Week in Review

so yet again way too long between posts...

Last Sunday, I picked up Mr. Andy Butler from the airport and helped him get to Bath. Ditched him the next day to go to all my classes (and a wine tasting seminar...) On Tuesday we departed Bristol airport for Dublin with about 6 other Americans most of whom are studying at Bath too. We rented a pretty nice apartment (meant for 5 people, shared by 8-10) just across the river from the temple bar district. After a short time wandering, we began drinking and bar hopping. Dublin was absolutely packed and in a celebratory mood getting ready for St. Patrick's day. Sampled my first guinness and decided its not bad at all... I might even like it better then beer. Just not the sort of thing you can chug. Well, I did see it done, but only by the Irish. The next day, we somehow managed to wake up and make it outside by about 10:30am.... INSANE! To get really good spots for the parade. But the parade didnt start until a bit after noon, so too much waiting. The parade had a bit of a different style then those I've seen in America. Mainly fewer floats and more groups of children dressed up in costumes, walking, and beating on all sorts of instruments. A lot of the groups were from America - mainly high school marching bands and bagpipe groups. After the parade and a break, a few of us went to the Guinness storehouse, did the tour, and imbibed our free pint of extra cold on the 7th floor with a panoramic view of Dublin. The second night of drinking began, and the entire city was overloaded. Every bar was packed full. In the second to last one we ran into a group of 3 irish policemen who seemed incredibly entertained by the guys in our group. Ended up hanging out with them and getting good stories until about 4am that night. Woke up early again to fly back to Bristol and spend the rest of the day asleep.

On Friday, Andy and I went to London for the day. Coerced him into seeing all the sights and walking across a bit more then half of the city. After dinner went to see "Fame" the musical. Definitely a good show, and I tried my best to remember some of the moves that could possibly be converted to cymbal visuals... haha. The next day I made sure that he made it onto a flight back to the US and returned to Bath via London. Enroute I got to see a huge security alert/bag blown up at Gatwick airport as well as walk by the huge protest march in London. Many group protesting everything from the one yr anniversary of the US invading Iraq to Israel to Blair/Bush to white power to the apparent colonization of Cuba, Venzuela, and Brazil. Lovely to see the communists, anarchists, and hippies all coming together like that....

At any rate, I've been recovering from the week and getting ready for the last week of classes before 'Easter holidays.' Don't worry too much if there is not another update until mid-April since break is 3 weeks long!