On Grans, Fancy Dress and Chivalry

Shake is the 50's version of Revolver (60's club night) where my friend Martin (aka Coops) is a DJ.  Since I was going to a fancy dress party*, I decided to kill two birds with one stone and dress up.  I bought the dress at a back street shop, and I hafta say, I love it.  My Granny is totally right: wearing red makes you feel better.

Doesn't Alex look just like Seth Cohen from the OC?  I wish you could see the rest of his outfit and how he dances.  It's really uncanny.

On a side note, you know what else makes you feel better?  Peanut brittle.  My Granny sent me two tins of it, and although I shared with loads of people, I'm still eating through it this morning.  Usually, on Christmas day, everyone else is eating one of the delicious cakes that someone or Granny bakes, but I always just sit with a tin of peanut brittle in front of me.  The warden on my hall, Scottish Reg (who sounds like Sean Connery), left a note in my mailbox because I gave him some of the brittle.  The note read:

"Hi Wendy    I am now your grans favourite number 1 fan.  Peanut brittle was best I have ever tasted.  I went to heaven for about 10 minutes when I ate it.  You have a special gran.  Thank you so much, RegX"

I agree wholeheartedly.  My "gran" is legendary.

Back to my original story, I went to shake and twisted the night away, literally.  I left at 2 when it was over after 3 hours of dancing.  It was fur-eezing.  Since all the bars were closing, the bus was packed with students dressed in all manner of inappropriate fancy dress.  The Dark Knight seems to be popular, as well as the devil (for girls).  Anyhow, there was an older woman across the aisle from me who had obviously just gotten off work, and she looked very tired.  The bus got so full that it wasn't possible to get off without quite literally pushing your way through a crowd of obnoxious, drunk freshers*.  

The woman managed to get up and started to push her way through (we were luckily at the very front of the bus).  There were a bunch of boys dressed as zombies or something stupid, and they were smashed.  The bus started to move again, and she said, "Wait, I need to get off."  One of the boys says, "I'll bet you do, but I'm not going to help you."  I flagged the bus driver to get him to stop, and the bus jolted everyone forward.  Same idiot boy says, "Get off me you dried up c---!"  I'll let you fill in the blank there because I don't repeat language like that.  

Anyway, maybe that's a term of endearment in England, but I don't care.  You do NOT talk to somebody that way, especially when you are an inebriated teenager talking to a lady whose been working all night.  I waited for someone to say something, but all of his friends just laughed.  Once the doors opened, a couple of his friends had to get off the bus for the woman to get off, and I turned him around and clocked him, right in the nose (with the same finger that wears my mom's ring, strangely, my left hand - I'm right handed).  Unfortunately, I ko'd him, probably more due to his drunkenness than my pugilism.  Also unfortunate, the place where we stopped had a cop on the street, and the bus driver (who hadn't seen the previous incident, only the kid) motions to the cop, who makes me and the now half-conscious teenager and a couple of his friends get off.  Here's our little exchange:

Cop:   What happened?  Who hit him?

Me: I did.

Cop: You?*  Why?

Me: [in my most convincing Southern drawl]  He called this poor woman words that should not be repeated in polite conversation, and his friends were not going to do anything about it, so I did.  I can't stand for that.

Cop: You punched him because he was yelling at her?

Me: No, I clocked him because not only was he disrespectful, he called her [I whisper in his ear what the boy said].  I don't know exactly what the translation of that is in England, but in Atlanta, that is about the ugliest you could say to a lady.

Cop: Well, it means the same thing here.  [to the idiots, as a group, who collectively are about 10% sober]  Did he say that?

Boys: Hm-arudm. He, not, maybe crowded, drunk. Mm-hum-harumph (something akin to how Parliament sounds to me).

Cop: [to idiots] I'm having you arrested for being a nuisance.  [to me]  Here's the next bus, love,  have you got a fare?

Boys: What?  He's the one that was abused!  Why does she get to go?

Cop: Because you're acting like a load of bloody knobs, and she hasn't done any more damage than the booze he's been drinking.

And Scene.  Picture of my slightly bruised hand.

*fancy dress - not, as it turns out, formal attire, it's costume or dress-up

*freshers - the majority of the population it seems like.  Uni students in their first year or all years who are too busy drinking and looking like trollops to have any sense at all.

*I had on, over my cute hair and saddle shoes, a red coat with flowers on the front, and I'm pretty sure the police officer thought I was twelve.  

For ME?

I met a very clever DJ at the club the other night (see Mom, you can use an arts degree!) who has a postgraduate degree in literature.  We were discussing meeting for  coffee via email, and I joked that he should respond via sonnet or haiku.  This is said response:

The weekend bulges with unfinished work,

And the nightclub is only a distant

Memory. But the scholar cannot shirk

The nagging questions, ever persistent.

Who, what, where, when, above all asking why?

The path along which knowledge is gathered

Requires a disciplined and steady eye;

You'll - whooops - stumble if you're getting blathered.

Even coffee, enlightenment's choice drug,

Should be drunk, like a long-distance runner,

With the mind on the move - not in a snug

Drawn out fashion, tho' that might be funner.

Social moments make a nice distraction

But shouldn't cause knowledge's contraction.

------------- x -----------------

Words pass over coffee steam

Busy feet pass by -

Flowers bloomed, bees travel.

Water falls down lonely cliffs

Gathers in pools - 

Monday's fine - two-ish?

Various and Sundry News Items

Just so you actually have an update before I dash off to the library, here's what's been going on.

1) It's a little late to be writing this, but I am finally getting better.  I've had a sinus infection/cold for nearly two weeks, and it finally seems to be going away.  My nose still gets runny every time I'm in the wind for any amount of time, but that's to be expected in this locale.

2) I'm getting in gear with my classes and reading (probably over-reading to tell the truth) in the library all the time it seems like.  I can't really read in my room b/c the computer/Facebook/blogs are too tempting.  I need to sit in an educational setting.  Plus, there's noises but it's not loud/musical.  I need background noise to study, but it can't be music (outside of Beethoven's 7th which used to be my study record of choice - thank you Shorter College).  I don't want to overdo it, but mum's advice was this:  "I never thought to myself, 'Hm, I wish I had read less.  I always could have read more, but no one says they ever should have read less.'"  Ah, the wisdom of my sage mater familias.

3) I got selected for the International 16 with the International Society.  It's 16 students from all over the world, and we'll get together and represent our countries in discussions each week as well as doing workshops and going on trips together.  It culminates in the spring with a trip to an acting camp where we'll write a music/theatre show for children about different countries and having an international point of view.  Then, we'll go to schools in the Northwest and put the show on there.  If you know me, it's really right up my alley, and honestly, I'm really honored that they would pick me.  I'm pretty well traveled, but I know that my point of view, per se, is very narrow.  I'd like to be part of the group so that I can break down some stereotypes about Americans.  I think most people hear "conservative, Southern, Christian" and they expect some kind of wacko fundamentalist like oh I don't know, my dad.  :)

4) I went to a club last night (The Roadhouse), and Monday nights they do this 60's club night, Revolver.  They play all vinyl (which I appreciate), and (as Chad and I deduced) almost all of it is from the 1960's.  Regardless, it was fantastic, and I danced till my Dr. Scholl's insoles even hurt.  It was a lot like Lenny's, and I wished I had my hula hoop.  A selection of artists played:  The Coasters, Chuck Berry, The Shirelles, Diana and the Supremes, Bob Dylan, The Beach Boys, The Beatles (more than once, but what do you expect?), The Troggs, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Dave Clark Five, The Zombies, The Rolling Stones, etc. etc. etc.  So basically, it was awesome.

5) I did a "self-tour" of Manchester and took pictures of a few places of note.  Here they are:

One of the canals, next to the Hacienda (which has a history-watch 24 Hour Party People).  Now it's actually just a bunch of apartments.  There are more canals in Manchester than there are in Venice, fact.  Another fact, the Oxford/Wilmslow bus line that runs in front of the Uni and my dorm is the busiest bus route in the entire world.  Something like 250 per hour.

The public library, which is a zillion times better than any private library I've ever been to.

The people of Britain think they are eating real, hot now, delicious Krispy Kremes, but they have been lied to.  They don't taste right b/c the UK has laws against I don't know trans-fats or something.

The Bridgewater Hall.  If you've ever listened to NPR, you know what this is.

The Manchester Town Hall.  Nice.  Designed by the same architect who designed the University of Manchester.  It's actually hugely tall and has a big clocktower, but my $30 camera  couldn't get all of the picture in.

Lake District, finally.

Okay, so I finally got the pictures from the trip to the Lake District, some courtesy of Troy, after my camera's batteries died.  For the background, I went with the International Society to the Lake District, which is about an hour and a half north of Manchester.  I didn't really know anyone on the bus, but I met two guys from M/cr Metropolitan University (MMU), and they were nice, so we hung out during the day.  Troy Rainbow (yes, that's totally his last name!) is from Australia and Gert-Jan is from Amsterdam.  We had a great time, and the weather was beautiful, if a bit chilly while we were on the water.  

There were sheep, and I got my picture made with them because well, they are so cute.  At some point, while I am here, my goal is to squeeze a sheep.  They just look so...fluffy.  

Anyway, I could describe the scenery for you, or I could just post the pictures.  Everything you look at looks like a postcard or one of those Kodak 1000 piece picture puzzles.  This has to be where they take all those.  It is unspeakably beautiful.  These pictures are definitely worth a thousand words, if not more.

Oh, luxury.

I broke down and went to Asda.  It is Walmart, which makes me cringe, but the main difference is that every single register is open.  It would have only taken ten minutes, but I scribbled my name on the card slip.  I have always done that.  My name is longish, I write big, and it never fits on the line.  They had this huge hissy fit and said that I had to sign my name exactly as it appeared on the back of the card to prevent someone else from using it fraudulently.  I showed them my Driver's license, Student ID and my passport (all with pictures) and signed a blank piece of paper before they agreed that it was okay.  Bizarre.  Probably karma or something for going there.

Here's what I bought:

actual Cottonelle toilet paper - see my letter to the Queen.

Ultra Soft Kleenex - I have a sinus infection and the Kleenex situation is about as bad as the toilet tissue.  My nose is raw.

POPTARTS! - I have been craving these like crazy, and I couldn't find them anywhere, but I was told by 40 people I could get them at Asda, so that was my mine reason for going.

Dr. Scholl's gel insoles - Aaaah.  I am officially gellin' like a felon.

Oh, and I found another food I like: kebabs.  It's not what you think though.  In the US, we put meat and vegetables on a skewer on the grill, and it's a kebab.  In the UK, a kebab is a big piece of Naan bread (Indian, sort of like a flatbread or pita, but cooked better) that has grilled, seasoned, spicy meat chunks with "salad" (a cole slaw-y mixture of cabbage, tomato and cucumbers) and a sauce (yoghurt, mango or curry).  It is absolutely delicious, and although it was huge, I ate the whole thing. Below is a picture comparing the two kinds of kebabs.

 

Off topic post

I know this is off topic, but it's not completely.  There are several of my friends/family who are going through really tough stuff right now, and I've absolutely been there.  A friend gave me a CD before I left, and I really like the group, Lady Antebellum (they're kind of country, sort of like Sugarland, but I like them better).  Anyway, the last song on the album really spoke to me.  I've been through some incredibly hard things, and in the moment, you don't really see how things can get better.  I look at what I'm doing now, and it's so much more than I hoped or planned for myself.  If I hadn't gone through those things, and I'd gotten everything I wanted when I wanted it, I might be happy sure, but I wouldn't be a very strong person, and I wouldn't be near as thankful for what I have as I am now.  The lyrics aren't sophisticated, but they are true, and that's pretty profound.

One Day You Will

You feel like you're falling backwards

Like you're slipping through the cracks

Like no one would even notice 

If you left this town and never came back

You walk outside and all you see is rain

You look inside and all you feel is pain

And you can't see it now

But down the road the sun is shining

In every cloud there's a silver lining

Just keep holding on

Every heartache makes you stronger

But it won't be much longer, 

You'll find love, you'll find peace

And the you you're meant to be

I know right now that's not the way you feel,

but one day you will.

You wake up every morning and ask yourself

What am I doing here anyway?

With the weight of all those disappointments

Whispering in your ears

you're just barely hanging by a thread.

You want to scream, but you're down to your last breath.

And you don't know it yet.

But down the road the sun is shining

In every cloud there's a silver lining

Just keep holding on

And every heartache makes you stronger

But it won't be much longer

You'll find love, you'll find peace

And the you you're meant to be

I know right now that's not the way you feel

But one day you will

Find the strength to rise above

You will

Find just what you're made of...

One day you will.

Wendy's got a brand new bag...

I bought this at Blackwell's Bookshop (which sounds like Harry Potter to me).  It's only about 1/2 true.  I needed a shopping bag (they make you pay for your shopping bags here to promote recycling and reusing your own bags), and I liked this one a lot.  Plus, it's Erasmus, and who doesn't like him?