Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station (Part Three)

Hello and welcome to: Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station (Part Three). I honestly did not envisage this story going on as long as it has done, so for that, I profusely apologise. I tend to ramble when I am writing. And talking for that matter. Luckily, I have got out of the habit of doing this at school. Well sort of. I do it a lot less than I used to anyway. But I still do it when writing, so sorry about that!

Anyhoo, back to my gripping story! Then we went to the massive boiler room so we had to put our earplugs in again. We were one level above the floor and it was quite a way down and there was only a railing stopping us plummeting to our deaths. I have to admit that I couldn't help thinking, "Oooh Health and Safety wouldn't approve!" I'm sorry but I couldn't stop myself. As we were walking round, Zoe slipped on some water and Emily had to catch her. That really freaked everybody out! We all noticeably slowed down and were more careful as we made our way to the staircase at the end of the platform. At this point, Fred decided to tell us that 2 men had fallen down the chimney things on the roof and had died. Everyone went very quiet and started to hold onto the railing. It took ages to get down the staircase because everyone was taking on step every 5 seconds. Again, I thought to myself, "Oooh those stairs don't look very safe! Have they had the Health and Safety checked?" I am still ashamed of those thoughts :-( Then we went back to the classroomy bit we went to at the begining. Oooh whoops! Forgot to mention the classroomy bit in MAADPS Part One!! Sorry!! Yeah, when we first got to the power station, we went into a classroomy place and got talked to about power stations for a bit. It was very boring but they gave us biscuits! And the diagram of the power station they showed us had lighty-uppy things so that was nice to look at. That was the point when they gave us luminous coats and bob the builder hats and yellow earplugs. Don't know how I managed to forget that! Anyway, so we went back to that place and then realised that 'Oh-my-gosh it's 2 o'clock already!' So we had to get back to the bus quickly and I never got a chance to say goodbye to Fred :-( On the bus, we had to fill in a questionaire about the trip. It was one of those 'strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree etc' questionaires. The questions were things like:

1. Did you learn a lot from this tour? (my answer: Strongly agree)
2. Did you find this tour useful? (my answer: Strongly agree)
3. Did you find this tour enjoyable? (my answer: Strongly agree)
4. Are you now considering becoming involved in any aspect of our production in the future (or something like that) - (my answer: agree)
5. Are you interested in taking part in future tours? (my answer: Strongly agree)
6. How could we improve the tour? (my answer: making the tour longer)
7. What are 3 things that you have learnt from this tour? (my answer: ummmm)

I think for no.7, I copied someone elses. I did learn something but it's quite hard to list. Looking back on those answers, I look like a real teacher's pet!! Oh well. I really enjoyed myself! Everyone was really suprised that I enjoyed it because from the sound of it, everyone found it boring and tedious. On the way home, I played Cubefield on my iPod touch and texted Emma while she was in German. I'd forgotten she was still in lessons. Oops. At least she didn't get into trouble. She seems to use her phone all the time at school. I'm rubbish at texting secretly. Well I'm rubbish at texting generally.

So that concludes the 'Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station' series! Hope you've enjoyed it! I have. I'll admit that it is full of irrelevant waffle. But it was fun to write and I hope fun to read :-) I shall certainly continue blogging because I like doing it and I think that's what matters. Although it is great to have lots of readers! I love you guys! Till next time :-) xxxx

Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station (Part Two)

Hello again! Right, where did I get to? Ah yes! The cooling towers!

Then we went into a large building with masses and masses of machinery in it. It was deafening! We had to wear the earplugs we had been given. They were bright yellow. I have always been a bit apprehensive about earplugs. I just don't like the idea of sticking something in your ear. I've always been quite careful about my ears! I try not to go to discos (partly because I hate them - I hate dancing and I hate dressing up and I hate the music the rest of my year like and I hate social events like that) and I have a limit on the volume on my ipod. I think it's stupid having a roaring noise belting into your eardrums. That and numerous discos could completely ruin your hearing! I'm starting to sound like an old fart (excuse the phrase) so I shall go back to describing my 'Adventures At Didcot Power Station' as the title promised! Then we discovered that the lift that would take us up to the control room place was being used by another group being shown around so we had to take the stairs. I continued my enthusiasm, saying "Come on guys! It's good exercise!" Now, those of you who know me will know that a loath exercise so everyone in our party did a double take! Hannah said, " But you hate exersice." I said "Ah, no, I hate sport!" She did still look slightly confused, but I just carried on up the stairs! We got to a sort of viewing area that overlooked the main boiler thingys. There are 4 units apparently. The are all identical (he didn't know whether they were identical to the last pipe when I asked, but he said the plans were all the same) but they work completely separately so that if one breaks down, the others will still run. They do something to do with boiling something which makes something else happen. It all got a bit confusing but it was good to look at! Then Fred showed us the shifts of engineers. They work shifts of 12 hours but they get about 15 days off a month - 8 all in one go at one point! I was debating in my head whether I should consider being an engineer in later life because I loved the sound of 8 days off in a row! But then I decided that, no. It wasn't the right career path for me. BUT... then we went to see the control room. There are 4 areas of control panel desks and 9 MASSIVE screens - 3 for each unit. Apparently, the computer engineer staff people stay at their desks all day working the computers and making sure nothing goes wrong. Fred said "They even have their lunch in there!" At the word 'lunch', I decided that this was the job for me! Sitting at a computer all day, chatting and eating lunch! Sounds like my perfect job! Well, my perfect job would be doing something or other at the BBC, preferably radio and preferably Radio 4 or 5live! But being a computer person who eats lunch would be almost as good! I wonder if they have any pasta.... Anyway, I'd better go to bed now. But 'Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station Part Three' will be up some time tomorrow, probably about 10pm because that's when I seem to be doing most of my blogs - just before bed! Right then, G'night everyone! xxxxx

Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station (Part One)

Today I went to a power station for a school trip! I was expecting it to be really, really boring because other people who had been before said it was just walking round, trying to hear a boring man talking over the racket the generator thingys were making. But I was pleasantly surprised! I thoroughly enjoyed the visit and I really want to go again. We were all given yellow hard hats and luminous jackets, so I had a great time pretending to be Bob the Builder and Fireman Sam! I have to confess that I do have the theme tunes of both those programs on my ipod - along with Postman Pat, Noddy, William's Wish Wellingtons etc. The 90's was the best decade for children's telly. I'm sure many people would disagree with me but that's what I think. Anyhoo, we got into groups of about 5 or 6 and were assigned to a guide and off we went. Since everyone else looked bored and uninspired, I decided that we needed some enthusiasm to get us through the day so I started acting very enthusiastically, saying things like "Right! Lets go!" or "Come on guys!" and asking our guide lots of questions. Our guide was called Fred and he was lovely! First of all, we talked about the process of electricity generation at the power station, eg. burning coal, putting it through a turbine, doing something with a generator and a transformer and huge towers. This went on for a while and it was really interesting. Then I asked him about the implications the miners strike had had on the power station. This turned into a long political discussion about the effects of privatisation and the Tories *shudder* and the economy. I found this immensely enjoyable! Then we went somewhere else and Fred explained about the cooling towers (the massive chimneys like at the beginning of the simpsons) which was fascinating! Everyone thinks the smoke coming out of the top is a really dangerous pollutant but actually it's just condensated water! Its ironic because the really lethal gases are clear so you wouldn't be able to see them anyway!

Anyway, I need to go to sleep (in bed on my itouch again!) so I shall continue this story tomorrow in 'Meg's Adventures At Didcot Power Station Part 2!" I'm sure everyone is looking forward to it! And even if they aren't, I'll still write it because I'm really enjoying doing this blog!

N'night xxxxxxx

Books :-)

I received some 'constructive criticism' from my mum yesterday. She said not to start my blogs saying 'ummm.... not sure what to say...' etc because it gets boring. Which is perfectly true so I wont.

Back to school today and everything is pretty much the same. I've got 3 GCSE exams in the next 2 weeks - maths, history and science. Fun fun fun! Oh well, once they're done, I can forget about them.

Todays (short) blog is about books I have decided. I happen to be reading 5 books at the moment. They are all really interesting but it's quite hard to read 5 books at once. I am re-reading a book about how Russell T Davies wrote Doctor Who scripts. It's a very good book! I am also reading Mark Kermode's book about his life and films. I haven't got very far in that one. And I'm reading my great friend Allie's book which I am really enjoying. It is my school reading book because we have 10 mins at the start of each lesson to read because it's meant to boost our vocabulary - which it does. I am reading Allie's book most at the moment because I don't have a huge amount of time for reading at home at the moment what with work and stuff. I did more reading in half term. Umm... and I'm reading a book called English History 1914-1945 which is very interesting but the print is tiny and it uses very advanced language. It takes me 5 minutes to read every page! I'm only on page 25 or something. Anyway, I'm reading a book about money and banks too, so I can understand the recession and everything. I can proudly announce that I finally understand Interest!

Right, I'd better go to sleep. I have been writing this in my bed on my iPod touch! Ok then, nighty night! xxxx

Hello again

Right! Blog number 2! Err... not really sure what to say in this one. I'm not doing anything very interesting at the moment - english essay. Actually, I'm also eating a Thornton's chocolate santa which I have only just got round to eating. I got SO much chocolate for christmas! I'm gradually getting through it all. Just finished my massive slab of Hotel Chocolat Rocky Road - it was delicious!

Anyway, my good friend Emma gave me this santa as a present and she even got them to put my name on it! Awww :-) So now I need to work out how to post pictures.... ah, I see. There's a button saying 'Add Image.' I shall click that!

There we go! Not a great quality picture, I took it on my webcam. Ah well :-)

Anyhoo, not sure why I'm going on about chocolate. I shall go on about Twitter instead.

I joined Twitter in January last year. It was just before Jonathan Ross came back to the BBC after being off for 3 months. I was googling him because I wanted to know when he was coming back. Then I came across his Twitter page. I had literally no idea what it was about - it took me a while to realised that the most recent post was at the top and past ones were below. Then I found Stephen Fry's account. I asked my mum if I could have an account like a good little girl and she said I could so I did! I quickly worked out how it worked and really started to enjoy it. Excited by my new discovery, I went straight on to MSN and asked all my friends to join. Most of them weren't as excited as me and did a couple of updates and left it at that. But a few months later, my good friends Emma and Izzy became as addicted as me! And I got my mum to sign up too! She loves it!

Since then, I have made loads of Twitter friends. Well... a few. But everyone is really nice! I don't have Facebook though. Not sure why. I suppose I see Twitter as a lot more sophisticated and adult which is what I prefer. I can tweet about politics and my views and Billy Elliot without being told I'm weird, which is nice :-) I really like the atmosphere. I have Twitter friends from all over the world - Germany, USA, Sweden, UK, umm think thats it. Well 4 countries is a good start. I'm begining to ramble so I think I should stop.

Thanks for reading!

Meg xx

Umm... hullo. I have finally decided to start a blog. Not sure whether I'll be very good at it but I'll give it a go! Should be fun! Please dismiss any spelling/grammar mistakes. :-)

I'm babysitting my brother tonight because my parents are having a meal at a friends house. The occasional cackle of laughter or excited shout can be heard through the wall that divides our rooms. This is normal for when he is playing a computer/wii/ds game. I sometimes hear, "Meg! Come and look at this!" which is the signal to go and observe what he is doing, make a comment and be told an interesting fact about Nintendo or Mario or game controls or something like that. These facts can go on for several minutes. Ben can memorise paragraphs and paragraphs of Wikipedia articles about his favourite subjects. This will probably serve him very well in future exams (although he is only in year 6) however, he is very selective of what he remembers. It is generally about Mario, Nintendo, Sonic the Hedgehog, stickmen or computers. He comes out with this stuff most meal times and, although we are very impressed, it can get a bit tiring.

I should probably stop writing this blog now because I need to do some maths homework. And then tomorrow I need to finish my english essay, write some stuff about poems and finish my review of a film I hated - from the point of view of a Christian. I have to say whether it represented Christianity well - which it did. So I have to write a positive review of it even though it was the worst film I have seen for ages! This blog has become quite negative now so I must stop.

Byebye :-)