The Prodigal Blogger, Part 2...

I know. I've done it again. I really am sorry. 3 months have passed without me writing a word, and while this is of no consequence in my mind, there are a select few of you to whom my writer's block (a.k.a. 'laziness') is unacceptable. I think about it. I really do...and then the phone rings, and then Oprah comes on, and then we get sidetracked while MySpace-stalking people we haven't seen in 5 years, and then I get stuck on ESPN.com reading about football, and...it just doesn't get done. I promise (again), I'll try to do better. Perhaps if more fascinating things happened to me, I'd feel more compelled to regale you all with my stories of adventure. Ahh, well. Someday...

Anyway, nothing terribly new & exciting to report around here. I came back to London last weekend after almost a month and a half of being at home. It was great to be home, although I have to admit that I felt kind of fish-out-of-water-esque. It's just sort of unsettling to have your life split in half, with an ocean in the middle. Plus, while I was doing my best impression of a lazy bum, school was always looming somewhere in the back of my mind, so I couldn't ever just fully 'be' at home. Also, I made the choice to sell my car before I left for school, so on any given day, I was at the mercy of whoever would let me steal theirs. And let me tell you, cabin fever? For someone as antsy as me?? NOT fun. The good thing was, I had nothing terribly pressing to do, so I did a whole lot of nothing. The Food Network and I spent a lot of quality time together, and I am now a court-recognized expert in TNT's entire daytime lineup: 10 am & 11 am - E.R., 12 pm & 1 pm - Judging Amy, 2 pm - Law & Order...and so on. So lazy, yet so lovely. I did try to be minorly productive whilst watching absurd amounts of t.v. though. I folded lots of laundry :)

So I'm back here till late June, catching up with the crew and, in theory, studying (although they call it "revising"?? Crazy Brits...) for our exams, which go from May 31st to June 14th. Somewhere in there, we're hoping to squeeze a couple of field trips (Paris is in the works, I'd be quite happy to see Portugal, and I am DYING to go to Rome), and then I'm home again on June 18th. Summer then commences with:

A) My dissertation - research disguised as hanging out with kids at the Boys & Girls Club across the street from the aquarium and responding to "Hey, White Girl..." Good times.

B) Finding a job - and if just so anyone happens to play golf with the director of the CDC or the powers that be at Emory, could you be a dear and tell them I'll be their best friend if they'll give me a job?? I'll owe you my first-born child. I'm not saying you can have it, but...you can come over and play with it whenever you want.

C) Deciding where I want to live once I find said job - Correction...I WANT to live in one of those ridiculous old houses in Druid Hills, but until I win the lottery or marry a Rockefeller, the likelihood of this happening is slim to none. I'll be trying to decide on a Plan B.

D) Figuring just exactly what it is that I'm supposed to be doing with my life - Translation...Aggghhhhhh!!

Other than that, just lots of playing with the fam (who are coming to visit on Tuesday...yay!!), sun-soaking, wedding going/bridesmaid-ing, road-tripping, and a general killing of time in anticipation of (drumroll...) football season!! And this time I won't be on the wrong side of the globe! Hooray! Now if only we could figure out how not to lose to Vanderbilt and Kentucky. Geez...

Rule #11 - Train Narcolepsy is also a no-no...

I suppose it's a good thing that I can't claim this story as my own, but I think this is simply too funny not to share...

Helpful Background Information -- There is a group of us that started out as just a few UGA alumni getting together to watch what usually turned out to be hugely disappointing football games and has grown into a hilariously random assortment of fun-loving American expatriots (representatives from Georgia x 4, California, New Jersey, Texas, Indiana, & New York) with a French guy, a Spanish guy, and a Scottish guy (who is 23 and wears Rockports, has not even a HINT of a Scottish accent, and used the word "y'all" in an e-mail last week!) thrown into the mix for good measure. Our core football network has grown to include roommates, co-workers, friends of friends, etc. It's lovely. Anyway, the group typically goes out together on Fridays and Saturdays, and lately, we've been getting together at New Jersey Joe's flat on Sunday nights to watch the NFL playoffs and laugh about the shenanigans that we got into over the weekend. Then, on Monday mornings, Adam (the original Bulldog football host) sends out a group e-mail recapping the latest happenings, and the e-mail chain carries on until the next weekend, when the silliness starts all over again.

The following hilarious story is an e-mail from last week's chain, authored by our Sunday Night Football host, New Jersey Joe. Joe is everything you want a yankee to be. He's brooding and sarcastic and looks and talks a bit like Robert Dinero does in 'Goodfellas.' However, despite the accent and the fact that he loves the Yankees, he's definitely one of the nicer people I've met since I've been here, and he's a lot of fun. What makes this story even more amusing is that he's not a crazy 22 year old frat boy...he's got a graduate degree from Princeton, he works at some big important investment bank here, and he's getting married in 2 months. And here is what happened to him last Thursday night...

"Okay, so I hit a new low in London last night.

A couple of drinks after work turned into a late night bender with multiple beers, Sambuca shots (I don’t recommend this), and no dinner eaten, so I got hammered. I managed to catch a midnight Jubilee line train out of Canary Wharf and figured I could grab something to eat at Baker Street. I remember making it to Green Park station, just two stops away from home, and thinking about how great a kebab would be.

Next thing I know I am being shaken by two Underground employees who are telling me I must wake up and get off the train. Staggering to my senses, I find myself in a place I have never been before – Wembley Stadium. I think it might be in Zone 17, and it’s just shy of 1 am, so no more trains are running (WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS CITY!!!????). I have exactly £2.50 in left my pocket and there are no banks or ATMs in sight. In my condition I get the grand idea that I can walk home, despite not having any maps or knowing only vaguely what direction I am facing. Within 10 minutes I am hopelessly lost, sobering rapidly, and realizing just how freaking cold it is. I backtrack to the stadium, which is the only landmark I can see.

I try to call the only taxi company whose number I have to see if they will accept credit cards – they do not answer. I now notice that there are 5 missed calls from my fiancée, who is flying into London today. She rings again and I have to explain to her that I am stranded at Wembley stadium at 1 am because I passed out on the last train and I’m not sure how to get home. She finds this incredibly amusing.

I attempt to figure out the night bus, and a helpful guy standing at the bus stop tries to explain the 5 transfers I must make to get back to Baker Street . Given my previous struggles with the night buses (as Faith can attest), I think about walking home again. I head off in a new direction, and as luck would have it, I find a Premier Travel Inn near the stadium. I go into the lobby and figure I will get a room and just take an early train the next morning to go home before work. Miraculously, this travel inn happens to have an ATM in the lobby, and to make a long story even longer, I am able to get cash and have reception call me a cab (which by the way only cost £15 from Wembley - less than we paid from Angel to Baker Street at 2am two weeks ago).

The moral of the story is this: don’t pass out on the last train in London when you have spent all your cash.

More importantly, despite my raging hangover and chuckling fiancée, I am still fired up about going out Saturday night in South Kenyonton . So let’s all throw on our dark jeans and meet at the Dreyton Arms, followed by the Eclipse. Maureen will be out with me and is looking forward to meeting everyone - you can join her in heaping scorn upon me for my unfortunate bout of narcolepsy."

Footnotes, in case anyone cares to keep reading and wants clarification -- There are 6 zones on the Underground. Central London is Zone 1, out to Heathrow, which is in Zone 6...therefore, 'Zone 17' would probably be in Scotland somewhere. The fact that he was pondering a kebab just before zonking out on the train is classic. Joe LOVES this late night London staple and is always the one looking for the nearest open kebab shop when we're meandering home at 4 am. I can attest to his night bus troubles because his flat is about a 10 minute walk from mine, so we usually brave the STUPID late night transportation system together. A couple weeks ago, after waiting, in the rain, for a bus for close to 45 minutes, we gave up and decided to cab it. It ended up costing us almost 20 pounds to get what couldn't have been 5 miles in a taxi. This city makes absolutely no sense. As for the last paragraph, South Kenyonton = South Kensington, the neighborhood home of Jeremy Kenyon, our Texas representative. The knock on South Kent is that it's the snobbiest area around, and, according to Zagat Jeremy, some of the bars require that you wear 'dark jeans.' We actually had to walk past a Lamborghini dealership and a Ferrari/Maserati dealership to get to the pub. Rough neighborhood, huh? Oh, and Maureen is Joe's super cool fiance who is here for the next month or so. She arrived last Friday, came out with us Saturday and has completed her initiation into the group. She's actually making chili and chicken wings right now for our normal food/normal fooball Super Bowl shindig this evening. We love her already!

I'll write my own real blog in a day or two, but I thought Joe's story was funny enough to pass along. In the meantime, I have to go write my dissertation proposal (that's due tomorrow at noon, after the game won't be over until probably 4 am...great) and head over to watch the football game. I'll be back with stories and pictures from Spain later this week though! :)

Hasta luego...

Look out, David Letterman...

I spend an exorbitant amount of time on the London Underground. I will readily admit that. It's not something I particularly enjoy, but because a) I live too far away to walk a lot of places, b) I refuse to constantly consult a map to figure out a new way to get somewhere when I already know one, c) the bus still kinda weirds me out, and d) especially lately, it's TOO BLOODY COLD OUTSIDE, I find myself quite the frequent patron of the beloved (or be-hated, depending on the day) "Tube."

I say all of this to say that, for better or worse, I have had plenty of occasion to observe and/or critique people's behavior on the trains. My assessment? I think Emily Post would be appalled. Granted, when you corral the roughly 13 million people who live in the metropolitan London area onto train cars built to hold about 50 people each every day, you're bound to run into some problems. But there are problems, and then there's the stuff that I witness all too often. Some of it's funny, some of it's distubring, some of it's rude, and some of it's just plain annoying, but I suppose it all bears mentioning. As 'civilized' humans (whatever that means...), I'd like to think that this stuff is common sense, but every day it becomes more and more apparent that, at least to some people, it isn't. To that end, I present my Late Show-esque "Top Ten Rules for Using the London Underground."

1. If there is one crucial rule with which to familiarize oneself before joining the ranks of those filing through the tunnels of the Underground, it is this one very simple (and not so subtle...there are signs everywhere) request: PLEASE, for the love of God, slower traffic keep to the right. This goes for the escalators going up and down into the tunnels (if you want to be a lazy bum and stand still instead of walking, whatever...just kindly move over so those of us who are not opposed to physical activity can get where we're going), as well as walking through the tunnels themselves. If you want to stroll along with the urgency of a drugged Galapagos Tortoise, be my guest...just do it on the right side of the walkway. This theory becomes somewhat irrelevant when encountering a walkway that houses two-way traffic, when all hell breaks lose and it's every man for himself, but the basic concept remains the same. Just please, don't be The Oblivious Moron holding up the whole procession because you'd rather not get your heart rate above 60.

2. Also imperative in ensuring that we keep things moving along at an acceptable pace is this rule: do not, under any circumstances, stop as soon as you go through the turnstiles, blocking everyone behind you from coming through. I don't care if your shoe is untied. I don't care if you don't know where you're going and need to consult your giant map. I certainly don't care if your cell phone is ringing. Walk 2 more feet, move over to the side, and resolve your issues in a way that doesn't impede the neverending flow of traffic. This becomes increasingly important when it's freezing outside, raining, or rush hour time.

On a similar note, must people halt in the middle of the doorway to the station to light that cigarette that they simply must have immediately upon returning to street level?? I realize that Europe doesn't exactly subscribe to our smoking-is-gross-and-kills-people mentality, and perhaps they're involved in some sort of intracontinental competition to see who can become the Emphysema Capital of the Western World, but not only do we not all enjoy being engulfed in your cloud of smoke as soon as we escape the less-than-breathable air of the Underground, but also, do you honestly not realize that you're standing in the doorway?? Again, walk 2 extra feet and move over. The general idea is this: if you're not moving, get outta the way. It's not brain surgery.

** note - Are we picking up on a trend here?? Perhaps if people could just stop being so totally oblivious to everything and everyone around them, this stuff wouldn't be an issue. Interesting...

Anyway, Mom Speech over. Moving on... **

3. I thought we covered this one in kindergarten, but I was obviously mistaken. Evidently, some users of the Underground (a.k.a. the woman with the red coat and the bad perm, who we will revisit momentarily) need a refresher course on recess etiquette. My own personal experience has led to the inclusion of this rule: Pushing?? Not OK. Even on playgrounds, pushing others is considered bad form, heavily frowned upon, and punishable by up to 30 minutes of standing by the fence while the other kids run around screaming bloody murder.

It was an incident last week which prompted me to add 'no pushing' to the presumabely common sense list of things that people need to be taught around here. I ignored my better judgement and decided that braving the insanity that is Friday at 5:00 might not be so bad. (Riiight...note to self, never again.) So myself and 600 million other people in a giant hurry are all waiting for the same train at Oxford Circus. The train, which, naturally, is already packed, pulls up and we anxiously await the opening of the doors and hope for a mass exodus of those who are already on the train so we can all fit. No such luck. Plan B, you try and maintain some sense of decorum, alternating from each side of the door and acknowledging who was there before you, stepping up when it's your turn. Well I do, anyway, but evidently I can't say as much for some people. There were probably 10 of us waiting by this particular door, and we were doing quite nicely in the manners department...until Richard Simmons' female twin shows up wearing Captain Kangaroo's jacket. Stupid woman...anyway, I had so clearly waited my turn, and I think I recall letting a cute little old couple go ahead of me so they wouldn't get split up. There was room for one more person before the doors closed, and I stepped up to take MY spot, when this jerky woman runs up at the last minute, having completely ignored the waiting-your-turn ritual that the rest of us had just gone through, hops up where my foot already is and physically PUSHES me off of the train. I was so stunned I didn't even know how to react. I think what I ended up doing was to just look at her in consternation, blurt out, 'Are you serious??,' and begrudgingly step back to wait for the next train. The feisty half of me wishes I would have actually, physically removed her from the train, reclaiming my rightful place, but if college football teaches us anything, it's that the retaliator, and not the instigator, is ALWAYS the one who gets caught and penalized 15 yards for unsportsmanlike conduct. Inevitably, some Underground employee would have seen me, had me arrested and charged with assault and battery, totally ignoring my protests of "but Mom, she pushed me first!"

Anyway, Rule #3, no pushing. It's not nice.

4. I admit that this next rule is sort of the equivalent of going through the Chick-fil-A drive through and eating your lunch while sitting in traffic (guilty, about 1000 times over), but I guess I feel like that's more acceptable because at least that way, your food chomping is contained to your own car. People who eat their food on the Underground bug me for several reasons. First of all, I cannot imagine a more unsanitary place to have lunch. Secondly, the boxed mayonaise sandwich culture over here (eww) is gross enough without having to watch people rip into the tell-tale plastic box, flinging lettuce everywhere and inevitably leaving their trash in the seat when they leave. Also, if you simply cannot hold off on eating your 12-inch Subway turkey bacon club with extra onions until you're NOT 12 inches from my face, could you please at least refrain from throwing the tomatoes you don't want on the floor?? A more amusing example: last night, I watched a boy try and eat his boxed sushi dinner on the train. What made him think he was going to be able to successfully maintain a dipping puddle of soy sauce in the corner of the box while attempting to maneuver chopsticks on a train going 45 miles an hour is beyond me. Basically, I'm just saying we could do without watching 4 course pre-theater meals on the Underground. If you're famished, eat a Power Bar...not spaghetti.

5. I'd be willing to bet you that 60% of Underground patrons on any given day are sporting little white iPod earbuds. I'm one of them, and unapologetically so. It's one of the few things that keeps me sane while having to co-exist with all of this absurdity. The problem arises when the ear-bud sporter blares his or her music so loud that you can hear it over your own. Keep it to a dull, self-audible roar, people.

Oh...and singing out loud? Unacceptable. If I don't even want to hear Cher singing 'If I Could Turn Back Time,' I certainly don't want to listen to your bad karaoke rendition.

6. As with Rule #4, I equate this one with putting your makeup on while driving...perhaps not the best idea, but again, at least you're in your own car. My issue is this: I know you're in a hurry, and there's no shame in quickly reapplying your lipgloss or powdering your nose, but could the Underground eyelash curling and mascara application stop? The other day, I actually saw a girl ask some poor, unsuspecting guy who wasn't even with her if he'd hold her mirror for her while she plucked her eyebrows. Come on, ladies...leave something to the imagination. You're giving away all of our tricks!

7. This Rule is going to give me away as the prudish, straight-laced American that the Europeans would accuse me of being, but seriously, the Public Display of Affection situation on the train is completely out of control. There is a level of PDA that's sweet and lovey and perfectly acceptable...and then there's the level of ridiculously smothering gropiness that needs to wait until you get home. Honestly, you're on the train. You'll probably be there in 10 minutes. No one wants to watch that. Spare us...especially the poor little kid and his grandfather sitting next to you!

8. This one goes in the same obliviousness category as the first couple of Rules. If you go shopping and have 45 bags with you, don't pile them all over the seats and take up all the space. I never particularly mind standing, but there are lots of little old ladies who shouldn't have to. Move your stuff...and don't then continue to glare at the person who subsequently takes your bag's seat. It's rude.

9. This is a big one. Hygiene. It's important. It's infinitely more important when you're squishing yourself into an extraordinarily enclosed space with a bunch of people who probably do not enjoy the smell of gym clothes. Or curry. And if you, say, haven't showered in several days, please, whatever you do, do NOT cough on the top of my head while reaching up to hold onto the handles on the ceiling, wafting your yumminess around for all to enjoy. The consequences of this behavior are severe for those around you. Particularly those of us who are of the...petite persuasion (shutup, Wes). I'm sure that some of my sensitivity on this topic stems from the fact that I am very particular about my personal space (which, for the record, is not such a respected thing on this side of the ocean. They see nothing wrong with close-talking...and, apparently, have no problem pushing and shoving complete strangers either, but whatever...), but part of it is also simply a desire to not have to smell the Indian food you ate for lunch yesterday seeping through your pores. Ewww...

10. The last rule is less an observation of patron mis-behavior as it is a constructive criticism to those in charge of the Underground. Midnight?? Are you KIDDING me? What kind of big, busy city's public transport system closes down every station within about 30 minutes of midnight? I cannot for the life of me figure this one out. Yes, you'd have to pay people to work the late shift, but do you have any idea how much money you'd make off of those of us who hate the night bus and avoid black cabs like the plague? It's just good business sense, Mayor Livingstone. And it'd make a whole lot of people very, very happy. So if you could get on that, by say, June, that'd be fabulous...

Happy Undergrounding!! :) :)

**footnote - I realize that Dave goes backwards with his numbers and that he's much less long-winded then I am, but then again, I never claimed to be David Letterman...I don't have a musical sidekick named Paul, I didn't go to Ball State University, I don't continue to sport a Michael Strahan-esque gap between my front teeth despite the fact that I make a gazillion dollars a year for talking to famous people, I didn't have a well-documented and long-standing feud with Oprah Winfrey, and I don't make it a habit of exploiting my poor sweet mother on national television on a regular basis...although I must admit, I do love it when they call Dave's mom! **

The Prodigal Blogger returns...

I know, I know. I'm sorry. It has been brought to my attention, several hundred times actually, that people are not so happy with my neglecting my blog. I blame this on a combination of laziness, busy-ness, and a general lack of interesting things happening in my life. It's nice to know people actually read this thing though...I think...

Anyway, your requests have been evaluated, and I'll make it my mid-January Resolution to do better :)

So...2 and a half months of updates in 150 words or less. Who thinks I can do it??

(I can actually hear you laughing. Shutup...)

k, well...I went home for 10 days in November to play bridesmaid in Mary Ellen's wedding and to eat normal food and watch NORMAL football for Thanksgiving. It was lovely and exactly the escape I needed. I've learned the hard way that being essentially alone in a giant, dreary city can really wear on you sometimes. Came back here for a few weeks, turned in a stupid research methods project, then went back home for the better part of a month for Christmas, New Years, and even more yummy food and football. Had lots of family time, sister bonding, and caught up with lots of people that I've been missing since moving across the ocean. Slept a LOT. Drove on the right side of the road. Went shopping and didn't cringe when I looked at my receipts. Left the house without a scarf and an umbrella. EVERY DAY. 'Twas fabulous...

So now I'm back again, 1/3 of the way done with my degree and feeling a little weirded out that 9 months from now, I'll have turned in my dissertation and will be waiting with baited breath for these people to tell me that I can actually have a degree. I knew my time here would fly by, but to be more than halfway done with the class part seems really strange. Also disturbing is the ridiculously small number of familiar faces I've seen since I've been here (Chris & Jan Woodruff and Janna, Amanda, & Brooke Abraham get SERIOUS bonus points at this juncture!) The moral of the story: get on over here, people!! You're missing it!

-- P.S. For those of you who are currently copying and pasting that paragraph in Microsoft Word to use that word count thing, convinced that Little Miss Long-Winded here can't keep it brief, let me save you some time. Astonishingly enough, the update segment above contains exactly 150 words. I couldn't do that again if I tried!!

-- P.S. #2 I feel the need to note that, technically, I have seen one additional familiar face since moving here, although it didn't come in the form of a visitor. When I got on my plane to come back from Thanksgiving, my friend Andrew from high school was sitting behind me. Literally. In the seat behind mine. He's here working for the same company that Allison was working for last summer when I came to see her here, living in her same flat building, which is about 5 seconds from mine. Crazy, crazy, crazy...he came with us to watch the ACC championship game (read "THE most boring football game ever to be played") and we have church-going aspirations sometime in the near distant future. Who'd have ever thought that I'd run into a fellow Parkview Class of '99/UGA Class of '03 Alumni on another continent?!? Anyway, glad you're here Andrew. See ya soon! :)

Bizarro World...

So I came to the conclusion today that London exists in some sort of weird parallel universe where the majority of the population is certifiably crazy. I almost can't believe I waited this long to draw this conclusion. I mean, I have seen some strange stuff in my life, but these past couple of weeks have been nothing short of hilarious. And appalling. Hilariously appalling, really...

I know I already mentioned the guy who randomly approached me and asked if I'd like to have his child, and while that was definitely funny, I can't say I'd be all that surprised if it happened while we were out downtown in Athens. London is crazy on a whole 'nother level. Here's what I mean...

-- I already listed the James Taylor-playing Underground man as one of the things that makes me smile. What I didn't mention was the lady who plays on the days when he doesn't. She is this little pixie of a lady who looks like a tiny version of Mimi from the Drew Carey show. She has got to be pushing 60, yet she wears clothes that look like they were made for Disco Barbie, and she ALWAYS, even at 8 in the morning, has on huge gobs of this glittery blue eye makeup that make her look like a smurf. To top it all off, I am thoroughly convinced that she was in the munchkin chorus in The Wizard of Oz when they sing 'We Welcome You to Munchkinland'...and better yet, in her helium voice, she unashamedly belts Bette Midler songs in the far-too-echoey tunnel of the Underground. I always make sure to check which day it is when walking into this particular tunnel, and I quickly turn my iPod on full blast when I realize it's her and not my James Taylor man.

She's amusing, but she can't hold a candle to these three all stars...

-- A couple weeks ago, my friend Cora and I were walking over to another one of the universities in London to listen to a talk about women and AIDS. Nice and uplifting, I realize...I swear, as a result of school, my life revolves around HIV at this point. Anyway, we were just walking down the sidewalk, minding our business, and we were headed up a little incline. I sort of glanced out in front of us, because, as I mentioned before, you can never be too careful about watching where you're walking around here. Well a little ways up the hill, there was this stubby man with a big beer belly just sort of standing in the middle of the sidewalk. He had this weird look on his face, and as we got up to his part of the hill, he started doing this creepy stalker-stare straight at Cora and myself. Naturally, he was on my side of the walkway, so when we got right up to him, I made a very concentrated effort to stare straight at Cora (and away from him) as she was talking to me...and then I hear the strangest sound coming from our creepy little sidewalk man. Out of sheer morbid curiousity, I made the mistake of glancing over at him, and I see him standing there, poking his belly at us and doing that spitting 4-year-old raspberry thing with his tongue. He made that sound for a solid 10 seconds, and I didn't even know what to do but make a face of "what the...," look at Cora in shock, and walk as quickly as I could the rest of the way into the Underground station. We'd have liked to blame it on the fact that he was hammered (at 4:30 in the afternoon), but the bottle in his hand said Diet Coke. What a psycho...

-- So immediately after the sidewalk spitter totally creeps me out, we get on the train to head over toward the London Bridge, where our talk was. We make our way onto the subway, and at this point, we're still pretty tickled by the Incident. Cora then makes a comment about how weird stuff always happens to me, referring to the baby proposition, and right about that time, this impish little man jumps onto the train and stands near us. We're just standing there, minding our business and talking about the funny things that have happened lately, when he overhears our conversation and evidently decides that we are in need of some religious intervention on his part. He basically starts doing what looks like a little Irish Jig dance and pulls a crucifix out of his pocket. He holds it up in the air and repeatedly starts making a cross motion in front of us, while smiling this weird toothy (but missing a few teeth...) grin and chuckling to himself. I swear, at this point, I'm thinking that someone has definitely lost the key to the Central London Nuthouse and all of the crazies just happened to hop right on over to join us for a little higher learning at the London School of Economics...

These things were funny enough, but I believe that was actually Friday the 13th, so I'd just chalk it up to people being weird. And then today happens...

-- I'm sitting in the atrium of a building at school this afternoon, waiting for my friend Heather so we could go listen to this boring lecture on participatory action efforts in Brazil (don't ask, it was terrible...and in Portuguese...), when it starts raining the obligatory 2 inches for the day. Of course, everyone starts scurrying around whapping people with their umbrellas, and the chaos that I previously described for you ensues. I, however, can sit happily inside and laugh about all of this, because I don't have to walk anywhere. And then I see one of the stranger things I've ever witnessed. This tiny girl (seriously, even I probably had 3 inches and 15 pounds on her) ducks inside the doorway, for what I assume is a momentary break from the insanity going on on the sidewalk. Ohhhhh no. I had no idea what a treat I was in store for. She crouches down and pulls a pair of those swishy warm-up pants out of her bag. Ok, I think...maybe she's going to the gym. Nope, nope, nope. She proceeds to pull them on OVER her regular pants...and yes, Anna, she almost falls while doing this. Twice...but she doesn't stop there. She then tucks the blazer-esque jacket that she's already wearing INTO the top of the pants, cinches up the drawstring around her waist, and ties them as tight as they'll go. Then she crouches back down again, pulls a little nylon pouch out of her bag, ever so carefully unzips it, and pulls out an anorak (those swishy pullover jackets with a hood that zip halfway up that every kid who shops at Old Navy has). She pulls the giant (and by 'giant' I mean this jacket probably would have fit Reggie White) thing over her head and zips it all the way up to her chin. She then cinches the drawstring around her face so tightly that all you can really see is her nose. As if all of this wasn't enough to make me laugh out loud, she isn't quite finished. She crouches down one last time, pulls a SHOWER CAP out of her bag and pulls it over the hood of Reggie White's jacket. Then she goes to work on her shoes. She tucks the bottoms of her swishy pants (and by extension her other pants too, I guess...) into her shoes and then loops the laces around the bottom of her pants and ties them up around her ankles, in what I can only assume is a final attempt at keeping water off of her clothes. The girl looked like she was ready to go fly fishing. In Niagra Falls. It was the funniest thing I've ever seen in my life, and I couldn't believe no one else was getting to witness it. She then zips her bag up, straightens her shower cap, and marches out into the rain. I mean...was all of that really neceesary?? Have you never heard of this great invention called an umbrella? Heather, of course, got there about 15 seconds too late to see any of this for herself, so while I was telling her about it, I was laughing so hard I had tears streaming down my face...oh, and I know I must have said the word 'pants' about 10 times, really loud and giggly, which, FYI, is not something you want to do in England. 'Pants' here means underwear...and I could totally care less. It was hilarious.

I have GOT to start taking my camera with me when I leave the house...

Oh, and one last funny thing...in my horrendously boring research methods lecture last friday, my teacher was talking about experimental design and the placebo effect. He was using this example of people with colds, and how giving them anything resembling medicine can sometimes cause them to report a lessening of their symptoms. The remedy of choice in his example was echinecea...only he kept pronouncing it "ek-ay-nay-see-uh." He must have ever-so-eloquently butchered this word 15 times in a span of 20 minutes, but ironically, only after he made some snide comment about Americans being dumb. Beautifully illustrated there, sir...

That's about all I've got for today. Just wanted to share some laughs from the looney bin that I am currently calling home.

However, I think that in order to truly appreciate it, you may just have to see it for yourself...hint, hint... :)

Love Actually...

Last week, I was feeling particularly London-y and decided to spend a rainy night NOT reading (for once!) and instead, I watched Love Actually...which, I should point out for those of you who haven't seen it, is one of the greater movies of all time, in my humble (but accurate) opinion...and was reminded of how much I love the opening part. It's a big montage of pictures of random people greeting people in the airport, all huggy and happy to see each other, and it has Hugh Grant narrating in the background. This is what he says:

"Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the Arrivals Gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion's starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don't see that. Seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it's not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it's always there...fathers & sons, mothers & daughters, husbands & wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends...when the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge. They were all messages of love. If you look for it, I've got a sneaky feeling you'll find that love actually is all around."

I so love that part of that movie, because I so believe what he's saying. I know that I'm usually a smiley, bouncy, happy girl...some might say annoyingly so...but one of my worst fears is turning into one of those people who you see out somewhere and wonder why they look so sad. I've noticed a lot of people like that since I've been here...the ones that look like life has just worn on them to the point that they don't even smile...and it's so sad to me. I know life isn't all cotton candy and fingerpaint, but I am so incredibly tired of turning on the news only to see stories about wars and bombs and genocide and politics and bird flu. I know those things are important and that they play a big part in determining how the world works, but I guess I naively wish that every once in awhile, people could just stop for one second to realize that it's not all bad. There are good things that happen...lots of them, every single day...but everyone is so busy worrying and complaining and arguing that they miss them. I also wish people would remember that, at the end of the day, we're all just people, and we all want the same things. We all want to be happy. We all want to be healthy. We all want to be free. We all want to be loved. We all want to feel safe. We all have dreams. Regardless of nationality, or age, or gender, or race, or sexual orientation, or socioeconomic status, or political affiliation...regardless of whether or not your religion wants you to wear a veil...regardless of whether you love the President or despise him...

That's the other thing I'm tired of...I mentioned a couple weeks ago that I try to keep my mouth shut in public because I don't want anyone to hear my American accent...I do this because it honestly feels like almost everytime this happens, I get an evil look and an eye roll, and then I get asked, 'so how do you feel about Bush?' I hate this question. I hate it for several reasons, but I hate it most of all because I shouldn't have to explain myself to these people simply based on what my birth certificate says. Why does it MATTER what I think?? If I met someone from Venezuela, my first question wouldn't be, 'so, do you think Hugo Chavez is a nutball too, or is that just us?' It is totally unfair to clump 300 million people together and assume that we all share the same mindset. I'm beginning to think that a lot of this is the result of some kind of weird global inferiority complex...that because we're the biggest dog in the fight, we have some kind of target in the middle of our chest that everyone feels like hitting, although at the end of the day, they sort of want one themselves because that would mean they're calling the shots. It just seems especially silly in a country like England, where people act like they hate us, yet they sit comfortably on our coattails most of the time and cruise right along with whatever's going on, content to be the allies but at the same time relieved that they aren't 'the bad guys.' I know a lot of them don't like Tony Blair either, but then again, I don't immediately ask every Brit I meet who they voted for. I do really like this quote that I heard of his recently though. He was asked by a member of Parliament why he believes so much in America, and he said "A simple way to take measure of a county is to look at how many want in...and how many want out." I think he's on to something there. I can't help but think that, for all of our problems and weak spots, I have to appreciate the fact that I can still make up my own mind and not worry about getting blown up by a roadside bomb. Maybe that's what I'll start saying to these idiots who evidently enjoy political debates on the Underground...

I can't even believe I'm writing about this, because I rarely discuss politics with anyone, but I guess I'm just constantly beaten over the head with this stuff, and I'm over it. I'm over the insanely divided way in which our country, and the world in general, operates. I hate that everything has to be a battle, and I obviously don't know what needs to happen to fix it, but honestly...

However, I have to believe that things can be different. The eternal optimist in me believes that things can change for the better because Hugh Grant and his script writers are right. Even with all of the fighting and disease and controversay and poverty, the world is still a beautiful place full of people who laugh, and cry, and fear, and hope, and love, and dream. And you know what Eleanor Roosevelt said..."the future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."

I guess that's me :)

They say you have to crawl before you walk...

Well, evidently the British are still working on crawling, because I SWEAR to you, they can't walk to save their lives. Much like any other place, you have the obligatory morons who stop walking with no warning & the ones who can't grasp the concept of 'if you're slower than Christmas, please kindly walk to the side so those of us with places to go can pass you', but I've never been someplace where simply choosing a side to walk on is an impossible task. It probably ties right on into the fact that, for the most part, people are unbelievably rude here, but honest to God, merely walking down the sidewalk here is the most taxing part of any day. It's like playing real-life Frogger, only the consequences of losing are death or dismemberment. Logic would lead you to believe that because they drive on the left side of the road that they'd walk on the left side of the sidewalk. Au contraire. You try & conform to their wrong-sidedness and you find yourself getting into head-on collisions. Ok, so you move to the other side of the sidewalk...nope, happens on that side too. You can't win for losing, & then throw in the people who don't even attempt to choose & instead opt to stay right in the middle of the walkway. I know it's a stupid thing to get mad about, but it's constant, & it's everywhere you go. I think my road rage has turned to sidewalk rage. I'm really wondering if I'm eventually going to see an all-out brawl in the middle of the street, because these are some seriously self-involved, 'my-day-is-more-important-than-yours' people we're talking about. I'll try my hardest not to actually get involved when it happens, but I feel fairly certain that the occurence of such an event is inevitable. I only hope I have my camera when it finally ensues!

Oh...and none of this is even taking into consideration the days when it rains, which is more often than not. It's kinda like driving on 285 in Friday afternoon Atlanta rush hour traffic when it rains; take the normal inability to walk and increase it by a factor of 10. The streets and sidewalks are mostly old & uneven, so there are places where huge, deep puddles accumulate, and people shove you right into them. And then there's the issue of the umbrella. I've quickly learned that if you're going to survive in London, you must never leave home without your umbrella...which means that everyone on said crazy sidewalk is similarly armed with one when it starts to rain. The sidewalk maddness then turns into huge pile-ups of entangled umbrellas spokes (what do you call those??) and angry, sopping wet people, because no one takes into account that you need to tilt to one side or the other when another umbrella-weilding person is walking straight towards you. It's hilarious to watch from inside the front window at Starbucks, but it's not quite so funny if you get stuck in the middle of it. If I make it out of here with both of my eyeballs still intact, I'll consider myself lucky.

So other than the daily near-death experience of making it to school and back home again, everything's going well and life is good. School is going to be hard, and I think I'm finally going to have to actually learn how to study, but I figure, if I work hard and do my best, I should be ok. There are around 20 of us in my programme (stupid British spelling!), and 10 or so of us have formed what we lovingly refer to as our 'cult.' It's so funny, we move in a pack everywhere we go. We're nice and diversified too: there's a girl from Virginia, a girl from Minnesota, 2 girls from Canada, a boy from England, a boy from Nigeria, a girl from Australia who now lives in Botswana, a girl from Zimbabwe, a girl from Norway, a girl from Ireland, and me. I'm sure people listening to us talk are baffled by the random assortment of accents, but we like it. Plus, it's saving us a TON of time and sleep, because we split up our readings and summarize them for each other. Sweet, huh? Maybe tomorrow in our reading group we'll hold hands and sing Kum Bay Ya.

In other news, I must say that, although it physically pains me to miss football season, at this point, I'm almost relieved that I'm here and not there. I was telling my daddy yesterday, it's much easier to mourn from afar. This way I don't have to see the newspaper headlines unless I seek them out, and I can avoid the idiots on the radio all together! I know that even the best teams experience growing pains from time to time -- Miami, FSU, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Virginia Tech are all currently having struggles of their own, and look at Penn State, Michigan, & Alabama a few years ago. Tennessee didn't even get to a bowl game last year!! -- but losing to Vanderbilt is about as low as you can get. Except for losing to Mississippi State. If we lose Saturday night, I'm going to have to request that the powers that be seriously consider just forfeiting the rest of the games and sending the boys into hibernation until next year. At least that way we wouldn't have anyone else tearing an ACL or doing whatever it is that kickers do to hurt themselves.

In keeping with last week's list of things that make me smile:

- the guy who sits in the tunnel of the Oxford Circus Underground station and sings James Taylor and old, old Elton John songs; today he was singing the Jackson Five!
- the fabulous people watching here -- my Mema would be so proud! It really is hilarious the things that people deem wearable over here. Sometimes I can't help but wonder if a blind person dressed some of them!
- the cute little school-uniformed kids that cram onto the trains in the afternoon to go home from school; I still find it pretty impressive that they know where they're going...and by the way, yeah RIGHT, that my kid is ever riding MARTA by him/herself!
- the fact that there's a new poster advertising the London Theatre Broadway production of Chicago...with "America's Sweetheart" (really?) Ashlee Simpson playing Roxie Hart. Patrick Swayze is also doing Guys & Dolls right now. We are sooooo going to the theater!

Oh, and adding to the vocabulary list, I heard a little girl who couldn't have been 12 say "this is bollocks" the other day. This place is awesome...

And yes, Momma, I'll take pictures soon, I promise...