one month gone?

"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying."
-Oscar Wilde

First off, an apology to those of you who think I'm too stupid to line up my pictures correctly. I just realized that if you view this page with internet explorer, the pictures are all out of whack, so some of you have probably been thinking that I'm an idiot for quite some time. (Or at least more of an idiot than usual.) I promise that they look better in firefox, and if you're still using internet explorer, then it's your own fault for not upgrading to a better browser.

Yesterday was the one month mark of my being in Kingston, which is crazy. I feel like I've been here forever, but the fact that I'm almost down to three months is a shocker. With the amount of trips and British Life fieldtrips being planned, I'm pretty sure that time will continue to fly by.

This week was a quiet one. On Thursday, I had to do field work for Evidence & Issues. This involved administering a survey in Kingston Town Centre. Now, everyone knows that people who are in town for a day of shopping are not interested in stopping to fill out a questionnaire on crime in the area, especially when it's considered a very safe place. To make matters worse, our target group was elderly and disabled elderly, so we had to hound old people with canes to answer our questions. And to top it all of, I was randomly selected as the team leader, so I had to choose a place to interview in town and do things like assign meeting places. Not easy, considering I don't know my way around all of the town centre. It will suffice to say that I wasn't looking forward to this, but it turned out much better than I had expected. Most people immediately said they didn't have time when I asked if they had a moment, but I quickly discovered that several elderly people like to sit on a bench and rest in between shops, and most were more than willing to answer questions while they relaxed. All in all, I thought it was quite an accomplishment. And next week, the lectures on forensics computing and linguistics start!

Yesterday, I headed into the city for the day with Sara. We started out at the British Museum and spent a couple of hours wandering around there. In truth, I only found few of the rooms interesting. I know that I'm not much of a history person, but I was expecting more than nine million rooms of pots and knives. The Egyptian stuff was cool though; there were plenty of mummified bodies and skeletons to keep me entertained. I also liked some of the things from the Greek and Roman empire age. Maybe if I remembered more of my global history from high school I would have appreciated it more. After a lunch of fish 'n chips (I eat a lot of that here), Sara and I went over to the London Aquarium. It was yet another disappointment, because a lot of the exhibits were closed due to construction. We did see some sharks and several fun fish, but we missed out on a lot as well. Luckily they gave us vouchers to come back after the construction, so we'll have to return towards the end of the semester. We hung out for awhile, looking through some shops, grabbing some food, and taking a few pictures of the city. Neither of us had taken the traditional phone box picture yet, so we made sure to check that off of our to-do list. Neither of us had been by the Tower Bridge yet either, which may be my favorite site in the city, so we stopped by for a picture. Then it was eventually time for the Jack the Ripper walking tour! The tour took about an hour and a half, and we walked to several of the murder sites while our tour guide talked in detail about the murders committed, the victims, the problem of arguing police jurisdictions, and theories on the identity of Jack the Ripper. It was extremely interesting, given my vested interested in crime. I think I'll pick up a book on Jack the Ripper sometime and read more about the murders, though it sounds like the experts argue disagree on almost every detail. It was a fun way to spend the evening, and this company offers several other walks, so I'll probably take a couple more when I have free time.

I satisfied my craving for American television last night by watching a few episodes of American Idol online. I made it all of the way through Hollywood week, and as usual, group night did not disappoint. Anybody watching it this season? Care to tell me why Jamar is gone? Hmph. I also discovered that there is an American Food section in the bottom of Bentalls department store. I checked it out the other day and found things like jif peanut butter, swiss miss hot chocolate, hershey's chocolate sauce, teddy grahams, apple jacks, fruit loops, oreos, and a few other things you can't find other places. No cheez-its, though, but apple jacks will surely beat out the cereal I've found here so far. I'll have to stock up sometime in case I ever need an American fix. =)