Back in the USA

Well, I have returned to the US, so that is the end of the regular postings on this blog. I may still put up the odd entry if anything exciting has been going on, but I assume my life will be less exciting in general from here on out, so it won't be worth blogging about. I got home without any excitement. I had a free seat next to me on the plane, so I got to lay down and sleep, which was really nice, but other than that, nothing exceptional. So here are the pictures from the last few days I spent in England. I have a new American number now, so if you don't have it send me an email and I'll give it to you. Take care and hopefully I'll get to see you soon!

Megan

Last Week in England

Wow. This is my last week in England. Next Sunday at 1:30 I will be back in Green Bay, WI. I can't believe it's over. I will be sad to leave all the friends I've made here, the rational political mindset and the general hatred for Rupert Murdoch and Faux News.

Well, this past week I basically just spent working on my dissertation. I finished a pretty good draft yesterday. It is 59 pages long, including a crazy amount of graphs, pictures and tables, but not yet including the appendices which will be quite long. I plan to get those set up today and start to put the table of contents together. So if I have any volunteers out there to do a read through I'd like to hear from you :) Anyway, I hope to be done with the editing by the end of Monday and do a final read through on Tuesday before printing it and taking it to the binder's. Then I will have a few days to do fun things before I leave. I still want to climb Maiden Castle, so maybe that can happen.

Well, I suppose that's about all the news I have. I plan to go around and take some pictures of campus and Bournemouth this week before I leave so I'll put those up either by the end of the week or early next week after I'm back in the US. Have a great week and wish me luck for the printing of this monster. Bye!

My neighbor is Mary Shelley

Well, better late than never, right? This is mostly just to put up the link for the photos from last week. And Mary Shelley, of Frankenstein fame, is buried in the cemetery behind where I live. Kind of cool to find out. Mostly I've just been working on my dissertation all the time. I'm editing the beginning parts now and will be starting to write the discussion and conclusion sections this afternoon and hopefully finishing them tomorrow so that the entire thing can be edited this weekend and then printed and turned in early next week. Wish me luck! Here are the photos.

Three Weeks Left

Well, only 3 weeks left in England before I turn in my dissertation and go back to the US. The paper is coming along pretty well and I have pretty much proved what I set out to do. So that is something, although it just means that all of my graphs and statistical tests just tell me that there are no differences between the groups that I am testing, which gets old.

This week I went to London with a friend. We wanted to see an exhibit at the National Gallery about fakes and frauds in paintings. It was a really cool exhibit and by the end we were able to see some of the problems with the paintings, but realized that you would have to really be an expert in one painter to really suspect that a painting was or wasn't by that person. After the museum we went out to Hampton Court Palace. We had to take a train about 30 minutes outside of London, but it was a really cool place to see. I have pictures but I haven't gotten them onto my computer yet, so when I get them up I'll put the link on here. We saw Henry VIII get married and saw the apartments of William III(?), a Mary, and Henry VIII. They also had some beautiful gardens and the world's largest grape vine. They also had a hedge maze that we went through. The day was going really well until we got off at the wrong tube stop on the way home and then missed our bus. We had to buy a new ticket home and it cost us more than the round trip that we had originally purchased. So that was crap, but overall the day was nice.

Thursday I packed and cleaned all day and then Friday was moving day. We had to check out of the place we've been staying all year and then move into the new place in Bournemouth. It took two trips to move all of my stuff and I'm going to have to make some decisions about things to throw away before coming home, but for now I'm all moved in to the new place and can just work on my paper with no other distractions about moving and such. So I suppose that is all from me for now. When I get the pictures up I'll post again. Have a great week and I'll talk to you later.

Oh Dear....

Well, we just finished the last full week in August. I thought that I was way ahead of the game, but now I'm not so sure. I have about half the length of my paper written, but it is in rough shape. I've started the results section, but as I haven't actually done the statistical tests yet there is only so much that I can say along those lines. So this week will be a hardcore week of maths. I must get the statistics done so that I can finish writing the paper the following week and then have a week for editing and then a week for printing and binding and hand-in and drinking and then I'll be back in the US. Crazy!

So this week was another rather boring one. I spent Monday and Tuesday at school working. Wednesday I stayed in Poole and went to a pub in the morning and then the local library in the afternoon to work. I have to be out of my flat to get any work done, but I don't like having to go to school everyday, so I try to change it up a bit now and then. Thursday I was back at school.

Friday one of my flatmates was leaving to go home, so I stayed home so that we could clean the flat. It took a few hours, but we scrubbed out the oven and washed out the refrigerators and most of the cupboards. So now we just have to try to keep it fairly clean so that there isn't too much to do on Friday when the last two of us leave. The other two leave on Monday.

Friday night I also had dinner with my friends. It was kind of an anything you have left party, so I made chinese bbq ribs again as I still had a few in the freezer from when my parents were here. We also had mac and cheese and salad and apple pie. It was a really nice night.

Yesterday I did some more studying in the morning and then wandered around the shops with a friend for awhile. Then I made chicken tacos for dinner with a few friends as I had some taco seasoning and chicken. So that was another nice dinner. After dinner my other friend came over as she had just gotten back from Denmark where she was looking at skeletons for her dissertation. It sounds like she had a really nice time there and we had a really nice time hanging out. It is starting to get sad that I will probably never see some of these people again. Some that won't be so bad, but others I will really miss.

I am also now expected to make a trip to Asia at some point to visit my friends in India. I am very scared of Asia, so that will be a challenge for me. I don't know why I have a fear of Asia, but I do. At least I would have some chaperones in India though, so I guess it will be okay. I'll just have to start saving money as it is super expensive to get a plane ticket there.

Today I am packing in the morning and then going to a cafe in the afternoon with a friend to get some work done, hopefully. Tomorrow is a bank holiday, so the library won't be open. I may just lay out all my work on the living room floor and start my giant math undertaking...we shall see. Wish me luck.....

Also, we are look for the word one would use to describe when you have been on a quest and you are done with it. What would you say? I have ____ my quest. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Have a nice week.

Sorry

Sorry this is late, but I really don't have much for you this week. I spent almost the entire week at the library. I got my outline approved by my adviser and started writing. I am at almost 5000 words of 15000. I think it will end up being too long, but I'll just edit it down at the end. I feel like I'm in a pretty good place at the moment and plan to do a lot of writing this week so that next week I can have my advisers read a few parts of it and get some feedback. Hopefully I will be able to finish it then in the next few weeks so that I have another couple of weeks to work on the formatting and verb tenses...blah!

I went to the Bournemouth airshow this afternoon, but it was rained out...so that was disappointing, but I had a nice coffee/lunch with some friends. I guess that's all I have. Sorry to bore you to death. Have a great week!

Hmmm.....

Well, let's see. This week was suppose to be entirely boring as I was suppose to be at museum stores all week looking at bone tools. But let's start with Sunday. I went with my friend to a castle nearby for a tour. She is doing some of her dissertation research there and I wanted to do something fun so I went along. It was a really pretty building on the outside, but had been burned down in the 60s by some business men who wanted to tear it down to build a new development. It is on the coast and has a beautiful view of the sea. So the inside is mostly gone and they are slowly trying to fix it. Money is hard to come by though, so it is a slow process.

Monday I went to Winchester to look at bone tools. The man there was really helpful, but there wasn't as much there as I expected as a lot of it is apparently on display at the museum, so I was able to get home relatively early. Then on Tuesday I went back to the Dorchester stores to look at another site. It took a really long time to find the box of tools there and it finally took the retired curator, who happened to be there, to find them for us. So that was good to get. I had wanted to climb Maiden Castle, a hillfort, while I was there, but it was raining, so I didn't get to. Wednesday I went back to Winchester to look at a few small sites from the area. I looked at about 3 sites and finished by about noon so I got a chance to explore around town in the afternoon.

Of course I went to the cathedral. Jane Austen is buried there. Then I went to the ruins of the castle that the bishop lived in. Apparently he built himself a castle at some point. Then as I was heading to the train station I found the real castle. In there I saw The Round Table, of Arthur fame. It is hung on a wall and apparently weighs a ton. It is from the 1200s, but really not all that impressive.

Wednesday night I got to hang out with my other friend who just got back from Norway. She was there doing a dig for the summer. I ran into her on my way home as she was on her way to the store. So that was exciting.

Thursday I spent the day at school and then we had Dutch pancakes for dinner.

Friday I was at school again and then we had a really nice dinner. I baked a chicken, and the other girls made potatoes, veg and dessert. It turned into a really fun evening.

Today I got some studying done in Poole and then ran some errands. I also tried to bleach the dirt and sunscreen out of my dress. It kind of worked, but also turned a bit of the green embroidery yellow...so that was unfortunate. It also didn't get all of the dinge out. Oh well, it isn't too noticeable. Tomorrow we are taking the day off from work. We are going shopping in the morning and then making scones and having a cream tea in my kitchen. It should be nice. Then it will be back to the grind on Monday. I am hoping to have a very rough draft of my dissertation by the end of the first week in September. I think I could go on with analysis for ages, but I'll just have to pick the most important things and focus on those. Well, I suppose that's it. Pictures! Have a nice week!

Museum and Boringness

Well, I'm going to apologize in advance for the next 5 or 6 weeks worth of posts. It is getting to be crunch time here for my dissertation, so I'm not really doing anything fun anymore. Plus I have no money, so all fun is over :)

Anyway, Monday life got back to normal and I went to the library all day to start writing and to look up a few site reports that I needed some more info from. Then on Tuesday I got to go to a museum to look at bone tools that they have in their stores. That was pretty awesome. I didn't get as much done as I wanted to, but I got a sample, and at this point that what I'm going for. I go back there on Tuesday to look at another site.

The rest of the week I spent inputting data, writing and starting initial analysis of the data that I have. It wasn't going all that well, but I really started rolling on it on Friday. Hopefully it will give some interesting results when I actually do a few statistical tests on it. I really wish we'd had a statistics course during this program so that I knew what I was doing, but I'll figure something out.

Last night we had taco night to celebrate one of my friends getting back from her placement. She spent the last 5 weeks living in a castle. Today she and I are going to a castle around here. Her dissertation is about castles. I'll have pictures next week from this adventure.

Well, I suppose that's all. Sorry this was short and boring, but that's just how my life is right now ;) Have a nice week!

Okay, Let's Finish This Up

Friday my parents and I got back to Poole in the early afternoon. It was too early for them to check into their hotel yet so they came with me to Bournemouth to pay the deposit on the place that I will be staying in September when I have to move out of my current place. They got to see the common areas but not the particular room I am getting, although it is nothing special, really. The place as a whole is pretty awesome though and is right by the park, so it should make for a nice last few weeks in England. After paying we came back to Poole to check them into their hotel. Then they rested for awhile before we went out for fish and chips on the quay. After that we called it an early night because they were pretty tired and we had to get up early the next day for Stonehenge.

My friend Danielle came to Stonehenge with us as she hadn't been there yet. We had to leave fairly early because we had to take a bus to Bournemouth and then another one to Salisbury before catching the tour bus out to Stonehenge. It worked out pretty well though. We also got to see Old Sarum, which is where the city of Salisbury originally started, up on the hill. It gave an excellent view of the current town. Then we went back into Salisbury for lunch, as we were starving at this point. We ate in a fancy-ish pub and mom got a steak and ale pie. We sat there for a really long time and then headed to the cathedral to see it and the Magna Carta. After that we headed back to the bus station as we had a two hour ride home ahead of us. The bus from Bournemouth was quite entertaining though as there were some kids sitting in front of us that were quite interested in us being Americans and Canadians (in Danielle's case).

Sunday was pretty calm. We wandered around Poole and then got Thai food for lunch. It was good and my parents really enjoyed it. Then they went to the Poole museum and wandered around town while I did laundry and got dinner ready. I made Chinese BBQ ribs and chicken wings and invited some friends for a dinner party. They brought mac and cheese, vegetables and dessert. It turned out to be a really nice dinner.

Monday we again headed off early to go to Osbourne House on the Isle of Wight. It is where Queen Victoria lived with her family. We had to take a train, a bus and a ferry to get there, but it was pretty nice. I thought it might rain, but the sky cleared and it was a pretty nice day. The view from that house is amazing. I can see why she would want to live there.

Tuesday we headed into London. We took the coach and then had to take the tube to our hotel. Mom did not like that. We got checked in and had to change quickly and then head to dinner. We ate at a Brazilian BBQ. I thought it was good, but I'm not sure how much my parents enjoyed it. Then we headed to the theatre to see The Phantom of the Opera. I thought the girl that played Christine was really good, but the rest of the cast was only ok. And Raul seemed too old. Oh well...

Wednesday we stayed close to our hotel and went to the Science and Natural History museums. They didn't open until 10 so we walked up to Hyde park and wandered around for awhile. The Science museum was pretty nice, but wasn't my favourite. The Natural History museum had some nice stuff, but it was very hard to find your way around in there, despite the map. We ate at an Indian place for lunch and then had pizza for dinner.

Thursday we took the tube down to the Tower of London right away in the morning and did a tour with one of the beefeaters. Then we walked through all the different areas. Saw the crown jewels and all that stuff. The funniest thing was that a couple of the coronation batons were off display with signs saying "in use" as if Charles II was being coronated while we were there....After the Tower we went to the Tower Bridge and went up to the upper walkway. That was pretty neat. Then we got to see the old engines that were originally used to open the bridge. After that we went searching for lunch and ended up at a Greek place. It was really good. Then we walked down past the Eye and by Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. After that we were pretty tired so we decided to head home for a rest before dinner. For dinner we just went to a place near our hotel. Nothing fancy, but it was good.

Friday we headed to the British Museum in the morning. We spent a few hours there and then set out to find lunch. We looked for Covent Gardens, but never made it. We found a nice cafe for lunch though. From there we wandered over to the Horse Guards area and saw the horses and saw them change the guard. Then we walked up to Buckingham Palace and saw a small changing of the guard there too. Then we looked for Hyde park and had a bit of trouble finding it, but we did see most of the embassies. Finally we found the park and walked through it until we got to the road our hotel was on. Then we went back to our hotel to get a cab to the hotel that we were going to stay in by the airport. Mom and Dad decided that they didn't want to have to take a train in the morning and would rather be near the airport so we went over there. We ate dinner at a bar and grill there that was American themed. It even had a Green Bay Packers pennant and Dad's old Transam. Red with a black bird on it. Me and Dad had more Indian food and it was pretty good.

The next morning we had to be up really early to get the shuttle to the airport. Checking in had a really long line until we realized that no one was using the self check-in machines so we headed to them and got that done fairly quickly. Then I left them at the airport as they went through security and went to find my bus back to Poole. Luckily I didn't have to wait too long and I was back in Poole by about 10am. So I got some stuff done around my house since I hadn't been there in awhile and had an early night. This week I have to go to a museum to measure bone tools and try to get a ton of work done and it is starting to get to crunch time. So that is it for now. See you next week and here are the rest of the pics.

Part 2 of the Long Absence

Monday we set off early for the vatican. We stood in line for a long time but eventually made it in. Really all we wanted to see was the Sistine Chapel so we headed almost straight there. It was a disappointment. I don't know why people think it is so great....and really the whole vatican just put me in a bad mood thinking about all the riches that are stored there and how much money it cost to build in the first place. I think god and jesus would be very upset to see how the Catholic church takes money from people and doesn't give it to the poor. Then we found out that the pope doesn't even stay in the vatican in the summer. He has a summer house somewhere in the country. That made me even more angry. People shouldn't be paying for a second residence for the pope when people are starving and dying all over the world. Ridiculous. Needless to say, we didn't stay at the vatican muesum very long and went on to St. Peter's Basilica. It was amazing, but still didn't really feel nice, knowing that the marble was stolen from the Colosseum and its obvious show of the richness of the church. It was quite beautiful though.

After seeing the church we had to catch a bus out of town to see the catacombs. The internet said that there were still bones at the one we were going to, but we were disappointed. The catacombs had to be built outside of the city walls because people could not be buried in the city. This meant a bus ride and then searching for them. But we found them pretty easily. We didn't get to see any bones inside though. Apparently there are bone, but only in the parts that aren't accessible to the public. We just saw holes in the rock where bodies would have been. Oh well, it was nice and cool down there :)

After the tour we headed back to the bus and went home. We got some pistachio and chocolate gelato and it was delicious. Pistachio is my favourite kind, I think. We got pasta for dinner and then went and sat in a piazza near our hostel until it started to get dark. It was a very relaxing night. Then we went home to sleep before our last train ride to Pisa in the morning.

We got to Pisa after a 3 hour train ride and found our hostel fairly easily. We got to choose between an air conditioned room or one with a private bathroom. We chose the air conditioning, although Pisa turned out to be the coolest city we visited. We headed out to see the stuff around the tower and take pictures before our 8pm climb up the tower. We got done with our sight seeing and photo taking early so we decided to get dinner before climbing. It was pretty cool because we had a view of the leaning tower from our table at the restaurant. A very nice way to finish our trip.

Climbing the tower was weird. You could feel the lean as you went up the spiral staircase. You could also see the wear in the steps from people walking from side to side as the tower leans. Going up was okay, but coming back down the lean made me feel like I was going to topple down the stairs. It was pretty slow going for me :) The view from the top was really nice though and I'm glad we saved Pisa for last. It was a relaxing way to end the trip. The next morning we had to get up pretty early to catch the bus to the airport to catch our plane. Then we had a two hour delay because the air traffic controllers in France were on strike. We had to apply to Belgium to fly over France. At least we got home though. We heard from the taxi driver that some flights out of Bournemouth had been canceled.

When we got back I had to run to the library so return a book and pick up some new ones that I had on reserve. We also bought some CDs so that we could have copies of each others' pictures from the trip. The next morning we left fairly early for London. We got there around 12 and headed to our hostel. We left our stuff and then headed down to the river. We walked along it until we got to the London Eye. It looked like a really long line, but it was actually pretty quick. The eye was nice, but nothing that great really. It is a giant ferris wheel that you go up in to see the entire city. We could see almost everything from up there, but being enclosed in a bubble was a bit weird. From there we headed over to the Tower of London to meet our Jack the Ripper tour. It was fun, but not as good as I imagined that it would be. The tour guide didn't really seem to know anything beyond her script and when I asked a question she didn't really have an answer for it. Oh well, it was something to do at least.

Friday morning we had to go to the airport to meet my parents and drop Sara off. I didn't realize how long the underground would take and then we just missed the earlier train so we ended up being late to meet my parents, which of course freaked my mom out. But we got there and go Sara checked in and through security and then headed off. We got tickets for the coach and sat down to wait to go to Poole.

TBC....

Second set of pictures.

Long Absence

Well, sorry it has been so long since updating. I thought I might be able to get one up last week, but it didn't end up happening. I'm going to keep this fairly brief as a lot of stuff has happened in the last two weeks. On the 13th Sara got to Poole. We hung out here and I took her to Bournemouth to look at a place that I will be living in September when my lease is up at the place I am currently living. She didn't make it too long into the night because of the jetlag, but she got to experience "authentic" British weather as it was dreary and rainy on the day she got here.

On the 14th we set off for Italy. We took a cab to the airport in Bournemouth for our flight at 12. We were then in Italy by 3pm (it's a 2 hour flight, but there is an hour time difference). The flight was hilarious because we flew a really cheap airline and they tried to sell you anything and everything. They were selling lottery tickets, smokeless cigarettes, food, drinks, there were even commercials over the pa system. It was bizarre, but we made it into Pisa. While we waited for our train to Florence we had our first Italian food. We also admired the mountain view. I guess I didn't really realize that there were mountains in Italy....Finally we caught our train and headed for Florence. When we got there we had a long sweaty walk to our hotel. We didn't realize quite how far it was or how hot it was outside. We were drenched in sweat from our backpacks and the walk. It was in the 90s the entire time that we were in Italy and none of the hostels except the very last had air conditioning. It was a bit much ;)

After checking in and sitting for a bit we headed up the the Michaelangelo Plaza, which is way up on a hill to see the view. It was pretty nice and we experienced our first gelatos. It was also a bit cooler at night, so that was a welcome change.

Thursday we spent exploring Florence. We started out early and went to a piazza filled with statues to take photos. Then we headed to the train station to make reservations for the rest of our train journeys. Next we walked across the Ponte Vecchio, a bridge with a bunch of expensive jewelry shops on it. Then we went to the Palazzo Pitti (Pitti Palace). There was art there, but mostly I just wanted to look at the palace. It was weird though because the ceilings were just painted on rather than being sculptural like the ones in England and France that I've seen. They almost looked 3D, but not quite. Like a poor man's version of a castle or something. It was weird.

We ate a quick lunch and then headed to the museum that has Michaelangelo's David. It was pretty cool to see it, but the rest of the museum was really small, leaving you wondering why you paid so much just to see basically one sculpture. From there we headed toward the church where we climbed the bell tower to get cool views of the city. There wasn't even a line for that, which was amazing. We then decided to go back to our hotel to try to escape the heat a bit and then head back to go inside the church later.

After a rest we headed back out to go in the church and then go to dinner. We didn't realize that you have to cover your shoulders for all churches in Italy, so we ended up having to wear these silly blue smock things that the people at the church gave us to cover up. It was a very big church, but it wasn't very exciting inside. We then got gelatos and sat in a piazza for awhile to people watch. There were people there on big group tours from America. After awhile we went to get dinner. We ended up with a really nice place. We each got pasta and wine and then shared a tiramasu for dessert. Yum! After dinner we went back to the Michaelangelo plaza again because we weren't ready to call it a night yet. This time while we were up there we heard a band that came and played for awhile. It was pretty nice.

Friday we left for Venice. We had to be out of our hostel by 10, so we slept in and left around then. We went straight to the train station and had some time to kill so we ate lunch. We caught our train and it wasn't long before we were in Venice. our hotel was really close to the station, which was awesome. We got a bit cleaned up and then headed straight out for a gondola ride. It was amazing! The driver was really nice and was telling us all about the buildings and how Venice was built. He also let us pretend to steer the gondola and take photos.

After the gondola we got tickets for the water bus and headed down to the San Marco square where the big fancy Venice church is. It was already closed when we got there, but we got to see the outside. We wandered around in the square, got gelato (the theme of the trip :), and then went up a tower to see the city from above. That was a pretty fantastic view. Look at the pictures and you'll get an idea. I also fell in love with the masks in Venice. They sold them everywhere and i decided I had to have one. You'll know it when you see it. Giant hat and big feathers :) The only problem was having to lug it around for the rest of the trip, but it was worth it :)

The next morning we were leaving Venice already, so we got up a bit early and wandered around the town near where we were staying for awhile. We say some more cool buildings and a nice park. Eventually we had to go back to the train station though and head off for Rome! When we got to Rome we found the hostel without too much trouble, but we'd gotten there earlier than we said we would so we had to call to get someone to come and let us in. But they did and then we headed off for the Colosseum! We paid a bit extra to jump the queue and have a guided tour. It was so cool! I loved being down in the area of Rome with all the Roman ruins. It was really neat. The other cool thing about Rome was that they had water fountains all over the place where you could fill up your water bottle for free. So that was really cool because it was so hot that we went through a lot of water in a day. After the Colosseum we headed back to the hotel so that we could get an early start the next morning.

We headed to the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill right away the next day. Our ticket from the Colosseum got us into both of those as well, which was nice. We spent about 3 or so hours wandering through the ruins before heading off to other sites. Our first stop was the Trevi fountain where we threw in coins to make a wish. Then we ate crepes for lunch and headed off to the Pantheon. We saw another columned wall on the way that tricked me, but eventually we found it. It was quite cool and Raphael is buried inside. After that we headed to the Castle next to the Vatican. It was nice and when we got to the top we had another nice city view (another theme of the trip :) We got some nice pictures and then headed down to walk along the river front. We thought we were going to get robbed at one point down there, but all was well, thankfully. It was pretty scary though. Then we got some fruity drinks and continued on our way to the Circus Maximus where the chariot races would have been held. It was pretty unimpressive as nothing is really left. Then we headed home. After cleaning up we went to a Chinese restaurant for dinner and I ate like a starving person ;) I guess it was a longer day than I thought.

I think that will be it for this entry. Here is the link to the first set of photos and I'll try to get more stuff up in the next couple of days. Enjoy!

Drinking Brains

Well, this week was a fun one. On Monday morning Danielle, her friend Caitlin from Canada and I left for Cardiff, Wales. We caught the train from Poole around 9. Then we had to change trains in Southampton and got to Cardiff about 12:45. It was a really nice train ride. The area around here isn't that exciting, but further north toward Wales the scenery was really pretty. We couldn't check into our hotel right away when we got there, so we went to find lunch. We ran across a gourmet burger restaurant so we stopped there. I got a pork burger with apple chutney. It was really tasty. After lunch we still had a bit of time to kill so we headed for the tourist information center to get a map and some brochures of things to do. It was then that we realized that Cardiff pretty much only has a castle and a museum. And a giant mall. So we headed back to the hotel to check in and drop off our stuff.

After dropping things off we decided to head down to the quay. It was about a 20 minute walk and we followed the signs and were soon walking through the ghetto. It was a bit sketchy. Nothing bad happened, but it didn't feel like the safest neighborhood. But eventually we got to the quay and me and Danielle geeked out because The Doctor Who Experience was down there. It is basically a small museum of costumes of the villains and some of the doctors and companions from Doctor Who. So we went through it but Caitlin didn't want to. We also went and saw the area where they filmed Torchwood and saw all the silly signs that people had left about bringing Ianto back (a character that was killed off in the last episode of Torchwood). It was pretty geeky and awesome! We also went on a ferris wheel ride near the quay to get a view of the area. It wasn't actually a super high wheel so you could see things, but not all of Cardiff or anything. Oh well. We grabbed dinner at an American diner themed restaurant. We got hotdogs and milkshakes. They were pretty good, but not as good as Sam's. After that we headed back to the hotel. We took a different road and it was amazingly different. There was a railroad track separating where we had walked and where we were then walking, so we had literally been on the wrong side of the tracks. We got home and were pretty tired so we just watched tv (a luxury as we don't have tvs in our dorms) and went to bed.

The next day we headed out to the castle. It was pretty neat, but not the best castle I've been to. Apparently it has been redone quite a few times in the past by different owners who thought different periods of history were cool. I do have to give one of them credit though because when they found the original roman walls during one construction phase they left them and then built replica walls on top, leaving the roman wall as the base and marking what part was Roman so you can still tell the Roman part from the rest. And that was in the late 1800s I believe. Awesome. The apartments where the family lived were quite nice and had some really fairy tale like painting going on in them. The keep was quite imposing, but only the stone part was left. There would have been a lot of wooden structures inside, but those are gone.

From the top of the keep I had seen a stone circle so I wanted to go over there. While looking for the entrance to the park it was in we found a Baskin Robins. Eventually we found the park entrance and Danielle made friends with a lady handing out fliers who used to live in Canada. Apparently they are going to be pen pals now...The stone circle was neat, but not very large. I must admit that until I got here I didn't realize how many of these circles are all over the country. I thought Stonehenge was more unique than it is. It is much bigger than the others, but the idea isn't original by any means. Something to consider. After the park we stopped at the Baskin Robins for ice cream. We then wandered around and went souvenir shopping. I got a Wales shirt with a Dragon on it and a present for my friend's baby that she is having in September. Then we headed back to the tourist center to find out if the brewery where they brew the local Welsh beer gave tours. They said no, but that there was a microbrewery near the stadium, so we headed there. I got a peach beer. It was pretty good. After that we ordered some starters and another beer, the pale ale. It was the darkest pale ale I'd ever seen and was a bit bitter. We were not really fans. After this we wandered around for awhile and then stopped for dinner.

After dinner we stopped back at the hotel to drop off our shopping and then headed out. We ended up at an Irish pub that was showing the Holland v Uruguay? football game. I've never watched a football game, but it was kind of fun. I didn't know exactly what was happening at all times, but it was cool. We wanted to try the local beer, Brains, so we ordered that while we watched. The beer wasn't that good, but Holland won, so I texted my Dutch friends to congratulate them :) One of them has been following it and is pretty excited. I guess Holland has never won a World Cup. After the game we headed to another bar and Caitlin and I switched to better drinks but Danielle was determined to like Brains. At this bar they served Brains in a glass with the company logo on it, which is a dragon. Since the brewery wasn't open we figured they didn't sell the glasses anywhere, so I had to order another Brains to that I could swipe the glass. So I'm now the proud owner of a Brains glass :)

The next day we had to take our bags to the tourist center to lock them up because the hotel wouldn't keep them for us after we checked out. So we dropped them off and then headed to the Cardiff museum. The top floor was art and the bottom floor was natural history. That was kind of odd, but they had a neat exhibit set up of Cardiff through time. It started with the earth forming and then moved on to dinosaurs and mammoths and then current animals. There was also a big room of archaeology of Wales. That was pretty neat. I didn't find any bone tools though. After the museum we tried to go to a small art gallery, but they were installing a new exhibit so we couldn't see anything. So we headed back to Poole.

When we got back I had an email from one of the museums that I'd been email asking to set up dates to come and do my research, so that was exciting. Then I had to head next door to my friend's going away party. She is going home to finish up her dissertation and then going to Belgium in August to work on an excavation there. She's the first person to leave and it was very sad :(

Thursday I went to school and got some stuff done. I also talked to my advisor about the museums and how to go about doing things and whatnot. So hopefully that goes well when it actually comes to doing it. Then I came home and bought my ticket back to America :( I had frequent flier miles so I had to book early because when I tired to use them for Christmas I waited too long and there were no flights left. So I am officially coming home on Sept 26th...I didn't realize how sad I would be to make it official, but pressing the buy button was really hard.

Friday I was going to go to school again, but instead I ran errands. I had to change my small change into bills, get small shampoos and stuff for my Italy trip, get Euros and return a library book to the local library. I got all of that done and then decided to pack a suitcase for my parents to take when they come to visit. They are going to bring an empty suitcase and I'm going to swap that for the one I've packed. I figured it would be good to do it early because I'm going to Italy and then my parents are coming and I don't want to have to be packing while people are visiting. So it isn't completely packed, but its pretty full and I still have a lot of stuff. Hopefully I can fit it all in two more suitcases. I've even started a bag to bring to a charity shop, but it isn't as full as I'd like it to be... In the evening I went to Sarah's again to have a movie night before she left. We watched Men Who Stare at Goats and it was actually pretty good.

Saturday I headed to the local library for a few hours and wrote the guide to my database for my dissertation. I also worked a bit on the intro of the dissertation. I figured it would be good to get the guide out of the way though because it is pretty thoughtless to do, but takes a bit of time. I'm not completely finished with it, but should finish it today. One less thing to do when it gets to crunch time in September. Then I met Melissa for lunch at the Chinese buffet. I had really been craving Chinese food, so despite being broke when she suggested it I agreed. It is only 3.95 for the lunch buffet though, so that isn't too bad. After lunch I had to go home and get ready to go out. A friend of a friend is getting married next month so we were having a hen night (bachelorette party) for her. We took a pink fire engine into Bournemouth and then went to a drag/strip show. It was a pretty fun evening for me. We ended up with 3 people crying though. How, I don't know. It was kind of ridiculous. Oh well.

Today I must get the guide finished and clean my room. Tomorrow I have to go to school and do laundry and then Tuesday Sara gets here! Then Wednesday we leave for Italy for a week! So there will be no blog next Sunday as I will be in Rome. I'll try to get at least a mini thing up sometime in the next two weeks, but I can't promise anything as if I don't have the pics up it may not really be worth it. My parents get here on the 23rd and I switch Sara for them at the airport and then come back to Poole. So if I don't get one up during this stuff I'll have a big one for the 1st of August. Well, I suppose that's all I've got. Here are the Wales pictures. Enjoy!

Happy 4th of July!

Well, this has been yet another boring week. Sorry :( Monday and Tuesday I worked on my dissertation and then Wednesday I returned to the Southampton library to finish up everything there. That about completes my data collection. I need to request one more book that Southampton had, but I didn't have time to get the data out of it as it had over 60 of the tools I'm looking at. So after I get that and finish the book that I have I'll be pretty much done. There are always more sites that I could look at, but I have over 500 tools catalogued so I should be able to do something statistical with the analysis. I also got a response from one of the museums that I emailed and the woman there will be meeting with the archaeology volunteers on Tuesday to talk to them about it and will get back to me then. So hopefully I can at least get to that museum to see some actual tools and look for cut marks and such.

Other than that I haven't been up to much. I decided that I wanted to listen to the Harry Potter books on tape. I looked them up online and they were like 70 pounds each! That was crazy, but then I thought of the local library. I'm a member but I never think to go there. So I looked at their catalogue and they had them! So I've gotten The Goblet of Fire and The Prisoner of Azkaban so far. So that's exciting. While I was there I also A Thousand Splendid Suns. I had enjoyed The Kite Runner so I decided to get that. It was a really good one. I would recommend it. The weird thing is that you have to pay for things at the library here. Books are free, but adult audio books are 1.50 and DVDs are 2.00. So that's strange. Children's audio books are free apparently though as I haven't had to pay for the Harry Potters.

Yesterday I went to Wetherspoons, the local pub, to study with a friend. It was morning so it was pretty dead and they have wifi there, so it was actually a really good place to study.

Friday I learned how to make Chinese BBQ ribs. Another friend left for her placement for 5 weeks on Saturday so we had her going away dinner on Friday. A few weeks ago Le made us ribs and they were delicious and we've been wanting to learn how to make them. So we decided this was the perfect opportunity. They were really good and pretty easy to make except that I burned some of them.....oops. They weren't too bad though. Then Le suggested that you can make chicken that way too, so I may try that sometime.

Well, I suppose that's about all for this week. Next week will be better as I leave for Cardiff, Wales tomorrow morning and will be back on Wednesday. Then on the 13th Sara gets here and we go to Italy for a week. When we get back my parents get here and stay for a week. So next week may be the last update for a couple weeks. I'll try to get something up here between went Sara and I get back on the 21 and when my parents get here on the 23rd, but no promises. I probably won't have Italy pics up until after the parents leave as there will be no time. But next week I'll have Wales pictures, so look forward to that :) Later!

Southampton

Well, this is going to be a short entry because I have a busy day today and I had a pretty boring week. Monday I met with my advisor and re-evaluated what I'm doing for my dissertation. I'm now looking at bone points in general and trying to decifer if there are any definitions that go with the different types of categories of points. It appears that there aren't from what I've seen so far. So Monday night I emailed some museums that have large collections of bone tools to try to get permission to go and see them. That way I can really see what they look like and how polished they are and if there are cut marks or anything on them that you can't see in illustrations and written descriptions. The rest of Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday I spent in the library.

Tuesday night I had dinner with Sytske and her sister, who was visiting from The Netherlands. That was fun and a nice way to end the day since I had been in the library for hours.

Thursday I went to the library in Southampton. That was awesome! It is a real library with lots of books and journals in it, unlike the one at Bournemouth. It did have a crazy organization system though, not the dewey decimal system. I conquered it though and found almost everything that I needed. I even got done early enough to do a bit of shopping and found a really cute dress. Then I went to McDonald's for dinner and headed back to wait for the bus. But the bus didn't come. Eventually we heard that it was running 90 minutes late. And to top it off my ipod had broken, so I had nothing to distract me. I don't know what happened to it, I was just skipping a song and it froze. I couldn't turn it off or anything. So eventually another bus came that was going to Bournemouth and the driver took pity on us and let us on. Then from Bournemouth I had to take another bus back to Poole. I didn't get home until about 10:30. And I had left at 7am! That was about the longest day ever.

Friday I again libraried. Then in the afternoon I went to the beach with Melissa, who had just returned from London. That was nice. And I wore my SPF 50+ so I was safe :) Then we went to dinner in Bournemouth and returned home.

Yesterday I went shopping for clothes for Italy and a new phone. I figured that since I had some credit from my phone company to buy a new phone I would get a second one so that when Sara and my parents come to visit I can give them one just in case we get separated or anything. My new one is a touchscreen and is pretty neat-o! And it was pretty cheap because it is the company brand instead of a "real" brand. And I got it for really cheap because of the credit. I also got a couple tank tops, a skirt and a new dress. I still need shoes though, so I'm going this afternoon to Bournemouth to look for those. Then I'll be ready to vacation!

So that's been my week. Next week won't be much better. But then the next week I'm going to Wales, so that should be fun! There are no new pictures this week. Sorry :( Talk to you soon!

Oxford!

Well, this post will be significantly shorter than last week's, much to your relief I'm sure. Monday was rather uneventful. I went to school and tried to get a lot of work done because Tuesday two friends and I were going to Oxford for the day. I did get quite a bit done, but still not as much as I would have liked. Ah well.

Tuesday we started off at 6:30am because we had to take the bus from Poole to Bournemouth to catch our coach to Oxford. We thought we were going to have to take a train for 38 pounds, but then my flatmate told me that there is a coach from Bournemouth for cheap. We looked it up and ended up getting tickets for only 14 pounds. So that was awesome! We got to Bournemouth and caught our coach with plenty of time. It was then about a 2 hour ride to Oxford. We saw some nice sights on the way, but I slept through a bunch of the ride. Not comfortably, but still...Anyway, we finally got there and stopped in at a really cute coffee shop in an old building to get some coffee and a quick snack. Then we headed off to find the visitor center to get a map of town. We were appalled to find out that you had to pay for a map. Everywhere else we've been they just give you a map, but not stupid Oxford :(

After buying a map we proceeded on our walking tour that was laid out in it. We set off from where we had gotten coffee and headed toward Christ Church College, one of the colleges that make up Oxford University. It is the one that the Harry Potter school look is based on and I think part of the movie was filmed there. I'm not sure though. When we got to the college we wanted to go in but the great hall (where they eat) wasn't open until after 2:30 so we decided to go back later and kept going on our walk. Prior to this we had already been lost and blamed Sytske's poor map reading skills, but we found out shortly that the map wasn't really all that great as Mieke got us lost as well. But that ended up okay because we saw some nice garden areas and then found an old fashioned candy shop. It was quite adorable. While we were in it we saw people walking around with black robes on. We think they must have been graduating that day as lots of them were covered in confetti and silly string and stuff, but some of them weren't and were just hanging out at shops and stuff. It was pretty weird to see people in robes, but we didn't want to be weird and take pictures of them so you won't be able to see any. Sorry. Side note: the robes were strange in that they were sleeveless and just past the bum. They also had long "wings" hanging off the shoulders. Very interesting.

We passed the Bodlean Library and headed for the Pitt Rivers/Natural History Museum. It was free, which was great because it was more a curiosity cabinet than a museum. Pitt Rivers was an antiquarian who did a lot of the early archaeology in Britain. He had a lot of junk from all over the world though. The building was very cool with some cool skeletons, but most of them were just replicas of skeletons that are actually housed elsewhere, so it was kind of weird. We didn't spend too much time there as it was pretty hot inside and it wasn't well labeled or lighted so it was a bit disappointing. We decided to head back to the Bodlean Library and see what we could there. Turns out if you want to see anything besides the outside you have to pay to take a guided tour. We didn't really want to do that so we looked around the courtyard a bit and then headed to get some lunch. We ate in this little church basement cafe. It was pretty good, but they put a giant chunk of dill in my salad, which was weird. I didn't eat it.

After lunch we continued our walking tour and then headed back to Christ Church College to see inside. We had to pay to go in here as well, but since it was what we really wanted to see we were okay with that. It was pretty cool, but not nearly as big as I imagined. The great hall had 3 long tables and a head table, but they packed them into that space. It would not be an enjoyable place to eat I don't think, but they do eat in there. The church was very pretty though. They have a really beautiful organ and some pretty stained glass. We then headed out through some courtyards and the library. Then it was getting to be around the time we needed to catch our coach back so we started heading back to the bus station. We grabbed another coffee and snack near the station while waiting and discussed our impressions. Overall we were all a bit disappointed in Oxford. I expected the entire city to be more spire-y and old and only some of the colleges were like that. Plus you couldn't see much because most of the colleges are closed to visitors and the ones you can go into you have to pay. So yeah, I'm glad we went, but it isn't somewhere that I'd return to.

Wednesday I was so beat that I slept until almost noon and didn't make it to campus. I did some work at home, but not nearly enough. Thursday I went to campus and stared at the microfiche reader, but I wasn't really feeling it :( Friday I called Sara to make more plans for our trip to Italy. We have our hostels, plane and train tickets booked. Now we just have to figure out our itinerary and what tickets we can buy ahead of time to skip queuing. I'm doing Rome and Sara's doing Venice and Florence. Exciting!

Saturday me and Sytske went to Slug and Lettuce to study and it was packed! So we had to leave because we never actually order anything other than coffee and didn't want to take up a table that they could use to make actual money. We ended up at Starbucks which was okay for awhile but then started to get really busy and loud after a couple of hours so we left. We stopped at the store to get food for dinner. We found a prestuffed chicken so we got that and some veg to roast. When we got home we realized that it didn't have cooking instructions on it. So I had to google some. But it turned out really good. The chicken got done before the veg, but we just had to wait a little bit longer and the chicken didn't get cold or anything. It ended up being a very good dinner. Then we went for a walk and as we were heading toward the quay fireworks started. I don't know why they were doing fireworks, but it was nice to see them. Then we headed home and I went to bed as I was pretty beat.

Today I have to look up opening times for things in Rome and put together a list of things I need to discuss with my advisor on Monday. This week will be sad because everyone is going away or having visitors. Hopefully that means that I will get a lot of work done. I want to go to the library at Southampton University but when I was looking at their website I realized I might need permission to be in there. I emailed them on Saturday, but haven't heard back. My advisor used to work there so I'll ask him. I just don't want to get all the way there and then have to turn around and come right back because I don't have a pass or something. So we'll see. They have a bunch of the books that I need and it would be much easier to use them this way then having the library here get them sent to me.

So that was my week. Not very productive and not very Harry Potter-y ;) Here are the pictures.

Ah! There's the Eiffel Tower!

Let's see.....Sunday was fairly uneventful. I tried to get some work done, but didn't do a whole lot really except for going to the gym. Then on Monday I went to school in the morning to look at some more microfiche! Woohoo! I think my life will now be spent in front of that stupid machine...if I can find all of the fiche. One of the books I was using was missing the fiche that I needed and another book had the fiche from some other book in it. I turned it in to the librarian, but she just seemed confused about it, so hopefully it makes it back into the correct book. I should have just found the book and done it myself...luckily I won't be needing it later as it was from a book about Stonehenge. I came back in the afternoon to find the plumbers in my kitchen fixing the leaking pipe in my ceiling! It only took a month from when I reported it, but the leak has finally been fixed. What amazing service... I went to exchange money and run some last minute errands and when I got back the plumbers had left. The wall and ceiling were still disgusting, but the leak had been stopped. So yay for that at least. After that I finished my packing and then around 9:30 I headed for the train station with Danielle. Our train to London was at 9:50 and then we got into Waterloo at 1am. From there we had to catch a cab to King's Cross because the tube was closed for the night. It wasn't too expensive though, so it worked out okay. It was weird to see London so deserted though. We got to King's Cross station and found some food shops still open. It turned out though that the international station (St. Pancras) was actually across the street, so we had to make a break through the drizzle over there to start our wait. Luckily there was a coffee shop open there though, so we got coffee and sat on a bench to wait for 4:55am when we could check in for our train.

St. Pancras station is really pretty. It looks really new and has a really high glass ceiling and a huge clock at one end. It is very boring in the middle of the night though. Finally 5am came and we could check in. I didn't realize that train travel was so crazy. We had to go through metal detectors and have our bags x-rayed. Then we had to go through French immigration right away at the station. I guess that was kind of nice though because then when we got there we could just go and not have to wait in line. So I got my passport stamped and then we had to wait again for about 10 minutes before we could board the train. We had assigned seats so it wasn't too big a deal. The seats were quite nice really, but I couldn't enjoy them too much as I slept for most of the journey. So when I woke up we were in Paris!!

First we had to figure out the metro, but that wasn't too bad. We bought a book of tickets which gave us 10 rides total. Then we figured out where we were headed and set off. The Paris metro isn't as nice as the London one, but it gets the job done. The funniest thing was that you had to throw a switch to open the train doors. It was very strange. We also heard a lot of musicians playing various instruments during the rides. I've never heard that in London, but it was interesting...When we got to our stop we exited the subway and since we didn't have a map yet we started walking the way we thought that we were suppose to go. Turns out we were wrong and had to backtrack. But eventually we got there. Our hostel seemed pretty nice and was in a very quiet part of town. We couldn't check in yet, but they let us leave our bags and told us to come back between 2 and 3 to check in. We grabbed a map in the reception area and then headed out to the Arc de Triomphe. It was awesome and my first Paris sight! Then we walked down the Champ Elyees and looked into all of the fancy stores whose clothes we could never afford. Then we found a pizza place so we figured we'd do that for breakfast/lunch since we hadn't really eaten anything for quite awhile. Danielle speaks a bit of French and I speak none, but the waiter was nice and spoke some english to us. We got a sausage and cheese pizza with an egg on it. We figured then it would count as breakfast ;) I had never had an egg on my pizza before, but I had heard of it awhile back and asked around and apparently it is not all that uncommon. So there you go. Apparently you can just crack one over a frozen pizza at home if you would like to try it.

After eating we walked further down the road and then saw a Canadian flag down an off-road. Because Danielle is Canadian we decided to walk toward it and see what it was. It turned out to be the Canadian embassy. But while we were walking toward it I got my first sight of the Eiffel Tower! I was so excited! I stopped and shouted to Danielle about it and she just kept walking. Embarrassed about my touristy-ness I think. So we figured that since we were heading that way we would walk over to it. We did and it was awesome. We thought maybe we could get tickets for later, but we couldn't so we decided to head back to check in to the hostel and come back in the evening to go up the tower.

When we got back to the hotel at 2:15 they told us our room wasn't ready, but that it would be in 10 minutes. After about 45 minutes we decided to head down the road to the chocolate shop that we'd seen earlier to get some chocolate cake. We brought it back to the hotel and sat outside on the steps to eat it. Finally around 3:15 they told us that our room was ready. We had been upgraded from a 6 person room to a 2 person room with our own shower and sink. We also got free breakfast. After we finally got checked in we headed out once again to go to Notre Dame. Notre Dame is a beautiful cathedral, but I think I've seen too many at this point as it wasn't as impressive as I expected it to be. We got the audio tour so that we could know a bit more about it and that was nice. Then when you finish the tour they have a gift stand set up in the church. I don't think that Jesus would approve of that at all.

From Notre Dame we decided to walk along the Seine river back to the Eiffel Tower so that we would get to see more of Paris. That was a crazy long walk. We didn't realize how long it was going to be when we started. We did end up seeing a lot of cool things though. We even walked into some sort of protest or strike. There were riot police everywhere and people dressed like doctors or nurses. They didn't have signs, just some random flags (not the French flag). We also saw two guys playing polo on bicycles. Finally after about 3 hours we made it to the Eiffel Tower. We then had to stand in line for another hour to get tickets and get on the elevator. There were some really obnoxious Texans in front of us in line so I couldn't really talk for fear of people thinking that I was with them...The tower was amazing! First we stopped at the second floor and then had to get another elevator to the very top. It is just shockingly high. And Paris is a crazily white city. Almost all of the buildings were the same color. (Side note, my flatmate was telling me that part of the reason Paris is so beautiful is that Hitler didn't bomb it during the war. He wanted to make it the center for arts and culture in his new empire so he refused to ruin it. So everything in Paris was left nice, unlike London and other cities that were bombed to pieces.) I thought that by going up the tower in the evening we'd get to see the city lit up, but it stays light here for far too long. It was still a very cool view though. After coming down from the tower we were starving so we walked back to the street we had come down earlier that had a few restaurants on it. The first one was full, but the second was an Italian place and let us right in. We got a bottle of wine and I had some really good gnocchi in a red sauce. Yum!

When we left the restaurant it was finally dark so I got a picture of the tower all lit up. Then we had to catch a cab home because it was almost 12 and we weren't sure what time the metro stopped running. I fell asleep almost immediately upon getting back to the hostel.

The next day we headed out at 8:30 to get to the Musee D'Orsay because we thought it opened at 9. It didn't open until 9:30 though, so we had to stand outside for awhile. Luckily they had an overhang so that we didn't get too wet as it was drizzling all day on Wednesday. The Musee D'Orsay is the art museum. It has all the famous paintings. Stuff by Money, Renoir, Van Gough, etc. It was very awesome to see it. We spent a few hours there and then headed to lunch. I got a country salad. It was good, but there were many kinds of meat which I didn't really care for all that much. There was a ton of pancetta, and two different kinds of sausage. There was also some bacon. Then there were a ton of vegetables as well. And of course we got bread with the meal. The craziest thing is how expensive soda is. More that water. Almost 5 euro for a bottle of coke. I'm not sure why this is. Perhaps a tax to deter people from drinking it or maybe all the importing makes it pricey. I don't know.

After lunch we headed to so some souvenir shopping before heading into the Louvre. The Louvre was open until 10 and we didn't know how long we would stay so we decided to go to the junk shops before going in. We got my friend Melissa a really cool scarf as a birthday present, and I got a really neat painting of the city scape with Notre Dame in the foreground and the Eiffel Tower in the background. It's funny to look at paintings of Paris because they just put the Eiffel Tower in the picture where ever it is convenient, whether you can actually see it from there or not.

After buying some stuff we headed into the Louvre. You have to go in through the giant glass pyramid, and unlike Dan Brown claims there is no inverted pyramid underneath it pointing to Jesus's blood. Just a reception area where you buy your tickets. So we bought tickets and headed into the museum. We had a map pointing out the major things to see so we figured we would try to hit a bunch of those as we wandered through. I had to see the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo. So we ended up wandering around for almost 7 hours I think. It was awesome mostly. When we finally got to the Mona Lisa there was a huge crowd around it and you can only get within about 6 feet of it because it is roped off. It is also covered in glass because despite the museum rules that there is NO flash photography anywhere, people insist on taking flash photos of the Mona Lisa. The thing is, this doesn't only ruin the Mona Lisa, but also the other paintings in the room with it. The glass helps, but not 100% and the rest of the paintings are screwed as they don't get glass. The really maddening thing is that the guards seem to have given up stopping the flash photography. I wanted to beat the people who were doing it and think the policy should be that if you take a flash photo anywhere in the museum your camera should be confiscated, all the pictures of the museum deleted and you get escorted out. If you want to try again you can pay for another ticket. There is just no need to speed the ruin of art.

The Venus de Milo wasn't as maddening. It was cool though. I don't think anyone took a flash photo of her while I was in that room. What I enjoyed most about the place though was the building itself. The ceilings and murals and carvings on the walls and over fireplaces and doors was awesome. It was especially awesome in certain parts of the building which is probably where people were living during different periods. They have a section of the museum set up as Napoleon III's apartments. It starts off just very nicely decorated and then suddenly you go into the most gold and shiny room ever. Completely filled with red furniture. It is insane!

After the Louvre we went to a cafe for dinner. Escargot was on the menu so we decided that since we were in France we had to try it. We got 6 to share and they weren't as terrible as I imagined. They were served in the shell and filled with butter and garlic. The thing was that they were pretty chewy so the flavor was good, but the chewiness was icky. I could only manage 2 before being completely grossed out. But at least I tried! After dinner we headed back to our hotel and went to bed pretty early.

The next day we had to leave at 7am to go to the train station to catch our train home. This time we had to go through French and British immigration. So I got two more stamps in my passport. We also had to go through metal detectors again. This time on the train we had backward facing seats even though we'd signed up for forward facing ones when we bought the tickets. I don't really like riding backwards, but it ended up ok. I even got my own seat for awhile as there weren't very many people on the train so I just went and sat by a window so that I could see the countryside. But really I couldn't see much because they plant trees or put up barriers to try to block the sound of the train. Then I read about the tunnel in the train magazine. It is 100m below sea level at one point. It is also actually 3 tunnels: one going to France, one coming back and a service tunnel between the two. And it only takes 20 minutes of the 2 hour trip to go through the tunnel.

After we got back to St. Pancras station we took the tube to King's Cross (which looks nothing like it does in Harry potter) to catch our train back to Poole. We got back around 1ish. Then I had to go and get a cake for my friend Melissa's birthday party that evening. My friend Sytske made an apple pie as well and we took them to the restaurant early so that they would be a surprise. Dinner was at an Italian place in Poole and it was excellent. A bit expensive though. When dinner was finished they brought the cake over and sang happy birthday. I think she was really surprised.

Friday I had wanted to get to campus but I didn't make it. I just got all my pictures up and organized my stuff a bit. Then Sytske and I made chicken and roasted vegetables for dinner. It was my flatmate, Gareth's, birthday so we hosted beerpong at night. It was actually a pretty good turnout. Then we wanted to go out after so we went with him. We sang happy birthday on the bus and the driver would flash the lights when we finished. It was very nice. The club we usually go to was dead when we got there so we had to find somewhere else to go. The next club we tried was 10 pounds entry so we said screw that and went to a club across the street. We were there a few hours when one girl noticed her purse was not where she had put it. We spent some time looking for it and reporting it to the bouncers and such, but it was gone. Her passport was in there, which really sucks. After that we went home. We had to wait forever for the bus and when we finally got on there were some guys sitting behind us giving Jarrod (an American from Boston) shit for being American and for making fun of the English football team. Finally they got off about half-way home and we thought it was over, but one of them grabbed his hat as he was getting off the bus. So then of course Jarrod and Gareth had to chase them off the bus. We thought there would be a fight but apparently they were all talk and when it came to actually taking a swing they just threw the hat instead and walked off. Luckily the bus driver waited and they were able to get back on the bus and get home. So ridiculous.

The next morning I figured the kitchen would be a wreck but they must have cleaned up when they got back. There were trash bags full of cans and bottles and all that needed to be done were some dishes and mopping the floor. So that was pretty cool and it got done in the next few hours. Then I headed to the Slug and Lettuce to study for awhile. I couldn't stay too long though because I had to call Sara to talk about our itinerary for Italy. So we have that set and I have to set up the hostel in Rome and London. She's taking care of the other cities. So that is awesome.

So that was my week. Awesomely fun, but not nearly enough work done, so I'll be trying to get some done today :( Well, here are the pictures. Have a good one.

Go Ape!

Hello!! This week was very exciting and next week will be even better, so stay tuned for that ;) Monday was a bank holiday so I couldn't go to school, but my Thai flatmate and I have decided to crack down on our other flatmates to keep the kitchen area clean so we did a really thorough cleaning of the kitchen in the morning. We even cleaned out the refrigerators and underneath them. Now we have a cleaning schedule and everyone has to be in charge of keeping the kitchen clean for a week at a time. Hopefully it works as people have just been getting messier and messier. I wandered down to the quay in the afternoon with some friends and we got ice cream and looked at the ferry trips available. You can go to the Channel islands for only 25 pounds round trip! That's almost all the way to France.

Tuesday I went to school and got a bunch of researchy stuff done. I'm trying to get through it as fast as I can so that when I'm gone in July I'll already have all the data collection done. Tuesday night I was going to make dinner for everyone, but then Le offered to make Chinese food so we did that instead. It was delicious. She made ribs the other day and they were amazing. I must get her to teach me how to make them before I leave here :) Then we watched Leap Year. It was pretty dumb, but oh well....

Wednesday was awesome! Me and Melissa went to this thing called Go Ape! It is an obstacle course in trees. So you get a harness and get taught how to hook it up to the safety ropes and then you climb up a rope ladder and have to go across rope bridges and stuff and then down zip lines. It was sooooo much fun! The harnesses weren't all that comfortable, but still. We had a bit of a hard time getting to the park that the course was in because our bus from Poole was late so we missed the bus to the park. So we had to get a cab, but it was only 7 pounds so that wasn't too bad. The park itself was really nice as well. They rent bikes and have a restaurant and hiking trails and stuff. We may go back there sometime just to walk around. The Go Ape! course was really cool. The first one was really easy and very low so that the instructors could watch everyone and make sure we were doing it right. Then we were pretty much left on our own to do the next 4. For each one you went up a rope ladder, did some obstacles and then went down a zip line. On the 3rd zip line Melissa's harness broke. One of the leg straps came undone. We went and found an employee and he said he could just fix it, but got her a whole new harness instead so that she would feel safer. After that we finished the course and then headed for the bus. We had to walk quite a bit, but we finally found the bus stop and that bus got us back into town on time to catch our coach back to Poole. It was an awesome day!

Thursday I was at school again. I made it about 6 hours before dying. Then I came home to make jacket potatoes with mexican chili for dinner for the girls. Friday I was at school once again and had to learn how to use a microfiche reader. It isn't that hard, just a pain. I understand using microfiche in the past as it was pretty much the only option, but I have a book published in 2000 that has microfiche in it. It makes me really mad. Get with the times Barry Cunliffe! So I'll be back to the microfiche reader on Monday...

Friday afternoon I came home early and then headed to the beach with Melissa. I covered myself in spf50 because I had no intention of getting sunburned. And I didn't! When we got to the beach around 3:30 it was really crowded, but it started to clear out around 4:30. And it stays light forever here, so we stayed until about 6:30 and it was still nice. Sytske met us down at the beach eventually and we did a lot of people watching. There was a group of cheerleaders there that were doing backflips and throwing people up in the air. When we got back Sytske made us Dutch pancakes for dinner. They are thin like crepes and we had savory and sweet ones. We figured we could eat a ton of them, but after one savory (bacon and cheese) and one sweet (black cherry jam and ice cream) we were stuffed. There was a formal dress party in another flat on Friday night and we meant to stop by for awhile, but by the time we were done eating it was 10pm and we saw them heading out so we skipped it. Ah well...

Saturday my alarm didn't go off so I slept really late. Then I met Sytske and we went to the Slug and Lettuce to study. I got quite a bit done, but we also spent a lot of time chatting. It was fun though. Danielle and I got our train tickets to London in the afternoon for our trip to Paris on Tuesday. We have to stay at the train station for a few hours over night as our train is at 5:30 in the morning and the last train from Poole to London gets in at 1am. So that sucks, but we figure we can kind of plan out what we want to do and then sleep on the train ride. Then Sytske and I got back together after dinner to watch a movie. We watched The Last Legion, where Colin Firth plays an action hero. It was pretty ridiculous. Who knew that Arthur Pendragon was descended from Caesar?

Today I finally got to the gym and now am doing laundry so I have clean clothes for Paris. So I'll have a million pics next week I'm sure, but here are the ones from Go Ape! Enjoy!

Last Assignment and London

This week was crazy and fun. On Monday I handed in my last assignment for my classes. Now all I have left is my thesis. Of course, because it was Monday that didn't go smoothly for me. I logged in to a computer at the lab and opened my paper only to find it all in bold print. I tried to change it and it would not. So I started to panic, but someone suggested that I try a different computer. I did and that solved the problem, thank god. Then the paper decided that it would include a blank page in the middle and no matter what I did I couldn't get rid of it, so I had to print out each page individually. Then of course there was no stapler to be found anywhere on campus so I couldn't staple it all together. Luckily I had a closable folder to put it in so it was ok. Then me and Stine, in matching outfits oddly enough, went shopping in Bournemouth. On the way down the street we saw a sign for smoothies and juice so we went in. Stine got a juice and when I tried to order a strawberry banana smoothie I was told they had no strawberries or bananas. So I asked about peach and he said he didn't know how to make that one. So I said fine, never mind and he was like no, I can make you something else. He then suggested the triple berry smoothie. So I asked what berries were in it and he said strawberries...but we don't have those...So I said no thanks and we left. So disappointing as I had really been wanted a smoothie.

We shopped for awhile and ended up in a coffee gift shop thing. And I found caramel coffee syrup! I was so excited. Glad to know where to find it now. We continued down the street and then stopped for lunch at an outdoor cafe. I didn't know what I wanted so defaulted to fish and chips. The girl came back after taking our order and told me that they didn't have any fish and chips...So I ended up with chicken strips and chips instead. They were good, but jeez! No fish in England in a seaside town?!?! After lunch we headed to one last store and I found some awesome new flip flops. So yay for that at least.

Then Monday night Melissa and I went shopping for the BBQ that we were having on Tuesday. We got burgers and stuff for s'mores. They don't have graham crackers here though so we had to make do with some plain-ish cookies. They also don't have hershey's chocolate so we had to just get milk chocolate.

Tuesday it was suppose to rain, but it didn't so we got to have our BBQ! It was a bit windy and cool though so we ended up rushing it a bit, but it was delicious. A bunch of the people had never had s'mores before so that was fun. They weren't totally convinced and now know why Americans are so fat, but it was a good time.

Wednesday I went to campus to try to get some dissertation work done. I didn't do a whole lot and realized how much harder my project is going to be than I thought. I figured finding the dates and size of the sites within a site report would be pretty easy, but it isn't. I don't know why, but most authors don't write it or have hidden it somewhere. I just got more and more frustrated.

Thursday I went to school again. I got through a couple of books and then borrowed a few more from my adviser so that I don't have to try to find them in the library and can keep them as long as I want. For dinner I went to Stine's for tacos. It was her last night in Poole so I had to say bye :(

Friday morning I got up at 5am to catch my 5:45 coach into London to meet Aunt Ginny. I slept a bit on the coach and then it got into town early! So I made it to here hotel by about 9:30. We chatted for awhile and then headed to Kew Gardens, which is a bit outside London but you can take the tube there. We had to upgrade our tickets to go that far, but it was a very nice place. You had to pay to get in, but it was over 300 acres of grass and flowers so it was worth it. There was a giant metal and glass greenhouse right where you go in that was amazing. There were huge trees in there that reach all the way to the top. They must cut them periodically because they were brushing the top of the structure. While in there we lost Ginny's friend Lynn. Me and Ginny had gone up the spiral staircase to see the view from the balcony and when we came down she was gone. We spent quite awhile looking for her and finally found her walking. I guess she had gone off to look at other things, but we didn't know where she had gone and spent a long time looking for her. Then we walked with her looking for bluebells. We had to walk a really long way and they were already started to die, but they were kind of cool. And the walk took us past Queen Charlotte's cottage which was pretty cool. On the walk back to the entrance we went by the Japanese pagoda which apparently was used to test bombs during WWII. We couldn't go in, but I guess they drilled holes through all the floors so they could see how bombs would fall.

We headed back to the hotel after the gardens. I went and checked into the hotel that I was staying in and took a nap. Then I met Ginny and Lynn again around 6:30 and we went to dinner. We thought about Greek, but ended up at Rodizio Rico the Brazilian BBQ. Lynn thought it was great and the food was awesome again. After dinner Lynn wanted to go to some bar in Covent Garden that someone had told them about the day before. I didn't really know what it was but said I would go. Turns out they had a live band playing that night. Lynn had fun, but I don't think Aunt Ginny had a great time. We stayed a couple hours and then headed out. I was beat from getting up so early and fell asleep immediately when I got home.

Saturday I met Ginny and Lynn around 9:30 and we headed to the Portobello Road market. It was really fun. Not how it looked in Bedknobs and Broomsticks, but still cool. I ended up with a cool ring and Ginny and Lynn bought all kinds of stuff. I don't know how they are going to get all of their purchases home. After the market I headed back to Poole as they were going to see a show that evening. I got home around 9 after an hour's bus delay at the station. I don't know what happened, but the 5 and 6 o'clock buses both showed up at 6. But I made it back.

Today I have to get some groceries and try to get some dissertation stuff done. Then I have dinner at Melissa's at 7. This week I have to get a ton of work done because on the 8th I'm going to Paris for two days and won't get anything done there. So here are the pics for this week. Talk to you later.

Party Week

Sorry I'm getting this up late, I had a long night, but we'll get to that at the end. This week started with nothing too exciting going on. I have my last paper of my last class to turn in on Monday so I worked a bit on that. Tuesday I had a meeting with my advisor about my dissertation. Turns out I may have to go to Southampton to go to their library because it's bigger and better stocked than the one here. But that should only take a day or two so it might be fun. I also might be able to arrange to go to some museums and see the bones if I can find a collection of them that is easily accessable. So I have to buckle down this week and get this thing started. Then later on Tuesday was cocktail night at Kukui, a new Hawaiian themed cocktail bar in Bournemouth. They have big sharing cocktails there so we wanted to try it out. We got dressed up to go, so that was fun as well. And the drinks were really tasty. We ended up spending about 4 hours there and there was hardly anyone else in the place so we could just sit and chat.

Wednesday was more paper work and some shopping for costume stuff. Thursday was pretty much the same, but for lunch I got a banana split with Melissa. The pub we always go to is having an 80's themed month and for whatever reason they think banana splits are 80s. They don't really know how to make a banana split here though as there was only chocolate syrup on it and no nuts. Oh well, it was pretty tasty still. I also got the black wig for my goth costume for the party I was throwing on Saturday, so it was a pretty good day until I got home and started to get a migraine. I went to be really early and it was gone by the time I woke up, but it still kind of ruined my night.

Friday I finished my paper. I just have to do a bit more editing and it will be ready for submission tomorrow. After I finished I came home and started dinner. I was making beef stroganoff and because I make it on the stove instead of a slow cooker I have to let it simmer for about 3 hours to get the meat really soft. It was worth it though because it was really good. I also baked a butternut squash as I was having Melissa over for dinner and wanted to have something to go with the stroganoff. Both things turned out good and it was a fun, relaxing night. We also planned a bbq for next week, so that should be fun as well.

Saturday I went to the gym in the morning and then cleaned my kitchen for the goth/emo/Stine's going away party. My friend Stine is going to Norway for 8 weeks to work on an excavation there and is leaving next week so we wanted to have a going away party. We had also been talking about having a goth/emo party for months but no one ever planned it so we decided to combine the two. Getting ready was ridiculously fun because the makeup was so intense. I've never colored my eyebrows in before and doing it in black was crazy. Then putting on the wig I barely recognized myself. We took a ton of photos so you can see what I mean. The whole outfit was crazy and even fake corsets are really hard to breathe in. We went to a rock club in Bournemouth where pretty much everyone was dressed like us. It was really fun, but by the end of the night my feet were killing me. As was my knee because I had fallen off the bus when we got to Bournemouth. But I guess it will match the other knee now from when I fell carrying scuba equipment. Oh well, I'll live.

Well, I suppose that's all. The pictures speak for themselves really. Enjoy and I'll talk to you later.

Late

I may be late getting this up tomorrow as tonight is the Emo/Goth party. So here is a link to the pics from cocktail night and I'll get the goth pics and the blog entry up as soon as I can. Later! Link

Planning week

Well, this was a very exciting week for me, but won't make for a very exciting blog entry, really. On Monday I handed in my second to last assignment for the taught part of my course. It was one of the hardest ever to write papers, but it's done now, so I don't care. Now I just have my assemblage report to write and I will be done! Just the dissertation to work on. After the hand-in Stine, Melissa and I went to a coffee/juice bar called The Dancing Goat to get juice. We'd found the place a long time ago, but hadn't had time to get back there to actually buy anything. The juice was really good and the mini blueberry muffin was also delicious. We walked home from the juice bar and then I went shopping with my flatmate, Baitalikee, because we needed pizza making ingredients. Monday was her birthday and she wanted to make home-made pizzas. Later that afternoon I made her chocolate muffins with peanut butter cups in them for her cake. Then around 7 we started the pizza. Gareth, my other flatmate, got really into it and tried throwing the crust. He wasn't very good at it though. B really liked making the pizza dough, but wasn't such a fan of rolling it out, so I ended up doing a lot of rolling. But they turned out pretty good and I think she had a nice birthday.

Tuesday I didn't do a whole lot. I did plan a goth/emo going away party for Stine, who is going to Norway to excavate for 2 months. That is happening next Saturday and should be very fun. I also hosted Taco Tuesday because I really wanted Mexican food. The taco seasoning here isn't quite right, but it was better than nothing.

Then on Wednesday night I got a text from Sara saying that she had bought her ticket to London for our trip to Italy in July. So that was super exciting!!

Thursday I bought the tickets from Bournemouth to Pisa so our trip is a go! I'm so excited! Then after lunch I went to Bournemouth with Stine to go to the costume shop to look for costumes for the party. I got a red corset with black lace. It is amazingly hard to breathe in, but Stine assures me it will get easier if I wear it around my room a few times before the part to get used to it. We'll see. If I pass out at the party, we'll know that didn't work :) Then Thursday late afternoon I went to the train station with Danielle to book our train tickets to Cardiff, Wales. We're going in early July for a few days while her friend from Canada is here. After we got the tickets we came back and booked the hotel. Then we looked at train tickets to Paris and found a good deal, so we booked those as well. We'll book the hotel next week. So that was really exciting. I'm going to Italy, France and Wales!

Friday I went to school to attempt to get some work done. I did get some done and have a much better idea of what I'm suppose to do for this assignment. So that's good. I just need to make a lot of tables so that I can do the comparisons and get the writing done. It shouldn't be too bad and I can hopefully get it done by Friday so that I don't have to worry about it over the weekend.

Saturday I went to the gym in the morning and then went to another grocery store looking for coffee flavouring syrup. They didn't have it, but another store had a really cute pair of shoes that I got. Then I came home and got a bit of dissertation preliminary work done for my meeting with Mark on Tuesday.

This morning I had an email from Mom that she and Dad got their tickets to come and visit last night, so they'll be coming at the end of July. So all in all it was a very exciting week for me, but the weeks that I actually take these trips will be much more exciting blog entries. Well, take care and I hope to hear from you soon.

Park and Food Fest

Hello! Well, this week was a bit more interesting than last. I have some fun pictures, anyway. I have a paper due on Monday so I was pretending to work on that for most of the week, but Monday was a bank holiday here. I'm not exactly sure what bank holidays are, but most people get the day off and banks and lots of stores are closed. So me and a few friends decided to go down to Bournemouth to hang out. We had originally planned on going to the beach, but it was cold and windy so we couldn't do that :( We did walk down by the beach though to get lunch. On our way we went through the park where we got to take some cool pictures. Then we ate at a restaurant with a beach view, so that was nice. After lunch we wandered down along the beach and then Melissa made us stand in the sand to take a picture. I didn't want to because I don't like having sand in my shoes, but then I caved. Then when we were just sitting along the edge of the sidewalk by the beach Sytske decided to be mean and put sand on me, which then fell down into my shoe. I was very upset, but she got herself back by throwing sand in the air and having it blow back into her hair. When we turned around from the beach we saw a dark black cloud coming in so we decided to head away from the beach. We didn't make it all the way to the store we were heading for when it started raining, so we ducked into a pub for some coffee. I got a mug with the queen on it!

It stopped raining after about a half hour or so so we headed for the square. They were having a bazaar of some sort and were selling crepes, so we had to get some. They sell them at every festival here. These were especially good ones as the actual crepe had vanilla or almond or something in it. Then it was filled with banana and chocolate. Mmmmm.... When we were finished we went to a store to look at jewelry as they were having a sale. Nothing caught our fancy, but there was a really cool pair of shoes that I loved. I tried them on and had to take off my sandy socks to do so, so I'm sure I left sand in the shoes... I wasn't sure when I would ever wear them though, so I didn't get them. After shopping we walked around in another smaller park and then headed home as it was looking like it might rain again.

Tuesday I didn't do much, but Wednesday I went to the Slug and Lettuce to study with Stine. They have an 80s menu on because they are celebrating their 25th anniversary. So we got club sandwiches for lunch. They didn't come with fries so we ordered those as well. When we got the sandwich we realized why it didn't come with fries. It was HUGE! Chicken, bacon, lettuce, tomato and tons of mayo between 3 layers of toasted white bread. And coleslaw on the side. It was delicious though. They also have banana splits on the menu, so I'll be going back for one of those.

Thursday and Friday I spent reading for and writing my paper. Then yesterday I went to an International Food Festival in Christchurch. Danielle and I took the train to Christchurch and then just wandered through the stalls all afternoon. We got some Spanish food and then Italian stuff. Then we saw a beer festival at a pub so we stopped in there for awhile. After that we got pork sandwiches from a hog roast booth. They were amazing.

Then that evening I had people over to my flat just to hang out. We just chatted and caught up since we don't see each other as often anymore now that we don't have classes. Monday is my flatmate's birthday, so I have to go and find a present for her today. Then I'm making her chocolate muffins for a cake, as that is what she requested. Well, here are the pics from the week. They are at the end of the album. I also ran out of bbq sauce this week, so if anyone felt the need to send me some (the Aldi's kind) I would love them forever ;)

Boring

Hello!! I'm sorry to say that this week's post is going to be quite boring. And all the more so because last week's was so long and picture filled. So I apologize in advance.

This week we had to do a full week of 9-5 lab analysis. We had assessed our faunal (animal bone) assemblage early this term and now we had to do a full analysis of it. That meant going through every bag of bone and identifying what bone it was and what animal it came from. This wasn't so bad for the cows, sheep, and pigs, but when it came to birds it was pretty bad. I put birds off until Thursday, but they still took their toll. They are very small with very tiny differences that mean the difference between one species and another. I hated this because I already hate birds and it turns out I'm really bad at telling the difference between their bones. But I finally finished after about 6 or 7 hours work. Then it was back to normal animals again. But I managed to finish by about 2:30 on Friday, which was awesome because I figured I'd be there all night.

Anyway, this whole experience just showed me that I don't want to have a job. I would leave my flat at 8 in the morning and not get back until about 6:30 or 7 and everything would be closed so I'd make myself some dinner, watch a movie and go to bed. What a boring life :(

On Thursday night we decided we should treat ourselves to dinner and a movie. We went to Wagamama, a Japanese noodle bar. When we ordered the waiter told us that they serve the dishes as soon as they are done so they don't always come out at the same time. Stine's dish came first and she started eating it. About 10 minutes later I still didn't have mine but wasn't sure how long it would take to cook or anything. Finally the waiter came over and said that he had forgotten to send my order in so he had talked to the chef and he was going to cook it really quickly. By the time I got it Stine was finished so then she had to watch me eat. It was a very bizarre experience and the food wasn't all that good. We did wonder later how long we would have sat there before asking about my food. They just really threw us with the pointing out that they didn't come at the same time. Weird. So then we headed over to the movie theater. I got a giant Ben and Jerry's sundae. It was delicious. And we saw Iron Man 2, which was pretty good.

Friday I finished early and came home and did nothing. I went for a walk with my flatmate and was asleep by about 10 :( Then Saturday I went to Bournemouth to meet my friend after work. We went shopping and I got the most awesome dress ever. It's white with black polka dots and is 50s inspired. So cute. Then we went to dinner and got mac and cheese. It was really delicious.

Today we were suppose to go to the beach, but it is rainy and cold so we're postponing. I may make paella tonight. I'm making it with a friend though, so we have to see what's going on with both of us. Otherwise we'll do it tomorrow. But we bought all the ingredients this morning, so I'm excited for it.

Well, sorry that this was such a boring post. Hopefully next week will be better. If it's nice we plan to do a lot of outdoor activities so that should be fun. Have a great week and I hope to hear from you soon.