Getting things done.

So yesterday I slept in, took my time getting ready, and then met a friend for some coffee and some shopping. After that I came back, was productive and got some homework done. After that, I got to go meet another friend of mine, Catherine, and a friend of hers for dinner. They're studying in Rome this semester, and it's their travel break. We ended up going to the Royal Oak pub, mostly because it's the only pub we could find that was still serving food. So I ordered the fish and chips, cause I love fish and chips, except when they served this fish, it still had skin on it.

Now, you have to understand, I have a rule. I don't eat things that look like animals. And fish with skin...looks like an animal. Yuck. So I didn't eat a lot of it.

So after that I came home and went to bed.

Today I slept in (through church...oops), and then went to meet Catherine for lunch at the Eagle and Child, where I had the Sunday Roast, that was wonderful. Then after that we walked to Port Meadow and relaxed with the horses for a while, and then after a stop by to show them the houses I live in, we walked by some of the more important Oxford monuments. After that I came back home, and was productive some more, then had nine at nine, and now have to be productive again.

Strange fact: I've recently, as in the last two weeks, picked up an interest in coffee mugs. Who knew?

I don't want to be sick.

I don't want to be sick, but I think that I am. I've been really achey all day long, and have spent most of my day in bed. I slept as often as I could, cause that's the only time that I didn't hurt all over. And now I've got the chills as well, my head is pounding, and I still have sinus issues from when I had that cold a few weeks ago.

I really don't want to be sick. I have a lot of school work to catch up on, and I'm going to Paris in a week.

Although, me and my roommate make quite a pair. I haven't gotten out of bed all day, and this last week she suddenly developed symptoms of diabetes, and has an appointment on Monday to get tested.

What a pair.

A lovely weekend.

So yesterday I got up, and went to the Ashmolean, the oldest public museum in the world. I walk by it almost everyday, but it took me until yesterday to go. It wasn't really all that amazing yesterday, they're doing a lot of remodeling, and so a lot of the museum is closed. But it was still cool to say that I've been. I also went grocery shipping, so now I have food!

The only other thing that really happened yesterday was I signed up for classes for the fall. So that was cool.

Today I went to C.S. Lewis class, and had some cool discussions about Perelandra. Then I talked to my teacher about a grade I disagreed with, and got a better grade.

Since then I've been unproductive, but I figure it's okay, cause I'll be here in Oxford all weekend, so hopefully I can relax and continue to catch up on homework.

A Day of C.S. Lewis

Okay, first, yesterday not a lot happened, I had my tutorial meeting, and went out to dinner for one of the girl's birthday's. It was a lot of fun.

Today, we took a bus out to the graveyard where C.S. Lewis is buried, right next to the parish church he attended. I've decided that I would much rather be buried in an English cemetary than an American one. American cemetaries have chain link fences around the outside, roads running by, and very industrialized graves. English graveyards, on the other had, are normally by churches, they're quiet and peaceful, and very lovely.

After that, we went to the Kilns, where Lewis lived with Mrs. Moore and his brother Warnie for a long time. We went out to the forest where it's rumored that he sat to write the Chronicles, we walked all through the house, saw the study where he did most of his writing, his bedroom, the attic that reminded one of the Magician's Nephew, the "Children's Room" where children evacuated from London stayed, and all of the rest of the house. It was really cool.

Although, here's some news for the day. I've been planning on spending the summer in Mexico City on an internship, but one missionary was on furlough, and just today I found out that the second missionary has something preventing him from taking interns, maybe a death in the family. So now, plans are in the process to transfer me to Morelia, Mexico. Hopefully all of this will work out with my finely tuned scheduling for the summer.

Scotland

Okay, so I had a wonderful short little trip to Scotland over the weekend. We traveled to Edinburgh by train, a very long seven hour train. But we made it there on Wednesday night, took the shuttle to our hostel, looked around the hostel a little bit, and then went to sleep. This hostel was cool because they gave each person a locker for their stuff, and you had a curtain on your bed to make your own mattress sized room. Plus they had a computer lab, and a free movie room, which we didn't use, but it was still cool that it was there.

We woke up on Thursday morning and walked up to the Royal Mile. It's basically the main street in Edinburgh, with the castle on one end, and the palace on the other. We did most of our shopping this morning with all of the shops lined up and down the mile. After wandering around for a while, we went to the Elephant House for lunch. This place is known because it's where J.K. Rowling started writing Harry Potter. She's from Edinburgh. So we ate there, and I got a coffee mug from there. We also saw the nearby statue of the Greyfriar's Bobby. After lunch, we walked up the mile to Edinburgh palace. It was pretty, but we didn't pay to go in, because we were already spending money on other things. But it's very lovely from the outside. From the castle we also got our first glimpse of Arthur's Seat, the really big hill/little bitty mountain. You'll hear more about that later.

After seeing the castle, we walked down the mile to Holyrood Palace, the Queen's residence in Scotland. We didn't go in, first because we didn't want to pay, second because it was closed. But we walked by. After that, I went back to the hostel with Holly, while the other two girls with us went on a ghost tour. We saw most of what they saw the next day. But back at the hostel we relaxed and did some homework due the next week.

On Friday morning we woke up, and went to the cemetery where some of the ghost tour was. It was there that J.K. Rowling found some of the names for her characters in the Harry Potter books. We found McGonagall, Tom Riddell (Rowling changes the spelling), and we heard that a Crookshanks was buried there, but we were never able to find it. It's a big grave yard. We also saw the school behind the graveyard that was the inspiration for Hogwarts. After exploring the graveyard, we went to go hike up Arthur's Seat.

We started hiking up, it took us around forty five minutes to get up. The view from the top is amazing, and we looked over the city and the sea. There was a storm out over the sea, but we didn't really worry about it. We took some pictures, and then we sat down to have a Good Friday devotional. We had only just started when we looked out and saw the storm moving remarkably fast towards us. The several teenage boys who were playing around decided it was time to get off. We decided likewise. The snow started coming down, but not the light fluffy snow that's nice. Since Scotland in generally is very windy, and we were at the highest point for a long long ways, right next to the sea, the wind at normal rates can knock you over. And this is storm rate winds with pelting snow.

We began our decent, clinging to the sides of the rock so that we wouldn't fall over. For a while, I was really scared we wouldn't get off. It was intense. However, it was very fitting that the storm moved in just as we were starting our Good Friday service, and "darkness came over the whole land" (from Luke's description of the crucifixion.)

But as quickly as the storm moved in, it moved out again. By the time we were down, the sun was shining again. All was well. After the excitement though, we went and had some dinner, and then went back to the hostel to sleep.

On Saturday morning we woke up very early and went to go on a Loch Ness tour. We meet in town at eight, and began our 13 hour tour. We drove in the tour bus for most of the morning, stopping for breakfast and lunch. We got commentary along the way of what we were passing. We passed by the Birnam Wood, which was quoted of in Macbeth. "Macbeth shall never vanquish'd be, until Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill Shall come against him." We drove through the Highlands, which are beautiful, and saw Ross Castle. A little after lunch we finally made it to Loch Ness, and Urquhart Castle. We saw the castle, and got to see the Loch, no Nessie though.

After an hour or so at the Loch, we headed back to the bus, and on through more of beautiful Scotland. We saw a lot of film sights, such as the forests from Last of the Mohicans, the Mountains that Mel Gibson ran across as Braveheart, the site of Hagrid's hut, and the cool train bridge that is in Harry Potter when Ron and Harry steal the car. We traveled through the moors, saw the mountains, more of the highlands, and got a whole lot of history. It was amazing. The sights were great. So far, I think that Scotland might be my favorite scenic place.

Always on the Move

There's always somewhere to go. Tomorrow I'm leaving for Scotland until Sunday. But, I think after that, I get to stay in Oxford for almost two weeks before Paris.

Today I still felt really sick. I got dizzy and lightheaded, and I'm still stuffed up and coughing. I'm hoping it's all on the way to being better though. It's too expensive to be sick over here.

Today I mostly laid in bed, resting up for my trip to Scotland, and trying not to get more sick.

More rain and clouds.

So last night my group led our Sunday night chapel, 9@9. It was really cool, and since this week is Holy Week, we did stations of the cross. More specifically, Everyman's Way of the Cross, the stations that we do at Happening. And it was mostly Church of Christ kids who had never even heard of stations, so it was really cool. And after that we had a time of worship and scriptures. I thought that it was really cool.

Today I woke up and went to work at Oxfam. Today we talked some about the differences in British and American currencies, how our coins have names, and none of theirs do. Also, I found out that while I say "math" they say "maths", for some reason. Interesting.

Well, most of the rest of my day was spent reading or doing homework. Cause that's just incredible fun. I did go shopping and I bought a purse at Primark though. I'm kind of anxious, but I think that's mostly because I keep thinking of all of the homework I haven't done. Oops. There's always something more to do...and there a whole lot due at the end of the semester that it's soooo hard to bring myself to do now. Lame procrastination. Hopefully I'll get some of it done tomorrow, and maybe I'll feel better. Hopefully.