It's been a while

to say the least. I'm not very good at updating you guys!

My first course has come and gone, and I just found out today that I passed the exam! One down, one to go. I felt pretty good about this exam, even though I was the first person to leave after 4 hours of exam-writing, but someone pointed out afterward that I was at an advantage being that the exam was written in English...a language that was native to no one else in the room. Oh well, I still am happy that I passed and I don't need to worry about retaking it.

I started my second course last Wednesday, Advanced Analytical Chemistry. This is definitely a step up from my previous course, and I've forgotten many of the properties of the compounds we're talking about, so I need to do some heavy reviewing. I have 4 hours of lecture (with a 15 minute break every hour, so more like 3 full hours...still...that's a long time) each day, but we're done with the lectures on the 18th! So it's coming up soon. After that, we're in the lab 4 days a week, but I think, based on the way the professor talks about it, we'll be done early on some of those days. I'm not worried, I think it will be fun.

I haven't taken many more pictures, yet. I have a few of the snow that I'll post when I get around to it (yes, I'm lazy) but I'll have more for you soon! Thanks to my mom and dad (really, thank you so much!) I'm getting to go to Norway as a birthday present! They sponsored me to go on a day trip fjord tour leaving from Bergen, Norway. So, Thursday the 17th I'm flying out of Copenhagen to Bergen; Friday I'm touring the fjord, Saturday I'm taking a train to Oslo, and Sunday I'm flying out of Oslo back home to start lab on Monday. It's a packed schedule, but I think it should be gorgeous. I did just hear, though, that Bergen is the rainiest city...ever. Like 60 days of sunshine a year. Hopefully one of those will be when I'm there! Either way, I'll have fun and take lots of pictures.

Tomorrow is also the two month mark until Tyler arrives and we get to go travelling through Europe. We've put together a rough plan for seeing a bajillion cities, but we have yet to book hostels or finalize anything. Two months is still a good bit of time, but it's nice to know it's coming up!

In other news, my plant isn't doing so well...a combination of not watering it very much (and these plants aren't supposed to need much watering, so you KNOW I'm falling down on the job) and dropping a curtain rod on it and severing some of its leaves...oops. It's still green, though, so all hope is not lost. I'll try to be better about it.

The weather is finally looking to be more consistently warm, though only time will tell if that's actually true. Warm is still under 50 degrees, but barely. Definitely want some NC sunshine. I discovered the farmers market/produce stand in the city center, and they have some very cheap and very delicious items. I think I'll take the time to bike down there more often. Plus, it's nice to just get into the city and see the pretty green areas that are there. Last time I was down there, there were two ducks waddling around with a 3-year-old girl in rubber boots waddling after them. Cute.

It looks like I survived the Swedish winter (at least the Skåne winter)...we'll see how the spring goes :-)