miss america

(note: In case you missed it, I did write about our trip to London last week , but I think I forgot to post it until today, check out Oct. 3) Well if anything, this trip has helped increase my appreciation for the US. I love England, but I miss America!! But there's no point in dwelling on it. Saturday we took a group trip to Stonehenge and Bath. Stonehenge is one of those places that is exactly like the pictures and nothing more, but you still have to go just to be there. It was a very windy day, but the guy that took us said that he's been there 7 times with our program, and this was the only time the sun was shining. You can't get very close, they just have this path marked out in a circle all the way around. We weren't there very long. Some of the guys from my group picked up rocks from the parking lot and were trying to pawn of "Henge Stones." I sat in bird poop - blah! Bath was just like in Jane Austen's novels. I can just picture her and her characters spending time there. The water is warm, but the sulphur makes it greenish. It's more the ruins of the Roman Baths, so aside from the actual bath itself, the rest of the tour was underneath the building where it was very dark and extremely crowded. I can understand taking pictures of the baths and some of the artifacts, but this whole group of tourists in front of me were taking pictures of every single diagram and poster. Whenever we got restless, we just started taking surprise pictures of eachother, which always turn out bad. After that tour we had free range of the town for a few hours. So we ate at this little corner cafe, the food was delicious but for some reason it took really long for my table. So most of the day in Bath was spent sitting in a restaurant. My favorite part of the trip was just being able to see the English countryside, albeit from a bus window. I love all the sheep and cows!! We got back to Oxford sometime after 7, and then a bunch of us went to a house down the street to watch a movie and hang out, but lack of sleep (and lack of interest in the movie) sent me home. On Sunday Marie (not my flatmate) came with me to church. You can check out St Aldate's online at http://www.staldates.org/. It was really crowded, people had to stand in the back, and they also have a night service. It was really good again, I love the worship, and they sang one of my favorite songs - Before the Throne of God Above - which made me very happy. Afterwards they gave all the students free lunches (over 200 of us) and had a little talk about their students functions. I was really impressed because the youth leader remembered my name from when I had first met him at Fresher's Fair, then I realized I was wearing a name tag for the lunch. Marie and I met a boy from Russia named Konstantine who likes to play the accordian. Because of the lunch we didn't get home until after 2, I had to get groceries. Bad idea to try that on a Sunday. As if the selection was limited enough, but everything I needed was out of stock!! Since I've been craving ice cream all week, I splurged on some sort of gourmet thing, but it's just not the same. Mom and Dad, on December 20th can you have the cupboards stocked with Turkey Hill Peanut Butter Cup ice cream, microwave popcorn, and iced tea? Thanks. Being that the better part of the day was pretty well spent, I thought I should attempt to get some work done, possibly at the library. But Oxford is such a small city, and since I already know over 100 Americans living here, and we all have similiar routes and destinations, I somehow ended up playing lacrosse in the street, and getting dinner at Kabob Kid. Made it home at 11:30pm without having ever graced the library. So that's where I was just at a few minutes ago, only they have zero of the books on the list my tutor gave me. So now I'm in the computer lab, not doing work, but I'm about to. And that's all for now. P.S. - my flatmate's mom sent her rice krispy treats, it takes about 2 weeks for packages to get here, but only about a week for letters I think. (hint, hint)