Stratford upon Avon

The end of another weekend. This one was both busy/lazy, but it was a great combination.

Let's start with Saturday morning. I woke up early...and by early I mean my body woke me up at 7:15 (when I get up for school), but I forced it back to sleep until 9:15. I went grocery shopping and got ready for Stratford. Sat next to Alina on the bus, but of course ended up semi falling asleep. Then we had to stop for 30 minutes half way through the trip because the bus was breaking down. It was okay though because Lauren and I bought Cadbury Eggs.

We finally got to Stratford Upon Avon around 2:30ish and we went straight to his birthplace. Most people refused to pay to get in, but I wanted to see it...I mean you can't go to Stratford and not tour his birthplace. There was a guy reciting sonnets, and one of the tour guides talked with Alina, Sean, and I for about 20 minutes about things in the house which was really cool. I bought the ticket that allowed you to go on the complete Shakespeare tour, but unfortunately everything closed at 4.

I walked along the rive to Holy Trinity Church where Shakespeare is buried even though it was closed. I also walked by the Swan theatre and saw some Shakespearian statues around. I met up with a larger group of people and we walked around the town a bit. It was so cute and European! We saw the oldest alleyway there that has been around since Shakespeare's time and we saw the school he went to as a boy.

We headed over to the Dirty Duck pub around dinner. That's where all the actors go before and after the show. Sheila said her picture used to be hanging in there, but we couldn't find it. I had an amazing burger and ate some of the delicious fish and chips! Alyssa, Rachel, and I decided we wanted frozen yogurt, so we left and the only play we could find was Mcdonalds. Which btw, they are all MUCH nicer here. This one was huge, 4 stories!

After we headed over to the courtyard theatre to see King Lear. I got a cool door knob hanger about actors and then sat through the 3 and a half hour show! The first act was blah. The actors weren't connecting with the text at all. I now know why Sheila teaches us line endings...if you use them, the audience can better understand your language and the story! The set was impeccable though! It was like a combination between 17th century stuff and WWII. And the set decayed as King Lear's mental state did. The second act got A WHOLE lot better and I understood the story way more. They actually had rain on stage, parts of the set fell apart, lights flickered and fell, sand came down. It was really cool visually. I have also decided that I would love to play the part of Regan in a show.

As soon as we got on the bus after the show, I was out. We got home around 1:20 and I went straight to sleep! This morning I forced myself to wake up later, around 10. I did some hw, worked on stage combat, watched Harry Potter 1 and Elizabeth, did laundry (upstairs since our machine is still broken), and ordered pizza! The pizza is a story within itself. The guy Erika talked to on the phone said he would give us a good deal since we were poor college students and gave us 10 dollars off. When we went down to get the pizza the delivery guy asked if he had the coupon, which we didn't. He wouldn't give us the deal. He called back to Pizza Hut and they said to charge us the original price. We refused saying we had gotten this deal and that was the price we had been told, and asked if we could talk to the guy we had talked to. He said no, pay the original price or he would take the pizza back. The guy that works in the lobby of the Landward was trying to help us out by saying it's a third party problem. Finally the delivery boy said, you can have the pizzas but we will block you from ever ordering pizza again... so we took it! Feel sorry for them, they just lost college kids money! But overall the day was VERY lazy, but much needed!

Now, I am talking to one of my best friends on Skype and it's making me miss home, but 2 months left! Crazy how fast this semester is going!

London things: Prams=strollers....there was a sign at Harrods that said no prams on the escalators. hehe.