Papers, Procrastination, and Pudding

Ok, not really pudding, but I'll get to that. And I think procrastination really speaks for itself. But I wanted an alliterative title, so there you go.

One of the oddest things about studying at Exeter is the method of turning in and picking up papers. It isn't necessarily good or bad. Just odd, at least compared to Kenyon. Each class has three assignments, each an essay unless you're in a creative writing or some film classes.

The first paper has a due date as determined by the professor, but they're usually due around the same time. This semester most first papers were due between February 12th and 19th. The second paper has the same due date across all the courses (at least third year courses). *Exception: your professor didn't get your first papers back by the week before, then the paper has to be pushed back.*
For just about everyone the second essay was due yesterday, March 5th. The third papers aren't due until May 15th. Of course those tend to be worth a lot more of the overall grade and creative writing courses tend to have all three assignments due at the end.
When turning in your paper you have until 4:00pm on the due date to turn it in to the office. With barcoded cover sheet. Yeah. Odd. You also need two copies: one with your student number and one with your name. Why? The papers aren't just graded by the professor, they're also assessed by a third party. Once the professor is done (as far as I can tell, this is the grade you receive and the other assessment is more for the class) they turn the papers back in to the office for sorting. The office has all the papers ready for pickup by a certain date before the next paper is due. We got our first papers back February 26th (or whenever we got to the office).
The good: 1) You definitely get your papers back before turning in the next one. Unless you're in a creative writing class. In which case, hope that you get feedback in class. 2) The office doesn't care if you skip class in order to write the essay. 3) Blind grading--your professor gets the copy with your student number and doesn't know who's essay it is.The tolerable: 1) No begging your professor for an extension--if you want an extension you have to ask the office and you better have a good excuse. 2) Lines. If even just some classes all have a paper due the same day, you can find yourself standing in line. And since they use the barcode on the cover sheet to check your paper into the system, then if you are still in line at 4 your grade will suffer for being late. 3) Blind grading--since your professors don't know whose paper is whose, they don't have a clue what you wrote about when you go to their office hours.
It's not a bad system. Just...odd. At least after getting used to Kenyon for two years.

SO! In order to celebrate the successful passing of our second due date, several friends and I did a Day of Food. It started with lunch. Don't judge us for sleeping in! I made hoagies. They looked a little like this:
Why, yes. That is homemade bread. And meat. No, not homemade meat. Nevertheless. They were more than delicious. /bragging

For dinner we had scrumptious creamy garlic chicken. And heavenly mashed potatoes. With a side of fresh fruit salad. My tummy was a happy camper.

We topped off our Day of Food with brownies. And possibly a viewing of The Scarlet Pimpernel. Because we are girls. And stories like TSP are the perfect brownie topping.

The lesson: Turn in your papers early enough to plan a fattening day with your homies. Also, knitting burns calories. A few, anyway.

Trains & A Walk

Yesterday evening, around 5:40, I was on a train heading south out of Exeter. It had been a beautiful sunny day, still crisp with winter, and the sun had a restorative effect on everyone's spirits. Now, as I looked up from my book to watch the countryside pass by, I saw the pinkish golden sunset in the low hills to the west, laying everything deeper into a soft grey shadow with the onset of twilight. It struck me again, as it has done many times in the past: I am in England, set down here like a grain of rice on the ground, so that this whole country, though much smaller than the States, feels vastly larger. I think these moments come about when I feel like everything about my experience so far can be encapsulated in what I am seeing. That pinkish gold sunset, the deep rose color of the sky - all at once it seemed to me that this was the perfect and only way to express my time here.

It may be somewhat silly, but there it is.

As you may have read from Claire's previous entries, she and I took a lovely walk a couple weeks ago that started out in the town of Beer, headed out across the fields and through a small wood, paused for a moment in a hamlet of Branscombe, then circled back along the steep gold cliffs toward Beer Head, with a stunning view of Seaton Bay, and finally returned to Beer. We chose a glorious day for a walk, as the sun was resplendent in all its late-February glory, and so the chill helped out quite a bit as we ascended the hillside, up to the top of the cliffs that led away from Branscombe. Seeing the figures on the beach get smaller and smaller as we climbed, stopping and looking at the water stretch away from us, was quite an experience. I adore these walks, the shared experience of beholding something beautiful. Saying hello to passing walkers is one of my favorite things now; it is like acknowledging that shared experience with a simple smile and a greeting.

Now that it is March, the weather seems to have got itself together a little bit. The sun makes itself known more often, and it was even almost warm the other day. It's very pleasant... almost too pleasant. There must be a severe bout of rain soon. I won't get my hopes up for a continuation of this sunlight. It is England, after all.

There are only four weeks of classes left. I have no papers due for more than a month. In the coming weeks I will be going to see Frightened Rabbit (again! Yes!) in Bristol, and when Karl comes to visit, we will be taking a day trip to Bath, and spending a long weekend in Edinburgh. Do expect more from me concerning these events.

The Long Awaited Wine and Cheese Party

Early last semester Deborah asked us if we would be interested, as a group, in a wine and cheese tasting hosted by Kenyon (and Kenyon Exeter) alum Marc Millon. What do you think our answer was? Alcohol & Dairy Products = Par-tay! W00t! It would be a refined kind of evening. Very adult. Filled with comments about vintage, aroma, and palette. Yes. Let's pretend we're all grown up for a moment.

Anyhoo. This event was finally held, after schedules were worked out, last Thursday. Marc, Deborah, and Mark's son Guy put together a great night. We tasted 8 wines in total, 4 with cheese and 4 with dinner. I went into the evening knowing little about wine other than the fact that I like to cook chicken in it. I came out of the tasting feeling that even though I'm no connoisseur, I can at least find my way through the wine section at Liquor Barn. A little more knowledgeable and a little more confidant.

The cheese was good too. I ate it. I ate it ALL.

In all seriousness, this party was not only a wonderful break from the Exeter campus, it was an opportunity to see Kenyon friends outside of class and to meet two very interesting and entertaining men. The evening was full of laughs, food, and pictures. And of course, the wine flowed into and out of our glasses.

This is one reason the Exeter program stands out. Great friends, great food, and an experience that opens you. And you feel it. Wine tastings are for grown-ups. And, whether we noticed or not, we are.

Blogger Fail

So, I make a promise to update on Saturdays and Tuesday and then I go and miss the first Saturday! I'm so sorry faithful readers! I'll make it up to you! With two, count 'em TWO posts today! First of all...the wonder of baked goods.

For various reasons, this semester the lovely Ashley and I decided to grace our Kenyon Seminar class with cupcakes every week. First, we thought it would be fun. Second, a three-hour seminar is always improved by the presence of food. Third, we love our group and want to give them yummy desserts.

This has been an exercise in commitment, creativity, and self-control. Commitment because we do it every Tuesday and it can take awhile. Today it went pretty quickly, I like to think that we get faster every week but we were also the only ones in the kitchen, and it still took a good 4 hours. A long day can take a LOT longer. Though we usually finish by 7. At the latest. After starting around 2:30. Yeah.

Our creativity has been...stretched through our decorating. My decorating. :) Going into this, we knew we were doing superhero themes each week. So far we've had Batman, X-men, Power Rangers, Superman, Underdog and Captain Underpants, and this week we did Justice League. We can't get too complicated. Our decorating set only has so many tips. That silver one in the pic is going to get worn out by the end. So we've been sticking to the symbols or recognizable characteristics.
And our control. Well who doesn't love cupcake batter?! I ask you!

Bonus: this cupcake was poked to test its doneness. It was done. However, the poke punctured the top and a black hole (more like black slot) resulted. It consumed any icing that came near it. I think this picture was taken around the third time we touched it up. :P

Beer to Branscombe

I won't be talking a lot in this post as I believe Caitlin will be posting about this in much better detail than I could.

Last Saturday she and I went on a walk. But not just any walk! We walked from Beer to Branscombe and back. It involved many obstacles. Like a cliff. And stiles. It was not for the faint of heart!


View Beer to Branscombe in a larger map

Here are some nice pictures for you!

This is Fore Street in Beer. We got very confused for awhile. This was not the direction in which we should have been pointing. Oops.











This is Starr House. It is old. Very, very old. Certainly older than your house.












The view once we got our breath back. This is looking back at Beer.













Here are the rest of the photos!

Beer to Branscombe

Why, hello. I do believe this place looks familiar...

I can't believe how long it's been since I've posted. Claire-proven fact: time goes by faster in England.

Anyhoo. My winter break was glorious. I will put links to pictures at the end of the post.

Since then, it's been crazy. I have three classes: Literatures of Memory on Mondays, Serious Play (a creative writing class) on Tuesdays, and the Kenyon Seminar on Wednesdays. That's right. I have a four-day weekend every weekend! The downside is that it seems to make the weeks go by SO much faster. March is next week. Next week! *looks longingly at the calendar*

Because things are happening so quickly, I've decided to try and keep a posting schedule. Look for my posts on Tuesdays and Saturdays. And if I don't post, you have my permission to kick me until I do.

Pictures!

I started in France...

Reims

Offenburg, Strasbourg

...and moved on to Germany...

Koln, Magdeburg

...before going to Denmark...

Hamburg, Copenhagen, Fuzzy

Helsingor, Copenhagen

...and ending in Sweden!

Malmo and Hassleholm

Another post in a minute!

A return to Bristol and London.

I returned to my two favorite cities for two spectacular concerts. On Valentine's Day I was in Bristol, and on the 16th, London. (Disclaimer: Do not let the fact that I felt okay skipping a week of classes for fun things be a deciding factor if you are a student looking for a study abroad program. Nope. Especially if you have a weakness for fun.)

Bristol - The Maccabees, The Bombay Bicycle Club, The Big Pink, The Drums

• One main bit of Bristol has a lot of shops and they're all on a steep hill. You feel like, at the top, you should have reached some awesome spectacle - indeed, there are some very nice buildings up there. It's worth the walk. (The Boston Tea Party on this hill is also worth the walk.)
• Any spare wall is plastered with posters for upcoming shows - Bristol is a very happening place, musically. It reminds me of Seattle. How nice it would be to live in Bristol and have access to the music!
• The slide: You may recall from my last post concerning Bristol a discussion of the smooth rock slope that has been polished to a metallic sheen from having seen the downward trajectories of so many rear ends. On the afternoon of my former visit to the slide, I was not able to go down it because it was monopolized by children. Pah! This time, however, was different. The slide was damp, but it did not hinder me. No, if anything, it sped me more quickly to the bottom, at which lay a large rocky outcropping! If not a near-death experience, it was certainly a near-injury experience. And yet, though I was yelling the whole way down and though I crashed bodily into the rocky outcropping at the bottom (it was the only way to stop) - afterward, I felt changed. Enlightened somehow. I wanted to do it again.
• The show: For dinner we ate at this very hip place that TJ knew (he seems to know all the hip places and is thus a valuable addition to any adventuring party), and it was called Start The Bus. Wow! Even the website is hip! The walls had been painted with quirky, professionally done doodles, with strange cartoons ("Sometimes you just want chips," says a doodle with chips protruding from mouth, nose, and ears.) and a Boston Tea Party-esque array of furniture. Almost oppressively hip. After that experience we traveled to the O2 Academy for the show, where at the door they took my camera (sigh) and so I have no pictures of what was otherwise an incredible night.
  The Drums, an American band, had a lead singer who was twig-like, blonde, and felt the overpowering need to make robotic gestures as he sang such fun songs as "Let's Go Surfing." Part of what I love about concerts is the audience participation. The lead singer of the Bombay Bicycle Club looked so happy when the crowd sang along with him (the crowd is a being with one voice and many hands.) As for the Maccabees' performance, well, let me just say that this band will probably define my time in Exeter.

London - Spoon, The White Rabbits

My next trip, for expenses' sake, was conducted in a low-budget way - cheap coach, cheap hostel, but these things weren't even hindrances. My time in London was amazingly fun. We spent most of it in the part of London known as Camden, which - well - I've mentioned before. It's my favorite part of London. It's probably the best place in the world. The atmosphere, the people, the market, the pubs, the music; everything is slightly off-beat, run-down in some places but charming and sharp in others, crowded and colorful, full of people selling things, wanderers, musicians, strangely-dressed folks and mundanely-dressed folks, huge statues of horses and labyrinthine markets hung with fairy lights and chandeliers, shops smelling of incense and the tang of spices mingling with the cool winter air and the press of voices.

In short, it is another world.

Now, as for the show, it took place in a venue called The Electric Ballroom. Somehow, some way, TJ and I were able to scoot right on up to the front of the crowd. I got to lean against the rail and be mere feet away from the bands, just like at the Frightened Rabbit show. I even got to take my camera in! The White Rabbits, whose music is full of energy on the studio album, is even more attention-grabbing on stage, and their performance was - how shall I say this? - electric. They swapped singing duties and instruments like it was nothing. I was enthralled, and then Spoon came on. Now, if you don't listen to Spoon's music, you should. Hearing all the songs I loved being played right in front of me, everything else disappeared. That night was seriously one of the best ever, right up there with Frightened Rabbit.

Afterward, the crowd left pretty quickly, but I wanted to meet Spoon. We caught sight of, and were able to talk to, two of the band's members, but Britt, the lead singer, evanesced before we knew it. While we were talking, a security guard came up (he was ushering out the stragglers) and asked us for our "passes" (like press passes, or backstage passes, I suppose). Dazedly, I handed him our tickets, which he seemed to accept as justification for our presence there, and so we were able to continue talking with half of Spoon long after everyone else was evacuated. It was great.

In closing: fried eggs.

Photos!

The silver ball at Bristol - sadly out of focus (that's us!)

White Rabbits

White Rabbits

White Rabbits