P.S.

I realize now that this whole experience is much shorter than it first seemed. We're two weeks in, and only six more to go! I discovered this when booking a weekend trip to Dublin for the second week in July, then marking it on my calendar--to find that the second week in July is only a little more than two weeks away! Crazy...its really, really flying by. I still haven't settled into a real "routine" yet, probably because I haven't started working yet, but I hope that will come. Personal revelation No. 7: I thrive on stability.

I got my "cultural stipend" from EUSA today by taking all my receipts to the office. "Oooh wow you've been busy!" they said, and I guess I have. It just seems like a normal vacation so far, but we really were squeezing the most out of every day, taking care of our touristy sightseeing before work starts. By the way, going out to get my cultural stipend was the only really productive thing I did all day. Aside from running early in the morning and going to class at night, I spent the day working on school stuff and generally bumming around--it felt wonderful, I'm not going to lie. :) Tomorrow will be much more productive--I need to research some things for work, which will FINALLY start on Thursday! I'm a little apprehensive after hearing the stories my fellow UT housemates have from their first couple of days....one of my friends met Jude Law at her job today (!!!), while another spent the day taking out trash and doing dishes. :( No telling....

A little more about Westminster; I don't feel like I did it justice just by saying it was beautiful and old, though it's pretty much the epitome of both. Tons of "famous" people are buried there: from Chaucer and Tennyson to Haydn to Newton and Darwin (oh the irony...), and of course royalty dating back to 1066. woah. There are also ornate memorials to soooo many more people, huge names like Shakespeare and lots that I can't remember right now because its bedtime. Goodnight!