April 5: The Design Museum

This morning in "Contemporary Britain" class we talked about Jack the Ripper. And that's all. I have no clue why the professor felt that discussing the old murder story for 3 hours would some how help us better understand contemporary Britain, but apparently he did. After lunch, we headed across Tower Bridge to go to the Design Museum for Museums class. I have to say, it wasn't nearly as big or "museum-y" as I had expected. It really just had two exhibits, one that displayed a bunch of new and innovative stuff in fashion, transportation, graphics, and furniture, and one that had a travelling display about the Dutch typography guy Wim Crouwel. Then on the main floor was a gift shop and a cafe. The end. The good part was, it was a really pretty walk there from the Tower Tube Station. I hadn't actually walked across Tower Bridge yet, so that was one more thing to cross off my list. Tonight I made sausage and potatoes for dinner. I will definitely miss Waitrose's apple sausages when I go back State-side. Tonight a friend went out to Metrogate to print something and brought back my mail, which was a singing "Tangled" birthday card from "Erin, Dad, Mom, Maggie, Lily Belle, George, Gus, and everybody else." I can't believe I'll turn 21 in a few days. I also can't believe there's just 17 days left till I go home! I'm not ready!!!

April 4: I Feed the Birds

Class was boring but the day was just beautiful, so I set out for Hyde Park in the afternoon with a breadbag full of crushed up tidbits for the pigeons. I laid down little handfulls of crumbs to all the pigeons I saw in the gardens. They're just such fun to watch. Everyone else seems to hate them but I think they're pretty. Some of them are really amazingly pretty, especially the ones that have iridescent feathers that shine in the sun. After hearing almost constant complaints and threats to the birds from my flatmates, it was really nice to get out and be able to just enjoy feeding the birds without being judged. Anyway, I don't see why everyone gets so worked up about the "flying rats." They are a heck of a lot cleaner than most people I know and probably smarter. Plus, they always manage to poop on the people who hate them most, which just makes me giggle. I like pigeons.

I found a bench tucked away in a nice big yew tree, surrounded by some really pretty wallflowers and a lovely camellia. I started throwing my hand fulls of crumbs and the first bird to show up was one of the big, wild wood pigeons that I love watching. They're very different from the usual rock pigeons, and are much bigger and heftier. They're a lighter gray than most of the common pigeons, with a white crescent around their neck and a rosy-ish breast. They are much, much, much shier than the rock pigeons, and usually I don't see them come in for crumbs until after all people have left so I was pretty excited to have found myself one. I had soon gathered a pretty good sized flock. There were probably around a dozen rock pigeons plus my wood pigeon who showed up for the handout. Most were the dark gray normal color that I love, but a few had some white splashes, and one had clean white freckles all around his neck. The wood pigeon decided he definitely did not like the rock pigeons so to keep the peace I would toss him the big pieces a little ways away so he could eat in peace. As I was watching my flock eat, feeling smug and satisfied in the little nook in the yew surrounded by cooing and pecking, I spotted a little flash in the center of the tree to my right. A little European Robin was hopping around in the darkness at the center of the tree, watching me with interest. I smushed some crumbs really fine and set them on the seat next to me, not expecting anything, but the little bird hopped on over and grabbed the biggest crumb and proceeded to munch it! He stuck around, too, singing and chirping little robin noises in the tree next to me, occasionally stopping by for a quick bite. I was in absolute heaven.

After awhile, I left the pigeons and the robin to their scavengings and took a little walk around the garden area, looking at all the pretty signs of spring. The daffodils and magnolias and camellia's are all almost done blooming, which seems crazy. I can't believe it's so late in the season here! The leaves on the trees are getting bigger and greener every day. I decided to swing by my pigeon-feeding spot on my return walk, and they were still there, pecking away, so I tossed them the last of the crumbs so they could go nuts. Just as I was about to leave, I saw my little robin, who I have named "Kevin,"  lurking in the yew, so I set some of the little crumblies left in the bag on the top of the bench, and he flew right down and started pigging out, like Maggie does with oreos. After he had filled up, he fluffed his orange feathers and started singing, with the contented pigeons cooing along. What an absolutely perfect afternoon!

Oh, yeah, and the most exciting part of the whole day: I found a blooming lilac!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LILAC!!!

Dog fountain with daffodils

Star Magnolia in a planting...Mom, I think we are going to have to go with this one

Camellia

Some kind of holly-looking plant with the craziest orange flowers that smelled just heavenly!!! I don't know what the heck it is, but I love it!

Leopard's Bane

My wood pigeon friend, Hubert

There's my little Robin buddy, Kevin

He was a little piggy!

I love my new camera!

The flock

The pigeons and the little robin

"Oops" (He, he!)

Crown Imperial

Kevin, singing his little head off!

This camellia isn't much to look at, but it smelled so absolutely amazingly, I just had to take a picture to remember the wonderful fragrance!

April 3: Football, Soccer-Style

Today we went to a football match, Fulham vs. Blackpool. We took the Tube to Putney Bridge, then picked out some men wearing bright orange jerseys and goofy, white and orange spiky hats (the colors of Blackpool) and followed them to the stadium. We were all wearing black and white in support of Fulham, mostly because A) Fulham has a very attractive American bloke on their team and B) Most of us don't have any orange in our wardrobe but we're all set for black. We had pretty darn good seats, behind one of the goals. The first half was particularly fun. Fulham was obviously the better team, and since the goal in front of us belonged to Blackpool, we got to see a lot of action. Fulham scored two goals in the first half. Then at half-time, their mascot came dancing out and we all had to laugh because he looked just like Bucky Badger! Turns out they call their guy Billy Badger. We definitely picked the right team to support! The second half seemed a lot less exciting, though Fulham did score one more time. A few guys got hurt, one from a nasty-looking kick to the leg and another two when they rammed noggins both going to head the ball. After the game, I came back to work on some homework and start preparing to sign up for next semester's classes. 

Billy Badger

FFC

April 2: Stonehenge, Old Sarum, Salisbury

A BIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIG day! We hopped on the bus at 9 and headed out to Stonehenge. The drive was pretty, through picturesque English countryside inhabited by lots of cows, sheep, and pigs. There are lots of little light yellow primroses blooming in the shady ditches that I just love, and a tallish shrubby dark green foliaged plant with little bright yellow flowers that looks interesting. Stonehenge was just as amazing as it was the first time I visited. It's just so impressive. I love how it's in the middle of nowhere, just rising out of a field. All over the plain, little burial mounds dot the view. Inside each are the remains of one or more ancients. Only some have been excavated. I learned (or was reminded) that there was originally a tall mound of soil in a circle around the stones, so entering the space would have been even more dramatic. I remember that last time I was there, there were lots of sheep grazing right next to the the circle, but this time they were a little farther off. Just as we started taking pictures, a sprinkler system turned on. How silly is that?! Can't they do that at night, when there aren't people trying to get a dramatic picture of Stonehenge? Thankfully, the weather held up even though it was supposed to rain. It was windy, but pretty warm. There were a bunch of "crows" (by which I mean big black birds of some sort. I'm not entirely sure what they call them here) building nests in the cracks between the stones, which was funny to watch. They were all flying around with sticks and competing for the best ones. Spring is in the air!

Silly sprinkler

Crow with a stick

After Stonehenge, we drove over to see a site that I hadn't even known existed. "Old Sarum" was a fortified city with a castle, built on a hill over modern Salisbury. Turns out, Salisbury's original name was "New Sarum," and it was built to replace the old city when they decided to move. The main castle and moat and such were built in 1069 after the Norman conquest for William the Conqueror, and Henry I added a more elaborate palace complex in the early 1100s. It was pretty amazing to think of the place as a whole town, since the whole area was only about twice the size of my yard at home. The complex was built to be impregnable, and the elaborate defense system is still pretty darn impressive. It's built on top of several layers of man-made hills, which rise out of the mostly flat countryside. The walls are worn down to just a few feet in most areas, and were built of flint stuck into mortar. Standing on top of the hill, we had a lovely view of the city of Salisbury in the valley below.

Moat around Old Sarum

The view from one of the sides

Behind me is the outline of the ruins of the old cathedral

View of Salisbury Cathedral

Friends up on the wall: Sarah, Ariel, me and Pa

Salisbury Cathedral

After touring Old Sarum, we made our way down to New Sarum, now called Salisbury. We were released for lunch, and given some suggestions by the guide. A few friends and I made our way to a pub called The Red Lion, which has been in operation since the 1200s. They think it's the oldest hotel/pub in the country, built 800 years ago to house the workers who had to build the cathedral. I ordered an egg and cress sandwich, which was very good. After, we made our way back to the cathedral to meet the guide. She took us around, pointing out the famous dead people buried there and the really amazing bits of art and architecture. I really love that cathedral. It's just pretty. It wasn't originally built to include a tall spire (which was added in 1320, 100 years after the main part was built), so inside you can see where some of the columns directly under the spire are literally bowed inwards from the extra weight. In the courtyard of the cathedral are two Cedars of Lebanon, which were planted there in 1837 to mark Queen Victoria's coronation. I vividly remember wondering what kinds of trees they were when I visited Salisbury the first time.

The entire outside of the church is covered in saints and

do-gooders. Here are St. Nicholas and St. George

Cedars of Lebanon

The Nave

Really pretty stained glass in a chapel

I think this was the North Transept

I asked a friend to take a picture of me with the cathedral

and the spire...well, at least you can see me and the lovely gray stone!

The drive home was a long one, and our driver did a pretty good job at making the majority of us at least slightly car sick. I had chicken and rice for supper, then settled down to read and rest. I'm mostly better, but my nose is all stuffy now and that has gives me weird sinus headaches from time to time. I'm kind of impressed at how fast this cold went though. Yay!

April 1: A dip in the Thames

Well, a few of us decided to do something a little different today, so we headed over to the River Thames for a nice little swim. It was a little cold at first, and a bit brown and cloudy, but after all my toes went numb it was quite refreshing. Then the Queen showed up and hopped in with us. Ha. April Fool!

I'm still sick so that's the best I could come up with in my feverish state. Last night was awful. The fever finally went away around 4am so I got some sleep till 8 when the construction down stairs started up. The fever came back with a vengence this morning so I figured I'd better spend the day at home. I felt a lot better around 1:30, and I think I was fever-free for a few hours, but now it's dinnertime and it's back. Freaking fever. I'm hoping that I'll be able to shake it by tomorrow for our big Stonehenge/Salisbury trip, but I'm going either way, come hell or high water.

March 31: Sick

I am sick. I do not like it. I didn't sleep well at all last night, in spite of the tylenol pm. I had weird and disturbing fever dreams all night. Everything hurts, especially my throat. Tea helps, but I can't be drinking tea every waking moment, so mostly I just hurt. I can't decide if I'm too hot or too cold or what. It is not fun. I went to History class this afternoon, but I'm not entirely sure how I made it there. I was walking to class and thinking about how I should pick up some brown sugar from the grocery store for my tea after class was over, and I somehow found myself inside the grocery store. I guess I thought I was walking to class. It was really strange. Anyway, I went to class to learn about the Blitz in London, but instead of going on an educational walk with the professor, I came home and drank more tea...with brown sugar, of course, since I now have a nice new bag of it. I am just icky. Gonna drug myself to sleep tonight and hope I wake up better.

The good news is, the fish I ordered for the tank at home finally came in and Mom says they look great and seem ok so far. We now have some really nice long-finned albino and calico Ancistrus. Yay!

March 30: Tea and a Ballet



Me with my friends Pa and Sarah at tea



Because we had such a busy afternoon with tea scheduled, our Travel Journal professor gave us the day off. All us girls on the second floor spent the afternoon comparing outfits and dressing up. We left for tea at 4, which was at the Gore Hotel, a really fancy place just a few blocks away from our flat. Tea was very nice. They brought us lots of little sandwiches with roast beef, ham, egg, salmon, and such, two very fresh scones with clotted cream and black currant jam, and dessert trays. The dessert options were amazing. I ate two of the freshly made eclairs. They were beyond delicious. The ballet didn't start till 7:30, and apparently they expected us to just stay at the tea place and leave directly from there, but that of course was way too much time sitting in a hot tea room, so we came back to our place before leaving for the ballet.

The ballet, Cinderella, was incredible. I had soooo much fun! The dancers were amazing, and the costumes were wonderful and I just thoroughly enjoyed myself. The backgrounds and costumes were done in muted, darkish tones, so the Prince and Cinderella in white and silver just sparkled. Cinderella's coachmen, lizards, mice, and a frog, all had very elaborate animal costumes, and I just can't imagine how they managed to dance with such gigantic masks and outfits. Our seats were in the top balcony, the third one up, but we could still see everything quite well. The best part of the night was when Cinderella came on stage in her ballgown costume, and a little girl behind me let out this giant gasp of wonder and astonishment. It was adorable.

On the tube ride home, I notice that my throat kind of hurt, which was odd, and then when we got home, all of a sudden I started feeling horribly sick. It happened within about 10 minutes, so I had no clue what was going on, so I figured I'd better get to bed as soon as possible. I was not feeling well at all.