Church bells

I am, honestly, sorry to anyone who's been faithfully checking this silly blog in the hopes I've written something new. My supervisors have said the U word - "upgrade" - and so I'm working full tilt on proving myself a viable academic.

But tonight I'm sitting up in the departmental work room, and I can see the west face of the Minster all lit up through the window. A few minutes ago, the bells tolled the hours.

England is a frustrating, silly place sometimes. But I love it here and when I leave, I'll miss the church bells.


P.S. No luck at SSHRC this year.

No one's kicked me out yet!

I've discovered a wonderful new place to study. I take my handy-dandy membership card and my book, and I go sit in the Chapter House in York Minster. It's calm and quiet,* and there's really something to be said for reading medieval theology in a room constructed 700 years ago.

I sat there for two hours today, until the cold stone got to be a bit much for my keister to handle, and an hour and a half yesterday. I expect I will be making a regular pest of myself.


* Except for the occasional school group, but they don't generally stay long, and often I learn something from the tour guide.

Being in Britain

I am now gainfully employed! I have a job at the local spice shop/Indian grocery, working part time. I won't start till I get back from my trip home, but they said they definitely want me and they're cool with waiting. That also gives me time to pick a schedule and apply for an NIS number so I can actually get paid.

I'm so excited!! It's kind of fun to be excited about going to work again. This isn't just a source of funds - I'm genuinely happy to be working at this place.

In other news, today is the Queen's birthday. There was a 21-gun salute in the park. Now, I expected something like, say, shoulder rifles. Not cannons. Cannons are loud, by the way. Very loud.

In other news, I got an email today saying I've been offered a space in my res for next year. I don't have to move! Woo!

On the whole, it's been a good day. :D This calls for country music, possibly with dancing around in my room.

Warm water, I tell ya!

Today I had to use a public washroom. Joy! The sinks only had one spout!





EPIC FAIL.

It only ran hot. I burned my hand. Actually burnt.

Another crazy thing about this country, and Researchy Stuff

Britain has yet to discover warm water. They've got "hot" down pat, and they've mastered "cold" as well. The revolutionary idea of combining the two is still undeveloped. Sinks (and tubs) have a hot spout and a cold spout. Rare is the sink that has but a single spout, from which pours forth wonderful warm water.

In regards to school, I am still working with Margery, and I'm rather annoyed that I will need to read such a wide range of material on her in order to effectively make a point. Everything from the political situation in Lynn in the early fifteenth century to gender relations and the larger milieu of female mysticism.

Today I hearkened way, way back to 4th grade or so, and started making a tally sheet. I am tallying the references to individual works and authors in the mentally-related entries in the Dictionary of Medieval Latin. A chart! David would be pleased. I can even make it fancier and combine it with my Middle English references. (Some of the entries are from Anglo-Saxon/Latin glossaries and point me to further, older, vocabulary!) And then, I can arrange them according to genre.

Charts make me feel like I'm doing something more concrete than just theory-work.

Maybe that's why David likes them so much. You can't argue with a good chart.

Another thing I really like about the Dictionary of Medieval Latin is that it draws on a wider range of genres: the literary sources are balanced by historical and theological sources.

However, I'm finding the actual definitions kind of irritating. Most of the entries gloss a morphological variant of "fool" - but the whole point of what I am doing is to try to figure out what that actually means. And I got a kick out of the glossing of fatuosus and fatuus with "lunatic." "Mad" would be a decent translation for some of the listed sources, but "lunatic" is just plain silly. "Lunatic" refers to a cyclical (generally monthly) madness, not just any madness at all. Sloppy. Tsk.

Life goes well, and now I go back to practicing Latin for the exam in April. :) Cheers!

"Holy crap did you feel that?!"

So I'm sitting at my desk, happily scribbling away about the past scholarship and problematic issues surrounding healing miracles in medieval lives of saints, when all of a sudden my desk starts to shake. And my chair.

Maybe there's a truck going by. No, it's taking too long. Maybe someone's jumping up and down? Why the heck would they do that at 1am?

So it subsides and I poke my head out of my door. Most of my floormates are doing the same thing.

"Did you just feel that?"
"Was that an earthquake?"
"Did anyone else feel that?"
"It wasn't just me?"
"It woke me up!"
"I thought it was someone on the fire escape!"
"My first earthquake! Cool!"
"I haven't felt that since the Halloween party!"
"Amazing how many of us are still awake at 1 am."
"Did you feel that?"

About ten of us were clustered around our stairwell, peering up and down to confer. It was really quite comical. Tomorrow I will buy a newspaper and see if it's mentioned. I didn't realise England had perceptible earthquakes.

And now, back to the difficulties in conceptualising and identifying disability in medieval hagiography.

Someone directed me to this amazing website. It seems we had a Magnitude 4.7 quake. Pretty fun.

If I make a donation, do I get to plunder, loot, and pillage?

This week sees the 23rd Annual Jorvik Viking Festival in York.

There will be nutters in the streets in pointy helmets.

I'm so there.

My life in my hands...

I took my bike out today. I figured it had been long enough, eh?

Wow.

First I had to get it up the stairs from the cellar. Oh drat, it's raining (and slippy). Perilous. Then I had to re-attach the sensor for the bike computer. Then switch the wheel around so it would actually sense something. Then realise the rear tire was deflated. Then try to pump it up (good investment, there).

At last I set off. Didn't feel safe just riding off into traffic, so I used a crosswalk to get to the other side of the street. I was okay at first, though a little nervous. Then I noticed it was rush hour. And dusk. Oh, my headlight is out of juice. And I was nervous about all the cars which made me less steady. Didn't take long for my nerves to go, and I veered off onto a side street. Got my bearings, decided to abort mission and head for home. Except the most known route back was the way I'd just came, and no way in hell was I going back there. Took a wrong turn along the river. It was pretty, and I'd love to go back. Got going in the right direction. Got turned around again. Found the city centre. Went the wrong way. And again. (They don't always bother labelling streets around here.) Finally! I know where I am!

Tomorrow I will try again. In the light and the non-rush hours.

Chips

Mmm, delicious pub chips. No, for the zillionth time, I did not have fish. I don't like fish. I don't care if it's traditional. All I wanted were the chips. :)

And they were delicious. Simply lovely.

My tuition fees are due tomorrow and I'm not sure yet how I'm going to get those paid. Is a puzzlement.

Yes, England Is Wet

People have asked me, "Is England really as wet and rainy as the stereotype?"

The answer is yes.

I present to you:
Exhibit A
Exhibit B
Exhibit C
Exhibit D
Exhibit E
Exhibit F
Exhibit G

I've been told there's a bar here that's particularly susceptible to flooding. Apparently it's something of a gimmick, and people think it's hilarious to go drink beer with their wellies on.

Settling In, Day the Fourth

This should be the almost-last of these posts.

I got up again today and went down to campus, armed with a photo. I got my school card! The background picture is a duck. I took lots of duck pictures.

I registered at the campus clinic.

I found the Graduate Students Association dining hall. I also found the GSA office, and the Overseas SA.

I found the chaplaincy office, but he wasn't in.

I returned the ethernet cord I bought. The free one was short and made life difficult, so I asked if I could have another free one. I made some packing mistakes, but a fortunate whim was bringing my ethernet connector/extender. Ha! Take that, 20quid* cord!

I tried to open a bank account, but I didn't have an original offer of accomodation (because it was emailed to me), so I had to go to CMS and ask God to draft me one. Being full of awesome, she did.

I found St. Wilfrid's, the closest Catholic church to me.

I also took a lot of pictures of stuff. This is Clifford Tower. I think it was part of William the Conqueror's castle. I'll double-check. This is part of the old city wall. They call them "bar walls." The gates (which I thought I had a picture of but don't) are called "bars." This is an old church in the middle of the city. I'm not sure how old it is, but it looks cool. It has a courtyard in the middle, with some columns. There is an old Roman column that was dug up and re-erected, but I don't have a picture of that yet either. I do have a picture of the old Roman wall that was part of the original settlement. It was called "Eboracum" back then.

I also found the Staples and got some cheap pens and located the bic mechanical pencils. Victory! But I'm buying a bunch next time I'm in Canada.

And then I came back and made chana masala and it was delicious. Very delicious. I think I'm going to try it cold in a pita tomorrow for lunch, perhaps with a bit of yoghurt dressing. Mmmmm.

Yeah, I'm hungry again. And I have reading to do. But I've brought you up to date!

* "Quid" is easier to type than £.