P.S.

P.S.
Leave it to me to need a few more words... After talking to Ed last night (thanks, Ed!), I woke to a gorgeous morning, with sun shining brightly on Lincoln Chapel's steeple outside my window. It's going to be a great day for traveling! Love to all, Melanie

Last Full Day in Oxford

I can't believe it's my last full day in Oxford! My feelings are mixed: definitely excited to see folks at home and sleep in more than a twin bed, and awed at the great experiences of the last six weeks. Today, a dark chocolate raspberry milkshake from Moo-Moo's in the Covered Market seemed the appropriate complement to some thick emotion.

Lena left by bus this morning for Gatwick Airport, where she caught a plane to Pisa to meet Ilja, her long-term entanglement, for a week-long post-Loaf holiday. I walked Lena to the bus, and we talked about next summer in Asheville. I worked away on Seattle Academy projects for a while in my room, until BBC broadcast the Olympic Opening Ceremonies live! It's hard to see in this photo, but here's a small crowd watching the spectacle on the Junior Common Room's flatscreen TV.

I packed everything but the last few items I need tomorrow morning, and headed off with Alison to a favorite cafe in the bottom of St. Mary's Church (below).

This is the cafe! And its view, of Radcliffe Camera from its churchyard garden (below), isn't too shabby. In fact, when I studied in Radcliffe Camera, part of the Bodleian Library, I often read at the window directly facing the garden cafe.

We split spicy chai for two and read pleasure books. Alison's reading Bolano's "The Savage Detectives", below.

This evening, Bread Loaf planned a nice spread to celebrate graduating seniors and thank the Lincoln College staff at large. Here are the "hearty" appetizers!

Me, Alison and Heather at the reception, below.

They even had a nice cake for the "seniors." Congratulations to Alison, and to all the graduates!

It's definitely hard to close both the summer here in Oxford and the blog about the summer in Oxford, so I figured I'd make some lists (as is my coping mechanism):

Things I’ll Miss
The bells (sometimes)
The friends on my floor
That dog that chases the Frisbee in University Parks every day at the same time
Buying postage for Ed’s letters everyday from the Porter’s Lodge
Pain au chocolat at breakfast
Regular curry for lunch
The fun of an extremely small class on a topic I love
Finding mail from home on the table at lunch
Marks and Spencer Simply Food grocery store
1,50 pound t-shirts at Primark
All the natural light in my bathroom
“Dreaming” spires
Lincoln College’s unreal (and perfectly manicured) quadrangles
Access to the Bodleian, and the satisfaction of figuring out the Bodleian
The “tourists” who twice now asked me for directions I could actually provide
The leafy green alongside the Thames that outgreens any green
The tops of buildings in the golden twilight
SO much to learn and to do
More things than I can list

Things I Won’t
The bells (sometimes)
Nearly tripping (or actually tripping) on cobblestones
Nearly getting run over by bikes
So much meat at dinner (tactical error… should have picked the vegetarian meal plan)
The exchange rate
Twin bed

Favorite Spots: If You Visit Oxford, Definitely Enjoy…
Edamame (“homestyle” Japanese)
Chiang Mai (Thai)
G & D’s (bagels and gourmet ice cream)
Gretchen’s in the Covered Market (funky-fresh upstairs café)
Moo-Moo’s (source of the chocolate-raspberry shake)
Ben’s Cookies (last sampled: orange marmalade-chocolate)
St. Mary’s Garden/Vault Café (mentioned above)
Aziz (cleverly combines the Thai and the Indian, riverside)
Turf Pub (where Clinton supposedly inhaled)
King’s Arms (the first place I ate in Oxford; I still remember the carrot soup)
Head of the River (you can’t beat that patio along the Thames)
The Bear (college boys get their ties clipped and hung on the wall)
Jamie’s (Italian… with service just like home)

New Places (At Least for Me) We'll Visit on a Next Trip to the UK
Natural History Museum, where Jon and Ellinor work (London)
Edinburgh
Dublin
Brighton
National Gallery (London)
The Victoria and Albert Museum (London)
The Trout (Oxford)

I board a bus for Heathrow at 2 PM (my time) tomorrow and board a plane for Seattle at 6:55 PM (my time). To the Bread Loaf folks who read these posts, thanks for an unusually good summer and have a great year. To everyone who made this summer even more terrific by sharing the experience online, THANK YOU! I'll see most of you, soon, stateside. Much love!

Soaking Up Oxford

This morning, before my last tutorial, Alison and I took a long loopy walk around Christ Church Meadow, and along the Thames, where I snapped this photo. Afterward, I headed off to meet with my tutor, Christine, about my second and final paper of the summer. She and I had a great talk, and I earned an 'A' on the paper! Hooray! Christine also pressed me again about doing more graduate work and urged me to email her anytime if I need anything. Double-hooray!

After an afternoon of working on projects for SAAS, Alison and I walked over to meet Heather Brubaker at the Turf Pub. We walked along Radcliffe Camera, pictured here, beautiful in the twilight.

Here's Ali and me at the Turf Pub.

The evening's prime destination was Jamie Oliver's new Italian restaurant in Oxford. Raised in Cambridge, Oliver's plan is to open his first restaurants in college towns before taking his restaurants to other cities. Here are Heather and Alison outside Jamie's.

Whenever we walk by this restaurant, we see a ten-deep (at least) queue outside the door. We waited about ten minutes outside, then another twenty in the bar, before we enjoyed an amazing (and leisurely; once inside... no rush) meal of bruschetta, polenta crisps with rosemary and sea salt, and various pastas (Alison and I split the "Turbo!" spicy penne and pappardelle with sausage, while Lena and Heather both enjoyed the truffle pasta). We had SO much fun!

Tomorrow morning, Lena departs, first for a week in Italy, then for Baltimore. It's hard to believe another Bread Loaf summer is coming to an end! After breakfast tomorrow, I'll walk with Lena and her stuff to where her bus departs. Fun plans are brewing, however, for the rest of tomorrow: Olympic coverage on the big screen in the Junior Common Room, pleasure books outside at one of my favorite cafes (IN the churchyard adjacent to Radcliffe Camera), and an early evening reception for the seniors (Alison included!) graduating tomorrow.

One last Oxford blog... tomorrow! Have a great day, all!
Melanie

Freudian Sip

Today marked my last class and the due date of what became an 18-page paper on how Edith Wharton uses transportation vs. locomotion to mark passive vs. active behavior in The House of Mirth, Ethan Frome, and The Age of Innocence. After all that, Lena and I needed a snack! (Above: Lena on the steps of The Snack Destination.)

We headed to Freud, the closest thing to a McMenamins (for those who know it) in Oxford. A church converted into a casual bar/restaurant, Freud is at once pretty, high-ceilinged, and intentionally rough around the edges. It's in a hipster neighborhood called Jericho, around a fifteen minute walk from Lincoln College.

We ate dinner at a little table on Freud's front steps.

In addition to olives, we shared hummus and pita, and a pizza with pepperoni and jalapeno peppers. Yum.

En route home, we encountered this, irresistable to the passing photographer meets former college admission person: the Oxford undergraduate admission office!

Tonight was the final night of "Deep Hall Entertainments," a sort of anything-goes open mike with truly high-level performances in the campus pub, Deep Hall.

Tonight, the acts included poetry, beat-boxing, Johnny Cash covers, original music, and a collaborative theater piece Heather Brubaker initiated. Here are Lena and Heather Lindenman before the festivities.

Heather Brubaker introduces her piece...

...created by the performers, Alison included, and staged inside one of the alcoves in the campus pub. Very cool!

Above, Alison gets into the act.

Tomorrow, Heather Lindenman leaves early in the morning (sniff). I hike out to meet my tutor for a conversation about the paper I turned in today, which she's grading tonight. Otherwise, it's final packing, some SAAS projects, and a special off-campus surprise dinner tomorrow night. Here's a hint:

http://www.jamieoliver.com/italian/oxford

More to come!

Five Things About Today

1. My ten page paper ballooned into a twenty page paper and draft #1 is now under the capable teacher-pen of Lena Tashjian. I'm telling you, people should hire this woman for the great, ass-kicking criticism she gives to any written work. My paper will come back all purple, and all the better for it.

2. Today = phone bonanza! Ed called this morning at 7 AM, and we talked for a good hour. Ed reports that the sun finally came out in Alaska (which could mean the weather's not great in Seattle; there's an inverse relationship), and the pinks, a species of salmon ideal for the Japanese School Lunch Program, finally "showed up" (on his birthday, no less), helping the Alsek bottom line. Ed and I also discussed/confirmed my destination for next summer, my graduation summer, which is... *drumroll*... Asheville, NC! Read more about Bread Loaf, Asheville at:

http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/blse/campuses/nc

(Someone teach me how to link that so the link isn't so cuckoo-long?)

3. Today = mail bonanza! Today was a record mail day, with a card from Mom and Dad, two cards from Ed (complete with diagram of rebuilt net; very cool), and a card from Cameron, the awesome Seattle Academy graduate fishing with Ed this summer. Cameron thanked me in his card for "helping me land the two greatest opportunities I have ever had: fishing in Alaska and going to Yale." Yes!

4. It's raining like a sonofabitch. It's raining so much, that a possible late-night study break to the cheap falafel stand might go on "rain delay." You know it's bad when it's too rainy for me to get FOOD.

5. Tomorrow begins the mini-vacation known as Oxford Without Homework. I attend my last class, turn in my last paper, and spend the next three days hitting the favorite haunts of Oxford and reprogramming my brain for actual work next week (wha?).

Have a great day! Love to all!
Melanie

Winding Down

Alison and I decided this afternoon to take our books and computers river-side and work outside at the Head of the River Pub. The setting is gorgeous: a huge patio with picnic tables and umbrellas, on the other side of Folly Bridge from the Indian-Thai restaurant the ladies hit Saturday night. I packed up so many books and notebooks for the outing, I forgot my camera. I hunted around online instead and was able to find a picture of the place, above.

Earlier today, I had my penultimate class, this time on Eliot’s “Mill on the Floss” (loved it, loved it, loved it). My tutor moved our last class of the session to Wednesday, so after Wednesday at 1 PM, I’ll be done with work for Bread Loaf Summer #4! My paper is also due Wednesday, so I’ll spend all day tomorrow researching and adding last details. My tutor wants to meet with each of us later in the week to discuss the graded papers before we go home, so that’ll happen Thursday or Friday sometime. Most everyone here is nearing completion on final projects, and the graduating seniors (Alison included!) are gearing up for the weekend’s festivities. Picture sort of a pleasant, mellow end to the session, with papers submitted, mild weather, overcast skies, and readiness for the next phase of the year.

The Meal on the Floss

After a day of reading off campus, Alison and I returned to a wedding here at Lincoln College. Bridesmaids dressed in our hall, a band played Amy Winehouse covers, and this little boy waited patiently for the wedding photographer.

Happily, the wedding forced all Bread Loafers out of the dining hall and into the many terrific restaurants of Oxford. The Loaf gave us each 14 pounds for dinner because we had no access to regular dinner (thanks, wedding party!). We headed to Aziz, which serves both Thai and Indian food (throw in some Flaming Hot Cheetos, and my culinary needs are met)! Pictured above are Alison, Lena, and Heather Brubaker at Aziz.

Aziz is situated smack on the Thames, with a beautiful riverfront (and river-height) deck adjacent to what's known as Folly Bridge. Here are Heather Lindenman, me, and Rebecca at our table outside, with Folly Bridge behind us.

Rebecca ran to the top of Folly Bridge to take pictures of us down on the deck, so I snapped this picture of her in the sun.

Swans swim up next to your table, perhaps looking for one of the incredibly good items we ordered: green curry with vegetables, red curry with prawns, chicken tikka masala, another Indian curry (now known as "number 63") with lots of garlic and onions, vegetable stir fry with ginger, papadum, and naan.

This was an amazing meal in an amazing setting. Witness the pinky-pretty sunset behind Heather, above. On a return trip to Oxford, I'll visit this restaurant straightaway. Tomorrow, I finish digesting tonight's curries and finish digesting Eliot's "The Mill on the Floss." Have a great rest of the weekend, everyone!

P.S. We saw the cheesetastic "X-Files" movie, which confirms 1) that Mulder and Scully sleep in the same bed and 2) that anyone can learn how to do a stem-cell procedure by Googling "stem cell procedure."