So... quick run through

In my last post I mentioned the first castle we went to, and one of the first cathedrals we visted. We have visited many more since, and I will mention all of them, and if anything stood out, but I'm going to try and get through them a little quicker. Cover more ground quicker, if you will.

Thursday (June 28) brought about another field trip. The first stop was to Rochester! This was our first castle RUIN, as Dover was still pretty much in tact. I divided my time between wandering around, admiring the scenery, and wandering around bemoaning the fact I did not have my camera. There was a very exciting moment when I tripped going down a flight of stairs, and grabbed the handle before I wiped out. I happened to do this right in front of my friend Lorraine, who proceeded to FREAK OUT about the fact I could be rolling down the steep flight of stairs. I assured her that despite the fact I am not at all coordinated, I have quick reflexes, and good aim, the combination resulting in my tripping A LOT, but not often actually falling. There were a couple of Dickens related sites here, but as I'm not in the Romantic Literature class and have read very little Dickens, this didn't interest me as much. I also only did a quick tour of the cathedral there. The reason being this: second hand bookstores. There were three that I saw in this town. I sadly only made it to one, but it was a very good stop for me. I got an early edition of The Problem of Pain by C.S. Lewis for 2 pounds and a copy of Ben Hur for 1.50 pounds. We were a little late getting back to the bus, but I AM UNREPENTANT! Dr. Ryken handled our tardiness with his characteristic maturity.

Next stop was Penshurst. This was a beautiful manor that Dr. Ryken called the archetypal English country house. The house was pretty cool, but the gardens here were amazing! There was a different garden around every corner. There were fountains, and ponds, and trees woven together to make a natural fence. I wanted to be there with my mother. The English REALLY know how to garden. I was excited to head back to London because I was planning on meeting up with my Uncle Harry and Aunty Donna, who were in England for both academic purposes and pleasure purposes, mostly likely with some overlap between those two categories. I don't get to see them very often, so I was excited to catch up with them! So naturally, there was a lot of traffic and we got back over an hour later than I was hoping. Thankfully this was only tenish minutes after I said I would meet up with Aunty Donna and Uncle Harry. They were sitting outside of our hotel when we pulled up. They had eaten dinner, but offered to take me somewhere as I had not. As college professors, they are obviously aware of importance that the majority of college students place on food, due perhaps to a general shortage of funds and time for food preparation. They bought me dinner. I was very grateful for this, and greatly enjoyed their company and catching up a little with them.

Aunty Donna and I. Photo cred goes to Uncle Harry. :)

Friday we began the day pretty early with an excursion to Westminster Abbey. We managed to be the first group inside! Despite this, there were still some transit difficulties. It happened to be around the time when many Londoners were heading to work. The first train pulls up and it already looks filled to the brim. Despite this, most of the group managed to squeeze on. There were probably about 6 of us that didn't quite fit on, and we waited for the next train. It soon arrived, looking equally full as the last one. We soon found the proper technique was just jump on and pray you can fit everything inside when the doors close. I found myself squeezed next to Ian Campbell (again, not my boyfriend, but my boyfriends roommate.) It had been slightly awkward between the two of us since he had forgotten me for the show on Wednesday night. At this point however, he does the equivalent of leaning over (there really wasn't much room to ACTUALLY lean) and says, "Elizabeth, I've always wanted us to be closer." I laughingly replied that I wasn't sure Ian (Ian my boyfriend Ian) would agree with him, at least in this manner. That pretty effectively broke the ice. When we got to the abbey, it was a pretty impressive to say the least. It was especially nice because it was still relatively quiet inside. Everyone got excited when we got to the poets corner. It was pretty cool to see but what I got excited about was the grave of George Frideric Handel. Of course I will be the first to admit that poetry isn't really my thing. After that we visited the Tower of London. It wasn't the longest or most thorough trip through, as it was raining outside and crowded inside. We did walk through the crown jewels section though. Wow. There are some BIG gemstones in there. Not to mention a golden punch bowl I could probably take a bath in. It was rather dazzling. After a quick romp through the gift shop where I found some gifts for my family, we departed. I couldn't find tickets to any shows that I wished to attend so once again, while the vast majority of my classmates went off to see something, I remained behind at our hotel.

Saturday we made a trip out to Hampton Court. I would say this was one of my favorite stops so far. The inside displays were very well put together regarding the various monarchs they depicted. There were several on Henry VIII, there was also a really interesting display of paintings entitles, "The Wild, The Beautiful, and the Damned" that I really enjoyed. The gardens here were absolutely spectacular as well. I am also pretty sure Henry VIII walked past me when I was exploring the gardens. I have decided at this point my favorite style of English garden is the enclosed sunken gardens, of which Hampton Court had two. I took a panoramic picture of a similar style of garden from Kensington Park, which is in a previous blog post. I also grabbed lunch there and made friends with a dog who was only too willing to let me lavish attention on her.

I had heard of a group who wanted to go to a play version of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, so I decided to join them. Possibly half an hour after we got back, we started RUNNING to the Tube station to try and make the matinee. We RAN through several Tube stations, and made the fatal mistake of getting off a stop too early, so we then had to RUN through all of Kensington Park. Kensington Park is HUGE!!! We made it five minutes after the show had started.  So we ordered our tickets for the evening show. Four row seats for 25 pounds thanks to our student status is pretty awesome. Especially if you are getting a 15 pound rebate after that. In the meantime, some of us grabbed ice cream, and myself and two of the other girls made a stop at the Sherlock Holmes museum. The three of us took turns taking pictures with the policeman outside while we each work the Sherlock hat and held a pipe. It was seriously fun. The inside was set up as it might have been for the "real" Sherlock and Watson, including props from some of their various adventures from the books. The house being very crowded, I explored quickly and once again wished I had had my camera. We headed back to the Park for the show. It was great! The technical quality of the show alone was fantastic. And it's C.S. Lewis. I have always been more of a Lewis fan over Tolkien.

Photo cred to Emily Lorraine Richardson

I had finally made it to a show! With a group of three girls that I love, and Ian (not boyfriend). It was really great. While my time in London was not over, it began to draw to a close. Only one day remained.  However, you shall have to wait to hear about that day another time.

Getting caught up to Oxford (Tuesday, June 26 - Wednesday, June 27)

As I write this I am sitting in the window seat of my room at St. Anne's College in Oxford England. I am woefully behind on keeping this blog updated. So much has happened and so quickly that I have not had the time. When I left off we were heading to a performance or A Midsummer Night's Dream. It was.... not what we were expecting. For those who are familiar with the play, the relationship between Theseus and Hippolyta was a clearly abusive one, and the society they and the four lovers inhabited we decided was supposed to imitate a gypsy or traveler culture. The fairies were much darker than I had imagined them as well. There were a couple scenes that... well, let's just say it shocked a large group of Wheaton students. We were NOT expecting them. So that caused much discussion in our group.

Then on Tuesday (June 26), we had our first outing. It was to Canterbury and Dover. After our English breakfast at the hotel (scrambled eggs, toast, bacon, and tea for me!), we piled onto the bus, and off we went. Our first stop was Canterbury. We gathered in the square outside of the beautiful cathedral. I noticed across the way a small ceramics store. Naturally, I immediately yearned to go inside. However, it was time to go into Canterbury Cathedral. We filtered in, and split into several groups for our tours. The first thing I noticed was the beautiful large stained glass window at the back of the cathedral. It was one of the few in the entire church that had been spared when the iconoclasm of the Puritans swept through England. Much of what we heard about was the murder of Thomas Becket which took place in the cathedral. His tomb was displayed prominently until again it was destroyed by the Puritans. Now there is simply a candle burning where it used to be.

After we departed from the cathedral, I convinced my lovely friend Irene to accompany me into the ceramics store. There were two floors filled with beautiful vessels. I also chatted with the man who had made all of it. He said he had ELEVEN electric kilns. I was in awe! I bought myself a mug that had the Canterbury cross on it, and promised Irene I would make her a goblet once we were back at Wheaton.

 Next stop was Dover Castle. As Caterbury Cathedral was our first cathedral, Dover was our first castle. It was beautiful. As you can possibly guess, as a huge group of English enthusiasts, this place really inspired our imagination. At least, it inspired MY imagination. I explored every inch of the place, spending a long time up on the roof, taking many pictures. I also wandered around outside the walls, admiring the gorgeous color of the sea, and gazing across The Chanel, in hopes of many catching a glimpse of France. Despite the beautiful weather, I don't think I quite managed. We soon headed back to the hotel after this.

Depending on how tired I am after relating the happenings of Wednesday, this might be it for this particular post. Wednesday, June 27 has been the low point of my trip so far. There were good parts, and horrible parts. The morning began with a relatively quick visit to Southwark Cathedral. It is decidedly one of the oldest cathedrals in England, and parts of it are VERY old. I don't have any pictures from inside the church, as it was a couple pounds to do this, and I wasn't really willing to fork over money just to take pictures.

After that we were free to wander around, and grab lunch before we were to attend a play at the Globe Theatre. We were going to see Henry V specifically, but more on that later. A pretty large group of us decided to go to see if we could find relatively inexpensive theater tickets for later in the evening. Now at least for me, this was much easier said than done. There were SO MANY shows I wanted to attend that were currently playing in London. I divided them into three groups: musicals I had seen (Jersey Boys, We Will Rock You, Phantom, and Wicked), musicals I have not seen and wanted too (Le Miserables, The Lion King, Singing in the Rain, Sweeny Todd, and a very new production of one of my favorite childhood books Matilda), and musicals I would not be going to (Shrek the Musical, The Wizard of Oz, etc.) I decided to try and see Le Mis, cause I've heard great things about it, and had not viewed it. However, the seats were VERY expensive and there was a general lack of student deals. I also had no desire to pay money to see Phantom performed again. Once was plenty. Therefore I decided to align myself with the smaller group that wanted to see Sweeny Todd. We got our tickets, and THEN I decided I wanted to go with the group that went back to St. Paul's Cathedral to climb to the top. With my recent breathing problems, I knew this was going to be a challenge for me, but it was one I really wanted to accomplish. With our looming play performance later, maybe I should have waited for when I would be taking up my own time. I didn't though. It was a struggle. I lagged behind the group, and was quickly out of breathe and soaked in sweat. London was extremely humid while we were there. One of the guys in our group was really kind and stayed with me throughout my trial. And I did make it to the top. It was a LOT of stairs. The view was beautiful! Downstairs wasn't quite as hard as upstairs, but it wasn't easy either. I wanted to rush into the gift shop quickly to buy a CD of the boys choir, while the others grabbed food there, but then they decided they were going to go somewhere cheaper. Having been holding them up all afternoon already, I rushed to buy my CD. Having forgotten I had tossed my camera into the top of my backpack after taking pictures at the top of St. Paul's, I quickly unzipped my bag to grab my wallet, and my camera fell out. Holding a CD, an empty bottle from my hasty lunch, and balancing my backpack, I didn't have the hands to grab it. I didn't have time to check on it then. I made my purchase and rushed to join my group. When they paused to grab lunch, I tentatively pulled my camera from my bag. As I opened the case it was in, I couldn't help but notice, my lens was no longer attached to my camera body. My heart sank, until I decided to try and just stick it back on. It went on.... and then came apart again. The plastic grooves that help the lens in place had broken off. Wanting to break into tears there and then, I carefully replaced my camera into it's case, and then into my backpack, and as we walked to the Globe, started brainstorming what to do. We got to the Globe, and took our seats, and I couldn't help but take my camera out to try and fix it somehow. I finally got around to trying to take a picture with it, and I did! This gave me hope that nothing more serious was wrong.

Then the play began! It was great! The only problem was our seats. The main character (Henry) often stood center stage for a good portion of his scenes. There also happened to be a pillar in between where we sat and where he stood. This was particularly sad because King Henry was pretty darn attractive. We did our best to follow the plot and understand the few portions spoken in French, and then I, already emotionally drained, decided to head back to the hotel. I collapsed on my bed, occasionally chatting with one of my roommates, while I waited for one of the people in my group that was heading to Sweeny Todd got a hold of me. And waited. I finally decided to start searching for Ian (not my boyfriend, his roommate. It's not at all confusing) as he had my ticket. He was not in the hotel. Not even a little bit in the hotel. Trying not to panic, I went back to my room and mapped out what the best way to get to the theater, packed up what I thought I might need, and headed for the Tube station, praying I would run into someone in my group on the way. Once I got to the station, I stood around for a couple of moments, and headed back towards the hotel. I wasn't willing to waste money on using the Tube when I wasn't sure I could definitely get where I was going, and I didn't have a clue where my ticket was. At a light, Dr. Coolidge and her husband of all people came up behind me and asked me how my day was. As soon as I started talking, I started crying despite my best efforts. They offered to help me get there, but at this point all I wanted to do was go to sleep. I headed back, hoping my room was empty, and when it was not, took a quick shower for some privacy. Dr. Coolidge came and checked on me, and after I had convinced her I just wanted the day to be over and wasn't interested in trying to make it to the theater still, I went to bed.

As I said, this was without a doubt the worst day I had on my trip so far. And even then, there were good parts. And it gets better!!!! While my camera has still not been repaired, it's a priority for me, now that I'm in Oxford. I would try to get more caught up, but it's getting late, and my freshly laundered pajamas call for me. :)  Stay tuned for happier adventures!

Second and Third Day in London!

So after my relatively sleep deprived night in England and my early breakfast our whole group headed over to St. Paul's Cathedral where we were going to attend church. It was beautiful! I can't give you any images from the inside of the church, because no photography was allowed, but here's an image of the outside.

 The service was beautiful. There was a boy's choir and a men's choir that sang together, and it was so gorgeous. Breathtakingly so. The sermon was given by the Bishop of London, and we also received communion from him. After this we had lunch in a different part of the church Dr. Ryken referred to as "the crypt." We had tea despite the fact it was a little early by British standards.

Next on the itinerary was a literary walk. We saw a plaque commemorating William Wallace, A few John Wesley memorials, and ambled through several parks before ended up at the London Museum.  This went through the history of London if you could not guess that from the name. I found the most interesting part of this exhibit was the section on the London fire. It was a fire that burned for five days that was only stopped when they started blowing up houses to keep it from spreading farther. It was so intense that the stone St. Paul's Cathedral (yes, the one mentioned previously) was destroyed. After my time in the museum, I headed back to our hotel on the Underground and stopped at a nearby grocery store for foodstuffs.

After I ate an entire box of British strawberries by myself and had prepared myself a nutella sandwich, I met up with my friend Katie and a new acquaintance of the trip named Joanne met up for the relatively long underground trip to Westminster and the London Eye. Despite the fact it had rained in the morning, the sun had come out in the afternoon and it was the perfect evening to go up in the Eye.

Near the Eye was the Palace of Westminster and Big Ben of course.

After that we once again made our way back to the hotel, this time for good (or so I thought.) We probably passed three pubs on our way from the underground station to the hotel (three that I noticed) and every one was full of people! Turns out there was a football game between England and Italy that night. Katie got really excited and asked if I would head back to the closet pub and watch the end with her. Since both of my roommates were asleep even though it was only 9:45, I agreed and we headed out. This was one of the most entertaining events to watch I have seen since I have arrived. Oh, not the game. The English WATCHING the game. There was singing, shouting, smoking, and drinking. When they got excited and started screaming, people were literally running from all parts of the street to see what had happened. Katie was giving me running commentary, which was also very entertaining. Finally we headed back and I got a good nights sleep, despite the rumble of the underground beneath me, and the continued shouting from outside.

This morning I again headed to breakfast, my roommates STILL asleep. I had more tea, which was lovely, then headed back to my room to continue the long process of editing a lot of pictures. Then we headed to the British Museum. The coolest thing here was the Rosetta Stone. I had heard about this for years, but had never expected to see it in person. We also looked at a lot of relics from Medieval Europe. There were also a couple of medals that match the design of the ones that are going to be used in this years Olympics.

After lunch we divided into two groups. I choose the group heading to Kensington Park as I wanted to be able to walk around and take more pictures of the outdoors. It was full of people! There were woman jogging with strollers, people on bikes, and lots and lots of dogs! They were everywhere! Many of them not on leashes. It made me so happy. At one point a huge dog came careening through our group to my delight and many others alarm.

Now once again I am back in my hotel room. I've taken the time in up til now to work on editing a lot more photos and craft this blog post. I'm caught up on this trip! Tonight we are heading to Regent's Park again to see Midsummer's Night's Dream in the open air theater. I'm really excited! Check out my facebook page for lots of my pictures.

We are here!

So yesterday I woke up and we were flying over Ireland. Naturally, I was ready to set the plane down there and start exploring, but that was not my end destination (this time!) Our plane landed in Heathrow airport in LONDON ENGLAND!!! Despite the fact it did not feel like I got any sleep on the plane, I feel like I had to have gotten some. It did not feel like an eight hour plane ride. So we disembarked, and made our way through immigration. I was right behind another guy in the WiE program and when I was called up and stated I was doing the same thing as the guy in front of me, the immigration man asked, "Is there anyone left in America?" Well, I certainly hope so, otherwise I'm not sure who would be reading this blog. :)

We gathered up our luggage and climbed onto a coach. I discovered the full extent of my directional difficulties, when I only had a vague feeling that something was different than usual, where my friend Ian was freaking out that we climbed onto the bus on the opposite side from the States. We dumped our stuff at our hotel, and went for a looooong walk in the city. We went all the way to Regents Park which was absolutely filled with beautiful gardens. I only took about 200 pictures my first day here. Hopefully I can get some of those edited and put up soon. Unfortunately I had felt pretty rushed out of the hotel by my roommates and left without a pound on me, which became important when we stopped at a grocery store to buy food. I ended up mooching off of four different people. In a way it was a good thing because I had a good idea of what other people had bought for when I manage to go back. After our walk I was REALLY tired. I took a nap even. This was a very poor idea. I'm never taking a nap ever again (at least on this trip.) Sleep did not come last night until probably 10 at night Illinois time. I did get a lot of reading done. I'm hoping tonight will be better. We dined at the hotel this morning and after some experimenting I discovered how to drink black tea! I had avoided it up to this point as I prefer to drink my tea plain. Black tea is not delicious (to me) by itself. By adding a tiny bit of milk and a small amount of sugar, it was actually quite nice. Good first lesson to learn in England.

Anyways, I'm here in England. It doesn't quite feel real yet. Maybe it's the combination of the sleep deprivation and the newness of everything. I can't believe I have so many weeks to explore this country. I love the people I'm with and I'm excited to get to know them better in England of all places. :)

So..... England!

Do you know what I should be doing right now? I can tell you it isn't write a blog post. But as I have been on campus for a whole week now and I got a LOT of work done already, I figured I could take a break. Another break. Ahem. Anyways, my last post was an ode to superheros that I wrote whilst at home. I am currently sitting in the apartment I have been sharing with a pretty good percentage of the other Wheaton in England participants. After a week, I've decided I'm very glad none of my off campus options ended up working out. Especially for my poor little awkward shy self who finds it insanely hard to be suddenly thrust into large groups of people I don't know, living at a central location as most of the other students has given me far more opportunities to interact with the people I will be spending LOTS of time with. I have not felt nearly as overwhelmed interacting with these people, which I am so thankful for. There were a couple meals that the group where I went to where I was overlooked, which really was not fun, but I did not starve, and I am sincerely hoping that it won't be repeating.

So I am taking eight credits this summer. I think I possibly could have taken only six, but I'm feeling pretty good about my decision right now. I'm really enjoying both of my classes, and with only two classes every day I feel like I can commit the time required to learning the class materials and get all the reading done (and it's a lot of reading! That's what I get for taking two lit classes!) This year with be Leland Ryken (or Ryken Sr.)'s last year participating in Wheaton in Englad (so it's said) and I have really been enjoying him in class. Here was the quote of the day in today's class. "On the plane, the exhausted female student leaned over to the boy sitting next to her and rested her head on his shoulder. MARRIAGE!" Now, this in part is funny, because honestly, that is a little bit how marriage at Wheaton starts. Oh dear. Professor Coolidge is also really a fantastic teacher, and I am learning a lot from her. I don't think I'm smart enough for her class though! We have also been doing daily "chapel" services in between my two classes (I'm completely done with everything at noon! It's beautiful and fantastic.) I was singled out the first day of class as a singer, and since then I have been called to the front of the class to assist Dr. Ryken with leading the class. And by assist, I mean he impatiently urges me to start the song already. Thankfully I've known all the hymns so far. I hope that trend continues.

Saga has been a little different, and yet, so much the same! When we first got here, it was full of conferences. Then we got some high school football players, which was actually extremely entertaining, because the herds of them part before a college girl like the Red Sea did for Moses, much to our great amusement. Then came.... THE CHEERLEADERS!!! I kid you not, Saga for the past week has looked like something out of my worst nightmares. Our little group of Wheaton in Englanders have been surrounding ourselves with the dwindling members of the conferencers in the hopes they can provide some protection from the hair spray and glitter. Also, Saga full of people who have no idea how to get a meal swiftly and skillfully is.... really painful.

I've also just now thought of something. So I've been slowly friend requesting people in my program as I figure out their names and most all of them are actually English majors. And when I finish with this post, I'm going to put it on my facebook page. If any of you are actually reading this, please do not judge the poor art major in your ranks for any grammatical travesties I may have unknowingly committed. I probably should have thought of that one BEFORE I decided to blog about my adventure to England with a bunch of English majors. Ah well.

So, tomorrow is Friday! We are all pretty excited about the break we get from everyday classes and hours of studying. But before my temporary freedom is nigh, I have a quiz to take and a paper to turn in. A paper I am currently procrastinating to avoid.... starting. I am honestly having much more fun jamming to my iPod. I'm also hoping my roommates do not peek into my room and see me jamming to my iPod. They probably think I'm weird enough without that. Ah well.

I've had some surprise run-in's with some good friends in the past couple of days. One of them happened to be an actual run in when Doug just happened to bump into me after church on Sunday. That boy makes me smile. So does Lindsey! Especially when she makes me fantastic home made Italian food for lunch. At 3. Does that make it dinner? It sort of served as both of those for me today. Here's hoping (and praying) for more pleasant surprises, a good work ethic, good weather (without sunburns!), and not forgetting anything important when we leave for our travel abroad. Like my passport. Or my camera.

Superheroes!

So I was all set to write a post about how I've been packing for two weeks and about how this is my last morning home and then I was walking my dog in my new Batman T-shirt, and I thought to myself, "You know what? I really like superheroes. I'm going to go and write a blog about them instead of a relatively boring one about packing and my 21st birthday." Though my 21st birthday was pretty awesome. Anyways...

I love superheroes. I think a good percentage of the nation would agree with me at this point in time. I've only seen the Avengers three times in theaters, one of those times being midnight of that glorious day it came out. But more on that later. I have been a fan of superheroes for a very long time though. Since before the first new Batman movie came out. I still have a whole group of superheros (mostly superheroines actually) that I created myself. My middle school/Jr. High friends and I would create elaborate scenarios with all of them and there would be epic battles and daring schemes. I could still tell you far more than you would actually want to know about Nightingale, Nina, Emerald, Vivia, and Libby. And those were just a few of them.

I also shared this passion with my lil brother. My not so lil brother at this point. >< He takes great delight in calling me shorty. I'm only an inch or two shorter! Uh... sorry about that. *cough* Anyways, I think we still have books on Superman and Batman up in his room. We would pour over these books for hours. I'm pretty sure both of us read them both from cover to cover. Though I think we both prefer to Batman to Superman these days. Anyways, it was around this time that I developed my obsession with Wonder Woman. I got a book on her that was bigger than the Superman and Batman books combined. It has anything you would ever want to know about WW. It's probably a little behind at this point, but still is epic. It's also not hard for me to see why I love Wonder Woman so much either. This is a kick butt woman who can hold her own up there with Batman and Superman. She is one of two woman in the Justice League (at least the animated series that was on Cartoon Network) and unlike Black Widow of the Avengers, Wonder Woman is without a doubt one of the heavy hitters of the group. It an interesting coincidence, both my brother and my boyfriend are big fans of Flash. The final reason I have for loving Wonder Woman so much is one of the reason Thor is one of my favorite members of the Avengers. Her backstory combines two of my favorite genres if you will: superheroes and MYTHOLOGY!!!

What followed my Wonder Woman obsession was Teen Titans. Back when Cartoon Network still played good shows, Teen Titans was at the top of that list for me. This was such a huge part of my childhood (or teenagehood if you will) I'm having a hard time even deciding where to begin. My siblings and I watched it. My two best friends from school watched it. I have seen every episode and the movie they released. I have a TT gameboy game. It was just the show we always talked about. We would plan to go over and watch it at our grandparents house since we didn't have the right channel. We picked favorites and stuck to them with tenacity. I was and continue to be a huge fan of Raven. Jonathan like Cyborg I think. Olivia had a passion for and Starfire. And I'm pretty sure Daniel will always love Beast Boy.

High School came around and this passion for superheroes continued. After I finally got plugged in with the right people at high school (the awesome nerdy group of course!) the superhero theme continued. At a much more literate level than before our group would write complicated stories each with their own character. I brought back Nightingale and Nina and Emerald for these elaborate tales and managed to develop them even more. It was also around this time the current fad for superhero movies began. There was Batman Begins, Dark Knight, Ironman, and the Spiderman movies (though I have never really liked Spiderman.) This is also around when my brother and I discovered the City of Heroes video game. Which we are still playing as college kids.

And now, in 2012, The Avengers has finally been realized. This has to be one of my all time favorite movies. It has everything a good movie should have. First of all, it has JOSS WHEADON AS THE DIRECTOR! I know most people don't pay any attention to directors, and I don't usually either, but I make an exception for this man. He is brilliant. The build up through the previous five movies was so well done, and everything just tied together so well in the final movie. I will admit I have a soft spot for Thor as previously mentioned, but I am also kind of a fan of Loki. My friend Maggie said something offhand about this during a pretty in depth and nerdy discussion of the movie. She said something to the effect of, Loki is a character you sympathize with and one you want to see saved, but his nature makes him irredeemable. I thought it was a fantastic way of putting it. Anyways, the movie was dramatic, hilarious, and just almost perfect. I'm not a huge fan of the Hulk, but they did a great job with him in the movie, and despite the fact Black Widow and Hawkeye are at such a different power level than the rest of the group, they were well represented in the movie, and were two of my favorites. Secretly, most of them are my favorites, but don't tell ok?

I'm not sure why this is a passion of mine, but it undoubtedly is. It's something I've shared with my brother, almost all of my best friends through the years, and boyfriend past and boyfriend present. If I could pick any superpower, what would it be? I would have wings! And with my wings I would be able to fly. (I thought that was probably obvious but I thought it was probably still a good idea to articulate it just in case.)

Summer break!

So I've been home for about a week. It's been lovely to be home. You know what the best part of it has been? Sleeping in a room where I have a comfortable bed, and it's actually quiet when I decide to go to bed. Look, Wheaton is great. For the most part I love it. But sometimes people are downright rude to those around them. Almost every night there would be people playing music, talking loudly, all during quiet hours while people with morning classes are trying to sleep. But here, this is none of that!!!! People are quiet at bedtime! The light coming in through my window with the blinds open is less than the light coming through my blinds in my dorm room. I have my dog back! It's been awesome to have a furry companion once again. It's also so great to just be with and around my family. We have so much fun together.
In a few weeks I shall be leaving for England. I'm really excited and relatively nervous at the same time. But mostly excited. I am going to miss a few things this summer though. This will be the first time since I started going to Cornerstone that I will don't be attending.

Haha. I'm going to pause there and explain why the first part of this blog might be a little weird. I started this yesterday when I was trying to get through the first four parts of Downton Abbey so I could watch the fifth part with my family. Turns out it's hard to follow a movie and write. That first part took me such a long time! This time the only distraction I have is a warm and sleepy Vizsla. Distraction enough, I know. But I shall persevere!

Here's a picture of my warm sleepy Vizsla.

 So, I'm missing Cornerstone which I am pretty sad about because of course, Children 18:3 is going to be there, and a band I just recently got into called Eisley is also going to be there. Flatfoot 56 of course goes without saying. So that's going to be really hard for me. What's going to be even worse is missing Honey Rock. I have already made it up there once this year, but this will be the first summer I will not have been up there. All of my family is going to be up there for something. My brother is going to be a counselor!!! I'm so excited for him! My sister is doing the program 2:22 which I think will be great. My youngest will be in res camp again. So yeah. Really excited for all of them. Also kind of jealous. I know it's kind of like hmmmm, which would I rather do, go to England for six weeks or get up to Honey Rock for probably just a week? Really? You're still sad about not making it to Honey Rock? But Honey Rock has been a huge part of my life for well, forever. So I will be sad. I will also be sad to leave my friends and family behind for a good portion of my summer. Though I found out yesterday that my dad and my senior pastor are going to be visiting me while I'm in Oxford! I'm pretty excited about that.
Sometimes when I sit here and think about doing this program, I wonder if I'm crazy. The correct response being, "Duh Elizabeth. You haven't figured that out a long time ago?" And I have. Also, come on, you are going to ENGLAND!!!!! But I am really burned out on school right now. This has been a really, really hard year for me. Maybe I'll go into more of that with my next post, but for now just know, I'm sick of school. I'm tired of watching people glide through a get good grades and have lots of friends while I sit by myself in my room struggling just to keep my attention on the assigned readings. And now I'm sacrificing time out of my lovely break to take more classes? Only to go right back into my SENIOR YEAR OF COLLEGE!!! I'm a little apprehensive to say the least. But I also know God can get me through this. So for the time being I will once again shove all my fears at apprehensions at him and go find some Shakespeare to read. To try and get prepared for that whole taking summer classes thing. Yeah....

Spring break?

So if you know me at all, you probably know that I did not have a real spring break this year. I went on Midwest choir tour instead! It was actually pretty fun. No matter what people say, I love the Midwest. My opinion is, if you don't like it, please move back to whatever warm place you come from. This might seem a little mean, but I am so tired of people complaining and/or bashing the Midwest. Sorry for the mini-rant. Clearly, Midwest bashing is a pet peeve of mine. But seriously, I love the Midwest. We get the most glorious autumns (my favorite season!) complete with apple orchards, crisp cool weather, and the most amazing colors everywhere! It also gets a sentence all to itself because I love it so much. We get fantastic winters with fluffy snow, and (usually) cool pleasant flowery springs. I can't say I like the summers. Summer and I don't get along, unless I'm at Honey Rock. Honey Rock is on average the right temperature for summer and there are these novel things called TREES! Trees happen to keep the worst of the sun off of my very sensitive skin. I have gotten a tan once. It happened to be the summer I spent all my time outside working at Honey Rock. I digress. I went on a Midwest choir tour in exchange for a quiet relaxing spring break. I did not have a choice in the matter. As my last choir tour was the stuff of nightmares, I was not excited for this one. There was only one thing that was the light at the end of the tunnel for me: The last stop. The last stop was home for me. My home church and a brief time with my family. This thought kept me going as I began preparations to depart. To explain, my previous experience with Wheaton College choir tour was out to Colorado and back. I was a freshman, still trying to get a handle on how college worked and where I fit in it. (Heck, I'm STILL trying to get a hang of it. And doing pretty badly.) Despite this I had been on choir tour in high school and it had mostly been pretty fun. (An introvert basically living on a bus full of people for a week never REALLY ends well, but there are various levels of coping.) That freshman year tour was the thing of nightmares for me. By the end I was sick in almost any way you could think up: physically, mentally, and emotionally. So you can imagine I was not absolutely thrilled with the idea of this one.
Long story short, it wasn't as bad as I was anticipating. It still was not and will never be my number one choice for a week off, but I survived. I made sure I was staying with girls I got along well with (when I could), I obtained a seatmate who has interests in common with me (this is hard for me to find in chorale), and I brought my iPod this time! (My iPod was stolen a week before we left and I had not had time to obtain a new one.) The girls in chorale I had previously been on less than fantastic terms with before tour didn't drive me up the wall as usual. I got a half decent amount of sleep (only half), struck up a friendship with our bus driver, and I did not get ill! However, tour has still left me more tired than before I had left, and left me to recover with school crashing down around me at the same time.
Today, I go home. For three whole days. Still not even close to a substantial amount of time, but more than anything since winter break. I get to sleep in my own bed, play with my dog, eat my mom's fantastic cooking, and maybe finally relax a little. Maybe. Have a very blessed Easter everyone!

I'm writing for fun!

So I haven't written anything in awhile. My schedule has reached overwhelming and I've had some as of yet unexplainable health problems. (For those interested, recently when performing anything that could be called physical activity, including singing in choir is leaving me light-headed, dizzy, overheated, and short of breathe. Three visits to the health center including blood work has yet to figure out what's going on.) However, I do still want to try and keep up this blog as writing has become my current mode of artistic expression for fun. I should be careful in saying that, because art was my previous mode of artistic expression just for fun, and it has since consumed my life, not necessarily in a way I am finding enjoyable. Such that it is at this moment however, I've gotten back into writing for fun. I haven't really written for fun since high school when I did an inordinate amount of text role-playing with my group of friends. This was a really great way for me to write, because I was not solely responsible for the plot, and with everyone playing a different character always kept things fresh and fun. Most of the writing I did by myself during this time still usually centered around these characters. This probably sounds pretty nerdy, and it really was, but it was nerdy in such a way to inspire our imaginations and fostered our little community of intelligent nerds. The one downside to this was I never really developed the ability to write without the heavy influence of others, the end result being most all of my writing for fun abruptly stopped when I got to high school.
All that changed when I decided to write a blog. I kind of resisted the idea of writing a blog for awhile for a variety of reasons. The biggest one being could I maintain this over a significant period of time. I've started a variety of diaries and journals over the course of my life and I'll start out going pretty strong, and then it kind of peters off. Usually pretty fast. I've managed to keep this going for a couple months, but obviously, I just had an entire month where I didn't post anything. So this is a work in progress for me. Despite this, it has been encouraging to see that at least as page views go, it looks like people are actually reading this blog, which is really affirming for me as a fledgling writer. Because of this, and because I do wish to become a better writer in more than just a school setting I'm going to persevere and keep trying to post something on a semi-regular basis.
Now, to the reason I began this particular entry. I have recently begun writing a story. Despite my friend Melody's urgings, I have not yet started writing a story in my imaginary library I blogged about in the past. I created it as a perfect place in my mind, and am therefore having a hard time coming up with a conflict that would be appropriate to write a story around. Instead my story's origins are a bit more complicated. Also in a precious blog I mentioned that I had played Dungeons and Dragons for the first time with a group of my friends from high school. I created a ranger and my friend Shannon created a rogue. We decided they were to be sisters. I created the character, we played a game, and unfortunately I haven't been able to do anything  with Dungeons and Dragons since. Despite this one night I had a dream that was based in a science fiction sort of universe prominently featuring two sisters. It wasn't a coherent story, just a couple of scenes, but I woke up wanting to know more about this world and these sisters. Future reflection on this dream showed a close similarity between these sisters and Shannon and my characters (the ranger and the rogue). I wrote all this down and went on with life.
Then my friend Rachael told me this idea she had for a world, a floating city. She had all the science figured out, she just wanted me to draw a picture of it. I took some notes, doodled a little, then also set it aside for later. However, all these ideas would come crashing into each other soon enough.
Cue class I'm having problems focusing in. I decide to do something with this idea I have put by the wayside. I scribbled the beginnings of a story in my notebook, and got excited about it. Despite the fact my friends were not directly effecting the process, they're influence was huge. One had created the entire basis for the world I was using. The other supplied half of my main characters (at least so far).
This weekend I managed to make it home for a day, and Shannon was home as well (this is a minor miracle really). Well, we got on my laptop and decided to Skype Rachael. Turns out, all three of us are writing stories and we all exchanged stories and read the others. It was so much fun! You could tell that all three of us have been reading the same fantasy books for a very long time. While all three of our stories might be very different content wise, all of them sounded pretty similar in writing style. The best part was we could exchange ideas and give advice on what was already written. It definitely inspired me to keep writing my story, and I hope these women can keep me accountable to keep me writing.

Love is the Movement and Valentine's Day

This was the first project I did in my college Ceramics 1 class. They were very time consuming. First I had to create the plates with a series of slabs (they aren't just flat pieces as they appear to be in these photos) using slip to attach all the pieces together. That was the easy part! The stencil was exponentially more frustrating/tedious/exhausting. After the basic plates were assembled I covered two of the plates with white slip and two with black slip (slip, also known as under glaze is basically colored clay.) Then I creating four identical star stencils and picked four basic colors. I was a little limited in my options but ended up with mostly primary colors. (Did you know that there are actually two sets of primary colors? The one we usually think about is for subtractive color combinations like mixing paint. Those are red, blue, and yellow. There's also additive color combinations like projected light which is red, blue, and green! So combining these together, I used all primary colors. :D) I proceeded to paint the stars on, warm colors on white, cool on black, trim where some of the glaze escaped under the stencil, repaint whatever background color was on if I scrapped too much off. Then came the Love is the Movement stencil. It too me so many hours to do those. Hours and hours and hours hunched over these four plates in the basement of the art department. Then came the first firing. It turned out that our white glaze was incredibly finicky and I ended up touching up all the glaze and refiring all of them several more times. I finally got to putting the over glaze on them, and refiring them several more times. The day came when my friend Tim came up to me with a grave face and led me into the kiln room. My blue plate had been fired too many times and a whole corner had broken off in the corner. I cried. I had spent so much time on these and then it had broken! But I persevered with the others and couldn't bring myself to throw out my broken plate. Finally I just had a couple spots on my yellow plates I wanted to touch up. So I did it and placed it into the bottom of the kiln. Well one of the seniors was working on large egg or stone shaped ceramic creations for her senior show and placed a very large one in the kiln. During the process of firing it exploded, covering my plate with broken fragments that stuck in the over glaze and stayed there. It was tragic. But all that to say, I think these plates have a lot more to them then just how much time was put into them and what all was done to make them look the way they do.

So there was the story about how these plates came into being and now I want to talk a little bit about the slogan, where it came from, and it's importance in current events. This is one of the slogans of the non profit organization To Write Love On Her Arms also known as TWLOHA. They raise awareness and provide help for people struggling with depression, self-abuse, addiction, and suicide. Here is a link to their webpage that explains what they do and where they come from: http://www.twloha.com/vision/ . As someone who has struggled with depression myself and watched people around me deal with self-abuse issues I am really passionate about what these people do. But the words Love is the Movement have a much broader application than just the slogan for an organization.

Today is Valentine's Day, right? Never been my favorite day. Well, not since you were required to bring a small paper valentine for everyone in your class and you made a cute little box to collect them all in. Since then I either passively rebel or just ignore Valentine's Day. So much so that I forgot about it probably a good six times yesterday, was reminded and promptly forgot again. I woke up this morning and it took me awhile to remember why there were hearts scattered all about my floor. I think mostly my rebellion is against the pretty standard idea that Valentine's Day is for couples only. Couples by no means have a monopoly of love. So why should they be the only one's to celebrate love? Single people: I can guarantee that there is someone out there that loves you. Family, friends, your roommate, your dog, and above all others, God. Let's start a movement where no person feels left out on Valentine's Day!

Finally, I think my community at Wheaton College could take this to heart, especially after the events that transpired during chapel this past Friday. There were a variety of at the very least insensitive and at the worst amazingly hurtful and racist comments made through Twitter. At Wheaton we try to hard to be perfect. Perfect grades, perfect appearance, perfect relationship with the person you ARE going to marry and have a perfect family with. If we have issues we try and suppress them and deal with them privately. I feel like this isn't a very Christian way to live our lives. We are sinful people. We all screw up. Denying this and trying to hide it is a lie. Things fester under the surface until they explode like with what happened on Friday. I think we need to respond to this incident with love. Love for those who were hurt, but also love for those who made the hurtful comments. If we responded with love we could be a much more authentic and welcoming community.

All of these plates are imperfect. Two of them are very messed up, one is broken, one is irreversibly dirty but after a year of reflecting on these plates, I can see the beauty in them. I have learned how to love them for what they are, and I think this is a lesson that can be applied to everything. Whether it's your single friend on Valentine's Day, people who are hurting, people whose culture or skin color differs from you, someone who have a different view of sexuality than you, or people who might have different theological doctrine than you, we can love them.

"Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins." - 1 Peter 4:8

Love is the Movement.

On libraries

So I have just come from my college library. Now despite what you might think, this was not a pleasant experience for me. Since my freshman year, I have not enjoyed our library. Despite my fathers constant advice that studying there would be better than in my room, I avoided it. At the time the best excuse I could find for this was that it was a very long way away from my dorm building, not made easier by the winter months, or inclement weather in general. My second complaint was that it didn't contain any FUN books. I continued to do my homework in my room for the most part and life continued on.

So today I once more sojourn to the library, because it was kinda sorta required for a class. I browse for what I was supposed to browse, then wandered around to areas I had not yet investigated. Before long I had settled down in a chair on the third floor and was pulling out my reading for tomorrow. And you know what? I did my homework at the library. It was terrible. I could not get comfortable in the silly chair (and there weren't more comfortable ones) and it was so quiet that when someone started typing nearby it was extremely distracting. I just wanted to get out and go back to my room. But I stuck it out and finished my reading. On my way back to my dorm I ran into a friend who was headed INTO the library. We proceeded to discuss how much we did not enjoy the library, and I realized there were good reasons for my feelings of dislike toward the library.

(This next section might seem a little off topic, but bear with me! It's relevant.) So I have this best friend and we've know each other forever, but we haven't gone to school together for the past six and a half years. We try to stay in touch with skype, but it's not quite the same. So when we do see each other again, you could probably guess that we get pretty excited. :) After the happy enthusiastic greetings, and flurry of hugging usually the next thing we do is grab a couple books (or a really large stack of books) and sit next to each other on the couch/bed/floor and read. It's awesome! We exchange books/recommendations and get to it. The great part of that is when one of us gets to a really funny, or a really epic part we say, "Hey, listen to this!" and proceed to read it out loud. With our school library I just feel like laughing out loud at a book would be frowned upon, let alone then proceeding to read said funny part out loud would be frowned upon.

To sum up why I do not enjoy the Wheaton College library: no fun books, uncomfortable seating, unpleasant lighting, the stifling silence, and feeling that if you were in the library, you should be studying. I always have the vague feeling that I'm doing something I'm not supposed to be doing. And that feeling does not pair well in my mind with books. Books make me feel like I can do anything!



This would be my ideal library. Okay, have you seen Beauty and the Beast? I'm hoping that you have. (If you haven't, go watch it! It's a classic Disney movie, and probably my second favorite Disney Princess.) Picture the library that Beast has in his castle (it's a good general base for my perfect imaginary library.) A huge room with floor to ceiling bookshelves, including those ladders you've always wanted to play on but never had the chance to. Take and entire wall of this room and make it a floor to ceiling window overlooking a gorgeous garden that perhaps has a small brook running through it with orchards in the distance. There would be an elegant door leading out into this garden which in favorable weather could be opened to let in delicious breezes and warmth from the glorious sunlight as well as delightful bird song. A large curtain of deep green could be drawn for atmosphere purposes.

Off to one side would be the reading corner. It would have a lower ceiling that the rest of the library, so as to make the atmosphere much more comfortable. While there would still be a few bookshelves, there would be some wall space for fantastic and beautiful art. There would be serene scenes of nature, majestic images of wild creatures, sculpture: simple and elegant, yet thought-provoking. Next would be the fireplace. It would be simply enormous, always lit, and some nights cozy winter nights s'mores would be made. The chairs would be plentiful and fantastic: no two alike. There would be recliners, and loveseats, and chaise lounges.The carpet would be thick and soft for those would decide to forgo the fantastic seating options. There would also be an inexhaustible supply of soft blankets and fluffy pillows (blanket forts ALWAYS encouraged.) In one corner would be a bubbling fountain that would provide an extremely pleasant and relaxing background sound. Against one wall would be the drink station. There would be endless amounts of tea, divine hot chocolates, and delicious apple cider. Those wishing for something cool and refreshing would also not be disappointed. Iced tea, and lemonade, and possibly even combinations of the two would abound. No hint of coffee would ever enter my divine library. (Sorry guys, this is my imaginary library. You can have coffee in YOUR imaginary library.) The mugs would be created by me, and they would all be unique and beautiful. This area of my library is also where the library dog would also spend most of it's time. (Alright, let's be honest. I would probably have multiple library dogs. Also probably some cats.)
All that doesn't even begin to cover the books. The books! There would be any and all books I could ever want to read! (Again, this is my imaginary library. If you don't like it, go create your own.) There would be fantasy and science fiction that took you to whole new worlds where anything is possible. Biographies of brilliant and interesting people. Historical fiction that carries the events of an age long past back into remembrance. Brilliant theology that illuminated and clarified scripture. There would be be beautiful leather bound tomes, and old paperbacks yellowed with age and knowledge. C. S. Lewis, Patrick Rothfuss, Diana Wynne Jones, Terry Pratchett, Ray Bradbury, J. R. R. Tolkien, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Jane Austen, Brain Jacques, Donald Miller. There would be audiobooks for those who wished to enjoy a story while doing something with their hands. The temperature and humidity would always be perfect for book health, and nothing short of evil magic could harm these books. No pages could be bent, no spines broken, no blemishes made. And this would not be a library of silence! Not a raucous place for mischief, but a place where books could be discussed and passages could be shared. There would be visits from authors, parties where one would dress up as a character from a book, night adventures into the gardens by lantern light. It would be a place of joy and knowledge and serenity.

And so once more it begins....

School starts once more and it has been going so well! For the first time in my entire college career I don't have an eight o clock class (at least for A quad) and  unlike last semester which was four class on Monday, Wednesday, Friday I only have one! My first class was Medieval/Byzantine Art History With our new art historian in the first five minutes of class took a flying leap over a table. He was trying to illustrate how important medieval art history was to our day to day lives. It was definitely a good way to begin the semester. I went and checked my CPO box and found that I had five pac slips (yes, they were for textbooks, but still! I got packages!) retrieved my books and heading out for food. At lunch I ran into every single one of my friends that had been studying abroad or at least studying elsewhere along with a good percentage of my other good friends. It was awesome! It was so good to see people I had missed for a semester, or even people I missed just over break. I went into Saga with nobody to eat with and ended up with three different saga dates.  It made me smile. Really the only low point in my first day was chorale. It was not fun to go back to music I didn't like without my chorale buddy who was a big reason I made it through last semester.
Day two of classes (which almost still counts as day one at college since we rotate which classes we take on MWF and TR) was also a lot of fun. I was a little apprehensive going into my Chicago class (it's what it sounds like: a class about Chicago) as I am not able to fit Wheaton in Chicago into my schedule, but there was a good spread of people there, including several others like me who just like Chicago and want to learn more about it. My teacher had us go around the room and say what year we were and what major we are and we tallied it up on the board. I would say there are about 30 people in the class (and there were several who weren't there the first day) and we had over 20 majors in the class. I was really impressed. It's very cool to be in an environment that is that diverse and varied. Next I had psychology 101. I think this is going to be a really fun class. The prof teaching it is really entertaining and obviously knows what he is doing. Finally I had my first Photo 1 class! This was a class I was a little apprehensive about because I took Digital Photography last semester and I learned a lot, but I felt the relationship between my prof and I had ended a little strangely. The first Photo 1 class was at the same time familiar and different in good ways. My biggest complaint about Digital had been that all that we talked about what the technical aspects of the camera equipment and the computer software we had been using. Already the readings we had for this class have covered content of what you are taking pictures of. I have high hopes for this class. :)
All in all this semester is off to a really good start and I am optimistic for the rest of it.

So last night.....

Yesterday my friends had a first day of the year party. Frankly I love our definition of a party. We watch ridiculous movies/TV shows that we pick mostly because of our ability to make fun of them, we eat entirely too much food (usually pizza), and drink a ton of soda. There are usually video games, and a large variety of other nerdy things. It's amazing. So I was first to show up for this party and my friend Shannon and I immediately go and do what has become a new party tradition for us since we have both gone off to different colleges: hiding from the rest of the party and talking about everything new in each others lives. We also resolved to try and talk DURING the semester a couple times this year.

So after my boyfriend finally found our crafty hiding place we rejoined the rest of the group and watched really old, really terrible cartoons including the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon! Oh my gosh, it was terrible! There was an acrobat class, and the character who was said class had a terrifying weapon: a stick! That was probably my favorite thing to make fun of in it! However while all this was going on, Shannon looks over at me and innocently says, "Hey you should create a character!"

And that's when it all began.

From that point on, I was learning. I'm still a little lost. Ok, really lost. I stared at the page with the different races and I was kind of like O.o. How am I supposed to choose one. Eventually I settled on a halfling. It helped that Shannon was making one too. So I handled the easy things like name, eye color, hair color, and after that I was completely deer in headlights. There were numbers and math. But it was kind of fun. So Shannon and I sloooooowly worked through a profile before our Dungeon Master got frustrated with how slow things were going, took my computer and finished everything for me. Then the real trial began! I was the only newb there and it was painfully obvious, but it was still pretty fun. Our small intrepid group was hoping to earn some money by killing some zombies! ...It didn't go well. But it was fun! I felt so bad for Shannon though! My turn would come around and I could get the dice roll by myself..... and then I'd be going, "Shannon! Shannon! What do I do now?"

It was most certainly a new experience for me. I think with a little for practice and a little more help from a friend who does know what they are doing (Shannon!!!!) I could really be having fun with this. However, I think after I go back to school I'm not going to have a chance to actually do this, so I'm not sure how committed I want to get with this. Time will tell!!

Also! My father texted me in the middle of the game and asked what I was doing, and I found out HE used to play D&D. He suggested I play a Paladin because they're the best (according to him.) THEN when I got home I found out my MOM had even played once. The new things you find out about your parents are astounding!

Farewell to all my nerdy friends! I love you all!!

New Year's Eve Ramblings and class schedule

So here I sit on New Years Eve at my babysitting job, sitting on the couch with a microwave pizza and a Coke watching one of my favorite chick flicks, Hitch.

Side note: Normally I am not the chick flick kind of girl. I would much rather watch an action movie. Almost always. But this movie makes me laugh. I’ve seen it many times but it still makes me giggle. Plus I guess it's more of a romantic comedy. Is there a difference between a romantic comedy and a chick flick? Eh, if there is one, it's not a big one.

Now normally this is not really how someone might like to spend New Years Eve. I wasn’t really thrilled about it when I heard about it, but I’m actually enjoying it. My friends are having a party tomorrow, which is really our New Years Eve party. Anyways, this quiet evening “out.” (haha) I’m doing something useful with myself and still having fun. I did forgot that not every family has not password protected wireless internet. Opps. THAT is why I am typing this up in a Word document. Also texting friend people that I like which is quite pleasant. I think I’m going to have to entitle this New Years Eve Ramblings.

So as I said, I am really enjoying this evening, however the start of next semester looms in the near distance. I am once again taking eighteen credit hours. I was discussing my schedule with one of my best friends at school and we are BOTH taking eighteen credit hours. Why are we doing this? Because we are crazy. But I’m actually looking forward to this next semester. My last semester was incredibly difficult for me, but I think this coming one is going to be a lot better.

My class schedule is as follows.

Chicago: This is a two credit hour class I’m taking A quad that I’m really excited for. It satisfies a social science credit and a diversity credit. The class is what the title says. Everything about Chicago. Now I’ll admit that I have not been to every big city in the United States. I probably haven’t even been to a lot of them. But Chicago is my favorite out of all of them. It is a beautiful city full of exciting adventures. (Ok, remember when I was resolved to not use thing as much as possible? It’s a lot harder for me than I thought!)

Intro to Psych: There is a long list of majors I think I could have enjoyed: Geology, English Literature, History, Psychology! I really enjoy psychology, much more than sociology (Sorry mom!) and I’m hoping I’ll do well in this class.

Something or other music survey: This class I am NOT looking forward too. I have already wasted more time than I was willing to give in the music conservatory. But my poor confused relationship with the music conservatory and the art department will be a topic for another time. Probably a long one.

Medieval/Byzantine Art: Confession- I haven’t gotten any of my Art History requirements done yet. This one will be my first. Our department just got a new art historian, and this topic is apparently his passion. I have come to the conclusion that if I am going to start Art History this will be a good place to start.

Photo 1: Ok, I’ll admit I’m a little apprehensive about this class. Photo 1 is film photography which I have dabbled in a bit but I could do so much more with it. Hence taking this class. Last semester I took Digital Photography and honestly I think I’m still figuring out the photography professor. I also get the feeling he’s still trying to figure out me. Maybe this class will be better since I kind of know what to expect from Greg. I’m hoping.

Women’s Chorale: All I am going to say about this is that I hope it goes better than last semester. Cabinet is driving me crazy. They treat us neither as adults nor as good musicians. I am both. I’m pretty sure most of the rest of chorale fall into those categories as well. At this point I will settle for one other, but I would LOVE to have both.

Ceramics independent study!: Ok, so I still need to fill out the paperwork for this class, I will admit. But it’s an art class so nobody expects it to get finished on time, right? If we can’t even begin to start an art meeting on time, all the paperwork doesn’t have to be on time right? But I AM EXCITED to be getting my hands dirty. I am also terrified! I have to figure out what I’m doing for my senior show by the end of this semester. I haven’t the slightest clue what that is going to look like. Also terrified that I am not going to be able to come up with anything. But we shall see.

So, there you have it. My informative and interesting class schedule for the coming semester. It should be a party! I hope everyone had a good night and may God bless you in the coming year.