Week One is Done...

Hello, hello, hello…it’s late and I’m tired, and not feeling very creative, but it’s been five very eventful, fun days, and I need to think about it before it passes me by, already too quickly.
I’m still loving work—I lectured for three hours on Thursday morning and it felt like twenty minutes. I think that is a mark of loving what you are teaching. On Sunday evening, after we’d visited Stirling, we had the first of three SUPER yummy meals this week, a cauliflower and broccoli bake at Portcullis (the best of what pub food has to offer, methinks), a sweet potato and goat cheese salad at Circle Café in Canonmills this week, and a kick butt vegetable risotto tonight at The Orchard, also in Canonmills.

On Monday, I took the students to the Scottish Parliament for an afternoon tour—I think the building is beautiful, but my friend Shannon insisted that I was “joking” when I told her so. I think most of the students were a bit bored, but my dorky-little historians’ heart loved it. It was the castle on Tuesday (five visits, was, surprisingly, enough) after a lunch in my old hood of Portobello (at my local, The Blue Bean.) On Wednesday night, I spent the evening with Shan and Esme, and six hours were gone in about six minutes. Last night, the Literary Pub Tour (and a knock at the door at midnight from students upset about Michael Jackson.) Tonight, a visit from a friend from our Georgia days, Sabrina, who introduced us to her lovely partner Andrew. Andrew’s a Kiwi, and I only made it about six minutes before asking him about Flight of the Conchords. Sabrina and I haven’t seen each other for three years, but remarked to ourselves tonight that we’ve seen each other in four countries: U.S. during our Athens days, Amsterdam in 2005, England in 2006, and Scotland tonight. We decided that we’d start referring to ourselves as the Jet-Set.

When we knew this adventure was a go, Ben and I had big weekend plans for Spain, or Guernsey, or Stockholm, but financial realities and now desire have kept us in Scotland. Seeing friends, relaxing when we can…we spent most of the afternoon yesterday watching the pond in Stockbridge and sleeping in the sun.

Sounds good as I write it. Let’s have more of that.