mac and cheese, thinking outside of the blue box

British Word of the Day: litter (pronounced LI'-tuh) - refuse, waste, garbage. (An American's trash) eg: "Put that in the litter bin, under the sink."

Today was another one.

I'm quite exhausted, but I've decided that there will be more days like this, more worthy of my exhaustion--probably days that I actually read more than 2 pages at once.

I attended two church services today. Both in the morning, incidentally, at St. Andrew's church, a parish church. I attended the 8 AM and the 9:30. The first had no music and we read several times out of the book of common prayer, which was new to me (the book, at least.)

During the services I was struck in two ways:
1) How heathenistic does our communion sound to those who have never heard of drinking our Saviour's blood and feeding on his flesh? (This was simply because the Book of Common Prayer worded it differently than I'd ever heard before.)
2) How religiously-based Oxford really is, compared with the rest of the spiritually dark Europe.

St. Andrew's has a wonderful programme for everyone that is young of age (me three years ago, say) and has several different names for them, very active, like, Crawlers, Creepers, Jumpers, Soul Survivors, etc. It sounds almost like a scientific experiment gone horribly wrong, but it seems to have gone in the other direction: wonderfully right! There were children galore in the service, along with plenty of participation from the youth. St. Andrew's is completely thriving, in a very healthy way, it seems like.

Tomorrow is orientation--serious business. With a planned schedule from 9-4. I really am a professional student these days. On Thursday we'll stop with the orientation business and finally get to have free time again--to meet with our tutors and decide when to meet with them each week (primary tutors) and when to meet with them fortnightly (every two weeks, secondary tutors).

I look forward to it all.

Cheers!

P.S. If you wonder about the blog titles, just ask; I'll be happy to tell. I'm not certain if it's exciting blog material or not.

bobbies without guns

British word of the day: tea towels - a towel used for drying off dishes, not decorative but not to be soiled with wiping up messes (America's dish towel)

Today was a good day. I have a feeling there will be a good amount of these sorts of days. It was still a bit cold, but I woke up at 7:30, and upon noticing my roommates still fast asleep, decided to sleep in until a very luxurious and unusual 8:00. I began a few postcards, and drank some more tea.

I ate my first digestive biscuits today--they are cookies that aid in digestion that have one side dipped in chocolate (which, in turn, makes them slightly more appealing than just calling them "digestives") Unfortunately, I find myself eating nearly anything that is dipped in chocolate. This isn't the worst thing I've eaten after getting here. Much better than mince pie:

We went for a jaunt about Oxford this afternoon, and it was fun to see things, and actually recognize them from my trip to Oxford during the Beatles interim in England. Surprisingly, I arrived exactly one year later in the UK than I did last year--the immigrations officer was extremely confused as to why I had a stamp from Heathrow with exactly the same date. She excused her mistake with her forgetfulness of the new year--I told her that I still had trouble that I was remembering it was 2009 instead of 2008. I do like writing 8's so much better than 9's. An unfortunate year change (as far as writing numbers goes.)

Today I saw the covered market, which is one of my favourite places here--there's a coffee shop that I was told about that has a really cutesy, girly name, with pink and purple things everywhere. (I may be in line for the next Queen of Ambiguousness--splendid.) And now I've forgotten who told me the place--I'll have to ask around because my memory seems to fail me so often. I'll find it sometime.

I also saw St. Mary Magdalene's church; it's beautiful and apparently they have a modern praise and worship. Not exactly what I'm looking for. And tomorrow, I believe I'm going to the 8 AM service at St. Andrew's. I've heard it's fairly popular with the students at SCIO, but I'm going to try to find a smaller church later on and get to know the people there really well, and let them get to know me, and recognize my face when I come in. But the preaching must be interesting, good, and quite anecdotal. It will be a "Rog" stand-in, I guess.

Saw a Starbucks today. Disappointed. Although, the Brits do have both Costa Coffee and Caffe Nero, both chains, and not much different. No strange creature for the logo, though.

We start our term the week after next; until then, it's orientation, orientation, orientation.

Until tomorrow (I hope), cheers!

arrivals & discoveries

British word of the day: queue - a standing line (eg: "Please form a queue behind the counter.")

I've landed, if you couldn't tell.

We made about four circles 'round a city name Something-Upon-Something (the exact name escapes me) and then finally landed in London/Heathrow.

From there I took a rather EXPENSIVE coach to Oxford and then took a taxi to Crick Road. This will be home for the next 3 months. The bathroom smells like fresh paint and there seems to be an endless supply of tea. What kind of island is this?

Because of impending jet lag, many girls at the Crick went for a walk with a girl in her second semester. It was cold, brisk, invigorating (yes, all that) and within minutes, I couldn't remember whether I had toes or not. I checked when I returned and indeed i did have them. I placed them immediately above the room's heater.

i have some clocks to reset and some e-mails to respond to as well as a bit of skype-ish things to download, so excuse me.

cheers!
marissa

inner nets

struggle between getting worthless ethernet connection fixed and [ab]using the wireless connection here at Trinity.

struggle?


constant.

but i will do this--following is a video of singing a happy birthday song for my sister, Reanna. She is in her last year of 20's: twenty-nine. maybe she'll turn 29 again next year.

i did forget the words for a second, but i come back strong, and aaron certainly reinforces it with ample facial expressions.

victoriana

got my reading lists for hilary term via e-mail today.

the victorian novel tutorial is going to kill me.

but i think i might die with a smile on my face, knowing that i know all that i can know about victoriana in england.

wish i was a vampire

i am finally done with living on campus at college.

and i am so done.
eternally.

i'm moving out and moving up.
and i will enjoy cooking my own food and doing my own dishes, thanks.

happy x-mas (exams are over).



i am tired. bone tired. i don't think this would be a very good time to get sick, but it will probably happen once i reach home.

now i have to conjure up 15 bones before i fly home for my massive suitcase that could never stand in for a carry-on.

wish i was a vampire.
i wouldn't have to spend money on food.

thought that's what counted.

She bit the inside of her lip. Blood. The tuneless whistling was driving her to distraction. No, not just distraction—bloody inaction. Confusion. Her eyes burned and her contacts were dying to get out, fogging her vision, clouding her sight, and making her usually visual life a ridiculous hassle.

It wasn’t worth trying anymore. It was one in the morning and she had a presentation due the next day. She had an essay torn to shreds by a well-meaning teacher. She had….she had no idea what to do with herself apart from complain.

She had a cup of coffee, or, she did. Now only the dregs were left. The French press coffee was good. The leftover liquid coffee nuggets left in the mug afterward? Not so good.

A mascara fleck jumped into her eye from her dating anniversary makeup. She blinked her right eye slowly, deliberately. Didn’t work. She wanted to look nice tonight. Just to give him a reminder that she could get dressed up, decked out, get out, go out. Some days were better than others, but it had been two years, after all. That was pretty long by anyone’s standards, married or unmarried. Or divorced, I guess.

He bought her a ring. Not an engagement ring. It was a cameo ring. It was a one-size-fits-all, a mass-produced ring circa 1978. But it was definitely the thought that counted. She looked at it more closely a couple of hours later. It read “AVON” juxtaposed next to the tiniest copyright symbol she had ever seen. So it wasn’t one of a kind, she thought. But it is now, I guess. She still swore to wear it. She didn’t swear aloud, of course. This would require a witness. And an accountability to this swearing. This she did not need. She would wear it every time she wore gold, which was at least once a month.

He bought it because it matched her cameo earrings, affectionately named Julia and Athena, for the pale, white, Greek women placed inside the boundary of the deep orange ovals. They swung a lot when she walked, which she liked. Some of her earrings whistled when the wind blew through them. The metal was shaped just right. On a still day, she sprinted when no one was looking, so she could hear the earrings sing to her. They were the only things that sang to her. Singing to herself didn’t count. But those were the kinds of earrings she liked. Dangly, musical earrings that glimmered when sunbeams got caught in them. The kind that sang when the wind hugged their curves.

She would wear prisms in her ears if they weren’t so dang heavy.