the fact that the workload is daunting to say the least.