Just got back from the BEST concert I have ever gone to. We went back to see Jack Gibbons play Gershwin and it was awesome. After the concert we met him in the pub and had a pint with him... he is really cool! Of course I forgot my camera but jess brought one so i shall scan it in when we get back and she sends out copies.

Wales trip

Right so here is my summary of the Wales trip. I just got the pics up on the site and will link the others soon.

Day 1
Saw the white horse of Effington out of the bus window along with neolithic farming terraces and some bronze age funeral mounds. Saw the biggest south bank tributary to the Thames which was smaller than Stoney Brook at home. Saw the modern site of an Anglo-Saxon town. We saw silbury hill which was this huge monument kind of like the pyramids and built the same way. I fell asleep while writing in my note book and went from describing Silbury hill to "I had a pint w/Allison, Erica" We looked at some of the building materials and how they relate to the geology of an area. Also went to Avebury henge. That was really cool... the local church is built inside of it- yay irony! Lots of sheep crap there tho. Then we crossed the border into wales. The signs were bilingual and that is just kewl! Went to Tintern abbey. It was absolutely gorgeous in the rain. I have no words for it and my pictures don't do it justice. Went through the forest of Dean. Saw Barday castle. In Chepstowe we stopped for the night at the Bowford Arms Hotel. The food was really good. Soup at last! We took a walk and saw a bunch of extremely drunk Welsh guys singing loudly for Welsh independance.

Day 2

Woke up to more rain. Lost my pen. Jess found it in my hair. Went to the walls of Chepstowe also known as Caerwent. My raincoat lost it's rain repelling abilities. We rode on the bus for a long time on day 2. I got soaked again when we went to look at the sea and this church that is kinda sinking. Back into the bus and some lunch enroute and it was Caerphilly castle. I broke out my poncho and the rain ended. Neat trick. I took lots of pictures and filled up the card that I came with. Back in the bus for the really long ride. We saw lots and lots of sheep, a few terrestrial crab farms and learned that in Wales, if it is flat land it gets turned into a rugby pitch. Ken Addison provided us with a stream of really awful jokes and we had to choose our meals for the rest of the trip. Stopped at the monument to Prince Llywelyn. Saw a really cool hawk and some plants that looked like purple lustrife. Then we stopped at Caban Coch which is a dam on a river in the mountains and was really pretty but still lots of sheep. We rode in the bus some more and ended up at the irish sea just as the sun was setting and the place looked just like a hudson river school painting. Got to the hotel kinda late around 9:15, sat down for dinner around ten. the manager aparently absconded two days ago and the people there had no idea we were coming. People had to share beds and things. To make up for it we got extra wine with dinner( which was really good.) and then hung out with the bartender til pretty late.

Day 3

Went to the barmouth estuary. The gold from the crown jewels came from the mountains around it. Then we went and looked at some dunes and some mud and did fun stuff like that. I was really very interesting. Stopped at a church that was half buried in sand dunes. Saw harlech castle. Drove the bus up snowdonia mountains highest mountains in england and Wales. Lots of sheep still. Hiked halfway up Mt Snowdon to this kewl glacial lake. Still some sheep. Beautiful view and lots of fun to hike tho kinda muddy. On the way back we learned that the Terrestrial Crab stuff was hooey. Stayed in Caernafon at a guest house that had two bathrooms for 22 people. That was fun... uh right. Also walked down to the castle there to get a pic of it lit up at night.

Day 4

Went to Caernafon castle... bought stuff and took lots of pics. Went to this big falling water power plant. Really neat. It is built inside of a mountain. makes lots of energy. Then we went to Great Orme Island which had a prehistoric bronze age copper mine that was just awesome. I bought stuff there and also learned that the purple plant I had been seeing was really purple lustrife. It was awesome! I think I am going to write a paper about bronze age mining. It is just so neat! I got their website but it is sadly out of date. There are lots of new finds and stuff that is going on right now! We saw the first iron bridge which was built using the technology for wood... dovetail joints and post and peg things and stuff. Then we went to dinner and went back to Oxford... by the last half hour, Jess and I were singing showtunes and oldies.

Just got back from the most awesome experience of my entire life!
I have so much to tell everyone but I am too tired to blog it all right now. Suffice to say that I am overjoyed, in oxford, and have "In the Heat of the Night" stuck in my head. I am going to go to bed and contemplate terrestrial crab farming as an alternative to sheep herding in Wales.

Chopin

Chopin concert was excellent... I may go to this guy's next wednesday concert; he'll be playing Gershwin. Unfortunately I will miss the one on sunday, we will return too late. He is an amazing pianist and we had two encore pieces! Yay! Bach will always be my favorite but I think that Chopin moved up a notch tonight!

Much fun... I am updating my pics now so soonly they will be here and I will rectify the multiplicity of men in the photogalleries. Don't know why frontpage (a hex on all things microsoft) decided that it was smarter than me and put them in there. This is really the last blog til I go... maybe... so Happy Birthday Mommy and I will blog it all on monday... or sunday night, depending on how tired I am.

Well I leave for my trip to Wales tomorrow. I am going to post the rest of my pictures tonight and wipe the cards clean. (I will burn them to a disk, mom, because I know that you don't like to trust the internet or my hard drive) Before I go and have all of this taken out of my head by new info, I want to say a few things that surprised me about England in no particular order.

1. Too many Americans. Everywhere I go there are at least a dozen of them... and not just in touristy areas either. I am surprized that there is anyone left at home at all! I wonder if all the Americans overseas came home if the population would double or the country overflow?

2. The weather-- it is HOT here one day and raining the next but the sun always comes out at some point. It is odd.

3. The sun comes up so Bloody Early and goes down so late. Intellectually I know that England is very far North but the whole sun thing is throwing me off. I think that it is two and it is really six or I think it is six and it is really nine.

4. Everything, I mean EVERYTHING in Oxford closes between 5 and 6. Restaurants stop serving at 7:30. At home, there are restaurants that dont even open til 6. It drives me nuts! Combine this with number three and you have major problems!

5. Dogs. There are dogs everywhere. People bring them with them everywhere. The bums on the street have them, little old ladies have them in their hand baskets while shopping for clothes. It is crazy. And unless you see them you dont know that they are there because I have yet to hear one bark.

6. Diversity. I hear more languages while walking down Cornmarket street than I have heard in my life.

7. They sell the same crap here that they do at home. Everything is the same except the words are spelled wrong and the price has a funny "L" thing in front of it instead of a funny "S" thing. I keep seeing stuff we sell in our shop at home.

8. Thongs. They are everywhere. Lurking on everyone. Turn around on the street an the person in front of you suddenly has low riding pants and a hi riding top and a butterfly thong emerging from the jellyrolls around her middle. Or sheer pants. That just isnt pleasant folks! Really it isnt!

9. Sheer clothing on people who shouldnt be wearing it. Or just sheer clothing in general. "nothanksI'drathernotseeyourunderwear" or "ohmygodIamgoingblind! PUTSOMECLOTHESON!" either way, not fun.

10. Ice, or the lack thereof. Nothing is cold here. Beer is warm... that is ok. Soda, however should not be warm. Soda should have ice in it. Too much ice in it so you can crunch on it. Bah!

There were more but I can't think of them right now...

It will be at least Monday before I blog again so just hold your horses and you will all hear about Wales and my adventures on the way, there, and back.

Went to the Ashmolean

I went to the Ashmolean museum this morning... it is odd to see things in person that you've seen in an art history book. I love the seal stones... little gemstones set in rings or just as beads that have a design carved into them that you press into wax to place your seal on something. They had thousands of them and they are beautiful... such detail! I want one now... though I have no idea why I would ever need one or if I would ever use it. I also went across the way from the Museum to buy my ticket to the Chopin concert tonight. Several people are going to come and I am really excited about it. I am not sure if I should dress up or not though. Today's attire is pretty spiffy except for the boots-silk blouse and green slacks with work boots- so I guess I should be ok. Now I am going to the market to browse a bit more.

Last night a formal dinner

Last night at formal dinner I think they refilled the wine more often than usual. Everyone was more than a bit drunk before they reached the Three Goats Heads. I only had one glass of white and one glass of red with dinner so I was really amused by their antics. I will not repeat on this blog what I overheard last night. Anyway, fun was had by all and then a few people wished that they didn't have quite so much fun. I just had fun. For some reason, I can't sleep past six thirty here even if I completely close the curtains. It is weird. I am also never tired when I wake up so I guess it is alright.

London

London

London was really a lot of fun although I really have to go back and do more stuff. I was really tired on Sunday after my adventure in Bath and so I was easily overwhelmed by the amount of things to do there. I think I forgot that it is a real city and more like NYC than like Oxford... those being the only two cities that I have any familiarity with at all. Bath fell in to the "Oxford" catagory.

Anyway, Sunday morning I went to London and promptly bought a hop on/off tour bus ticket because I had really no idea where I should go or what I should do or how to get there. It was really a good idea. As I rode around the city in the top of the bus, I realized that I needed to come back again and do more stuff. I am well aware of how long it takes me to do a museum so I have resigned myself to not going to all of them. I did get off the bus and go to the Tower of London and the National Art Gallery. I stopped and had linner in a very nice pub which I chose because it had the same name as one of my favourite pubs in Oxford... The King's Arms. Had a very good meat pie. At 5pm I went to the National Gallery for a little while again and then watched some really amusing red Giraffs in Trifalgar Sqare. There was some sort of huge opera thing going on with the girraffs and people dressed in red feathers... I have no idea what it was about. At 6pm I walked over to the Ghost Walking Tour by Gaslight/Pub Crawl that came with my bus ticket. The tour was really fun and the guide, Paul, was really quite amusing. I met a very nice girl from Baja Mexico called Maru. She and I walked around together and talked a bit. She was trying to get a hold of her friend in London to find out where he lives so that she could stay there until 5am when her bus to venice leaves. She never did get a hold of him and our tour guide was kind enough to show her where a late night Spanish Bar and a 24hour Internet Cafe were. We exchanged emails and I hope that she replies soon because I want to know how she fared. I had a bit of an adventure getting back to the bus station (I was really close to it- just on the other side of the block. I just didn't know that) but a soon as I saw it I was in the clear. I love the 24 hour London to Oxford express! So wonderful, So cheap, So close to St. Peters! I was so tired that I didn't even turn on my computer when I got back in. I just went straight to sleep.

bath

Bath
Well that was fun! I left an hour earlier than I planned and alone and got there fortyfive minutes later and in a party of five. I woke up early so I decided to go on the 833 train to Bath instead of the 933. The fare was only 8.50! So as I was a bit early I got a yogurt and sat on the benches. Ten minutes before the train was to leave, four of the other people staying at St. Peters showed up at the trainstation. Aparrently they wanted to go to Bath too and had heard that I was taking the train. So we said hello and discussed what we wanted to see. It turned out that what I wanted to do did not really over lap with them so we were basically just traveling there together. We got on the train and off at our switch. I looked at the schedule and our connecting train went from delayed to cancelled in the space of five minutes. the next one wasnt for another hour... I should have slept in. We kill an hour at the trainstation and just as we are about to get onto the next train we see charles who is going to bristol on the same train. We get on the train and it is packed. Standing room only because the first one was cancelled. I spent forty minutes standing in the little space between the car and the dining area with four other people.... fun.

We get to bath and have some lunch. Over lunch we discuss the things we plan to do. All I wanted to do was go to the Baths and to the costume museum and maybe see if the balloon rides were running. They wanted to go to the jane austin museum and have a high tea. We went our separate ways and they did go to the baths but we must have missed each other because I didn't see them again until i got back. I asked the tourist info about the baloons but they said it was too windy. So then I went pretty much straight to the baths and stayed there for at least two hours. Amazing. Great audio tour. just amazing. I bought the joint ticket that gets you into the costume museum too so I went there afterwards, stopping at several shops on my way up the hill. Bath has a lot of fashion shops and none of those fashions like me so I didn't spend too much time. The fashion museum was awesome and I was there for two and a half hours until the lady tapped me on the shoulder and said that the museum was closing in five minutes.

I wandered back down and cought a few more shops before they closed and went back to the train station and immediately found a train to the switch and as soon as I got there, boarded a direct train to oxford. When I returned we watched a movie and now I am going to bed. I think I may catch a bus to london tomorrow. I am hoping to find another day to go as well.

Leaving for bath

Ok well I am leaving for Bath now... on the train... this is going to be interesting and I will blog all about it when I return... just a side note- what is the deal with the fish and chips- a person can only eat so many fries!

Bath.co.uk - Bath's premier website for shopping, tourism, attractions, accommodation, what's on and things to do in Bath

Bath.co.uk - Bath's premier website for shopping, tourism, attractions, accommodation, what's on and things to do in Bath

I think I will take the train rather than the coach.

Bath.co.uk - Bath's premier website for shopping, tourism, attractions, accommodation, what's on and things to do in Bath

Well I guess I am going to Bath this saturday. I have to go via london because only one bus runs from Oxford but that isn't too bad. I will arrive there at 12:45 and leave around six thirty. I won't get back to Oxford til almost 11:30 but that is OK too. Then Sunday I think I will go spend the day in London. I don't think I want to spend the night in Bath. It isn't really that far away, although by the time I change buses it is like a 4 and 1/2 hour trip. There are hostels where I could stay but I don't really want to stay the night there. I will browse the Bath site and blog where I want to go.

In and out

In and out

Last night after dinner I decided that I wanted to see if the King's Arms had Strongbow glasses that I might be able to abscond with. No one seemed particularly interested in joining me as they were all getting drunk in the courtyard having gone to the liquor store earlier. So I took a walk down there. As I turned the corner by St. Peter's I saw one of the girls coming back from her after dinner run. I asked her if she wanted to stop by the King's Arms with me. She wasn't sure so I was to wait for her for 20 min and then not worry about it. I got to the king's arms, ordered a cider and discovered that not only do they not have strongbow glasses, they do not have strongbow... just some random other cider.

I sat outside and drank my cider in the somewhat sporatic mist that passes for rain here. I got a few odd looks for that but the tables weren't even wet. Five minutes later, Jess is walking up the street. She asks to borrow my camera because she saw a bike she wants to take a picture of... which I would link to if my bloody picture site was working.... ahem. The guy at the table next to me gave me a weird look for giving my camera to this random girl that came up to me... ah well. Jess comes back, gets a pint of Stella and then regrets it because the King's Arms has lots of interesting beers on tap. We decided the other girl must have gotten distracted by the guys in the Quad or something. We decide on another round before we try to find a pub with strongbow glasses. I got this delicious honey beer, and ten minutes later Jess got a special bitter which she didn't like so we switched. By that time we had moved inside and out of the suddenly much harder rain. We decided against another pub and left the Kings arms to find a chip truck and get some chips and cheese. Got our fries and went home only to be met by one of the guys who wanted to get a couple pints to help him write his paper.

We wandered down to Rosie's and listened to the live band sing bad, old music... I still have Elton John singing in my head. After last call, we wandered back to St. Peter's and ran into a bunch of the guys and one of the girls who were drinking in the quad. They wanted to get some food from the chip truck so we went back out with them. We came back (on the way, one dropped some of his chili on his shoe) and got in the door. We talked for a few minutes and then one of them said that he needed to eat but had to go to the ATM first. So we went back out. Got him some taco badness and came back again. This time we dispersed and went back to our respective rooms.

This morning, however, all of the girls who didn't go out with us were rather wretched. I guess there must be something in the chips because everyone who ate them is fine.

Hooray for greasy fries that come off trucks in the middle of the ... well not even that late at night. I was in bed by 12:30.

rainy day!

Rainy day

It is raining again today. Kind of a soft cool drizzle with a somewhat gusty wind. I rather like it; it makes a nice change from the hot sunny weather that we have been having.

Just an update for you picture people- the centenary site is down so I can't put any pictures up right now. Also my computer has decided that he doesn't remember that I installed the driver for my camera. So now I have to get my pictures the bass ackward way. Feh on technology!

Last night we watched Excaliber. For those of you who haven't seen it -- consider yourselves LUCKY! The movie was so bad that we went out to get a drink so that the bad parts would seem funnier even though they really aren't supposed to be. The acting sucks, the music is like a bad rip off of StarWars (come to think of it, most of the movie is a bad rip off of StarWars) and the damn thing is almost three hours long. It was not fun.

Standing in the English Rain.

Stonehenge
Yesterday's trip was incredible! We first went to Old Sarem to this old castle ruin. Really interesting walls made of a stone that I would swear is flint. We then moved on to Salisbury Cathedral and then wandered around the town. Beautiful! Everything was Beautiful. Then we went to Stonehenge which was the most amazing experience that i have ever had. Even though you can't really get that close to it, it is just amazing. There are no words to describe it. My pictures do not do it justice. To top it all off, though it rained the entire time we were in the bus, the whole time that we were out of the bus the rain stopped and the sun came out a bit. Such an Awesome day! (in the sense of inspiring such awe that you get some serious goosebumps just thinking about it)

stonehenge

Stonehenge!

In the morning I am off to visit Stonehenge! It is so danged hot here right now that I am not sure that I'll be able to go to sleep. That and I am Really Thirsty but Sainsbury's was out of water... so I got soda which really didn't help me at all. Feh.

Yesterday's concert of Medieval Music was awesome! Really informative and very beautiful music. I have some pics of the people all spiffed up for formal dinner but I forgot my camera for the concert. Too bad, I wanted to take a picture of that crazy dance we all did. It was rather amusing. Called the Crazy Hermit or something... very funny. I am going to mail all of my postcards in the morning too so if I have your address, expect some mail in the somewhat near future.

Yesterday morning I also updated my pictures page so if you want to see my latest purchases and pics of random people and pubs just click away! They all think that I am crazy here because I always have my camera. They just don't realize how totally insane I actually am.

Yawn! I think it is naptime!

The Gamer's Lovesong

All Gamers must go to this site at once and download this awesome song! It is absolutely spifftaculous! All non-gamers please go back to your sad, normal, game-free lives or listen to this song and be either completely bored or infected with that thing called geekhood.

stolen from Sleeping Wolf


critical hit on my heart

Fun with Pubs

Fun with Pubs

Last night we went out with Bryon again. He left for Leeds today. First we went to the Castle, where he had gone when he was here twelve years ago. Now it seems that it has changed a bit in twelve years because it is now a popular place for gay men to hang out. All five of us happen to be straight although Bryon sometimes doesn't look it. The really amusing part was that he had just been telling us about his adventures in the gay bars of Chicago which he just seems to randomly pick out. He has said that if he was single and gay he'd never want for dates. We found this all rather amusing, finished our drinks and went in to the pub nextdoor called The Jolly Farmer. As we walk in, we notice that it is pretty much the same kind of place as the first pub only it is busier. This was even more amusing. After we finished those drinks, we wandered a bit until we came upon the Duke of York. This pub did not cater to any particular sexual orientation, but it was rather interesting just the same. Part of our problem has been finding pubs that aren't full of Americans... we'd found one but we weren't sure that we wanted to stay there. There were some... interesting... characters there and a live band that was... um... interesting. We sat outside and watched the cars. After finishing those drinks, we walked a bit more and got some... interesting food off of a Chip Truck (these trucks that come out after everyone stops serving food that have pitas and fried stuff) We then went into the Guiness Time pub that we had gone to before. I think it is actually called Rosie O'Gradie's or something. Inside we sat and chatted until this somewhat intoxicated and very frustrated guy came in. Then we stared and laughed. He apparently wanted to go to the Chicago Rock club across the street but they would not let him in because he had trainers on. he came in to this pub to take his black socks off and put them over his sneakers so that they would look like black shoes. The entire process was hysterically funny and the end result did not even look that bad but by the time he finished and went back over it was almost time for them to close. So he just came back and talked to us. All in all a very amusing night for all involved.

I've been writing postcards today and feel very silly because most of the people I am sending them to actually read this silly blog and it just seems kind of stupid to send postcards too. But then I feel silly most of the time so this is nothing new.

I am starting to get tired of English food. This weekend I decided not to eat at St. Peters and have been going out for meals. It is very refreshing to eat something that isn't fried, although the food here is really good sometimes it just gets a bit tiresome.

Sorry... long time no post

I've been a bit busy and havent posted so here is a quick rundown of what I have been doing.

Wednesday- I swore that I would not kindle and open flame in the Bodlian library... then drooled over the books. Came back here, had lunch then went on a walking tour of Oxford... that was fun ish... I took pictures. I came back here and immediately got on a bus for Stratford where we watched some swans do water balet , visited Shakespeare's birthplace, and saw a play by John Fletcher. Very funny play. we came home and went to sleep.

Thursday- Did some work in the morning, went to lunch with President Hoyt, his wife, the Reverend Dean Doctor Bryon Grigsby, and everyone from Centenary. Rachel chickened out and left before we went punting... we went punting. It was fun but I felt bad for Bryon and Jerry who had to pole the boats. We came back, I did some more work and then we went out to buy Jerry a drink for not tipping us into the drink.

Friday- Did way more work than I have been doing. Bought a jacket, went to the Turf Tavern for dinner (it dates to the 12th century) with Bryon, Jess, Rachel, and Kathy and had Fish and Chips. We continued on to the Kings Arms pub and The Crown and when the pubs closed we went to O'Neils and met up with Jerry and then we all closed O'Neils. We came back to St. Peters and sat outside. I took pictures of that too but they haven't made it online yet. Somewhere Rachel aquired two pub glasses and they ended up in Jess's bag. We went to bed at one thirty.

Saturday- The sun woke me up at 5:30. I told it to go to hell and it woke me up again at 7. Today I plan to finish up my papers and do some stuff around oxford, do laundry, write some postcards and then Bryon wants to go out again before he leaves for Leeds Sunday morning.


I am having a blast and wish all of you were here.

well I did go out tonight.

Did go out tonight because eight of us wanted to see the Eagle and Child where Tolken, C.S. Lewis and a bunch of other people wrote their stuff. I just had a glass of cider though, and we came back just now. It was fun to go out with all the girls and stuff and I didn't feel bad because I brought my reading with me and actually got a little work done. I am going to read for another hour or so and then I am off to bed. Library registration in the morning. :)

I have had all my classes

I have had all of my classes now. I have a lot of work to do. Lots of reading and writing and research. I am not going anywhere tonight because I want to finish all my reading now, work on the topic I am going to write on tomorrow at the library and write my paper either tomorrow or thursday so that my weekend is completely free. Then I can edit my papers on monday and hand them in on tuesday. This is my plan... plans can change but this is my plan. I have to re read Gawain and the Green Knight and re read Geoffrey of Monmouth tonight or tomorrow. I haven't gotten many new pictures because i really haven't had time to go anywhere. I did take a picture of the four drops of rain that we got today. That is really the only rain we've had. I wish that I had listened to Shannon and not Mom and brought all long pants and my other long sleeved shirts. It is really cold here- maybe 60 degrees or so and a little windy. Oh well, just more stuff I have to buy. I haven't spent that much yet, maybe 115 pounds or so. Most of that was one time stuff like the bus fare, the clock radio and books (although the books will not be just a one time thing). I have spent some on food and stuff though. I have been trying to keep in mind the exchange rate's sucky-ness by doubling every price I see. If it still is worth it, it is ok. Most of the coffee is really overpriced but I need it anyway. The coffee at Oxford SUCKS! It is burnt to a crisp. There is an american style cafe just down on the corner that has decent coffee but highish prices. Kinda like Greens Beans prices or any coffee house micro roasting place. The pubs are pretty expensive too. L4 for a mixed drink isn't uncommon. I have been drinking either Guiness, Stella or hard cider so they are anywhere from L2-L3. My keyboard is not set up for the pounds symbol but it is really annoying me. I can't type on the British keyboards because everything is moved around. You'd be surprised how many times you use the left hand shift, and the @ " and return keys. All of these and a few others are in a weird location on the British keyboard. Paper size is also different but that is easy to fix. I should get to reading now. I will post later.

Formal Dinner

Last night was the formal dinner. Everyone got dressed up and then went out into the grassy courtyard in the picture of my view. There we were served Champangne and the wine guys kept filling the glasses. We talked with all of the other summer school people and the intellectual property people and also the teachers and presidents and all of those people. After about half an hour we were told to go on to the chapel for the lecture. Climate change as it affects the poles or something like that. It was kind of interesting but my contacts were bothering me so I was kind of distracted throughout most of it. After the lecture, I had about ten minutes to go take out my contacts and go up to dinner. This was a formal dinner so we sat and were served by the very nice undergraduate oxford students who are working here over the summer. Cold vegetable soup, then smoked salmon on a bed of lettuce, then lamb with turnips, greenbeens, and carrots, and then lemon ammoretto cheesecake for dessert. White wine, red wine, and port also. While at dinner, we discussed going out to a pub afterwards and so we tried to get a group together but they didn't seem to realize that the pubs close at 11 and it was 10:15. Three of us finally just said to heck with them and went down to O'Neils on the corner for a Stella. We had fun and when they started to close up we took a walk around town and passed four or five Chip Trucks. These are vans that come out on the street and sell greasy food to people after 7 when all of the food places stop serving. Today I have classes pretty much all day. Tuesdays are nuts for everyone. I will probably get a chance to post some more pictures soon though. I wish you all were here and I will be buying the first round of postcards this week so if I don't already have your address please email it to me!

Blackwell's

Oh My God! I want to move into this bookstore. Bookstore isn't even the right word! It is a four story library where you can buy the books! They also have a music store and an art and poster store. It is HUGE! I want one of everything! I bought this awesome History of the English Language book. I also saw Harry Potter in Welsh (really neat) and I didn't even have time to really look in there. One early morning next weekend will be spent there!

Ohh a pub!

Bryon showed up yesterday, along with the president of the college and his wife. We did the welcome bbq thing and then Bryon, Jess Rachel Perry and I all went out to the pubs. We were the only people in the first one and the second one was more of a club. I had a blast. It was kind of amusing because we had all had several glasses of wine at the BBQ already. We heard a lot of old stories and a few new ones out of Bryon and got to know Perry really well. She is my neighbor on left in the picture from the outside. I am the one on the top in the middle with the window open and Bryon is actually staying on the very top which you can't really see from my pic. I really want someone to take a picture of everyone but I am afraid to give my camera to some random person off the street. I had intro classes today and I really am excited about this experience. Now it is off to the formal dinner and lecture. Everything here is so interesting!

Pictures

Pictures! I have my pics up!

Written at 9:30 am gmt on july 6

Well, That was... special...

We did end up going out last night. Rachel knocked on my door at around 9 and we went to the bar on the corner to meet up with her friend from the night before. Two drinks later still no Matt(?). We discovered that O'Neils is the place where people go when they are no longer twentysomething but don't want to admitt it. These three guys were hitting on the two ladies who were sitting next to us. The math didn't work out so the third one (and youngest and most sober) started talking to Rachel. He thought she was from Spain. Jess and I found this rather amusing. When he found out that we were American he proceded to tell us all about his two years in Florida. One of the other brothers, Curt(?), (it turns out they were all brothers) started trying to do magic tricks with his ciggarette but was too drunk to really do it and so dropped it in Rachel's lap... twice. on the third try he did it but badly. The other two girls left and so the brothers were all talking to us. The intoxicated Magician asked me to guess his age. I was close but he wasn't happy (I was over by two years). Jess got to hear more about Florida and I really don't know what the other two were talking about. They eventually left around 11 and we were wondering what was taking Matt(?) so we went back to call him. He apparently misunderstood and was waiting for us outside the gate of Oxford up the street. We caught up with him and went to his friend's birthday party at the "Bubbly Bar." Yeah...um...this place is umm... Special. Actually it wasn't really that bad. It was small and loud but there were not too many people crammed in there. The Birthday Guy whose name I couldn't hear bought us all beer- Stella Artois, a pretty good Belgian lager- and we sat in the back by the dance floor. It is funny... both places were playing old American music, and so were many of the shops we went into during the day. We tried to talk a little but the music was just a bit too loud so we danced instead. Jess and I peeled the labels off the second beer and hung on to them. I think I am going to make an album of beer labels and stuff that we aquire on our nights out. (while waiting for Rachel to call, we were handed an ad for a two sided strip club) Around 1ish Jess and I decided that we'd had enough fun to last us a while and we left. Rachel stayed with Matt(?) for a while and eventually came back. Jess and I found our way back with no trouble and were in by one-thirty.

I got up at eight and it is now nine thirty... I think I will see if either of them are moving yet.

4:30pm on July 4th 2003

4:40pm GMT
I still can't get this to connect to the internet. Feh! I will have to wait until tomorrow to post this. Jess and I went for a little walk around Oxford. There are shops everywhere and it is really easy to find your way around. Also it is totally designed for pedestrians... no one even tried to run us down. We wandered around for a few hours then decided to actually look for something and couldn't find it. Jess wanted some kind of cheap radio and I wanted an alarm clock radio thing but the only ones we saw were like 20 pounds and we were thinking more along the lines of five. The money here is kind of hard to get used to. It is just weird having pink bills. I was accosted by a pair of cows and we saw this cool Guiness time sign. There was also this really interesting band on a pedestrian only street. They weren't too bad; I haven't taken a picture of them yet but the day is still young! I have not changed the time on my computer yet and I don't think that I want to. It is just weird that it is 11:46am at home. I am still not sure what the meal schedule is here yet but I think that we will find out about it tomorrow when everyone else arrives. I did at least mangage to call home... I was dialing too many ones. I think I might buy a calling card but I might just keep using my credit card. It is a pound a minute which is a lot. The internet cafe thing is like a pound for half an hour so I think internet it is for today. This sucks that I can't post yet! Tomorrow it will be straightened out, I hope. Nap time again because we must have walked about 3 miles just looking for a phone card.

We will probably stop at an internet cafe tonight so this will end up being posted out of order but that is ok. :)

Yay!

I am up and running online! I will put up the other posts that I wrote but coulnt publish so if the dates don't make sense that is why.


one thirty pm Oxford time on July 4th 2003


I'm Here! one thirty pm GMT on July 4th

I made it to Oxford in one piece! Unfortunately for some reason Theseus will not acnowledge the internet connection here so I am writing this in word pad. Let me begin at the beginning.

We drove to Newark. Fine. We tried to find a restaurant to get some lunch. After pulling into several hotels we did find one and it did have pretty good food. We had to circle the block a few times to get back onto the right road to get to the airport. Even though we ate lunch, we were still really early so I checked in my bag (no line!) and we went to look in the shops. I found a bookstore so we killed a good lot of time there. We decided to go downstairs and sit and wait for Jess who was on time. While we were waiting we played "name that person" For those of you who have never played this game, all you have to do is point out an interesting looking person and guess what their name should be. You never really know if you are right or not but it is a lot of fun to do while peoplewatching. Jess got in and waited in a MUCH longer line to check in her bag and then it was time to say goodbye. Just before we all parted ways my father noticed a post card that had a map of NJ, but in stead of Fort Dix it said Fort Fix. They of course had to buy one.

Jess and I went through the metal detectors. Everyone took of their shoes and I set the thing off with my silver bracelet. Not a big deal, as soon as the lady came over she knew what set it off. Another two hours of sitting at the gate and we boarded. I had a window seat in the back of the plane next to some Brittish Guy in his late twenties. Poor Jess had an asle seat next to some Brittish High School kid who smelled really bad. The flight was not too bad. I took pictures taking off and landing. The inflight movie was Chicago which was excellent even on an eight inch screen and edited for content. The food was surprisingly edible. I took about a two hour nap and then woke up again. Poor Jess didn't sleep at all. My right ear is still poped from the descent though because I wasn't paying attention and stopped chewing my gum.

Once we got on the ground, stuff got a bit confusing. First we spent what seemed like an hour in line at customs. No problems there except for the line which did move steadily there were just a lot of people. We found our luggage and lugged it on over to the money machine. It did not charge us to take money out which was cool. All we had to deal with is the surcharge from our banks. Next adventure, to find the bus terminal. We got there but I still don't know how much sense it made. We went down a ramp that was about a floor and then we got into an elevator and went up a floor. Once we got there we found the spot for the Oxford bus and waited ten minutes for it to arrive. The bus - sorry - Coach driver was very nice and helped us put on our luggage. We both did nap a bit more on the bus. We got to Oxford and walked a block and a half to St Peters after a bit of confusion over the street we were on. Once we got there we discovered that there are too many summer programs here. After a bit of running around and with the help of several wonderfully helpful people, we got ourselves straightend out and got our room keys and the building pointed out to us. Our rooms are really nice. Small but nice. We hauled our luggage up (I am in 33 and Jess is in 22) and decided to take naps and do some unpacking until 2pm GMT. I unpacked, discovered that theseus doesnt want to play, and decided that a shower would be better than a nap. It wasn't too bad. There was good water pressure and there was hot water. Only one shower on the floor though. Everything is very clean if a bit old. I tried to make a phone call from the card phone but it didn't want to go. I will try again when I meet up with Jess.

Now I think I will have a bit of a nap because it is 1:30 here already and 8:30 at home.

still working on getting hooked up!

Well I just sent in my request to get hooked into the network from my room, so hopefully it will happen tomorrow. I am posting from the lab here at St. Peter's and it smells funny so I don't want to stay here very long. I didn't do much today. I spent most of the morning relaxing and reading in my cute dorm room. Then I took a short walk around the block, came back and talked to Jess and got my packet thing (which is missing page four by the way). We woke Rachel up at noon and went to lunch (mmm... pasty...) then wandered a bit and came back for the informational movie thing. I just came back from dinner with Heather, Rachel, and Jess, at the Chicago Rock Cafe, and decided to attempt a login thing.

Last night was weird. We got back from the internet cafe and went back to our rooms. Around 2300 we saw some fourth of July fireworks over the buildings and went out to watch. While we were outside, Rachel showed up and wanted to go out but we were pretty tired and didn't feel like clubbing so she went with this local guy that she knew somehow or another. I went back to bed; too much walking that day. We might go out tonight but Rachel is pretty doped up on some decongestant allergey stuff so maybe not.

I want to post my darn pictures! and now it seems that my comments are down! Fehhhhh!!!!

later then

Well I'm here!

Hi, this is Jessy in the UK. I am posting from an internet cafe right now because I can't get Theseus to recognize the internet connection at Oxford. I have written other posts and will publish them and my new nifty pics when I can get Thee up and running. Jess and I just had dinner at this great place. It was really good. I am surprised how early everything closes here! The shops that we were in earlier are all closed now. It is 7:50pm here and everything was closed by six. Weird. I am really annoyed that I can't get online with Thee!

Quick Summary

Plane ride was relatively uneventful but Chicago was great even on a tiny screen.

airport was a pain in the ass but we survived.

Slept on the bus a bit and was hit in the head with Otherness because I didn't recognize any of the plants along the road. The trees are all weird.

Got to St. Peters and there was confusion all around. It all got straightened out eventually but there was much running back and forth.

My room is too cute for words. Pics later.

Theseus doesn't want to play with the LAN connection in the room.

We took a nap, then went walking and browsing, met a couple of cows (pic later), and then took another nap and did some reading and messing with Thee.

Had dinner. Got confused about the check and tipping. Went to the kewl pound for half hour internet cafe.



That is about it. Details and pics as soon as I get Thee on the internet. Miss you guys already and wish you all were here.

Only a few hours left before I leave for England. I wanted to thank everyone who has wished me good luck and has dealt with my spaztasticalness over the last week or so. Thank you all. This entire post was said more eloquently and more organized before eclipse said that it didn't like me so I apologize for the confused order.

I still need to pack Theseus and go through my room and do a final check on everything that is left in here to make sure that I have all of the vital crap that I need. I made two new cd's last night so that I would have something to listen to on the plane and I also have to print out some WWdN stickers for posting in unusual places. I have packed my suitcase (all sixtyone lbs of it), my carry-on, and I have rebraided my long braid (which is over a yard long now) I also can't remember what else I wrote in the previous post. I hate this part of traveling, all this waiting. Once I am on my way, I love it but the waiting for the time to leave is just as bad as packing. I have been told to post a picture of something that I did every day which is fine but i just hope that my rinkydink website can handle it. I have a huge headache. I am also hungry and I already miss my doggie. I told my father that if she gains one pound over the six weeks that I am gone it will be taken out of his hide. I still need to grab a random reading book for the plane and relaxation elsewhere. I do want to buy a few books there too. (like the latin version of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone) he he. I will try to remember the other crap and post again before I pack up the puter.

Shiitttt! my long post just went to nether hell! feh!