Heavens above!
Like me, you might be in need of a diversion from stressing about January deadlines. As a final year student, the feeling of panic/terror/impending doom has set on a lot earlier this year. Here’s my suggestion of how to quell those feelings by ignoring the issue:
If you’re lucky enough to be escaping from deadline stress on a holiday over the Christmas break and you’re taking a night flight, look out for the toolkit orbiting earth.
An unfortunate NASA astronaut managed to lose hold of a tool bag worth £70,000 while working on the International Space Station. My Dad always told me that it was bad to laugh at another person’s misfortune, but sometimes it’s hard to suppress a smirk.
If you’re not lucky enough to be jetting off but still want to be distracted by the sight of someone else’s very expensive mistake, use a pair of binoculars and the instructions at the link above.
More productively, another welcome distraction could be planning your next trip.
If you’re thinking of travelling to a specific country in one of your uni holidays, keep up with the news from there.
It’s a good way of researching things to do, as well as making you aware of any potential problems with travelling there.
Of course, it also means that you’ll have plenty to talk about with any locals that you befriend, who will no doubt be impressed with your worldly knowledge.
Just search the country profiles section of the BBC for links (in the right hand bar) to the latest news stories for each country.
For my part, I’ve found myself unexpectedly engrossed in the pension crises in Japan’s aging population. Anything to tear me away from a map of the Persian/Greek conflict…
Tags: distraction, ISS, news, research, Travel