Yesterday I ran for exactly eight miles, and I didn’t feel very sick afterwards.  I’m moving on up.

I did not go running today, and here are the reasons why:

- Mothering Sunday Roast.  It’s Mother’s Day here, and after church we had a wonderful lunch in the fellowship hall.  Jaime and Rosanna made the most wonderful roast I have ever had in my entire life, with the most wonderful savory gravy.  Did I mention it was wonderful?  It was.  And there was rolls and roasted potatos and vegetables and this wonderful strawberry jello stuff but made with evaporated milk.  Sooo good.  Right now I’m proving my point about how my blogs are all about food.  And that’s one reason why I didn’t go running. 

-Other reason is that ARIF IS HERE for the week, and we showed him around Cambridge.

Anyway, I was considered fortunate enough to be at the same table today with Preceptor and Yvonne and Preceptor’s parents, as well as Jenna, Gabriella and Juliana.  That was a fun time.  Yvonne’s such a character, let me tell you.  Lots of conversation about finding a good-looking guy to punt our boat down the Cam and how to not be annoying Americans.  I love Resurrection.  It’s such a wonderful little congregation.  It’s going to be hard to leave it. 

And I was looking at the pamphlets that Resurrection has set up in its little pamphlet case, and one of them is called “Griffons, English Lutherans, and Other Mythical Creatures,” and I thought it was really funny.  It’s true.  There’s only about a thousand.  Maybe a bit over that.  o.o02% of the English population according to the pamphlet.

I. Want. To. Listen. To. Seven. Swans. So. Bad.

Also, travel plans have changed AGAIN, potentially.  We basically don’t know what we’re going to do over the second part of break.  We’re thinking Wales for the first few days.  Then maybe Austria/southern Germany the second part of break.  And then the first weekend of Easter Term we’re going to Glasgow/Edinburgh.  I need to get to the continent at least once.  May 6-9 Jenna and Courtney are going to Paris.  I may tag along on that, as well.

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It was Jenna’s 21st birthday tonight.  Courtney and I got up early (5:15? yikes!).  We made pancakes and hashbrowns and hot chocolate.  Jenna came and we ate it from breakfast.  It tasted so good. 

Then we had some early church, and then we went downtown Cambridge, and then we came back and I had a nap.  And then we had Greek.

Jenna’s mom called to say happy birthday while we were in Preceptor’s office, so she got up to answer the call real quick.  Preceptor asked how old she was turning and I answered “21.”  He asked if that was a big deal in America.  I said yes, because that’s when you’re legal to drink.  So he said, “oh, well, then she should have a beer, shouldn’t she?”  And he walked over to his little secret stash and plopped one of his little, squat french beers right next to her Greek grammar so she had a surprise when she came back.  I thought it was so funny.  That’s my favorite memory from today.

As I already mentioned, I ran nearly 8 miles today.   I’ve been feeling really good lately, but the only problem is how upset my stomach gets for the second half.  That’s really annoying.  I need to figure out how to make it stop, because then I’m all out of joint for the rest of the night.  Annoooyyying.

One more good story:  I was running on a footpath that had two rather sizable fields on either side.  I’m running along and I’m seeing several of these brown bumps all over the field and I ask myself “what are those?  Those weren’t there yesterday.”  And then I see more and more, and they’re scattered all over the fields, probably around 50 in each.  And then all of a sudden I realize that they were rabbits and I was surrounded by TONS OF RABBITS.  That made me really happy.  I don’t know what those rabbits were doing.  Eating, maybe.  Relaxing.  Digging holes.  One of those three things.

Then we had a nice house dinner with last night’s leftovers.  I felt a little queasy, but that didn’t stop me from eating a lot.  And then we brought out the birthday cake Courtney and I made for Jenna yesterday.   It was good.  I made the frosting from clotted cream and powdered sugar.  Lord, have mercy on us.

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I have a dilemna. 

I really want to stay in England for a couple more weeks in May.  The entire house is going to Germany to play soccer against the German Lutheran seminary the last weekend in May.  I’m not going to make it to Germany over break, and I’d like to see it.  And apart from that, I’m going back before everyone else, and that’s pretty depressing.

I’ve been looking at tickets to get home on May 29 or so, but it’s a little difficult.  I could get a flight for $700, including taxes on a different airline.  I’m checking to see if I could just pay a fee to get my reservation changed.  Or I’m considering trying to fly stand-by.  I really don’t know how that works, though.

 When it’s all said and done, I probably won’t end up doing it.  But I at least want to try it out.

 Tell me, via this or email, what I should do. 

 On another note, I ran almost 8 miles today.  I’ve never run that much before in my entire life.  It feels good, but my stomach always hurts after. 

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Well, son of a gun.  Apparently there was a level 3 earthquake last night at around 1 in the morning and I slept right through it!  Cyndy and Aaron woke up, but did any of us girls?  No.  The house was shaking pretty violently for about 10 seconds, I guess, but none of us girls woke up.  I slept through my first earthquake.

But on our way back from lecture today I noticed that the gates on one of the colleges was a little messed up.  And I just know it’s from the earthquake.  Other than that, haven’t observed any damage.

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If you’ll recall, Cat Power’s sultry version of “Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again” is a pretty good cover of Bob Dylan.  But Bob Dylan is also pretty darn good.  Sometimes I wish I lived back then.  What an adventure that would be!  But then I wouldn’t be right here, right now.  How absurd!  Right now’s not too bad, you know. 

I’m doing my first early church essay on Justin Martyr.  What a guy. 

I went on a NEARLY SIX MILE RUN TODAY.  Straight through.  Why did I not have this potential during high school when it actually mattered?  What a world, what a world.

I need some new music suggestions.  Somebody, throw them at me.  Please please please.  I can’t buy anything right now.  But I at least need to have some prospects for when I get home and I have tons of money to blow.  Haha, just kidding.  I will have no such money.

Tomorrow’s Lenten dinner will be superb.  Peter, Matt and Adrienne are doing lasagna, garlic bread, salad, green bean casserole, and cheese cake cup cakes.  Half the time this blog is about food.  Why is that?

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Today Flat 8 girls (that’s the Concordia girls, for future reference) hosted house tea. We’ve been planning for this sucker for a long time, and today it finally happened. It was beautiful. The menu was as follows:

- BLT’s on Courtney’s fresh-baked baguettes

- Blueberry and Raspberry Scones with clotted cream

- Apples with home-made caramel

It was a lovely spread. Pictures featured below (taken by Jenna Bremer).

And today I did my taxes. It took me under an hour. I was proud. I just hope I didn’t do something terribly wrong. I can never tell.

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Well, wouldn’t you know it, the fact that we didn’t try and contact any couchsurfers till three days before our trip meant that none of them could take us in! With this knowledge, we still set out bravely early on Saturday morning to conquer the noble city of Bath. Our party consisted of us three girls, Aaron, Mandy and Josh. After a transfer in London, we hit Bath at about 1 in the afternoon. We checked the tourist center to first see if they could find us any available lodging. None. But they told us to check out a few hostels, so we vowed to do so.

So we checked out Bath Abbey. I’m not Cathedral Snob, but compared to the other ones I’ve seen, it was kind of lame. Plus, there were these huge plasma TV screens everywhere? After that we watched a street performer do his thing by the line to get into the Roman baths. The AUTHENTIC Roman Baths. The reason for coming to Bath. Which we did not see because it was 14 pounds to view them. Which comes out to $28. We’re cheapskates, what can I say.

So after the rather entertaining street performer was done, we set out for the Jane Austen center, which was kind of a waste of time. You have to pay for that nonsense, too. So we took a look in the giftshop and that was about it. Then we checked out the recommended hostels. Nothing. So we decided that we’d try to get on the 6:30 bus back to London, and then back to Cambridge, even though that’s not what our tickets for. We girls had done it before, so we figured it was possible to do it again.

So we went back into the center of Bath, stood in front of the wall that surrounded the Roman baths and came up with elaborate plans to pass our cameras up to the people inside, or pole vault over or whatever. But we did nothing of the sort. We decided to go to a tea room instead. So we did that, and similar to our experience in Ely, it was delicious.

After that, we went to the “Royal Crescent” to see some of their impressive architecture and then went on a walk through the botanical gardens. The area of England where Bath is happens to be very very hilly, and Bath is on one of those hills, overlooking little towns on other hills, so it was very beautiful to get a nice view of the neighboring towns. Then we decided we should head back to the bus station to catch our 6:30, first stopping at a pub so Josh and Aaron could get a little something to tide them over.

So we get to the bus station, hoping there won’t be many people there and we’ll be able to get on no problem. Well, problem: there were like, 40 people in line. Our hearts sank as one. Yet Mandy still mustered up some courage and asked the bus driver if there would be room for us. Our hearts sank even further as we watched him shake his head. That head shake meant we were stuck in Bath till at least 3:20 am, when the next bus would come around, with no lodging.

So we walked around town some more, looking up clubs that would be open late, and pubs and other things. We eventually settled on Pizza Hut because that’s what we all wanted. So we sat in there for about two hours, till about 10, and ate to our hearts content. Afterwards we decided that we’d go check out the YMCA and see if we could stay on the couches in their lobby for awhile. Well, we waltzed right in and camped out for about five hours. I fell asleep for a good portion of “The Highlanders” but woke up for the Jonathon Ross show, and that was pretty funny, I’ll admit.

So we left the Y at 3 and headed to the bus station to check out this bus. Well, the bus comes around, Josh asks this time, and we get another head shake. Oh no. Oh no oh no. The next bus is coming around at 4:45 am, so we must try that one. So we walk around Bath some more, observe lots of drunken college-aged students stumbling around, considered camping out in front of McDonalds, and ultimately sat in the front of the Roman Baths building, which was emitting some nice warm air from its vents.

We go back to the bus station at 4:45 and ask the bus driver if we can get on this bus. It is nowhere near full. It shouldn’t be a problem. Except the guy said no. He said since we had funfare tickets, we couldn’t do that. It wasn’t allowed. Etc. So I jump in at this point and ask if the bus will be full. Of course it won’t be. So I say we’ve been out all night, we have no lodging, we need to take this bus. Jenna then asks what the fare is. At this point, the guy says “I don’t believe you, but I’ll take you.” I almost started crying, I was so happy.

So we got some z’s on the bus, then got to London. Kind of nervous with the transfer, ended up changing out tickets for 9 pounds, which sucks. Sat in the bus station for another hour and a half, and ended up getting back to Westfield about noon. I have never been so happy to see Westfield in my entire life. I LOVE Westfield. So so so much.

Now for an explanation of the title of this little entry. As you know, we were trying to get a couch-surfer host for the past couple days but failed. One of our potential hosts emailed Courtney back and said her house was going to be full that night because she was having a party. But she invited us to the party, as a matter of fact. She said it was a “wild, wild weat” theme. We figured she must have meant to say “wild, wild west,” but mis-typed. Well, we weren’t really up for a party with a ton of strangers, but it was nice of her to offer.

So we’re outside of a restaurant in Bath, trying to figure out what we’re going to do for the next 6 hours till the 3:20 bus. All of a sudden we hear a ruckus coming from across the street, and we see a group of loud women with boots, pink sparkly cowboy hats, and plastic shotguns. What could this be but the the wild, wild weat party? So we laughed at that, and commented on how ironic and unlikely that was, etc, etc.

Well, we’re coming out of the Y, in a slightly different part of town, at 3 in the morning. We turn the corner, and who do we see traipsing around the streets of Bath? The wild, wild weat party, drunk to oblivion and happily shooting their plastic pistols over their heads. I almost died I was so happy about that. Hilarious.

And I guess that’s really all I have to say about Bath. Pictures when they’re uploaded.

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Mama

A million times, I love you!

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WASSUP.  So we’re going to Bath this weekend and I think I’ve been corrected by British/Finnish people about how I say it like, twelve times this week.  I hope we don’t mess it up!  Exciting developments have taken place for this little trip:  we could not find hotel rooms, hostel rooms or travel lodges for the weekend.  There’s some big literature conference happening.  So we’ve resorted to www.couchsurfing.com.  Mother, do not flip out.  “Couchsurfing” is a large, global network of people that will let people stay at their houses during their travels for free.  There are 70 of these people in Bath.  Courtney and I signed up, and we found a really adorable young couple that have hosted over 30 people/groups.  They’ll take up to four people, so the four of us girls are going to try and stay with them on Saturday night.  The boys are hopefully going to be staying with a guy and his roommates in a dorm at the University of Bath.  We haven’t heard back from these parties yet, but hopefully they’ll get back to us by tomorrow.  Our couple’s first musical interest was Sufjan, so we should get along just fine.  So I’m totally pumped about that.  I think we’re going to try doing this while we’re in continental Europe over break.  It’s free!  You can repay your hosts by doing dishes or buying them a drink or something.  But after you’ve stayed with someone, you can positively or negatively review them based on your experience.  Our couple (Luke and Ariane) have about 30 positive reviews on their page, so we’re feeling pretty confident.  And there’s four of us staying with them, so it should be all right.  I’m really excited about it, and I hope it works out.

Otherwise, life at the house has been nice, as usual.  Yesterday all the students/wives made lenten dinner.  Actually, it was mostly Heather, but we all pitched in the food.  We had white chili, carrot and coriander soup, cheddar sandwiches and bbq chicken sandwiches.  It was so spicy, but delicious and satisfying.  Tomorrow night is Baked Potato night and “Lost.”  I’m down for that.

Classes have been going well.  Greek is getting hardcore.  Apparently Jenna and I have almost caught up to the Greek 2 class.  We’re on Lesson 17 and they’re on Lesson 19 in our books.  It’s been such a whirlwind of activity, I feel as if sometimes I’m going to drown in all the declensions and verb endings and tenses.  But we’ve been doing pretty well, I think.  I can always translate from Greek to English.  English to Greek takes much more looking up in the book, but I’m getting the grammar down and it’s becoming familiar.  I think we may starting reading the Gospel of John after break or something, and that’s pretty cool.  Reading the Gospel of John in Greek.  Who would have thought?  Greek classes are also getting pretty fun.  We had a translation day today and there were many laughs and good times.  So Greek is quickly becoming a favorite.  However, I’m also enjoying Liturgy and Reformation a lot.  What is going back to Concordia going to be like?  I’m not sure.

Jenna, Courtney and I have tea on Monday.  I’m pretty exciting.  We’re making mini-BLTs, caramel apples slices and blueberry scones with clotted cream.  And they better like it. 

Instead of Germany over break, we may be going to Rome and Florence.  Uh oh!

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*Disclaimer: This is SUCH a load of garbage written on a Saturday night because everyone is lame and doing homework and probably listening to their ipods on shuffle*

These days everyone knows best. We can decide what is most beneficial in terms of our lifestyle and our vocations. We can creatively assemble our own religious systems and our own guaranteed-to-work weight-loss programs. In fact, we can even assert our own preferences on other people if we feel like it. We know what’s best for ourselves, and we’ll be damned if we don’t know what’s best for our neighbor. We point out where their haircuts went wrong and where they speak too much and where they raise rotten kids. We can criticize politicians and authority figures and celebrities and professors. These are our American rights, and we’ll die to preserve them (or maybe we won’t, because perhaps it will be best if we live).

And what’s even most impressive, we can contend that a person’s work of creative integrity is subject to our own whims and fancies. The “shuffle” function on any music-playing device illustrates the rotundness of American choice quite nicely, I think. We’ll buy (or illegally download) a carefully-constructed album, labored over for days and weeks and months by its respective creator, and then shove it onto our computer and condemn it straight to the pool of anonymity with all the other artists and creators that live trapped in our hard-drives. From then on, the songs may have names, but the songs are distanced from each other and they are subject to the capricious selection of the Most-High Shuffle.

There is nothing more annoying than anticipating the solemn yet cheerful “The Transfiguration” after hearing the ominous “Seven Swans” and getting the bombastic and rhythmically decadent “We Just Can’t Be Defeated” instead. Not only does this tear apart the intentions of the author, it also ruins a perfectly-crafted moment of nearly-divine inspiration. “We Just Can’t Be Defeated” (by the Go! Team) is a fine song in and of itself, and also in the context of the album on which it’s been placed, but it has absolutely no right to infringe on the ownership of that last spot on Sufjan Steven’s genius fourth album. I will contend that the first two songs mention, played consecutively as intended, compose one of the finest moments in musical history. To separate them is nearly profane. The thought leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. But isn’t this the very danger of the shuffle?

Albums are often lovingly-crafted entities. Not always, I’ll admit, but often enough. Imagine the sleep-deprived musician sitting in his studio-apartment at 3:17 in the morning, trembling under the influence of a pot of coffee, deliberating over the track-list in front of him, intent on placing his songs correctly and cohesively. Imagine the six piece band, weathering intense and passionate debates over the natural order of their songs, putting their friendship on the line, but emerging from the strife with one beautiful, thematically consistent album. What right have we to enter ourselves into this conflict of the artist’s soul?

Take “The Life Pursuit” by Scottish twee-pop band Belle & Sebastian. It’s a narrative. It’s a difficult narrative, but it’s there and it’s deliberate. It tells a story, it teaches a lesson, it sympathizes. It’s a living and breathing creation. Its members work together in an orderly fashion to faithfully relate this story. How can you tolerate hearing “For the Price of a Cup of Tea” before “Act of the Apostle”? How can you systematically hear the White Stripes and then Simon & Garfunkel and then the New Pornographers and still retain your sanity? There’s a reason Half-Handed Cloud wrote one song but split it into seven parts. Dare you put one part six (”I Got A-Rested) in front of part four (”That You May Be Gracious) and still feel good about yourself in the morning? But this is the very danger of the shuffle!

Or consider the Polyphonic Spree’s musical offerings. They’ve put out three full length albums. The first song on their first album (”The Beginning Stages Of…”) was entitled “Section One.” The last song on their third album (”The Fragile Army”) was entitled “Section 32.” Each song has a subtitle that adds flavor to the song, but there is no mistaking that these songs were placed in order for a reason. Not only is each album a cohesive project, all three albums together express a continuity. They are viewed as a unit. The sections portray the natural progression of theme and style through the band’s existence.

A similar comparison can be made to The Decemberists latest album, “The Crane Wife.” Who knows why Colin Meloy and his fellow troubadours put “The Crane Wife 3? at the beginning of the album and “The Crane Wife 1 & 2? at the end, but that portrays even more meticulous planning on the band’s part, as they expect the listener to be able to put the narrative together, even though it does not appear chronologically on an album. This album models itself off of an old Japanese fable. This theme is prominent throughout the disc. But go ahead, send it to your ipod shuffle. Hear the album’s closer, “Sons and Daughters” before hearing “Highway to Hell” by AC/DC. See if it’ll lead you straight there.

iPod Shuffle, you’ve ensnared us. You’ve taken our integrity and you’ve taken our money. You’ve robbed the artist of his laboriously-composed sequence of songs. You’ve made us lazy and sharpened our fickle inclinations. But I, my friends, will listen to The Fiery Furnaces’ “Widow City” from rocky start to noisy finish with the sensitivity of a finely-tuned and obedient Fiery Furnaces fan.

Of course you have the right to disagree with me; these are the benefits our post-modern society. And I’ll admit that I’m being facetious… but only semi-so.

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