Sorry about the wait squad. After getting thousands* of angry emails from jilted readers, I have returned after missing last week’s blog post. Sorry not sorry I was living the dream in Paris. I’ve done a lot of cool stuff the past couple weeks, especially #Week8, so I’ll just cruise pretty quickly through #Week7.

The week was pretty nondescript, mostly spent reading and planning the Paris trip. I usually take a backseat on planning things because I’m a slacker and a bad friend, and this was a reminder why. Planning sucks! It is boring and time-consuming and I hate it. But it was certainly worth it because my week in Paris was all kinds of dope. Here’s the rough skeleton of what went down:

• 16 (Friday): left for Paris early in the mo, met Hannah, Taylor, and Emma, checked in to apartment, walked around, went to Louvre, drank wine by the Seine.
• Saturday: Musse d’orsey, Musee Picasso, watched Midnight in Paris IN PARIS
• Sunday: Dylan arrives, Notre Dame, Shakespeare and Co., boat tour, steak and frites, squad gets #turnt
• Monday: Champs-Elysees, Arc du Triomph, girls leave
• Tuesday: Dyl and Q’s First Day, Sacre Couer
• Wednesday: Pompidou, Louvre, bars for St. Patty’s Day
• Thursday: Eiffel Tower
• Friday: walked around, #treatyoself
• Saturday: left early in the morning, got back via plane/trane/automobile

It’s pretty much impossible for me to say everything that happened unless I wrote like ten pages but you don’t want to read that and I definitely don’t want to write that. Seriously, I’m already bored and I think I’ve written like 100 words.

Anyways, it was an awesome week. I spent the first couple days with Hannah, Taylor, and Emma, who is Hannah’s sister living in Paris as well as a true homie. It was awesome to see them all again; you know you’re really good friends when catching up just takes like two minutes, and then everything’s like normal after that. Since Hannah and Taylor were only in Paris for a few days, we covered a lot of ground and did a lot of stuff. My personal fave was the Musee Picasso; in second grade I did a report on Picasso, and I’ve been a big fan ever since. I used to really love to draw as a kid, and this was a reminder of that, much like the dinosaur skeletons reminded me of my childhood paleontology dreams a couple weeks ago. I’ve actually been drawing quite a bit the past couple days, and it’s been a lot of fun.

Dylan arrived on Sunday morning, thus kicking off the 36 hours that the whole team was there before Hannah and Taylor left Monday afternoon. We walked over by Notre Dame and into the Latin Quarter, and stopped by Shakespeare and Co., a bookstore that is apparently old and famous. I got Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, my only purchase in Paris. Hannah and Taylor were pretty insistent that Dylan and I buy some clothes at some point during the week, but we declined.

We took a nice little boat tour down the Seine, then ate dinner at this awesome place that basically gives you unlimited steak and frites. As for our one night together, it fizzled out pretty quickly. We got rowdy, and fast, so what was intended to be a long and wild night ended with all of us asleep by midnight.

The next morning was appropriately hazy and groggy, but we got through it, and walked down Champs-Elysees to see the Arc du Triomph (I have no idea how to spell any of these things). Then, after hanging out a bit, Hannah and Taylor left; it was a bummer to see them leave so soon, but very cool we got to spend time together.

*no

I’m in a vastly different time zone, but time still seems to fly at the same pace. I’ve already been here for like six weeks! I feel like I just got here. I’m still not even used to the whole “drive on the left side of the road” thing. I only have a tad over two months left here, and it bums me out a little bit. But on a brighter note, that’s two more months of having very fun times actin’ a fool in Scotland. Here’s what I did this week:

The first few days of the week were mainly spent catching up on reading. I had a couple essays due in week five, as I’m sure you loyal readers recall, so I neglected a lot of the reading I was also supposed to be doing at the time. Fortunately, the books were pretty good, and the large volume I’ve been forced to read here has actually made me a significantly faster reader. So now I’m actually on track, and don’t have to sit in class afraid to get called on, which is a relief.

On Thursday night, I went to my first Scottish house party. I was invited to the hall soccer team social despite the fact that I’ve gotten injured in the grand total of two games that I’ve played, and I gladly accepted. You will probably not be surprised to hear that house parties in Scotland are not very different than in the US. A bunch of dudes awkwardly stood around holding drinks until someone suggested a drinking game. The games we played were pretty similar to the ones you might come across at any US school, except for several that we played that involved lots of memorization. Luckily for my liver, I proved to be a quick learner, and spared myself any outrageous amounts of drinking. Don’t worry, mom!

On Friday, I left for Edinburgh with my friends Jeff and Collin. We got there at around 6, got dinner, and went to a few pubs. Edinburgh’s a real beautiful city, and it was cool to see it at night all lit up and whatnot.

We all slept terribly because I swear the guy we shared our hostel room with was possessed or something. He kept grunting and yelling in his sleep, both in Spanish and English. He was probably a crazy person, but I guess it was kind of neat that he was a bilingual crazy person.

We got an early start to the day, and headed down the Royal Mile, an old street in the middle of most of Edinburgh’s historic tourist destinations. We toured St. Giles’ Cathedral, which was beautiful, and then headed to the top of the Mile to Edinburgh Castle. It was a massive place, not too dissimilar from Stirling Castle last week. I enjoyed touring it, but preferred Stirling Castle a bit more because it seems like it’s been re-done quite a bit more than Stirling has. But who am I to critique castles? They’re both pretty cool.

We then walked down the Mile and then headed over to the Elephant House, the café where JK Rowling wrote her first few Harry Potter books. Like the rest of my generation, I’m a huge Harry Potter nerd, so it was a pretty awesome spot to see. I am, however, still bitter that the Harry Potter website sorted me into Hufflepuff. I hold Ms. Rowling personally accountable for that.

We then hit the National Museum and the National Gallery. The main highlight: a skeleton of a Megasloth. Seriously, Google it. Way back in the day, there were sloths in South America that were like 20 feet tall. The world is amazing.

Our last stop in our very productive day was Caldon Hill, which has a beautiful view of the city and a few neat monuments, including the Nelson Monument, built to honor Admiral Horatio Nelson, but probably also me. After surveying the town and resting our weary legs, we headed back down to the bus station.

I sat next to a lovely old lady from Glenrothes, just one in a series of many dope old people I’ve encountered in this country. Then, the bus broke down, which was irritating, but we hopped on a new bus pretty quick. It was a very enjoyable couple days, and I was very impressed with Edinburgh. If I have a free day or two later on, I hope to go back.

This upcoming week is a big one. I leave for Paris on Friday for a week, so the next couple days will be focused on preparing for that trip. I’m meeting my very good Whitman pals Hannah, Taylor, and Dylan, and we are going to run roughshod over the town. I’m stoked. Also, my golf clubs are arriving on Tuesday, so hopefully I’ll get some playing in before Paris. It’s a bummer that six weeks have gone by so quick here in St. Andrews, but so much good stuff is happening it’s hard to stay mad for long.

This past week was an unfortunate reminder that yes, occasionally I have to lock down and get actual schoolwork done. I’ve really enjoyed my classes because the material has been very interesting and my professors are very cool and competent; I have also enjoyed my classes because other than quite a bit of reading, I basically have no homework.

I had two rather lengthy essays due this week, however, so I spent plenty of time in the library researching and writing. But no, they’re done and I don’t have anything due until April. So that’s neat. I would highly suggest that Whitman start using this academic structure of basically never turning stuff in (cc: George Bridges, cc: whoever the new president is).

The rest of this blog post will be in bullet points because it’s my blog and I want to do bullet points this time, so stop complaining, ok? Ok.

• Cool Old Dude of the Week: A couple weeks ago I introduced Bob, a very cool old dude who was a former St. Andrews caddy and talked my ear off and gave me food. What a guy. This week, I met this awesome old fella who was once the superintendent for all the St. Andrews courses and then traveled all over the world consulting other golf courses. Unfortunately, I didn’t catch his name, but it doesn’t matter because he doesn’t read this blog anyways. Whatever.
• My Body is Betraying Me, Pt. 3 and 4: So far, I have pulled my hamstring and gotten the stomach flu in my short stint at St. Andrews. Well, there’s more! This week’s segment of “My Body is Betraying Me” is a double feature. On Tuesday, I slept weird and then couldn’t move my neck for like three days. I had to turn my whole torso to look to my side, and I couldn’t look up. I looked like a crazy person. Then, on Sunday I hurt my knee in the first few minutes of playing soccer for the first time since pulling my hamstring about a month ago. My teammates probably think I’m a fragile baby, and they’re probably right. But actually I’m pretty sure my knee is fine and I’m hoping I’ll play tomorrow.
• Cool Weekend Trip Pt. 2: Last weekend I stayed in Glasgow for a few days, and it was dope. This weekend, I was less ambitious, just taking a day trip, but it was lovely. Along with my friends Jeff and Collin, I went to Stirling, neat little town a couple hours away. The main attraction is Stirling Castle, which massive, super interesting, and very historically significant, especially in regards to the centuries-long conflict between Scotland and England. We toured the castle for a couple hours, then went into town, grabbed lunch at a pub, and looked at all the other neat old buildings.
• My plans for the upcoming week are pretty up in the air. If my knee is feeling good, I’ll try to get out and play some soccer, but we’ll see. My weekend is also totally free, so I might take another trip, potentially to Edinburgh. Currently I’m listening to Kanye West’s most recent single and eating donuts. I feel like a king.