Long walks, day two

I've been meaning to visit Edinburgh's excuse for a beach for months now, but standing by the sea in the dead of winter is hardly my idea of fun. Today was beautiful, though cool and breezy, and I decided that now would be as good a time as any.

The problem, then, was how to get to the Firth, and finding the part of it accessible to pedestrians. My handy book of Edinburgh maps suggested that the route would be simple enough - basically, head east and hope for the best - so I packed my camera and headed for the park.

The simplest route would have been to cross Princes Street to the Omni Centre and keep on going, but I wanted to take some pictures of the heather in the park, so I went the long way around and eventually exited near the palace. What followed was an hour or so of walking through an area I think was Portobello, seeing more of what I've come to think of as inner city Edinburgh - in other words, there were no cows today. I did like the Craigmillar cows.

Eventually, once past the crematorium (I said I took the long route...), I reached the Firth and the public swimming area, and descended to the beach. There are a few things I can say about the Firth of Forth: there's quite a difference between tides, the water is fairly brown close to the shore, and the beach is freezing. Everyone I saw - the couple with the dogs, the old man digging for shellfish against the signs' instructions - was dressed warmly against the wind, except for one poor fool, who I last saw heading for the water with his tennis shoes in his hand. Look, I'm all for sticking my feet in strange bodies of water, but if I'm on the beach in a North Face jacket, there's no way I'm sloughing off the shoes for anything less than polar waters. Uh-unh. I did get a souvenir seashell, though.

I had been noticing all along that my route was closely following that of the 12 bus, so, having planned ahead today, I was able to secure passage back to Princes Street and save myself the three-mile hike into the city center. One mile from Princes Street is far better than three from the beach.

In a totally unrelated note, I'm making friends with the morning security guard at Tesco. Since my purse or my iPod sets off the detectors almost every time I enter or leave the store (and that Tesco is the only one at which this happens!), the guard and I have gotten to be on quasi-familiar terms. This morning, he asked me where I'd been, since he hadn't heard the door alarm in a few days. Nice to be missed. He then went on to tell me that he's from Malawi and has a Criminology degree, and he's deciding what to do with it. That's two criminologists at grocery stores, now - I'm thinking there must be some sort of union...

Well...Friday, at least

Today won't go down as the most exciting on record, but it did have its high points.

I set off for a walk to Duddingston Loch, a bird sanctuary located on the southeastern side of Holyrood Park. While I was there, I decided to finally do what I had been meaning to do for months and check out the little church up the road. As it turns out, the church is the oldest still in use in Midlothian, and dates from the 12th century. You can still see the hardware once used for tying up your horse. While there, I noted that Craigmillar Castle was only 1.5 miles away, so I decided to make the hike.

Craigmillar was a favorite of Mary, Queen of Scots', but that's about all I can say about it - having made an impromptu trip, I had no cash on me, and thus couldn't get inside the castle. The cows grazing outside were a nice touch, however, and the day itself was lovely. The nice weather and the fragrant trees and shrubs were the only consolation I had on the way back; what began as a relatively short walk turned into a six- or seven-mile hike, and my feet are still sore from Wednesday.

The other bright spot of the day was receiving e-mail confirmation of my audition on Tuesday. I found a posting on SAGE for a two-week gig requiring a female with an American accent. I qualify on the most basic criteria, so let's see what I can pull out in the studio...

Also: Nightwish is awesome. Yes, they're a Finnish symphonic metal group, but they're still awesome.

Crazy day

I didn't do much in the way of productive endeavors today. Actually, I woke to my alarm, pushed it back half an hour, and rolled over. Firbush took more out of me than I realized, I suppose, and anyway, the blankets were warm.


I did rise eventually, however, because today was Interview Day - that's right, an actual phone interview for an actual job. We shall see. Soon after that conversation ended, my other phone rang and, long story short, I'm auditioning to read sentences for two weeks for a company that needs a woman with a "pleasant" American accent. The interviewer asked where I was from, but fortunately seemed nonplussed when I told him. He then asked if I could do a southern accent, to which I was forced to reply, "Not convincingly".

After dinner, I wrapped up my sore feet (note to self: never go on a two-hour hike through Edinburgh in shoes you haven't worn since September) and took my constitutional in the park; as the sun isn't fully setting now until close to nine, Holyrood is jumping after dinner. For those who haven't yet done the twilight thing: get thee to the park. I'm serious, it's lovely in there. The heather is blooming and smells fantastic, the grouse/pheasant/large bird is stalking that grassy lawn at the St. Leonard's entrance, and the hills are lousy with rabbits. I saw several baby bunnies today (all together, now: "Aww..."), and one came to within two feet of me. There's nothing cuter than a palm-sized rabbit hiding in the heather.

Firbush and Killin

What a trip! We returned from Firbush this afternoon to see the sun for the first time since Monday morning! That said, the rain was the only real downside to our trip to Loch Tay - the area is beautiful, everyone seemed to have a nice time, and the writing excercises were amusing.

I'm not a biker (and I wasn't the only one there who can't ride), and I wasn't really fond of the idea of kayaking on Loch Tay in a wetsuit (you need it), so I took advantage of the roads and paths between the center and the village of Killin, three miles away. The most common features, besides ridiculous amounts of postcard-quality scenery, are sheep and cows; sheep bleat in a variety of registers, with the lambs sounding almost charicaturish and the older sheep sounding more like they're grunting. We also stumbled across deer and geese over the trip.


My favorite excursion was a walking trip to Killin. Dilys, who played taxi driver for most of us at one point or another, drove Rachel and me into town, and from there we popped onto Kinnel, a local sheep and cattle farm, to see a prehistoric stone circle. The owner was a very nice fellow who apparently gives permission to every tourist who wanders up to the house, but even nicer were his three border collies - like my dog, only black and white, and trained. They barked a lot until they smelled us, but what was so interesting about them was that they could cross the sheep-stopping grates that had been giving us fits with no problem.

The stone circle was tiny when compared to something like Stonehenge, but interesting and very scenic. The only downside was getting to it, which involved letting ourselves into the pasture (we're not so good with farm gates) and crossing a sheep-pie minefield.

After that, we visited the Breadalbane folklore center, which houses Rob Roy's sporran and dirk and several other artifacts, including the healing stones of St. Fillan. For the curious, there's a movie played upstairs - more a monologue, really, by a guy acting as Fillan - that tells all about the saint. Most of what I got out of it was "These hands...these hands were healing hands..." Good fun.

Crossing the bridge over the Falls of Dochart (a series of rapids), we passed the island where the chiefs of Clan McNab have been buried for 350 years, then headed out to Finlarig Castle, a ruin located half a mile out of town.

Finlarig might have been something in its day - 1609 - but by now only two towers and some connective wall remain. Most of the structure has fallen, and you're warned to approach at your own risk. Other featurs of the property include two graves, a 19th-century mausoleum (also in ruins), and the so-called "beheading pit" of Black Duncan Campbell.

Legend has it that the pit was reserved for noble executions, while the commoners got the hanging tree behind it. Some archaeologists think it's really just a cistern, but "beheading pit" has a certain charm to it, and the legend sticks.

I did a little research today, and Finlarig is possibly haunted (though there's not much left to haunt, really).






In any case, I took my share of pictures, and two came out slightly odd. It might have been the lighting conditions or my flash, but take it as you will.

Back from town, we then headed down to the bonfire (which didn't want to start for a good while), and a few of us roasted marshmallows. A few others fantasy casted The Dark Tower. Weird things happen when the wine is flowing...

Firbush ho!

It seemed like April would never come back in September, when we were told about our end-of-term Firbush trip, but the day is upon us, and the bus leaves at 9:30 tomorrow morning. I've packed as much as I can tonight, and the rest will be dealt with in the morning. Until then, I have my bug spray and my bathing suit (ha!), and I'll have pleasant dreams of hanging out in the middle of nowhere with two-thirds of my class.

And dreams of my last YGC retreat, which had its less-than-pleasant moments, like waking up to find mites in my bedding. Guess who got new sheets when she got back to New Haven?

The thing is, I'm not a particularly outdoorsy person. We never did any camping when I was a kid - my mother's idea of roughing it is the Holiday Inn, as we like to say - and so I'm slightly inept at this whole 'outdoor retreat' shtick. Granted, Firbush isn't a tent complex or anything, and odds are it's better insulated than Camp Chinqueka's horrid mite-infested 2x4 cabins ($2,000 for two weeks of summer camp? I think not) - but I'm hoping for heating, even in April. This is Scotland, and the only advice I've been given regarding Firbush is "Pack sweaters".

Perhaps I'm being a little rough on Chinqueka. For non-YGCers, Chinqueka is a girls' camp in quasi-rural Connecticut that features, among other things, 14 non-insulated cabins, a lake for skinny dipping, a water trampoline that...ahem...broke, various benches for econ problem sets, and a steady supply of teabags for the mornings when you wake up, clean the bugs off of yourself, and stumble into the main room with a baritone voice. We used it as our fall retreat every year I was in the group, and it was intense - Connecticut is colder than you'd think in September, and when you wake up in a freezing cabin, shower in an outdoor stall that probably hasn't been mucked out since the campers left, and sit down with Mozart after breakfast, you can see why the Social Chairs brought booze. Then again, we also had our annual square dancing night, a dance party, plenty of card games, and the aforementioned skinny dipping (I opted out of that - Connecticut's cold, and the juniors always steal the seniors' clothes). Chinqueka is a rite of passage, forced bonding through griping, and a chance to wake up on the floor of the main hall with your sixty new best friends on the second morning, look around, and realize that you're still cold but that the mites are at bay. Some people never showered. I was one of the princesses who not only did so multiple times, but brought her own hairdryer to boot.

The hairdryer is coming to Firbush. We can't bring our own booze, but I'm sure someone will figure something out. Still, I'm going to miss not waking up and singing something in Latin/spirituals/Meredith Monk, drinking styrofoam cups of Lipton tea, and square dancing with Yankees and the coolest should-be-dead-by-now caller I've ever seen. I will not miss the mites.

Saturday

Today was a wonderfully random assortment of events, none of which had anything whatsoever to do with writing.

I got up and did my laundry this morning first thing. I possibly could have slept in past nine, except for the fact that our lovely pipe people decided that 9:15 on a Saturday morning is an ideal time to lay new asphalt. It was loud and smelly, and I hate them all.

This is one of Scotland's 'open weekends', meaning that most of the historical sites are free to the public. Ella and I took advantage of this to see Edinburgh Castle, saving ourselves £11 each in the process, and would have seen the Stone of Destiny and the jewels had the line not been ridiculous. Seems that everyone else in the city had the same idea, for some reason...

Tonight was the SCO and a mixed program featuring a superb cellist. Even one of the first violinists was dancing along. Sadly, our cheap seats didn't give us a view of the Jack Black-esque cellist who really gets into his music, so I don't know how he was affected. Pity.

Then there were nachos, always a good end to a Saturday night.

Supermarket overload

Today was my turn to make the hike to Cameron Toll for our Jeeves & Wooster DVD, and while I was there, I decided to pop into the Sainsbury's connected to the mall to have a look around.

Dear God.

After not having been in a proper grocery store since the Christmas holidays, I was blown away by a full-sized Sainsbury's. They had a butcher counter. A cheese counter. A quarter-aisle of Old El Paso products. More wine than anyone could ever need. Clothing. More than fifteen varieties of cereal. Philly Free (or their version of it). Maple syrup. Goose fat. Bags of frozen berries.

And they, too, took AMEX.

I bought myself a few souvenirs (not the goose fat), collected the DVDs, and headed back to town. The only problem with this Sainsbury's is that it's 1.5 miles away, and my arm started to go numb after a while.

Then again, there is a bus...

Scarf update

To all of you who have ever read my posts, or watched me knit in class or in front of the television or at the Golden Hour: yes, I finished the damn thing.

Behold! My scarf!

Is it beautiful? No.
Is it ever going to win any prizes? No.
Is it perfect? No. (Have you noticed the edge in front of you?)

Still, it's my scarf, I bound it off a few minutes ago, and let's just say I'm relieved. Granted, I'm not the most dutiful knitter, but that one took me 49 days.

Next time, I should try to purl as well. Baby steps.

Tuesday

Not much going on in my world today besides the bright ray of sunshine that was Jeeves & Wooster. Tomorrow's my day to make the mall trek, so I'll be off to collect...um...four copies of the Telegraph, bright and early.

There are worse addictions, I'm sure.

Speaking of the Telegraph, I actually read a few articles today, as the cover story pertained to Virginia Tech. I paused for a moment when the writer quoted a student as saying that the gunman had been "Asian", and I wondered what the other readers were going to think. There's a funny thing about Asian over here. When Americans hear the term, we automatically think Chinese, Japanese, or Korean, for the most part; people from southern Asia are mostly lumped under "Indian". In the UK, it's just the opposite: Indians and Pakistanis are "Asian", while the others are "East Asian" or simply "Chinese". When the article reported that the gunman was Asian, I knew what to expect, but I imagine that quite a few British readers expected an Indian shooter. Just one more quirk in US-UK linguistic relations.

Long walks and fun with Tesco

This being Jeeves and Wooster week, we were all revved up to walk to Princes Street for our DVDs today. Unfortunately, WH Smith isn't on Princes Street. No, the rail station WH Smith doesn't participate in these sort of schemes, meaning that our nearest WH Smith was in the Cameron Toll Shopping Centre, which is 1.5 miles away.

Fair enough. It was a nice day for a walk, and though the mall's nothing to write home about, I finally saw it. Since we have four DVDs to go, however, and since both Anurag and I are collecting (he's picking up copies for two other people as well), we've decided to combine forces and go on alternate days, meaning that I don't have to swing by Tesco in the morning and get my paper.

Ah, Tesco. Lately, I've been making friends with the morning security guard, as the door scanner has been going off every time I pass through. I don't know what it is! It's not necessarily the iPod - I've tried leaving that at home - and I don't carry my cell phone most of the time. Either there's something about me that the scanner doesn't like, or something in my purse is bothering it, and I have no idea what that could be. I've cleaned out the bag, checked everything for security tags, but so far, no luck. At least the security guard's a nice fellow.

Sunday

Church choir was fun this morning - there were six people singing! Two of them male! Very exciting stuff, that.

The rest of the day has been lackluster. There was a nap, there's been a bit of writing, and there was my second Jeeves and Wooster DVD, thanks to the Daily Telegraph. I love this series, as it combines two things I greatly enjoy, P.G. Wodehouse and Hugh Laurie. A young Hugh Laurie, speaking in a British accent...

Hello, Dr. House.

The joy will continue through this next week, giving me a daily excuse to walk to Princes Street and pick up my daily DVD.

On a more random note, I wanted to post this picture. My puppy - my cute little border collie puppy - has grown substantially since Christmas, and can now reach things, like food. Dad's calling her 'Beelzebub' on her bad days...

A friendly notice

Dear Possibly Inebriated Canadian Guy,

You might not be aware of this, but Richmond Place is a cluster of brick and concrete buildings built around a central pit of sorts. As anyone who's ever been in a stone building knows, hard surfaces tend to create echoes.

You were probably unaware of this last night when you began to have a conversation with that Russian girl. At least, I think she was Russian, since she had a vaguely Russian accent and the thread of your conversation tended to veer in the direction of her possible Communist leanings.

Sir, might I humbly suggest that grilling a young lady about her ideological bent, especially in the parking lot of Richmond Place at 4 AM, may not be the swiftest way to her affections?

May I also remind you that there's quite a difference between Republicans and Communists, no matter how strongly you feel about the Democratic Party?

Lastly, sir, as a poor bystander who merely woke from sleep to hear your conversation through her cracked window, I must agree with the security guard who repeatedly asked you to lower your voice. Telling him to f*** off was less than mannerly on your part, but perhaps this isn't the case in your part of Canada, where the Red Scare never ended and Republicans get warm, fuzzy feelings about Chairman Mao.

Freaky Friday

Chicago and New England may be up to their knees in snow, but today was Fog Day in Edinburgh.

At 9:30 AM, I left my building and headed for the mall on Princes Street. The weather was lovely; the sky was blue, the sun was rising, and the temperature was pleasant. I didn't feel underdressed in my sandals.

I was in there maybe forty minutes, but when I emerged, this damp, heavy fog was rolling through town. The temperature had dropped, I had to button my jacket against the sudden chill, and my hair did very bad things.

I figured the fog would lift during the day, but we had an all-day white-out of sorts. I haven't seen Arthur's Seat since this morning. I trust it's still there, but you can't prove it by me. Still, at least the fog tendrils were atmospheric, and gave me an excuse to procrastinate ("I can't work, the fog is making me sleepy...ooh, that guy's cutting the ferret's fingernails...").

Thursday

Not a particularly exciting day here today - started with a nice morning walk/run in the park, followed by more of the hydraulic drilling - but tonight was amusing, thanks to Blades of Glory. It's not the greatest movie Will Ferrell has ever done, but it was a good way to kill two hours. The costumes alone are pretty special, especially the peacock suit with the bird puppet hand and the feathered tail.

I was rather surprised that they didn't even try to spoof "Bolero", but the JFK/Marilyn Monroe clips were pretty good. That, and the crossbow, and the bathroom toilet paper scene...

Pub Quiz

On my second foray into the weird world of British pub quizzes, I am proud to say, the team I was on didn't come in dead last. No, 'Fourplay' was fifth of seven, and while we didn't win the beer, the wine, or the candy, at least we had a respectable place in the rankings.

I realized too late that the Periodic Table in my wallet could have come in handy, but Amber and I were still able to get nine of the thirteen elements with a G in their names. I would re-memorize the Periodic Table, but I figure once is enough for anyone.

They're ba-ack

Around 12:15 today, the hydraulic drills returned to Richmond Place.

The pipework that was completed while I was out of the country wasn't the end of the story. No, now begins the really fun part, when the utility company digs a trench through the parking lot and the cobblestones so that the new pipe can be connected with the mains in the street. Makes sense, right?

Well, the rude bastards at the company didn't give our staff any warning that they were coming, so our only indication that something unpleasant was about to happen was when the yellow barriers began to go up yesterday afternoon. The note in the foyer warns us that this digging - which may extend to tomorrow - will be extremely noisy and will produce a great deal of dust, and that people on the lower floors should keep their windows closed. This, of course, does little to help the noise, but at least there's relatively clean air inside the building.

At this point, I don't care about the new water pipes. My hot water is fine. All I want is pressure in my shower...

Easter, Part Two

After church, I got a call from Ella to firm up the group Easter dinner plans, and she let me in on a new facet: since none of us had received a basket, we were going to make them for each other and exchange. Aww...

Dinner was at a lovely French restaurant off George IV Bridge, Easter baskets were fun, and then Monica and I got a wild hair and decided to round the evening off with Auld Reekie's Terror Tour.

The Southern Baptist Convention would not have been amused, but what else were we going to do? Homework?

At twenty to nine, as the first stars came out (days are getting quite long around here), we gathered with a bunch of tourists, including a particularly annoying group of teenaged American boys, for our tour. Our poor guide, who was fairly attractive in a speedwalk-or-I'll-cane-you sort of way, had to put up with the heckles from these boys all night, but managed to get us into the vaults without losing anyone.

As they tell it, a student living in the building decided to do a little renovation, so he bought a mallet and started swinging at the walls. He then accidentally opened the vaults, which had been closed for a century and a half, and the fun started. The vaults have only been partially excavated, but they're not a nice place to live - pitch black, with damp walls and no windows, and whenever it rains outside, it rains in the vaults 24 hours later. This also applies to the "Gardez loo" phenomenon. Lovely visual, that. The vaults were primarily inhabited by people who had nowhere else to go, since James VI/I made homelessness a crime punishable by death, and as our guide put it, life expectancy in there was pretty short: a month for a man, a week for a woman, and perhaps a few days for a child. Add to that the nasty Tron fire, and you've got a recipe for some fairly unhappy entities.

So then, for whatever reason, the local Wiccan coven decided to start meeting in the vaults in the sixties. They built a stone circle in one room, designed to protect the person within, and then they needed a mirror. Unfortunately, the head of the coven brought the mirror from his wardrobe, and a mirror connected to door without a lock is, essentially, an open portal to whatever wants to come in. Suffice it to say that bad stuff started happening - scratches and whatnot - and so the head changed the circle to be one of entrapment, keeping whatever was in the room inside the ring. Our guide told us this, especially about the e-mails they had received from tourists weeks later describing what had happened to them, and then several people ventured inside.

The Wiccans now meet further down the vaults, in a rather strange temple. Why they're still in there, I have no idea.

The most infamous vault is saved for last, and the rules are pretty clear: men stick to the left wall, women to the right. Apparently, the entity is misogynistic, and tends to attack women. Since it keeps to the left side of the room, however, the men get to take the brunt of whatever happens. Nothing happened to our group, but our guide filled us in on a few stories (after warning us that camera and phone memories tend to get wiped in that vault), especially the unpleasant one about the mother and very young daughter who had been on the tour. The mother had been letting the girl squeeze her finger, and suddenly the pressure increased on her hand to the point of pain. She called for light, the guide finally got the flashlight back on, and then she discovered that no one was holding her hand. In a panic, they looked around the room until they found the little girl curled up in the partially collapsed vault behind them. She said she had never let go of her mother's finger, and that she had been led down there. Good times, eh?

My personal low point of the tour was the Museum of Torture, which is a small, slightly warm room ringed with authentic torture implements. Now, I'm usually not that squeamish when it comes to these things - I wrote two papers on the Black Death, for crying out loud - but when our guide began to describe them and their effects in rapid, graphic detail, I started to feel a little overwhelmed. I made it through the iron masks, I made it through the nutcrackers (not the technical term, but that's pretty much what they do) without effect, but when he got to the bamboo splints, I started to lose it - all the color went from my face, I started to get dizzy, there was a ringing in my ears, and I began to see black spots. I realized I was going to pass out, so I crouched down on the floor and rubbed my temples until I was feeling less shaky. What can I say, fingernail torture really gets to me. I've never fainted in public, and I really didn't want to start last night.

The bracing pint of Strongbow in the pub at the end of the tour was most welcome, as was the declaration of Monica's and my exceptional beauty from the leader of the annoying teenaged boys. Yes, I know, my Davenport fleece just screams "sex appeal".

After that, there was some chocolate and a call to the parents, who seemed a little surprised at my choice of Easter recreation.

Easter

Talk about strange ways to spend a holiday...

Last year this time, I went to Sunday morning services with Mary at, appropriately, St. Mary's in New Haven. We then did a large, Italian Sunday lunch at Scoozzi, thanks to Mom and Dad, who pitied us and our dining hall fare. Still, the dining hall wasn't a complete dud at Easter, as we often had special breads, the ubiquitous Passover staples, and dyed eggs.

Cut to this year. Dying eggs, I was told this morning, isn't a big thing in Scotland. The situation was different fifty years ago, when kids would dye eggs with tea and then go rolling them down hills and whatnot. You used to find the shells all over Arthur's Seat. Sadly, the custom has gone out of practice, and the only eggs around are of the Cadbury variety, like the basket the Korean church that shares Kirk o' Field left for us this morning. Sweet of them, but I wasn't quick enough to get one...

I had more pressing concerns. After my two-Sunday break from choir, I was back with four songs I'd never heard and a distinct lack of other singers. Easter is a Communion Sunday, so everyone who would usually be in the choir was serving, and when neither of the other American students showed up, I was left to carry the choir, solo.

Time to sight-read the soprano line...

Fortunately, I had a few minutes before the service to look over the hymns, and Roy cued me in to a couple of ritards, so I only really flubbed my way through the first verse of our Communion hymn, which was actually two hymns back-to-back. What made me truly happy was when Roy started into "Christ the Lord is Risen Today" as the Communion anthem - finally, an Easter song I recognized, even if I wasn't singing along...

Hope the bunny was good to everyone!

Saturday

Without classes, the weekend rather blends into the other five days, with the difference being that the mail doesn't run as often. Sadly, I didn't receive my Easter basket. Thanks for nothing, DHL. May giant bunnies with nasty, pointed teeth hunt you down.

Or I could just go buy some chocolate.

I finished a project I've been working on since the end of February this evening, which is a load off my back (Yay! Now I can do something new!), but I fear it's not particularly good. I'm going to let it sit and come back to it when I'm feeling more inclined to edit.

And now...perhaps some dinner. It's quarter of seven, so it's time, even if the sun's still up.

Procrastination

It was in the 60s today, the sky was cloudless, and the breeze was nice, so I killed a couple of hours this afternoon by taking a long walk around the neighborhood volcano.

The park was more crowded than I've seen it in months, as if the city is breathing a collective sigh of relief and emerging after the winter. The cherry trees are beginning to blossom, the daffodils are still in bloom, and I could walk comfortably in a tank top and sandals - if I were in New Haven, this would almost be sunbathing weather. As it was, I took the trail through the woods behind my church to get to St. Leonard's Gate, then started up the road and past the lakes (big swan nest in the first one!), and just as I was coming around the back, I noticed some people up on a trail.

Well, I thought, I can hike in sandals. They're pretty broken in, as anyone who's seen Ian's Spain pictures can attest.

I followed the trail up, then realized I was climbing the back of the Crags and that the path was getting steep. Vaguely I recalled a tricky path back down on the Arthur's Seat side of the Crags, but figured I'd find a way. Taking care not to a) be blown off the mountain, or b) lose the fleece tied around my waist (hey, I'm optimistic, not stupid), I followed the path around the top, admiring the views of the city as I hiked, then came to the rough patch.

Fortunately, the group of preteen boys and their mountain bikes left before I had to crouch and climb down in a less than dignified stance. I like walking around the park, but I never said I was any good at it. And hey, remember that I was in sandals.

I was in high spirits by the time I made it back to my room, where I washed my feet, changed clothes, and chilled out with my computer for a while. Then I stood to go make dinner, and suddenly my body began protesting, particularly my bum knee and the other hamstring.

Funny how that happens. Good thing I went to the gym this morning...

200 posts

Huh, a new milestone. Maybe I'll get a cake or something...

I've never seen the sort of floor cohesion I saw last night. The common room's usually pretty empty past dinner, but instead there were at least five people clustered around the television, watching Britain's version of The Apprentice (Sir Alan's not as Trump as, well, Trump, but his hair's better) and making snide comments. Then a few of us stuck it out for The Underdog Show, in which celebrities have to train shelter dogs to do tricks. One amusing part is that the model dog they use to demonstrate the routine looks suspiciously like a grown-up version of my puppy. Another is that we were promised a doggie dancing routine by one of the judges during the ten o'clock results show. Then there were the dogs that wouldn't cooperate, and the host - there's not much to be said for the host, other than that he'd make a fairly attractive woman. He wore more eye makeup than most of us do on formal occasions. Still, there was the cute "Aww" factor of puppies, which made the evening most enjoyable.

Everyone seems to be relaxing a notch or two, so what are we to do but chill with our television?

Resnet frustration

I did intend to post yesterday, but that was before Resnet decided to go on holiday. We're going on 22 hours without in-room Internet right now, and Richmond Place is getting testy.

That was only one more thing in a string of blah moments yesterday. I slept in until eight, skipped the gym, and felt like curling back up and sleeping until noon. Still, I dragged myself to DHT, selected one of the two remaining stacks of biographies for the prize reading, and read a memoir by a fairly young neurosurgeon for most of the day. Interesting, but probably not a winner. Once I finished, I realized that the Internet was down, but since I was too out of it to do more than an hour of writing, I went for a coffee on my dwindling Christmas Starbucks card and played Dungeon Crawl.

Today should be better. I'm awake, for one. I made it to the gym, I've found a functional computer, and I'm going to go see about the job I've been trying to get for the last two weeks. Hopefully, there will be some writing done today, now that I don't feel quite like death.

Snake charming in Tangier

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Well, just got back from what was supposed to be a trip to Spain, but that expanded into day trips to Morocco and Gibraltar as well. I'm exhausted, so in lieu of a long recap, here's my video of our snake charmer in the casbah...