Rain Rain Go the Hell Away

Download this: “Flood” by Jars of Clay
Why: because im about to start building an ark at this point in my trip with all the rain

Fact: Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum was the first museum in the world to be opened to the public when it was officially opened in 1683 according to the Guinness Book of Records.

So the title pretty much gives you the idea of the day. Rain, rain and more rain. I walked the entire way into the city center plus some to use my rainy day plan today. The rainy day plan was to go to the ashmolean museum and then to shop my little heart out. I did both.

The Ashmolean is cool but small. They have a ton of Egyptian stuff and some minor british art work. Its by no means the British Museum, but it was still worth an hour or so of my day which I duly gave it. Nothing to impressive or exciting to report seeing there really just some cool stuff the brits nicked from various imperial conquests back in the day. Way to go Britain. I decided that there is a good reason most british museums are free. Its because they stole all the stuff from the rest of the world and they feel a bit guilty charging people to see their stolen artifacts which they have absolutely no intention of giving back. Again, way to go Britain.

After checking out the museum, I headed to waterstones to pick up a few books. I found a nice copy of Northern Lights which is the british title for the more commonly known book called The Golden Compass. I also ventured up to check out the selection of CS Lewis books since he was such a huge fixture at oxford back in his day. Lewis, Tolkien and a few others met at their favorite pub in oxford every Thursday night to share the work they had done with one another and to critique the others works. The group referred to themselves as the inklings. In fact, CS lewis was the first person to read the lord of the rings books, and he was such a great friend of tolkien that he wrote the screwtape letters for him. I found a copy of his essays on Christianity that sounded like a great read so I decided to pick that up as well. Erin was telling me that supposedly, on day while lewis was walking up a hill on the Magdalene campus he came to believe in Christianity and that basically inspired most of his works. Whether its true or not its still kind of a cool thought.

After the book shop I headed to the covered market where I pretty much walked around the different shops and bought a bunch of fun jewelry that I don’t really need but whatever. Its still super cute and funky stuff that ill be able to say I got in oxford. I would totally buy the clothes too but its way expensive when you think about it. I also had an excellent panini from a little coffee place called brothers. It was goat cheese and roasted red peppers. Mmm delicious. Oh, and the gigantic triple chocolate cookie from bens cookies was fab too.

Most everything in oxford closes at 5 so by then I had sucked it up and walked back in the rain to start getting my stuff together for my departure the next day. By the time erin and drew got home from work I already had my pj pants on since I was wet and cold and needing comfort. Erin had no problem joining my little pajama part and we were a bunch of lazy bums just sitting around on the couch watching tv for a while. We ddint even feel up to going out for dinner so drew made us some super awesome chicken tacos with all the toppings, popped in Talladega nights and loved on life for a while.

We had resolved to not going out this night (erin said that she thinked her liver hated her and I told her I was pretty sure my liver hated her too lol) but erin got a text from anton wanting to know if we wanted to meet up for a drink before I left. Not wanting to stand him up on his birthday we decided to meet him just around the corner at the local pub. Being lazy as we are, he showed up at the door before we had even changed out of the pajamas. Oops.

I really stuck to my word this time for the most part. I had just one pint of strongbow and I was done. Again though, the pub had last call before we even knew it anyway. Unfortunately, anton didn’t get his birthday hot so we had to go back to the flat to get him one before he caught the bus home and we found our way to our beds.

It was a nice night and a fitting end to my time with erin and drew I think. We all headed to bed and I proceeded to repack my suitcase for half the night which I sometimes do with my neurotic tendencies.

Excited to be moving on to Egypt, but super sad to be leaving erin and drew. It was a great time with them and I think I will definitely have to make another trip back before the move back to the states. Plus, I have a new british friend. Sweetness.