Northern lights...

Thursday morning I went to another lecture. I've decided that, more than learning experiences (we covered much of the ground the Austen lecture's covering in Dr. Eberle's seminar, and this new addition, Practising Criticism, is basically a freshman class), lectures are social spectacles. I asserted myself, with Julianna, through the crowd of confused freshers to some good seats in the narrow, stadium-style benches and desks of one of the lecture theatres; we sat in the middle of this florescent-lit pit, looking down at the professor and up at the few fashionable students on display in the balcony seats reserved for latecomers. The professor (still not sure of his name) hooked the hormonally percolating youths into "practising criticism" by analyzing some racy texts like The Starr Report (which reveals a "mysterious bit of presidential cross-dressing" in its poor editing) and a Danielle Steele novel. I laughed along with everyone, but I split my time between watching a cute, preppy boy sitting at the balcony (I swear he is not 1) English nor 2) gay... :P) and puzzling over the professor, whose wit kept tricking me into thinking he was more attractive than he really is. I figure, even if I only learn a few tidbits about "practising criticism" to take back to the States (a good idea, since I'm about to write some criticism for my senior thesis), I will always have these more shallow sources of interest. ;)

Jenna arrived, somewhat to my surprise, in Gloucester Green on Friday at noon. I lugged around my laptop (read: ball and chain) as we canvassed central Oxford to get her oriented/fed/checked-in at her bed and breakfast, hoping that I would get a moment to edit my final paper for Dr. Eberle, but I was very pleasantly distracted by getting to catch up with my best friend. We ate lunch at the cafe where, it is suspected, coffee was first served in Europe, and we took a very scenic walk down High Street, where we both discovered some of the older colleges, the entrance to the Oxford Botanical Gardens, and the residential areas around Iffley Road. Her bed and breakfast looked... Well, I can't exactly say decent, and the receptionist was a little off, but we were glad to know she'd have a safe, relatively comfortable place to sleep for the night. Jen took the chance to look around Broad and Cornmarket streets while I dived into Blackwell's for a delicious cappuccino and paper-editing session, and after she rejoined me we got some groceries, she held the eggplant while I parked my bike and showed her around Keble, and we made our way back to the UGA house for curry night. My first real bit of cooking in the house turned out well, thanks to Jenna--I cooked as good of an eggplant curry as I did the time we tried it out in Alpharetta, and this time she figured out how to save my crappy stovetop rice skills by putting some in the microwave like her mother does. Julianna also helped by making some wonderful naan, which had to rise for 7 hours! We fed about a third of the house, and then we indulged in some melting-middle chocolate puddings (did you know that almost all English desserts can be called "puddings"? It's just how they do) and the new version of Persuasion, which for all Julianna's and my snarky commentary (it wasn't at all like the book in some parts!) had a very attractive actor playing Captain Wentworth...

Saturday was really a banner day. Jenna stopped by the UGA house early to drop off her luggage/get a cup of drip coffee (she's been cut off from it in France! among other cruelties, her weird host family doesn't make coffee!), and she took a tour of the Bodleian and of Christchurch (home of the quad scenes and the Great Hall from the Harry Potter films!) while I got a bit of reading done. We met up at Blackwell's and were able to snag lunch at The Rose before we had to catch a bus at Gloucester Green--even though we were too early for the whole ritual of cream tea (we missed out on the scones and clotted cream!), she got a club sandwich, I got a quesadilla (surprisingly correct for this side of the Atlantic, except for the interesting addition of some fresh avocados in the center), and we shared a piece of lemon cake to soak up our pots of tea. We had plenty of time to amble to my preferred route to the bus station (a quiet alleyway instead of the crazy pedestrian bottlenecks in Cornmarket and George streets) and meet Lindsay before we bussed off to Woodstock.

Woodstock is a very cute little town about 30 minutes outside of Oxford--I'd say it's about the distance from Duluth to Alpharetta, and the town centre is about the size of Davidson (or Nevada, IA!). We walked by several cute family-owned shops in the old stone, three-story buildings--"Hampers" fine foods and "Silken Dalliance" clothiers looked like they would have been my favorites--but eventually we were glad we hadn't wasted any time before we walked the 15-minute path down a family friendly, suburban-looking street to Marlborough School, where Philip Pullman was going to give a talk as part of the "Woodstock Celebrates Books" festival. Blackwell's had two long tables full of Pullman's books for sale, which boded well for our hopes of getting his autograph, and once we each had bought a fancy, 10th anniversary edition of "Northern Lights" (aka "The Golden Compass") we settled into some great seats at the middle of what looked like my old middle school's gym set up for a kids' musical. Mr. Pullman spoke for about an hour, and despite my typical starstruck haze I remember some high points being his appraisal of Daniel Craig (a good pick for Lord Asriel, and "a great pair of swimming trunks") and his readings from "Northern Lights" and "The Subtle Knife." He did a great bear voice when he read the chapters where Lyra and then Will met the armoured bear, Iorek Byrnison, and I felt as excited about the stories as I did when I picked them up in middle school and practically memorized all the words I was now hearing the author speak. I got really nervous standing in the book signing queue (or, rather, one of the two--they were both pretty orderly, but I swear I have yet to see a proper, civilized British queue), but when I approached the table to thank Mr. Pullman for speaking and to ask him to sign my book I felt very comfortable chatting with him a bit, like I was talking to a friendly uncle. I only started shaking again as I carried my book like a grail away from the elementary school and back into civilization, where not just anybody had a book signed "To Lauren--Philip Pullman."

Saturday night was a long night. Jenna, Lindsay, and I stopped in The Marlborough Arms to pass the time over our respective merlots, Peronis, and pints of Scrumpy Jack (what a delicious cider! Couldn't leave a drop...)--we knew it was a classy place when, as we approached the bar, the sound system started pumping "The Final Countdown." After teetering to the front of the top of a double-decker bus back to Oxford, we met "the closest to an English gentleman you'll get," Ed, and his band of two girlfriends and several mates going into Oxford to watch the England/France rugby match, and we yelled our laughter at each other all the way to George Street. A clockwork exchange of bikes took place when I lent Lindsay my bike to drive home and Julianna, whom we caught as she was biking around a street corner, pulled her bike into the now-empty space in front of The King's Arms, where we took Jenna to a proper English pub dinner. I got my usual sausages and mash and treated Jenna to a foamy Bulmer's cider, and we only had to catch the beginning bit of rugby-watching insanity as we had a quick, chatty dinner in one of the back rooms. It's all blurring together now, but I'm sure we got back to the house, drank some coffee, watched Ugly Betty, Skyped/mobile phoned some friends, watched two minutes of Casino Royale and the whole of Strictly Ballroom, and read "Northern Lights" until Jenna's taxi arrived at 3:45 a.m. to get her to her bus to Stansted Airport. I feel like we had a really fun weekend (few to no snags, once we actually got her here), and I'm glad I learned that I didn't have to spend the whole weekend being a bookworm--I finished my two essays for tutorials the very next day!

Since Jenna's visit, I have been able to make microwave rice like a pro to go with two leftover curry/curry-in-a-can lunches, and I have survived (alright, and enjoyed ;) ) two more tutorials. I don't have class again with Dr. Goldman until two weeks from today (he's going to the most respectable country of the United States to lecture/vacay in Boulder, CO), and I don't have any essays due until Monday the 29th anyway. I'm thinking that it will all add up to a trip to Blenheim Palace this Friday, possibly a trip to London over the weekend, and, finally, the anticipated pilgrimage to the Lake District sometime next week...