Trick-or-Treat!

(please notice my little black kitty cat Halloween earrings...

you can't really see them can you?

They're cute, I promise.)

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Well! I didn't even think I was going to celebrate but this family really likes Halloween and they're pretty into it. We only just bought the pumpkin this afternoon at the grocery store and as soon as it started to get dark outside Curtis was saying "We have to get that pumpkin carved so people know we have candy!!" I figured pumpkin carving must fall under my job description so I rose to the challenge.

Not bad, huh? I worked real hard. I hadn't properly carved a pumpkin in ages and it was actually pretty fun. I was tempted to get real creative but knew that I didn't really have time for that and didn't want to disappoint myself. We popped a candle in and put him outside to greet out trick-or-treaters.

When we still hadn't had any trick-or-treaters at about 7pm Curtis was starting to sound very disappointed. We bought SO much candy at the store today and it was sitting and waiting in these cute little pumpkin buckets. Curtis had put out some decorative witches and even brought the gargoyles back out of the garage (I personally really like the gargoyles -- they're griffins. I think Kimberly must have hidden them in the garage before her parents came into town). But, finally, the cute little kids started ringing the door-bell. I think we've had about 30 come by. It's fun. They have cute costumes and they're all very polite and say thank you about 4 times before leaving.

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In the first group of boys that came by one of them said "Are you American?" and I said "Yes, I am!" and he said "Everyone is! Why are they all American?" and his friend said "because it's an American holiday, stupid!" And it was really funny.

Lauren and her friend Anna went trick-or-treating a little bit ago (basically wearing their school uniforms and some 3-D classes with the lenses popped out) and they're currently off to Blockbuster. I have requested something NOT scary.

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And I am sitting here enjoying some peppermint tea, letters from Steven and Paige and my new book -- October Sky. I'm really tempted to read it all tonight since when I wake up it will be November and the book is about October... We'll see what happens.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Tree Stars.

Guess what movie I'm watching right now.... THE LAND BEFORE TIME!! I know. It's the best. How lucky am I that it just happens to be on TV right now? So lucky.

I know that I've already said this about a dozen times but the weather here has been really wonderful. I don't feel like it's even gotten very cold yet and the nice, mild, decently sunny days just make me so happy.

I really want to be outside enjoying the non-rainy weather as I expect the dreary weather will be coming soon but I've recently decided, no wait, I've know for a long time, that I don't love walking the dog. He stops so much and is always yanking on the leash and it's just not my favorite. So I'm seriously considering taking him for a walk through the neighborhood (after my movie is over of course) and then taking my ipod and going on my own walk around the lake.

Then again, I'd probably be just as happy to sit around here and check things off my to-do list and read my book, which I'm really enjoying, and write some letters -- except that the postal workers are on strike so I don't know if it would do any good to make the extra effort to get my letters out today anyhow.

Happy Friday! I hope it's a good one. I don't have anything planned for the weekend... I'm hoping we get some trick-or-treaters here tomorrow because that would be fun but I left my red thing at home so I don't have a costume this year : ) Since all of my good costumes in recent years have involved the red thing. If you do something fun for Halloween, I want to see pictures!!

Sparkley Water and a Waffle.

Lauren and I shopped around London for about five hours today and that's all that either of us purchased -- one very large glass bottle of sparkling mineral water and one waffle each. We hopped on the train at 10:19 this morning, took the tube to Oxford Circus and spent the entire day walking through the shops of London.

We stopped in French Connection (it's just been this past week that I figured out that FCUK stands for French Connection U.K. Took me a while, huh?), and Banana Republic, walked through Selfridges and then walked into a store called Liberty. They have everything there: Bedding, clothes, fragrances, fabrics, yarn, dishes, shoes, Christmas decorations... you name it. The store is in a really cool looking building too (first two photos: 1) flowers outside of Liberty -- have you ever seen a dark purple calla lily? 2) the many floors of Liberty).

I decided it might be really fun to go find Hamleys -- the gigantic toy store. Bad idea. Considering that it's half-term and all the kids are out of school, we just should've known better... there were so many people in there we couldn't even move!! We took the escalators up a few floors but finally just decided we had to leave. It was super hot in there and we were getting overwhelmed. It seemed like all of the employees where just playing with the toys : )

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We also found the brand new Anthropologie store on Regent St. It was fantastic and it made me feel at home. Like I was on 5th and Pine or in U Village or something : ) except that since the store is brand new it means they don't have a clearance section, and I absolutely cannot afford to buy anything in that store unless it comes from the clearance section.

On our way down Oxford St. headed to Hyde Park, we were enticed by the smell of waffles and had to stop. It was lunch time anyway. Milk chocolate for Lauren and dark chocolate for me! It was a little messy -- I don't even really know how the fork was supposed to help. I was a bit intimidated by it and maybe a little embarrassed to eat it so I carried it around for about ten or fifteen minutes before attempting to conquer it. I prevailed.

Lauren had absolutely no intention of doing as much walking as we ended up doing but she was a trooper and I really appreciated it as it saved me money... on our way to Hyde Park we found this magnificently huge horse. Of course, I needed my picture with it. The horse is part of a war memorial. There are war memorials everywhere here but this particular one was built to honor the animals that were lost in the wars. Poor animals. That tends to be my least favorite part of war movies. Steven can attest to that as I tend to ask "are the horses going to get hurt?" whenever we watch something that seems to have that sort of potential.

Hyde Park was absolutely lovely today. The sun came out and made the leaves all look bright and pretty. It was so nice being in the park after walking through the crazy busy city. There were paddle boats and rowboats out on the lake and people out walking and it was just so pleasant.

We were just going to walk through the park until we got near to Harrods but... neither of us knew where exactly Harrods was so we ended up walking a little further than we meant to. We didn't realize how far into the park we had gone until we came across the Princess Diana memorial fountain. There were lots of little kids playing in the water and it was fun watching them. It was a bit cold for me otherwise I might have joined in.

Lauren also lets me take loads of pictures! This wasn't the only time that she decided to find a place to sit for a minute while I took pictures of everything I could see.

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When we left the fountain area, I pulled out my super cool tourist map -- the one from the Big Bus tour that has very few street names and lots of pictures of all of the touristy places -- and then decided that I needed to use the real map that Kimberly let us borrow for the day. We finally found Harrods. It's amazing. I really enjoyed it and am looking forward to spending a bit more time in there. I probably can't buy anything there either but it's so much fun! We looked at the Valentino dresses. Wow. You wouldn't believe the price tags. Well, maybe you would. They have lots of Wizard of Oz decorations all over the store including a collection of very modern looking ruby slippers created by some high end designers. The food halls at Harrods were fantastic. They had similar ones at Selfridges. The food halls are full of, um, food! It's kind of hard to describe actually but they just have all sorts of amazingly fancy food and then different stations where they serve various types of foods and a fancy little bar area where kids were sitting with these amazing looking gelato sundae type things. Lauren and I each bought some sparkley water (that's what Caitie Anderson used to call it when she was little and I babysat for her) and continued on our way. That was my big Harrods purchase -- a $1 bottle of water. It is a pretty bottle though AND now I have a bag that says Harrods. I suppose I'll have to save that for my scrapbook!

By the end of the day we were very tired and hungry and ready to be back at the house. The train back seemed slow and we had to walk back to the house in the dark but I certainly enjoyed myself and thought it was well worth it. I was so thankful to have Lauren's company. We pretty much talked all day and while she might not think I'm the coolest 22 year-old she's ever met, she doesn't exactly seem embarrassed by me either.

You may consider this my Christmas card to you.

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Love,

Steph

Wait. What?

Okay, so we just changed our clocks here last night -- woohoo!! Extra hour of sleep! -- but then I talked to Mom today and we had a slight disagreement on what time it was. Each of us was trying to tell the other that it was an hour earlier or later than it really was. Turns out you guys don't change your clocks until NEXT weekend. Who knew? So, I'm only 7 hours in the future as apposed to the usual 8.... just thought you'd like to know.

The Mountfords.

Oxford Take 2: Friday afternoon I took the train to Oxford again. I'm a pro. Virginia Water train station, platform 2, train leaves at 14:01. Get off in Reading, go to platform 4, train at 14:53: first stop--Oxford. I texted Victoria to tell her that I was there and then I just walked around the town a bit until she could catch the bus to come meet up with me.

The sun was out and I really stopped to look around me this time. The weekend before when I was in Oxford I was really just having a good time and hanging out with friends but this time I took a few more minutes to really enjoy the beautiful architecture they have in Oxford.

Victoria came and found me somewhere near Christchurch and we walked over to a very cute cafe called Pert where Victoria treated me to hot chocolate. I think I had to go through about 3 inches of whipped cream and marshmallows before I actually got to the hot chocolate part but it was so tasty and we had a lovely time just sitting and talking for a bit.

We were on some what of a tight schedule and were supposed to be heading back to Victoria's school to meet up with some of her co-workers but... we decided to take in some of the sights before we caught the bus again. I took loads of pictures this time.

Since Victoria reads my blog (how cool is that? people actually read this stuff!!) she noticed that I was lacking information on the buildings in Radcliffe square so we headed back over that way and she straightened me out. Of course, I had to put up more pictures for you in order to remind you of the things I had taken pictures of before that I said I didn't know anything about. These new pictures are better than last weeks anyhow.

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This one here is a picture of one of the university churches. There are many of them. This particular church was built in the thirteenth century.

And THIS (below) is the Radcliffe Camera. It was originally built as a library in 1749 but is currently used as a reading room for the Bodleian library, which is nearby. The Bodleian library has a copy of every single book that has even been published. Crazy. In some cases, the only existing copy of the book is located in this library.

After my second tour through Oxford, we caught a bus back to the school. We met up with 3 people who Victoria works with and we all went out for cocktails. I had a Carol Channing. Couldn't tell you what's in it except that I know it had champagne and it was pink and very pretty and had a raspberry floating in it. I felt classy drinking it. Victoria had a virgin apple mojito, which was quite tasty, and I won't tell you how much the other girls had to drink... Then we headed out to a noodle bar (tasty but definitely reminiscent of Gwinn -- loaded with onions and peppers) and finally, Victoria and I abandoned her co-workers (they were still up for more Friday night fun) and got in the car to drive up to her home in Sutton Coldfield in the midland area of England, just outside of the large city of Birmingham.

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We arrived pretty late but Mr. and Mrs. Mountford were ready and waiting when walked in the door. The first words I heard were "Oh! Paige's friend! Isn't Paige lovely?" In case you don't already know this, Paige is always a good person to be associated with and I'm just the luckiest that I got to live with her for three whole years! The second thing I remember hearing, after meeting and hugging both of Victoria's parents, was "Would you like some tea?" The answer is always yes. I love tea. I took a seat on the couch, made fast friends with Cleo the cat and thoroughly enjoyed a lovely cup of tea. We stayed up late talking and I stayed up even later listening to Harry Potter on my ipod. (I can't stand Professor Umbridge!! Book 5 is proving to be a rather tense one because of her character...)

We had a very nice Saturday morning as we all slept in and then just took our time getting started with our day. We had tea and crumpets and watched cooking shows on TV and I don't think I even got into the shower until around 11:00am. Victoria's sister was nice enough to drop us off in town and Victoria and Mrs. Mountford and I spent the afternoon walking around the shopping centers, along the canals and through various interesting buildings in the center of Birmingham. I feel like I'm quoting Paige's blog from last year because I distinctly remember her saying these exact same things but that's just because we both got the same "tourist talk" when we visited... Birmingham is the second largest city in England and has more canals than Venice. I like the canals. They make the city look much more interesting and I like the idea of having lots of bridges to get from place to place.

Mrs. Mountford was literally dragged into this photo. I just think it seems silly to have loads of photos of me all by myself in pretty places! So I pulled her in with me and it's a good thing I did because it's a darn cute picture.

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We had lunch at a restaurant on the canal called the Handmade Burger Co. and it was super tasty and crazy busy! At nearly 3 in the afternoon the place was packed and Victoria had to stand in line for about fifteen minutes just to place our order. Victoria and I split a burger and a fantastic goat cheese salad. Just hours before, I had told her that I didn't like goat cheese. I was mistaken. She said maybe I like British goat cheese better because the goats here have accents. Good theory. Works for me : )

Here are some pictures of the "floozy in the jacuzzi." The fountains weren't running for some reason but this whole city center area was just gorgeous. I really like big open pedestrian areas like this. It's great for people watching and you don't even have to give any thought to which direction you're supposed to look before you cross the street. Birmingham is definitely well equipped for pedestrians. I felt like we hardly had to cross any streets at all.

Through our wanderings we found a huge candy stand in the middle of one of the shopping centers and Victoria quickly filled a bag with a large assortment of sweets including gummy teeth, sour watermelons, gummy strawberries, chocolate pigs, coke bottles, shrimps, gummy fried eggs and lots more that I can't remember. I personally tend to go for chocolates and caramels and things like that but Victoria is all the gummy/sugary sweets.

We wandered through Christmas stores and looked at beautiful clothes we can't afford and then met back up with Mrs. Mountford for a cup of tea at the cafe inside of Marks & Spencers.

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Back at the house the whole family, including Victoria's older sister Anneliese, sat on the couch and ate pizza and chips (the french-fry kind) and watched Mona Lisa Smile. Before the film even started, the cat had already settled onto my lap (where she remained for the next three hours) so everyone was serving me while I sat there... I was totally being pampered but really, it was all for the cat. She's the queen. I'm just the princess. Ice cream cones, cake and chocolate candies followed the pizza -- it was a major food day! And more tea. Always more tea : )

We got an extra hour of sleep Saturday night and Sunday morning we hurried out the door. Victoria and I took a two hour train ride into London, found our way to the St. Pancras (NOT pancreas!) train station, had a quick lunch and then she was on her way to Paris for a vacation with her Australian co-worker, Bec. They're going to go to Disneyland Paris and it will be Bec's first trip to a Disney theme park. I'm SO excited for them!! It's just so much fun to go with first-timers.

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And here I am, back in Virginia Water. It's always nice to come back to my lap top and the phone with the free calls home but I had an absolutely spectacular weekend! I cannot wait to visit them again.

Can we just say domestic?

I have been told TWICE this week that I seem like a very "homely" person. Umm... do they know what that word means? I think they mean "homey" as in like provides a comfortable, cozy, home-like environment. But homely? That means unattractive and unrefined. Oh wait. I just looked it up and it also means "suited to the home or ordinary domestic life" but still... let's find a word that means "suited to the home and sophisticated domestic life." I like that better. It's so much nicer than being "plain" and "ordinary." If they're going to use the word maybe they should specifiy which of the definitions they are referring to. Or, we could just say domestic... that's pretty cut and dry.

Is that really necessary?

These are my thoughts on homemade ravioli: it takes forever and it looks funny.

I've had this butternut squash sitting on the counter all week and I thought "hey, why not try to make butternut squash ravioli?" I had never made ravioli before. I wouldn't say that it was a failure... I think the little raviolis turned out the way they were supposed to but I'm not sure that I like them. I tasted the filling and I tasted the dough and I wasn't fond of either so now I'm hesitant to cook them. It was a fun little experiment though.

Of course, at home I would have a food processor, which would make this a lot easier (I used a pastry cutter to squish the squash...) but I DID buy myself a little six inch rolling pin, which helps, and I was pretty much out of cheese, which also would have made them taste better. Cheese makes most things better. That just means I'll have to make a nice rich cheese sauce to pour over the top to help distract from the strangeness of these little whole wheat squash pockets.

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Anyhow, that was yesterday's adventure.

People.

And I don't mean the magazine, though I would definitely enjoy having that to read on the trains. The house has been full of people this week and I've been seriously loving it. There was a couple here from Canada visiting but they left this morning and later this evening Kimberly's parents are coming from Canada to stay through the weekend. It was nice just to have a couple of other people around to talk to or even just be near. I like having people in the house.

The plumber was here on Tuesday and he fixed my shower so we're pretty much best friends now considering that my shower had been broken for a whole week!!! And there's a guy here all week painting the inside of the house. He's really good company and always stops to talk with me as he walks through the room and I can always hear him whistling or humming. A little bit ago it was Ode to Joy but just now when I could hear him washing out his brushes in the laundry room, I'm pretty sure he was humming Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas. Bit early for that, but I understand how it is when you get something in your head.

Yesterday I got to talk to so many of my favorite people from home. I talked to Steven. Twice. And then I talked to Lena and I had a nice surprise skype call from Hilde, which I was super excited about and I talked to Mom. Twice. All of the people interaction helps to make the time go by faster. I can't believe it's already Wednesday!!

Lauren is off school this week and next week so her friend Millie was staying her for four nights or something crazy like that. On Monday, I spent most the day hanging out with them, cooking for them, dying and cutting their hair and... well, clearly... doing face masks. Not that this is something you should photograph and put on your blog, but, why the heck not? (I chose the picture with the least of me in it -- Lauren's the one in the middle) I think next week Lauren and I are going to go into London together and go shopping. I'm excited about the potential hang out time.

Oxford: Friends, food and fun.

I had a lovely weekend in Oxford. Of course, I always have lovely weekends to tell you about, don't I? Victoria had her friend Laura and I over to stay in her flat for the weekend. She works at a girls boarding school and lives in a building with about 30 of the older girls who board there. It's a pretty unique living situation, not unlike living in Ashton, except that Victoria has her own kitchen and everything so that's pretty great.

I arrived late Friday afternoon and Victoria and I drank tea and talked about the differences between British and American weddings while waiting for Laura to show up. It turns out that British weddings are MANY hours long and incorporate multiple meals and lots of tea. We walked to a pub in Headington for dinner and spent the rest of the evening at the flat drinking more tea and watching Shakespeare in Love.

Being around other girls my age and just spending time in "hang-out" mode was SO what I was needing this weekend. We talked and we laughed and exchanged stories and it was fantastic! Saturday morning, Victoria had to work but Laura and I sort of slept in and layzed around a bit. We finally got out the door around 10am and went to the outlet mall in Bicester. What an outlet mall!! They had EVERYTHING there and all of the wonderful stores that are still far too expensive even at the outlet mall. Jimmy Choo, Brooks Brothers, Versace, Ralph Lauren, Dolce & Gabbana, Armani, Burberry, Gucci, Diesel, DKNY... basically, it was amazing. I wish I had a real job and I could've spent some real money there. I was so good though. All I bought was a really cute track jacket type top from Puma and it was way on sale and I was needing a zip up type sweatshirt thing anyway so it was totally justified. Now I just need a hat (to keep my little head warm) and I'll be good to go. Those have been the two things I've really been needing.

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We finished up our shopping and then Laura bought us both tall skim milk caramel macchiatos from Starbucks and we sat outside and talked about teachery things. It was lovely. Laura is just 6 weeks into her first teaching experience and it was so interesting what she has to say about it considering that we're exactly the same age and have both just finished our education training.

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On our way out of Bicester, we stopped at Tescos and bought stuff to make pizza for dinner.

I wish I could say that we spent the rest of our afternoon in thoughtful conversation but when we got back to the flat we made toast with chocolate spread and tea and we sat and watched The Hills until Victoria was done working. Oh my goodness. Have you ever watched the hills? Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous!! I can't believe that we watched 3 episodes. We kept just looking at each other like "seriously? how is this even a tv series?" It's so not good at all. I mean, does someone actually get paid to write it? There isn't even a script! It's just a bunch of rich girls living the high life in California and being dumb. It was funny though and it kept giving us really random topics of conversation so I suppose it was worth a little something.

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Okay, I have to start telling you about all of these pictures!! All of the ones you've seen so far are of Christchurch in Oxford. A lot of Harry Potter filming was done there. It's really pretty. Actually, Oxford is just a pretty place in general. There are lots of interesting buildings and tons of students everywhere. We took the bus into Oxford for a quick little tour after our mindless Hills watching.

This is from a little shop that is entirely devoted to selling anything and everything to do with Alice in Wonderland. It's pretty cute and has some really interesting stuff. Very touristy of course but I liked it. Alice Liddle, who the stories were written about, used to come to this shop to buy sweets and the shop has since then been converted into a tourist trap. I felt bad because the lady working the shop was obviously trying to close up but since there were already 6 people in there, we went in anyway. We had a good time in there.

These two photos, above and below, are from Radcliffe Square. Honestly, I don't remember the significance, but I took the photos anyway. If I find out anything interesting about them, I'll let you know.

And back to the flat... (we didn't stay in Oxford long because Laura and I had eaten anything all day except croissants, toast and chocolate spread, caramel macchiatos and a dozen cups of tea so we were feeling rather famished)... We made pizza for dinner (BBQ chicken with red and yellow peppers) and Victoria baked this funny cheese that was sort of like brie. It's called... (those dot-dot-dots are because I'm looking it up online right now) camembert cheese! That's what it's called. And it comes in this round little flat thing and it has a rind on it so you slice off the top and then bake it and it gets all melty and you dip bread in it and it's lovely. (Except Laura doesn't like cheese so she didn't have any.) So we had that and tea, of course, and Victoria made apple crisp for dessert which was delightful but we were all way too stuffed.

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Pretty much the TV stayed on all evening and there were lots of really random shows on. I'm still not used to British TV. There were actually a lot of comedy type shows on and we pretty much just laughed at (and with) the people on TV until around 11pm when we were too tired to carry on. Or at least I thought I was too tired. After 15 cups of tea I actually had a really difficult time falling asleep and tossed and turned for quite a while.

And here I am with a Sunday roast at Brown's restaurant in Oxford. Sunday morning, we took it slow again and barely made it down to the dining hall in time for breakfast. We caught the bus back into town and did a little shopping before going to Brown's for lunch. The food was really good. I've never made a roast before but I suppose that would be a good thing to learn. I like all of the roast vegetables and everything that go with it. By the way, in case you didn't know, Yorkshire pudding isn't actually pudding at all, it's that puffy pastry type thing that you can see in the right corner of my plate (near to my left hand). You eat it with the gravy. Why do they call it pudding?? More shopping to follow, back to the flat for tea (where we watched some gymnast thing on TV) and then off to the train station.

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I could've stayed all week. I like being with other people and I liked all of the shopping and talking and laughing and making food together and drinking tea together. I like how drinking tea is so social here. We should drink more tea. Well, I do. I drink loads of tea, but I mean that we should drink tea together. Let's work on that.

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Looking forward to spending this next weekend with Victoria as well!! She's taking such good care of me : )

Locked in.

Even after 6 weeks in this country, I have a hard time remembering that you cannot lock or unlock doors from the outside OR the inside without a key. I don't like this. It makes me feel claustrophobic and stuck. Yesterday, a package came from my mom and I ran downstairs to buzz the parcel delivery man into the gate and then he knocked on the door and I tried to open it but it was locked! I had to run back upstairs to my room to get my keys and then back to the door to unlock it. I try to remember to keep my keys in my pocket but since I don't go out all that often, I'm in the habit of leaving them on my night stand. Just one of those quirky things that's not my favorite. I mean, isn't that illegal at home or something? Aren't you not allowed to have doors like that at home because it's a fire hazard and it would be really bad if someone couldn't get out of the house in an emergency because they can't find their keys? I think that's the case.

The good news is that I got a late grad gift from Mom yesterday and it's beautiful and I love it (red wool coat with silver buttons) AND today I got letters from Lena and Steven. I feel so loved. Oh yeah, more good news, I made chili yesterday and I'm about to have some for lunch : ) Yep, super exciting day here. Mostly, I just had to tell you about the strange locks.

I'm going to Oxford this weekend so I may or may not be on a computer. Probably you won't hear from me again until Sunday night or Monday though. Have a great weekend!!

Steph

Windsor up close.

I spent Monday afternoon walking around Windsor. Kimberly had purchased a travel card for the day so that she could get around on the trains but she passed it off to me when she was done with it around 2:30pm. I figured I needed to take advantage of the free transportation so I hopped on a train.

I walked over the Thames river towards Eton College. There were some really pretty buildings and lots of young guys walking around in their school clothes -- black pants and shoes, white shirt and long black coat. It seemed so formal and I was definitely very aware of the lack of females in that area. Makes sense, seeing as how it is a boys school.

There's not a whole lot in Windsor unless you're going there to shop or see the castle. It's pricey to actually go inside the castle but it's cool to walk around the outside. It's huge. I couldn't really grasp how huge because from right in the center of town you can only see pieces of it at a time and it seems like it's all spread out.

This isn't the greatest picture because you can't see just how crooked this little building is. When I go back I'll take a picture from a different angle. I didn't stop to look but I think there's a little cafe or restaurant in there. I want to drink tea in the little crooked building in Windsor. Maybe next time I go.

Fortunately, I wasn't in a shopping mood but it looks like there's lots of shopping to be done in Windsor. It's a very touristy town, as is expected with the castle being there, and it seems to be focused on tourists. It was the first place where I had seen lots of gift shops full of odd T-shirts and everything you can think of with the British flag plastered on it.

I can't imagine living somewhere like this. It's so strange to have a huge castle just hanging out. You're just walking around and around every other corner there's this ginormous building. And sometimes the Queen lives in the ginormous building. That just seems so strange.

This is how bizarre it is. When you walk out of Starbucks it's just like "oh, yeah, there's the Queen's house. Wonder if she's home today?" Of course, I had to actually go into Starbucks to get this full experience.

It was a really pretty little town and I particularly enjoyed all of the leaves and trees everywhere that were changing colors and the fall sunlight was really quite perfect for taking pictures. Sometimes I take loads of pictures of the same thing simply because the light keeps changing and I find that captivating. You have to take all the pictures so that later you can decide which light was the best or maybe there isn't a best at all because they're just all different. Of course, my wonderful little camera doesn't always capture things exactly how I see them but that's okay, I love it anyway.

I need to go on more outings like this. I had my book with me the whole time and had some difficulty not pulling it out and reading it while I was walking around (East of Eden, you'll understand when you read it) but it was nice just to walk around some place new.