Free at last, free at last...you know the rest

Sorry sorry sorry! I’m overdue, I know. But the good news is, the term is over! I’m free!

Let’s give a few quick updates: I had my band concert last night. It went really well, apparently the audience said it was the best the band has sounded in a while. This is my first term so I’ll just take their word for it.

I finished my two essays. Yay me.

I haven’t started editing my nano yet. Boo me.

That’s it for my personal life. Let’s move on to more interesting things.

BritBit numero uno: While at the concert they had little snacks for people to eat, including cookies (or should I say biscuits?), wine (it’s still weird for me that alcohol is not even a problem for college-age people), and these things called mince pies. Now I’d heard of mince pies before, but I had no idea what they were. I asked two girls sitting next to me and they had a difficult time explaining it, beyond saying that there were raisins and the pies are really sweet. So I tried one, and they were right. They do have raisins, and they are sweet. It’s like a mini pie with really sweet fruit filling. I didn’t like it. I’m not a fan of raisins.

But if you don’t like raisins, you must be thinking, then why did you try it at all if they said there were raisins in it? Well imaginary questioner, I just like to try stuff sometimes. It might’ve been so delicious that I didn’t mind the raisins. Unfortunately…it wasn’t.

BritBit numero dos: I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this (how many times have I said that? I can’t remember) but here they only go to school for three years. In the U.S. college is four years. Also, here “college” is like “high school” in the U.S…I think. So, if someone here says that they took maths in college they don’t mean university, they mean the equivalent of high school. Oh yeah, and they say “maths” not “math”.

BritBit three yo: I have no idea what a surgery is. I went to the pharmacy to get something and the ladies there mentioned going to the surgery. In the U.S. surgery is a procedure in which stuff gets cut up. And by “stuff” I mean your body, and by “cut up” I mean operated on. The first way was simpler.

Let me look it up now…okay I give up. I keep getting links for the actual practice of surgery, not what the UK version of the word means. Hm…it’s a mystery. I’m guessing it just means the doctor’s office, or the hospital.

BritBizzle number fizzle: Does parmesan cheese have to be refrigerated? I’m almost certain it doesn’t, but everywhere I look here it’s in the refrigerated section. This has nothing to do with England except for the fact that I discovered it here. How weird. England is challenging all of my previous beliefs about food.

Sidebar: Glee is the most amazing show ever. I say this now because the songs are stuck in my head and it’s hard to concentrate. If you have a TV, watch Glee. It’s on Fox. By the way, not a fan of Fox. They cancelled Firefly, and therefore they suck. What is Firefly? Watch it on hulu. If you’re not in the U.S. and therefore can’t watch it on hulu, buy it. It’s a sci-fi western. Yeah, that sounds weird and kind of stupid, and I was reluctant to watch it at first, but it’s amazing. The pilot starts off slow though, so be sure to stick to it. Also, they cancelled Dollhouse and it just started getting good. Fail.

I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be plugging these things. It’s not like I’m getting paid for it. *shifty eyes*

Seriously though, I’m not getting paid for it. I wish.

Well, I’m done for now. Also, my birthday is next week. I just realized that when I looked at the calendar on my wall ten seconds ago. I always forget about my birthday until a week or so beforehand. Weird. Anyway, you can send presents to University of Sussex room number…just kidding.

‘Til next time! Peace and love :)

Pssh. I thought you said it was a challenge.

50,020 words. I won. I’m awesome.

I’m talking about NaNoWriMo of course. I managed 50,020 words in 29 days. I could’ve added a thousand or two more if I had worked on the last day, but I decided to take a break. So I’m proud of myself. The novel isn’t actually finished, but I’m planning on finishing it this month and editing it in January. This is kind of unfortunate because it means I’m putting another project on hold, but I guess that’s what happens when you write five million things at once.

Well that was probably boring for anyone who isn’t me. Let’s move on to some BritBits because nothing else exciting has happened this week:

Elevators are called lifts. That’s a simple one.

The double decker buses are cool. I really want to go up on the second deck but so far I haven’t. I’m afraid of heights so I don’t know why I want to go up there, but I think it’d be fun.

Free range eggs are expensive. This isn’t really a BritBit because I think it applies everywhere, but it’s annoying. They were out of regular eggs and I didn’t feel like going back to the store later so I just bought them. Life shattering stuff, I know.

Have I mentioned the faucets? I hate the faucets. In the US there’s one faucet in the sink that runs both hot and cold water. Here there’s one faucet each for hot and cold water, which is terrible because when you wash your hands you either burn them or freeze them. I’ve yet to discover a way around this. It’s amazing what a little innovation can do. One single faucet eliminates that problem easily.

Cell phones are called mobiles. Another simple one.

It actually does rain a lot here. The past couple of weeks have been awful, raining nearly every day. Even if it starts out sunny, by the end of the day it’s raining again. Today was the nicest day in weeks. So the rainy England stereotype might be true. I wonder why it rains so much. Hm…

Um…that’s all I can think of right now. Sorry, I’m a bit preoccupied. I have two essays due next week, and I know that’s a horrible excuse and I hate when people use that excuse…but I have to. Duty calls.

I can’t believe it’s December already. It’s good because it means vacation is coming up, but the one bad thing is that essays are due. Oh well. One more week and I’m done until January. Awesomeness.

Later.

Sigh. It's always me.

I know I just posted yesterday, but I have to share this.

So I was on my way to class and decided to get a cheeseburger for lunch. I go into the store and buy one, except they don’t have cheese. I’m cool with that, if slightly annoyed. I can’t even remember the last time I ate a burger without cheese. It’s like eating pizza without pepperoni—what’s the point?

But anyway, I get the burger, and now my mood is a bit down. I suck it up and take a few bites of my burger, going outside and walking towards my class. I’m about to take another bite when out of nowhere something hits the right side/back of my head. I thought someone threw something at me before I noticed by burger was gone. A bird landed in front of me and my burger lands a few inches from it. It was then that I realized it had stolen my burger. A bird STOLE MY BURGER. It was fairly large, kind of like a gull. And it started cawing and other birds showed up to eat their newly acquired meal.

So I paid for a burger that didn’t even have cheese, and a bird stole it from me. Needless to say I was not pleased. I was so displeased, in fact, that I wrote a mini rap about it during my lecture:

Yo I’m walking down the street
With a burger in my hand
I’m about to go to class
When BAM! Something unplanned
Occurs. I get hit
On the back of my head
It’s a bird and very clearly
It wants to be fed
Whoosh goes my food
Right down onto the ground
The bird picks it right up
And makes a really loud sound
It was calling other birds
To eat the stolen meal
I’m standing here in shock
Imagine how I feel.
I’d only taken three bites
And now my food was gone
The bird is clearly the queen
And I’m its lowly pawn.
Oh well. I have to go.
Class will start really soon.
I hope the day won’t get worse
But—sigh—it’s only noon.

Yep. There it is. I’m going to assume getting food stolen by a bird isn’t an England thing, and I was just unlucky. Here’s hoping it doesn’t happen again.

Cheers.

Harassment, a segment title, and a lesson in inflection

Hey there.

It was a quiet week and weekend. It passed by fairly quickly. I have two essays due in two weeks, and my NaNo is coming along swimmingly…which is a weird phrase, by the way.

I guess I could go on about some more British tidbits…hm, I should come up with a catchy title for my British life section, since I talk about it nearly every week. British tidbits…aha! BritBits! Yeah, you know that’s awesome.

Sooooo it’s time for another segment of BritBits!

Something odd actually just happened yesterday. In the UK you need to have a TV license if you have a TV or if you watch live TV on your computer. Seeing as I don’t have a TV and I don’t even know how to get live television on my computer, I don’t need a license. However, someone in my house had gone to the mailbox and brought a stack of mail into the kitchen, many of the envelopes coming from the same person. It said “URGENT” on it so I assumed it was a bill or something about the university.

It wasn’t. It was a threatening letter stating that I had not informed TV Licensing, some company, that I did not need a TV license and that my house is currently under investigation. They said to call to inform them if I didn’t need one, so that’s what I did today. And what happened? The lady said they were sending someone to my house anyway.

Really irritated by this point, I went online to search what one of these “visits” were like and found multiple comments saying “Don’t let them in.” They have no right to enter anyone’s home. They aren’t the police. They have no warrant. They’re just a company trying to sell something, and being rude while they’re at it.

So basically, it’s harassment, and they’ve been getting away with it for years. They’re like Jehovah’s Witnesses, except they act like they have authority and they get people to let them in their homes. I’m not sure why this company hasn’t been shut down for consistently harassing people, but whatever. I’m ignoring them from now on. Talk about invasion of privacy.

So. There’s that.

Another slightly interesting (if obvious) BritBit is that Thanksgiving isn’t big here. That makes sense, as it’s an American holiday. Still, online I see all these social networking sites talking about Thanksgiving and I’m not sure how I feel about it. I would have forgotten about it if it wasn’t everywhere I looked online. I feel like I should care that I’m going to miss it, but I don’t. I’ll probably end up eating pizza.

And that’s another thing. The UK is extremely Americanized. I mean yes, they have their own culture here, but I was expecting a bigger difference. The food is different but they still have Pizza Hut and Burger King and even KFC. They have Sprite and Coke and Cheerios and Capri Sun. They listen to American music, they watch American television, they watch American movies. I wasn’t expecting any of this, or at least not at this scale. This just makes “culture shock” even more laughable than I found it before I came here. I thought it wouldn’t be that bad, and that was when I was expecting huge differences. I’d compare it to visiting another state. Yeah there are lots of differences, but nothing anyone can’t handle.

I just remembered something else. British people have different inflections in their tones. It drove me crazy when I first arrived. So, for instance, let’s take this scenario: two roommates are looking for…um…a remote control for the TV in their room, but they both realize it is missing at different times. They can’t find it, so they both assume the other has it. So one day the first person finally decides to ask. In the U.S. the conversation might go like this:

Person 1: Hey, have you seen the remote?

Person 2: What? You don’t have it?

In the U.K. it might go like this:

Person 1: Hey, have you seen the remote?

Person 2: Do you not have it?

It seems almost exactly the same, doesn’t it? But it isn’t. The inflection in the tone of the second person is different. The American person’s pitch increases throughout the sentence, so that the last word (“it”) is the highest pitched word. In the U.K., however, the last word goes down in pitch. So it’s sort of like, “do You NOT HAVE it?” whereas in the U.S. it’s, “you Don’t HAVE IT?” That’s how you determine if a question is a question: the pitch increases at the end. Have you ever seen those girls who speak like every sentence is a question? We think it sounds like a question because of the rise in pitch, not really because of the words she’s using. If someone said, “What is the capital of Texas.” with the same pitch throughout the entire sentence, the average person would be confused for a second or two because it would be unclear if it was a question or a statement.

Why is this important? I dunno, I guess it isn’t really. It’s just something I noticed, and it probably doesn’t apply to every single person here. Just generally speaking. I guess it interests me because I’m an English major and language fascinates me. Or something.

Okay, one last BritBit: British people are not reserved. I don’t know where this idea came from, but it’s a lie. They’re just as loud as Americans. This could be due to the fact that the drinking age is 18 so people are wandering around drunk. That, or it was just a misconception to being with. Here I was, hoping for a quiet, relaxing year away from the rowdiness that is America. Nope. Don’t believe everything you see on TV people.

Speaking of which, I miss TV. I had one in my room last year but I couldn’t exactly pack a TV in my suitcase. I guess I could have had it shipped…but then I’d have to pay for a license. Sigh. Nothing is free anymore. I hope this atrocious practice doesn’t spread to the U.S. Though I guess it already has, since you have to have a digital cable thingy in order to watch TV now. Still, that’s not really a license. And now I’m rambling.

That’s it for now. See you next week. Happy Thanksgiving!

Good times, missed food, and more English stuff

Hello there! I am back and ready for action!

I had a great weekend this past…weekend. Let’s just ignore that awkward phrasing, shall we? I went on an overnight trip to a local town with the Christian Union. I had a great time. I can honestly say I have never been around so many nice people at one time. Ever. I mean, the level of niceness was almost of ridiculous, like they had some sort of secret diabolical plan. It’s kind of like fattening up a pig before slaughter. The pig is all excited to get lots of food, thinking their owner is amazing, but they don’t realize the evil intentions behind it, muahahaha.

I’m kidding. I know there isn’t a secret plot against me or anything, it’s just that we live in such a cruel world that sometimes you forget that good people exist.

That bit of philosophy aside, it was a great weekend. We all brought sleeping bags or, in my case, comforters, and we slept on the floor…the very hard floor. Fun times. There were a few sessions where we listened to a speaker about the Bible, which led to some of interesting discussions. We watched Hitch on Friday night, always a good time, and there was a 90’s party on Saturday night that was pretty awesome. Who doesn’t love the 90’s?

And now, moving on, it’s time for a bit of a rant.

I miss American food. I really, really, really miss American food. In particular, I miss American cereal. Cocoa Puffs. Fruity Pebbles. Captain Crunch with crunchberries. Apple Jacks. This is the stuff dreams are made of, and they don’t have them here. The cereal selection is actually pretty limited. And they don’t have grape jelly so I can’t make peanut butter and jelly. I’ve tried looking in several stores for it but I can’t find any. They have this flavor called blackcurrant, which is apparently a fruit of some sort. I haven’t tried it yet and I don’t currently have any plans to.

They also have this stuff that I finally tried during the weekend away. It’s called squash. I don’t remember if I mentioned it before, but it’s this concentrated fruit juice liquid type thing, and you pour a bit into a glass, and then fill the rest of the glass with water. It’s not good. I can stomach it, but I would never go to the store and buy it. It’s just watery juice. I don’t see the point. Maybe it’s healthier or something. Silly Brits, caring about their health.

Oh America. I miss your unhealthy foods. I miss sour patch kids and Twizzlers and those giant blow pops. It’s a hard life I lead.

One thing I’ve learned since coming here is that there are way too many accents. I haven’t learned how to tell the difference between most of them yet, but I can still recognize the difference, if that makes sense. As in, I can hear the difference in a person’s voice, but I don’t know what area that person is from. I can, however, recognize the Manchester accent, because it stands out.

What else is going on…well, my nanowrimo book is coming along swimmingly. I’m thousands of words behind, but I’m not worried. Why? Because I discovered the most amazing tool to ever be invented in the history of EVER. It’s this website called Write or Die. You enter how many words you want to write, and you enter the time you want to write it in. Then you click “write” and go. It sounds simple, but it’s really effective because there’s a clock ticking down to 0, and if you stop writing for five seconds or so the screen starts to change colors. I’m not sure what happens after turning slightly red because I was so unnerved I started typing again. I might just let it run to see what happens. I started out typing 500 words in 15 minutes and I’ve gotten it down to 10 minutes. It’s a great site for me because clocks counting down freak me out. My brother (I have a twin brother) used to play Sonic on his Sega Genesis (old school right?) and whenever Sonic was underwater for too long this intense music started playing and you only had a few seconds to get above water before you died. It always freaked me out. In fact, all video games seem to have scary music whenever you have a few seconds to do something, and it always bothered me. So that’s where my fear of being timed comes from.

That was a strange tangent. Let’s get back to English stuff.

Okay, I’ll talk about one more thing before I go. Actually, two things. One, it’s weird going into a store on campus and seeing alcohol. It’s even weirder seeing students buying it, like they’re adults or something. Psssh. We Americans know better. I’m joking, by the way.

As an avid hater of alcohol, I don’t really like the huge drinking scene here. There’s a huge drinking scene in the U.S. too, of course, but here it’s legal so it’s more accepted. I just find alcohol gross. The smell makes me nauseous. I’m not saying I don’t want other people to drink it or anything. I just don’t see why getting drunk is fun. It doesn’t look fun. It’s only fun for me, because I get to watch people act like idiots. It’s free entertainment.

And the last thing: living in a house is awkward. If you don’t make friends with your house mates it can be uncomfortable. Sometimes you just don’t click. Say, for instance, they’re more of the partying type, and you may not be. Just as an example, say you’re spending the month writing 50,000 words for fun while they think getting wasted is just as amusing. For instance. In a hall if you don’t make friends it’s still big enough that it doesn’t matter. In a house it’s more personal. So if you decide to come to Sussex, or have a choice for a house in general, remember that. You can get lucky and become the best of friends with your house mates, or you could be stuck in an awkward situation.

And that concludes this post ladies and gentlemen. See you next week!

Oh, wait a minute. One more thing. Recently it was implied that all Americans like George Bush. Huh? Absolutely not. I’m pretty sure it’s the exact opposite. Just wanted to clear that up.

Fail.

Oops! I nearly forgot to update. This is going to be quick for two reasons: 1) I’m way behind on NaNoWriMo, and 2) I’m falling behind in school. Being sick 2 out of 6 weeks so far is NOT GOOD.

This weekend I went to Warwick Castle. It was pretty cool. On the bus ride there and back we watched Cool Runnings (always funny), Meet the Fockers (it was fairly amusing) and Forrest Gump (I don’t care what anyone says, I hate that movie). In the castle there were these creepy wax figures of the people who lived there back when it was occupied. You could also climb up these stairs and go to the top of one of the towers, but after climbing a bit I had to go back down because I was terrified. I have a thing about heights.

It was really cold there too. We spent the afternoon there but there’s only so much you can do, so I wandered around bored for a bit. There were some beautiful views though. Oh, I took this gorgeous panoramic picture that I'm really proud of. I used some special feature on my camera that I've ignored for a while. It's kind of small on here but it looks pretty when it's bigger.

I’ve joined the Christian Union on campus. It meets every Monday and it’s incredible. Never have I met such a nice group of people all congregated in one place. Everyone is so friendly and caring. It’s a nice way to start off a week.

Ugh. Sorry for another bad post but I have so much to do, so I have to go. I’m determined to win NaNoWriMo no matter what. Oh, and there’s that pesky schoolwork too.

Next week will (hopefully) be more interesting, I promise! I know, I fail. Sorry.

Sick of being sick

I don’t have anything major to report this week, due to being sick. Again. Also, it turns out the first time I was sick I had swine flu. I went to the Health Centre and the doctor said that’s probably what it was, and I was just unlucky enough to get sick again. Go figure. I don’t know what it is I have now. To be honest, I don’t care, I just want it to go away.

Since I spent most of the week in bed I don’t have that much to say. I missed out on any fun Halloween activities that may have happened, as I was too busy coughing up a lung. Ugh. Oh yeah, Saturday was Halloween. I’m kind of annoyed. I wanted to see Saw 6 but I didn’t feel well enough to go.

My classes are going okay, but I’m worried about falling behind since I’ve been ill so often. This week will be spent catching up.

There is something exciting happening this month though: NaNoWriMo! What is NaNoWriMo, you may be wondering. Well, it’s short for National Novel Writing Month. Basically it’s a challenge to write 50,000 words in one month. You don’t actually win anything, but you get the satisfaction of accomplishing something. 50,000 words seems too short for a novel (to me) but you can still work on it when the month is over. It’s good inspiration for me to actually start a novel I’ve been thinking about writing for a while. Unfortunately I didn’t do enough preparing and now that I’m actually writing it I realize I haven’t done enough research. Whatever, I can always go back and fill in important information later. The point is to write.

Speaking of which, I should probably go work on that. I don’t really have anything else to say right now. Wow, what a lame post. Sorry about that, I’ll try to be more interesting next time.