Monday, October 31, 2011

YORK ** LOOK!! MATT'S PICTURES UP, TOO!

Matthew and I headed to York for the weekend. I still need to get some pictures from him to complete the full blog post, but I can start on it now and then add later.

We ended up having to leave on a train at 7:22AM on Saturday, and then didn't get off at the right spot. So, in a nutshell, we rode all the way down to Manchester to turn around and come back up to the North. However, it wasn't a big deal at all :)


Right by the gardens and train station


York is an absolutely beautiful city. We dropped off our bags at the hotel, then explored for a while.

Beautiful tourist destination sign. I found it very classy

The castle wall




A coffee shop located inside a lookout locaion!


We ended up eating some delicious Italian food for lunch (myself lasagna and him a salad), and then went back to move our bags to our room. I will admit, the hotel was a bit old and creaky, but it was worth saving the money since we were only there one night.

We ended up watching Illuminating York, which was incredible. Those are the pictures that Matt took on his camera (mine was left in the hotel). It was absolutely BRILLIANT. Make sure to check back for those photos.

















We had dinner at Witherspoons, and it was rather fortunate that the bouncers didn't second guess our ages when we walked straight in, as my ID was left in the hotel as well. I wasn't really feeling hungry, but my tummy was lying to me. I ate a wonderful burger and was quite content.

Sunday we went out and about, jumping on a "hop on hop off" tour bus, which led us all around town, telling us scary stories. We then got on another one of the buses which had a live tour guide, which was far better because we could always understand her! Interesting random facts about York: it is well known for being a haunted city; was held by the Vikings for a while; has a long term rivalry with Lancashire; etc... I was able to learn so much this weekend that it's hard to remember what it all consisted of! We also had the time to walk around the top of the wall which enclosed the majority of the city. It was very beautiful!

The wall while on it, and from the side


We had brunch at a very delicious restaurant: myself having lamb shoulder, Matt with fish & chips. We also went to Starbucks to people watch, into a museum about gladiators that were excavated within York, wandered around on our walk back to the station and a National Railway Museum.

The cathedral


Another view of the gorgeous cathedral!



Altogether an amazingly fun weekend, in which Matt and I grew very close to one another through the traveling experience.
:)

Revs week!

Hello all!

This week has been rather fun, in general. All my classes went really well, and I had many things to do at night!

Tuesday, I went to Revolution for the foam party. Once again, the foam rather was lame. When I've always thought, and heard, of foam parties, it always involved foam up so high that you need shorts in order to feel comfortable; a bath tub of bubbles. Well, at Revs, they squirted out foam for about five minutes and then stopped; and they waited until late late into the night. Overall, it was a mass disappointment.
However, Matt and I made the best of it by going downstairs and filling in on karaoke: someone didn't show up for the song "You're Beautiful" by James Blunt, a song that Matt and I had already mocked together. So, being the good people we are, we took over and proceeded to try and black the memory out of our minds.
I was really wound up, because I ended up drinking a red bull, so we have sort of decided to never go down that route again, especially when he is getting tired. Haha.

Foam party at it's peak

Matt + Lynette + foam
The next day, lacrosse had our first game. We did a lot better than I thought we would, final score being 6-20. The other team had been in a higher division the previous season, and this is our first year actually being in a league; we also had ZERO subs, while they had about eight.
I played rather well, and was quite happy with my performance. However, I did accidentally check (aka hit) my own player in the head. I was going for the ball, but the opponent stepped out of the way, leading my stick to take a crack at Georgie. :( I felt absolutely awful.
I didn't score, but I did take out a girl which directly lead to my teammate scoring. Nicola, my teammate, has played on Scotland's national team. She is not only an incredible player, but also exceptionally nice!


Nicola and I :)

So here we are, game over, wind howling. No bus. The bus dropped us off, and then took the fencing girls to their match. We waited. And waited. And sat and froze, then threw the ball around with each other. FOR THREE HOURS. It was absolutely ridiculous. However, we did have a good time socializing and bonding with one another.

Our next bonding experience: Revs together. About a third of us went and met up with the boys team (who had lost 0-40 or so). Since I ended up winning the award of "Dick of the Day" due to my hitting a teammate, I had to chug a pint. Not really fair, considering they all learned to chug when they were probably 16, whereas I didn't drink until far more recently! Either way, I had an AMAZING night out with them!

Girls left to right: Gabi, myself, Becky (our keeper), Nash (our captain), Sarah, Lauren, Georgie and Nicola
Boys (whose names I know): Freddie (second left), Tom (our social chair, in blue button up) and Alex (green)

The way back to the bar was very clearly labeled at Witherspoons

Alex, TK and me
Thursday was the final Revolution night. Finally. It was SUPPOSED to be a Ben and Jerry's night. However, just like the foam night, there was much disappointment. Fortunately, Matt and I got in for free because of Facebook (I had posted it as my status and therefore made the free guestlist), so we only spent a total of £3 each for the entire night.
SO. MANY. COINS!
Aaaaaaand here's where the disappointment started:
"Ben and Jerry's"
WHAT?! Yeah. That's what I thought. We waited around for hours. For that. EW. But at least it was practically free ice cream.

Monday, October 24, 2011

Not too much...

Honestly, nothing has really happened in the last week. It has basically consisted of classwork and day-to-day tasks, such as cooking and eating, sleeping, reading for class and hanging out with friends around the flat.

Let's see, I woke up one morning and then the fire alarm went off. Usually, it's just a drill, so I didn't wear any shoes. Apparently the house next to us, which is connected to us somehow, had a kitchen fire. No one really knows who did it, or at least we didn't at the time, and we ended up spending about twenty-five minutes sitting around in the bar, waiting for the firefighters to do their thing and tell us when we were in the clear to go back.
It was rather fun, because my friend Ben and I played a game where we guessed whether people had been to class or had just woken up. It was really easy, but hilarious. About 80% had not seemed to have left their room yet that morning, Ben and I being two of them. So many trackies (sweats) and tshirts!

Truly, nothing else too exciting. Was going to go out on Friday, but had a little too much and decided to instead just hang out with Matt. It was nice meeting some new people, but they ended up going to the club that I didn't want to go to anyway. It was fun getting all dressed up though!

I've been recovering from being a bit sick, so I kept down-low this week. I am SO glad that mom convinced me to get a flu shot because it had really saved me from getting sick. Basically I just don't really have much of a voice right now, nor have I for a while, and my nose has been getting a bit clogged up. However, there are no flu-like symptoms that have been keeping me down. EVERYONE is getting sick right now though, all around me. Basically all of my closest friends have been infected, to the point where they cannot even look down at homework to study. I really do think that it has been the flu shot that saved me from getting a sore throat and really quite ill. Thanks, mom!

Anyway, had my gym induction today and am really looking forward to working out there.
Oh! And my first lacrosse game is this week, over in Liverpool. SO EXCITING!! I really love the team :)

This next week is really packed, so I'm excited to actually get to do some things. This weekend I'm going to head over to York to see the lights and such (I'll take pictures, I promise). There are also just a lot of things going on in town that seem appealing for the week. AND! I'm getting a haircut today! YAY!

Much love,
Lynette xxxxxxxxxxx

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Saturdays!

I figure that I'll just give you my run-down on my typical Saturday as they have been, and to come:

1. Wake up at some type of hour in the late morning (such as this morning I woke up around 11, as I had been out late with friends [Emma and her flatmates] the night before, dancing at Sugarhouse, the college's very own club)

2. Hop on the bus with Matt to go to town to do our weekly shopping!

3. Buy my fruits and vegetables from my favorite stand, generally amounting to less than £5 for everything.

4. Eat something completely unhealthy for our breakfast/lunch. For example: last week we had mini doughnuts, much like the ones that are at Lights of Christmas; this week, we had delicious "pancakes", AKA crepes--I had nutella and banana, while Matthew had Baileys and buttons (Bailey's the alcohol and Cadbury chocolate rounds! Talk about a crepe that mom would love!!).

5. Go up to the butcher's and pick up whatever meats are sounding good for the weekly meals, generally costing under £8. Today I ended up picking out some sausage, bacon and minced beef (planning on making shepherd's pie later on!). Overall, I really like this step because I know that the people are getting the meat from their own farm, and because it's inexpensive, delicious and from locals!

6. Buy bread from the bread stand. Today, we appeared right when they were closing, so I got two baguettes for £1, rather than £2. It was rather nice. Unfortunately, they didn't have the delicious bread that I picked up last week. I think that we just came a bit too late this time, even though last week it was even later. Well, so it goes. :)

6. Walk down to the Sainsbury's, which is much like our Albertsons, or other general grocery store. Low prices, good deals and a great supplier of everything else needed. We tend to spend the most time here, making sure that I get everything checked off of my list. Today we honestly probably spent an hour and a half just collecting everything that we needed. It is so nice to have a list though! I kept my original one, so I've been just building off it, giving or taking what I enjoyed previously and what I could do without.

7. Hop on the bus back home and put away all that we bought. The bus to and from town is £2.25, which isn't all too bad. It's also very worth getting to walk around and have a set tradition of visiting the market on Saturdays. I don't know what I'm going to do the weekends when traveling, but perhaps just buy food on Wednesdays, as the market is open then as well! I really enjoy the market in general :)

8. Cook dinner together, generally at my flat, with all the newly acquired foods! Tonight we had carrots and peppers that Matt seasoned and cooked up in the oven, fried potato slices with cheese and fried sausage. It was most definitely delicious. I rather like cooking with Matt, as neither of us truly know what we're doing. We instead just sort of get a random idea and just go for it. It has worked in our favor, and also definitely against us. But tonight, for once, we actually made the right portion size! We've had our fair share of issues with that in the past (both the bacon/chicken and chips fiasco). Fortunately, we're figuring it out as we go along!


Altogether, I have to say, Saturdays are by far my favorite day. I like the consistent routine, and I also do love spending a day wandering around with Matt. We just get along so entirely well and it feels so natural to be together often.

Much love,
Lynette xx

Friday, October 14, 2011

Pictures from Elements



All the second year flatmates, minus Danny
Right to left: Luke, Dave, girl not in our flat, Ben

Dave, the American

Luke and the girl from Italy. I wish I could remember her name! It's been bugging me like crazy

This is my neighbor, Danny. I love him very much! 

Maria and I at Elements!

Part of the group at Elements!
Ben and I (my other really awesome flatmate whom I spent a fair amount of time with) :)
Aaaaand there you have it! A good night, only spending about £6 :) xx

Observations on the Education Model

My Philosophy adviser asked me to tell her about my feelings on the education model here in England. This is what I noted, as I figure that you all might be interested.


To be quite honest, I'm finding that I really kind of like the way that they handle lectures and seminars. For a larger school, it's convenient because you have the lecture, go back and read whatever they tell you to, then have a small seminar group with the professor where questions are asked and the readings are broken down. 

Overall, I like the uni way. However, I definitely still prefer taking a lot of different classes. At Lancaster, and most all unis in the UK, the only focus is on your major; the only classes you take are in your major and minor. The way that the minor works is as a fallback major. Lancaster is one of the only universities to operate in this way. I don't really know how I feel about it, but I know that a lot of the students aren't so fond of it. How awful would it be to work so hard at a major and then come to find out after second year you cannot stand it? They only have three years of uni here as well, so that makes it even more difficult.

When it comes to their "college" (our high school), they spend the last two years focusing on a specific subject area. Although this is rather smart, in some ways, I still don't think that it develops the full person as well as a well-rounded education would. I also don't really like how it forces the students to choose what they're wanting to go into at age 16. However, I find it better than the other countries that make them choose closer to 13...

One of the other problems is that the curriculum is heavily test-driven. I've talked to multiple British classmates here about the system and all of them have claimed that it's all about the testing. Also, in uni, there aren't any check-up short papers, but instead just one large paper at the end of term, so that should be interesting. Hopefully all goes well there!

Anyway, I'll write a bit about my Wednesday night later. Thursday I went into town with Tom, and took a few pictures, so I'll attach them later as well. The night ended with a couple hours of reading for my seminars (which I did today) and then hanging out with Matt.

Much love! xx

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

First week of classes!

So I figure that I should fill you in on my first week of classes!

Monday I went to Aesthetics. Which I dropped today. It was too hard to stay awake in a class where the professor started off saying "there won't be any time for questions because I need to get through the lecture". this being my first class of the week, I didn't think that it would be a problem. However, in my other two classes, it was definitely not like that. The content was not read off a powerpoint, and it was actually interesting.
Matt and I had the most ridiculous dinner of a pound of bacon plus cheese, and then chicken. It was awful. Our stomachs hated us. It was just way too much food...meat, specifically.

Tuesday I had "Philosophy of Science", which was quite interesting. I ended up enjoying it, although I was a bit drowsy. I ended up just eating during class, which saved me. I had lacrosse later and had a good time playing around again. I ended up playing attack, and basically dominating. Except not completely. ...quite a bit though. I play better than a lot of the returning players, so that's rather nice. I then just ended up hanging out with Ben and Danny, getting some pizza. I also ate a plate of spaghetti. It's probably my favorite meal to make, as it's less than £1 a meal, when you divvy it all out.

Today I went to "Knowledge and Reality" and really enjoyed it. Engaging professor, and very interesting topics.
I changed up my classes, so that took a while. Then Matt and I hung out for a bit, made some chips back at my flat and once again made far too much food. We ended up attempting to pawn them off on my flatmates, but in the end were able to get rid of them with one of my friends from Flat 2. It's really nice, because my flatmates and I are really becoming like a family. They really like Matt, too, so that helps because we can all just hang out.

Although I am talking a lot about my hanging out with Matthew, it really isn't all I do. It's just one of the highlights of my day, so I figure I should mention it. For the most part, I've been hanging out with my flatmates, eating, or running errands around campus.

Hopefully I'll be going on a trip not this weekend, but the next; potentially up to Scotland in Edinburgh.

One of the problems about Lancaster is that there's nothing to do for free. Basically to get into town and do anything of importance, or excitement, it's about £10, so not a daily thing to do.

Tonight, I'm going out to Elements, a club, with all my non-fresher flatmates. Potential pictures later.

Much love,
Lynette

Lake District

I went on my first traveling adventure on Sunday to the Lake District.

It was a regular gloomy, English day, but filled with a lot of adventuring and discovering.

Marcus, complete with poncho
So basically Marcus and I had a nice easy breakfast of tea and pastry, and then wandered for a bit until we got to go on an island boat tour. 

The town of Windermere :)
We also spent some time around the swans and ducks near shore. Too cute!
Swan and I
BOAT TIME!
The cruise we got on
We then hopped on the boat, which took us around the lake and by all the different little islands. It was pretty rainy, but fortunately Marcus and I went to the top deck when it wasn't all too horrible 
Small islands in the lake!
It was altogether a nice little tour, and I'm glad that we got to be on the lake for a bit! Bummer the weather was so English, though. Haha

Up on top deck, wind howling!


 We then wandered around the town a bit more, continually seeing stores about Peter Rabbit and Beatrix Potter herself. Getting curious, we popped into a place called "The World of Beatrix Potter". It turns out that Beatrix lived here when she was writing the majority of her animal stories! Feeling the nostalgia rushing back from reading the books at Grandma Lietz' place, I went on the tour while Marcus went off exploring elsewhere. Apparently he doesn't like being a child...haha. Actually, I think it's mainly because he never got into the stories when he was younger.

Anyway, the interactive tour was AMAZING! Here are some various pictures from inside it :)

They had a "Peter Rabbit's Garden" place with actually green growing. It was a beautiful little garden!

The inside felt, smelled and looked exactly like what it would be like if one stepped into the story books!

For each character there was a little screen that where you could read about the idea behind the character. As it turns out, Beatrix was an animal lover that wrote stories about her own pets! It was AMAZING reading about where the inspiration for the different characters came from
 Marcus and I then caught back up to each other and went out for lunch. Here is our stereotypical British meal:
Starting with tea

Having fish and chips, with some odd salad and mushy peas. Best fish yet though! Yum yum!!
 We then went out with Larissa (a Canadian) and an English boy, presumably called Tom (pretty sure that every British man's name is Tom...). We wandered around this next city (I have forgotten its name) and basically just saw a lot of sheep! Nothing too exciting, although nice to have some time in the countryside :)

Anyway, that was my time out in the countryside! Fairly certain that I just came home after that and spent some evening time with Matthew, then came back to my flat and went to sleep! Altogether a productive day. I really enjoyed all I did hanging out with Marcus and Larissa.

Much love,
Lynette

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Full weekend lowdown (Sunday to come)

Thursday: Freshers fair, and signed up for a lot of clubs. In the end I've decided to just do lacrosse, although I wish I could also do rugby. I'm also going to be a part of the Psychology in Education society. :)
Didn't think that I was going to go out, but then ended up going for Freshers night because some of my flatmates convinced me. The theme was beach, and the club was interesting. I liked it in the beginning, but got really sick of it quickly. Too many drunk freshers and I really just wanted to have Matthew to dance with rather than just bobbing along with a group of girls who didn't necessarily care for me. Overall it all could have been better. I think that the problem is just that I was becoming tired of the same music, and was tired of Freshers week in general. Honestly, I thought that I liked to go out a lot before, but now I'm realizing that it's only to a certain extent. I love dancing, yes, but not when it's the exact same every night (and when it's every night that I'm doing it!). Got home, ended up hanging out with Matthew in the end, which was nice. :)

I was entirely unproductive on Friday, which was irritating. I wanted to do something, but couldn't quite figure out what to do. I woke up very late and then just hung around with my flatmates. I would say that my two best flatmate friends are Ben and Danny--both really cool second years. I then was considering watching a football game with them, but chose instead to dress up for our Cops & Robbers party. Went out and had a decent time, but all the music at the clubs was the same so it became a bit repetitive and boring. Left with others in a taxi back home, caught up on Survivor, then crashed for the night.
Cops and robbers! :)

Saturday I woke up and went out to lacrosse practice, the "taster session". Of all the new girls, I was the only one who had played before, so they all thought that I was incredible. Pretty cool...haha.
The way lax works here is that there's a girls team, boys team and then mixed; mixed is the most competitive. However, they play their games on the weekends, so I'll just play with them when I'm around and not traveling. Otherwise, I'll be on the girls team where the games are on Wednesdays. I AM SO EXCITED! We ended the session with boys and girls together, just playing a fun scrimmage, mixed rules (no hitting, five seconds to hold the ball), although it was awesome getting all into the game with the boys. They were definitely being aggressive, but I tore through them. One goal, two assists :) They were terrified of me. I loved it. :D

I then went to the market and bought a lot of food for only 32 pounds. Awesome! I was quite proud of that :') Matthew just happened to be on the bus behind me, so I waited for him (which didn't take long, as my bus was late while his was early). We did all our shopping together, and ended up spending the rest of the night together. We went to the Freshers bubble party (snuck him in) which turned out to be just bubbles rather than foam on the floor. SO SAD! But we danced, which was nice, as we dance lovely together.


Matthew and I at the "bubble party"


Matthew and I are together, which makes me more than happy. Everything about it all is so entirely perfect. We don't have to hang out all the time to be happy, and can go off and do our own things. I don't feel alone without him when I'm hanging out alone, nor do I give up other things and people in order to see him. Overall, things are incredible. It's one of those things like, him and I are going to hang out anyway and there's no avoiding it, nor would we want to. I usually never feel this way, but my realization for this is "why not?". I'm not sacrificing anything by being with him, and I'm really looking forward to the next few months having someone who is so wonderful for and to me.

I will write later about Sunday, but now I'll attach some photos :)
Love,
Lynette