Day Thirteen: Some R&R

Well, I didn't think that going to bed at midnigt-ish would require a lot of extra sleep, but I guess the last long few days had taken more out of me than I realized. All this went through my head as I woke up and looked at my iPad's clock... at 11 am. 

I jumped out of bed and got ready for the day, partially glad I had a free day to get so much sleep, but partially bummed that I had wasted so much of it sleeping. I went downstairs and made myself a proper pancake  breakfast (thanks Dad) that turned out perfectly! 

I went over to the other house to use the wifi for a while, but didn't stay very long, as Lydia and Abbey asked if I wanted to go with them to a thrift store. I only brought two short sleeved shirts and no shorts, as we were told it would be rainy and cold every day, but I've been rolling up my jeans and cycling through the short sleeved shirts as frequently as tact permits in this wonderfully hot weather. So I went with them to find a few more warm-weather-appropriate clothes. 

On our way out the door, Tom told us that he was paying for anyone who wanted to come rowing at a pond north of our residential area at 3pm. So the three of us went to the thrift store, found some good stuff for pretty good prices, and came back home just in time to meet up with the boating group. It was a good twenty minute walk to the pond, so we were all very excited to be down closer to the cool water when we got there. Lydia, Miya, Josie, Theresa, Abby, and I (more recently known as Gru and the minions, with Miya acting as Gru) got a double rower boat, which we rotated through every now and then. After about an hour, we docked our boats, and made a quick stop at a nearby ice-cream counter (I only break down and get one about half as often as the other minions do, because it bugs me to spend money on stuff I just eat, but on a hot day, homemade creamy ice cream thats a lot better than most american stuff is food for the soul as well as for the body). 

After I got home, I whipped out my violin and got some practicing in. It's weird to feel how swollen the wood is here. It's playing pretty well, and it hasn't broken at all (to my delight) but it responds a lot differently here with the wood so much more, well, full of water than it's used to. I got my fingers to remember a little bit of how to do their thing before I decided to spare the room-mates. 

I went downstairs and made some thai curry noodles for dinner. Tom walked in with everyone from the other house to play a history game as I put some rice on to cook. 

Tom's games are...interesting. We all loathe the dreaded 'Dice or Card' game. Basically you decided if you want to roll the dice or draw a card. It's a 24-sided die and there are about 300 cards in his deck. If you roll the die, you have to say a person and an event for the century that you roll. For example, if I roll a 1, I get really excited and exclaim something like "60 AD! Boudicca fought the Romans! She was crazy!" and then we get a point. Hooray. If you draw a card, Tom reads some ridiculously obscure person or event and then you have to provide the date in which it happened. No one likes cards. 

My interest was genuinely peaked though when Tom announced that anyone who got at least one point would get ice cream that he had just bought. 

Ice cream was on the line. Heck yes I was gonna get at least one point!

Tonights game was Scattergories though, and I had a good feeling when he said that round one was on permanent physical features and anatomy of cathedrals, and the second was for castles. We have spent a lot of time talking about these things, and I have been doing pretty good on the memorization, but I had a trick up my sleeve for this game. 

See, when you play scattergories with a lot of really smart people, its to your strategic advantage to play with simple terms. Seriously, I led my team to victory in the first round because while the other teams where focusing on the complex terms Everyone had been reviewing, like the clearstories, quires, and rudescreens, I made sure that the bishops throne, the steeple, pews, belltower, tombs, tombstones, and the celestial pendants were also on the list. Leave it to a blonde to win a game against smarter people by using the 'inside the box' method. 

After the game (and my rice) were finished, we had our ice cream (i seriously love that stuff. It's my vice...) and everyone from the other house left. We ended up talking for a little bit, which is always so fun, and then popped some more popcorn and watched Becoming Jane with a better speaker system. After the movie, I worked on my little travel log here until probably later than I should have, before going to bed. 

All in all, it was an enjoyable, simpler day here in Cardiff. And I had Ice cream :)