There's a Theorem that Says:

There's a theorem that says:

The shortest distance between two points is a point.

At a point I am on a plane with 

wings made of feathers and

a captain who speaks in

a language I can't understand.

At another point I wake up in

a toxic cloud, surrounded

by tainted dreams where

vacuums turn to snakes and

leave me cornered on 

the bathroom counter.

At some point I am

wandering along a hikers path trying

to find whatever point

I'm looking for.

All I find are bees.

I hate bees.

I'm still confused

about which one is which.

The Dawn of a New Era...

So we all know I'm not in Kansas anymore... or London, as the case may be (mere semantics).  So I've finally decided what I'm going to do with this here blog, aside from the obvious occasional updates on pivotal moments in my life.  This includes, but is not limited to: sweet trips I intend on taking, embarrassing moments that will inevitably occur at various points in my future, and important meals I may consume (because let's not kid ourselves about the importance of food in my life).  Oh, and when, by a miracle of God, I graduate from college, you'll all hear something about that too.

I've been doing a lot of writing, as is customary for any Lit. major.  But beyond writing critically, which I'm forced to do on a far too frequent basis, I've been writing a lot more creatively; if I don't want to be poor for the rest of my life I should attempt to make something of these random and tiny bursts of creativity, so from time to time I will be posting and thus sharing them with any and all of you who may continue to read this.  

The more I write, the more I love writing.  I am learning about the process in general and specifically learning so much about my own process.  I no longer look at my writing as simply a "before" and "after" because I'm actually grasping some of what happens in between.  Lately I've been writing a lot of poetry (which is weird, because approximately 16 weeks ago I was dreading taking "Intro to Poetry" and now I love it).  Poetry has previously never been my thing, but somehow it's managed to turn into it.  That said, poetry isn't for everyone, I certainly never thought it was for me and therefore will not be hurt if you have absolutely nothing to say on the matter.  But because the people who read this are people I love so much, I thought I'd be a little vulnerable and put it out there anyway.  Happy reading!

Always with love,

Ashley

I Run Like A Girl

     Two days ago, October 19, 2008, I ran a marathon.  Simultaneously the best, worst and most painful decision I've ever made in my life.  Saturday afternoon Brittany and I flew to San Francisco (apparently it was JetBlue's first flight so we got free cake!!!).  Ryan few in shortly after us.  Nike had some awesome things going on, though I didn't want to wait for 3 hours to take advantage of any of them, so massages and pedicures were skipped in favor of our own personal pre-marathon food marathon.  We went to Italian street and had some pasta, then I ate Ryan's pasta, then we somehow got free tiramisu, then we went to this really delicious pizza place (3 bites in we were all feeling mighty sick), then I wanted gelato... let's just say that between the two marathons I completed this weekend that my body pretty much hates me.

     6am Sunday, dark and early, we got up, I ate the random pickings I could find (luna gummies, an apple, water) and jumped in the crowd of 20,000 runners clustered in Union Square.  Being that this was the Nike Women's Marathon, there was a LOT of estrogen (just over 1,000 men and that was it!).  The first 2/3 of the run can be described as a LOT of eating, surprised?  About every 2 miles there were food stations, orange slices, bananas, luna bars, more really gross gummies that I couldn't pass up, and I'm pretty sure I stole some pretzels from some random people along the way.  At the (very obvious) split between half and full marathon runners I seriously contemplated unofficially switching.  It was a good thing that I didn't because, though I couldn't see them, Ryan and Brittany could see me and probably would have jumped on the track and turned me back around.  

     Around mile 17 I hit my first wall (yeah, there was more than one) where I started mumbling profanities and talking to myself.  Around mile 21 I thought I was going to die, but I figured if I ran just one more mile than I could walk the last 4.  Approaching mile 22 I saw a giant sign that said, "Ghirardelli mile," which basically meant that I was handed the most delicious piece of chocolate I've ever eaten, and could thus stop running to eat it (Caramelized almond, if you must know).  I walked that whole mile, realized that it was still possible for me to MAYBE hit my goal of 4:30 and so I ran... all the while wondering if I might involuntarily break into sobs or vomit, or both.  Luckily I never actually cramped up to the point of incapacitating myself, which was nice, I crossed the finish line when the official clock read 4:36, but had yet to figure out my official time since I'd crossed the starting line after the clock had started running, I just didn't know how long after.

     At the finish line there were "hot firefighters in tuxedos" with little blue boxes on silver platters.  These little boxes held my Tiffany's necklace that I received for finishing the race.  I say "hot firefighters in tuxedos" in quotes because, though I'd read about and was excited for this before the race, I took no notice of them and basically headed straight for the bagel table.  By the time Brittany and Ryan got to me I had most of the chocolate chip bagel in (or around) my mouth, a jamba juice in the other hand, and was attempting, unsuccessfully, to pick up a bowl of granola.  

     I'm fairly certain that after such physical exertion that your body goes into a panicky survival mode, I think for about the first half hour post race that I was pretty out of it.  We basically went home to shower, got food, napped for 4 hours (being a spectator is hard work... just ask my two fans), went out and ate again, and then slept until morning.  It was amazing.  I found out that my official finishing time was 4:29:58, which means I hit my goal!  Now as I start day two my walk is reduced to a waddle, and likely will be for a while.  Though this post might, to some, sound like one big complaint, I really am SO happy that I did it, as I slowly regain mental capacity I'm more and more proud of myself for finishing the thing, overlooking the pain it is such an awesome feeling.  I don't know that I'll ever run a marathon again by myself, but it would definitely be fun to do with someone and apparently I was so encouraging (not) about the process that Ryan might entertain the notion... we shall see!

So this is me pointing to my name on the wall, I'm ALMOST tall enough to reach it!
Me crossing the finish line in the gray, don't I look happy?
And me after the race... eating.

Coming Home Again

     And so the end is upon me, at least for now.  At the moment I'm sitting in a coffee shop in London (not ideal for my last day here, but if you could feel how heavy my backpack is you'd understand why I'm being stationary).  Paul's cousin Matt is coming to meet me when he gets off work and then we'll meet up with Chris and Cat at his place so that I can shower and change into an outfit that I HAVEN'T been wearing over and over for the last month.  After that we're meeting up with Paula and some other Wood Greeners for my last supper at Wagamama's in Covent Garden followed, hopefully, by Ben's Cookies and perhaps a bit of dancing at KoKo as long as Chris is up for it.  Otherwise, perhaps we'll just have drinks at Punch and Judy's and watch the street performers from a safe enough distance so as not to feel obligated to give money.  

     This morning I left Kyle in Amsterdam, thus ending my month of backpacking through Europe with him, Darryl and Veronica.  We had a fabulous time, saw so many sights, went so many places, experienced so many languages and met so many new people.  So many things, in fact, that I won't even attempt to explain them all here because you'll get bored about 1/6 of the way through.  Considering that I'll be home tomorrow evening, I suggest asking me about any and everything.  Partly because it's always better to hear it straight from the horses mouth and partly because I'll be dying to talk about it all.  This particular trip was to Edinburgh, Stockholm, Rome, Florence, Cinque Terre, Zermatt, Cologne, Amsterdam.  I think I met the best people in Edinburgh and Stockholm (excluding, of course, Darryl's lovely friends who played host while we were in Germany).  I'd also have to say that Cinque Terre is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen.  We did a lot of climbing this trip, St. Peter's Basilica, the Duomo (or rather, the building next to it), the hills of Cinque Terre, castles and towers in Germany, etc.  Unfortunately we did not have time to climb the Leaning Tower (though we tried), or hike through Zermatt due to rain (instead we sat in a pub with Guinness... lazy!).  As a result I have a renewed love for hiking (and hopefully a good foundation for training hills for the SF marathon).  

     Veronica and I really got to have some lady bonding time, especially when it came to sampling the food, which we were all about (let's be honest, you can't fully experience any culture without experiencing the food).  I'm not sure if I've actually written about it, I'm sure I've talked about it, and I'm sure I'll continue to talk about it, because this little gem of knowledge has become very important to me: Hospitality.  Throughout the last 6 months I have experienced the true meaning of the word.  Everywhere I go, no matter what country I'm in I'm amazed at how gracious people are. and I want to make sure I make an effort to learn from that and try to repay others in kind as best I can.  I won't say anymore about that because then I'll feel like I'm repeating myself too much when I brag about how lucky I am to have met the people I have and been treated as well as I have been.  You can all look forward to meeting many new friends from abroad as I finally get to play home team and show a little American hospitality.

     I suppose I'm getting ahead of myself, I can't play host until I have my own place, and to get my own place I have to come home, which is what I'll be doing tomorrow from 3:10pm London time until 6:45pm California time.  I can't wait to see everyone, I'll be a busy bee next week trying to get back into the swing of things, be responsible and still see everyone so give me some time and we'll all get to eat, drink and be merry!  I'm going to miss London so much, but coming home was inevitable and I have no turned my focus onto how excited I am to see everyone that I've been missing oh so much!

Why do you call pork pigs?

     Today was a very happy surprise.  It's been a long week of goodbyes; Wednesday night Chris, Liz and I spent the night bonding before Chris skipped off to Paris with his mom and sisters and Thursday night Liz and I got wings for the last time.  Yesterday I took her to the airport (as her mass amount of luggage prevented the operation from being a one woman job) and spent the rest of the day consoling myself by exercising my wallet (during which I realized that if smoking crack were my coping mechanism it would probably be a lot cheaper).  This morning I went and met my friend Jon for tea and he informed me that it was the Queen's birthday today and that I should head to Buckingham when we were done.  I did so, forced myself like the pushy little girl I am to the front of the "queue" aka massive crowd of people and clung to the gates of Buckingham Palace (after walking from Charing Cross... CHAMP!) until the royal family came out onto the balcony.  It was so fantastic!  So many different jets flying overhead and thanks to the super zoom on my camera I got some awesome pictures of Prince Harry (and Prince William, the decidedly less gorgeous future King).  Now I'm awaiting the arrival of Kyle, who should be starting his journey on the Piccadilly line right about now.

     Now that the quick recap of my week is over I will attempt to give a brief description of my absolutely incredible trip to Salzburg, Vienna and Prague.  For the first time I feel like there is no way for me to accurately describe my trip (but now that I type that I feel like I've probably said something like that before).  I hope that, if any of you are even slightly interested in my trip, that the first question you ask me is "How was Austria?"  While I have yet to experience my upcoming adventures with family, I must say that Vienna is, without a doubt, my favorite European city thus far.  The architecture is beautiful and consistent, the palace is gorgeous, everything in the city is so accessible, the food is fabulous (even the pizza was pretty top notch, thank God), they have lovely traditions and the most important and wonderful thing about it is that the people there are indescribable.  However, knowing me you know I'll attempt to describe them anyway.  

     We had the good fortune of getting in contact with Rick's cousin and staying with him.  He picked us up from the train station and took us to his home where he'd prepared a room, bought food and drinks, a map for us and he even wrote his address on three separate pieces of paper in case we got lost so that we could give it to a cabby.  He was the most gracious host, he even set out a little jar of water in the bedroom.  That night his cousin Sebastian and their friends Michael and Nikolaus came over and we all went out to some bars and had such a good time.  I've had some pretty amazing nights in the last six months, and some pretty funny ones, and I can't remember the last time I laughed as much as I did that night.  The next day we went and got wiener schnitzel at a local place that gives you such large portions that it spills off your plate, if you ever get a chance to go I suggest you try it because it's delicious even if it stops your heart in the process.  

     After lunch Martin (who took off the day of work for us) and Michael gave us a tour of the city.  We saw the university, parliament, the supreme court (we even went on the roof where there's a view of the whole city), they showed us the spot where Hitler gave his famous speech (you know, the one you always see pictures of?), we had coffee and these pastries with "surprises" inside, Austrian chocolates, etc, it was a great way to experience the culture.  I prefer that to seeing a city from a tourist perspective, this way we actually got to see what their culture is like from a more realistic perspective.  That night Martin stayed in since he had to work early but Michael and a friend of his, Jakob came and took us out again that night.  On our way out we got little bottles of jagger from a hot dog stand and apparently it's tradition to wear the cap on your nose and then the person with the lowest number on the bottom of their bottle (yes, there are numbers) has to buy the next shot.  So here's a picture for your viewing pleasure of that little experience.
     After that we went to a local bar that Michael promised had "odd" people, he was right, we sat next to a group of garbage collectors still wearing their bright orange uniforms (mind you it's about 11 at night) and this guy Arnold starts talking to us about Fraternities (but I should be saying thanks Arnold, because he paid for all our drinks), and then there was a guy behind Liz who was really old and asleep in the corner.  We moved on to a club that was playing nothing but Austrian music, which to me was so much better than your average pop club because I can find one of those anywhere.  There was a conga line during one song, it was quite funny.  Before catching the bus the next day I walked to the palace, which is modeled after Versailles, it's beautiful, I wish I'd have had more time to wander but I was in a bit of a hurry.  That's where the Austrian Zoo is where there's a baby panda.  The maze was so tempting but I knew better than to go get myself lost right before I was supposed to head to Prague.

     Here are a couple of pictures of us on our tour of Vienna.  This one is in front of the Supreme Court with Michael and Martin.  
     This picture is of me on top of the Supreme Court building overlooking the city.
     Once we got to Prague and found Hamilton, my elementary school friend who offered us a place to stay, we got ready and decided to go out.  Before we went out we got some Bekerovka, which is a popular Czech liquor and had some drinks at the house.  Then Ham's friend came over and we all went out to a couple different clubs where his friend was djing.  It was such a fun night!  The next day Ham took us across the Charles Bridge and showed us the Lennon Wall, which is a tribute to John Lennon (and is also the wall I'm standing in front of in the picture below)
     After the Lennon Wall Ham had to leave us to go meet his new roommates while we wandered the city for the day.  Dre went to a museum while Liz and I opted to relax at the top of one of the parks near the castle.  Prague is a very hilly city so once we got to the top we had a great view.  Liz opted out of climbing the abundance of steps it took to get to the palace once we got down so I made the trek alone before meeting up with them at the Charles Bridge, it was beautiful inside!  We then went to meet Ham and headed to the beer garden, which is an outdoor area in the middle of a park on the opposite side of the city from where we'd been all day.  By the time we got there we were so pooped from having 4 late nights in a row and a whole lot of sight seeing (plus my allergies don't agree with Prague AT ALL and I was about ready to flood the park with my snot) so we grabbed the keys from Ham like big party poopers and attempted to find our way home.  Now in saying attempted I don't mean that we got lost, rather that it was just ridiculously far from where we were and probably took close to an hour to walk to.  I was so hungry so I stopped at a mexican restaurant (I realized all too late that it was the last place likely to have food before we got home and it ended up being really expensive, but I had no other options).  It had started to rain, which was weird because it was such a beautiful and hot day up until that point.  Once inside the restaurant we looked outside and it was literally pouring rain, luckily we were right around the corner from Ham's place and Liz and I spent the rest of the night in.  Dre, at this point, went to a friend's place who was also studying in Prague and we didn't see him until the train back to Salzburg.

     The next day Liz and I were in the ultimate poop mode and went to the movies to see Iron Man over doing more sight seeing (to be fair, we'd walked for no less than 9 hours the day before).  To make myself feel less guilty I braved another massive set of stairs to get to a very old church that overlooked the city from yet another angle.  Liz sat half way on a bench and enjoyed the view from there.  Here's a picture of the Charles Bridge during the beautiful weather we had (about 15 minutes before Hurricane Prague hit).
     At this point Kyle should be arriving in about 45 minutes, I can't wait for all of our traveling, if any of it is even remotely as wonderful as Austria was then I think we're all in for a treat.  First stop is a day trip to Cardiff (a 3 hour bus ride that equates to $10 each way, AMAZING!) on Wednesday.  Then next Sunday we're off to Edinburgh, Stockholm, Rome, Venice, Chinque Terre, Zermatt, Cologne, Amsterdam and then I'll have one night in London before coming home.  I figured I'd write in the itinerary here in case this is my last blog before I head out.  28 days until I come home, crazy isn't it?!  See you all soon!

Markets, Meridians and Mayhem

     This week was a really calm week.  I didn't do much other than read and go to the gym a lot until about Friday.  Wait, that's a lie, I feel like I always say that the week was uneventful and then I remember everything that I did!  Okay, so Paul left a little over a week ago, but not before we spent a bit of time with his cousin Matt one afternoon.  This was to my good fortune because I now have another friend in the London area.  We met up Monday to go to the National Portrait Gallery to see the Tudors and to otherwise count how many people we knew in each room (not many); our attention spans got us through a whole hour and 20 minutes before we called it a day and headed for the nearest coffee shop (Starbucks... go figure).  We got lost in Trocadero trying to find a place to sit and then went to Covent Garden for a drink and some WAGAMAMAS!  Oh man, I'm going to miss that place so much.  Saw the new Indy with my friend Chris, his girlfriend and Liz, I must say, a bit disappointing.  Oh well!

     Wednesday I attempted to go back to the Portrait Gallery to see the Vanity Fair exhibit only to find out that it had ended Monday (hence Matt and I seeing a "sold out" sign for it).  A bit bummed but not deterred I spent the afternoon in Camden Town wondering why I hadn't spent more time there in the first place.  It's basically a free for all of every kind of person you can think of, dressed any way you can imagine and it's wonderful.  There are a lot of street markets, vintage shops and food stalls so I had a fantastic time wandering and buying myself a very small medley of salmon sushi for £4, thanks Camden.  

     Friday Liz and I met up with Pete and Sharon at Borough Market and tasted quite a bit of yummy food.  It's like free samples at Costco but better.  We all had lunch together and then Liz and I wandered around Brick Lane for a while, took lots of pictures of graffiti (perhaps a Banksey in there?) and bought a few little things at some of the stalls.  On our way back we saw a shop that was selling prints of Banksey's graffiti and Liz is actually going to go back and buy one, they're so interesting!  This picture is of Liz and I with some of the "wall art" around Brick Lane, it doesn't do the wall justice, but we look cute so whatever!

     Saturday was really the big day out.  In the morning Liz and I got up and headed across the river to Greenwich.  We walked around the market stalls there (I found the most wonderful Rosary, I've been looking for one for ages!) and had a delicious crepe for lunch.  Then we walked over to the Maritime Museum and, more importantly, the Observatory.  We basically made a b-line for the Prime Meridian and had a mini photoshoot doing various poses to display all of the ways you can stand on or around a Meridian, pretty fantastic.
     That night we put on our cocktail dresses and jumped on the tube for the last Circle Line Party ever.  As of June 1, 2008 alcohol is banned on all of London's public transport so we made sure we were there to make history (or something like that).  The party was mainly organized through Facebook and had over 9,000 Londoners attending (I reckon there were far more than that).  At 9pm Liz and I got to Liverpool Street Station right onto the platform where everyone was geared up to party on the tube.  Officers had closed off the station by 9:20 and were not letting people onto the platform.  We hopped on the next train and wandered through the madness trying to find fun people to hang out with.  (Side note:  When we got on the tube at Wood Green we assumed the people in cocktail outfits were going to the same place as us so we went to sit with them, turns out they weren't but they're the most lovely people and they live in Wood Green!  We exchanged information with one of the girls so I may have new friends as more and more people go home before me)  Not long after we switched cars Liz and I got separated, right before Kensington (I think it was Kensington) we got stuck in the tunnel for over a half hour with SO many people and it was super sweaty and gross, I stood on one of the chairs to see if I could see Liz but no luck.  Little did I know she had gotten off already and onto another tube car, so to her good fortune she missed being stuck.  I had met a nice group of guys who were turning football cheers into Anti-Boris songs (Booooooris Johnson, he's a wanker, what a wanker... etc.)  Good fun, although at one point we thought that a guy in very close proximity to us was going to puke all over the place and considering our current stationary position we were really dreading such an event.  Luckily he kept it together for us all, thanks bud.

     It was amazing, people were ripping down adverts and tube maps and wearing them around their clothes.  There were people dressed up as super heros, alcohol bottles, and Boris Johnson (mainly funny blonde wigs).  It was supposed to be a cocktail theme (if you hadn't guessed) so there were a lot of people in fancy clothes and some tuxes.  By the time the train was moving again all of the boys I had made friends with had to pee and really the sweatiness was rather unbearable so we got off at the next stop and found a pub to hang out in.  I called Liz but she was, by that time, at home safe and sound.  The next morning I read about the party and there were 17 arrests and 6 trains taken off of the platforms due to vandalization and damage.  Apparently it got even more rowdy after we left!  Here's one of the few pictures Liz and I got before we got separated, hopefully it gives you even a fraction of a picture of the amount of people involved.  I have pictures of the platform as well, nothing but a sea of bodies!  I'm so glad we went, it really was a fabulous thing to witness.

     So there is my amazing story about the tube party, I suppose reading about such an event is not the same as witnessing it, but believe me when I say it was like nothing I've ever been to before.  Tomorrow Andreas, Liz and I are off to Austria and Czech Rep. for 6 nights.  I'm really excited because Rick Mohr got me in contact with his cousins so we will be meeting up with and staying with them in Vienna and then we will be staying with my elementary school friend, Hamilton in Prague!  It's always so much more fun when you have people to show you around or at least tell you where to go so we're really excited to have some locals on our side!  Hopefully I'll have plenty more to share when I get back!

Now it's time to say goodbye...

     This week has been a week of more goodbyes.  After we came home from Amsterdam we spent the night seeing Paul (Fellman) off by having a little kitchen party and laying low.  Paul (Railton) and I have been pretty lazy this week but it's been nice just being able to spend some time together.  Monday we saw Erica off by going to a few different places, met up with Breanna, which was nice because her and Erica are sorority sisters.  Tuesday we saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall with Andreas (SO hilarious).  Wednesday we spent the afternoon with Eileen, had what some might call a disastrous lunch (while others... cough, paul and I, cough... would call it a normal day), afterwards leaving Paul in the parking lot because Gordon didn't realize he wasn't in the car... I laughed, a lot.  Today we went to the Dali exhibit by the London Eye and it was AMAZING.  My favorites were the series on Alice in Wonderland and the series on the 12 tribes of Israel.  I finally bought his autobiography, which I plan on reading when I'm done with Elizabeth and Mary (thanks mom and dad... it's fantastic).  I feel like this week has gone by so fast and we haven't done a whole lot of anything.  We've eaten Nando's twice, had some Pizza Express tonight and generally have spent far too much time inside room 113 in Wood Green.

     Tomorrow night should be fun, meeting some friends to go to Cafe Pacifico for my fix of mexican food.  We will also be meeting up with Paul's cousin so that should be fun.  He leaves Saturday around noon and then I'm fending for myself for a couple of days, probably sitting in the backyard (if it's not raining) reading my book, otherwise I'll be inside... no biggy.  After having two smelly people in this room for two and a half weeks it will be nice to have some alone time so it's kind of perfect that everyone is gone at the same time (not that it matters but Andreas and Liz are in Rome and Chris and Traci are on their Greek Island Cruise).  

     I can't believe that I only have 3 full weeks left to live in London, walking along the Thames this afternoon, watching the sun shine on the Eye, looking at Parliament, I realized how much I'm going to miss living in this city; I really do love it here very much.  I, very unrealistically, wish that I could pick up everyone that I love and plant them in London.  Rest assured, now that my mind is free from thinking about school I've started to miss home very deeply, I'm very anxious to get home and see the people I care about.

     On another depressing note, I do believe that the following picture, 1 of a series of 5 from our night at the Globe, is the only (series of) picture(s) of all 7 of our little Wood Green group.  Real World London anyone?