So THIS is Falmouth...

Been here for a little less than a week, but that's been a very, VERY interesting week. Some notable moments...

-Four hours in immigration. I think that may count for time in prison.
-Met four out of five roommates. I got VERY lucky in that one.
-Nice house. My room may be haunted, though. We'll see.
-Three days to get my key. Heather & Lay aren't the most understanding bunch, about a lot of things.
-In Norway, any American is a celebrity. I was uncomfortble at first, but then the tall blonde girl sat on my lap.
-Yesterday I bodyboarded for the first time ever. I can't believe it, I'm near the ocean and using it! What the hell???

I'm going to try and get a bank account here, get a cash flow started. It could be over a week before our house internet is set up. Not a long post this time, got a lot to do yet. But so far, I'm doing alright!

[Philosophical Moment]

This past week has been a very stressful one for me. I've been going non-stop trying to get all the last little things together to make my travel a smooth one, and as usually happens, I ran myself too hard and crashed in the form of an ear infection. I'm just about ready to hit the road, but I'm still nervous as fuck.

The reason is I'm about to go through a monumental change in my life. I'm going to grad school, I'm going to be living in another country, I'm going to be cut off from all the people I know and surroounded by people I don't. Bigger than that, I realized in living with the folks again, is this is the first time I'll be living without the support structure of my family, who I've always relied upon.

This is NOT a bad thing for me, I'm starting to understand. It's a huge change, but it can be the source of huge improvements. I'm going to have to take command of a lot of things that, until now, I've left to chance. In college I met most of my friends through a single person that liked to be in charge of other people's lives, and while I've singled out the ones I prefer over the years, I'd rather have met them on my own terms. Jobs are things that are usually gotten through friends, and that'll always be a factor, but for what I want to do, I'm going to have to make my own connections in a real hurry. It's going to be hard, but if/ when I get through it, I'll be a better person.

This year in England is going to be a telling point on a lot of aspects of my life. All I can do is hope I can make the best of it, and do everything to see it done. "Do! Or do not. There is no try."

[/Philosophical Moment]

Son. Of. A. Bitch.

The past seven weeks, there's been one big thing I've had to take care of: my student visa. To get it, I need my passport, proof of enrollment, proof of residency, and documentation that I can pay for it all. It was this last part I was waiting on, then I could go to the embassy in Chicago, pick up my visa, spend the night at Evan's drinking, come home and spend one last weekend in Indy. That's out the window now.

See, after spending all week trying to track down my loan forms with Sallie Mae, it turns out what I needed was the letter from the school saying I was approved, and that I got last week. So I make plans to go up to Chicago Friday morning, which someone leaked to the Fates and the Fates said "Nay." See, two things happened this morning. One: I woke up at 2 a.m. with my left ear about to rip itself apart. An ear infection and me three days from an international flight. Two: Friday is 100% booked at the British Embassy, so even if I was healthy enough to drive five hours, they wouldn't let me in. So, yeah, no visa for me. I'll have to get a temporary one when I land and get the official one later, a strategy highly unrecommended by the school, but what else am I going to do? WHAT?!?!?!?

Marsha laughed hysterically at this. It was funny.

Testing Continues...

I was over at Bethany's last night, sipping fine liquors and discussing various enlightened topics of the day with fellow outstanding citizens of the local area (read: getting drunk and talking smack), when blogs came up. Bethany has one on this very service, I discovered, so I'll be linking to it soon as I can find it again. Funny thing was, when I pointed her to mine, only the first post came up. This was disconcerting, she should have seen three. She also has a whole bunch of personalized stuff incorporated into her template, while I'm just sporting the standard shell. So much more to do with this e-bitch. Learned today that Indy Game for this Sunday's been cancelled due to Garret's work schedule. I was really looking forward to finishing this last adventure with them before heading out, but there's some comfort knowing that it's not my fault.

I wanted to visit Rory, Evan, and the Grand'rents before leaving, but that could be tricky with this being my last week here. I'll be going up to Chicago so Evan's kind of a done deal; he wanted a weekend but that just ain't happening, little bro. Rory, if I can manage it, will also have to settle for a weekday evening, I think. Grandma and Grandpa are easier to please in this respect, snce they don't have any binding reservations during the day. Still, lots to do.

Here's a test photo. I'm going to have to take some more recent photos. Also, Blogger REALLY doesn't like imageshack photos. Going to have to work on that.

Troubleshooting

So apparently I can't see my second entry. Don't know if that's a problem with me or the server, but I aim to rectify this sitiashun by the time I leave the States. So here's hoping.

One step closer, two steps back

Every time I wrap up one project, I find two more to work on. My student loan got approved, but now I need to get my visa, which means probably another trip to Chicago; Julia Carson's office wants to get involved, but I don't know what they can do. And the dog's going mad, hang on...

There's a bunch of Evan's stuff on the driveway that he didn't want at his apartment in Chicago, so it's just sitting out there. I'd be a bit nervous of it getting stolen if our 100-pound dog wasn't deranged about visitors.

This blog is OVER!!!

What's this, some kind of blog?

Well, it was bound to happen. I am now a blogger. Lord help the internets.

I'll have a bunch of things going up here soonthe closerI get to leaving the US, but for now I'm just playing a bit.