happy pancake day!

happy mardi gras too, right?
unfortunately i didn't have any time to do any celebrating of the holiday today, i'm too much in debt to work, which is a shame.
we went to the national gallery today, and checked out the best paintings (in my opinion) there for masterpieces of london. they have a few monet's and van gogh's, which were great to see, i didn't know that london was home to them.

going back to sunday night, church was awesome. the church thats around the corner from us is enormous inside, and it unfortunately there were hardly any people in it for the 6 pm mass. can't remember the name of the church, but the priest's name is father duncan. he's an old man, with glasses. the church doesn't look special from the road or anything, infact courtney said it looked like a gym. on the inside its in the shape of a cathedrale, but waaaay less decorative. the walls are all flat, with a flat color, no ornate designs, and no carvings or anything. its a totally modern interior, and the cieling is painted bright blue! its totally un-church-like... but the mass was exactly the same as it would have been in the states, except it was with an english accent. and the mass was only 45 minutes! so its definitely going to be our new home. i'm looking forward to getting my ashes there tomorrow night.

no real other news on this end... friends of people are starting to come here, like michelle's friend john came tonight, and courtneys brother mark is coming sunday.

an interesting fact we found out: cab drivers in london are allowed to urinate in public whenever they want as long as they do so in the direction of their car, like on a wheel or something. i think thats pretty nasty. so far while i've been here i've seen a couple people peeing in publice, and you can't really go out anywhere without seeing puddles of urine or vomit on the streets. its really disgusting, i know, but i guess some people say 'you gotta do what you gotta do.' part of me can't blame them, since you have to pay to use the public bathrooms.

another celebrity interesting fact: george micheal, who is a singer, i don't know if anyone out there recognizes the name, was arrested for drug possession this weekend in close proximity to our house. i'm not making this stuff up, it was at the corner of hyde park, which is right near us, they found him slumped over the steering wheel of a car with marijuana and some other drug on his person. amazing.

and the happiest thing to report on: i have acquired a london underground sign! when we were all coming back from somewhere on the tube this weekend, as it was really late, there was a vulnerable sign, which was just sitting there, it had been for a while, and it had been catching my eye for quite some time, so i decided that i should clean up the city. no cameras were on it or anything, although i don't really know if i should be blogging about this... its pretty sweet tho, it says 'help keep your tube safe' in the tube font, and its bright red! oh its cardboard too, its not metal or anything. the next one i'm after, and i plan to ask nicely, is this illustration of a platform where you'd board the underground, and there's these footprints that stagger over the edge of the platform, and it says something like "alcohol is the #1 cause of deaths on the underground"... which is hilarious in itself, and then it says "stay away from the edge when you've had a few" or something. its a real gem, i'd love to get that too, get them home safely and frame them together as a momento of the trip. its going to depend on how well i can talk my way into getting it. i'll have to play the charm card. *UPDATE: here it is, i got this picture off the internet, but its taken in a tube stop, on the escalator... they have a poster every 2 feet, and alot of the time they just repeat the same sign over and over... so here's the one i got.














thats pretty much it for tonight! i'm pretty busy this weekend with work, plus i just got sent the new material for jerkmag.net that i have to update on the website by friday, so we'll see if that happens. tomorrow we're going to the imperial war museum, so that should be interesting.

i have to start saying cheers more. they don't say thanks, they don't say you're welcome, they just say cheers. i'm very american with the 'thank you's' and 'you're welcomes.'

cheers mates!

bath&chelsea

well, what a wonderful weekend its been!
first of all, i want to say that as i'm typing this on a sunday afternoon at around 1, i can hear the songs from a church in the background. don't know where its coming from, but i like it... it sounds like a church where all the people sing loudly, i'm thinkin baptist? could be wrong... but its most likely not catholic - its not like a choir, its more like a entire body of the church belting it out!

speaking of churches, we found a catholic church RIGHT around the corner from our house. i didn't get home in time to hit up the 6o'clock mass, but the people who went were home by 645, they said its an express mass. i'm hoping that the one i go to tonight at 7 is just as quick!

so let me back up a little bit here, back to friday.. the trip to bath. everybody in the house except for 2 people (lindsey and michelle) were going on the trip to bath, so we all got up and got to faraday house by 9. 9.20 we were on the road, in the coach bus, it was nice. unfortunately for us tho, there was a lot of traffic on the highway (they call the highways by numbers and letters, we took the A4 and the M4). so we got stuck in traffic and apparently the bus driver had to take some different routes than planned, and we didn't get to bath until 12:30. i guess it wasn't supposed to take that long, but it did, and as a result, we only got to spend about 1 hr and 15 mins on our own exploring the city. even worse was the fact that we had to get lunch in that time also. first let me explain what went down. basically because we were short on time, they drove us around the city of bath, explaining the history and whatnot, so it was impossible to tak pictures of the beautiful parks, and squares and everything. its a lovely town, i tried to get some pictures, but it looks alot like london except everything looks the same. everything is made out of the same kind of rock, i think it was called bath limestone, so every house is the same tan color. the city is set in the hills, which is really pretty. there's a cathedral, there's all sorts of nice looking buildings, there's nice parks and stuff, its a shame that we couldn't explore it all. the city is famous, however for the roman baths. the natural hot spring in the city is the only one of its kind in all of england. so when the romans were in england 2,000 years ago, they built some baths (basically swimming pools) that were fed with hot water.. and by some miracle, they are still there today. all the original pipe work and stuff is still working (not pipes, but the way water gets from one place to another), and the water is still being pumped out into the pools. so back to our free time - me, courtney, andrew, and max went to a pub called coeur de lion (heart of the lion in french) for lunch. i had the fish and chips and peas, which was extremely good. everyone else got sandwiches. the place was pretty interesting. it was no bigger than our living room at home (or maybe 20 feet by 20 feet). and we suspect (this is only an educated guess) we suspect that everyone that works there is homosexual. not that there's anything wrong with that. but we started to get that vibe when we saw pictures of the workers dressed up in drag, and they had certain manerisms that made us think that they may have all been gay. is this blog material? i'm sorry, i shouldn't have said anything. anyways, here's a shot of the inside of the pub.














so at 1:55 we had to meet at the roman bath museum, which wass where we spent the rest of the day. the museum is situated right on top of the original bath, so that the bath is the main draw of the museum. this was kind of weird, but it was an amazing thing to see. the water was green, and bubling (not because it was boiling, but because of the gasses coming up). and you could walk around, and look at all the artifacts and stuff from the romans, and actually walk right next to the baths, and look down into them, which was amazing. the fact that the same exact bath existed 2,000 years ago was incredible. so i went picture crazy there, but here's some good ones - a panorama of the bath itself. there's steam coming off of it because the water was so hot.







and here's a shot of me, i couldn't resist, and i think it came out great. i rested the camera ontop of some ancient roman bricks that made a perfect ledge. i think thats why the shot came out so good.














and then here's one of the better shots of the neighborhood i took from the bus. you can kind of see how every building is made out of the same stuff.















so after we went to the museum we grabbed some quick eats at a fake patisserie ( i had pain au chocolate that didnt compare to france), and then it was time to go back. we ended up spending more time in the bus than at bath! so when you look at it that way, and you think about how much of the city we didn't get to see, it wasn't really a good trip. alot of time in the bus in exchange for not-so-much time in the city. but it was definitely nice to get out of london and see more of the country. even riding in the bus was nice because we got to see the countryside.

saturday was of course, the football game. chelsea v portsmith (they dont say "versus" they say "v"). the entire experience was incredible! i want to back to another game so badly! the day started off with a talk from some local football experts, who gave us tips and tricks, as well as explaining the way the league works. the way the league works is really well-planned. there are different teers of the football association, and at the end of the year, the top 3 teams in each level move up, and the bottom 3 teams move down a teer. that way the games are always interesting, even the ones with the bad teams. and last year, chelsea won it all, they were the premiere league (top teer) champions! the first time thats happened since 1955. and this year it looks like they're going to repeat. just like any team in the states, the fans are really hardcore... except they dont really dress up for games, or paint their face, or have banners, or signs, or anything. they wear they're regular clothes. maybe they have a scarf that says "chelsea," or maybe a hat. very few people had jerseys on, mostly kids. people didn't even wear the team color (which was blue). everybody was dressed in their regular clothes, which are dark by nature, so the stands just look dark. so that made it difficult to tell which group of fans were rooting for which team. they only way to tell was by the chants. the chants were unreal. i soon found out that we were right next to the little sliver of portsmith fans. i am a chelsea fan. i became a chelsea fan when i got my ticket, which was amung the chelsea fans. it was a home game for chelsea. the chelsea stadium is humingus. its outdoors, but the stands are all covered. it holds 40,000 people, and every game, there are 40,000 people there. there's 4 different sections to get in, the east and west stands, one other set of stands opposite of us, and then 'the shed' (just like the movie). we were in the shed, which was right behind one of the goals. first half chelsea was shooting at our end, and the next half they were defending it. unfortunately they didn't score at all in the first half, but did in the second half (twice). portsmith is really bad, actually, they're in danger of going down a teer at the end of the year. the field was all mud, so that sucked, but it was interesting. before the game i had a hotdog for 3 pounds. it was huge - at least a foot, maybe longer. i also bought a program for 3 pounds, and actually, i got a t shirt for 3 pounds also. everything was 3 pounds. thats not true for everything, just the things i got. alot of stuff was madd expensive. so i got to the stadium early and went in to my seat, figuring i would walk around the stadium before the game, but to my surprise, you couldnt walk around the stadium, just my section (the shed), and you couldnt even go to the chelsea mega store which was in part of the stadium.. so i had to just sit and wait for the game to start... and eat my hot dog. before the game it reminded me of an su game, everybody was warming up to some piped in music. the one thing that was a bit fishy was that you couldnt drink beer in the stands, only in the concourse area. so before the game it was like a pub in the stadium, with everyone drinking and watching footbal that they had on tvs out beneath the stands. when the game started everyone was in their seats. not a single empty seat anywhere. our view of the field was great, i suspect every view was great. we were behind the goal, and up far enough where we could see everything. and one of the best parts was the chanting between our section and the portsmith people. especially since the game was tied at 0 until the 60th minute, both teams thought they had a chance. the chanting was great, i got lots of video of it. very vulgar. very funny. some of the chants were familiar, like the "give me a c" chant where they spell chelsea, some were stupid, like the "chelsea, chelsea, chelsea, chelsea, chelsea" chant, and some were great, like "champions, stand up!" chant. i couldn't understand most of the chants because of the accents, and because everyone was yelling them, but some were to familiar tunes - like the graduation song. one of the chants sounded like the graduation song. it was hilarious. but most of the chants during the game were jsut different ways of saying chelsea. so they were easy to learn. the fans were really roudy, too, alot of cursing and vulgar hand motions between sections. but i never really felt unsafe. it was like any game in the states, i just went with the flow. the game itself was really good. and as soon as chelsea got the first goal, the chanting started to get really negative towards portsmith. i got some great video of that. expect a chelsea video montage on the su site. chelsea ended up winning 2-0, and it was an excellent time. it was just great to be emersed in the culture like that. it was a huge learning experience, and a memory i'll always have. here's some pics:

the stadium from the street














the view from our seats:






(it was really sunny, a beautiful day for a game, but it made it hard to take pictures. either the sky was totally washed out, or it wasn't and the stadium was really dark). i tried to work with it tho.

here's another view from our seats:














and here's a view of a corner kick from our seats:














and here's a cool shot of the sign entering a certain gate at the stadium. by the way, the stadium was called: stamford bridge.


















and don't go thinking that its the chelsea lions or something. its jsut chelsea. the chelsea football club, or CFC. they don't have a nickname.

came home from the game and caught the tail end of the su game - very dissappointing. today i'm heading to faraday for a group project, and then church, and i have alot of work to do. i can't believe wednesday is ash wednesday already! im going to give up biting my nails for lent, in case you wanted to know. tuesday is also pancake day locally, have no idea what thats all about, but it should be a good time. we'lll see if there's any festivals or anything, i think there are. anyways i gotta run, i need to start doing work! sorry if this is kind of messed up to read, but i'm pressed for time!

cheers!

football game

so i woke up this morning at 7:45, on my day off... marched down to faraday house (in the rain), got there at 8:45, and got in line to get the tickets for the game on saturday. yes, the line, 20 people long (for only 35 tickets). i was so nervous in line because i knew that alot of the people in front of me were getting more than 1 ticket i.e. the kid infront of me who got 4! so i had no idea if their were going to be any tickets left over for me as i was waiting in line. it was like i was in line to get a child or something, everybody who walked thru the line to go somewhere else in the building was eyed by everyone in line to make sure that they didn't budge. people who did try and get someone in the front of the line to buy them tickets were met with boos and hisses from the people in the end of the line. it was rough, 35 tickets is not alot of tickets, and it was even rougher in my area, around the 20th person in line, because we were all conversing, talking about how we hoped their were tickets... but for people 3 behind me - there were no tickets. i got the 32nd ticket! it was amazing! but i felt horrible for the people behind me.. espcially since the dude infront of me got 4, after he was one of the ones who was talking with us about how we hoped there were some left over for us. anyways, the tickets went like hotcakes, if you weren't in line by 8:45, then you weren't going to get a ticket. doors opened at 9 to the office, and if you got there at that time, you were out of luck. what a hectic morning. but at least i got a ticket! i'm so excited for the game!

in other news, we went to a 'design talk' at the design museum on monday night, and our teacher, francesco, said that he had seen madonna in the streets near marble arch. well, thats where we live, so last night i searched on the internet to see where exactly she lives, and low and behold, she lives only a few blocks from our house! the internet didn't give an exact house number, but a few different sources confirmed a street thats right near ours, and its a small street, so we have it pinned down. and the sources led to more interesting finds! turns out tony blair, the prime minister, has a house in the same neighborhood!!! and they DID give his house number, and its actually visible on our walk to the underground station at marble arch! and there was an interview on the internet of the owner of the store that tony blair shops at, which is marble arch food & wine! which we shop at too! its amazing! so we live in the same neighborhood as madonna, and tony blair, and hopefully someday we'll see them walking around or somethign! its unbelievable.

here's the map of our little area:















the green area on the bottom of the map is hyde park, and the area of hyde park nearest to our tube stop is where the marble arch is, hence the name of our tube stop is marble arch. tony blair lives at 29 connaught square, which is pretty amazing. i think thats where the red star is. if you google their names, and the name of the street (connaught square) there's proof that i'm not lying!

think i'm kickin the cold!

i've been drinking orange juice, and eating very healthily lately, plus taking cough-drops, and blowing my nose whenever i feel the need, and i think the result is that i'm starting to feel well again! like always (i think its going to be the routine), sunday night and monday night are busy, because i've got my big classes on monday and tuesday. so tonight i get to blog... not really much to catch up on.

we've been finalizing our spring break plans: looks like we're going to go to madrid, spain for the first weekend of the break, then fly to roma, italy. we're going to spend the most time there, about 4 days, then take the train to florence, and fly out of pisa on sunday night (pisa is pretty close to florence). will we see the leaning tower? if its convenient. i've heard everybody and their mother say that its just turned into a huge tourist trap, much like niagra falls. so its going to be a pretty busy little week, but we got some great deals on places to stay and flights, so its not really expensive! it'll be a nice little break for us.

speaking of plans: su got its hands on 35 tickets for a football (soccer) game this weekend, and they're offering them to the first 35 people at the student services office on thursday morning! so i'm going to be waking up really early thursday and i might camp out a little but to get these tickets! apparently, its sooo hard to get tickets to games, and the game will be a really good experience, and su is taking over 50% off the price of them... so pretty much, i'm very excited for that this weekend!

this last weekend, on sunday we went to camden markets, which was an experience. london is full of markets, portebello market, burough market, spittlefields market... and they all offer different things. this one was high on clothing (vintage) (used), high on food, from all over the world, and high on the nick-nacks. lots of gothic stores with chains and stuff, lots of just, crap. but some stuff was interesting, some of the clothes were really cool. i almost bought a hooded sweater, with a fleece lining, but it was like 40 pounds, which is ridiculous. lots of jewlery here. it was huge, it was a combination of so many streets. it was crazy.

here's some pictures of the main drag... where every little side street kind of goes off into its own labrynth of retail.




























also this weekend on saturday was the big muslim rally. i hate to say this, but it was really scary. we waited till after the rally was over to run our errands (we went to the tate britain museum (just like the louvre) and then we went (in the rain) to try and find a church, st. joe's, then we found it a little bit late, and the only door (we peeked in) was RIGHT next to the alter, so we gave up), but when we did go out, the muslims were DENSE! and i can't help but think that they a. hate americans, and b. can tell that we're american.. so i have no idea what they might do! it was really frightening, but it turns out that everything was alright, so no worries.

in other news: i tried some gum that they have over here (i think its exclusive to europe and not in the states), and its flavored like coca-cola! it was the craziest trip that my mouth has ever been on! it was a little bit "fruitier" than coke, but it still had the taste. and it was brown too. it was crazy.

listened to the su game last night against west virginia - what a great game.... im really sad that g-mac is leaving. i hope everyone goes to the villanova game. it would be unbelievable if we won.

i think thats all for this update... as well as going to the football game saturday, we're going to try and get into the field trip thats going to the town of bath on friday. i love the su field trips, cuz they're free, and they're a great time. so this weekend will be a great one, hopefully get some pics up on the internet!

Recap

Well, now that all the france stuff is cleared up, i can update a few other things.
this work week was very tough, like i said - probably not the weekend that would have been great for france, but we didn't know that when we booked it.

tuesday was valentine's day, which was great! me and courtney didn't go all out because we're not rich, so basically, we had a "tech-v-day" where i got her a wireless card for her laptop, and she got me a real case for mine.

here's me with my gift. its red, from italy, very designerly, holds my powerbook like a wet-suit, and hey - its waterproof too! its gorgeous. not to mention the bag it came in from the apple store- that was good enough a gift!


















After exchanging gifts we went for a walk around parliament square which was nice. on the tube, we actually heard one of those licensed musicians (which have a name - buskers) playing boston - more than a feeling, which was awesome to hear. the guy was great, he was even hitting the high notes.

infront of parliament sq. on tuesd:














couple of sick people enjoying the city... speaking of the sickness. let's talk about it:

everyone believes it originates from this one girl, ashley, in comm design. one day she said she was sick, and she went to the dr. who said it was very contageous, but did she do anything? did she quarentine herself? no. then this other kid, charlie got it. it wasnt looking good. then the paris trip came, everyone felt fine! first couple of days went off without a problem... then is when the attack came. me, i got sick, hard, i fell, it was bad. ouch. annnnd looking back at it, probably living in the same room with everyone wasn't good. the next person to go down was max. then andrew picked it up. then michelle got it. and courtney got it. 5/8 in the house have it. not too shabby. this place is a germ pool. scientists should come here to do testing! anyways - its pretty bad here, the coughing, sneezing, etc.... and it sucks because while we're sick, we can't really do much, so it feels kind of like a wasted weekend.

but we can't really go anywhere tomorrow.. the us embassy sent out an email to american students saying to not really go outside tomorrow because they overheard talk of a huge rally (up to 20,000) in protest of the cartoons, by all the muslims in the area. and since our area is kind of heavy on the muslims, we're not going to be doing much tomorrow.

wednesday night was my night to cook, and i had no idea what i was going to make up until when i went home. but it ended up being bbq chicken, and those same potato things from last week, and pees, and it was delicious! and people loved it too. courtney helped me make it, and it just felt so good to get it done with.... it always does. but a new dinner shedule is coming out this week, so that's something to look forward to.

wednesday night was also the su game against cincinati. my computer didn't pick it up this time, so i had to be continuously checking it on espn.com... and then the internet itself just stopped working! so the next time i checked it - su had lost. bad night.

basically i've just been laying low trying to recover. tomorrow should be interesting with the muslim march thru the city, so that might be worthy of an update. sunday we're going to hit up some markets, camden market actually. reminds me of camden, ny, but we'll see what its actually like sunday!

oh, tonight we figured out a little bit more traveling we'regoing to be doing. not too much, just italy over spring break, and maybe spain over spring break too. but we're still talking everything over.

just chillin tonight - cheers!

p.s. -> found out what GOLF stands for and i like it - it stands for "gentlemen only, ladies forbidden" (i don't really like it, i like the bit of trivia)

Give the People What They Want!

PICTURES!

So its been a while since the last post, but this one promises to be one of the best, if not the best one yet. Just going to give a little picture-book type story of the trip to Paris last weekend (which was INCREDIBLE)!! Buckle up! Its going to be a fast trip!

BONUS!! videos!! There's a medly of short videos from Paris on my website - web.syr.edu/~jateska! And more to come, also!

Here we go!
Starting off -

Here's the Waterloo Train Station here in London as we are boarding the Eurostar.














And here's Courtney sitting in her assigned seat. You can see the layout of the train car.














This is the Gare Du Nord in Paris!














And here's a sample of what the interior of our room at the Hotel Richard looked like.














And here's a look at the hostel from the road.


















Alright, when we got to Paris we dropped our stuff off, and then checked out the nearest monument - Bastille.


















Then we walked along the Seine, to the ile of the City, and we toured Notre Dame. I'd have to say I'm getting pretty good at taking my own picture.














Andrew took this sweet picture of me and the lovely lady.


















Here's the main alter area inside the church - very sweet.














And then, on the same little island was St Chappelle-














Here's the dude we bought our first crepes from. I had sugar and butter and it was delicious!















OK tomorrow or soon i'll post up the exterior panorama of Centre Pompidou - the post Modern museum in Paris. But for now, here's the interior of the lobby.














Here's the inside of the tubes on the outside of the building the building is inside out-ish, with the pipes and elevators and stairs all on the outside of the building. It was done like that to maximize space inside.














At night we went out to dinner - here's the appetizer i got - which is salmon.














And here's the main dish - a big pot full of Pork, Veggies, Potatos, Bacon and Sausage.















And Last but not least, here's the mousse au chocolate with a ball of pistachio!!















Here's the small patisserie type place where we got breakfast on Saturday - its right by our hostel.














And here i am on the Champs Elysees infront of L'arc de triomph!














Her'es the climb up - it cost about 5 Euros, but it was totally worth it. There's a museum on top, and it was just a gorgeous day up there. More pics of this event will be coming, there's some beauties!














A picture of Me and Courtney ontop of L'arc, with the Eiffel Tower in the background, unbelievable. The pictures were hard to take because it was so sunny!! (crazy, isn't it?!)














Heres everyone (except me) at the little pond in the Jardin des Touilleries which is situated between the Champs Elysees, Arc de Triomph, and Obelisque (which we've just hit), and the Louvre (which we are about to see).















I asked a man to take our picture. he did. and he gave the camera back, alright!!














This is Venus de Milo. Best part was seeing the back. Nowhere can you find a picture of the backs of any of these famous sculptures, so I made sure to check it out.


















Victoire de Samalthrace (winged victory) (Nike), this was great, especially, again, to walk around it! This piece is one of my favs just because of the history and intrigue behind it.



















Here's the group after tackling the Louvre... very tired.















So after the Louvre, we grabbed some croque monsieurs at a cafe nearby, went home to take a little napsky, then hit up the EIFFEL TOWER!! @ night - Absolutely Gorgeous!


















Another view of the base:


















Beautiful view of the city!














We spent a LONG time at the Eiffel Tower, so we went to bed afterwards, then the next morning, Sunday, we woke up, had the usual patisserie for breakfast, you know, croissants, pain au chocolate, and we went to the Musee D'Orsay, which was lovely, because i knew the history of it, and the art in it, i felt like I'd already been there before!














Here's Courtney in the lower gallery. The 5th floor one was the best, but the first did have some good ones, like both "dejeuner sur l'herbes" by Manet and Monet.














Here's 3 samples of the work that's in the Musee D'Orsay - very impressionistic. i loved getting close and being able to see the strokes!! It was like a private tour of the artist's studio. Here's a couple Van Gogh's. (don't wet your pants).





























Pointilism (using tiny dots) by Seurat



















So thats basically where I stopped taking pictures, after the Musee D'Orsay on Sunday, we went to the Latin Quarter, which is kind of where the Universities are (the sorbonne). We walked around a little, then went back to the Hostel, and some people left on Sunday Night. The rest of us, me included, left Monday morning at 6:30, meaning we had to take a taxi at 5:30 to the Gare au Nord because the subway wasn't working yet! Plus I was sick ontop of that, plus I had a presentation to make at 2, which wasn't done, and an essay due Wednesday - but i got it done, thankfully. Wouldn't have not-gone, in retrospect, it was a fabulous trip! Hope to get back sometime also, because it was very inspiring!

It was amazing, almost 99% of the french that i took in highschool came back to me! Which was crucial, because no one else in the house really spoke it well. So i was responsible for bridging the language gap between all 7 of my roomates, and the entire city. It was alot of hard work, but it was all very fun! and it felt great to be speaking french again!

I'll be posting another blog later on, with regular updates... I'll keep this entry "just paris."

Cheers,
Jamie

gonna keep it short

i dont think ive ever been stressed like this - ever. not the level of stress, but the reasons. im going to a totally different country tomorrow, and im not even sure how to get to the train station yet. things are crazy here, i dont think they're supposed to get this crazy. everybody was like 'oh yea, you'll have time to travel, and explore," well, if the work keeps up like this, i don't know if i'll be able to keep doing this to myself. its really a shame. hopefully this is just one of those 'bad weekends' that i really shouldn't be traveling on, but we made a poor decision to go with it anyway. i dont want to sound like im not going to have a good time. thats not the case - i plan on seeing everything, experiencing everything, being happy all weekend and not devoting one single brain cell to my homework. it will be a fun trip, im very excited, i just feel a little unprepared and everything. i'm hoping it all works out.

so anyways, about my life the past few days - i'll keep it short.
basically ive been doing alot of work.

wednesday was of course, my nigh to cook. i went to somerfields and got ground beef, potatos and carrots, and made burgers and potato wedges for dinner.. and they were excellent, if i do say so myself. and others said it too! it felt great to have a good old american classic for dinner. but after dinner it was right to work. im writing a 1,500 word pape on alphonse mucha (hope to see some of his work this weekend in paris) and im workin on the signage for faraday house (which is due monday). as of today we're still not completely done with that, which is why im a little stressed, but everythign is going to get done somehow (thats the mentality we have in our group (no, it will)).

stayed up last night doing work so i caught the su game. was battling the internet and the ridiculously crappy user interface at suathletics.com, so i didn't get to hear the first 15 minutes of the game, which was very unfortunate, because i heard that we actually had the lead there for the beginning. what a horrible game. i got some good sleep last night.

wednesday during the day, we also went to the museum of london, which isn't art, as much as it is just stuff that relates to the city. and the history of the city. it was interesting. then we went on a little walking tour with the teacher, we went to the oldest pub in london, and we went to a very very smashing pub thats all art nouveau, and its right by st pauls cathedral. had a half pint at the art nouveau one, it was called 'pride of london' and it was the most bitter bear that i've ever tasted (havent tasted that many). it tasted alot like shampoo, which made me want to throw up as we walked thru the back streets of london (very quaint and beautiful. rich with history). on the walk the teacher mentioned soemthing interesting - there's a law in london that says you can't tear down 2 kinds of buildings - churches and pubs. i thought that was rather funny.

last thing -i thought this was funny too - on the way to class on weds there was a guy playing john denver "you fill up my senses" on the giutar in the tube station. i didnt know that it was such an international hit.

ok, thats it for now - going to grab dinner (lindsey's night - ravioli's in red sauce), then head back to farady for a short while, then back here to shower, shave, and head to bed! then its paris in the morning!

have a great weekend everyone, i'll be in touch with many many pictures when i get back!

cheers,
jamie

busy busy

sooo much to get done before we leave for paris.
leaving for the romance capital of the world at 630 am on friday - we're taking the eurostar train which takes nearly 2.5 hours to get to paris. and its exciiiiting!
spending all of friday, saturday, and sunday enjoying the wonderful sights, and then taking the early morning train (630) back to london on monday. and monday brings with it a project due, tuesday is valentines day, and wednesday i have a paper due. so thats why im going crazy right now trying to work on all the papers and projects and stuff.

so there's this place called 'pannetonne' or something like that right near faraday and i've been using it as a snack place. they sell "jacket potatos" which are basically baked potatos, and you can put anything on them. the other day i had straight up cheese, and then today i had chilli con carne (which wasnt nearly as good as the cheese). they're great, they're huge, not too expensive... i might be addicted.

this morning i woke up at 8:44, andrew woke me up, apparently i turned my alarm off partially in my sleep. class started at 9:15 ish (keyword ish), so i basically got up, put in my contacts, got dressed and walked to the tube. but we made it, but it was a stressfull morning.

after class - went to argos (the catologue store) and ordered some hair clippers. great deal, in comparison to what it would cost to get a haircut every now and then. cheapest haircut for a guy that we could find is 10 pounds. the buzzer i got was 16 pounds fifty p. and tonight courtney buzzed my hair! feels great to be short again!

and courtney made some excellent tacos tonight for dinner! a great change up from the usual pasta trip that we had been stuck on. tomorrow is me, and its going to be hamburgers, fries, and carrots. its going to be a late meal tho, cuz we're going to the museum of london, then i have to go to the library, and then i have to buy the goods, then make the meal. hopefully it wont be too late, because i have to work more, and then get adequate rest before an all-out work fest on thursday, my last chance.

today we went to the national gallery for the mastepieces of london class. its becoming kind of a regular thing. i like the national gallery, but theres alot of better museums and galleries in london, and im totally psyched about going to paris and checking out those museums! i've been learning about them for so long, its hard to believe that im finally getting to see them in person!

so- it looks like its going to be an early bed time tonight, as opposed to the last 2 nights (i wont disclose any actual numbers, but im very tired).

i'll be spreading the news about my meal, and the rest of the days to come-
cheers!

hello photo

ok here they are:



first one is a clasic london shot - big ben, the millenium eye, parliament (right side of pic) and a double decker bus (on an un-london like sunny day!)


this is one of those night shots that was taken by me or patrick that night when everyone else went out somewhere, and we walked to parliament square to get shots like this one.


just a cool shot of the escalator in the underground (tube) station. they have this rule, which works brilliantly: if you just stand there and ride along, stand on the right, and if you walk, walk down on the left. its very effective. some other things noticed on the tube: nobody makes eye contact. its kind of scary, everybody just stares into space, or at a paper/book or something, or they look at your shirt, or pants or shoes - so they know you're from out of town when your head is up and you're looking all around. also, the phrase 'mind the gap' is not used as much as it used to be... there's a few stops where there is a huge gap between the underground train and the platform, and they say it, and it sounds great, its wonderful. they also say 'mind the doors' too, when the doors close.


this is the jack the ripper guy (in the hat) at one of the stops, talking about the ripper... not a terribly interesting shot, but this is what the walk was like.


the infamous cooking schedule. you can check out what people have been doing, what they're scheduled to cook, and how the whole system works.


and here's the whole group that lives at 32 brendon - from left to right(heads): andrew, patrick, courtney,michelle, krista, me, lindsey and max