Last weekend, Jansher, Stacy and I went to Oxford. The most entertaining part was seeing all the rowing teams. Apparently rowing is huge there. They live on the Thames and they had all these boathouses, each with a coat of arms for that team and about 15 long boats inside a huge garage. On top was a room that was surrounded by windows, and from what we could see, looked like a country-club bar or something. We also went to lunch at the Eagle and Child pub, where C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkein used to meet. I didn't realize how many popular authors attended Oxford.

The cathedral was also amazing. It was strange because our churches, even Catholic ones, are mainly a place of worship. This was a museum/place of worship. That's how the entire school was. I would not want to attend, daily, a world land-mark. I would get so tired of the tourists and think, this is my school!

Oxford is best described by my photos which I have posted. However, even though Robby lived there for a summer, after three hours there, Jan, Stacy, and I had seen enough of the town. It was really fun though, and might not have been as entertaining if I hadn't been there with friends.

In only a few days, I will be going to Paris! I'm excited. I'm also semi-nervous because I have heard that the French are stuck up. I also think that I won't be able to see everything in just one weekend. I'm staying with Martha's friend, Brittney, so I didn't want to invite myself for a whole week, and I also have school of course. Everyone will be leaving me for St. Patty's day in Ireland. Where better to spend it an Irish holiday? And tickets are about $40 round trip! Unfortunately, I have school and an immunology lab that I cannot miss.

Wednesday was Stacy's birthday, so we went out to The Font, the disco (meaning club) on campus. That was fun. I wore animal print leggings and a shirt with a jaguar on it. I was endlessly teased for my choice of outfit. Why did I wear it?.... because I can. I think Stacy had a good time, as she said, usually her birthday falls on a weekday but no one can do anything, so it usually goes unnoticed.

The girls- Ashlee is hiding

Other than that,I have just been trying to keep up with school, which is really hard here. I had an abstract with the due date of "week 26", so I completed it and brought it to class on Thursday assuming that it was to be turned in in class. Oh no! Of course not. I neither had the right date, nor location. You must print off a coversheet with a barcode. Then you have to submit it in the "Life Sciences reception" in a building where we don't even have class. And I should have known that first year classes always have the due date of assignments on Wednesday, and second year classes on Thursday and so on. When you go there they scan your paper and give you a receipt. Then your teacher grades it. Then a teacher in the sciences field grades it. The grades are averaged. Then for quality control, your papers are sent off to a third-party grading site where all the universities from the UK send theirs to ensure that they all grade comparably. Then you get your paper back 2+ months later. This is the same for my Spanish tests as well. Before you get the grades on the first three, you have already taken the fourth and final one. You get them all back around the end of the semester. That doesn't really give you a chance to know how you are doing and improve. The system is so strange here, and with 10% of the school being international students, you'd think teachers would do a better job of explaining the process.