Of Churches and Puddings

Back way when on Tuesday, I decided the best way to write my last tutorial paper was to go visit Blenheim Palace. So, after the Shakespeare class, my friend and I hopped on a bus out to the Palace, and that was that. You don't own me, tutorial paper! I'm an adult!

 It was absolutely beautiful. I had no regrets that Tuesday. Except for the sun; if we had gone the previous day, it was more overcast, and we would have sacrificed the sunlit beauty of the gardens for some well needed shade. Thank goodness, it hasn't gotten over 80 degrees over here, but it can still be pretty toasty in a pair of jeans and a button down (it was cool that morning, don't judge!).

 My second experience with the panorama feature of my iPhone. Turned out pretty well, in my opinion.

 The inside of the palace was fairly bland; nothing crazy going on there. Some elaborate decoration here, evidence of lavish spending there... The works. There was an exhibit on Churchill, though, and that was pretty neat.  Otherwise, it was a less grand version of Windsor Castle. Still plenty of beautiful extravagance, though. The gardens are where the beauty really shines, and when I walked through the doorway to see this, I was very much glad it was a sunny day.

 The gardens absolutely took my breath away. I didn't know what to say at first. And this is only a FRACTION of it! I documented a few things, but there were rose gardens, entire FIELDS of lush green grass, and even something called the "cascades" (three pictures down). It was stunning. My only wish is that I can come back some day in the winter, when it's snowing. Seeing these fields covered in a pure, white blanket would rock my world.

 After the Blenheim escape, I had to return to my stay at the Bodleian Hotel Library. I managed to blow my way through Sir Thomas Malory's Morte d'Arthur as well as a few secondary sources, so that went well. My topic this week was contrasting Malory's Merlin and Prose Merlin's Merlin. Prose Merlin is a prose Middle-English work, written by a host of authors. It is not contributed to one single author. The Middle-English made for a bitchin' time...

I caught this picture when I was coming down from the 2nd floor of the Radcliffe camera. I call it: Looking Into the Eye of the Camera.

There's a reason I'm an engineer and not an artist.

 Nothing much happened on Wednesday. I spent the day cooped up in my flat writing my essay. I submitted it and got it back today with comments from my tutor. I can't wait to discuss it tomorrow! I have had an absolute blast in this tutorial, and my only wish is that I could keep studying under this tutor for another few weeks. I feel like I've only barely touched on Merlin. I would also take another tutorial on Norse mythology. Oh, if only...

Today, we were out getting some lunch after Shakespeare, and we went down the main market street thing. This guy shows up every now and then. Creepy wanker.

 After lunch, we went to the local covered market, where only independent stores are allowed. I got a milkshake. A Ferrero Rocher milkshake. You know, those little chocolate covered hazelnut candies? Yeah. That was in a milkshake. U jelly? I also grabbed some Turkish delight at another stall. I saw it, and it reminded me of A. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and B. I had never tried it before, so I picked up 3 pounds worth. It's some gooooood stuff.

 At 6:15, we went to Evensong at the New College Chapel. Now, I was psyched, because I had heard great things about New College's choir. And I tell you: they were amazing. I'm including a link to a song that I recorded at Magdalen College, except this time it's sung by the New College choir:  https://soundcloud.com/heliqwopter/new-college-agnus-dei
Tonight's Evensong was also the celebration of Corpus Christi, so the congregation rose, followed the priests, and trod on the rose petals that were being distributed on the hall floor. According to the email I got earlier today about it, it's an old medieval tradition. Cool stuff.

For dinner, we went to a pub called The White Horse. I finally found my toad in the hole that my parents were telling me I should try. It was delicious. Absolutely so. The gravy was savory, the sausages succulent, the mashed taters magnificent, the produce pleasant, and the Yorkshire pudding yummy. I think I will have to go get it again. It is a huge improvement on bangers n' mash.

As for tomorrow? Well... Tomorrow, I leave for Scotland for the weekend. That should be fun.

[Insert clever title here]

Friday started off with the tutorial. As I mentioned in the last blog, she thought my essay was my best yet, and we had a very interesting tutorial. Lots of ideas thrown around, lots of discussion. It was great.

Dinner consisted of going to a nearby Chinese restaurant that Dr. Snyder had recommended. I got the Pineapple "Gu Lao" Duck. Not sure why it is in quotations, but the menu had it that way. That's scary... Pretty presentation, though.

 Saturday, we went to Bath. No, it's not a giant porcelain tub. Yes, it was a giant bathhouse that the Romans built. There are naturally occurring hot springs here, so they figured it was a good place to set up a leisure house for the Roman soldiers around 76 AD after Emperor Claudius's invasion of Britain around 43 AD. It's a nice little place. They advice not going in the water; as you can see, it's quite green. And it's fairly toasty.

 This hairdo, though...

 When we were finished with the bathhouse tour, we were left to roam the city until time to go. Our tour guide offered an optional tour to tour some of the city. Some of the group acquiesced, and we were led around to various little landmarks, such as this edifice. I don't remember exactly what it was (a bridge, maybe?), but it looked cool and pretty, so I snagged a shot of it. Below it was a weir, something designed to alter the characteristics of the flow of the water? Eh. Whatevs, man.

 Sunday morning I awoke to go to my second church service in Oxford at Magdalen College. It was a much smaller service than at Christ Church, and the chapel room was much smaller as well. Me and two others arrived early, about 10:40 or so to tour the grounds a little before service at 11:00. We had to tour then, because after that, we wouldn't get the chance to see the grounds for free unless we came back for another service.

They had a beautiful little garden tucked away in the college; it looked like the perfect spot to sit down on a blanket and read some books for a tutorial class. I imagine it's quite the popular area during the weekdays.

 Inside the chapel were, as in all Oxford churches, beautiful stained glass windows. I thought that the center picture in this window looked like Jesus holding a lightsaber, so I named him Darth Jesus and snapped a shot. It's a little bit harder to tell in this light, but in the chapel, that little stick he's holding was much redder, and looked like a red lightsaber.

The choir here was absolutely stunning. Here's a link to them singing Agnus Dei.

https://soundcloud.com/heliqwopter/magdalen-agnus-dei

 After the service, we waltzed around the grounds for a bit longer, trying to get as much of the scenery as possible before we left, never to come again. I got a nice photo with a bridge and water behind me. I should have gotten the shot with the church behind me. Duh-doy.

In all gardens, flowers grow. It's the natural order of things. Well, Magdalen's gardens were overflowing with flowers, and I liked the roses. I couldn't cut one and bring it back to Bethany, but I made do with a photograph of one. She appreciated it.

 Oh, I forgot: they have a deer park. Yeah. An enclosed area where deer just frolic around. Beats the hell out of any ole drill field back in the states. I wish we had deer...

What's that? I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of how awesome this trip is

Sorry for the wait. I know you've all been refreshing the page constantly waiting for another post.

I've been busy this week. We had a Shakespeare paper due Monday that I spent my Sunday working on, and of course, my tutorial was today. I pretty much wrote the entire thing yesterday. The tutor says it was my best work yet. Not sure how that happened.

Let's start with Monday.

On Monday, I woke up, wrote a Shakespeare paper, and then went to high tea. It was a British as could be. We all had standard English breakfast tea, so that wasn't anything new. We also had various kinds of small sandwiches, like ham and mayonnaise, salmon, cucumber (nasty buggers), and egg salad sandwiches. The egg salad and ham sandwiches didn't stand a chance against me. In addition, there was pound cake with a ribbon of strawberry jam and clotted cream in the center, and scones. With strawberry jam and clotted cream to spread. I want more clotted cream. I want an entire tub of clotted cream. I want to put it on everything.

The rest of Monday went by relatively smoothly. I burned through more episodes of Orange is the New Black on Netflix. And read some of the book I checked out of the New College library for this past week's essay: significant features of French medieval romance Merlin. This was probably one of the coolest weeks for my tutorial subject.

On Tuesday, after the Shakespeare class, I went to the New College Library to look at some manuscripts and old books they had on display. A couple of the manuscripts dated back to the 12th century. Amazing. I didn't get to touch, though.

The rest of Tuesday passed without incident, as I spent the majority of it in the Bodleian Library, desperately trying to absorb as much information as I could before starting the paper that night. I only got through the introduction before I called it a night.

Wednesday, our professor mercifully let us off class so we could go to Stratford-upon-Avon. It was nice. It's a quiet town (except for the tourists, pah!), and we had a decent vacation away from work. We left at 12:36 sharp on the train, and passed by some beautiful countryside. 

On arrival, we started working our way into town, passing by the town center, where a nice little statue is located. Moving further, we came upon Shakespeare's parents' house. They lived in a fairly decently sized house, as one of the trades of Shakespeare's father was being a glove maker. So, he needed leather on hand, and therefore, cows. We also passed by a pedestal that was labeled "Shakespeare's Ghost" (see below). Nobody was there; I was tempted to throw in some coins for the laugh.

Eventually we came to the theater we were going to be seeing Henry IV, Part One at. Located nearby is the town's Shakespeare statue, surrounded by a few statues of some of his characters (Lady Macbeth, Falstaff, Prince Hal, and Hamlet). I snagged a picture with Prince Hal that's up on my Facebook page. The MSU group took a group photo in front of Falstaff. And another group photo on a bridge overlooking the River Avon. Well, either the River Avon or one of the canals that leads into it.

Our tour guide walked us along the river/canal on the way to the Holy Trinity Church, where Shakespeare is buried. We saw a little fuzzy swanling. Nobody was dumb enough to try and go pet it. Thankfully.

 As we moved into the church yard, I had to snag some pictures for my mother, who is a cemetery enthusiast. I know she's already seen the burial grounds, but I got more pictures because it's just pretty.

 Inside the actual church, we saw the tomb of Shakespeare, his wife, and some other weirdos.

 When our tour guide turned us loose, I had a chuckle at the name of this Thai restaurant. Seemed interesting enough. We spent a little time walking over to a nearby secondhand/rare book store. They had so many great things; I wanted the copies of Thomas Malory's works and the Canterbury Tales, but they were 50 pounds a pop. I can wait. After that, we wandered back to the theater where I was able to catch a picture of the swan statue in front of the theater.

 After the theater statue shot, we went over to the Dirty Duck/Black Swan pub, where the actors of the plays go to grab a drink when they're finished acting for the night. I had a three course meal, starting off with garlic mushrooms, then a 5 oz steak (it needed an American touch for flavor), and ended with some clotted cream ice cream. I should have gotten the chocolate fudge cake, but oh well. It was still damn good ice cream. And, of course, I had a couple pints during the whole encounter.

 In the theater is a big fake bear. So, naturally, I had to get a picture with it.