Highlights of the drive from Austin-College Station-Huntsville:

1) silo with a smiley face

2) sign for “Old Potato Road”

3) stretch of freeway covered in stripes, called “Highway Paint Test Site”

4) this song was playing when the surrounding terrain suddenly and unexpectedly switched from field to towering forest

5) GIANT statue of Sam Houston

We had a grand time bringing in 2012 in the woods. I have mixed feelings about the summery weather we’ve been experiencing of late–though it is undeniably pleasant, I feel almost guilty for enjoying it since I know I will be moving to a significantly colder climate in only a few months. Nonetheless, the weather was perfect for camping and hiking. We did not see any alligators (sadly) but we did come across what appeared to be aquatic slime molds

and some very interesting tree tumors.

After our woodsy adventure I spent a bit of time with my friend’s (very French) family in College Station. It was a lovely time, with lots of cheese and words I did not understand.

Graduate school interviews begin in two weeks, when I’ll be flying off to New York City. I’ve never been so excited.

I went on a trip to Fort Davis & McDonald Observatory a few weeks ago. It’s an almost 8 hour drive from Austin, so I got a chance to knit for a while. I am having a hard time making the polar bear sweater’s shoulders look the way I want them to. My geometry/short row skills are sorely lacking.

This is what I had before leaving on the trip. (Classy bathroom phone pic? Yes.) I technically "finished" the thing on the bus ride out, but the shoulders are still too lumpy. I think I will tear them out YET AGAIN. I got a laugh when I noticed the Care Bears suitcase in the corner of this photo. Why yes, my weekend travel case is printed with pastel bears and the words "Setting sail for grandma’s!" I will likely continue using this suitcase until I am a grandma.

 That is all the knitting I’ve done this semester. I occasionally bring a project to lectures, but I haven’t made any substantial progress BECAUSE GRAD SCHOOL APPS.

In my downtime from school/lab/applications — when I should be doing my laundry, cooking healthy meals, and vacuuming my house — I go for extremely long walks around my neighborhood. These walks sometimes include emotional phone conversations with my parents and best friends from home, but more often they’re are centered around random contemplation and playing with all the neighborhood cats. Such as this friendly critter:

There are so many wonderful cats in Hyde Park. Some of them are disgustingly scruffy and some are clean, some are cuddly and some are mean, but all of them are entertaining. They cheer me up on crappy days. 

I encounter lots of cats with this maddening behavior, though: they look at me with an adorable expression and meow cutely, but when I approach them they step back a few feet. And meow cutely again. And then step back once more when I approach, but continue rolling their head about, asking for affection. Repeat, repeat, repeat, until I get frustrated and continue on my walk. WHAT DO YOU WANT, CATS???  CUDDLES? NO CUDDLES? Fickle creatures.

On an unrelated note, I discovered this video last week and I cannot even begin to describe how hilarious I find it. Seriously. I would need three pages to explain why I start giggling every time I think of it, and the album cover would deserve at least half a page. I haven’t heard Best Coast since July 2010 (when this album came out) and I can’t believe they’re a "real band." With good reviews. And for n+1 reasons I can’t believe I am actually listening to them 1.5 years later.

And then there is this:

In case this is impossible to read (probable), it’s the lyrics page for "Our Deal." The comment that made me laugh (out loud at Bennu while ostensibly working on my a chem fluorimetry report) says "it’s obviously about her cat." I want to be best friends with whoever wrote that comment.  

I made the scarf with a simple seed stitch pattern; it was an easy knit but I think it makes a nice fabric. It’s fairly firm but still drapes well.

I used Lion Brand Homespun on 10.5 (6.5 mm)’s; I love the jewel tone colorways of LB Homespun. It gets a lot of hate from fiber-purists, but the vibrancy and cushy softness always win me over. The gradations in color are fun, too. This colorway’s called Ambrosia.

I think the bright pink looks nice with our hair color, too. (My mom and I have almost the exact same hair color).

I apologize for the poor photo quality. The digital camera I borrowed for my trip abroad has been returned to its rightful owners and I’m back to using my computer’s camera, so everything is dark and blurry.

Making this scarf was soothing. It’s made with a thick yarn and fairly big needles, so progress was quick. It’s satisfying to churn out fabric in such a manner. I stayed up far too late working on it because I couldn’t bear to put my needles down. I wish I more often got that feeling about "important" things. It’s not uncommon for me to find myself so immersed in a knitting project (or spinning) that I’ll stay up half the night because I can’t get myself to stop working. It’s rare that I get that obsessively excited about academic pursuits, but I feel like I should. I wonder if the super amazing and dedicated scientists I know lay in bed at night thinking ceaselessly about new hypotheses the way I find myself lying awake mentally plotting cable designs or puzzling out sleeve constructions.  

I was expecting an L-shaped scar (that’s what the internet said was common for a ligament reconstruction surgery), but I got this super-cool S-shape instead. It looks a little bit like a smiley face. Or perhaps a nematode.

My right ankle has already lost a great deal of muscle definition, though it’s only been ten days since I walked on it.

It is so skeletal. I finally understand what it would require to (and why I do not) have "skinny girl" legs. I love exercise way too much to ever have fashionably gaunt legs. Muscular calves and meaty thighs all the way.

After my stitches were removed, the nurse/assistant/whoever she was asked me what color I wanted my cast to be. I was not expecting this (I mistakenly thought it was black or white only), so I was quite overjoyed (and overwhelmed). My response was something along the lines of: "Blue! Well, actually, is the green lime? Is it bright? I think green. Or maybe pink? How bright is the pink? What does the purple look like?" She looked at me like I was crazy and asked, "Do you just want two colors?" I could barely contain my glee, of COURSE I wanted two colors. I wanted all the colors. I settled on green and pink stripes:

I suspect that she may’ve thought I was a twelve-year-old kid, but I am nonetheless very pleased with the bright colors of my cast. And, even more exciting than its vibrancy, I can walk again! I’ve been using one crutch, since it’s still pretty sore, but it’s amazing to be able to put weight on my leg. It makes moving around infinitely easier. I walked to get ice cream with Dylan tonight, an endeavor that would’ve been impossible on crutches yesterday.

It was intensely satisfying to see my ankle behave the way it was supposed to when my doctor pushed it around in various directions during my appointment today. My foot used to flop in a sickeningly disconnected manner whenever he pulled on it or pushed it to the side, but now it shifts forward the normal amount and doesn’t go anywhere it’s not supposed to when wiggled sideways. I am SO glad I had the surgery. I honestly can’t believe I went more than five years with an ankle so unstable that I could sprain it while brushing my teeth (yeah, this actually happened a few months ago). Never again.

I’m looking forward to colder weather when I can actually wear knitted things again.

The hot summer weather of Austin is really wearing on me. Crutches + heat ≠ fun times.

Oh, and I’ve been studying for the GRE! The math section is so much fun. I did not expect it to be extremely difficult, but I also didn’t expect to react to these problems with glee. My favorites are the ones with random symbols thrown in…if (2 smiley face 3) triangle 4 is 2, what is [(1 smiley face 7) triangle 5 ] smiley face 3?!!? It’s great. The verbal section is full of interesting surprises; I’ve discovered that I do not spell nearly as well as I’d like to believe — I thought there was an extra "i" in scurrilous (scurrilious, NO) and one less "i" in ignominious (ignominous, NO). Oh well. No one actually uses words like those anyway. I’ve been putting all the words that I don’t know into cutesy example sentences based on Harry Potter and Song of Ice and Fire characters.

Okay, now story time! Once upon a time, back in the murky muddled snafu that was my first two years of college, I had an actual serious boyfriend for whom my 19-year-old self decided it was a great idea to make a sweater. There’s a widespread superstition among knitters that making a sweater for a boyfriend will lead to the dissolution of the relationship, but apparently teenage Caitlin did not believe in such nonsense and went FULL SPEED AHEAD in designing and knitting this thing. It was the first big project I’d attempted to make for someone bigger than me (how do boys have such long arms?!), but I worked on it incessantly, and I finished everything but the shoulders and collar. When it became clear that the relationship was quickly headed for the ninth circle of hell, I somehow twisted this loving creation into a bitchy weapon ("when we break up you won’t get the sweater!!!"). I was not exactly the model of kindness and maturity back then, sorry world. I stuffed the sweater in a box and didn’t knit much of anything for almost a year.

But!! I couldn’t let all that knitting go to waste. I remain quite proud of my polar bear design (I can’t draw worth crud, so designing a chart that actually looked like what I wanted it to was an accomplishment for me). The Polar Bear Sweater has been dragged out of hiding and I shall finish it this summer. It’s a bit (a lot) big on me:

but big also= comfortable, right? I can roll up the sleeves a couple times and wear as many layers underneath as I please! And now that it’s a girl-sweater instead of a boy-sweater, I am most certainly going to embroider a happy-face on my polar bear.

I think it should have green eyes and a cute inquiring nose. 

I arrived at the DFW airport on the evening of the 2nd feeling quite bedraggled (exhausted, fatigued, tuckered out, grungy, disheveled), but I was determined to stay awake until a normal bedtime to beat the effects of jet lag. This was a failed effort, of course. After arriving home and being properly fed, I decided it was a good idea to crawl into bed with a book (some Robert Frost poems I’d left out on my bedroom table, I believe). I read half a poem, and…lo and behold, it was 3 AM! I awoke ravenous and ready for a giant English breakfast to start my day. Instead I contented myself with a glass of water and forced myself back to bed. This became an annoying pattern in the week that followed–I’d go "take a nap" in the evening, wake up in confusion somewhere between 2 and 4 AM, and then awake for real around 7. 

When I did actually get up, I was greeted by lovely flowers in my bathroom

and the most amazing sight in my parents’ refrigerator:

OMG SO MANY EGGS. The Taylor family knows the way to my heart, and it is seven dozen eggs. I made egg scrambles (with salmon and mushroom and green chili sauce and cheddar cheese) and fried eggs and eggs in tomato sauce and was overwhelmed with happinness. 

Anyway. Excess eggs aside, it felt strange to be home. Very strange. Everywhere I went in Europe sparked funny little memories of home and childhood, but actually returning to Rockwall County was like being shot back in time. The first day I met my parents for coffee after their morning walk, and driving into town at 9 AM brought back a wave of memories from home, particularly the summer I started class at Richland (2006). ‘Twas the smell of cedar and lemon mint that did it, I suppose. The instant I rolled down my car windows, the smell of cedar was overwhelming, reminding me of countless days spent wandering outside, napping in the sun, exploring, and daydreaming. It took a bit of present-day wandering to figure out what the heck lemon mint is, though. I knew it had to be something abundant, since the scent is so pervasive, but the fresh purple ones (as seen in the link) smell a lot more flowery than the scent that’s detectable in the summer air. The old, dried out (summery-cooked) ones, like this: 

are the ones I was looking for. I broke one off, carried it inside, and identified it with a bit of Googling…so now you know, if you ever want to induce in me recollections of childhood summers, you need only mash up a bit of drought-ridden cedar and dried out lemon mint. Mmmmmm.

I spent most of my time at my parents’ reliving those childhood memories, gallivanting barefoot about the property. It felt damn good to dig my toes into the crispy grass, listen to the cicadas (they are SO RIDICULOUSLY LOUD), catch grasshoppers, and scorch myself crimson (oops) by laying outside reading. I (embarrassingly enough) watch True Blood, and I came across a book from the series that it’s based upon while stuck in an airport in Reus, Spain…and upon my return to Texas, I bought nine more of them. Oh, the shame I feel in admitting that I was suckered into reading a silly romance series! In any case, I spent a rather large chunk of time lounging outside reading about the adventures of Sookie Stackhouse. It was so hot outside that the glue of the paperbacks’ bindings melted and my books completely fell apart. I probably should’ve taken this as a sign to take my sweaty self back inside (or at least put on some sunscreen), but I didn’t, and I am now about a hundred times more brown and freckly. (I, like Sookie Stackhouse, absolutely love the sun. Yes, I realize that this is a dangerous thing for a light-skinned, light-eyed, light-haired girl to be fond of. No, I do not really care. Bright, burning sunshine makes me too happy for me to care about skin damage. Getting sick? Take a nap in the sun! Headache? Put on some dark shades and sit outside with a bottle of water! Feeling depressed? Lay in the grass listening to instrumental music! Brooding or antsy? Hop on a bike and ride around for a couple hours! Overcome with laziness? Jog outside in the sun! Basically…any foul mood, physical malady, or case of weltschmerz can be alleviated by spending a bit of time in the sunshine. I will worry about what this is doing to my skin at some later point in time.)

 In addition to wandering around outside and reading, I decided it was a good idea to put multi-colored streaks in my hair. I went from this:

to this:

It’s mostly faded from my hair (it’s been two weeks now), so I need to refresh the dye, but I was quite pleased by how it turned out. The boxes recommended bleaching first, but I didn’t want to mess with that–but the colors still came out fairly bright. The pink faded extremely quickly, though (I bought a different brand for pink because Sally’s didn’t have it in stock in the other brand; perhaps on my next try I’ll get a different pink).

Dyeing my hair was really messy, unsurprisingly…it looked a bit like a unicorn had given birth in my bathtub by the time I was done. (Actually, I have a My Little Pony with magnetic feet that’s been standing upside-down on my airvent for the past seven years, and when I walked into my room after dyeing my hair I realized that this MLP’s mane is pink, teal, and purple. UMMMM.) It was easy enough to dye, though:

1) Divided my hair up into little sections (with most of it piled atop my head)

2) put on gloves and applied dye, then wrapped each little section in foil

3) rinsed out…waited patiently for my hair to dry so I could actually see the colors

4) success!! but I also dyed my neck. oops.

Dyed neck conveniently covered by flippy ponytail: 

The same day I dyed my hair I bought three cute little mice from Petco to give the kitties a bit of fun.

They were pretty precious critters, but Cleo had a lot of fun chasing after them.

Too cute to eat?

Brave Cleo chased after the mice all afternoon, but Figaro spent his time sleeping and looking confused. He is very fat and lazy.

Though Cleo caught all the mice several times over, she never actually ate any of them. I felt a little guilty about letting the mice be killed by my cats without actually being eaten…

The rest of my time in Rockwall was spent hanging out with my family, and about a week ago I returned to Austin. Every day before my surgery I spent most of my time outside and on my bike, but on Friday my leg was sliced open to repair a couple of silly stretched-out ligaments. The surgery went well, but I’ve been bored out of my mind since. I have a new appreciation for my life as a non-crippled person, because getting around on crutches in >100 degree heat is terrible. I have also discovered that I despise painkillers; the day of my surgery the opiate-induced loopiness was a bit of a novelty, but by the second day the haziness in my brain was unbearable and I decided I’d much rather deal with pain than mental stupor. I cannot wait to get off crutches and get out of the apartment…and in three weeks I move into a house. ADULT POINTS. 

We explored the botanical gardens on our last day in Cambridge. It was beautiful and a lot of fun. 

Perhaps we should not’ve gotten so close to the giant leaves; they might’ve EATEN US.

There were several wonderful trees that demanded climbing. 

We had to return our bikes, a very sad occasion (even if they were terrible bikes).

Without a bike, though, I was able to notice things I hadn’t before. For example, I found 10p on the ground (yes, I can buy a sixth of an espresso!!!) and saw this lovely storefront. I totally believe that acupuncture can cure the flu. That would be another great way to spend my newly found 10p. 

We had a nice little banquet to celebrate the end of the semester. It took one entire lifetime for them to bring us water. Jokes ensued: "They probably have to get it from a well" "No, they have to dig the well" 

Tiffany and I have made plans to go sky-diving in Austin. I’m making sure this happens.

We had one last fun night at the Regal Wetherspoon (we really had no choice about staying up, since our coach left at the abysmal hour of THREE AM).

I crammed all my stuff into my suitcase and headed to the bus station in the middle of the night.

I FELL ASLEEP EVERYWHERE.

A longer tale about my final adventures in Cambridge: 

The last day in Cambridge was a whirlwind of activity. We had our final exam in the morning and then our last lunch at Churchill College — for the first time in the four-and-change weeks we’ve been eating there, they didn’t have my favorite staple, broccoli (I won’t miss English food. This is a country that likes to throw all the best ingredients into pies to prevent this ravenous girl from getting at them.) After lunch I went with Tiffany, Neil, and Kevin to run a few errands. I was unable to deposit money, so I changed most of my pounds to koruna and euros and picked up a couple cute Cambridge shirts. Instead of heading home and tackling the packing problem (no amount of space optimization makes my stupid sock collection weigh any less. Who brings ten different dresses and ten pairs of tights on a five week trip to Europe?), the four of us headed to the Botanical Gardens. We’d all biked by it a number of times without going in, but Dr. Diller strongly recommended we visit.

The gardens were even lovelier than I’d anticipated. There were plants with leaves as big as my torso, beautiful shaded ponds, and trees that begged to be climbed (and I am never one to deny a begging tree). We happily traipsed ’round the gardens, explored the greenhouses (the desert plants reminded us of home, and the tropical ones reminded us of why everyone hates Houston), saw a neat array of genetically-manipulated plants (wheat over the past couple hundred years, greens, that sort of thing), and watched cute little families. It was a beautiful, sunny day, a perfect send-off for our last Cambridge adventure.

We would’ve liked to continue our tour of the gardens for longer, but we still had to print airline tickets, return our bikes, and get ready for dinner at 7:30. Returning our bikes was a sad occasion — they were worthless clunkers, but they faithfully carried us around the city for a month. The walk home was really weird. It felt almost like a breakup; walking home that afternoon was uncannily like walking home from one of those “tie up loose ends and get back forgotten earrings” conversations. Things I’d seen every day appeared completely different as I realized that I’d never look upon them again. My host family was out when I got home, and I tried to pack as quickly (and efficiently) as possible so that I could finish before dinner. Rolling my clothes made everything fit pretty easily, but I knew it was going to weigh way too much (it did). I decided to ignore the problem ’til morning, though, and headed to dinner. It was a long walk with no bike, and ever so melancholy (though I did get a laugh about an acupuncture place that said it could cure everything from infertility to flu to “frozen shoulder.”)

Dinner was nice; we got our grades and said goodbye to Dr. Diller and had some yummy food. Afterward we headed to the Flying Pig and then the Regal Wetherspoon for one last night out in Cambridge. The Regal became our sort of home-away-from-home(-away-from-home), I suppose. We certainly spent enough time there. Five of us had a coach to the airport that left at 3 AM, so we decided the best option was to stay up all night. I went home about 1 AM, had one last chat with my host mom (I was sad that I didn’t get to say goodbye to the kids), finished packing, and dragged everything to the bus station beside Parker’s Piece. The coach ride wasn’t great, but I fell asleep quickly enough to not care. The first thing we did upon arriving at the airport was weigh our luggage, and mine was far overweight. To make matters worse, my conditioner had exploded all over everything. I wanted to lay my head down on my luggage and go to sleep on the floor instead of dealing with the problem, but rearranging had to happen. I threw away various things I didn’t need, stuffed my carry-ons with shoes and socks, and put on several jackets. We got breakfast, and I fell asleep at the table. Our terminal wasn’t assigned yet, so I fell asleep on a random set of benches. We moved to our terminal, and I fell asleep. We got on the plane, and I fell asleep before it took off. Neil woke me up when we landed, and within thirty seconds I was asleep again. We had a stop-over in Milan, and I dozed in my seat (after devouring some sausage). We boarded, and I fell asleep immediately. We got on the train to the city, and I fell asleep despite my best effort to stay awake and write.

I have reached my exhaustion limit, it seems. The past week has been an intense struggle to stay awake; every time I sit down my body tries to take over and make me go to sleep. The lingering sore throat I’ve had since Barcelona is worsening again, as is the nasty sinus crud. I continue on, though, cramming as much as I can into what little time I have left. There are too many things to see to pay attention to the fact that my body needs rest. Time enough for that when I return to Austin, right?

Rome was amazing. Prague is the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me. I leave for Dublin tomorrow. Saturday I fly back to DFW. I’m going to miss Europe.

–I no longer have pink eye

–I am going to Rome, Prague, and Dublin next week

–I only have one day left of biotransport

–I have returned from my blogging hiatus, sort of

bad ones:

–I still have not written up entries about my trips to Amsterdam, Barcelona, or Paris (though I have outlines in various degrees of completion for each city)

–I still have the sore throat/cold thing that’s been driving me crazy for two weeks

–The one day left of biotransport is my final, meh

–Europe has eaten all my money

Recent happenings:

We went on a walk by the river through a bunch of pastures to have cream tea on Monday. It was a lovely setting.

Rented punt to enjoy the end-of-term celebrations

It rained and we became very bedraggled

Watched fireworks! This one is like mitosis turned inside out.

The river was insanely crowded with punts and boats and kayaks

 Being in charge of a punt was rather hard. 

I love this city and this country and this continent. Cambridge has become home to me, and I’m really going to miss biking to DAMPT every day. I’m going to miss the pre-sliced chorizo from my local Tesco Express and the funny old guys that’d chat with me at the Red Lion. I’ll miss laughing at the tricked-out girls at the Regal Wetherspoon and getting burger patties with bacon and fried egg from Uncle Frank’s Kebob stand at 2 AM. I’ll miss hearing little kids screaming in Turkish at 7 AM and electrical plugs that turn off when you don’t need them. I’ve had an amazing time here.

All the colleges in the University have finished their end of term exams, and there are students parading all over Cambridge in robes and fancy clothes. They’re having their May Balls this week to celebrate, and various colleges have been putting on amazing fireworks shows to commemorate the end. On Monday night my classmates and I decided to rent a punt and venture out onto the river to watch the Trinity fireworks. (Apparently every year is an unofficial competition between St. Johns and Trinity for most epic firework display. One of them — I think Trinity — had an unlimited budget for May Ball this year. What do you even do with an unlimited budget? Diamond champagne glasses? Gold and platinum forks? Suits woven of vicuna wool and shawls crocheted with single strands of silk by blind nuns?)

It was raining when we departed, of course. All of my European tales are centered around rainstorms. I hopped on the punt with the girls (and Neil, with the hope that he could take over if I fell in the river) and Lindsey passed the punting stick over to me. I had the grand luck to’ve obtained a heavy wooden stick (which of course got more unwieldy with the rain and repeated insertion into the river-plants) instead of one of the lighter aluminum ones. I was hopelessly inept at directing the punt where I wanted it to go — I kept veering right, then over-correcting, then running into the bank, then over-correcting back the other way. I only dropped the stick in the river twice, once because I got it stuck on a bridge above us. We wandered down the river for awhile and then met up with the other half of our classmates (being punted by Gary, who was a much better captain than I). I took a break from the helm to drink a cider and float aimlessly for a bit. I was completely drenched, both from the rain and the water that’d run down my arms from the punting stick every time I pulled it out of the water. Despite looking and feeling like a bedraggled drowned rat, I was having a grand time.

I was nervous that I was upsetting my friends with my inability to make the punt go where I wanted it to, though. I will admit that I was being rather annoying with an outpouring of apologies for my poor punting skills. (Semi-random aside: once I saw an episode of a cooking competition show where this girl kept repeating “Oh my god, I’m the worst one here; I’m so out of my element; everyone else is better; I’m going to fail; I hate myself fail fail fail” and then SHE WON the whole competition. She was so annoying, and I was embarrassed to watch her proclaim her low self-esteem aloud because that’s exactly how I am, even though I know how horrible it sounds. Instead of watching, I wanted to bury my head under my pillow and beg forgiveness from my boy-at-the-time for being so annoying. Then I realized that apologizing for being insecure was just another level of insecurity that was even more annoying, and I was creating an endless loop of apologizing for apologizing for apologizing for being insecure that was going to accomplish the exact opposite of what I wanted. Instead I just laughed super awkwardly and covered my eyes whenever she started with another “I suck” tirade. This is actually a huge problem for me; it drives my parents and my brothers and my friends — particularly Dylan, who listens to more of that crap than anyone should ever have to put up with — batty when I lose my sense of perspective and freak out about being “worthless.”) In any case, I don’t think anyone actually cared about our directionless travel!

Once we decided to start moving again, a trio of British boys yelled out as us from the bank to ask if we could ferry them over to their own boat. I of course thought this was a grand idea (though everyone but Tiffany seemed to disagree), so they hopped on and took over the punt. Our six person punt rode very low in the water when filled with nine people, but they were much better at directing the thing than I was. They quickly (and rather ungraciously, to be honest) hopped off again once we reached the crowd of boats situated to watch the fireworks, and I wanted to move our boat out from under the bridge for a better view. Somehow our punt had become lodged under another punt during this exchange, so I found myself jumping up and down at the end of it trying to get us free. The people on the adjacent punt kept saying “Oh, just move closer to the edge and it’ll dislodge” and didn’t make much effort to help. Somehow I managed to complete this maneuver without falling in the river, and we set up near the bank to get ready for the fireworks.

I didn’t know what to expect from the display, and after the first song and set of fireworks I thought (with disappointment) that it was over. It was nowhere near done, though, and they continued on with song after song accompanied by fireworks and a fountain show. They played a hilarious array of things, from Sandstorm to Star Wars to Vanessa Carlton to more classical songs, and the fireworks and colored fountains and bursts of fire spouting from the bank were timed with the music. I started giggling giddily and had a lovely reminder of how happy I’ve been over the past month. It was completely surreal, sitting on that English river, surrounded by scores of people just as enthralled as I, drinking cider, watching fireworks as the rain was illuminated by spouting fire-fountains, in Cambridge, a place so rich with history. I couldn’t stop laughing because the whole setting just made me so happy.

After the fireworks were over everyone tried to move at once. The river was insanely crowded, and our punt was jostled sideways and propelled along with a gaggle of other boats. I was a bit tipsy from my ciders, and in the slippery darkness (and with repeated bumps from other punts) I very nearly fell in the river several times. Somehow I managed to stay up, though with lots of squeals and laughter every time I nearly toppled into the water. My feet and core were aching from the effort of staying upright by the time we got back to the station, but it was a good feeling — and I did get us back safely, though it took a couple tries before I oriented the punt the correct direction for docking. It was an awesome experience, and the firework display was absolutely spectacular.

1–survived confusing train mix-up, saw beautiful fields of flowers, made it to London

2–stopped briefly in the British Library and imagined I saw smile-y faces in hand-written scores

3–saw a neat medical history in the Wellcome Collection (there were also GIANT models of disease carrying bugs, so cool)

There were pieces of science-related artwork in the collection as well, including this bit of silliness. Clones are potentially not like other humans? Really, people? Have you heard of identical twins??

4–grabbed a quick lunch and saw this woman sitting with an empty Smirnoff bottle

5–saw a bit more of the city while walking between museums. This is the Dept of Information, where Orwell worked–they apparently called it the Dept of Propaganda or the Dept of Misinformation, and it inspired the Ministry of Truth in 1984!)

6–went to British museum and scoffed at England’s propensity for filching and hoarding

This carving is designed so that it looks like it has the right number of legs from the front or the side, but if you look at it diagonally there are TOO MANY.

7–was grumped at by John Soane Museum docents, stared at the uninspiring collection of a hoarder 

8–saw amazing diseased tissues and two headed fetuses at the Wellcome Museum

9–went to the Hunterian museum for a history of surgery (and saw many sketchily-obtained bodies)

9–took the train to Heathrow to fly to Amsterdam! 

Here’s the long version: 

On Friday morning our train to London was supposed to leave at 8:55, but there was some mixup that involved the nonexistence of the 8:55 train and/or our tickets not being valid for peak hours and/or some of our tickets becoming mysteriously demagnetized. Any/all of these problems aside, we got on the 9:30 train and made it just fine (though I was feeling a bit woozy from the night before, which we spent at the Regal Wetherspoon pub).  The weather was stunningly perfect at the end of last week (I took a lovely nap in the sun at Parker’s Piece — which I keep calling Pease Park — last Thursday; sun-naps are the best). The fields of summer flowers we saw on the ride in were beautiful splashes of red and blue.

We then moved on to the British Museum (and immediately lost Gary when he stopped to take a picture–this apparently became a general theme of the weekend). After the group reassembled in the massive domed courtyard, we began our tour. I found it to be a rather outlandish place. Important historical objects have been filched from all around the world and dumped together in one jumbled building. We saw artifacts of Greece and Egypt and every other country that England could nab stuff from. If I remember the story correctly, the English government told Greece that they’d return their artifacts if Greece built a proper museum to hold the items. Greece built said museum, and England was like “JK GUYS we’re keeping it all.”

Tomorrow we have our first midterm and then we fly to Barcelona. I need to hurry and write about the craziness of Amsterdam before the craziness of Barcelona starts… 

If I’m given the opportunity to sit down, there is an 86% probability that within five minutes I’ll be asleep. Considering that I’m currently propped up on my elbows on my wonderfully comfortable Cambridgeshire bed, you’ll probably have to wait a couple days for those travel entries to arrive (in pieces). 

To tide you over,  here is a silly and pointless blog entry about tights, inspired by the wonderful tights I’ve seen in Europe. (They’ve mostly been in England, actually. My style is apparently much more like that of Londoners than Europeans on the continent.)

reasons why tights are amazing:

1) You don’t have to shave your legs.

2) If you weigh more than 100 pounds, your thighs probably touch. (Please tell me I’m not just a beefy-thighed anomaly here?!) It’s a terrible feeling, especially when it is hot outside, and tights prevent this horror.

3) They keep out light chills, so you can wear a dress even when the temperature drops. They don’t feel bulky and hot in the summer. They are amazing as an extra layer under jeans when it gets wintry. They are perfect for all weather conditions!

4) They come in BRIGHT COLORS.

5) They cover bruises and scrapes if (like mine) your legs look like they belong to a tree-climbing ten-year-old.

6)  They provide some degree of modesty when you are wearing a skirt/dress on a bike on a windy day.

7) They are enough to keep an ankle brace from hurting/chafing. (This means footless tights + ankle brace can be worn for yoga and any tights +ankle brace can be worn with sandals!)

reasons why tights are not as amazing as I want them to be:

1) They make your feet sweat.

             (Buy footless tights! Problem solved).

2) One-size-fits-all tights are not long enough if you’re over 5’5".

             (Again–footless tights! Or just take out the stitching at the toe and make them footless.)

3) Most tights have a rougher thread or stiffer knit around the upper thigh (I suppose to compress/stay in place), and this makes the backs of my legs very itchy after a couple hours.

             (I have no solution to this problem and it makes me very sad).

4) They run easily.

              (Solutions: have a huge tight collection, keep clear nail polish on hand, and continue wearing hole-y tights but remain oblivious to the fact that you’re probably starting to edge toward "homeless" in the eyes of any observers playing the "hipster v. homeless" game.