And Then There Were None

And in a blink of an eye my suitcase went from 0 lbs to 37 lbs to 49 lbs.

I JUST finished putting up everything on my board too!

lamelamelamelamelame

I'm leaving tomorrow.

5:45 AM: Get my sorry butt out of bed
6:30 AM: Turn in keys to the porter
7:00 AM: Meet Caitlin to grab a taxi and head to the station
7:38 AM: Train to London Euston
10:12 AM: Arrive in London
15:25 PM: Plane to Chicago
18:41 PM: Arrive in America!
9:49 PM: Plane from Chicago to Columbus, Ohio
23:57 PM: Arrive home

Basically, tomorrow is going to be hell.  It'll be worth it though.

Today was my last trip into town.  I was not a fan of the Christmas rush in the least.  I also turned in my final paper today.  You know, I thought that if I wrote a paper about Sense and Sensibility, I'd like it more.  It turns out, that isn't true.

I still can't fathom the idea of leaving England behind tomorrow.  All of my friends are going through the same denial-process too.  Both Lydia and Kate leave very soon.  I feel like just yesterday I was sweating bullets, tossing steaming mulch on the campus grounds, then stir-crazy at home for two months, then just arriving at oddly sunny London, sick as a dog.

I have to say, I'm so excited to be back in farmland Ohio, potentially the least exciting of our states, only beating out the Dakotas and Wyoming.  And I'm thrilled to go back to The College of Wooster next semester.  Junior IS will be wonderful.  I miss working hard, thinking, learning, and being challenged.  Also, I am so so so excited to live with Kate in a small, danky, disgusting little room meant for Freshmen (that is, if ResLife is nice to us and puts us together).  I can't wait to hear about all of my friends' travels.  It will be fantastic.

So, how can I be sad to leave when I have SO much to look forward to? : )

I hope everyone has enjoyed following the blog!  Thanks for keeping up with me!

Cheers!

Three, Two, One; Take Off!

Dad,
This post is for you.  First, happy birthday (as of yesterday), congratulations on being 45, and secondly I'm updating so you can read this brand new post on your iPad!  I can only imagine how you're conversation with Mom will go:

You: "Jan!  Jan!  Annie updated her blog!  And she put me in it!  Come look, come look!"
Mom: "Jim, I'm a little busy doing the dishes [and adoring our favorite youngest daughter from the photo collage on the fridge]!"
You: "You're in it too."
Mom: "Be right there."

Then, like any other technological encounter, I imagine it'll continue on to this:

Mom: "Jim, move your fingers.  I can't see anything."
You: "Oh, jeez Jan, calm down.  Erhm, what did I just do?"
Mom: "Where did the page go?"
You: "Just a minute, keep your pants on."

Anyway, happy birthday Dad!  I can't wait to secretly use your iPad and customize all your backgrounds to kittens wearing silly costumes!

So, today was my last day of classes.  Again (just like all the other hopeless weeks), FOUR people showed up to my Victorian Literature seminar.  Including me.  Having actually read the book unlike the rest of my half-witted peers, I did the majority of the discussion, delicately ripping out the very soul of the main character of Adam Bede by George Eliot. 

The novel is really about Hetty Sorrel.  You know it's going to be scandalous with a woman named Hetty

I loved this book.  It was my favorite novel that I read while in England (sorry, Austen).  George Eliot is actually Mary Ann Evans and had to use a pen name, which is also pretty cool.  At the end of the class, my professor wished me well on my flight home and said, "Thank you, Annie, for contributing such a...lively presence."

Welcome.

And now I have three days, one night, and two papers left and I'm allowed to leave the country!  I'm certainly not going to miss eating like a 40 year old single man.

Cheers!

My Final Week Countdown

You know you've got yourself a pretty great friend when:

1. Wikipedia-ing is an acceptable and very fun passtime
2. She watches American Psycho with you at one in the morning
3. Is down for making Mac and Cheese at five in the morning
4. Rides in the death-seat of the double-decker bus (with some convincing)
5. Doesn't question the eight pictures of cats tacked up on my bulletin board even if we both know they aren't my own
6. Discussing Russia is not weird, neither is the trans-Siberian railway.  It's cool!  You just haven't realized it yet.
7. We can house a bag of slightly salted kettle chips in .25 seconds (in which Stefan can attest to)

And now I'm just left with work.  An edited portfolio for Creative Writing (aka CREW), a take-home test due Monday, an in-class test on Monday, and the rest due sometime next week.  The work is relatively easy, however, I haven't had a work ethic since last May so concentrating proves to be difficult.

Speaking of work ethic...

I am SO proud of the COW.  Why?: Because we are too awesome for words

Seven days until I'm back Stateside!  Does the stove in the flat's kitchen really have to break now?

Cheers!

The Real Thanksgiving

And now, after a lengthy intermission, Part II:

The Boyfriend and I returned to Lancaster, tired from traveling and carrying around eighty pounds of Christmas presents on our backs, and made the executive decision to do nothing of great importance for the remainder of his visit.

Me: So...
Boyfriend: So...?
Me: ...Wanna watch 30 Rock all day and eat junk food?
Boyfriend: jumping up and grabbing Cheetos, Goldfish (pizza blasted), plethora of assorted candybars.  Let's do this.

And thus began the 30 Rock marathon, though I think he got annoyed at me for quoting every single line because I've watched all five seasons at least four or five times.

The next day we had terrible rain.  Rain that I had never witnessed in England; and despite the common myth that it rains here all the time, which is partially true, but it does not rain consecutively like it would back in Ohio, just obnoxiously on and off.  But that day, it was a cold downpour, and because we're awesome, we decided to go on a walk to the amazing sheep fields.

Unfortunately, I did not bring my precious camera on this adventure, but Boyfriend brought his SLR and took some beautiful pictures and I'm sure some of you will recognize the stone wall from previous entries.

"If we take nine pictures in a row, we can't mess up!"

That night, the rain stopped and I took Boyfriend to one of my favorite pubs in town named The Borough.  It was my first pub I went to in Lancaster, with my friend Caitlin.

Also note that the Christmas lights have been up since early November...Not right.

Sunday was Real Thanksgiving and thus we made drunk chicken with Mr. E's recipe (by "we" I mean Boyfriend):

Naturally, we used Stella Artois as the beer can

Yes the chicken is in a sauce pan, it is college cooking after all

And on Monday morning, I shipped Boyfriend off on the next train to Manchester (which he would proceed to trip over his luggage and pull the train alarm) and I found myself with only two weeks left in England!

Cheers!

A Gentleman's Intermission

First and most importantly, Lydia's birthday was YESTERDAY and she is now 21.  I'm sad I couldn't celebrate with her, but excited to have our ladies night back in session this Spring Semester so we can at least have a belated birthday celebration, probably in a really small, danky room in the basement of the crappiest dorms on campus.  Also, her new tattoo is amazing.

Secondly, this is not Part II, not because I'm being cheeky, but because a certain someone (BOYFRIEND) hasn't updated his blog OR sent me pictures, ahem, ahem.  Here are some so nobody gets their knickers in a twist:

Interpretive posing at the James Joyce Center (and yes, my shirt has owls on it, from Primark!!)

Boyfriend taking some really cool pictures of Dublin at the Gravity Bar, Guinness Factory

Boyfriend and River Liffey before we did our 2 and a half hour walk

Third: because I have four papers due by the time I leave, I reserve the right to be cranky at/with everything.  Such as:

1. Look, it's 3 AM.  There's no need to be shouting in Chinese at whatever or whoever in your room across the hall.
2. There are three girls in this flat and two boys.  Put the dang seat down.  (I'm looking at you, Greek boy).
3. I did NOT pay money to sit on this bus or train to listen to your crappy mix of Rihanna and techno music.  Why do you even have earphones if you insist on playing it so loud that the entire carriage can hear?
4. And to the ten Occupy Lancastrians in town square: go home.  Just go.
5. To the empty aluminum can rattling outside every time there is a gust of wind: STOP IT.
6. Also, everyone should walk faster than me so I don't have to slow down my pace.  Thanks.

Oh, God.  I've become an old person.



(Cheers!)

Thanksgiving: Several Hours in a Lobby Eating Fruit Rollups (aka Winning)

Okay, no more teapot posts, however, as a quick preface...  I'd like to inform my dear readers that I just made the purchase of black currant, ginseng and vanilla tea.  Not that you all care.

I pick Boyfriend up from our wee Lancaster train station midday, just in time to drop him off at my flat so I could go to my British Romanticism class, where my old British professor challenged my third-wave feminist attitudes on writing. HAH, picked the wrong girl for that!

I race back to the flat, Boyfriend had insisted we fly to Ireland the same day he arrived ("Oh, might as well get all the flying out of the way, even though you are probably one hundred percent right about flying the next day, but whatever!"  Okay, fine he didn't say the last part), so we had a small window of time to catch a train in order to check in for the flight.

Needless to say, there was a lot of running through the airport, and me saying, "Hey, we should totally sign up for the Amazing Race!" and immediately retracting that statement after sprinting up a flight of stairs.
As you can imagine, because it is my life, we missed the flight.  And all the hotels were booked... Except Travel Lodge: the cheapest, ugliest looking accommodation we've ever seen.

At the crack of dawn on Wednesday, we awake, and get on the 8 AM flight to Ireland!

"You both look so happy!" Happy, mom, yes, we are happy.  Also delirious from sleep exhaustion and just relieved we managed to not screw up this flight

Dublin Town Center: you can also see the Spire Monument in this picture (the giant spike)

Dublin was a pretty cool city.  We did a lot of shopping and I even got to author-stalk James Joyce!  Boyfriend humored me and got me a few trinkets from the James Joyce Center!  I think Larry Stewart and Mazen Naous from the COW would applaud me.

That night, we walked to the Guinness Factory, where Boyfriend took some excellent pictures from the Gravity bar after we had our free pints of Ireland's greatest beer.  Afterwards, we stayed out fairly late (I know his post says 3 AM, but we were definitely in bed by eleven...latest) taking pictures of the lit up city and eating Irish McDonald's chicken nuggets on the bench overlooking River Liffey.

Boyfriend in Merchant's Arch

Photographer in action

And what good would one of my stories be if yet another thing didn't go wrong?

Stupid Dublin ATMs ate my money and left me with 20 worthless American dollars.  So the next morning, I had to call AAA back in America to sort it all out (I was surprised Mom hadn't all made them want to quit their jobs by then).  Boyfriend and I, completely exhausted from running around Dublin, decided to head back to Lancaster.  But first, we needed to get to the ferry.

Boyfriend: "Oh, it's no problem, my super awesome iPhone says that it's just past the river by the Dublin Docks.  We can walk that.  My iPhone hasn't been wrong about anything either."

So I prepared myself for a very long journey:

Yes, I am a dork, thanks for noticing.  And yes, water does come in that ridiculously sized bottle here.

US TWO HOURS LATER

"Boyfriend, we're idiots."

"Yup."

 Oh, and our backpacks weighed like thirty pounds from our Christmas shopping (yes, families, we love you just that much).  We finally made it and then proceeded to spend approximately six hours in the lobby of the ferry waiting room, and mind you, this was on Real Thanksgiving.  But that's okay, because it was pretty hysterical and we were too thrilled to have found the ferry to care.  Also, I made him play ISpy with me as well as micro-manage his game of Solitaire.

But we made it onto the ferry, and the stormy sea made us both a bit motion sick.

Spirits still high despite wanting to throw up

At midnight, we were in Holyhead, Northern Wales!  I've never been to Wales, and even at night it was absolutely beautiful.  I'd live there if it had a Chipotle and didn't have such chilled winds.

I believe this was our favorite part: Holyhead.  It was beyond any beautiful words:

Boyfriend photobombing my lovely picture

Sooner or later, we found ourselves back in Lancaster!  Which everyone will have to wait for that post, so there.

Cheers!