Weekend, etc.

Overnight, I generate a lot of heat because I first cover up with a flannel blanket, then my duvet comforter pulled up over my ears to ensure that I don't wake up in the middle of the night with a sore throat, cold nose, chapped lips. Because of all the heat, my windows have condensation on them in the morning, all over, a huge foggy mirror with small droplets that've grown too large and streaked down the panes. Because my windows face the east, the sun rises in the mornings and because the windows are all glossed over with moisture, my room glows. Every morning, for the first 3 hours of daylight, from the smallest bit to the whole sun emerging over the Woodhouse chimneys, my room glows. And I wake up early.

The literary rigor is still surprising but mostly overwhelming. I wake up, put on the coffee, brush my teeth and put on another pair of socks, drink my coffee, and begin to read and read until class and then again after class until I get hungry enough for dinner and then read a bit half-heartedly after dinner because my mental acuity does not correlate very well to the fullness of my stomach. Last night especially -- I made eggplant parmesan (eggplant is my "meat") and ate entirely too much of it. But on the whole, I'm estimating around/about 6 hours of work for each class this week, which puts a small damper on my desire to find a job, because I don't know if there are enough hours in the week for both.

The shopping trip was successful this past Saturday -- found boots, a few warmer sweaters/longsleeves, and an umbrella. Tomorrow I'm going thrifting with my roommate Leander in a town down the road called Harrogate -- she's promised to show me some good shops and maybe I can add to my sweater/sock/warm-etceteras collection (it's certainly wanting). We've spent a lot of time together recently, with grocery shopping and cooking on Sunday, and cooking and eating together last night as well. She's taught me fun English insults -- if a friend's getting on your nerves, you can call them a "tinker", a "sod", or a "bugger" and it's still all in good fun.

I went camping in a small town called Whitby in the northeast two weekends ago with my roommates, the same town written about in "Dracula" -- the first bit of English soil where Dracula set foot and found a house. It's actually charming, though the ruins of an abbey on a high hill over the sea could probably be creepy at night. We went down to the waterfront and walked along the wooden pier and had fresh fresh fresh fish and chips -- and they love to pour vinegar on top of everything then sprinkle it with salt, and I have to say, it's really good. We basically pitched a tent in a field at the edge of a farm amongst the herds of sheep and cows -- and woke to a gaggle of geese honking belligerently at us and the mess they'd found around our fire pit. And since I carry the best of luck with me wherever I go, I had to share a sleeping bag with my roommate Stef because I'd left mine at home. I wore tights, 3 pairs of socks, jeans over the tights, a t-shirt, a longsleeve, a hoody, and a waterproof coat over that, with a wool scarf and wool hat on top of everything else. It was an experience to say the least. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful stars, though -- the biggest sky I've seen since I was 6 looking up in Yosemite valley.

Current Hyde Park Picture House film log:
1) The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
2) Man on Wire
3) Jar City

To be seen in the future: The Brideshead Revisited.