Swedish engineering student

This has always been a tricky little topic for me.

Age three, my parents separated. So, I grew up with ‘home home’, my grandmother’s house (where my mum & I lived for years following the split), ‘dad’s home’ – and I also lived at my aunt’s house during the holidays while my mum had to work. In any case, ‘home’ was always a term in flux.

On a wider scale, ‘home’ often refers to where you are from. In my case, this is Birmingham.

I had never known anything different to Birmingham until I started studying at the University of Cambridge. During this time, I saw Cambridge as more my ‘home’ than Birmingham; after all, it was the first place I had ever discovered alone. The winding streets, the bustle of tourists – I found it magical and new and completely and utterly mine.

Alas, this was temporary.

After discovering I was to move to London last summer, there was a moment – you may possibly remember it, I wrote a blog post – where I sat in New Street station (or should I say, ‘Grand Central’) and felt slightly sad to leave Birmingham.

I’m not really sure why. My memories of Birmingham are not usually wholly positive, harking back to a time where an awkward teenager who didn’t quite fit roamed, yet to discover the breadth and the possibilities of the world outside the city she was currently residing in. Nevertheless, in Grand Central last year, I felt a small spark, a flicker, of what I think some people may feel when they think of ‘home’.

I haven’t felt that towards Birmingham since.

Each time I go back to visit Birmingham, there is a change to the city. A new coffee shop or restaurant is created, my usual bus no longer stops by my house – there’s even a new tram system which has been implemented. The city itself is slowly shifting towards a better future, a more streamlined look. It’s fabulous and fantastic – but it’s no longer the Birmingham of my upbringing. I feel with every new building that is built, with every new brick laid and splash of paint applied, the city is slowly shutting me out. I feel alien.

I have changed, the city has changed. We just don’t fit.

Less alien, however, is the once unfamiliar and intimidating life in London. Each day I step onto the Victoria Line with precise regularity. I understand the ins and outs of what you should and shouldn’t do here. I’ve adapted to the late nights, the early mornings, and I’m haphazardly juggling everything accordingly. My 10 months here have absolutely flown by in a whirlwind of tube journeys, brunches, Friday drinks and canal runs.

Now, don’t get me wrong, Central London still seems like an institution. Impenetrable.

But I have found an absolute sanctuary in my edge-of-Zone-2, pokey, £££££££ per month flat in Hackney Wick.

I’m currently writing this post in an #edgy vegan coffee shop and lunch spot called Mother, in Here East, a building which was once used by production/news companies during the Olympics, but which is now formed of empty spaces that are slowly becoming occupied by independent businesses. It’s an ideal spot, overlooking the canal in the sunshine – a people-watcher’s dream. Looking around, I can see a diverse stream of people walking and cycling along the canal today, or sunbathing, or drinking coffee, or having breakfast/lunch. There’s ‘90s music playing. I’m drinking a smoothie that has ‘cacao’ in it. I’m about to go to the gym.

I’ve never felt so free as I do here. I’ve never felt so accepted, even in Cambridge. Perhaps I wholeheartedly fulfil the artsy stereotype of the people who live here - I mean, I am currently wearing my mom jeans, an oversized cotton shirt thrown on over them, typing furiously on my Macbook with my large, taupe glasses on.

But perhaps I feel at home here in Hackney Wick because I’ve realised I don’t even have to try to fit in here, because everything and everyone is just so different. I walk along the canal and see people tending to their boats, some painting them, some watering plants on top of them, some hosting BBQs and drinking cider on them. Each and every life here is different, and it’s liberating. I’ve never felt like this before.

It’s made me want to try new things – for example, I went bouldering a couple of weeks ago with my housemates. Bouldering. It was incredibly fun, but I couldn’t quite get over the fact that I had done that, and enjoyed it. Me.

I feel less scared to be me. To discover new things. To fuck up.  

And perhaps this is what home feels like. Finding a place that allows you to be content in your own skin, your own body, your own mind. Finding a place that allows you to roam free. A place that accepts the fact that you’re a theatre-going, gin-and-elderflower drinking, life-drawing, book-reading, gym-going, (bouldering), stressed, single, account executive who is still figuring herself out and wanting to meet lots of different people with different experiences.

No doubt, I could go all statistical and strategic and say that factors such as age demographic, etc. widely affect attitudes/preferences towards a place. I don’t doubt that in the future, Hackney Wick will no longer feel like home – we are, after all, creatures who are in constant change. But right now, I’m home, and I’m happy.

Microsoft OneNote tutorial for study, class and lecture by emmastudies

Hello! I have had numerous people message me about how I structure my notes for OneNote so I thought I would put together a tutorial! Above is a small run down of the program and my little two cents on each feature. But now I’m going to go into a little more detail to help anyone who is looking for somewhere to type their notes. Through I’ll suggest my ideas on how to use OneNote for different reasons including study notes, class notes and lecture/tutorial notes.

Set up and use:

Start by downloading OneNote from the App Store or from their website if you’re using a PC. It is free!!! I would definitely recommend downloading the mobile or tablet app as well.

Sign in with an Outlook account and begin making your notebooks. For high school I would suggest a new notebook for each class. For university, I had one notebook for the entire semester. As I go into my second semester I’ll make a new one, and so one. For study notes, it is up to you. You could either make one notebook for all your study notes and use sections to divide per subject or make a new notebook for each subject again. Or simply and a new section in the existing notebook. Notebooks are linked to OneDrive meaning you can close the notebook and reopen it at any time. They’re automatically saved too, so you can edit on your phone and when you use your computer it is updated!

Start creating sections. These act as dividers so depending how you have structured your notebook, make them for either each topic of your subject (high school) or each of your classes/subjects (university). For my high school class/study notes I made a new section for each new topic and for university I have one per subject. As you can see in the photoset; my notebook was legal studies (subject) and each section was for a topic (crime, human rights, family, consumers, assessments and homework).

Create your pages for each time you have class. Add the title of what you’re doing and start typing your notes. For my lectures I usually just name them “lecture 1”, “lecture 2” because I’m lazy, however for study notes I would use each subheading of the topic in the syllabus. If you’re wanting to understand my headings and subheadings completely I suggest checking out the legal studies syllabus that I created the above notes too (you can see it here on page 26).

Time for decoration and colour coding. Usually as I’m typing I bold or underline and colour code but you can always go back and do it as a revision method. This also gives you a chance to add any extra information you find! You can see an explanation of my colour code in the final image of the photoset. I found colour coding and formatting super helpful when I was studying for my HSC final exams!

Printing time! When I had finished my study notes (or class notes) I would print them so I had a physical copy to highlight and annotate. Here is where it gets a little fiddly. To print on one A4 size piece of paper without cutting off half your text, you need to shrink the size of the text box. This is what you might see - with half the text cut off. I would say reduce it to about half the original size - you can usually see on print preview how close it is to the edge. After you have made the textbox thinner, it should look like this. Another tip is printing using one sheet for two or more pages. This helps to reduce the amount of paper you’re using. On the print settings look for “pages per sheet” and change it to the number of pages you want (obviously the more pages, the smaller the font). It should look something like this (I’m not 100% sure if every computer or printer has this option, but for reference I use an Epson printer).

If you are thinking : ‘What a simple question, I know the answer to that! It is used to control the temperature on my refrigerator’

You are absolutely right ! In fact most people I have asked this question seem to know thus far. But how does turning a knob control the temperature ?

The refrigeration cycle

The fridge works in a rather simple way:

Refrigerant (liq) takes up heat from the object you want to cool

Changes state from liquid to gas

Compressor pressurizes fluid, heating it up. ( Why ? for better heat exchange )

This hot gas meets the cool gas outside, changing state back to liquid

Further de-pressurizes as it heads back

Repeat

The thermostat switch

If the temperature inside the fridge goes up, the compressor must be turned on to circulate the refrigerant.

Here’s the crux of the post :

That knob determines when the compressor is to be turned on !

That knob is coupled to a screw type mechanism which lowers or moves up as it is rotated.

A bellow ( like a balloon ) keeps expanding as the temperature inside the fridge increases until it hits the arm and flicks the thermostat;

Compressor : ON ;

Refrigeration cycle : START

That’s the story of that mysterious knob that had baffled me for quite some time.

15th April ~ 13:50

Reading about Congress bills can be dry, so here’s a quick thread on the eight bills (among 2,000 - according to Al Jazeera English) introduced since Trump took office in January.

Critical Writing Tips: How to Get a First!

Show ability to deal confidently with the relevant principles. - Do not sound hesitant or passive. - Frame your opinion with words like “can”, and write that you “will” argue it. - Show you really believe in your points.

Demonstrate a capacity for independent thought.  - Show you have read competing viewpoints, choose one and argue it. - Acknowledge counter-arguments to show wider reading.

Show that you can critically assess arguments. - Identify weaknesses in the arguments made in the relevant literature.

Evidence your point of view by including your opinion.  - Start with your thesis and make it run throughout the essay. - Make sure it is a reasoned view, supported by evidence. - Include as many footnotes of sources as possible!

Include relevant quotations and references to views expressed in the relevant literature.  - Read beyond the reading list given to you in lectures, tutorials/seminars.

Mary Jackson

(1921–2005) Mathematician and engineer

Mary Jackson was a human computer at Langley Research Center, as part of the West Area Computers. She then became the first black woman engineer at NASA at its founding in 1958. After 34 years at NASA, she asked for a demotion in order to serve as a Federal Equal Opportunity Specialist with NASA. She was also a Girl Scout leader for more than thirty years. She retired in 1985.