Indeed it is, even though in a windy and overcast day like today it seems hard to visualise that. And with Spring we have the unavoidable Spring cleans, it is also a good time to perform a situation check on how things are going and try to improve them if necessary.

Last time I’ve written a “proper” (ie, long) post was basically at the end of my Christmas holidays (that was back in January…). Since then the days have been getting progressively longer and milder (I cannot use the word “warm”, that one is reserved to Portuguese weather!) and the term is basically finishing! I’ve finished my lab classes, even though I still have a sizeable pile of lab reports to mark 🙁 .

My lab work has been progressing well, I now have good results to communicate, with a couple of publications being prepared at the moment. Thesis-wise things have been stationary as I’ve been finding it difficult to juggle lab work+classes+marking+a bit of personal time, adding anything else to that mix would blow things up, I guess.

And with regards to that “bit of personal time”, I’ve been trying to make the most of the outdoor conditions, because even if it is not “warm” (but mild) one can still enjoy oneself and do some nice things. I’ve been doing a lot of sculling lately (as it was probably evident from some pictures I’ve posted here not too long ago…), having finally sorted out the lightweight sculling single which was being refurbished before I left for my Christmas break (and what a great boat it is!…).

I also managed to convince some of my lab colleagues to join me in a 10k race which will be taking place in Whitstable over the May bank holiday. Given that two of them were not regularly doing sports we had to take it really easy in the beginning, but we’ve already managed to do 10k in ~1h with no stops, hence it is starting to look good!

In February we also had a nice day trip to Belgium. While the weather wasn’t as spectacular as the same time in the previous year when we went down to Boulogne-sur-Mer it was still decent enough to allow us to visit Brugges and buy a lot of fantastic Belgium beer!

And now I’m looking forward to a couple of days at home. The weather forecast looks very promising – but to be honest anything usual for Porto at this time of the year would be better than what I’m currently looking at outside my window – the sky is absolutely white, the trees are moving like crazy and one just does not want to leave the house at all (I don’t intend to do it… and I have plenty of things to keep me busy here anyway!)

OK, break’s over. Let’s get back to work!…