it will be ok [and i'm avoiding studying]

I think when I look back on this semester I will remember it was a good one. That's how it usually works. I've been exceptionally busy, I feel homeless sometimes, I feel like I didn't sit down for four months, there has been much more drama than I have ever wanted in my life... but I've gotten to know some really cool people and had some great experiences. I went to Las Vegas! and St. Louis... yeah. So, maybe the good cancels out the bad.
I don't say this for no reason: fall semester last year, I had mono and took one of the worst classes in the journalism department while trying to find an internship without any real experience. And I look back now and it was one of the best semesters at Ball State. So it's whatever.
What doesn't kill you and all that, right? And I'm alive and have learned from my mistakes and am better because of it... or something.

reason number 112 why wacom tablets and finals don't mix.

in case you're wondering...

...what to get me for Christmas, I created a tumblr, where I am posting links to neat things in online stores, and online stores with neat things.

http://www.beckyrother.tumblr.com

So there ya go.

the end of the year

It's that time again. The end of another year, and time to think back on everything... blah, blah.

2008 was a good year. Being out of Indiana for half of it didn't hurt. Spring semester this year was the best ever, mostly because I was studying in London. Then summer was good, because I was in Colorado interning at the Colorado Springs Gazette. Then I had to go back to Muncie. Anyway, I don't want to describe it, so, being a visual journalist, I made a chart to show my level of well-being over the year.

2008 in review

What's that? Internship announcement? Oh yeah —
next
year
I will intern
at
The Minneapolis Star Tribune.
I'm excited. You should be, too, I've heard it's a great place to work.

Also, next semester I am doing an immersion project with the Institute for Digital Entertainment and Education. Hopefully I will learn Flash better than I know right now. It's not paid, but I get 3 credits for it. I'm more interested in actually learning than getting paid anyway.

Yup.

it's been a long time

Yeah, uh, sorry... it's been a long long time since I've had any time to do anything other than school, publications work and sleep.
This semester I have a pretty light school schedule, so I thought it would be a good idea to join the staffs of all the publications at Ball State - the Daily News, which I've been on since the first day of my first semester of freshman year, and Ball Bearings Online, and Expo magazine. So I've been really busy with that.
Oh and I broke my foot about a month ago. I stepped in a pothole. Don't judge me. It's been an issue since now I have to drive to campus and park in handicapped spots and pay $70 for a parking pass. Grr.
On the plus side, I have had an excuse to be on campus much more than I might have been had I not broken my foot. This is good because I am almost never in my house, which is good. Things are not working out in my house - my roommates and I are just too different and I am getting upset about things unnecessarily. So I am counting the days until winter break, when I will move out with one of my other roommates and live in a university apartment. I can't wait.
And that has been my semester in a nutshell.
This week I'm going to St. Louis with the journalism office. The National Scholastic Press Association is having its annual convention and I am going as a representative of Ball State. It's going to be the first convention I've been to since I was a high school student, so I'm really looking forward to it.
Cheers!

my new place

It's great to be sitting here in my new house. I've lived in a few places since I've been in college, but this is the first time my name has been on the lease. I moved in on Sunday, and right now there is one other girl living with me, but eventually there will be four girls total living here. It's great. The house is cute, and it only takes about 10 minutes to walk to the center of campus.
It's going to be a good year.

i'm back in indiana

...In case you were curious, or worried, or cared.
It's kind of nice to be back in my room. Now I'm just really, really excited about moving up to Muncie to be in my own house (which I'm renting with three other girls) and start classes again. I do like school. And I really like school supplies.

heading (home? away? back?) ...east tomorrow

It's always weird when you leave a place that you've become familiar with, especially after you've come to appreciate it - be it a small town in the middle of nowhere or a big city, there's always a certain amount of remorse that comes with leaving. This time, I've been counting down the days until I'm back in Indiana, but now, with only a few hours left here in Colorado Springs, I'm dragging my heels.
It's not because I don't miss everyone at home — I really, really miss everyone at home. I've been musing it over, and I think someone at the paper said it best: I just dipped my toe into the giant ocean that is the Real World. And I like it. I like the feeling of being responsible for myself. I like having a nine to five. I like going out with friends from work.
I like feeling like an adult.
But it's more than that. It's also that nine or ten weeks seems like the amount of time it takes to adjust to a place. Everywhere I've been in the past few years, there's always been this period of uncomfortableness when I'm not used to the atmosphere or the pace of the city. Of course it's always a little different, but nine seems like the magic number.
So here I am, in my tenth week in Colorado, and I'm finally kind of okay with people driving ten under the speed limit, dressing like they just worked out, and walking around with their head in the clouds mountains. I'm starting to hang out with people. I like my job.
And now I have to leave.

Anyway, here's my travel plans, in case you're wondering.
I'm driving back with my mom, taking three days (or two, I guess, if we're feeling up to it). If we take three days, we're stopping in Salina, KS, and St. Louis. If you're following me on twitter (/beckyrother), I'll be posting updates as we hit milestones.
Wish us luck!
Cheers!

i swear this is not the only thing i do at work

more cat pictures

unplanned productivity

Today I woke up at 6:30 in the morning because both dogs were howling. Loudly. And then the alarm clock went off in the other room. I knew it was hopeless. I got up.
I had been planning to get up pretty early anyway, to schedule a time to bring my car in for an oil change and tune-up before my Very Long Drive next week (next week!). So I called them at 7, when they opened, and then just stayed up.
At 9, I went to Starbucks, partly to get out of the house, partly to work on my DVD project and partly for a latté. I sat between some people doing an interview (still not sure who was interviewing whom) and a group of what I took to be young New-Lifers, one of the ultra-Christian churches in town. They talked about Batman for about half an hour, saying how they would never bring young children to see it, making terrible faces about how graphic and terrifying Heath Ledger as Joker was. I'm not going to judge.
What did I do between 7 and 9? I still don't really know. I started packing, I put some stuff in boxes, I moved them into the spare room, but I don't think that should have taken up two hours' worth of time.
Oh well.
I left Starbucks, went to the library to return some books, and came back to lay out in the park for a while. (I know you probably don't really want to hear about every second of every day, but that's what ya got.)
Then I took my car in to the Saturn dealer, where I was confronted with those terrible questions about whether to replace seemingly vital parts of my car that may or may not cause the engine to fall out, catch on fire or explode. I chose to risk it. It was either that or pay $400. Life's tough when you're poor. I still ended up paying $250 for new brakes, which really did look bad and were clearly in need of replacing. The other part, that could be any dirty old metal part on the engine, but I know what brakes look like, and I know mine were bad. So they replaced them, and I got to take them on a test drive with the manager of the Saturn dealership. That's why I like Saturn — everyone who works there is so friendly. I've really had nothing but good experiences with them.

And that's all.
Cheers!

rodeOOOH

Last weekend was one of the better ones this summer, mostly because I got to hang out with other people and actually do things.
On Saturday, I went to a couple art museums in town - they were having free admission days. We went to one downtown that was supposed to be modern art, but it turned out to be a room with screen-printed scarves. It was cool, but there wasn't much to look at. The next one we went to was bigger - The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center. It had literally all kinds of stuff - one room was Native American stuff, and one room was photographs, and one room was "everything else" with abstract, sculpture, glasswork and pottery. It was a pretty good museum, considering it's in the middle of Colorado.
Then Saturday night we went to the rodeo. Yes I did, I went to the rodeo. With Rina and Alexis, interns, and Rina's roommate, a Colorado College student. It was a lot of fun, we were laughing a lot of the time and no one really looked at us. I think we were the only people there just to look - everyone else seemed really emotionally connected and seriously into it.
On Sunday I got out of work really early and went to a dance performance at Colorado College that had people from the Cirque de Soleil and crazy stuff like that.
So that was my weekend.
I'm putting up pictures.

LOL

more cat pictures
I'm sorry, I had to.

Busy weekend

First of all, I would just like to tell you that my window is open and cigarette smell is coming in from outside. Also, I'm reading a book by Chuck Palahniuk - think Edward Norton in the beginning half of "Fight Club" - so I might be a little more brusque than usual. Or something. So.
And now for the post.

How to begin. It's been a long two weeks, with no break between last week and this one, and my family visiting starting Tuesday. Not to complain, I'm much happier when I'm busy and feel like I have a purpose instead of just sitting around on Facebook. So I went up to Denver on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning, which I already talked about.
This weekend was packed with all the tourist stuff I haven't done since I got to Colorado Springs. I feel weird going out on my own sightseeing at places people usually bring families or friends, so mostly I've kept to the suburban aspects of sightseeing: the malls, the Starbucks, the highways... I really thought Colorado would bring out the woodsy adventurer in me, but for the most part I guess I was wrong about that.
We started out on Friday, when there was a cattle drive through downtown Colorado Springs to celebrate the Fourth and also to raise interest in the Rodeo next week. It was weird and surprisingly short, with very little fanfare leading up to the moment the cows would shuffle past us surrounded by cowboys on horses. The road didn't close until about five minutes until the scheduled time. The whole thing was kind of surreal.
After that we kind of hung out till 4, when we went to a barbecue at my coworker Dave's house. He had gotten up at something like 6 in the morning and smoked a "couple'a huge pork butts," as he said. They were really shoulders but called butts. It was worth it, the sandwiches were delicious.
We left about 6:30 or so, in time to decide where to watch fireworks and what time to go. The Fourth of July really confirmed my suspicions that Colorado Springs is the most patriotic place in the country, next to Washington, D.C. Combine the center of a giant Red state with a couple of military installments and evangelical Christian bases and you get a whole heapin' pile of patriotism. So there were about four different displays we could have gone to. The one we went to was in Memorial Park, and the Colorado Springs orchestra played a concert beforehand. It was nice. By the way, I did take a lot more pictures than I'm putting up here, and I started a flickr account: www.flickr.com/photos/ihavegoodnews/ - There's a link on the right side of this page.
The next day, we started out really, really early (7 a.m.) and took a cog wheel train ride to the top of Pikes Peak. That was something I've been looking forward to since I got here, so it was exciting to finally get to go, even if it was pretty early. The view from the top was absolutely spectacular, and I had a great time walking around with my brother.
Lessee, then we went to Seven Falls, the only really lame thing on the trip. It was a pretty tall waterfall, sure, but we had to pay something like $17 each to get in, and all we did was walk up some stairs. I'm still sore, and didn't really see anything spectacular like I would expect after paying some exorbitant fee to get into a park.
After that we went to Royal Gorge, which was expensive but really was worth it - it's a pretty narrow bridge 1,000 feet above the Arkansas River. Kind of scary, but neat.
Then today we went to the Garden of the Gods in the morning before the family had to leave at 2. That park was free, and the best one, I thought. The rock formations were really cool, and we were able to actually walk around (the path was paved) the area and take pictures and stuff. And it was morning so it didn't get ridiculously hot.

And now I'm tired. But look at my flickr account - I can only put up a few photos a month (basically the limit I'm at right now) but it's good if you want to see more of what I did one weekend.

wild, wild west...

Driving back from Denver today got me thinking. Mostly because I couldn't get This American Life back on my ipod to listen to it while driving, so I was forced to keep Gnarles Barkley on repeat.That's not a bad thing, they're a great band, but after a while I tend to stop listening to music and actually think about things. So I wanted to write some of the things I was thinking about before I forgot them (as has already happened with 97 percent of the rest of the things I think about).

I think the West is the ultimate embodiment of America: huge and expansive, with subdivisions full of enormous houses on their half-acre of land each. There isn't much between Denver and Colorado Springs - it's mostly just rolling hills and blue-tinted mountains going off into the distance. What do they do with all this land, I wonder. It seems like such wasted space to me in my still-kind-of-European mindset. In London, there wasn't a centimetre of land that wasn't a building, or a road, or the Thames (and even that was crowded with boats and ferries). But Here, in the West, there appears to be more land than people know what to do with. The result, intentional or not, is a general feeling of excess, of being big for the sake of being big. American.
On the other hand, the grandeur of the Rockies and the vastness of the scenery - that in some places you can look around you and see nothing but rolling hills dotted with evergreens, huge white puffy clouds and the winding road ahead and behind, give the place a closeness with God that I haven't felt anywhere else. The sheer beauty of the place - of the West - makes me certain of His existence. And His greatness.
Amen.


Oh also.
I guess I should mention the reason for my being in Denver. Unlike my other Denver adventure, this one had a purpose: my family has flown out to visit me for the week. They're staying in Denver for two nights before coming to Colorado Springs, so I drove up after work to meet them and have dinner with them. I ended up spending the night there, in their hotel room, in a double bed with my 18-year-old brother, and leaving this morning. They get to go to Estes Park, while I had to go to work.
It makes me feel so grown up, to have my family visit me in the other place where I live. It's really happening, this growing-up thing.
Yikes.

field trip!

Well I'm really tired, so I don't want to write much, but Kristyn Brisnehan just sent me some pictures from when we went to Helen Hunt Falls, so I wanted to put them up here. Enjoy!

Kristyn, Susan and me

Helen Hunt Falls... and me

in which i have terrible hours

I haven't written much this week because there really isn't much to talk about. I've been designing the Metro section most days, which is actual news, so I have to work from 2 to 10. I don't want to complain, but what am I supposed to do for five hours while I'm waiting to go to work?
The Metro section is kind of fun, though - I get to learn about the city and I sort of like the excitement of being on deadline. It's a different kind of design, though, one that's more like putting a puzzle together than creating an interesting package. I have to say, I like features design better.
Yesterday, I went downtown in the morning and realized that I had missed the annual Pikes Peak Rodeo Breakfast by, I don't know, half an hour. Dang. When I got there, there were still huge blocks of hay in the middle of one of the busiest intersections of downtown, though, so at least I got some interesting photos.
I also went to the Pioneer Museum downtown. It's actually a lot more interesting than it sounds - it talks about the first people to climb Pikes Peak, and the history of the mining industry in the West. There was also a little section about Native Americans, which I enjoyed. The best part ws that the museum was free. Yep, I'm poor.

hay!

the Pioneer Museum

awesome

Today was such a good day, I don't even want to write about it. That's how good it was.
Basically,
My boss went through the supervisor eval he was supposed to do for me to get internship credit, with only good things to say. Included words "lifesaver," "superb" and "would hire her immediately."
Designed some awesome stuff. (See insert- that ran Wednesday)
Organized an intern movie night to see "Get Smart." While only 3 other people showed up I felt good about it.
Woo-hoo!

photos from denver

on the way to Denver

the 16th Street Mall downtown

the capitol building

Another one of those spontaneous adventures...

This week is weird, in that I am scheduled to work both Saturday and Sunday. Originally my boss had me working all seven days, but I told him that just because I am an intern it is not OK to make me work every day of the week.
So he gave me Wednesday off.
Wednesday, really? I didn't know what to do. I had a couple of errands that I had been putting off till today, but I knew there was not enough to take up the whole day. I needed to return something at the mall in the north of the city, a place that I usually take I-25 to get to. As I was driving, I thought about how I-25 goes all the way to Denver... and so I went. There was a bookstore at the mall, where I bought a Frommer's guide with a nice map, and I had Tom-Tom. There are times when I am extremely grateful for the GPS device, and other times... I want to throw it out the window. In Denver, with tall buildings all around, it constantly lost signal, most of the time at exactly the moment I was nearing an intersection where I was supposed to turn. It was infuriating.
Despite Tom-Tom's best efforts to strand me in downtown Denver, I made it, and really enjoyed the city.
Denver is a pretty big city - Wikipedia says about 500,000 in the city and 2 million in the metro area. I walked around downtown a bit, where there are quite a few tall buildings, and people walking around the streets, but for all that it really didn't feel huge. It felt, well, Western, with big wide streets and the laid-back feeling I imagine when I think of the American West.
I only spent a few hours there, because parking was stupidly expensive: $2 for every 15 minutes. Next time I go, Dave says I should take the tram in to the city.
Denver reminded me of a European city a little: 16th Street is mostly for pedestrians, with shops and restaurants, and a tram running through the city and into the surrounding suburbs, I guess. So that was cool.
I'm gonna post photos in a new post. This one is too long.
Cheers!

well that's funny

I had a good day at work today. I was literally busy the entire time, something that always makes the day go by a lot faster and makes me feel like I've actually accomplished something.
After work I have done absolutely nothing, and I got home two hours ago. I've been looking at the internets, mostly, and found this gem of computer-age wit. Enjoy.

marriedtothesea.com

an evening with ira

Today, joy of joys, I got to see Ira Glass speak at Colorado College. He's the host of NPR's This American Life, which I've been listening to fanatically for a little over a year now. So imagine my shock and awe to find that he was coming here, to Colorado Springs! It's like learning that the actor you've had a crush on since, like, forever, is going to be in your town. I was ecstatic.
I met Rina, fellow intern and Ira fan, who had somehow found out that doors opened at 7:30 and gotten good seats. When he came on stage my heart literally skipped a beat. There is just something about seeing a celebrity in person that can't be matched no matter how many times you see them on TV or hear them on the radio.
Anyway, it was awesome, he talked about storytelling techniques that he had learned in his years of working for NPR, and how he met his wife. He also played a couple of stories he had worked on, either as a producer behind the scenes or as a reporter actually doing the interviews, and talked about how the stories came to be. I was fascinated.
Here's a photo that I took secretly.

Ira Glass

Today I also read a book the park, got a little sunburned, wasted too much gas, considered renting a moped, walked around Old Colorado City (which was stupid), tried to find a skirt at the mall (also stupid), and watched part of "Semi Pro" (which I turned off because it was stupid). So Ira Glass really made up for a long day of things that could have been a lot more fun.
Cheers!

oh, and i totally forgot...

I went to see a punk show at this venue called the Black Sheep with my friend Willow, a copy editor, and one of the interns, Rina, who's a grad student at Berkeley and the arts intern. It was about what you would expect at a place called the Black Sheep: a couple scene kids, a couple hipsters... the usual punk show crowd. But there in the middle was one couple who stood out not because of their multicolored hair or odd clothing choices, but because they looked like they were going to a rodeo. Hicks, like I haven't seen since I left Columbus.
So the bands were pretty good, I hung out with some interesting people, and left with a ringing in my ears so loud that I think Rina and I were shouting at each other in the car on the way home, but I'm not really sure. All I know is my ears were still ringing when I woke up this morning. Like I needed another reminder that I went to a show — the huge black I'M UNDERAGE x's in sharpie on the back of my hands (still there as I'm typing right now) were reminder enough.
So that was my first Black Sheep experience.
...Can't wait to go back.

I wasn't really allowed to take photos... this was with my phone. I like this guy's pants.

p.s. read this

best day ever!

Ok, that's exaggerating a bit, but today was a pretty damn good day. It's about 10:45 right now, and I'm going to start from now and work my way back to morning. Yep, I'm going to describe my entire day. That's how good it was.
As a preface, I have never seen a fight. I've heard about fights, and people getting arrested, but in my almost-21 years of life and through all the places I've been I have never personally witnessed anything remotely close to a fistfight. Consequently it has become a sort of obsession of mine to see a fight first-hand. Tonight I came close: Driving home from the movie, I saw flashing lights at the end of my street. please let it be a fight, please let it be a fight, please let it be in front of my house. I was half right. As I got closer, I counted at least four cop cars... but nothing else. They were in front of a park about a block from my house, and as I passed (windows open, driving 10 mph) I could hear a guy yelling at the two cops holding him. Yessss, witnessed my first arrest. I made it to my house and locked the door. A good ending to a good day.
I was coming home from seeing The Incredible Hulk, which came out today. I went by myself, half thinking I wouldn't make it since I didn't really know where the theatre was. But I made it, literally just in time - I found a seat as the first trailers were starting. The movie was great; I had a lot of fun, even though I was by myself. That is to say, the movie was entertaining enough that I wasn't bored enough to think about how I was watching a movie by myself.
Before I went to the movie I made myself a real dinner, chicken and pasta. I'm really proud of myself, since I don't cook very often, and most of the time if I do cook it's a Pasta Sides or Velveeta Shells. So my dinner tonight was delicious.
Work was good, too — this morning I sat in on a meeting about a graphic for an upcoming story and ended up with the "winning" idea after everyone else spent about 15 minutes discussing and then someone asked what I thought. How exciting! I really haven't done a lot of graphics (read: no graphics), so I wasn't sure how well it would turn out. I worked on it most of the day, and am still not done with it, but I'm pretty happy with it so far, people have said it's going well. I also have been working on a food page, which I may or may not put on my other blog (www.beckyrother.blogspot.com) tonight. I think I'm supposed to wait till it runs, which will be Wednesday. Anyway, my boss came up to me today and told me how much he liked where it was going. I'm realizing now how much other people's opinions mean to me...
There was also an intern welcome party sort of thing this afternoon, since the last intern just arrived. I finally met everyone. I'm the youngest intern (not a surprise, most people don't do internships till after junior year), but all the interns seem really friendly and pretty eager to do... something... we all decided we need to get together, but no plans were made. Whatever.
And I had Toaster Strudel for breakfast.
So an overall good day.
Cheers!

notes on an evening

Tonight after dinner I went to Starbucks, ordered an iced coffee and sat outside to enjoy the warm summer night. I had brought a book to read, but ended up just watching people go by. The Starbucks is right downtown, so there were a lot of people to watch. I decided that there are pretty much three types of people here: rich outdoorsy types (A), college students from Colorado College who might be rich but try to hide it (B), and homeless people (C). Fascinating.
So while I was sitting there, a group of A's, a guy and three girls, came up to me with a camera and asked me to take a picture of their group, who had presumably just finished a run judging by their short-shorts and tennis shoes. I smiled and agreed, of course, what else do you do when someone asks you to take their photo? So as I was standing there, holding the camera, the guy of the group turns to his friends and says to me "Now don't you think about running off with our camera..." What? Did this jerk in Nikes just threaten me? Also, do I look like the kind of person who would run off with someone's camera? Frankly, I'm insulted. Honestly.
So, um, Colorado Springs is a great place to live, but, seriously, I'm a little frustrated with group A.
On the plus side, I had a pretty good day at work. I stayed pretty busy all day (which is good, since normally I am bored for at least about three of the eight hours I work). More interns arrived, and most of them are really friendly. It's making me feel pretty good about myself — one just graduated from Yale, one's in grad school, and one just graduated from another school. And then there's me, who just finished my sophomore year in college. Win. Also, I got my first paycheck today, which was smaller than I expected but still not terrible.
So that's what happened to me today.
Cheers!

oh also, don't forget to look at my new blog that I'm going to update when I make interesting things on the computer. Right now there's not much up there, but I plan to make more soon. Coincidentally, if you are in need of a graphic designer who's into typography and making things look good, please please please let me know. I have a pretty reasonable rate, too.

i can has cheezburger?

I am creating a new blog, possibly as you are reading this, exclusively for clips from my job and things that I make independently. Another thing you can look at when you get to missing me terribly and this blog is the only thing that makes you feel better.
That's sarcasm. I do still have a phone, you know. It still works, even all the way out here in Colorado.

I really don't know who I'm talking to.

http://beckyrother.blogspot.com/

little boxes, on a hillside...

...and they all look just the same.

oh the places i've been

Ha.
It's been a good weekend. Yesterday I went to see "Kung Fu Panda," the new Pixar movie, with a friend from work and her friend. It's always nice to hang out with people outside the office.
So that was fun.
Today I went to Helen Hunt Falls with some people I met through a group I'm in. They're an incredibly nice family, and I had a great time exploring Colorado Springs. Helen Hunt Falls is a fairly small waterfall about half an hour away from downtown. The area around it has some nice-looking trails, so maybe I'll get to go back sometime and do some hiking.
We also went to the Broadmoor. It's The hotel/resort/golf course here in the Springs, and pretty much everyone I have talked to has mentioned the Broadmore at least once in conversation. It's a big deal. Actually, the Senior Open is being held there this year, so a lot of golf (here pronounced gof) fans are excited about it. I'm less impressed, probably because the five-century-old buildings I recently finished touring were a little more exciting than looking at a building that was built in the early 20th century. Still a nice place, though.
I hate to keep mentioning Europe, because I know that sooner or later I will inevitably sound like a douchebag: "Ah yes, this stone structure reminds me of the thousand-year-old castle I saw in Spain." and "Oh, you like trains? You should have seen the panoramic train I took through central Europe last month." and "But it's hard to put something so earth-shatteringly awesome out of my head completely, so you'll just have to be patient.

This is from when we drove up a mountain today.

wow...

I had heard there was a tornado in Edinburgh, about 20 minutes from my house, but it hadn't really registered what that meant until I saw this photo on a "week in pictures" slideshow from msnbc. No one was killed, the caption said, but the storm caused about $20 million in damage. And now I hear that both US 31 and I-65 are closed around Columbus because of flooding.
It's a scary thing to know that such major destruction has been going on almost in my backyard, while I'm a thousand miles away and unable to do anything. I mean, I really couldn't do much if I was there, but I feel kind of guilty being away while the rest of my family was probably sitting in the basement waiting for the tornado sirens to stop. At least, I guess, at least I don't have my dog to worry about anymore.
Well, Columbus-ites, I'm praying for you.
Be safe.

sometimes the truth hurts, or, i'm tired of frosting

To be blunt, I left Columbus for the summer to get away from the pettiness that inevitably comes with living in a small town. I came to Colorado Springs, a city of 500,000, hoping to find something of the anonymity I felt in London, where I could walk down the street and not feel strangers' eyes on me, judging me. Instead, as I stroll through the streets of Colorado Springs, I feel even more self-conscious than I did in Columbus. Colorado Springs is like a giant suburb without a city to make it legitimate.
When I first got here, all I could see were the mountains. To a girl from the midwest, waking up every morning to look out at mountains was like waking up in a fairy tale. Then one day fog hid Pikes Peak and the surrounding mountains, and I saw Colorado Springs for what it really is: a silly little town with a couple squatty little buildings.
Maybe it's being alone a lot of my free time, but I still feel a little like an outsider, and that's kind of given me a negative opinion of things. And I guess I just need to vent a little, so definitely take things I wrote with a grain of salt. Most people are nice.
Whew.
I feel a little better.

And now random thoughts.
I listened to Bright Eyes for the first time in a while today. That guy is the definition of emo.
It takes being away from someone for a long period of time, thinking you're going to see them in a few days, and then finding out they're not coming to realize how much you can't live without them.
That's not true. I've known it for a while.

what i'm doing with my life

Today I finally got connected to the internet my rent is paying for! So I put a couple pages I worked on during my first few weeks at the Gazette on newspagedesigner.com. Well, two pages. The other pages I uploaded are all from the Daily News at Ball State. But anyway.
Here's one page I did last week or so. It ran on Monday. I'm pretty happy with it... especially since it's my first front page of anything (it's the cover of the Life section). And Dave, the guy I'm renting a room from, is the writer, which made this even more special.
Nothing interesting really happened today. I left work about an hour early, after sitting around for about a hour. Sometimes I feel like they really didn't need an intern — they pretty much have things under control and never really have any work for me to do. Most of the time I take other people's work and they end up, I don't know, doing other things. Whatever, I'm here to learn about journalism. So far I've learned that it's a scary place with no job security. Too bad I really enjoy newspaper design.
I guess we'll see...
Cheers!

i have good news!

Today as I was leaving work I honestly thought "wow, I can't believe I just played with Illustrator and InDesign all day got paid for it." Seriously.
I had hoped this summer would help me figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life, and, kind of surprisingly, it has already. I wasn't sure at first, but I really enjoy working at a newspaper. It's kind of a relief, to know that the thing you've planned to do for years is actually the thing you want to do.

Me with Pikes Peak in and some of Colorado Springs in the background, taken when I had dinner at a friend's house.

What an adventure

Last night I went to see my favorite band ever, Death Cab for Cutie, at Red Rocks Amphitheater in Denver. I was pretty sure at least one other intern would be working by now, so I bought two tickets. No such luck. So I went by myself. It wouldn't have been so bad if it hadn't been for the other people looking at me wondering why I would go to a concert by myself.
But enough of that. The venue was amazing – it's a little outside of Denver and the stage and seating is carved into rock. I honestly don't know how to describe it. It was that incredible. I got there an hour early, thanks to the advice of my coworkers. Sat for an hour, thinking about how much fun I could be having. Anyway. The first band was Rogue Wave, a band not a lot of people have heard of, apparently, but I was really excited about. I hadn't realized they were playing, so it was a pleasant surprise to see them. Then Death Cab for Cutie! I didn't think I would be so excited, but I was yelling with everyone else when they came on stage. They are by far my favorite band, and I knew most of the songs they played. They've been together since 1997, so they had a lot of material to chose from. I'm glad they played more than just stuff from their new album Narrow Stairs and their first major-label record Plans. Cause I've been listening to them since before Plans, which is I think when a lot of people became fans.

So that's my story. Denver seems like a nice place; I might go back some other weekend and explore a little more. It was only about an hour and a half a way, and with my trusty Tom Tom guiding the way, I'm pretty confident that I would be ok by myself. Or with someone else, you never know.
Cheers!

Death Cab for Cutie were amazing

stanley

he's cute.

memorial day weekend shenanigans, or something

I had Saturday, Sunday and today off from work, so I spent a lot of time exploring Colorado Springs by myself. It was kind of fun; I'm glad I chose an area with enough to do around town, instead of someplace like the Scranton Times (I seriously did apply there. Didn't hear anything back. It's fine. Fine.)
Saturday I explored downtown a little, and I just happened to get there right as they were opening this big fountain for kids, called "Uncle Wilbur." Honestly it's kind of creepy. The fountain is a big blue ball surrounded by a bunch of water jets in the ground, and every once in a while Uncle Wilbur pops out of the ball and showers the kids with water from inside the ball. Am I the only one who finds something strange about this? Eh? And the thing has a Web site (weird): www.unclewilbur.com. Huh. Anyway I watched that for a while, took some pictures and then went on to my original goal, to explore the downtown. I found the library and got a library card. They had cards that go on your keychain, which I thought was a great idea, since I don't have a lot of room in my wallet. It's a nice library.
Sunday I went to the Most Confusing Mall in the World and wandered around among the white trash for a little too long. It's a nice mall, but on the weekends it's way too crowded in a bad way for me.
Today I had lunch with one of the ladies from the P.E.O. chapter my mom and I went to last week, Elaine. We went to Manitou Springs, this really cute little area west of the city with little shops and restaurants. I had a lot of fun, and she told me a lot of really interesting things about the Colorado Springs area. Elaine is a retired Spanish teacher and said she's lived in the area since the 50s. So she was a lot of fun to talk to.
So that was my weekend. Not as bad as I expected. Really, it was pretty good.
Cheers!

the end of the beginning

...Original, I know. But I thought it fit.
So.
Over all, it's been a great beginning to a new job. I was really nervous about starting at such a large paper (the circulation is over 100,000), but everyone has been really nice, and I think I'm starting to make friends here, albeit slowly. But really the whole thing has completely exceeded my expectations (which is good): the people I'm renting a room from are a nice young couple who pretty much let me do my own thing, everyone at the paper has been really friendly and helpful, and Colorado Springs is beautiful, and seems like I won't really run out of things to do (for a few weeks, anyway).
I'm trying to keep my expectations low, while staying positive. So far it's working out well.
And.
Tonight I went to see a movie, for the first time by myself. It really wasn't that bad, aside from a few times when I wished I had a hand to hold or a shoulder to lean on. I saw "Son of Rambow" at a little two-screen theatre downtown. It was really cool, with curtains and crappy old seats and — strangely — glow-in-the-dark pictures painted on the wall. The movie was fantastic, and the theatre's atmosphere only made it better. In one part, they watch a movie in a theatre that was really similar to the one we were in. So that was cool.
Now I'm trying to figure out what to do with myself for three days while I don't have to work. I found a really good mall, pretty close to where I live, so I'm going there for a little bit, and then Old Colorado City is having "pioneer days" or "frontier days" or something, so I'm going to check that out. Other than that... time stretches in front of me like I-70 in Kansas. Ha!
Cheers!

inside the theatre

outside The Gazette

colorado photos!

The Garden of the Gods.

Bear! Look closely, in the top left, by the sign. He's small.

The One Interesting Thing In Kansas

like going to a different country, only no currency exchange

It has been a busy week! Well, month, really, if you want to be specific, but I'm going to talk about this last week so the rest is, for now, irrelevant.
My mom and I drove my little Saturn out to Colorado Springs, where I am doing my Very First Internship. It was two long 12-hour days, and I was glad when we finally arrived in the city around 8 p.m. mountain time. When they say there's nothing to see in Kansas, they mean There Is Nothing In Kansas At All. It was the longest day of driving ever.
But we survived, and it was definitely worth it. Colorado Springs is a beautiful town right at the base of Pike's Peak and the start of the Rocky Mountains. It has a population of about 350,000, and counting the outlying areas it's about 500,000. You wouldn't know it, though, from driving around the city (which I've been doing a lot of). It's kind of like an enormous suburb with no urban center. The downtown is nice, a really snazzy (yes really) collection of specialty restaurants, bistros, nightclubs and boutiques. I think Colorado Springs is one of the wealthiest towns in the United States. If it's not, it soon will be, if the stores here are any indication.
Before I got here, I had thought that Colorado was mostly a Democratic state. I found that this is not true – in "hippie" places like Denver and Boulder, the Democrats are a lot more powerful than here in the rest of Colorado. It supposedly seems pretty conservative, I guess by western standards. I still found it pretty liberal, after living in the capitals of conservatism for so long.
I'm living with a reporter on the Gazette, Dave Philipps, and his wife Amanda in their house a few blocks from the paper. I was worried that the situation might be weird, but so far it's worked out well; they're both really nice people and this way I didn't have to worry about finding housing by myself. Instead, Dave has lived here his entire life, so he's really helpful with information and directions in case I need to go somewhere. (The satnav helps with directions too, haha)
Work so far has been fun. All the designers are really friendly, and have been really helpful with the new system that I'm learning. They recently switched to InDesign and a data system called DTS, so I can sometimes help people with InDesign and they can pretty much always help me with DTS. It's not that complicated, but there are a lot of steps to remember when designing a page. I've actaully already gotten to design a couple pages that will run next week, which has
surprised Jerry, my boss. To take off the modesty hat for a second, apparantly I'm the shit. (puts hat back on) So I left work feeling pretty good today.
I think that's good for tonight. I'm still adjusting to mountain time, which is two hours behind Indiana. It's good in the morning, but right now at 11 p.m. it feels like 1 a.m.
Goodnight!

oh, high school

I went to American Pie tonight. It's the big event of high school, where a bunch of kids perform oldies to other high school kids who don't know the songs, and a lot of the community who do and wish the kids did too. It was weird going back to my old high school, seeing people I only sort of know and don't really want to talk to...
Realized I really don't miss high school at all. Like, at all. I pretty much hated most of it... the pettiness, the superficiality, the lonely hours I spent in my room because no one called me. I was stupid. I don't want to turn this into some kind of sob story, but, well, I was dumb. Of course no one called me, I didn't ever call them.
College has definitely changed me, and it was definitely for the better.
So that's my story. I'm glad high school is over, but I wouldn't have changed it - those years made me the person I am today. (har har)
Tomorrow I'm going to Chicago with my mom. We're renting a hotel room (yes, an actual hotel, not a dirty old hostel) in a hotel with a pool across from Woodfield Mall, one of the largest malls in the country. I'm pumped.
Cheers!

it's true

"time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana"
Groucho Marx

hello

So, as you have probably noticed, I made a new header for the bloggy. I decided that, since it's kind of unlikely that you'll hear much else about the other half of the world, I'm going to start fresh.
Hence the silence...

not.
Anyway, right now I'm just counting down the days till my internship starts. As the day grows nearer I am more and more terrified of it. This will be my first "real" job, and I don't know anyone. That's what makes me the most nervous - I'm fine with living away from home (obvi) but this will be the first time I won't know anyone at all before I get there. Yikes.
Luckily I have you, my average-of-three-blog-readers out there. You're great.
I also have this thing called Twitter (www.twitter.com) that you can follow me with and keep up with what I am doing nearly every minute of the day. Tempting, right? Just get your own profile and then go to twitter.com/beckyrother and follow me.

Cheers!

Part One: the first half of my adventures after school

I'm going to put up as much as I have written about Kyle and my after-school European tour. I haven't done Spain yet, but for now, know that it was awesome.
I probably won't post nearly as much for a while after this, since I would be saying things like "today I ate meatloaf." That's not interesting. But stay tuned: my Colorado Springs Gazette internship starts May 19, so I'll be posting (hopefully) daily about that. Keep checking back for the rest of my Spanish adventures... until then, read this!

I think it would be impossible to describe every little thing that Kyle and I did during our 10-day tour south through Europe. That said, I'm going to try to remember as much as I can about it. For posterity.
Sitting here in Starbucks, listening to jazz music and drinking a mixture of fruit juice, lemonade and tea, I feel about as far from Europe as I ever have. Did I really live in London? Have I really spent the last few days sleeping in various beds of various sizes and hardness?
Sitting here, watching Starbucks employees happily taking orders for "grandé-carmel-mocha-soy-frappuccino-no-whips" and "venti-sweetened-shaken-passion-iced-tea-lemonades" (that's what I got) from, like, 17-year-olds in short-shorts and tennis shoes, there's no way I could not have been out of the country for three and a half months. Why are these people so friendly? Why are the Starbucks bathrooms so nice? Why is that "small" coffee so big? Why is there so much saturated fat in my muffin? My perspective on coffee shops - and everything else - has completely changed. I could go on for pages and pages about the differences between Europe and America, but that's for another time... I'm supposed to be writing about last week.
So.
Kyle and I were the first to leave the flats; our train to Amsterdam left at 7:30 a.m. a day before the rest of the group. We took a high-speed Eurostar train to Brussels, Belgium, and then a normal train the rest of the way.
AMSTERDAM
We got to Amsterdam about 3:30 and checked into our hostel with no problems. Then we went out to explore the city. Amsterdam is, without a doubt, the strangest place I've ever been. We took a guided tour one day we were there, and the guide told us the government in Amsterdam doesn't really care what goes on in the city, as long as it makes money for the city. Most people who live in Amsterdam seem to have the same mindset: they kind of look the other way when it comes to "illegal activities" (you know what I'm talking about) or, really, anything. I've never been to a place where I don't feel like someone, somewhere, is judging me in some way (take that as you will); I'm not sure I liked the feeling. It's not that people didn't care at all about anyone else, it's just that they were completely indifferent to everyone else. It's not something I'd like to get used to, as much as I might complain about people judging me.
The first thing that really struck me was the plethora of bikes. In this city of canals and narrow, winding streets, it was much easier to ride a bike than try to navigate through the streets with a car. Kyle and I rented some one day, and it was an adventure riding next to cars and through the throngs of people in the pedestrian areas. We also rode out to the countryside north of the city, which was a really nice change from the crowds.
The next thing that struck me was the smell of marijuana. Everywhere. Literally, everywhere. Since it's legal to carry small amounts of it, it seemed like everywhere we went someone was smoking a joint. It was an interesting experience.
Our hostel was close to a lot of the museums in the city, away from the craziness of the Red Light District, which was a blessing. We went to the Van Gogh museum one day, which I really enjoyed. It was a huge collection of Van Gogh's work, so you could see how he changed and progressed as he got older. That was neat.
AND we went to a live taping of "Diggnation," a weekly online show about stuff online. Kyle got me hooked on it after we realized British television is crap, so I've been watching it pretty regularly for about three months. It was awesome to actually get to see it live, and afterwards we met the two guys who host it, and I got a picture with one of them. It. Was. Awesome.
I think that was the highlight of Amsterdam. I'm glad I saw the city, but I don't think I'll go back anytime soon.
After Amsterdam we took a train to
BORDEAUX
Wine country! The trains didn't work out like we wanted them to, so we ended up only having about 24 hours in Bordeaux, but I really enjoyed it. Since it's not really a huge tourist destination, not a lot of people spoke English. That was kind of exciting, since it gave me a chance to try to speak French. I realized I really don't know much... something I had suspected in Paris but hadn't really thought about since most people seemed to know what I was saying. Here, though, people were not as used to hearing American-French accents, so I had a harder time communicating. I got through it, though.
I wanted to take a wine tour, or tasting, or vineyard tour, or something, but time and money had a stronger say (does that make sense? We didn't have enough time, or money). All the tours we found were at least 30euro and lasted two days. Great. We ended up just walking around the city and buying a bottle of wine from a supermarket and taking it back to the hostel. Almost the same thing, right?
We were planning to take a night train from Bordeaux to Barcelona, but night trains are kind of going out of fashion, so we had to book another night at our hostel in Barcelona and leave Bordeaux in the early afternoon. That was disappointing, since we had planned a night train to save money for a night.
Anyway, we finally made it to Spain after a long train ride and a harrowing search by Spanish border patrol agents. By "harrowing" I mean we had to show them our passports for the first time ever on a train, and they took one guy on our car away because he didn't have a passport. Yikes!

still alive! ...didja miss me?

Hello!
This is my first post from the United States in a few months, and I promise it won't be my last. I'm not going to write a lot tonight, since I'm still recovering from Kyle and my 10-day tour of Europe last week. Which was awesome, by the way. I mean seriously awesome. I'll tell you about it, I promise.
Coming back to Columbus was weird, just like I thought it would be. I think the strangest thing is how wide-open everything seems: I'm so used to living in a city where the buildings are all touching each other and there aren't any less than six stories tall. Being in a suburb, where there's lots of room and I can look straight ahead and see the horizon, is kind of disconcerting. It's kind of like claustrophobia, but in reverse. Also, after living with so many people in such close proximity, it's weird to be alone again, sleeping, doing errands, driving... I've gotten so used to being always with people, even while I'm sleeping, that I'm kind of lonely now. But at least I get to drive again! That was one thing I really missed whilst in England: although public transportation like the Underground and the red busses were great, nothing beats the feeling of freedom you get from rolling down the windows and pressing on the gas pedal. It was great to be able to sit in my car and know I could go anywhere, without having to worry about which stop to get off at or how far I'd have to walk once I came out of the station. Now, if only gas wasn't $3.50 a gallon... Also, I have walked far less than I had been in the last few weeks – a consequence of the suburban lifestyle. That will be something to get used to; although I love being able to drive right up to the door at Target, it's a lot less healthy and eco-friendly (Great Britain is all about being "green"). And, finally, and maybe most importantly, my house feels really lonely without a dog to keep me company.
I miss my dog.
A lot.

Cheers!

school's out, school's out...

Well, it's over. This was definitely the best semester I've ever had, ever, and I'm so thankful to have had this opportunity. I can't believe I have to leave... it feels like we just got here... and that we've been here forever.
I love London.
I wish I could stay longer... it's so sad to look at my dresser and not see clothes (or clutter), and to have no food on my shelves.
Today I'm taking my two enormous suitcases to a long-term storage place near Heathrow, where they will stay while I'm on my Last European Adventure for a Long, Long Time. I don't even want to think about it.

I will be incommunicado for a few weeks while I am exploring Europe, but I plan to keep this blog after I get back... instead of European Adventures, I will soon be having Colorado...ian Adventures as the design intern at the Colorado Springs Gazette.

Until then,
Cheers!

what did i do yesterday?

Not much, for my last Saturday in London.
I thought I was going to be really productive, so I got up early and went to Portobello Market with Amy and Nathan. We walked around for probably four hours, and still didn't see everything we could have. When I went to the market the first time, I only saw the antique part, but there is a section for food, like fresh veggies and meat, and a section for vintage clothes (I'm kind of glad I didn't know about it sooner, since I probably would have spent way too much money there), and a section for junk that you might find at a really bad garage sale. I'm glad we went early, because by the time we walked back we could hardly get through the hundreds and hundreds of foreigners who come to the market every week. It was a madhouse. But a lot of fun.
At the market we bought some fresh spinach and cheese, and brought it back and made omelettes. They were fantastic, especially since we had been eating a lot (a lot) of pub food in the past few weeks.
Then we sat around for a few hours. It's nice to just relax sometimes, since we've been running around doing stuff for three months straight.
Then we tried to find a jazz club to go to. There are a lot in London, so we headed out with two good choices. Both ended up really crowded, and there was either a 10pound cover charge or an enormous line outside. We ended up just going to another pub. It was still a good night, though.
Cheers!

more adventures with a day pass

For the past two days I've bought day travelcards that work on the Underground and on the busses. They cost 6.80 pounds, but they're a better idea than using the pay-as-you-go pass I have for normal days, especially if you go a lot of places. So today I tried to get my money's worth.
Kyle, Nathan and I started out at Victoria station, where we bought discount tickets for "Wicked" tonight. With a student ID card the day of, they were 25pounds instead of 50. I thought it was a good deal, and it ended up being really worth it; Wicked was amaaaaazing. I absolutely loved it.
Anyway, after we got tickets I went by myself to Camden, a shopping district known for weird stuff. There are a lot of vintage shops and places to buy really weird goth clothes. Strangely, it was all still retardedly expensive. So that was kind of a letdown. I tried to take a bus there but ended up getting on the wrong one, so I ended up taking a subway. Good thing I got that pass! By the time I got there it was pouring down rain, and most of the market is outside, so I didn't have the greatest time.
So I decided to go to Kensington High Street, which used to be the very best place to go shopping in London. Now that title belongs to Oxford Street, but Kensington is still a really nice place to go. Somehow while I was in the subway trying to get to Kensington it got warm and sunny, so shopping at the two places was even more opposite. I bought a shirt for a pound. Awesome.
Then we went to see Wicked, which was amaaaaazing. It's playing in Chicago and New York, too; I would recommend it to anyone. It was fantastic.
Good thing I bought that card!
Cheers!

i spent more time undergound than above ground today

That's not really something to be proud of.
Yeah, so I went to Tate Modern today with art class. That was cool, since I think my prof works there and knows a ton about the paintings there. I just went to Tate Modern last week with the Peters family, but it's a big museum so I still saw a lot of new stuff.
After that I had some lunch at a pub on the South Bank, one of my favorite parts of London, because of all the street performers and interesting things to look at. It's also got a great view of London from the banks of the Thames. It's worth a day to just go and walk around for a while. I had a delicious club sandwich, which here is not lunch meat but chicken, tomato, lettuce, mayo and egg. Yum. It was a beautiful day, so it was a nice walk to the pub and then back to the subway station.
Then I went underground. I first went to Victoria station, where I wanted to buy tickets for the musical "Wicked" tonight. I got to the ticket office, where they said they had four tickets left. Perfect. I needed three, and there was a big student discount. I told him this, and he told me to show him the three student ID cards. Crap. Everyone had to be there to get the discount?! So I was mad about that.
Then I went to Waterloo station, where I needed to book a train from the Netherlands to France. I found the ticket office and everything just fine, but when I told them I needed to go to France the guy told me I had to go to a different station. Fine. So I went to the other station, waited in line for twenty minutes, and the guy told me the same thing. A different station. This time it was not fine. By this time I had been trying to get these tickets for about an hour, so I got pretty mad. I never did get a real explanation why I cannot reserve train tickets in England, but apparently I just have to reserve them at the train station the day of our trip. That's upsetting. Whatever. Whatever.
I was fed up, and getting back on another train did not help my mood. I decided to make a pit stop at Coven Garden.
That was a really good idea, because it was probably about 60º F outside, with blue skies and a little wind. Coven Gardens is a really cool place, with street performers, shops and tons of things to look at. There are a bunch of little specialty shops, like one called Octopus that sold cute little handmade-looking things with cute drawings of animals on them. I also saw an opera singer and a street magician. Where else can you see things like that right next to each other? It's a really great place; probably one of my favorites in London. So I had a good time walking around there for a while till I calmed down enough to get back on the underground. By that time it had gotten dark, and all the businesspeople were going home from work. So I spent the last half-hour of my day staring at black-trenchcoated backs and trying unsuccessfully to read a novel over someone's shoulder.
Oh what a day.
Cheers!

parliamentary, my dear watson

ooh dear what a title.
Today we took a tour of Parliament. We did not get to go into the chamber where the House of Commons was meeting, but we did get to see where the House of Lords met and the throne where the Queen sits when she opens Parliament each year. It was interesting to get to hear about how the British government works; even though we've talked about it in class, it was good to get the "real" story from someone who works in the building. We also saw where French president Nicholas Sarkozy was going to address both houses later today (well, earlier now). So that was cool.
Then we went on the London Eye, the World's Largest Ferris Wheel. Our group took up two entire cars, which says something for the size of our group... and the size of the cars. They were enclosed in glass, so at the top we had a 360º view of the entire city of London. It was cool to be able to point out places we'd been to and to find Hyde Park, near where we live. The whole ride took about half an hour. That was one time around the wheel, which gives you some idea of how big it was. I took tons of pictures, so hopefully I'll be able to get a few of them up here eventually.
That's all I did today. I'm pretty exhausted from the last week of touring and homework non-stop, so I'm going to bed early tonight.
Cheers!

adventures in homework land

For the first time all semester, they are requiring us to do actual work. So that's why I haven't posted much.
Yesterday was homework, all day. I really don't want to complain, but I did not sign up for the London Centre to sit in my room and write papers. Especially during the last week. The last week! It's really depressing... everyone leaves in a week and one day... and I go home in two weeks. Time has flown by.
Anyway. Today we're going to sit in to a session of Parliament. I think it should be really interesting... I've seen some sessions of Parliament on C-SPAN, and sometimes they can get really loud and rowdy. So I'm pretty excited. Then after that we're going on the London Eye! The largest ferris wheel in the world (I think). So that should be awesome.
Cheers!

i'm procrastinating

It's midnight here, and I'm only halfway done with a paper that's due tomorrow for British Life and Culture. I figured I should take a break and update you about my life, though. That's how much I care about this blog. Or... maybe I'm just a terrible procrastinator.
I just got back from "Happy Now?" a play at the National Theatre about two couples with marriage problems. It was really good, although kind of depressing. It made me rethink my ideas about having kids one day... maybe I don't want that. I was kind of depressed because I saw some of myself in the main character, whose life in the end turns into something she never wanted. Now I don't know what to think. It was a good play, though.
Yesterday was Easter, the first one I've had without my family. I had Kyle's family to hang out with, but it's not the same. We went to a church in Kensington where the founder of the Alpha course is a minister. It was a non-denominational contemporary service, where there weren't any chairs, just cushions on the floor, and the band played Christian rock. It was a lot like the Celebration service at FUMC in Columbus, and the complete opposite of the church we went to for Good Friday services. I liked the contrast, although I was kind of disappointed that we didn't go to a normal service for Easter Sunday.
Cheers!

well

I'm going to write this right now, since I don't think anything exciting is going to happen today.
It rained and was cold and awful outside, so I spent most of today inside trying to plan our trip for when school is over. It's hard! Since most countries have different, independent rail services it's hard to figure out what time trains are and everything. I spent a few hours trying to figure out how to get from Amsterdam to central France, and then decided maybe we'll just skip Champagne and go directly to Nice or Marseille, and now I don't know what I'm doing. We're going to go to a train station Tuesday and see if we can sort it out with some help. I did get a high-speed train booked from London to Amsterdam, and a hostel in Amsterdam, so at least we'll get there, even if we have no idea what to do after that. Spring break worked out ok, and then we just decided when we wanted to leave and then went to the train station. So I'm not too worried, but it would be nice to be able to know exactly what we're doing over the break. Right now our plan is to go from Amsterdam to Reims to Nice/Marseille to Barcelona to Seville. We're thinking about cutting out Reims since it is a lot. It kind of depends on the trains.
So that's all I did today. We're meeting Kyle's family for dinner soon...
Cheers!

hoo boy

Yesterday felt like it went by really quickly. First Kyle and I went to church with his family, since it was Good Friday, at Westminster Cathedral (not Westminster Abbey. ha) That was interesting, since it was a Catholic service. I had never been to a Catholic service before, and so all the standing and kneeling and sitting was kind of confusing. They sang the entire passion of the Christ story, with different people singing different parts. We stood for the whole thing, which I can understand since if we had been sitting most of the congregation would have been asleep. There were so many people there! We got to the church about an hour early, and I'm glad we did, because by 2:30 the seats were completely full and people were standing on the sides and in the back. I'm glad I went, it was definitely an experience.
By the time the service was over it was 4:30, so Kyle and I went back to the flats and the family did some more sightseeing. Then we met again for dinner at a pizza place in Notting Hill, which was nice. It's a really posh, upper-class neighborhood, so the room where we ate was filled with kids called "Lilly" and "Juliana" talking really loudly about "oh moi GASH, reeeally?" The food was good though.

museums, and st. paul

We walked around today. A lot.
First I went to the V&A museum with art history, which was really cool. They had a copy of the sculpture "David" (the real one is in Florence), and a really cool photography exhibit. We didn't have much time to look around, though, because Kyle and I met his family at St. Paul's immediately afterwards. We met them on the balcony of the dome. That was neat – it's one of the largest unsupported domes in the world, I think, and it's covered with paintings and mosaics to make it even more impressive. The inside is a lot lighter, too, because it's made out of light stone instead of the usual dark stone. We didn't get much time to look around, though, because it closed at 4:30 and it took a long time to get to the very top.
After that we walked to the Tate Modern museum. I hadn't really been before, but I really enjoyed the gallery. It had a lot of really modern art, like a whole exhibit of minimalists, where a single fluorescent light set at an angle was a commentary on the human existence or something like that. I appreciate modern art like that as a whole, but some of the pieces were sort of weird. I felt very pretentious standing in front of a solid black canvas. It was a good museum, though, and I'm glad we're coming back next week with class. Our prof Giovanni works there as a guide, I think, so he'll know a lot about many of the pieces there. I think it'll be good.

on the line

Yesterday we took a boat to Greenwich, which I thought was a long way away but actually you can still see London from the dock. It's the place where time is measured from, and where the Prime Meridian is located. There's also a maritime museum there with a lot of ships and stuff. It was a pretty cool trip, they just let us do whatever we wanted to once we got to the maritime museum. So that was fun. I stood directly on the Prime Meridian, which actually goes through London (I think) so I might have walked over it a few times and not known it.
After we got back from Greenwich (I mean as soon as we got off the boat), we met Kyle's family for dinner at a pub close to their hotel, and then went almost immediately to see "Chicago" in Coven Gardens with Kyle, his sister and her friend and Mrs. Peters.
I really enjoyed "Chicago" after seeing the movie in theatres a few years ago. I thought the actors were great, and the dancing was really cool. It was a lot of fun. It was kind of awkward watching it with Mrs. Peters, since a lot of it is kind of sexual. Anyway, I liked it. I thought it was interesting that there was one song in the musical that I don't remember from the movie: one about how no one has any class anymore. It seemed more British than the rest of the musical. I might just not remember it though.
That's about it, I guess. Today we're going to some museum for art class. Can't wait.
Cheers!