"Buon giorno, Principessa!"

Things are happening really quickly right now. We’re officially done in 6 days, and I’m officially home in 16 days. I can’t tell you how excited I am to be done, but I’ve got a lot of crap to do these next few days. Fortunately, I was able to get a lot of that knocked off today.
Today was a very full day. I got up, had breakfast, and went to colloquy. At 10:15ish, Steve, Adam, Tabitha, Eri, and I went to the National Portrait Gallery for MAG. When we left the tube stop at Charing Cross, Adam noticed a store that was having a massive store, so we checked it out. Steve got this cool fedora and souvenirs for his family, Adam and Eri got stuff, and I got a gigantic flag for £2. It’s red and white and says “England” on it. It’s mammoth: 6 feet by 10 feet! I have no clue where I’m gonna put it, but it was really cheap, so it was worth it. It’s gonna be fun.

The National Portrait Gallery was alright. It’s not as cool as the National Gallery or Tate Britain because it’s all, well, portraits. And that gets old after a while. But we saw cool paintings/photographs of Nelson Mandela, Salmon Rushdie, Harold Pinter, Patrick Stewart, Judi Dench, Paul McCartney, Princess Diana, Albert Einstein, James Joyce, and people like that. So it was pretty cool. After that, we had lunch outside the National Gallery. Then we went in and checked out the gift shop. We all loved the National Gallery (I did, at least), and none of us seemed to have any qualms about spending some money there. I got two prints of paintings in the Gallery that I really liked: Lake Keitele by Akseli Gallen-Kallela and Rain, Steam, and Speed – The Great Western Railway by JMW Turner.
The first one kind of reminds me of Findley Lake, but mostly makes me think of the lakes in the Adirondacks on the Highlander program last August (Jeez, that was less than a year ago!).

This isn't even my favorite Turner painting. I don't think it is, at least. It could be. But I've seen the original in the National Gallery and I do love it a lot. Besides, the gift shop only had two different Turner prints- this and one of a ship, so of course I went with train. Though the ship one had a better sky...anyways JMW Turner, I’ve decided, is my favorite painter. And I think it’s cool that I can say that. See, before this program, I didn’t know enough about art to say what my favorite style or artist is. But now that I’ve seen and studied the art that I have, I can make those calls. I’m not an expert on art, or even half of one. But I know a lot more about it now. I can identify some painters by their style. It’s pretty cool. But yeah, I like Turner. Yesterday we went to the Tate Britain and saw an exhibit of about a hundred paintings done by him throughout his life. I stayed longer than everyone else and wrote down the names of the paintings I liked a lot, filling a page in my notebook. Before leaving the Tate, I bought a 5-pound book that talks about and shows about 50 of his paintings.


Anyways, back to today. After the National Gallery, Tab went to a concert and Steve, Adam, Eri, and I went to the Tate Modern to finish our MAG. On the way, we walked along the Thames and took pictures of St. Paul’s, the Millennium Bridge, and the Globe Theatre.

I’ve got mixed feelings about the Tate Modern, and especially the modern art inside. A lot of it, I just don’t understand. Some of it is cool, most of it is confusing, and some of it is just downright disturbing or scary. I don’t want to say it’s “bad”, because someone might not think it is. But it’s definitely not for me. But parts of it were cool. I’m not a big Picasso fan, but the Andy Warhol stuff wasn’t bad. And I got to see my first Pollack, and it was pretty cool. So it’s not all “bad”, I suppose.

After the Tate Modern, I went by myself to this church that Pastor Keith had wanted me to visit. It was where John Wesley was converted. The name of the church was St. Botolph-without-Aldersgate. I went to the wrong one, called S. Botolph-without-Aldgate. So that sucked. They pointed me in the right direction and I took the tube there. It was cool. I took a picture of a plaque on the fence that talked about it and went in the church and everything. The people there were really nice. They said he wasn’t converted at the church itself, but it happened on that street that the church was on (the original location was no longer standing). So I took a picture of the street.

I got back to the Highbury Centre and had some food. Then I went out to the library to return the music I had checked out (Johnny Cash, the Beatles, Iron & Wine, Flaming Lips, Regina Spektor, and the Decemberists) and get new music. It’s a good deal- you can check out up to 10 CDs at a time for 30 pence each. And they give you a punch card and every 10th CD is free. I’ve checked out over 30 CDs so far, including every Johnny Cash and Beatles CD they have. Today I got Bob Dylan, Muse, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Moby, and soundtracks to 2 Disney movies and a James Bond movie. I was happy.

Now I was at the Highbury Centre to stay. My trip out was long and tiring (my knees still hurt) but productive. I got 2 prints, 10 CDs, saw the church for Pastor Keith, finished my reading, and listened to a lot of music. Here’s how the progression worked from morning to evening: West Side Story, the Killers, U2, Beatles, Iron & Wine, Decemberists, and Green Day.

After dinner we watched “Life is Beautiful”. It’s an Italian film about how a father helped his young son survive in a concentration camp during the Holocaust. I won’t say too much about it because I’m planning on watching it with some of you this summer. But it’s easily one of my new favorite movies. I gave it a 9 out of 10. It’s the official model for what kind of husband and father I want to be.

Ok, after the movie wasn’t nearly as cool. To make a long story short, tensions have been running high with everyone the past few days. We’re all tired of the program: the readings, the MAG, the plenaries, the colloquies, the papers, the Highbury Centre. We’ve been doing this for 3 whole months. We all live together, all 30 of us, and it’s exhausting. So basically, a couple of my friends and I got in an argument. But some of us went for a walk and talked about it, and then all 5 of us got back together and talked, and it went great. We’re all fine now. We just gotta make it to the end.

After patching things up with my friends, I skyped Emily for a little bit. I feel bad because I was going to skype her earlier, but I had to reconcile with my friends first. So she sort of got put on the backburner tonight. Sorry honey! Luckily, everything worked out, and the good news is that Emily and I are able to skype again on Thursday. I’m excited for that. I miss her a lot. But I see her soon…

Alright, here’s the deal. I’m exhausted, hungry, and my knees hurt like hell. I’m gonna post this, get ready for bed, watch a cartoon or three, and pass out. Goodnight Irene.