Shutters

This morning's adventures were almost the complete opposite of yesterday's; the bus never came, so my flatmate Anna and I had a (not so) pleasant 45-minute walk to the art building in freezing rain. Let's hope that doesn't have to happen again anytime soon. Things did start to look up once class started though! We actually got to do some test photos with the 5x4 camera using paper negatives. With the much-needed help of my group, I developed, fixed, stopped, washed, and dried my first-ever film print! The subject matter isn't exactly the most exciting thing on the planet (cutlery from Poundworld), but I was proud of myself. I was so giddy inside, I'm sure all the other second-year photo students thought I was crazy. The professor, Dave, was standing by the wash bin talking to some students and he saw mine sitting in the wash bin with all the others. He picked it up and started commenting on how "the exposure is just perfect, the use of the shallow depth of field is great, the composition and contrast, etc..." Then he asked whose it was and I meagerly raised my hand in the back. Dave looked surprised that the "best photo neg of the day" was from a student who had never been inside a dark room before Tuesday, and how the other students are probably going to get tired of hearing similar comments from him throughout the course of the term. Words cannot describe how good I felt.

I grabbed a toasted cheese and tomato ciabatta for lunch today at one of the cafes on campus, which tasted like HEAVEN because it was so warm and I was so cold. I'll definitely be getting another one sometime. My finance tutor must have forgotten about our presentations because she didn't say a word about it during the entire 2-hour workshop. I was definitely not complaining! However, I didn't really sleep well last night, and I may or may not have dozed off in the middle of class, and she may or may not have called me out on it... that'll be the first and the last time that'll ever happen, haha :)

Ashley, Storm, and I went to something called the Globe Cafe tonight; it's kind of like a place for people around the world to hang out and drink tea/coffee. It meets at one of the local churches on Thursday nights. We basically just played Scrabble with a bunch of British people all night. It's nice to hang out with people who share the same values as you; I really missed church. We all had a jolly good time, so I'm thinking it's definitely something we'll be going back to!

- One and two pounds are both in coin form, so whenever I get change back I feel like I'm getting ripped off.

- As mentioned, they drive really really fast over here. I could practically feel my stomach in my throat flying over a few speed bumps earlier today.

- There's a kid in front of me in one of my lectures that has a mullet. Good to know the Englishmen know how to rock a schweet hairdo.