Life is a Cabaret

So many things have been happening. I'd been intending to post a lot more when I was in Ireland, but I ended up too busy to spend much time on the internet, and I'm...not really going to complain about that. Because Ireland was awesome and gorgeous and a week was not enough time, except that it was also expensive so it's just as well that I only spent a week there.

And the weather was good! When I'd looked up the weather it seemed like it was supposed to rain the entire time, which depressed me. But then I got there and it didn't rain very much! Lots of sun! When it rained, it was usually when I was on the bus. So I was very pleased with that.

thunderemerald, I went to Dingle. I also might have got food poisoning in Dingle, because we had lunch there and I started feeling sick after that, then spent the night throwing up and sleeping for roughly thirteen hours, and then felt pretty much fine the rest of the week.

Saturday night really sucked. I really should have just flown home. I was on my way back to London via ferry and trains when I got on what ended up being the wrong train. It was the right train line, and the right platform -- it was just too early, but trains can just sit and wait awhile, so I thought that's what that one would be doing. I should have just looked at the departure board because then I would have seen that this particular train was going to Manchester, not London.

I got off at the first stop and found out that there were no more trains going to London that night, which meant I had to find some place to spend the night. I almsot cried when the guard told me. I went back to Crewe, where I'd gotten on the wrong train, had to buy a new ticket for the next morning, and then had to find a hotel. My host mum told me when I got home that she would have spent the night in the train station rather than pay for a hotel, and maybe I should have (I do wince at paying the money), but between stress, nerves (spending the night, trying to sleep, alone, in a train station in a foreign country?), and the discomfort of trying to sleep on benches, I didn't think I'd be able to sleep at all, and I do not function well when I don't get enough sleep. I probably would have bungled getting home even worse than I already had.

And I wanted to get home as quickly as I could because I had Star Wars in Concert at three in the O2 Arena, and the Jubilee tube line, which would have taken me straight there, was down for engineering work that weekend. That would have been fine if I'd gotten home on Saturday night and therefore had enough time to get myself to the O2 on Sunday, but instead I was on a train back. I ended up being fifteen minutes late to the show, but it was a great show, and I'm just glad I made it at all.

I've been reading reaction posts for The Eleventh Hour, and talked to the big DW fan in my program. I've been trying to see it for myself, but it's not been happening. Last night I tried watching with BBC iplayer, which did work (hooray for being in Britain!), except there are those issues with the internet on my laptop, and iplayer won't work where there is no internet connection, so I only saw the first fifteen minutes. I got to school today thinking I'd just download it, but I've been having issues doing that, and I don't want to use iplayer on a school computer because there are other people in the computer lab and I don't want to disturb them.

The universe is conspiring to stop me from watching Moffat's Who. I wonder if this is a sign.

Unsurprisingly, I've been pretty busy. Classes are going well so far, though I haven't really had to do anything besides show up and do a bit of reading, and for the literature class discussing--most of my other classes have been mostly lecture where I just sit there. It's different, since I rarely take mostly lecture classes, but it's not that bad.

On Saturday I was out with some other people from my school, one of whom is here on a different program, and she says that her program has harder coursework and less cultural immersion than mine, so I'm glad I chose my program instead. Easier work and more culture and excusions? There is no bad there.

On Friday I went to St. James's Park, and I fed the ducks. I very much wished I'd brought my copy of Good Omens, but oh well. I still fed the ducks.

Tonight I'm going to see Twelfth Night, because even though I'm not in the Shakespeare class, there were some extra tickets, and I got one. Score! It does mean, however, that tonight will be a late night. Which is only bad because tomorrow is a particularly early morning. I have to be at King's Cross at 7:45, which means I need to leave the house at 6:45, which means I need to be up no later than 6:15. Gah! I hate early mornings!

But I will suffer it for Scotland. Three days in Edinburgh! Where pretty much everything, from train tickets to meals, is paid for by my program! My personal shopping and activities I'll have to pay for, of course, but I'm very pleased to get to Scotland for so little money.

I won't have internet until Friday, but until then, Twelfth Night! And SCOTLAND!

*uses DT icon, mostly because he's Scottish but partly for the pretty*

I win! Mostly.

Today has been very busy because I have this paper due tomorrow and it took me until about 4pm today to think of a topic for it, because that thing just did not want to be written. But I did manage to write it, and take it to the writing center to get edited, so it's also been revised, and might actually be an all right paper. Whoo!

I also have a poem due tomorrow for my poetry class, so I wrote one about working at the movie theater and how people who leave their trash in the theater suck. :p

I do still have about thirty pages on international politics to read, plus the world section of the New York Times, because apparently I have a quiz on that tomorrow. (Gah, two papers and a quiz in one day? What is up with that?)

But I am still happy and full of win, because this week I applied for a copy editor position at the school newspaper, and today I got notice that I got it! *dances* And it's a paid job! Finally I have a paid job relating to what I want to do for a living when I get out of college that I can put on my resume as actual related experience! Okay, I don't really want to work with newspapers, and I'm sure it's not going to take long before I'm gnashing my teeth at how badly people use grammar, but OMG I FINALLY HAVE A REAL EDITING JOB! :D:D:D

This does mean that I have two jobs this semester, which sort of amuses me because this is actually the first semester where I've even had a job at all, and now I have two. But both are supposed to be about five hours a week, and one's daytime while the other is evenings, so I'm sure I'll be fine.

Damn, this semester is going really well for me so far. :D

I had a very full day. Very much fun.

A couple friends and I went downtown to hang around the river since it was nice outside. Apparently everyone else in the city agrees, because it was packed there. And there were lots of people with tattoos, including one guy with one on his throat. Dude, I cannot even imagine getting a tattoo there.

We also went into this antique store, and I? Found a first edition Goblet of Fire, wand order mistake included. This made me ridiculously happy because GoF had been the only HP book where I didn't have the first edition hardcover. I used to have one, but then my younger sister lost it several years ago and eventually I bought a paperback version of GoF, but I had always been very sad because it rather ruined things. But now I have a complete set of first edition hardcover Harry Potter books, so go me!

Then we hung around Borders for awhile, because that is what my friends and I do: hang around bookstores for fun. But there was nothing new that I wanted, so I was sad, except not really because first edition GoF! Then we went to World Market, which is hiring! For some position having to do with wine! If I have to work, I'd love to have a job working in World Market with wines.

We went out to sushi for dinner, and mmmmm, sushi. I love sushi.

And then we watched Star Trek.

( Some spoilers for Star Trek )

Also, I applied to work at the theater. Since one of the managers is my best friend's boyfriend, and I've known him for like eight years, I'm hoping I have an edge. Though it was sorta weird, 'cause it was a computer application that I did right in the theater. They didn't ask me for any references, and also on the page with school, apparently they were just asking for high school because they wanted to know my last completed grade and only accepted numbers, so I could only tell them that I'd graduated high school, not that I was now a senior in college. They apparently didn't want to know about college at all. Very odd.

It is also the Glorious 25th of May, which is quite appropriate for being Memorial Day. I need to go reread Night Watch now.

Today's Thing of Awesome: my parents typically send me stuff for Easter (though not because we're religious, because we aren't--they send me stuff for Valentine's Day too). My mom sent me an email telling me that this year's offering would be "pitiful" due to the worsening economy. I didn't much care because usually they just give me candy and maybe jewelry, and I don't eat much candy or wear much jewelry. Except today I get my package and it's one of those cool pretty glass/ceramic/whatever eggs that open, and inside it was a few pieces of candy and $100.

I think my mom and I have different definitions of "pitiful". Whoo, unexpected money! :D

In other news, I stopped watching Buffy. I made it to early S3, but I kept getting annoyed with the relationship stuff. Heh. I was expecting to get depressed, if Joss made me care about a ship and then smashed it to pieces, but instead I'm annoyed. Last weekend I was obsessively watching it--watched S2 in two days--and ignoring important papers and all that. Now I just don't really care about watching it anymore.

That does not, however, stop me from wanting to read fic. WTF, self? Well, okay, Joss did depress me a bit because I find myself wanting to read Buffy/Angel, but it's a very new and odd thing for me to want to read fic about a show I lost interest in watching because it annoyed me.

I am in a very good mood today. Last night I was feeling off, but then heart_of_man and I went for coffee (well, so to speak, since she didn't actually get anything and neither of us drink coffee) and we talked for a couple hours. That was great, and I felt much better at the end.

Tomorrow I have two fairly biggish assignments due, and I did those today, and I think they're fairly good. I'm pleased with them, at least. :)

But mostly I am still full of COMPLETE GLEE because today I read Busman's Honeymoon, one of Dorothy L. Sayers's Peter Wimsey/Harriet Vane books, and I just ADORED it. It's almost exactly what I want to read in a story. :D

( Spoilers )

So yes. I loved that book enough that I really need to buy it now. And also find fanfic, of course. XD yuletide has some good ones, and surprisingly so does ff.net, but neither really has that many. This is probably just a tiny fandom. *sigh*