Back to school

I'm alive! The cold has been successfully fought and destroyed, thanks to flu tablets, an abundance of fruit, and of course a little whisky. So, no excuses now, back to the regular postings.

The big decision towards the end of last week, was to finally give education another go, which for me is quite a big step, since me and education never really saw eye to eye. Most of my school years were met with what can best be described as a lack of attention (not that it's any different now, I still tune out after about 5 minutes), and so I finally left with some less than inspiring grades.

Despite this lack of legitimate qualifications, I've still managed to bluff my way into a career as a programmer, defying the maths teach who said I'd never have a career in IT if I couldn't do maths. But recently, I've been thinking recently that it's time to start filling in some of the gaps, both to give a few more options career wise, and also just out of the interest of learning something new, and so starting in January, I'll be starting the introductory course in Physics through the Open University.

For those outside of the UK, or just not familiar with it, Open University is a correspondence based system, along with some short summer schools and tutorials, whereby you do a series of courses each year, and each course earns you a certain number of points. When you have enough points in the right area, you can put this towards a degree, or other qualification. There are probably thousands of Open University students shouting at my two sentence summary of Open University, but perhaps I can describe it a bit better once I've been through it.

Both my wife and a friend of mine have been through Open University courses and now have their degrees to show for it, as well as having the pleasure of getting their own back on me for all the years spent asking "Why do you want to keep studying? Are you crazy??". But, they seemed to enjoy it and are encouraging me to go for it.

So, for me this means just over two months of TV, socialising and lazing around before I trade it in for study books and last minute revision, but whatever happens, I promise I'll still keep time aside for the blog and for going round other blogs. Here's hoping that old dogs can still learn a few new tricks!


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