I'm Here!

Good news -- I made it to England! Here's a recap of my events:

At the airport last night, everything went well. Checked luggage, security, boarding, etc. I kind of had to fight with people to get to an overhead bin to put my stuff in, since the bins were above the row behind my row (as to be expected, since I got extra big gigantic leg room by being in the front of the economy section). Also, side note for Daddy: I was reading an article in Newsweek while I was waiting around, and it mentioned trainers debating on ellipticals v. treadmills. One said that they preferred ellipticals because it is easier on your joints, and the other said "most people prefer treadmills because it feels more natural." So that's like our argument. You need to evolve so you can use ellipticals.

Then, after boarding, things weren't too eventful. We took off pretty much right on time (we would have been early for takeoff, but there was a slight delay because of a "cargo discrepancy" that they had to remedy). I didn't get any more details on the "cargo discrepancy." I ended up sitting next to a pretty chatty Irish girl who I had to hear go on and on and on about things. The good news was that I understood like 80-90% of what she said immediately, and another 5-15% of what she said within a few seconds after she said it, which is good, since to me Irish people sound pretty much like English people. The bad news is that she had just spent 3 months in the U.S., though, and pretty much seems to have adopted a manner of talking that is easy for Americans to understand (she says "movies," not "films" -- unless that's Irish, too, and not just American). But it's still good that I understand people pretty well.

So because she was so blabby, I missed the start of all the movies -- and like the first half-hour of them. When I started flipping through them (there was definitely no on-demand -- this was the oldest airplane I had flown on for a while -- it still had built-in ashtrays in the armrests and in the bathroom), I immediately turned to a channel with a guy climbing. It took me a second and then I was like, oh, it's Alain Robert. It turns out to be a documentary on him. It's surprisingly long, but overdramatic -- about as overdramatic as you'd expect. At one point, though, they're interviewing his wife and she's saying "you know, you can't really give your kids a good education if you're only available by phone," or something like that, criticizing Alain, and he's next to her and he just starts laughing at her. That was kind of funny.

Then I watched Friends and The Office. Then, some channel briefly showed a picture of people mountaineering, and I got out my headphones to hear what was going on, but it switched to like lions and monkeys, and didn't say a single word about mountaineering that I heard.

Oh yeah, for dinner I had chicken and mashed potatoes, and for breakfast (no choice) I had a croissant and orange juice. We were supposed to land like 20-25 minutes early, but apparently there was a queue at Heathrow so we had to circle the airport for 20-25 minutes. So we landed pretty much right on time.

But then, the trouble started. First, it took another 20-30 minutes to get a staircase over to the plane, because, apparently, no one at the airport was ready for us (no one is ever ready for me). Then we have to get on a bus to get to the terminal, and we must have been miles away from the terminal, because it takes like a solid 10-15 minutes to get into T4 on the bus. Next, I have to go through immigration. No major problems there (which is good, because I was worried since my student visa doesn't kick into effect until the 15th), but they did want to see my letter of acceptance at Cambridge. I was happy to bring it out for them -- I've always carried that around and immigration is never at all interested in seeing it -- but this time they did! But immigration took a while. They've also revamped the lines so that even if I have a UK visa I still have to go into the "Other Passports" line (I think). Then I had to get my bags. I got one off the carousel pretty quickly. The next one, though, I waited a few minutes for. I saw a bag on the floor next to the carousel that looked like mine, but I didn't investigate immediately. But I noticed that no one else was paying attention, so I dragged my stuff over, and it was mine. Go figure! I wonder why it was there. Maybe somebody else thought it was theirs, realized it wasn't, and then put it next to the turnstile rather than on it? Everything still seemed to be in it, so that's all good. Next time I should attach a ribbon to it.

So by this point, I was late to meet Nick's parents, and Nick was long gone. Apparently his parents were like 2 minutes later than they wanted to be at the airport, and they were worried I'd already have come out and wandered off. But it was all okay.

Then I had to get back to Baldock, which took quite a bit of time (from like 10am to after 1pm). First we had to do the Picadilly Line (lots of gaps to mind) all the way to King's Cross, which probably took like an hour. Then we have to get tickets at King's Cross for the train, which took a while, but our train wasn't for a while, so it was okay. Nick's parents went off in search of the tickets while I just sat there guarding the luggage and watching people take pictures of Platform 9 3/4. Then, we had to take the train up to Baldock, which was another solid hour, and then walk the 10-15 minutes from the train station in Baldock to his parents' house with all the luggage. But we all managed quite well.

For lunch we had like lunch meats, and salad, and bread, and so I made a sandwich out of it, but (and this has happened before) they don't seem to do that -- they eat it all separate, and just use the bread as like bread-and-butter. I tried to wait and see what they did with their food, but they made me take mine first so I just winged it. I don't know if they knew what to make of that. Also, at one point, I couldn't get a piece of meat with a fork and so had to use my (clean) fingers and I don't know if that went over too well.

Then we had to go to Tesco for contact lens stuff (all taken care of) and apparently lunch food for tomorrow -- Nick's mom is sending him off with a lot of food for this trip. Since then, I've been reorganizing and repacking for our 4am departure tomorrow. Still haven't seen Nick, although he could be back in an hour or so.

That's about it. Future blog posts will be shorter and better written, but this one is more about being informative -- plus I'm tired!

Also, I have a cell phone, and I *think* it's number is 07546 580017, which means that if you're calling it from the US, you dial 011 44 7546 580017. But I'll try to confirm that. Also, don't try to call it immediately, no matter what, because I'm going to France and once I'm out of England it's 15p/minute to receive calls -- and I haven't put any credit other than the built in 20p onto the phone yet (and probably won't till I get back).

See you all on like the 24th!