Things that make Edinburgh awesome Part 2

Arthur's Seat.

Things that make Edinburgh less awesome: an abundance of tanning salons.

titles are overrated

Just about five minutes ago I had a rather cheesy moment while folding my laundry, and I don't mean like the one I had the other day with Ivonne when we ate an entire block of Port Salut. The fact that there's only a week of class left has tricked me into thinking I only have a week left in Edinburgh and consequently I've spent the last few days in a panic over having to do ALL OF THE THINGS! in a VERY SHORT AMOUNT OF TIME! Not only should I be writing an essay, researching for my review article, figuring out my summer plans, and booking train tickets, there's a science festival going on and it seems that I all of a sudden have friends and social commitments. So while I was hanging up my socks to dry and trying to keep my heart rate at a healthy level, Don't Stop started (haha) playing on my computer and I realized how incredibly silly it is that I'm stressing out over not having enough time to enjoy life. That was way more inspirational in my head but I suppose it was inevitable that I would eventually write a bad blog post. The point is that for a while now I've been trying to get better at both living in the present and taking action more often because I have a tendency to overanalyze the living shit out of every detail of everything and end up doing nothing.

In other news, it's officially been spring for more than a few days and it's still snowing. Also, I've been hosting several Berkeley friends over the last few days and have made a couple of American exchange student friends (finally), so details of trips to Glasgow, the Highlands, Loch Ness, and other things like deep fried Mars bars and the National Portrait Gallery may be coming soon to a blog near you. More likely I will post pictures but I promise they will be the pretty ones.

Concerning the pixie

Lady/stranger in the salon: 'You look like a model.'
My best friend: 'You look like your mom.'

Better than Christmas (or And on the 13th day, God said 'let there be heat')

Almost two weeks after the boiler stopped working, a plumber came and fixed it this morning. I almost cried out of happiness. No longer must we live in an icy hell of nights spent shivering under two duvets whilst wrapped in several sweaters+hats+gloves+socks and a festering mountain of dirty dishes because no one wants to do them with cold water.

Things that make Edinburgh awesome Part 1

Museums are free. I love that on any day of the week I can just mosey on over to the National Gallery to ogle some Botticelli or Degas, or go sit in the atrium of the National Museum of Scotland to people watch just within view of all the taxidermy.

"Bow tie"

Traipsing

One learns quickly that sunny days in Edinburgh are not to be squandered.

Sunday farmers market (Stockbridge)

Why yes, I am in fact just making a series of picture posts. More writing to come soon once I find some...inspiration?

'do you want some cheeese with that whiiiine?'

Solveig :)

the only less-than-enjoyable part of this outing was that my hands were frozen to the point of near paralysis by the end of it

"Eat a grey!! Save a red!!" yes, that is squirrel meat

I HAVE FRIENDS

this was also a long time ago, but we had a flatwarming party...

St. Andrews (long overdue)

was...quaint. Honestly the most noteworthy thing about the day was that within the span of about two hours we got snow, rain, sunshine, and hail by turns. This kind of erratic behavior seems to be typical of the atmospheric conditions of coastal Scotland. It's irritating to say the least when you wake up to sunny weather but by the time you've gotten dressed and are rushing to class it's begun to snow.