Charlotte's Birthday :o)

My flatmate, Charlotte, is from Belgium; it was her birthday this last week. Charlotte teaches me something everyday, but I think my favorite lesson, and one that I am most likely to retain for a long period of time is the perfection that lies in a great piece of chocolate and a cup of Nescafe. Drinking Nescafe would otherwise be a horrid proposition for a native western Washingtonian (land of independent coffee shops and the corporate giant, Starbucks) if it were not for the addition of chocolate to this equation :o) During reading week, whilst Charlotte and I stayed hold up in our respective rooms reading and writing essays we took periodic (read: frequent) mental vacations to enjoy Belgian Chocolate dipped in Nescafe. It was brilliant.

To celebrate Charlotte's special day, I invoked a special Gramenzekesen tradition of covering her door with newspaper so that one can burst through to a new year!
























Then made really down right decedent pancakes that were chocolate with chocolate bits in them, topped with raspberry preserves and accompanied by a cup of Nescafe, yes please.























For dinner we all made risotto together. :o) This is a picture of our other flatmate, Sam, and myself wearing my aprons. Charlotte recently brought me one from Belgium that says Chocolate on it :o) Happy Birthday Charlotte! Thanks for being magnifique!

Brotherton Library and Rent, the musical

I know these seems like an odd combination, and indeed, it very well might be. In the spirit of John Donne's conceits, I thought I would write a little blog entry that connect two seemingly disparate things, and share one of the many idiosyncrasies of my life which makes it that much more full and makes the world a little more Rachelified.

Today I was listening to my mp3 player on the way to the library, and upon arriving to the library the song, "Take Me Or Leave Me" from the Original Rent Soundtrack began playing. If you are not familiar with this little ditty, let me briefly share with you that it is two women singing to each other about how they are completely different, and want the other to understand and "take me for who I am," and both threaten to call it quits to the whole relationship. There is one particularly brilliant bit where the two women belt out, "Women! What is it about them!? Can't live with them or without them!"

This song is one of my favorites to sing quite loudly in my room, so my flatmates are fairly familiar with the music and I think learning the words a little more every time. :o)

Return to library: This afternoon, I am walking up the stairs to the section of the library where I spend a good deal of my time (4th floor between G and H) and maybe it was the sunny day, maybe it was the good breakfast, or truffles from Charlotte, but the music MOVES me, so I check to see no one is looking and do a little dance and mouth the words to the rest of the song all the while envisioning a musical taking place in my library (which I think would be amazing.) Stifling my laughter a bit as to not completely fulfill the stereotype of a loud American and also to not disturb the other library patrons, I regain my composure and find a seat (near the Shakespearean Criticism) and settle into my reading of John Donne and George Herbert.

It was a good moment.

Mince Pies.

I have not, as of yet, spoken too terribly highly of British food. To be honest, as a vegetarian, it is not terribly easy to sample all of the local cuisine of Yorkshire, most of the dishes involving a sort of meat substance. Which is why I had always assumed that mincemeat pies, were also of animal origin, not so unreasonable, the English love their meat and their pies. I was completely wrong. Mince pies are not only a sweet without meat, they are ambrosia. I was right pleased with these little holiday treats, they are lovely. Maddy came over to my flat, and my friend, Laura, is visiting for the weekend and we had tea with mince pies fresh from the oven (well from a box but then warmed in the oven.) They smelled delicious, and tasted even better. I will learn how to make these from scratch.

Robinhood

Part of Justin's English cultural education involved a viewing of Robinhood: Prince of Thieves, Kevin Costner style. An all around great film, if you ask me, which you implicitly did because you are reading my blog. hahaha. Although there are two letter writing snippets in the movie, and it is integral enough in the plot to show the hand of a person writing.... upon seeing this bit of the film I said aloud, much to the amusement/annoyance of my fellow movie watchers, "ugh that is so culturally inaccurate to that time period, there is no way that someone would write with that manner of script during that period!"

Some background on that outburst: I recently partook in a few paleography courses where we took to deciphering texts from the Early Modern Period, well after the time of tale of Robinhood. It wasn't until after the 1600 did people begin to use italic and even then it was mostly women, men still sticking to the Elizabethan secretary hand until around 1650.

In addition to that there is a few geographic slips in the movie that Maddy and Kayleigh spotted such as landing on the white cliffs of Dover and almost instantaneously arriving on Haydrian's Wall (which is hours north, by car) Jim pointed out that tree on Haydrian's Wall is actually a Sycamore disguised as an Oak so that it could contain mistletoe as the dialogue of the movie dictates.

I am not sure why I felt like being such a myth buster when watching this particular Robinhood last Saturday. I hold complete suspension of disbelief when watching the Disney version, never seemed to have any qualms with a fox shooting a bow and arrow :o) You know you want to get that song stuck in your head, and maybe this one too. :o) Such a classic.

Justin visits York-shuh

Last Thursday, a friend of mine from Tacoma stopped by Leeds on his way from India to Tacoma. I picked Justin up from the train station at TWO in the morning! Which in my other life would have been beyond late, but I am grateful that this rowdy graduate school lifestyle has acclimated me to late night adventures such as this; we certainly sat up talking until the weee hours of the morning.

Partially due to my upbringing in the great Northwest United States of America, and partially from my experience with weather here in Leeds, when it was sunny on Friday I ensured that Justin and I had a decent amount of outdoor time. We headed up to a little town near Leads, Knaresborough. The train ride alone would have been enough to satisfy the eyes with their fill of rolling green countryside and trees with leaves turning that last bit of rusty yellow before the next storm strips them bare, but wait! There's more!

I love the changing of the leaves. Deciduous forests can be so beautiful. I can hardly contain myself. :o) Upon arriving in Knaresborough we discovered a path that wound through (maybe not as literally through the trees as the picture above may suggest) the trees and next to the river Nidd, and we could look up to the historic bridge which gives really adds to the beauty of this town.

We stopped by Harrogate on the way home, wandering around town and stumbling across some really lovely rose gardens.

We rounded off the evening with viewing of a cult classic, With Nail and I. Let me just say this: hilarious.There. That's it. Done. My friend, Maddy, joined us for the film and whilst Justin fell fast asleep in the first 30 minutes, Maddy and I stayed up to watch the main characters use plastic bags for rain boots and we acquire great fodder for movie quote banter such as: "Don't threaten me with a dead fish." There is also apparently a couple drinking games that can accompany this film (they are especially clever here in the UK for their games involving alcohol) and one variation involves matching the main characters alcohol consumption drink for drink... well, this would make you very ill indeed.

Are you celebrating?

Seems like there is much about which to be festive this week; my dad's birthday on the 5th, I watched the elections, and commemorated Guy Fawkes day with fireworks, chocolate, mulled wine and marshmallows... but who knew that all the while it was National Sausage Week? Certainly not I, that is until my visit to Harrogate this very day; so I ask you:Are you celebrating?

This is where I spend my time...

I love fall leaves. I love leaves falling. I fall in leaves loving. You get the idea. This is a picture of part of the English House where my professors offices are located and is where most of my seminars are held. This is an especially lovely, sunny fall day a few weeks ago. So lovely, in fact, that I felt compelled to attempt to capture the sky in this picture.

Aw the English Faculty House. That's not me in the front door, but I reckon it is another of my ilk here at Leeds. The English house has a great computer cluster upstairs and pretty cozy chairs in which to sit and read downstairs. On a whole, the place is like a maze, and I have more than once made a fool of myself at that front door; all intuition leads one to push, but it is, in fact, a pull... or the other way around... who can keep these details straight? :o)

I wear a nerdy backpack, and that's okay! You know why? I carry around a mess of books where ever I go, also I'm a nerd.

This is a shot from the staircase inside the English House, look at all those studious people, working their way through the difficult texts and sitting in surprisingly comfortable chairs. I know I go on about the chairs, bu when you find yourself sitting in one place for hours on end, you become acutely aware of the quality of chair. haha. That rhymes.

More English Faculty houses on the other side of the lane.

Aww the Parkinson's Building, within is the GREAT Brotherton Library, one of two libraries on campus and the one at which I spend more of my time. It is booktastic.

As requested I have now included two views form my kitchen window. The above view is if you look down, the one below is if you look striaght out; below... gipsey camps, out... rolling green fields. :o)

Creatures big and small

For Halloween this year, I traveled with a selection of my fellow English Postgrads on what is referenced as the Otley Run! You can find more information about these phenomenon on Wikipedia as I discovered, I will do my best to succinctly sumerise this festive tradiation.

The general idea is to start in Headingly at Woodies Ale House and then hit all 16 or 18 pubs and bars to downtown having at least one drink at each. YIKES! Other stipulations in the Otley run tend to involve the themed costumes of any given group. I sat one sunny sunday afternoon with friends at a Starbucks along the same road in Headingly down which the Otley Run holds its course. I was surprised/appalled/amused to see groups of 8-15 students at a time pass by as clowns, golfers, mimes... you name it, the more creative the better. So the unique aspect of our venture is not in that we wore themed costumes, zoo animals, but that it was Halloween where such attire is relatively expected for parties, also that we orderded half-pints for most of the evening and saved our livers a little extra work.

Drinking is interesting to me here at Leeds. As a subwarden (and someone obssessed with cultural activities,) I often see large groups of freshers start their nights out on the town and the general attitude about drinking seems to be: "hey! why just get drunk!? when we can get drunk wearing a tutu, clown wig and drawn on with highlighters." and that's just the fellas :o) Well... not our fellas... They were proper animals! In England, were people are a bit more reserved this dressing in costume and then partying is a social construct that seems to have created a loop-hole in standard propriety. In the states, we employ this device on most readily on Halloween, seems to be a little more called upon here in Leeds.


the Otley Run was an adventure I was told I needed to experience at least once while I was here in Leeds, so there it was, now I have completed it.. nearly... I did drink water at the last few pubs... the Otley RUN! To be honest, it was an awesome good time, and I think a good cultural experience for a book worm like myself... I mean, when else will I have a chance to go out to a bar dressed like an animal, let alone 18 bars with an entire group of people dressed as animals?! We facepainted, everyone had great costumes, I went as a zebra (pronounced zeh-brah) We started the adventure at roughly 4:30 in the afternoon and were finished with the pubs at around 2:00 AM... Happy (Late) Halloween! I definatly slept in on Saturday. :o)