cafe ramblings

here i sit at an internet cafe, paying £1 an hour to finalize this weekends travel plans and to connect with my friends via the book of faces.

waiting for mario to show up...again. haha.

i am happy but exhausted from nonstop internship work, play-going, and sightseeing. being able to navigate the tube like the tube-riding-prodigy i am makes me feel unstoppable. i know it's lame as hell, but every time i find my way somewhere without asking for directions or having any waves of uncertainty lap at my brain shore, i feel empowered.

i've done a lot of exploring by myself and have really enjoyed my time. my favorite day so far is the day i bought 'my' acoustic guitar. [my is in quotes because i am selling it back before i go home! no really. i will. even if it is a FENDER and the sound rings more beautiful than damien rice's voice...yes. you cannot afford to keep this guitar, you are selling it back. end of discussion, katie.] so anyways, i went on an adventure to find a consignment music shop and ended up stumbling across the coolest hippy vintage part of town. reminded me a bit of little 5. everyone down there was awesome. i actually saw another person in a tye dye t-shirt! [no one, i mean NO ONE wears tye dye in london...] tattoos and piercings were a necessity apparently. don't think there was anyone i met who was lacking in either department. and every shop on either side of the street was a music store, artsy cafe, or tattoo parlor. i spent literally hours drooling over £2,000+ guitars and even playing with some of the locals. haha.

then i met the guitar of my dreams.
[the instant i touched it, i swear it glowed. purple.]
haha. after playing 2904387250938475 different ones, this one just felt right. so i bought it. right there. impulsively. even though it was way out of my price range and completely impractical for it's purpose. i don't care. it made me happy. so i did it.

our study abroad coordinator, sinead, warned us right after we arrived at the flat, 'live each day in london as if it's your last because someday you're going to be right.'

[woah.]

i've heard the first part of that quote a thousand times but her seriousness when adding the last part of the phrase made all exchange surprised looks and chuckle out of uncomfortable politeness. so that's why i'm spending way too much money to go to paris with the love of my life this weekend and impulsively buying musical instruments i do not play nearly well enough to actually invest in.

i could follow this conclusion with an entire paragraph about everything in moderation and how my life will fall to shambles in poverty within months if i continuously lived by this responsibility-lacking creed, but i won't. back to london.

london.

what a city! our gorgeous tour guide russell, with the tight white jean pants that made it impossible not to stare, must have referred to it as 'the greatest city in the world' 50 times on our tour of the london tower. i don't know if i'd go that far [i doubt russell has been to san fran] but i do love it. the diversity is unbelievable. you cannot walk down the aisle of a grocery store without hearing 4 different accents- from all over the globe! the people are so much more friendly than i expected them to be after all the cold, heartless horror stories i was told before i came. the weather is a bit glum but that just makes the sunny, warm, breezy days worth celebrating.

the royal history is fascinating. i've never enjoyed a history lesson so much as when we went to see the crowned jewels. i stood there mouth gaping as russell explained the beheadings, divorcing, stealing, inter-family marriages, six fingered wives, affairs, murdering of nephews, and discovery of hundreds of bodies beneath the church floors... you can't make up crap this interesting. i was rarely bulge-distracted during this part of the tour.

my internship is going really well. i want to write so much about it so i guess it will have to wait until tomorrow. it's already 11 and i have to go back to the flat, shower, eat, read hp, and go over lines before bed. and we're leaving for the leeds castle tour at 8 am tomorrow! woooo! [russell is our guide again. too bad we're all enamored. too bad he's 53. haha.]

i am promising myself to update more often and to add pictures next week at work.

goodnight, london.
katie