Goodbye Dissertation

I have finally handed in the thing! I never have to think about Tudor adaptations again but for those of you who aren't on my course and have no idea what I'm on about this is the general gist of the research:

The main premise was talking about adapting novel to film which is pretty much the only thing we see these days in movies and television. I put a twist to the research and discussed historical adaptations of the Tudor period instead so I could look at mis-representation of history and how it effects the audience's learning. I thought I'd do this because I thought I liked history and the Tudors especially, BIG MISTAKE! I've literally ruined any liking I had of Tudor adaptations and never want to see one again!

Basically lots of historians think that if a film tells the audience that Anne Boleyn slept with her brother then everyone will think its true even though it was just scandalous rumour from the court (who doesn't like a bit of gossip?!) However, others say that the audience aren't THAT stupid to think that everything in a drama is true? 

Well I did a survey and found that (hooray!) we're NOT that stupid which is just brilliant, so I'm really glad I wrote 10,000 words about that.

I had quite a lot of interest in this dissertation at the start so I probably should have written this post back then, but now I'm cynical and glad to have it out of my life. Anyone else writing a diss at the moment I feel for you and you will get through it (for tips to keep on track see here) 

However, for me, I'm very much looking forward to my freedom and getting gazeeboed with my fellow BATVers and my sister is visting for the week yay! 

Easy Peasy Shortbread

This is the last weekend before the dreaded dissertation deadline (and for me my documentary hand in too!) so I thought I'd make some amazing shortbread to keep me going this weekend.

Its possibly the easiest thing to make, pretty much everyone has the ingredients lying about and if I have time I usually try to make a batch at the start of the week to keep my cravings during the week at least slightly subdued.

This is based on a Sam Stern recipe but changed slightly

You will need:

175g plain flour
70g caster sugar
110g soft butter
Few drops of vanilla extract

You need to do:

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees fan oven and give your cake tin a good buttering. I usually save the foil bits from butter spread and use that to just save a bit of time (kitchen paper always leaves messy bits)

2. Put all of the ingredients in a bowl and start rubbing the ingredients together. Stick this on to keep you entertained:

3. Once you've got all the ingredients into breadcrumbs pour the crumbles into your tin and push down into the sides so its all equal.

4. Now its time to decorate, I usually stick to the old school fork marks round the sides and little forks pricks, score the lines of where you'd like to cut the slices lightly.

5. Stick it in the oven for about 10 mins or until its nice and golden. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 mins, cut the slices along the scores you made earlier and take out of the tin to cool down.

6. Sprinkle on some caster sugar and enjoy with a yummy coffee! Enjoy!!

Hopefully I'll make it through this weekend now I have these bad boys! Have a fab weekend, see you on Monday!