You don't look a day over 249!

Hi friends. You may have noticed that I've given the page a little makeover!

Well, it's been a little while since last I posted. I'm getting concerned that if I tell you everything that's happened to me while I'm in Glasgow/traveling on this blog that no one is going to want to talk to me when I get home. So maybe I'll be more discerning about what I post, hmm? We'll see. I'm not one to hold things back generally.

Some of you may know, but others will be surprised to hear that I have a 3 week long spring break coming up in March/April! But the best part is that it starts on the 31st of March and goes until the 17th of April. Those of you who have a calendar handy will realize that that's a Monday to a Friday, meaning I actually have from the 28th to the 19th. But THEN you have to consider that I don't have classes on Friday, so it's really the 27th of March until the 19th of April. This break is followed by a "reading week" in which nothing happens, because I only have 2 finals in the entire month of May. TWO FINALS. Sure, I have papers and things due before this whole hullabaloo of a break, but after a month of vacation, I will have another month in which to study for 2 finals. This is like a dream come true! Remember fall semester at Midd, in which I had 3 papers due in ONE DAY, a final the next day and another final the day after that? Glasgow is AWESOME.

Looking back on that paragraph, I should rethink the number of words written in caps. In info tech (6th grade, anyone?) they told us that over The Internets, people can't hear your tone and you should therefore avoid using all capital letters. It looks like shouting.

So I apologize for shouting.

Anyway. Spring break is going to be awesome. We're planning a very cool trip that I will tell you about once we finish planning. It would be extremely awkward for me to share information that I later have to take back because of scheduling problems, you understand.

But I can tell you about a few trips I have planned for the next few months before spring break:

• 7-8 February: Trip to Carbisdale Castle in the Scottish Highlands. (This castle is supposed to be haunted). On the way up, we're stopping in Inverness to have lunch with Nessie.

• 26 February - 1 March (which looks a lot longer than it is because people keep forgetting that Feb has only 28 days!): Trip to Dublin

• 12-15 March: Trip to Amsterdam

• 28 March: Trip to London, the starting point of the Spring Break trip
  

I am really looking forward to all of these trips, mostly because I have a sweet new camera and I LOVE taking photos (there I go yelling again). I'm so eager to get out in the world and see new things, meet new people, etc. etc. Hopefully this list will continue to grow.

While I'm really looking forward to traveling, I'm loving Glasgow at the same time and I want to spend as much time here learning the city as I can. So far, there are several things that I've grown accustomed to in Glagsow:

1. Chips = french fries but Crisps = chips. This leads to a HUGE amount of confusion.
2. Tights + shorts is normal; sometimes, it appears, mandatory? I'm not sure if I like this.
   
3. All dogs are well behaved. They don't need leashes, they can sit quietly outside a store and not attack/bark/what have you.
4. You get so used to the fine mist of rain that sometimes you don't notice it's raining until you go inside.
5. Hills. And stairs. And then more hills.
6. Indian takeaway restaurants that serve: Indian food, pizza, fish and chips, all sorts of kebabs, and burgers. Sometimes Chinese, too.
7. Keyboards are different. The @ and the " are switched, which makes for some pretty confusing typing when I get going quickly.
   

That seems like enough for now. Mostly because it's all I can think of off the top of my head.

Inauguration day was a hard day to be away from the States. My American friends dragged our Canadian and Australian friends to a pub for dinner to watch the whole shebang on BBC (time difference meant it landed nicely after class, just in time for dinner). It was VERY strange to watch a new President sworn in while bagpipes played in the background, and old Scottish men laughed at our choice of programming (though they had been watching it before we even got there!).

This weekend was a really interesting Glaswegian experience, however. Sunday was Robbie Burns day, celebrated on 25 January every year (because it was his birthday). This wasn't your typical Burns day though, because it was his 250th birthday! We ended up seeing a youth symphony perform a bunch of Scottish waltzes, polkas, jigs (ok, I can't ascertain that they were all Scottish, but the kids were all wearing kilts so it all felt pretty Scottish). For a "halftime show" an older gentleman played a few pieces on a fiddle. Robbie Burns' own fiddle! That's an old instrument. It was really fun, especially since it happened in this really beautiful museum and it was free. All the little kids were dancing in the front.

We also visited the Glasgow Cathedral and the Necropolis (a gigantic cemetery on a hill overlooking the city--supposed to be the highest point in Glasgow) this past weekend. I didn't think ahead to bring my big camera, so I have no photos to show you just yet. I'll be heading back there sometime pretty soon to take some photos of the place. Also, we saw the oldest house in Glagsow. Old Glaswegians were SHORT. I could barely stand straight up in some of the doorways. Guess it was the kilts that made Scottish warriors so frightening. Or maybe the broadswords. Either way.

Alright, I'm out of witticisms. Plus my laundry is done.

See you soon; same bat time, same bat place.