Archive for the ‘Life’ Category

Our building recently held a cheese and wine night for residents. We’ve been trying to work out what these is. ChatGPT thinks it is a Spanish-style cheese coated with paprika such as a Pimentón Ibérico or Idiazabal, but when I searched for those, they did not look that similar.

Last week we hiked up Tibradden Cairn via Three Rock and Two Rock. It is about 10k there and back from Ticknock. Two Rock is the highest point in the Dublin Mountains at 536m, although the Dublin Mountains are part of the Wicklow mountains which go higher (they’re just the other side of the county border).

I’m excited to share that I’m now a Chartered Psychologist with the British Psychological Society.

I’ve been in psychology for many years, and chartership is something we work towards over the course of our careers. It’s nice to hit that milestone. Of course, I’m still the same person I was yesterday – just now with a few extra letters and a slightly longer email signature.

The Yorkshire Museum is located in York and has several galleries on dinosaurs, Star Carr, Roman York and the Vikings. They have a sensory corner with some handmade creastures and a virtual reality feed a dinosaur interactive exhibit that Venla had a go at. We also tried the fossil dig. Everything was in good working order so it is a well kept museum. Worth a visit if you are in York.

I free soloed the Little Sugar Loaf. Technically, there is no climbing involved and you just walk up. Also, some would say a hill that is 342 metres high isn’t much of an achievement. Especially when the car park is like half way up. But I wouldn’ be great with heights and this one just turns into a scramble at the top.

I didn’t actually fancy the scramble. There are a few false summits that way and by the second one I decided there was too much scrambling. So I went around the other way and took the more gentle path. You get a lovely view from the top.

You might be surprised to learn that it is fairly near the Great Sugar Loaf.

The viva is an oral examination also known as a thesis defence. In Latin it means “living voice” with the idea that you give voice to your research while being examined by a panel made up of an internal examiner from the university, an external examiner from another university, and a chair who is there to ensure smooth running of the examination.

I completed mine last week for my research on mental health in ultra-endurance athletes. I am delighted to say that I passed with minor corrections!

Lovely zoo. The habits looked large and well-designed but we still got to see plenty. We got lucky with the elephants and the tiger was huge. The hippo was hiding, unfortunately. They also have rhinos, giraffes, zebras, chimps, sea lions and loads more. But the highlight might have been the wolves. There was a pack of them running around. The gorillas were also brilliant.

Wild Encounters is located just outside Newcastle West. They have a range of birds, reptiles, meerkats and farm animals. Also, a tanuki, which was both cool and very timely given how popular Animal Crossing currently is in our house. There was plenty to keep us entetained in terms of talks, a hands-on petting of the rabbits and guinea pigs, and ferret racing in which Venla and her team mate Polly took first place!

Ulster Museum is composed of three levels: history, nature and art. There is loads of interesting stuff including a piece on The Troubles, the formation of continents since the creation of the Earth, and two discovery rooms with lots of hands-on items for children. It’s also located in the Botanical Gardens so you can have a walk around those as well. And it’s all free.

DUNeS recently hosted a visit from Dogs for the Disabled who are a charity that provide assistance dogs. They are similar to Guide Dogs but help with physical mobility issues like walking, retrieving dropped items, raising the alarm if something is wrong and a range of other tasks.

They also provide therapy dogs which in this case is a well trained dog that acts as a companion (the dog has no additional training in psychodynamic theory).

They are a registered charity and currently fundraising to build a new HQ so if that is a cause you would like to support, check out the Dogs for the Disabled website.