Catching Up and Cleaning Up

Ok, so I'm finally about to get up to mentioning what's happened in the last 3 weeks. Of course, I've forgotten quite a few things but that will honestly just make it a better read most likely as I'll (finally) only mention the important things. First, however, some house-cleaning. Here are blogs that I intend to write soon.

* Yorkshire Field Trip -- I want to include pictures on this one because I took quite a few of them up there but I don't have my computer back yet.
* Fulham v Tottenham -- Just haven't got around to this yet.
* A Virtual Tour of the Neighborhood -- I've taken a lot of pictures of the views from our room and also what the walk from the dorm to the tube station looks like but here again I'm foiled by the lack of my computer.

Now, for the last three weeks. The last important thing that I did not mention was Election Night. Waiting for the returns to come in was somewhat painful. With the time difference of 5 hours, it meant that the first results did not come in until 12 AM local time. In the meantime, there was Champions League on. I'm not sure if I've mentioned Champions League before, but Champions League is the competition between the top teams of all the European football (or soccer, if you prefer) leagues. Liverpool was playing Atletico Madrid at Liverpool. I happen to dislike Liverpool. This is mainly because my favorite team is Chelsea. Chelsea is currently leading the Premier League. Second place? Yep, Liverpool. Even though this is a different competition, I wanted Liverpool to bite it. An early goal put Madrid in the lead and in the waning minutes of the game it looked as if the visitors would hold on and win both the game and the group. In the 94th minute--and I don't even believe that there should have been 4 minutes of stoppage time--Steven Gerrard, Liverpool's captain and star player, threw himself at the ball in the Madrid penalty area. He made contact with a Madrid defender and the penalty was given. Gerrard slotted it home and Liverpool salvaged a miracle draw. The problem? The foul should have been on Gerrard. The Madrid defender went straight up while Gerrard recklessly threw himself into the defender. I was just short of livid and screaming at the TV. Anyhow, it was fun but I was a little bit worried that Steven Gerrard might some how steal a miracle win for John McCain. It would be in character for him to do so.

As we all know, that did not happen. After the Liverpool v Madrid game, I went down to the dorm’s election night party where Mieke, the resident director, was so nice as to bring her Skybox in and hook it up to the TV so that we could watch CNN's election coverage. We watched election related youtube videos (mostly Daily show clips) to pass the time before results came in. Once results started, it was all eyes on the TV and the room was packed full. I had the pleasure of sitting next to Laura and chatting with her all night. She was mock indignant with me for confidently averring that Obama was sure to win. The reason for my confidence was that every poll and all reports about ground games indicated that Obama was in a much stronger position and that only some bizarre fluke could lead to a McCain win. Soon enough, it became clear that I was right as Obama racked up state after state en route to the Presidency. However, I was little able to enjoy this development because I made the mistake of divulging the fact that I didn’t vote. The reason I didn’t vote is simply because of how cumbersome it is to vote from abroad. Also, with Pennsylvania polling solidly in Obama’s camp, I felt that my vote would not be crucial. Even when Pennsylvania proved to be a landslide win for Obama, this fact was still held against me, which led to me unfortunately losing my temper at around 5 AM and barking at Ali.

That was my election experience. It was fun watching history be made but the polls sort of drained all suspense for me. Nonetheless, it was a good opportunity to bond with Laura. The worst part, though, was that not only did I end up dead tired the next day, but I also ended up voiceless. All the talking and Steven Gerrard-related yelling left me quite hoarse.

The next day my only major activity was scouting dinner locations for my date with Laura. First, let’s back up a bit. After starting as a unified 24, groups, as they tend to do, started to form. Mainly there are three groups. Caelyn, Greg, Andy, Josh, Gabe Cahn, Hilary, Margot, Blake, and Francesca constitute one group. Dmitri, Michael, Gabe Grossman, Marie, and Tom constitute another (Marie, as you might be able to guess, is a very attractive girl). Lastly, there is myself, Dan, Lisbeth, Laura, Katie, Michelle, Constance, and Ali. Given this state of things, I spent a good deal of time hanging out with and around Laura. On the way to seeing Chicago, Josh, Laura, Roderick, and I got a bit lost (or rather we got poor directions) in Piccadilly Circus. I misread a sign. Then we turned the wrong way because Josh and Laura decided to go right when I said we should go left. Finally, we picked out the restaurant that we were supposed to find. These navigational misadventures formed the subject of some playful arguments between Laura and me. Laura would make fun of me for misleading the group; I would counter that she misled us equally. These arguments were, I thought, rather flirtatious in character. I had long half fancied her and these arguments brought us a bit closer. As I detected what I felt was further flirtation from her, I became surer that I wished to ask her out. In fact, I’m rather sure that the day long illness I suffered was a consequence of my emotions making me both sleepless and nauseous. I resolved myself that I had to just man up and ask her.

So I did. She responded affirmatively. In fact, if you want to be technical, she asked me out. I simply pulled her aside and told her that I fancied her, which led to her catching my drift and asking if I wanted to go out on a date. Of course, I did. The Yorkshire trip being on Friday of that week prevented us from going out then. Saturday was to be reserved for Guy Fawkes Day celebrations (it turned out to be a miserable day and a washout). Sunday would be reserved for homework. Thus, my gratification was delayed. I formed a new plan. I bought tickets for Never Forget, which is the musical featuring the songs of one of my favorite pop artists, Take That. We would grab an early dinner and then follow it up with seeing the show. That was set for Friday. Hence, on Wednesday, I headed to the area around the Savoy Theatre to scout possible dinner locations. I settled on Garfunkel’s, a tacky, touristy, sort of diner. True, it was not the most romantic possible choice, but I wished to keep things cheap and was afraid that going too far over the top would come off as too forward.

Friday, then, was our date. Laura, as I had hoped she would, looked rather alluring. She was wearing a nice dress and her leather boots that I happen to think are incredibly sexy. I went with my dressiest possible attire: khaki pants, blue dress shirt. I was nervous beforehand, especially when she showed up three minutes late as a consequence of her cell phone clock being three minutes slow, but my nerves quickly went away. We conversed easily all the way to Garfunkel’s and then over dinner. Mostly, we just talked about family and how it was when we were a kid. I offered to pay, but she insisted on paying her share on account that she is a “modern girl”. I protested but was secretly pleased by her modernity. We made it just in time for the show to start. It was everything I hoped it would be. That is, it was a big, colorful, cheesy, sing-along sort of musical. I had never imagined that I would see “Once You’ve Tasted Love” as a burlesque number or a salsa rendition of “It Only Takes a Minute” but I did and it was brilliant. By the way, when (if) I get married, I hope that my bride will agree to use the lyrics to “Never Forget” as our vows. When we got back to the dorm, Laura commented (much to my relief) that she had a really great time and suggested that we see Quantum of Solace before she departed on Monday for 7th week break. Unfortunately, paper writing made that something of an impossibility.

Everyone left by Monday morning for interim break, which left me depressed. I had no computer, no companionship, and to top it all off it was a dreary, drizzly London day. Also, I realized that I had a lot of work to do. I needed to do plenty of reading for both Professor Hadley’s Slums and Slumming class and Professor Mahawatte’s course. This realization, combined with my unwillingness to travel alone, conspired to make me scrap my own travel plans. Thus, it was a rather miserable week. I simply read, played solitaire, watched tv, and waited for humanity to return to me. Friday night, Dan returned and with him so did relatively easy computer access. Saturday, we went to the Fulham v Tottenham game (which will get a separate blog). Sunday, the girls returned from their travels and Buffalo gagged another game.

I was hoping that the old adage would prove true and that absence would indeed make the heart grow fonder and lead Laura to eagerly seek me out upon her return. Perhaps because she didn’t spend the whole week alone, and thus wasn’t dying for companionship, this wasn’t the case. I convinced myself that I was just being paranoid, but now it seems that this should have struck me as the beginning of the end. Monday, I enquired if Laura wished to go out with me on a second date for my birthday. In retrospect, I regret this because I left her no choice but to say yes. I should have left that date until Friday so that she would not have to dance around my birthday. Regardless, I wished to make my 21st birthday special and could think of no better way to do so than going out with her. We would eat at the Stockpot before catching a showing of Quantum of Solace, which she had been wishing to see. Once again, conversation flowed easily and I was very relaxed. She insisted on paying for the meal on account of it being my birthday (another reason I feel bad for leveraging my birthday the way I did) but on the condition that I buy her dinner on her birthday. Then, we headed across the street to the film. UK films are preceded by a good 15 minutes of commercials and then a couple trailers so we were afforded plenty of opportunity to chat. Finally, the movie started. It was decent but the way it was cut made the plot hard to follow. Honestly, I had zero interest in the movie. It just seemed a convenient thing to do with Laura and I knew that she had wanted to see it. Overall, the date seemed to go well and she suggested that we do something on the weekend after our papers were due on Friday.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be like that. Thursday she found me in the lounge and told me that it wasn’t working for her and that she just wanted to be friends. I could go on and in fact wrote a lot more about this before deleting it because it just wasn’t fair to Laura to air it out over the internet. The gist of it is that we ended up talking and because I was pretty heartbroken I acted immaturely and selfishly and made things worse than they should have been. So, now things are a little awkward between us, but I’m making it my mission to rectify that and prove to her and to myself that I was even slightly worthy of her. The rest of Thursday and Friday were pretty difficult because I was still feeling down, but I muddled through.

Saturday, I stayed in and watched rugby all day and rugby did its best to cheer me up. The day began with the final of the Rugby League World Cup. Australia was heavily favored to win the World Cup by beating New Zealand. After all, they had defeated them 30-6 just a couple weeks ago during the group stage. Moreover, they had absolutely demolished England during the group stage and likewise crushed Fiji in the semifinals. It looked to the entire world that there was no team in the world capable of even challenging the Kangaroos. The Kiwis, however, didn’t get the memo. After Australia scored the first two tries to go up 10-0, it looked as if the rout was on. Australia was in fine form and was cutting through the New Zealand defense. New Zealand, however, showed an impressive fight back. They came back with two converted tries for a 12-10 lead and it went to half time 16-12 in favor of Australia. Surely, though, Australia would come back after the break, assert their dominance, and destroy New Zealand. Again, New Zealand had other ideas. A concerted Kiwi performance combined with several Australia miscues allowed New Zealand to win the second half 22-4 and win 34-20. This constitutes one of the biggest upsets in rugby history. New Zealand was given 10-1 odds against winning and won by 14.

Later, it was time for some Rugby Union fall internationals. First of all, it was time for England v. South Africa at Twickenham. The Springboks of South Africa are the defending World Cup champions. After winning the World Cup in 2007, their form has been somewhat patchy but they remain one of the world’s strongest teams. Such is their dominance that a 20-15 victory over Six Nations champion Wales and a 14-10 win over Scotland were considered signs of vulnerability. England was coming off an impressive win over the Pacific Islanders 39-13, which they followed with a 28-14 loss to Australia. They were looking to bounce back after that disappointing result. Instead, the Springboks embarrassed England. England frequently challenged the Springbok try line, but South Africa’s defense was stout and they simply could not be penetrated. Meanwhile, English miscues yielded easy points for the world champs. When all was said and done the score was South Africa 42, England 6. It was England’s worst ever defeat at Twickenham and it comes before next week’s clash with New Zealand, arguably a stronger side.

The third game featured New Zealand’s fearsome All Blacks against Wales, the grand slam champions of the Six Nations. Wales was looking to pull the upset just as New Zealand had done earlier in the day in Rugby League. In the first half, they looked up to it. The pack played powerfully and strong tactical kicking allowed Wales to jump out to a 9-6 half time lead. However, the All Blacks came roaring back in the second half of play. New Zealand grabbed control of the game and refused to let it go. All of a sudden, Wales could not get any possession. New Zealand repeatedly pinned them back in their own end forcing clearance kicks. Wales just simply couldn’t win the kicking battles and always ended up ceding ground and the ball. Wales put up a brave show of try line defense but New Zealand’s relentless pressure was eventually enough to crack them. If I recall correctly, the final score was New Zealand 22, Wales 9.

Sunday I woke up late and didn’t get around to doing too much before the NFL games came on. Miami v New England was on Sky so I watched that and Dan shouted out updates from around the league as he monitored them on the internet. Overall, it was a pretty relaxing day. As I write this, it is late Monday night. I have a report to do tomorrow and I haven’t started my part. Time to get on it. Anyhow, that has been my last three weeks.

Before I go, though, I have to mention one more thing. I owe a huge debt of gratitude that I will probably never be able to repay to Greg Nieder and Emily Ponder. Greg is about the best friend a guy could possibly ask for. He’s always there for me when I need him and he really helped me through things after I was feeling the disappointment of what happened between Laura and me. Emily is our course assistant and she also helped me gain some clarity after what happened. I took things pretty hard, not so much because of anything to do with Laura (who I can’t fault at all), but because it brought back a lot of old feelings of depression and inadequacy. Emily helped me see the bigger picture just as she did when I was feeling desperately depressed in Wales. I’m not sure what I would have done without Greg and Emily but I’m sure that it would not have been good, so I can’t thank them enough.

Postscript -- It's now Wednesday evening, tonight we have tickets to see Neil LaBute's play In A Dark Dark House. The wounds are still pretty fresh, so it's still difficult for me to be around Laura (and I already have to go to class every day). For that reason, I'm skipping the play (it does not sound like my cup of tea anyway) and am going to stay back, go to the local pub, and watch Chelsea play Bordeaux. Right now, I need something that will make me happy, not a play about a man who was abused as a child.

Also, frustratingly, I did my part of our report, which involved writing discussion questions about the Salvation Army, but Professor Hadley did not use them. She had her own questions for discussion and was hoping to get back around to mine but ran out of time. That means I stayed up an extra hour working on discussion questions that she never actually looked at. I could have wrote anything for those questions or, in all probability, nothing at all and it would have been the same to her! That's just how it's been for me these last couple weeks.