Gott nytt år!


I hope you are enjoying the start of the ‘20s. I’ve just returned to Sweden for a few weeks after a festive break back in the UK. I won’t be away for long though; from January 25th I’ll be revisiting my old Master’s haunts as I spend a month working at University of Leeds, learning how to do geotechnical site investigations and catching up with my supervisors over there.

The past month has been filled with many festive activities here in Stockholm and across England. I’ll keep this account brief as I’m a little sick of writing from trying to finish the first paper of my PhD (The performance of near surface geophysical techniques in the proglacial environment) before I go to Leeds. January already seems to have too few days for my liking!


The Golden Hall - Stockholm City Hall
The Blue Hall - Stockholm City Hall
Back at the beginning of December, I came the closest to a Nobel prize banquet I think I’ll ever manage. As international researchers, we were invited along to Stockholm City Hall for a buffet dinner. I’m still not entirely sure why but am certainly not complaining. Felicity and I seemed to be the only ones that had signed up from our department (couldn’t pass the opportunity for some free food and wine!). We enjoyed an evening in the golden hall at the city hall along with about 100 other researchers from across Stockholm, learning about the history of the building while munching through numerous Swedish dishes, accompanied by a string quartet. The Nobel prize banquet is actually held in the blue hall below because the golden hall is not large enough to hold all the guests.

Duck roast at Jenny's
The following weekend was filled with Christmas dinners as Eva and Nelson welcomed 16 of us over for a very international potluck dinner on the Saturday (Felicity and I contributed chicken, homemade bread sauce, cranberry sauce and Christmas pudding truffles) and then Jenny had Felicity, Charlotta and I over for a duck roast on the Sunday. During my last week in Sweden for 2019, we had a PhD day where we learnt how to present our science to non-scientific audiences, each giving a practice presentation with feedback in the afternoon (apparently I sound very BBC!). The department julbord (Swedish Christmas dinner) this year didn’t quite live up to 2018’s magical
Eva and Nelson's Christmas
experience at Gamla Riksarkivet. Sadly, there was no dessert room this year as plans to return to Gamla Riksarkivet had to be abandoned when it was found that the University’s official catering options had not been used, leading to complaints in the press. Instead, we had our Christmas lunch in the department lunchroom; there was still a large selection of pickled herring, ham, potatoes, various smoked salmon dishes, meatballs and numerous veggie sides but the festive atmosphere was slightly lacking.


A very festive Lancashire gang
The next day I headed home to celebrate Christmas with friends and family across the UK. I was able to slot in meet ups with many old friends from both school and university days over the couple of weeks I was back. For the main event, Mum, Dad, Tom and I spent 4 days up in Lancashire with Grandma and the Aubrey’s (Jane, Chris, Josh and Sam) who very conveniently now live 3 doors down from each other. Having two kitchens definitely helps when it comes to Christmas dinner as we were able to run the cooked turkey along to the Aubrey’s once all the vegetables were ready. Back down in Buckinghamshire, we caught up with most of the Watts gang during an afternoon/evening of food, games and the usual Watts madness at our place.


Watts cousins (Minus Charlie)
The Watts gang (A few had already left)
To finish off 2019, I met up with a group of friends from Lancaster University over in Cheltenham for one night. We had booked an AirBnB so spent the evening playing games then had a good brunch and round of crazy golf (not one of my strengths!) the following day before heading our separate ways.
Crazy golf with Max, Rachael, Becky and Steph.
So that’s it; another year over, here’s hoping that the year 2020 provides as many unforgettable experiences as the last. For now, it’s back to the writing before heading over to Oslo on Tuesday for a 3-day geology conference. Wishing you all the best for the year ahead!

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