One Step Closer

Almost done with finals. Two days left. Just keeping track...
This weekend was kinda low key, as we were studying for finals and writing papers and such, but was also another great reminder of why I love Bath and what I'm going to miss. (I apologize because I know I keep saying that...but it is true.) Saturday I went out Christmas/window shopping with two of my housemates. It was fun shopping (we even finally made it into Mr Simms Sweet Shoppe, which looks like it came right out of that opening scene in Willy Wonka), but the best part was wandering around the city together. There was a great student jazz band playing Christmas songs outside of Bath Abbey and just everywhere we went there was a feeling of joy. We had to stop walking a few times just to look at the beauty of the city. Then, Saturday night was Taco Night number two!! We learned our lesson from our first Taco Night and bought even more food. (And thankfully, there were no Corona spills this time.) It was so nice to have the girls in my house gathered together, eating delicious tacos, and just laughing and having a great time together.
Sunday my friend Connie and I went to an Advent service at Bath Abbey. It was great to go to an Advent service (yay Christmas!) and Bath Abbey is just gorgeous, but as I told Connie after the service, I'm glad I'm not Anglican. (Too many rules for me.) And even though it was cold and we both had work to do, Connie indulged me and went up to the Royal Crescent with me. Yes, the Royal Crescent is one of the biggest icons/landmarks in Bath, and I hadn't been up there yet. In my defense, it is kinda far away. We got up to the Crescent and sat for a while in Victoria Park, right in front of the Crescent. In a way, the Royal Cresecnt's not really that amazing. It's a big building with a bunch of houses on a hill. But on Sunday, I was really struck by the Crescent and its beauty. And for whatever reason, it really summed up all of the reasons I'm sooo glad that I chose to study abroad in Bath. There's just something about the feel of the city itself that makes me feel at home. And I love that. Sunday night I crammed in another belated Bath/British experience - quiz night at the local pub. Ian (our awesome hired British friend) regularly attends quiz night at The Cork and invites ASE students to come along, but I always forget or am really busy when I actually think about it. But not this Sunday. I went to quiz night with half of my house and a couple of other ASE students and had a blast. (It was like that episode of the UK Office. Only, you know, not.) It was a really tough game, but we ended up tying for third. Which was pretty awesome. Then, I went back to that silly work business.
My Monday, unfortunately, was not very exciting. I did make a side trip to the gym (and slipped in some gross not mud? it was gross) and finally made it into the gorgeous antique book store that I walk by pretty much every day. But other than that, I spent most of my day glued in front of my computer finishing my dissertation for my internship. A lot of hours and a zillion words later (alright, it's around 7,600 ish words), I finally finished. And went to sleep, thankful that I didn't have to worry about it any more.
Tuesday, I had to wake up at the crack of dawn (alright, 7) to get over to Nelson House to turn in my dissertation and then go to an all day rehearsal and then performance for my Late Twentieth Century British Drama Class. Thankfully, half of my house is in that class, so I wasn't alone. But that morning still wasn't fun. We all got to see the space we were performing in for the first day that morning, which is always fun. We had a tech rehearsal in the morning, which took a long time, as always. We had a quick lunch break, then came back for our dress rehearsal, had an even shorter break, then came back for the final performance at 5:30. Incredibly, the show was pretty good, especially considering facts like we only had about 12 hours of rehearsal time in class before today, and stuff like that. (I don't think I've actually discussed in detail what we were performing. We did excerpts from plays that we had read earlier in the semester - Night by Harold Pinter, Fen by Caryl Churchill, Love of the Nightingale by Timberlake Wertenbaker, Woman in Mind by Alan Ayckbourne, and Shakers by John Godber. I had supporting roles in Fen and Nightingale and my 'big scene' was from Woman in Mind. My favourite part was that my scene partner was Andrew Butterworth - the ASE internship advisor and the best old British man ever!) The whole performance had been a very stressful process, but in the end, it actually was a lot of fun and challenging (like performing always is). And it was even better because I love our class.
Today I had my first real final for my Jane Austen class. Then I did some window shopping and looked at shops that I cannot afford. Tonight Andrew Butterworth took the interns out to the local pub and we hung out, talked, and drank. For a finals day, it was a pretty good day. Now I have one last final tomorrow and then I'm done. After that, all I have to do is pack, stress about leaving, and play with my lovely friends. I'm excited.