St Leonard's Dinner

It's thankless to be a postgrad, really. You look out your window to see undergrads running around outside, making fools of themselves (I'm looking at you, Raisin Weekend), while you're cooped up inside, reading book after book that only tangentially relates to your paper/discussion/dissertation in an attempt to not sound like a fool when someone questions you about your program.

However, this can all be fixed by the wonders of free food and wine.

One of the traditions of St Andrews is the St Leonard's Dinners. St Leonard's College is the postgrad college here at the University of St Andrews and once a semester the Provost will host a formal dinner for postgrads lucky enough to get a ticket.

And by lucky enough, I mean awake early enough on a Saturday morning to send an email at a specific time in the vain hopes of getting a ticket.

Which, because they had me at free, I was indeed one of them who got her stuff in on time to get a ticket to last Wednesday's dinner. A handful of us from IPT got tickets and while I've pretty much given up on the hope that more than three IPT students can get together and have a gathering with pleasant conversation (by which is mean the American Southern definition with everyone ignoring topics that are known to cause glowering across the table) it was a fun night. An excuse to get dressed up is always appreciated.


The IPT group after dinner.


Sadly, getting tickets to this dinner means that we aren't eligible for next semester's dinner, but they did mention something about a ball...