Easter/Girls time!

Finally, Easter Holiday! Today I've been cleaning, washing and mopping my room/the house to get everything tidy for when my friends arrive tomorrow! I can't wait! :D Their flight will land at 8 o'clock in the morning on Stansted airport, so we've planned to meet up at Victoria station to do some serious shopping in London, before heading back to Oxford. Needles to say, my room mate left me a complete mess, so hence the day off to clean up. To make matters worse, we have a serious ant problem, and he left an empty can of Red Bull energy drink on the kitchen counter, which was crawling with ants. Yuck! He is such a lazy idiot. Anyway, after doing some grocery shopping in the city center I had a stroll over the Gloucester Green Antiques and Craft Market (held every Thursday from 9 to 5! Check out all Oxford markets here), and bought two sweet little prints from Essex (setting the painting counter to 6) and a lovely amber pendent. A good start of Easter, I'd say!

Hope you're having a lovely Easter Holiday!

Sick

Yes, not homesick this time, but just sick. Although both involve a running nose... So the stress and tiredness have finally caught up with me and I'm sick. Exactly like it did the last time with my previous internship, only this time it is midway in the internship, and not at the end. On the bright side, I took Thursday and Friday off, so I've had like a four day weekend. On the down side, Wednesday I sneezed so hard I dropped the eppendorf tube and spilled the (precious) DNA I had been working on for 8 hours on my pants. Shit.
Oh, and another thing to show how fucked up I am from this internship: I posted a Mothers day card to arrive on April the 11th in Holland. Mothers day in Holland is on May the 11th. My mum loved it though, and we had a good laugh about it.

Only 11 more weeks to go!

Comrade in battle

Hi there! Another update from a miserable Dutch girl stuck in Oxford. And don't let the exclamation mark fool you, it's still shit out here. But, I was right about the quiet (English) girl: she's awesome and we've become very close friends. As it turns out, I'm not the only one who doesn't feel at home in the lab, she just knows how to hide it very well. Which is probably why she lasted until know. But life in the lab has become a little more bearable now that we can share our angers and frustrations. To be honest I don't think I'd be able to survive without her, and she's said as much about me. Right now I'm beginning to feel a little guilty about leaving in June, because it means I will leave here alone in the talons of the other girls... 

With love, Willemijn

p.s. Another PhD comic to describe the insane long working hours and the lack of windows in our lab (seriously, from 08:00 to 22:00?!)