My inability to get wireless at St. Michael's hall, a lot of work, spending time with people, and lack of motivation since getting home means these last few blog posts are a few months behind. However, I did write things down in a notebook while I was lounging in the common room or somewhere else away from my computer. So while not posted while I was in England, they are still what I wrote while abroad.
Monday was our last colloquium, which was an extremely bittersweet feeling. It's funny, our first colloquium really didn't start till it was already getting dark, and the last one finished while it was still pretty sunny out. Just shows how long I've really been here. I talked more than usual this time, and even managed to touch on the main point of the article, so I was pretty satisfied. After that though, I managed to accomplish basically nothing. Really need to buckle down, I still have a lot of reading to do. Tuesday I went to the St. Peter's library and was a little disappointed. Since the Oxford students are done, I expected to have the place to myself, but instead it was as crowded as usual. And of course people still left stuff all over the tables so you couldn't use them even after they left. I did manage to get some work done, so I was satisfied.
Wednesday was our last field trip, so sad. We went to Kenilworth Castle and Stratford-Upon-Avon. While I was looking forward to seeing Shakepseare's birthplace, Kenilworth was actually a pleasant surprise and the better part of the trip. Kenilworth is basically ruins of an Elizabethan castle that once belonged to one of the Queen's favored, Robert Dudley. It was amazing, walking amongst castle ruins in England on a beautiful, sunny day. I loved exploring, and I admittedly went a little camera crazy, so that by the time we left my camera was dead. I walked around the entire place and stuck my head in every little nook and cranny I could find. Sometimes I would go with a group, other times I would just go off by myself. I also took quite a few creeper shots while I was on my own. We did spend a little more time there than was necessary, though. We spent an hour just laying in the grass enjoying the sunlight, or other little random things like cartwheels and somersaults.
Finally we went straight to Stratford, which is an interesting little town. The Shakespeare connection was actually not that important until the last hundred years or so, so most of the monuments or buildings are rather new. Of course, there are many old ones as well, and the birthplace and some of the surrounding shops are original. We went straight to the birthplace upon arrival, but had to wait a while before we could go in. It was interesting to see, but I definitely liked the globe better, and I really didn't learn anything new either. After the tour we only had an hour to explore the town, so a group of us hurried over to the church where Shakespeare is buried. I wasn't willing to pay to see the actual spot where his body is, and I was rather irritated to see that the church had its own giftshop inside the chapel. I liked walking around the tombstones, where some of them were so old and moss covered that you can't make anything out on them anymore; or there were some that written in lettering that none of our modern eyes could distinguish anymore. It took us a bit to reach the church, so we were only there about 10-15 minutes before we had to leave. I would have loved to see the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, which just finished major renovations earlier this year, but it was definitely too far away to go and see. There were also a couple of book shops I would have loved to look at along the way to the church, but being me it is probably a good thing that I didn't. There were actually quite a few shops in Stratford that you can find in Oxford.
Looked into getting a snack for the bus, but decided not to. The people who did were late getting back, so we gave them a little bit of a hard time. I meant to do homework during the ride back, but go figure I fell asleep instead. Back at CMRS I stayed up watching TV and talking with people, which is basically what I want to spend all my remaining time here doing, especially considering there's so little of it left. I really don't want to leave.
Thursday I got some work done on my paper after lectures, one of which was given by Alun.
Friday was our last lecture, only one instead of two. The topic was interesting and the lectern was good, but I really couldn't focus and only took one page of notes. Lunch was fun, since we spent it admitting how little work all of us had actually done on our final papers. Sadly, this is probably going to be a serious work weekend. However, while watching a movie in the JCR, I agreed to go to Blenheim in the morning with some people. Not entirely sure who all is going, but it should be fun.
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