The first part (about laundry) has been cross-posted to LJ. The other bit is new.

I am doing laundry which is 2 pounds per load (roughly $4... yeah). So I thought I could maybe just hand wash everything in a big sink and some boiling hot water. Which led me to believe I should throw on my peasent skirt and put on an apron and go poke at my soaking laundry with a stick. But I decided not to, and to just give up the 2 pounds. Since it costs so much, I took the risk of throwing most of it in together on the coldest setting possible. I did not put in my stockings (nor would I ever) or my white shirts, figuring that was just trouble. I have a bitty sink in my room with a stopper in it, so I started the hot water running in that. I filled it up and put in some soap and tossed in my clothes. Only the water was boiling hot. They have yet to figure out the whole combined tap thing and the whole restriction on how hot the water really can come out thing, so the hot water is hot enough to scald, or make tea with. In fact, Conrad stated that the combind taps are catching on. They call them "combo taps". To which Bre responded "we call it civilized." So funny, so true. Anyway, back to the story.I had to find a way to submerge my clothes without permanent damage. So I used the wrong end of my toothbrush and prodded at them with that. I think God must have delighted in that as much as I delighted in the thought of me washing my clothes in a midevial washroom. Here I am, standing over this bitty sink, prodding my clothes with my tooth brush handle.

In other news we went Camden crazy today. All for about 9 pounds I got a hugeish thing to cover that hideous bed spread I have, 2 scarves, and a HUGE lunch that involved fried noodles and real seafood (lobster, crab, mussles and clams).
While in Camden I found the perfect souvenier for Grandpa - an ash tray with paintings of various scantly clothed girls in them... like the old-fashioned Betty Paige kind, not today's version. It made me think of the boob mug he had, and if he were alive, I would have bought it and shipped it out immediately, even if it cost me 11 pounds like some other things I shipped out today.

That is all for now.

Smarter than the beverage

Here's a funny story I forgot to share. Happened about a week ago.
Bre and I went shopping, and found this "juice". They were buy one get one free at 1pound 45p. We both got 2, making sure to chose different kinds. They aren't HUGE bottles (1 Litre) but they are good sized. We get back to the FMC and I'm thirsty, so I crack one open, and immediately made this face I can't describe. It is beyond sickeningly sweet. So I let Maria, Bre and Emily try it, and they all like it. By this point Michelle (who lives here and works at the FMC) has come into the room. I decided to sip it again, and repeat my violent reation. Michelle starts laughing. Appariently you are supposed to dilute things you buy here. They don't sell juice in unconcentrated form. So I fill up a 6oz cup and put a coulpe drops in. Bre likes about a 60-40% ratio of juice to water. Today I found that it's supposed to be 4:1 water to juice.
It was pretty amusing. I don't like it that strong, but for the price I paid, this will be a pretty good deal!

In other news, I went shopping today. Well, "shopping". It made me want to cry, really. Half the things I couldn't buy because we have nothing to cook with. Bre and I saw a HUGE bowl of pasta and sauce in a movie today, and both were obsessed with it, ignoring the movie and thinking about pasta. Oh, what I wouldn't give... anyway. If it can't be microwaved, we can't cook it here. The other half of the things on the shelf were too expensive. I couldn't justify buying them on a limited budget when they feed us here. I did get some tea, biscuits/digestives/cookies that are chocolate coated on one side, and a loaf of bread (which is reasonably cheap here). I also bought lotion today, and it was insane. We won't talk about that though.

And we saw the changing of the guards (um, tourist trap?) and dyed Emily's hair Funky Cherry.

So here is what I have been up to:
Class, class, fun, class, fun, class, WEEKEND! (that being Thursday night)... so we had some adventures on the town. Thursday we ran around at night with our cameras and took pictures of the Tower Bridge - very cool.

This was a cute little door we found on the bridge. So we all got in.


The subject at hand.


From L to R - Bre, Amy, Emily, Jeff

And then...


L-R: Maria, Emily, myself, Bre

Friday we went out to the pub, as evident by the picture. Since Bre hadn't done shots EVER, we thought we might as well all do one and teach her... fun times. The place we went to was The Famous Cock, which evidently holds a different meaning in British terms.

The beer here is sooooo much better than American beer. But then again, just about anything is, because I think American beer tastes like pee. BTW - that is a pint. It comes in pints?!?

I am working on opening a picture website, but right now it is being stupid.

I returned to Camden and was successful in my hunt for cute black flats. And they were about 15 pounds. I also found some nice scarves. Scarves are the in thing here, and they are durn nice (and cheap!) scarves too. They are Pashmina, whatever that is. 100% Viscose, made in India. All I care about is that they come in every color known to man and cost about $3-$5, depending on what you want. Yeah buddy. Look in the picture of us at the Pub - all the scarves in that picture are good examples of what the others bought.

Today we went to church, which was awesome because we sang most of my favorite songs. Not to mention there is a subway underneath the church, and it rumbles at appropriate times. Even though I was more than glad to sing In Christ Alone, and it was amazing, as it should be, it did not compare to the Houghton student body singing it. Sorry, London, but you've got NOTHING on us!

It's a bit late, if you couldn't tell.

They tried to feed us this "lasagna"... it wouldn't have been *that* bad had they called it something else, but when you are expecting lasagna and you get burnt green noodles with odd veggies and some white sauceish substance... well, this is what you get. Sad Karla.


Pictures of the previously mentioned skirts:

Not the greatest picture, but you are supposed to be looking at the skirt, people. That is a wrap skirt.

Detail of the exciting embroidery at the bottom and on the waistband.


And the peasent one.


Lastly, I leave you with this picture of me in a phonebooth on a windy day.

Dublin! W00t!

We (we being 6 of us) just booked our trip to Dublin, Ireland! The best part is the plane was 29 pounds round trip, and the hostil will be about 50 for the weekend - we are waiting to see if we can get a group rate.

Amy and I are heading out the morning of Oct. 7th (the glory of not having Friday classes) and the others will join us later that night. We all fly out on the same plane on the 10th. That poor plane.

Just a TAD BIT excited!

But I have to be up for class in 6 hours. Night!

Eatin' good in the neighborhood

Don't worry - I think I'm eating pretty good here.
This loaf of Sourdough, 2 rice balls (Ragu - that has meat, sauce, peas, and some other random stuff and mushroom - which I haven't eaten yet), and 5 fresh, fat figs were all under 5 pounds ($10 american). The figs are amazing - 5 for a pound! Yeah buddy! And look at the size of them! You can't buy that at Wegman's.





This morning I waltzed about the town ON MY OWN and survived. I took a nice walk in the park, stopped for a cappucino at the Oasis, and went to the bank (only to find out I had to go to the post office). At the post office, the lady almost shortchanged me $100 because she didn't know the difference between american denominations. Don't worry, I fixed that right quick.
Then I bought those figs from a cute guy with a nice tan that kept winking at me. It was amusing.
I went up to the barn and bought some converters and the rest of the food pictured above. Now we are off to find scarves.

But first - a glimps of the festival we went to last night, including fireworks over the Thames (from which you could see Big Ben, Westminister Abbey, and St. Paul's Cathedral.

A higher calling?

So perhaps I have found another purpose for this thing. I think I will use it to keep all my American fans up to date - well, at least for those who do not have access to my LJ, which I will be keeping up to date as well. So we can try this out for a bit and see if it works.

I just made this so I could comment on Becky's blogs.