Well Friday the 14th I went up to Somerset, spent a couple of days there at the windmill. Then on the 16th I went to Bristol station, met up with my cousin Megan (seeing as Hannah is now too old to go) and we journeyed to Queen Ethelburga's School (yes it is as posh as it sounds) just outside of York for the Quaker camp (that sounds boring and religious but it really isn't). It was great meeting people who I hadn't seen for over a year and also making loads of new friends. It was better than last year seeing as I knew people this time around, but the food was still damned awful. Our rooms were better than last year, loads bigger. I shared a room with Sophie and Olivia (a different Olivia from the one I usually talk about on here) but Megan (different Megan - not cousin Megan. Argh they all have similar confusing names.) couldn't fit in our room seeing as we were too late to get a 4 room so had to get a 3 room even though ALL the rooms had 4 beds (the 4th was folded up into the wall). I'm going into detail again. I could spend a week writing out every single detail. I will bullet point stuff (my blog has taken away the bullet point option! Nooo!).
- Fancy dress theme for last social this year was fairy tale creatures so I went as a pixie (last year it was up in the clouds and I was a fairy). - For activites this year I did cooking and we all made cookies and stuff to sell at the tuck shop so yeah it was fun. - I got an award on the last night! (each year the leavers give out one award each on the last night). Mine was for 'most beautiful smile' from Jenny. - On the leaving day I got hugged so many times it was insane but I love hugs so :D
You can trawl through the pictures: http://www.yfhs.org.uk/2009piccies/index.html
So I stayed there for a week, went on the 23rd (sad to leave!) back to Somerset, was bored for a week (we did go places like the swimming pool (it closed down about a day later) and some zoo which was then on the news since atheists didn't like it as it was a Christian zoo and it had stuff about animals being created or something... I did however buy some clothes: two new t-shirts (plain black and plain white - mainly to wear under my new lumberjack shirts), two new lumberjack shirts (blue & brown and orange, white & brown) and a pair of jeans. Then yesterday we went to Bath to visit my Granny and stayed overnight. Then my second cousin Gabriel and his wife and kid Jude (who is almost a year old) came to visit us there which was nice and Jude was sweet.
Well yesterday I finished re-reading LOTR and I have to say I forgot how much I loved the books. Moreso than the movies probably, (I haven't seen them in ages however) but I do love the movies, even if loads of stuff was cut out (the Tom Bombadil chapters and Scouring of the Shire are probably the two I miss the most) and the storyline deviated a bit (but hey, what movie adaptation ever did stay completely true to it's literary counterpart?). I could ramble on about LOTR but I'm sure you don't want to hear my ramblings.
In other news, I have been playing Top Trumps with my sister to pass the time. I introduced it to her yesterday and she loves it. The ones we own we got free with Weetabix - Predators, Dinosaurs and LOTR:TTT (yay. Except she doesn't want to play that one. Fair enough). I think we also have a Beano one somewhere.
I can't really write a blog now. For one thing it is the afternoon and I blog better when it is the evening, but I am going away for another two weeks so I thought I'd blog now. Another thing is that my head is all LOTR-y as you can plainly see (well it would happen if I read the whole thing in one week. Under one week). So bye for now.
Have some websites though: http://www.ludomancy.com/blog/downloads/ < nice games http://www.kimbawlion.com/rant2.htm < lion king is a rip off! http://omegle.com/ < sure you know of this one anyway but still, 'tis amusing (sometimes)
I am oh so tired. You know the feeling when you just want to close your eyes and curl up in a ball and sleeeeeeeeeeeeep? Yeah, that one. (If my blog is weird today blame it on the tiredness)
Anyway, lets see what Sophia has been up to in the past week. (I'll make a list, it's easier. and more fun)(damn, my bullet point button thing has disappeared. Well it will have to be a not so good list. Simply because of the lack of bullet points.)
- On Sunday I went to a pub and had hoisin duck salad. - Our new Clio arrived on Tuesday (remember how the old one went up in flames). It is a very yummy shade of green. Every time I go past it I wonder what it would taste like (if it were edible). - Read three more Discworld novels (Equal Rites, Wyrd Sisters and Moving Pictures). I have now decided to have a break from them (just so I can re-read Lord of the Rings. I have read about three pages so far. But still, I started it today (after finishing Moving Pictures) and I've been out most the day). But I do like Discworld (for some reason there I wanted to refer to myself as "we". I do that sometimes). - Yesterday Lily (who now has a 14mm flesh tunnel and can put her little finger through her ear) and I went out with our sisters (it was my Mum's plan!) and we went bowling and to the cinema. So I finally saw Harry Potter 6 yesterday. Wasn't as shit as I thought it would be. I actually thought it was alright, not the best but still decent. They did cut out loads though (which pissed me off) and they destroyed the Burrow (wtf. That doesn't happen in the book). But yeah, amusing romance scenes. - Went out clothes shopping today (gyarhhhh. I hate it.) because I'm going to the York place again like I did last year and I basically need a "posh" outfit for one of the nights. But it's not so posh I can't wear it normally. But I do vaguely look like a girl for once(!). It's a black and grey chequered top/dress thing that I'll wear with leggings. Oh and whilst shopping they played some stupid r'n'b song that had completely butchered Bowie's "Let's Dance" which made me sad (okay apparently it's by Craig David. nyargh). But now I'm listening to the original and I'm happy. - Now listening to "Hurry On Sundown" by Hawkwind. 'Cos it's awesome. - What more should I write? Once I start writing a blog I want to write and write and write but beforehand I just don't want to write a blog post at all. Oh well.
So I have returned from France. I had a rather nice time. I am now also convinced that all French men are called Jean.
We rented out a small villa that had a swimming pool and it was really nice.
I kept a sort of diary. Here it is in compressed form:
~First Week~
Sunday: Went to Southampton Airport which was very small. Got on a small plane. Arrived at Avignon airport which was TINY. Arrived and met the owners of the house who live forty minutes away - showed us the house. I was tired. We ate pasta with tomato sauce. I got the green room but actually wanted the blue room (because it was blue).
Monday: We had a lazy day, just swimming in the swimming pool and stuff.
Tuesday: This is the day I actually started keeping the diary, since I had no paper beforehand. It is creepy French paper which is gridded with extra lines in. They don't have lined paper over there. Visited a small French town today. Took some pictures there, visited some churches. On the way there took photos of awesome rock cliff things - local legend says that they are monks that got turned to stone after falling in love with some Moorish women.
(they're all looming and ominous!)
Wednesday: Visited a small French town named Lurs in the mountains, visited some churches and stuff. Mainly went there for the tourist office, but it was shut on Wednesdays.
Thursday: There was a big lazy cricket in my room. Otherwise a lazy day today.
Friday: Visited Gorges Du Verdon - very scenic. Then went swimming in a nearby lake. Nice and cool. There was an area of the lake we (well me and my sister) that was bright green. Reminded me of the poisonous liquids in Spyro that you died if you stepped in. Afterwards visited a mountain village.
Saturday: Lazy day. For some reason the main entry for today is about me slicing my thumb open on a bread knife. and there was blood everywhere! :D
but it was only a small cut.
~Second Week~
Sunday: Went to the infamous Lavender fields there.
Monday: Went to Sisteron and visited a citadel with good views over the rest of the town. It has some history to do with Napoleon but I can't remember what. Really hot though and it was really nice in some cellar place we found which was all dark and smelt of that lovely underground smell that you get in caves (but it smells nicer and more natural in proper caves (sadly we didn't visit any caves (they were too far away))).
Tuesday: Went to a market, didn't buy anything but there was a dead body there. Covered by a white sheet and everything. Police and firemen (yes France uses the firemen instead of the ambulance in cases like this) wandering around. It turns out he died of a heart attack (not some inventive murder like I imagined) but still, RIP market man.
Wednesday: Dad, Virginia and I went to the observatory and I didn't understand a thing because they spoke French too quickly. But it was nice inside the observatory. All sci-fi-y. They had thirteen telescopes in all. Also they were having a sci-fi film night on the day we left for England; playing Wall-E (would like to see), Star Trek (already seen), Hancock (don't want to see) and Jurassic Park 3 (don't want to see). Not the greatest line up for a sci fi film night IMHO.
Thursday: Went to another town and market, purchased two pairs of earrings. One is black with some blue and green in, um, an explosion shape and the other are blue dreamcatcher type things. My sister bought a necklace and mum bought some soap and kitchen items. Afterwards went to a lake and went swimming. Not as good as previous lake though because there was no beach. There were rocks that you had to step off to get into the lake.
Friday: Lazy day
Saturday: went home.
^ Oh that was awfully written. I do apologise. See for some reason I only kept the diary for one week and then gave up so the second week I did from memory.
Anyway other things about France:
BNs!!! I had some!! Photo proof of them (and, um, a packet of Pringles):
(look at them being all happy!)
Magical French food! (well not magical). They have all this awesome stuff over there that we don't have (but then that's true for pretty much all countries). Crazy cereals - I quite liked the Lion cereal - caramel and chocolate flakes. BNs of course. Other awesome cereals including flavours of Special K we don't get over here. I tried snails. Can't say I was mega impressed. But they were all garlic buttery. Chocolate spready stuff. Rillettes du Mans!! I had that on my sandwiches every day. (just looked it up on Google images. It looks disgusting there. It really isn't). Tried a little bit of Lavendar ice cream. Weird.
Wearing my blue dreamcatcher earrings now. My first pair of dangly earrings and they feel weird. My head's all "there's something dangling from my ears!".
Trying to extend my sister's vocabulary I gave her a new word each day to learn, although near the end of the holidays I usually forgot to give her one. and she usually forgot what they meant.
Books! I brought seven: Frankenstein (which I had read a third of), a half read Lolita, The Colour of Magic, Mort, Sourcerey, Animal Farm and Northanger Abbey. I liked them all. I also managed to pace myself fairly well so I finished my last book on the second Friday but then had no book for the aeroplane journey. (for those that know me that read this blog if you have any Discworld novels then pleasewouldyoumindlendingthemtome? :D (oh I have just been to the library (the other library, not my usual one) they have a fairly large collection of Discworld novels. I got three out. Which ones I can't remember.)
Speaking of aeroplane journeys it was weird going to France in an aeroplane because before I went on the ferry or the Eurostar/Shuttle. I may have been on an aeroplane to France before mais je ne sais pas.
By the end of the holiday our house was full of insects. Moths, crickets, flies, wasps, weird beetle things, mosquitoes, spindly legged house spiders (I don't mind these ones), fat house spiders (I abhor these ones. Only when they're moving though); you name it, it was in our house.
Pool was full of insects every evening when we switched the light on. Usually moths or fly-things. One time in the morning I found two dead big house spiders at the bottom. My sister would insist that I save as many insects as possible with the net.
One day Virginia came to show me two flies; one was on top of the other, it was obvious what they were doing. Then she goes and says "I wonder what they're doing". She's thirteen dammit, she should know.
Our villa:
I would put more pictures in but it is the most annoying thing on blogger because you have to drag them down all the way since they appear at the top. I may make a Photobucket album so you can see them there. OK I have now made an album but it doesn't show up. Screw that. I'll work on it.
Argh that was a horribly horribly written blog post. It has also taken me a day to write it. Started yesterday and added little bits at intervals throughout today.
