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Well, Wednesday night was the last meeting of this year’s Moore Course module. We’ve been studying Ephesians, as I’ve mentioned before. (Well, I think I’ve mentioned it… can’t be bothered to go back and check now!)

I don’t know why but I feel like it’s not been quite as good as previous Moore Course modules that we’ve done. It just seemed to be based around a particular commentary a little too much. Sometimes the book would make statements which didn’t seem to be backed up by any of the verses it quoted – which I think is probably because the line of argument was traced through properly in the commentary, but not in the book.

Either way, I’m not sure about it. My exam marks over the past few years have been going steadily down – the weird thing is, I’ve been putting more time into revising since the first one! So this year I don’t know what I should do, perhaps if I spend less time revising I’ll do better… the exam is on 27th, so we have a little while anyway. No reason to stress about it either, whatever happens – whether I pass or fail – it’s not going to really affect my life in any meaningful way!

Well, this week was a bit more busy, but in a really nice way.

On Friday evening we had 21, and then afterwards Alex came round to stay for a couple of nights (he had a party near Ipswich to go to).

Anyway, on Saturday morning we did a bit of shopping and general sorting out of stuff. In the afternoon, Laura came round and we had dinner, then watched lots of various comedy things (as well as the Doctor Who episode ‘Blink’). It was a really nice evening!

Then, on Sunday we went to church in the morning, then had some lunch with Alex, and then went to Sunday@6 in the evening. So not a very exciting day but quite relaxing!

Not much else to say at the moment. We started the Moore Course last week, we’re doing Ephesians this year. I keep seeing Ephesians everywhere – at the prayer meeting last week, on someone’s blog! Strange. As well as reading through the course notes, I’ve also bought a couple of commentaries on Ephesians and will be reading through them as well.

This weekend has been slightly extended because we had Friday off to revise for our Moore Course exam. Although we were revising all day, we did go out in the evening to see Mark Watson, who we knew from Radio 4 (his radio show “Mark Watson Makes the World Substantially Better” was one of my favourite comedies on Radio 4). Anyway, it was absolutely brilliant – we were laughing all the way through! There is something about seeing comedy live which makes it funnier. I think I will see if Mark Watson has any CDs or DVDs out, it would be worth getting!

Anyway. On Saturday morning we had our Moore Course exam. Despite being a bit late due to some confusion over where the exam was actually being held, I think it went pretty well. Possibly not quite as well as the previous two exams, but it’s always so difficult to tell! I managed to answer all the questions at least, the tricky bit is knowing how many marks you got for those questions. I think I rambled a bit in the essay question, but then I suppose most people probably don’t write at their best under exam conditions. We will find out our results in a few weeks, I’m not waiting with baited breath but it will be interesting!

Afterwards we went out to lunch (the Sun Inn at Dedham), which was very pleasant. When we got back home we did a bit of gardening (mowed the lawns for the first time this year – the grass had got a bit long, I hope we didn’t cut it too short). And then we went to dinner with Simon at the Yew Tree in Great Horkesley. It’s been ages since we saw Simon (hello Simon, by the way, I expect you will be reading this at some point!) so it was really good to catch up. And the dinner was nice too, as it usually is there.

On Sunday we went to church in the morning (to both services!) and then came back home for lunch. We did a bit of sorting out in the afternoon and then had a nice walk around Highwoods Country Park. Then we watched “The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency”, which I’m getting quite into, and before that “The Lost Art of Oratory”.

So now you know!

… our exam, that is. On Saturday morning we had our Moore Course exam on “Old Testament 1″. And it’s all over! High fives all round, I think. It seemed to go quite well – I was expecting the exam to be awful, but in the end it turned out to be moderately OK. I managed to answer all the questions to a reasonable degree at least, which is usually a good sign! Of course, how many marks I will get is a completely different kettle of fish but I’m fairly confident I at least got a pass mark – and I don’t really care if that means just scraping through!

The exam was on Saturday morning, and afterwards we went for lunch at the Sun Inn in Dedham with a few other people who were also sitting the exam. It was a very nice morning / early afternoon! In the evening I made a start on the Wasgij we’re borrowing from my parents – didn’t get very far, it’s quite a difficult one: the picture on the box is only a clue as to the picture you actually make. The picture you actually make is of the same scene, but 70 years later! Quite a clever idea though, and they’re good fun.

On Sunday we went to church in the morning, came back for lunch, and then spent the afternoon doing some cleaning and getting ready for the evening — we had a whole bunch of people come round for pizza and to watch a film! When I say ‘whole bunch of’, I mean Alex, Elisa, Anne-Marie, Tom, Dan, Alison, Steve, Karen, Phil, Jenny, Matthew, Ellie, and me and Phil. It was probably the most packed out front room has been since we moved in! But it was a very good evening. We watched ‘Stardust’, which I haven’t seen before, and I rather enjoyed it.

Oh, there’s one more thing I have to say: I want my hour back! I’m still catching up on sleep after missing an hour on Saturday night. Still, at least losing an hour now means gaining an hour in October, so it’s not all bad!

Apologies for the lateness of this blog post, what with the long weekend I almost forgot to make an update! We’ve been fairly busy as usual this weekend, but it’s been very enjoyable.

On Friday we spent most of the day revising: we have an exam on Saturday for our theology course on the pentateuch. (The exam is optional, but it does help cement what you’ve learned in the course). We took a break from revision to go to the Good Friday service at Eight Ash Green.

On Saturday afternoon we headed over to Ipswich to see my parents, and spent the rest of the day with them. We spent a bit of time looking around Christchurch Mansion, which is actually a very interesting old house to look round – and all the better because it’s free!

On Sunday we went to church in the morning, and then afterwards drove down to Kent to see Phil’s parents. We didn’t do very much on the Sunday except for watching “The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” in the evening – which was very good, I really must read some of the books!

On Monday we spent some of the time revising and some of the time learning to play bridge (!) – I’d never played bridge before but I had played a similar variant online called Spades. It seems quite complicated to begin with but after a while you start to get the hang of it!

In the evening we went to see Joseph at the Adelphi Theatre in London — it was a birthday present for Phil’s sister, Roz. It was great fun – Lee Mead was in it, and he put in a very good performance! I hadn’t seen Joseph on stage before (although I did perform some of it when I was in primary school, but that doesn’t really count) and I really enjoyed it. It was very good fun, and the music is so catchy and engaging you can’t really fail to love it!

Afterwards we drove back home, and that pretty much brings you up to date.