The Oxford Outsider Returns

After a very crowded flight which left an hour late (not a big deal), we arrived safely in London. Things went quite slowly at the airport and it turned out that our luggage had gotten really soaked (I guess in Orlando, where the weather caused our delay). A bunch of our stuff, including our UK mobile phone and a ton of clothes were very wet and gross when we unpacked them. Fortunately, the phone still worked and the clothes are mostly okay. Some of our books were destroyed, though.

We arrived in Oxford and got off the bus, then realized we'd left our camera bag on the bus. The lodge had trouble finding our room keys while Andrew ran all over town and fetched the bag from the bus. Finally, we got to our very tiny rooms (we rented two since they're so small) on the north side of town. We share a bathroom with 3 other rooms on the top floor of this Hertfod College house. It's closer to town than we used to live, but very small and the shower is awful.

The good news (and it's mostly good news) is that we're in Oxford and having a great time - though getting virtually no progress made toward the quickly approaching school year. We've been to pubs, barbecues, out to lunch and dinner, to the library to visit Simpkins, to London to visit the British Museum and Dickens House, shopping at the local shops, and we've seen lots of old friends. It seems every time we've had a free hour or two, someone has invited us to do something with them. It's really been fun and we definitely feel welcomed back.

We just had a very nice coffee with the "other" Andrew, whom we haven't seen since we were still living apart last year. It's always nice to discuss education with Andrew, who has a unique perspective on things as a teacher, scholar and researcher, and who can genuinely relate to the problems facing schools like the one I teach at. I feel like I've been a bit of a disgruntled teacher while talking about my job here. I think part of me just wants to have someone intelligent say that I really do have a hard job, or tell me I'm not crazy for thinking it should not be nearly as hard as it is. I don't know. Part of me doesn't want to go back, either, especially since the summer has been so busy.

Tonight while Andrew (husband) is off playing games with his buddies, I'll be with some MCR folk seeing Fahrenheit 9/11. I wanted to see it in the States but hadn't had time yet.

Tomorrow PJ has invited us to a lovely dinner at the Octagon. He'll be preparing authentic Chinese noodles. Should be wonderful! And we hope to make it over to Lechlade tomorrow during the day. It's a small village not far from here where Shelley wrote a poem about the churchyard. There's a plaque at the churchyard and I'd just like to see the Shelleyan sites. Saturday is Andrew's degree day. Monday we'll be headed to Sutton Hoo, an early medieval settlement that Andrew has study rather extensively but we've never visited. Then the middle of next week we'll spend a total of three days in Edinburgh and York.

I'm sure the rest of the trip will fly by as the first few days have, and before we know it we'll be frantically asking ourselves why we didn't make the time to get ready for the new school year while we were here. I brought stuff to work on to get my TV class planned, but so far all I've had time to do is read The Scarlet Letter for my AP Lit class. At least I'm liking it better this time than I did when I read it in high school. The introductory essay by Hawthorne is just as torturous as I remember it, though. I got quite a bit read on the train yesterday and hope to finish it in a few days and move on to Catch 22, which I have never read and must also read for the AP students.