Heading towards 4th year or post grad/jobs

[Xenia]

Continuation of the previous thread for those of us with children who are just finishing their 3rd year at university (so either "graduating" in 2020 or going into year 4 in Autumn 2020)..........

My twins' degree results will be out in late July. Good luck to everyone else waiting for finals results.

Hope they are are all ok Haffdonga, I’ve been very tense all week, just generally concerned about both being away.

...in slightly positive news , DS1 got offered a grad job by his placement employer.

He will accept it And keep as insurance - not really what he wants to and opposite end of the country from us and miles away from the stuff he likes to do . But £35k salary in this climate - it’s a good insurance policy to have.

That's definitely good news, Eve!

Congrats to your DS Eve. Nice news at a very difficult time; well done to him.

DS2 will be home on Sunday and his big brother the week after. Just trying to work out where to fit all their stuff. 🤨 I've sort of taken over DS2's wardrobe space whilst he's been at uni, so will have to make space for him now...

Well done on the job offer to Eve's son.

On the how to fit stuff in ....keeps happening here as the 5 move in and out... I think the older 3 are now entirely gone and daughter 2 took her remaining 17 boxes 2 weeks ago (I hired a 2 men with a van to move it) so that just leaves 36 of her sisters' but there is no rush for that as is tucked away at the back of the garage.

I am actually alone, my heaven on earth.... until tomorrow when my son is back from his long weekend away at his girl friend's parents' so very peaceful. The floor downstairs is actually staying clean rather than covered in half the woods opposite the house where he and his friends seem to trail in bits of leaves despite taking off shoes...although my other son says I do it from gardening but I don't agree.

The Parker children issue is common at this stage - my son's have one school friend who has been round here and is very very busy in first graduate accountancy job (plus doing studying plus exams), others are doing nothing. The only one that concerns me is my son in Bristol as he is going into week 5 of his law course next week and most of his friends have not started year 4 of university or masters yet there so I hope he is doing enough work and not too tempted by relaxing with them. I think my twins have some kind of mock exams in October (in half term week) and half of this year's final exams in December.

(My first attempt at "bold" in my history of mumsnet worked.....)

Congratulations to your DS @Eve

All rest and no play makes DS a dull boy @Xenia

That’s great@eve, a job in hand makes the search for an ideal job so mischievous easier. DS is busy applying for graduate jobs and has had a few assessment s and call backs so fingers crossed. His twin sister, meanwhile is loving the masters workload (much easier than oxford allegedly) but no motivation to look for a law job after it.
Xenia with all mine gone now I almost miss the mess and beer bottle empties in my recycling...

Good luck to the Carrimac twins who seem to be doing fine. I spoke to one of mine in Bristol today - he chatted for ages as his only flat mate is away this weekend. It is his first day off from doing law work and his eyes feel a lot better - all this screen work affects his brain and eyes etc. He has just ordered new lenses for his glasses which the optician thinks might help. He was hoping to get into the Bristol U library as usually the law students from his place can but not this year even real BU students now only get 4 hours a week in the library -usually he would spend all day every day most days in the library - so a huge change.

He did send me a recent email which sets out some of the arrangements for their first mock exams later this month. It looks like they can download it in a week and then they have 2 weeks to decide when to spend the 100 minutes doing the mock exams. I don't think he knows yet what materials are used/available. Anyway he sounded very happy so that's good. He says they are doing lots of nice dinners rather than night clubs this year and he prefers it - no nights getting very drunk or late nights. He had a friend over and he cooked them both a stew. He does loads of cooking at our house normally and says this term he has been back to cooking properly again so that sounds very good. he also says he is spending hardly any money as no nights out!

Hi again everyone.

Congratulations to @Horsemad and @Eve's offspring. And I hope @latedecember1963 is making progress.

Not much to report here. Both DDs went to their respective unis a fortnight ago. DH took DD1 to Cambridge. She is back in the 1st year accommodation which is en suite rooms with very limited shared kitchens and quite expensive. However, she is sharing her kitchen with friends now as they have chosen to be together. Her bf is elsewhere in college but at least they can see one another. One of her course mates is next door to her so they can also be lab partners as they are in the same bubble.

DD2 is in a private house. I was quite concerned because DD1 has always been in college accommodation, but the letting agents have been remarkably helpful. The place wasn't that clean so we took loads of photos, and there were several things wrong. My dad came along for the ride and whilst I took DD to the supermarket, he tackled the glacier in the fridge. We were there for around 3 hours and by the time we left, her bed was made up, the fridge running properly, the kitchen floor scrubbed (by DD) and a list of non-working/broken things compiled. 2 others were meant to arrive that day, but they didn't so DD spent her first night there alone. She was a bit worried, but we had chatted to the Polish family across the road earlier and they said she was welcome to ask them for help if she needed it, so we left her to it. The next day, the other girl was there by 9 am and the others have arrived since. The blocked washbasin, non-fixed toilet seat and something else were fixed promptly. DD had to get shirty with Virgin Media about the broadband, but she channeled her inner me and got it resolved. She is quite assertive when she needs to be, probably more so than her big sister.

DD2 has had a couple of classes in person. DD1 starts this week. I have optimistically ordered a turkey expecting both back for Christmas, but realistically, who knows?

@Xenia, DD feeling the same about lack of library time at Bristol.
One of her flatmates had a cough yesterday so he went for a test. Only 3mins walk away! I don’t think it’ll be covid (they ft me to see what I thought ) but we’ll see!

Have had DS with us today. He arrived in time to go for our usual brunch at the local deli. Was in good form - ate loads and gave details of the girls on his course! Classes start properly tomorrow but he now has an idea of what is required to get his Masters. No exams but project forms 50% and has to complete assignments on a set number of week long modules. He is (as usual) very relaxed about the workload; part is the way he is regarding learning but some might be due to him having a graduate job lined up. He should have spent the summer in Singapore working for them but they have contacted him to say the job offer is still there and they will contact him nearer the time regarding their assistance in getting his visa (hope it’s quicker than DD getting hers this year).

DD is still staying with my sister in Brussels, enjoying work (seems to be attending lots of meetings giving real time verbal translations which she finds easy) and trying to find a flat. Covid is still a major problem in Belgium so flat hunting isn’t easy. She and my nephew are planning a weekend on the coast visiting my parents so all going well.

We visited DD today. She has had her first online day of lectures, which she said went really well. There are only 8 people on her course, with 2 being very mature students. They have said they are happy for the 6 youngsters to meet up without them, so it is perfect for working together.

Her lecturers have worked together on their assignment timetables, so they are nicely spread out, so she has been able to work out a plan of work which will enable her to (hopefully) keep up with the work.

It's nice to hear what they are all getting up to this year.

I've just arrived back with DS and the washing machine is on!

We got halfway home & he wondered aloud whether he'd packed his laptop... 🙄 Luckily, he had!

His uni email has been closed it would seem, so tomorrow's important task is to get that set up again and then hopefully he will receive his timetable.

At least he remembered the laptop. My twins have their first exams (mocks) this month but they are on line so I hope the system works and they will not have used it before. I think each exam is 100 minutes and you can pick which day you do it on later this month but must do it all at once. So I hope wifi does not cut out mid way and mean the exam is not counted (and you only get a mark/feedback if you complete a section at the end of the exam asking how you think you did in it which is going to be psychologically interesting - do you show off or underplay?)

Hmm, that'd be tricky Xenia!

DS still waiting for timetable. On the website it said the course started last week but it hasn't.

They should try to ensure they've got a decent 4G signal and data allowance as backup for the WiFi, Xenia. Or some other contingency arrangement.
DDs house had a medical student friend doing exams there last week because his internet had totally died for some reason. Fortunately for him they didn't have any local lockdown rule to bar a sixth person in the house.

Glad to hear everyone is doing ok. My eye is continuing to improve which is a huge relief, thank you for asking Malbacfan. Hope life in school has got off to a smooth start for you. I'm with Y5 for 3 days and YR on Wednesdays. The joys of the mud kitchen await me this morning!
That's a fantastic job offer, Eve. Strange to think our DCs can have starting salaries equivalent to the cost of a house when I got married in 1988! Well done him. 🎉

Glad the eye is on the mend.

My son is going to his girl friend's parents' house again tomorrow. I hope they don't mind these long weekends with him here (and she knows she could come here to be with him if she wanted too as she did in the summer). She works very hard indeed and both are doing law conversion (at different places) so it is a good match. Anyway it looks like I will have a second weekend in a row with no one here (which I like). Son had 2 school friends round yesterday evening and I think it was a late night (2am I think they left) and I saw the pizza boxes this morning but at least they are having some safe social life - my son cooked for them earlier too. They were very quiet although I was woken again at 3.45am by a very very low helicopter - by the way it was circling I suspect there must have been a criminal police were trying to catch in gardens near by for quite a while. I wonder what it was. It was very low and noisy. I couldn't see anyone in our garden from the window (very bright night, lots of moon out...)

DS had his first online contact today for his course. Obviously, the cat just HAD to help and insisted on miaowing like crazy and scratching at the bedroom door to see him! 😆

It was as if she knew... 🤔

Funny cat. My son who is at home has a lot of on line workshops for the law course so I can often hear what is being said through the door - not that I stand there listening in. It is certainly helping remind me of the basics of law.

I hope everyone is still doing okay. One of my twins has one more mock law exam to do tomorrow and the other has finished I believe) and then they have the rest of this week as a kind of half term.

How have they found their exams Xenia? Last week was induction for DS, think he actually starts next week.

I got in this afternoon and the kitchen looked like a student hovel house. Loads of dirty dishes lying around, crumbs on the worktops, shoes everywhere, random items of clothing slung over the table. No sign of either of them.
Words will be had... 🙄

DD is enjoying her course. She phoned us very excited today, because she has a job at last. It's only Saturday evenings and won't make up the shortfall on her rent, but it's a job at least. It's in a small restaurant/bar and she was chosen over another girl after they each did a trial shift (even though she is more expensive, because she is 21). She's home for her flu jab at the weekend, so it'll be nice to see her.

That's good, both of itself and as a morale boost.
I haven't talked to DD for a couple of weeks; she whatsapped me last night wondering if I knew some computing stuff... I didn't, it was proper engineery type of things.

Glad to hear everyone's doing ok. DS2 has had some seminars and tutor meetings in person but all lectures are online which he seems happy with.
Frisbee has started again. He assures me there are strict rules about limited Nos and temperature checks etc before and during the sessions. On balance, I think having something other than studies going on is probably important. There is a park round the corner from his house that he tries to walk or run in each day.
Well done to your DD SMaCM! Fingers crossed she isn't affected by local lockdowns.