Nott What You'd Expected...

First Trimester, Mary's Bday, and DDay at hand....

This is it. 3 month anniversary, Mary's Bday, XCXMas, and my Last Night in the flat until January 6/7th.... so bittersweet.... I still can't hear after last night, and my headache was not made any better by an hour interview/presentation with Mark and Carol that finally ended about 20 minutes ago.....However....

Last night was amazing. Aside from the labor-intensive ironing of 6 dress shirts, getting ready to go out listening to the Scissor Sisters made my week (granted, it was Monday, but life is a little bit easier here...)
The gang was dressed to the 9s for Fancy Dress at Oceana (you'll remember Oceana from my first Rave-esque video of blogging past)... and after phone tag, a long tram ride, and a now-forgotten walk from Royale Centre to the Club, we met up with a jubilant Mary, who had been socializing with her buddies on the Bball team as part of their christmas formal earlier in the night...
The scene in Oceana was out of control- as part of Christmas celebrations, they had fog machines, mist, huge singalongs to British Christmas Number Ones of yore (yeah, Love Actually eat your heart out), and some of the coolest confetti/streamers/flying santa hat episodes that i've ever been a part of.... why don't we do this more often? Monday = Oceana night from now on....

Tonight I have my Crosscountry Formal to look forward to. I feel kinda shady about going, as i haven't really been the most religious runner in the last three weeks. Truth be told, it's been a strange relationship of late (my running and me).... With running, it's a touch and go feeling- if i don't do it, i feel disgusting, dirty, guilty, but at the same time, personally it feels freeing to not run- this is the longest i've gone since 7th grade not running, and i feel more relaxed, lazy, and at peace with my lax attitude. Make no mistake, i will be ready to go this next fall, but for now, I'll have to live with being 'The American that only shows up for Socials' until January rolls around....

Beyond the formal, our flat secret santa party is tonight, as is the last time i'll see M and C for three weeks. After this meeting about 30 min ago, i really like them. Basically because i was showered with praise for an hour, but that's beside the point. We were given a painfully vague assigment - come up with a paper topic (due in Feb), and present it to them. That was it. No specifics. So, everyone who presented yesterday was reamed. Fortunately for me, my topic was easy to develop, and my last oral presentations have bombed so badly that they thought i was "taking great strides in my confidence and presentation ability"..... ha, set the bar low and ye will succeed....

My favorite line of Carols was great- both in its truth and also in its bluntness..... she said something to the effect of "You are embarassed of sounding smart.... you can't get yourself to sound intelligent... it's like you're embarassed.... i blame public schools these days... a feeling of AntiIntellectualism...." i found it truthful in the sense that i find writing so much easier, so much more fluid and accepting of using bloated language than i do saying big words or using metaphors, but i also found it strikingly honest and hard to swallow. Hopefully i can 'get over it' by the time i start teaching.....

I need to sleep. Pack. Clean (holy God the flat looks like shit), update my ipod. give Aaron his money for our Hostel in Chamonix (we might not have snow, on a sidenote.... meaning i may not ski in the alps...), and do laundry.

Busy Busy Me. It could be worse.... I could be taking finals.

*QUICK SHOUTOUT TO MY BOYS- ZACH AND JOHNNY ARE BACK IN THE STATES AFTER FOUR (OR MORE) MONTHS ABROAD, IN TANZANIA AND SWITZERLAND RESPECTIVELY..... BE SURE TO CHECK OUT THEIR LIFE-CHANGING BLOGS (IGNORE ZACH'S INABILITY TO INDENT OR CHANGE PARAGRAPHS, ENJOY JOHN'S AMAZING PHOTOS)... I HAVE LINKS TO THE RIGHT....

I LOVE YOU, SAY HI TO AMERICA FOR ME... I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE YOU AGAIN THIS SPRING (SUMMER, JOHN)...

......tomorrow will be my last post in what may be weeks. so soak this up. enjoy it. because when i get back, i'll have the biggest post in blogger history. we're talking three hours just to read.... so save up your strength, you'll need it......

posted by Kevin @ 12:42 PM