Don't have a title...

What in the world have I been doing here in London? Running around like a chicken with my head cut off. Yeah I know that is extreme for London, but yes I am doing it! This week flew by and I can't even figure out where it went. It is now Sunday evening-ish and I am about to chat with my lovely family. But Sunday evening Mallory? What happened to Monday-Saturday? That is my question! Monday and Tuesday were rather normal at my internship except, wait! I have some breaking news: I received my first official call at DBA....yes someone called the Design Business Association FOR ME! The receptionist phoned over to me to inform me that I had a call waiting and I just started at it. I was thinking am I supposed to answer that? Then I looked at her and she nodded so I picked up the phone to say hello but before I could talk, think or even better hear what she was saying she had transferred me over to the person calling. Who was I talking to and why did they call for me?! But then it hit me, I sent out emails to companies who need to get stuff in and they were from me personally so yes I got about eight more phone calls that day and every single one was just as terrifying! Brits are REALLY hard to understand over the phone, like REALLY HARD. Tuesday I also attended my first DBA event as a staff member which was interesting (Brits hate when you say interesting btw). I say interesting because I have not a better adjective for this event. It was great to be a part of something so official but I was sort of just a fly on the wall. But hey if you need any advice on how to make money at a large corporation, hit me up!! Wednesday and Thursday are pretty irrelevant as I just had class and class again but my professor on Wednesday was HILARIOUS. He was cracking jokes left and right and it just makes it even better that he is about 60 and just adorable...comes into class every time huffing and puffing with a full coat and jacket/tie with his glasses about to fall off, I think the stairs just do him in every time. But he is fun and super posh! Friday is a whole nother story! I went to a CASTLE! We took a trip with our program to Dover and Canterbury which was about an hour and a half commute out of London. Here are some great moments captured by me, myself and I...and some nice guy from Colorado!

 Dover Castle was the first place we visited. Of course while we were there good old Mother Nature decided to pour down on us, but we made the most of it. The castle was so beautiful and rustic, definitely nothing like in the Disney princess movies but that is a-okay with me! The castle had so many old underground tunnels and interesting things you could scavenge through, it was very fun!

And then we went on over to Canterbury to see the Cathedral there. We were supposed to take another trip to the White Cliffs of Dover, but due to the excessive amount of rain we had to cancel this from our agenda...what did we get in return? A free pint of alcoholic beverage on Central College. I swear they replace anything bad here with alcohol, but are any of us complaining? NOPE. So we toured the Cathedral, got some great fish and chips and then headed for our free alc. This was the end of a very long, cold and wet day but we got some great sight seeing in and lots of picture taking!

So what is on my schedule for this week? Well folks this is the week! Yes, I will be heading back home to the great USA for a short visit with friends, lots of catch-up with family and oh the main reason? MY BEST FRIEND'S WEDDING! You know there will be tons of blogging about that. And then what after I return to the UK? One day in London and FIVE in ITALY!!! Get ready for some master blogging about some of the best experiences of my life. Buckle your seat belts and hold on tight to your mouse because I am about to take on the world...as if I haven't been already! Thanks for reading this cheesy thing.

Love you all.
The Site-Seeing Softball Player

Third Times The Charm.

So yes I went to Paris this weekend...wait did you read that right? YES I WENT TO PARIS THIS WEEKEND!! But lets just rewind to the morning of Thursday...departure day. I went to class like normal and that lasted to 1:00 then I ran a few errands, had to mail a few letters and grab some snacks for the big trip. Finally I ventured back to Woburn to finish preparing for the 9 hour bus ride that was waiting for me that night. So I get to the door, get out my card and scan myself into the building. Walking past the front desk I looked straight ahead at the table that sits right in front of the stairs and I mentally noted that the girl sitting at the table was FOR SURE American. (Our program director always tells us that he can recognize Americans from a mile away, I'm starting to understand what he means, its a sixth sense). Then reality hit me in the face when I realized the American looking girl sitting at the table was a girl named Ciera that goes to CENTRAL. Then I really started putting the pieces together when it hit me again, she is studying in Wales this semester, the same program that one of my good friends Shannon is in, so what did I do? Look over to see who she was sitting at the table with. Yep. I look and guess who I saw? SHANNON COULSON! Yes. I screamed! And then she screamed, and then I screamed again and she did and this happened back and forth with a lot of hugging for a solid seven minutes! Then there were tears and more hugging and more screaming...basically people walking by were thinking "damn Americans." But it was so so so so amazing!! So we talked and talked and looked into each others eyes and talked some more and then later on had a cheeseburger and shake and talked some more! Then I handed over my room key to her and a friend so they could have a free stay in a full furnished room...I mean what hotel comes with two beds, sheets, towels (okay hotels have that stuff), two closets full of clothes, lap tops and best thing for London...RAIN COATS! They landed a good one huh? Yep!! And off to the bus station we went...Paris bound and super giddy! I mean seeing a dear friend and heading to Paris, what more could a girl want? Well I am about to tell you what I got!!

So just to put our trip in perspective...we left London on Thursday night at 9:30 and would arrive in Paris on Friday morning at 7:30. But how would we get there? Yep here is the kicker folks. We rode the bus for three hours, got woken up to go through customs, then another hour, then woken up to board a ferry for another hour and then back to the bus for another four hours to Paris. The ferry? Pretty darn sweet, until my head met the table and I was out cold! What about customs you ask? Well let me just tell you according to the people of customs and everyone in France and England Mallory Danielle Schulenberg of the United States never entered or left France...yep I was the only one without a stamp or paperwork either way. Yikes! No idea how this happened, but it did. Below is a picture of myself in the ferry and then the nice MegaBus we took. Seriously first class folks!

 Kind of reminded me of a cruise ship...or I guess a giant bus holder in the water which was what it was in reality!

This picture was taken at approximately 7:50 in the morning right after a ten minute giggle fest because we were in PARIS!! So what did we do when we got there?

DAY 1:
We arrived in Paris and like I said, had a giant giggle fest...we even saw a moving building. See the thing is, is that we all thought the building was moving and it was really funny when we got there, probably because we were so sleep deprived! So we decided to venture towards our hostel...that was a little over a hour of a walk. Well we had to start somewhere, so we did. Reading the maps that appeared every now and then we thought we knew what was going on, so we walked and walked and walked some more. Then we ran into this beauty:

In case you aren't familiar with this marvelous thing, it is the Arc de Triomphe. Have you ever watched the Tour de France? Yep light bulb, that's where you saw it! So we took some pictures here! And then kept walking to our hostel. Well we walked for another hour or so when we finally gave up, we were going the completely wrong way and were giving up. Like giving up to the point of making a group decision we would pitch in for a Taxi. So me being me decided to hail the Taxi for the group. It was cake. I got the dude and he pulled over and we showed him the address of where we needed to go, then it happened...he put the car into drive and sped off, no words, nothing, just left us! Hmmmm, okay? So I got another, showed him where and we got a little further, he asked how many. So I told him we had four girls, and yep it happened again, the car went into drive and sped off. And that is when we made the group choice to become Canadian for the weekend....and get Starbucks. We got Starbucks and a two day Metro pass because we were done with the mean taxis and worthless walking.

 After finding our hostel we ventured over to Notre Dame to see the beautiful place and all it had to offer, it was so amazing and worth all the sleep deprivation and walking that we had done.

 We also went to the Bridge of Secrets. This is a bridge that people bring locks to and lock their love (or whatever they want) onto it, then throw the key over into the canal. It was so fantastic and awesome to read all of the locks that had been put on there in the past.

 And we spotted the Eiffel Tower...just slightly, but we promised ourselves that we would go back later after we ate dinner. So we found a little Italian restaurant and had some dinner. That is when we decided that we were way too tired and nasty to go back and take pictures in that state of mind, so we waited until later on in the night.

We checked into our hostel and took a nice nap until our tour guide showed up to take us around Paris. Brandon is a guy from Central who is studying in Paris so he met us to show us a few of his favorite spots in Paris and hang out for a bit. And he took us to the Sacred Heart Basilica which is the highest spot in Paris, yep pretty much the most beautiful view in the world! Pictures: oh and by the way, we had to walk a ton of stairs to get to the top, yes we are getting our conditioning in but just in case we aren't, we walk millions of stairs a day!

 And after we did all of the walking and touring, we went back to the Eiffel Tower again, but just wait the third time we went is the money maker! Oh and this picture is sparkly in case you were wondering! The Eiffel Tower sparkles for ten minutes on every hour...this was at 8:00pm!

And we said goodbye to our great friend and amazing host for the night, he was awesome and we could really tell that he loves the place! Paris is perfect for him! Off to bed for us, since we never really even slept the day before!

DAY 2:
We woke up, ate and off to the Eiffel Tower. Gotta be first in line for pictures...too bad everyone in Paris goes to the Eiffel Tower every single day!! Here are some of mine:

What do you do when you are in France? Take millions of pictures in front of the Eiffel Tower! Well we did that and then some. Yes the last one is me having a romantic kiss in front of the most romantic piece of art in the world...with myself!! After that we ventured over to see the Moulin Rouge Windmill, home of the can-can dance. Then to the Luve where we didn't actually see Mona Lisa but were in the presence of her home! Good enough right? Day two went a lot quicker than day one but overall the trip was brilliant! Would I go back? Maybe not, but it was way worth the weekend trip! I don't want to spend another weekend pretending to be from Alberta, Canada in my life. I'm proud to be an American and I will flaunt it so take that Frenchies!!! Okay well that was it, Paris came and went and we experienced much more than I can put into words. There are some pretty hilarious stories that can be told in person, but for the record...I spent enough time in front of the Eiffel Tower for all of you out there reading!

Love you all.
XOXO
The Site-Seeing Softball Player

Is This Real Life?

I am posting to let you all know that my life has officially turned into a fairy-tale. Tomorrow (Thursday, October 3, 2013) I will fall asleep in London, on a bus in case you were wondering, and wake up on Friday in...wait for it...PARIS!!! Yes folks it's really happening! I might have already planned to visit the Eiffel Tower at every hour of the day. I mean don't judge me, I want as many pictures in front of it as possible and duh I need different angles of the sunlight! Yes I am excited to say the least. I will be roaming the land of love and dreaming about love, love and more love! I also have very high expectations that I will meet a random and super weird dude with black hair who will be wearing a white button down and red art hat with a super super super French mustache and the only words he will say? Bonjour! Yep. Okay I am totally being a tourist but hey that's my job right? Totally! Anyways I am going to Paris and am ecstatic about it but am done rubbing it in...for now, once the trip is over all bets are off!

So how did I focus throughout this week knowing that Paris was waiting for me? I DIDN'T! This week at my internship and class was a bit of a struggle but I made it through. I had a lot of work again at the DBA but continue to learn more and more each day and got invited to my very first event next Tuesday as part of the staff! Eeeeeek! So there's that and let me tell you about another experience we had here in lovely London. We (my three teammates and I) were able to get ourselves kicked out of yet another area in which we visioned ourselves throwing and (them) hitting this semester. Yep. The perfect place, about 45 seconds from our room doors and still on the property of Woburn Place was turned to mush in less than two hours. (Let me paint a picture for you...this is right out the back door of our student lounge, through the designated smoking section, up a small flight of stairs and right there! Down from this glorious location? The rubbish area. Yes our brilliant and new softball field was a tunnel surrounded by brick walls and cement, to the right was a fence and above the "tunnel-like" strip sat an overhead of glass. Perfect location right? Well at least I couldn't throw any wild pitches! They would kill something.) Here's what happened...we headed out to this new location that Paige and I discovered one Wednesday when we were throwing. This was yesterday evening after we all had a long day at our internships, what better to soothe stress than some nice catch and pitching with three teammates? So out we go and things were rolling great until it happened. A ball flew over the brick wall in slow motion, it was like one of those shit is this really happening? moments. But then nothing happened! We were good! So Kallie went to retrieve the ball while I began to pitch to Paige. After a solid 40 minutes of pitching our world came crashing down. Out came one of the front desk girls and in went us, gloves and all. Apparently there had been noise complaints from students living in Woburn Place. Now my argument? Who complains about noise at 6:00pm? LAME-Os!!! So our next attempt? Regent's Park where we know that ball play is acceptable! Wish us luck!

Okay well I need to go finish packing for PARIS!!! Love you all and thanks for reading, hope you are as excited to hear about Paris as I am to live through it.

The Site-Seeing Softball Player

Eye Love Ben

Well it's been a while since I last documented my life so I figured I should update you all on what I have been doing that is more important than sitting at my computer and blogging about my every move in London. My internship is still going great and I am getting more and more responsibilities with that, they even let me proof read important documents...I know scary right? The girls that I work with are just so cute and bubbly in their own ways and I love being around them, it gives me a great idea of what actually working in London would be like...fantastic! But I still haven't been convinced that is it great enough to move here forever, you're welcome mom and dad (and B). By the end of Tuesday I think it was a general feeling that everyone in the program had worked so hard during our two day work week (pathetic I know) we all needed to grab a drink or two. But wait! We had something much more important to do before alcohol could enter the picture. I'm not sure if any of you have ridden a ferris wheel or ever seen one? But I experienced a ferris wheel on drugs!! Yes folks I am referring to The London Eye!! 438 feet (give or take) high of pure beauty and a little bit of body odor. Yep. I got stuck inside of a box for forty-five minutes with a dude who could have used a few sticks of deodorant to put a dent in what was steaming from his arm pits! But the ride? SO.MUCH.FUN. The best part of the whole thing was snapping billions of pictures of good old Big Ben! I think that might be the main reason people ride the darn thing, to take pictures and pictures and more pictures. Actually I think that is the sole reason that people do most things in London, so they can take a picture and post it and tell everyone that they were there, I mean I do the same thing! So let me show you a few pictures that I took when I rode the Eye!

 This was the Eye when we approached it from a distance, so so so pretty! Doesn't look as big as it actually is trust me. The box things that people ride in have two benches and fit up to like 20 people!

 A night shot of the one and only Ben himself. Which just in case you were wondering because many people (Londoners included) don't even know that neither the tower or the clock are Ben. Big Ben is actually the name of the bell that is inside of the thing, so technically nobody has seen Big Ben, or at least I haven't, I'm not going up in there!

 And yet another snap of Big Ben, just this time it has me in it too! BONUS. This was captured after a long day of internshiip, walking, tubing through London to find the Eye and scarfing some McDs on the way to the Eye-so don't judge my messy pony and glasses!

So what about the rest of the week? Wouldn't you want to know! Well folks I am about to tell you about a week/weekend that will go down in history as one of my favorites while in London! I hosted my first visitor this weekend and it was the best thing in the world. Who might this visitor be? Well it was (traveling all the way from Kansas City!) Miss Mary Carnes...eldest sister of my very favorite Sarah Carnes!! Okay, she is studying in Ireland but it was still pretty cool to have a visitor from home and we did EVERYTHING! Saying as the trip began with us planning MY trip to Ireland in December, we seriously had the world at our fingertips and we took full advantage!! Let me just explain this weekend in a nutshell via pictures because who doesn't love seeing pictures of two girls wondering around London?!

 We went to a place called Drink Shop Do which was recommended by the Sarah Carnes. This place was adorable, you could literally drink, shop and do! Well I am still a little curious as to what the doing was but the drinking and shopping was brilliant. Above and below is my hot chocolate that was magnificent and so so so rich! I loved it and yes that came with a little refill mug thing! It was so perfect. The best picture ever!

 After that we ventured to the fabulous Buckingham Palace! Yes we braved the crowds on a Friday morning for the changing of the guard. Just a suggestion, when people who have been there before tell you to get there at 10...THEY AREN'T KIDDING. We got there around 10:15 and it didn't begin until 11:30, yes we should have been there at 9:30. But we made our way to the front with our American ways and saw the whole thing up close and personal with all of the other tourists. No joke I guarantee that at least 3/4 of the people were non-Londoners! But the changing was really cool, I mean it took them forever to change out the poor guy but it happened and we witnessed it all.

 Above is the dude getting changed out after a 30 minute ceremony leading up to it. And then we followed them as they walked out and (below) I got a picture with the guards! Does anybody wonder how they keep the hats on their heads? Because that is all I could think about the whole time I watched! Also the hats are NOT the same size, some are shorter and fatter while others are skinny and tall. It's so strange. I think I could write a report on the guards and their lives! Probably not, I'm just rambling about nonsense because I am SO HAPPY!!

 And then we got a picture of the whole scene! Like just stare at it for a minute...pure beauty! Just ignore that I am taking up a chunk of the building but seriously such a pretty picture. If only the little, baby, perfection in a blanket of George was actually in that building it would be a million times better BUT I will just pretend that he is!

 Then we stumbled across the St.James Place and the fabulous guards that we harassed for quite some time. We realized that you can no longer get close enough to take a picture next to a guard so we had to stand there for a while and time it so that we could have a picture right next to the guards! It was quite a rush and super fun to plan out, everyone around us was cracking up at us but totally worth it! And then we accidentally ran right into the horses changing of the guard! We waited forever to see the human changing of the guard and then literally almost got ran over by the horses while they were changing! It was great. So we took a picture with the guy guard the horse stables and the whole dealio!

 After a bunch of Royal business we ventured over to the super touristy sites so that Mary could see what London is all about! So we walked past Parliament and Big Ben and of course saw Westminster Abbey. But needed a better angle on the view for pictures of course. So we crossed through an adorable little park area so we could cross a bridge that pictured the perfect snap! Above we have everything with me photo-shopped into the picture! Just kidding, but that is what it seems to look like huh? And then another picture of what London is all about, Parliament and the ever so famous Ben!

 We hit up Trafalgar Square again and had to be pictured with the famous lions! Then after such a long day of walking we caught the tube and headed back to Russell Square for some food and relaxation. The next morning we hit up some great markets with some decadent food and a few cheap buys! We sat down to enjoy a giant fruit kabob that was smothered in chocolate and candy...DELICIOUS! And then to the Tower Bridge of London! Beauty.

 The Tower Bridge was so beautiful and perfect. Like look at the top picture...now pick your jaw up off the floor because you have to be in awe!! Seriously I should go into the post card business because these pictures will blow people's minds in the states!

So I guess you could say that this weekend was a success! I mean yes it was a complete and utter success in so many ways...best weekend ever! I was the ultimate tour guide even though some of the questions I was not super confident in my answers I was so excited to tour around a great traveler! We had a blast, ate some great food, witnessed some hilarious selfies being taken...speaking of selfies, oh my goodness! People here don't understand that if you own an iPhone you can turn the camera around and see the picture you are taking...better yet you can also ask someone to take it for you! Gosh it was great to see all of them trying though, super great! Okay well there is my weekend in a nutshell and a little extra rambling to go with! I had a great time and still can't believe I am living in London permenantely but it is getting more normal. Thank you for reading if you got this far you are a true fan!!

Until next time (which will be a lot sooner than this I promise) love you all and miss you tons!
The Site-Seeing Softball Player

P.S. I threw this week for all of you softball players/fans out there...in an alley and it was great! Paige caught for me and I would say it was super successful, felt like I was in Kuyper again pitching like nothing changed. Just in case you all were wondering!

Cadbury World-Chocolatey Chaos

Whew! I have finally survived my first self-planned road trip in Europe. Wow does that feel nice to say/hear/read/type. Birmingham, UK was definitely not somewhere I will pin on the map to return...EVER. We left Friday morning from the Victoria Coah Station, a bus station, to head two and a half hours out of town to Birmingham for some chocolately goodness of a weekend. Now when I say we I mean myself and ten other girls who are in my program. Yes I was dumb enough to not only agree to go on a trip with eleven girls included but to PLAN the trip for us girls. Why did I ever think this trip was going to run smoothly? That is a great question! But we all survived...I am still trying to figure out how though. So about the trip? Yes, we got to Birmingham Station around 11:30 on Friday morning and headed to our hostel which was about a thirty minute walk from the station, not so bad after all. (I have already accomplished my goal of going on a trip taking ONLY my backpack. YAY!) Checked into the hostel around 12:15 and began our mad dash to Cadbury World for our tour at 1:30. Cadbury World is located in a neighboring area named Bournville so we hopped onto the train and off to the chocolate heaven we were. Once arriving at the Cadbury World we did a virtual tour of how the company got started and the history behind the "Dairy Milk" chocolate. This tour ended with each of us able to create our very own chocolate creation and then EAT IT!

Yes, this is me with my "creation" of Cadbury chocolate and rice krispies...not too bad actually! The chocolate was unlike anything you could ever dream of tasting, so rich and creamy and warm and tasty and definitely not something that you should eat more than once a year. But I had it twice in one day...OOPS. No worries, the tour was so long that I definitely walked off all of the free samples I had during it, which was quite a few! The tour was three hours of chocolate perfumed rooms filled with Cadbury history and goodness, we even got to go on a little ride/tour of some more history about how the chocolate beans were and still are made.

That is myself, Karlee and Jess on our ride through the chocolate bean world. After the ride, chocolate drawing, picture rooms and more tasting we made our way to the souvenir/chocolate shop. BAD IDEA. As the guy at the register said when we were checking out, "Yeah. Chocolate is cheap here." Well if chocolate is cheap why not buy some?! I got three different kinds to take back with me which were Whole Nut, Nutty Caramel and Toffee Popcorn. I may have nibbled a bite out of each already, just to test whether or not they were worth the 1.50 pounds I paid for each! But surprisingly chocolate alone was not enough to fill our empty bellies up for the day, so back to Birmingham we went for some real food. There we ate at the Handmade Burger place that had all organic and fresh ingredients for any item on their menu. It was so delicious and just what each of us needed after a long day of travel and chocolate binging. When we finally made it back to our hostel we joined in on a free pub crawl to a few local pubs and had a marvelous night sleep in beds that were arguably more comfortable than our own back at Woburn.

We had two rooms with six beds each and a HUGE bathroom per room, it felt like paradise for a night. The next day was awfully different for me to say the least. I woke up and showered for the day. After eating breakfast at the hostel and checking out for a day of touring backpackers style we were off to explore Birmingham first hand. A few hours into our day I was suddenly feeling very under the weather, deciding to sit out in a coffee shop to sip on some water and relax. I still have no clue what I ate that made my body this upset, but I was down for the count. My body was not willing to cooperate whatsoever, so I ended up catching a much earlier bus ride back to London alone to get home and sleep this bug off. The funny thing about the bus ride? I was literally the only white person on the bus and couldn't tell you the ethnicities of some of these people...lets just say when I fell asleep on that ride I was clenching my purse hard in my arms! I arrived back to Woburn at about 5:45 Saturday night, took a hot shower and slept straight until 9:30 this morning. Birmingham wanted to make sure I never came back and they succeeded.

After sleeping "it" off for 15 hours I felt great and ready to go! Today I have made it to a nice market in Camden Town and am off to buy some groceries for the week. This week I have a lot on the schedule and can't wait to tell you all about it, detail for detail. Until then, stay American and enjoy your week! Love you all and can't wait to see your beautiful faces when I do!

The Site-Seeing Softball Player

P.S. Here are a few more pictures from the weekend, mainly for Dad and Kelsey since they don't have the luxury of facebook creeping!

 A giant chocolate bar! And some of the many other candy bars to choose from at the candy store!

 I got to write my name in chocolate! And then eat some of that chocolate which was DELICIOUS!

The whole group for the weekend, 11 girls out wandering the factory of fantastic and decadent chocolate!

Holy Hectic Heaven

What a week! Today is only Thursday (night) and it has been one crazy, busy, insanely fast and very demanding week in London. My internship went better than ever on Monday and Tuesday only I actually felt like I was at a real job working a real day in the real world. I was assigned so many tasks that were oh so tedious and lengthy this week but I did make it through every single one and with limited errors. If you ever need a webpage designed, detailed or just formatted I am your girl. Yes, I have officially taken over the updates and designs of the DBA website...for the most part. And speaking of my internship and the process of getting there...gosh the tube is starting to be a whole new story for my life. Let's just say that I am becoming an expert on the tube and am proud of it. I experienced a first for tube stations this week. Yes ladies and gents, I officially stepped onto an escalator for the first time with NO hesitation. Now whether or not I really had a choice on that is a different story, but I did it and that is what matters. I know that I have already informed you that I spend a lot of time at King's Cross Station, but boy is that place a war zone. The best part is I am finally feeling like one of their own at King's Cross so it's great, except I am beginning to get very irritated with all of the outsiders. When I say outsiders I mean: people who stop in the exact middle of traffic, those who (rudely) board the tube before letting people off, and of course people who walk super slow with some type of directions held in front of their faces...yes this happens and the main reason I know is because I was there just two weeks ago! But King's Cross is super super super packed with people and these people do NOT wear deodorant, I can smell when they choose to hang onto the bar above my head in the tube. I think I might start carrying a travel size body spray and give them a spritz whenever I get a wife of BO on the tube...quite often. Also another culture difference here is that when you are on any type of public transportation it is an unwritten rule that you should not make eye contact with anyone there in your presence. So naturally when I am riding home from work I make it a game of how many people I can stare at until I can tell they are uncomfortable. It's GREAT! I just hope someone doesn't blow up on me one of these days! Okay well enough about my tube ranting. To wrap things up I have had one busy busy busy week but still made time to talk to quite a few lovely teammates, one amazing family AND the best boyfriend in the world. OH. And my future bride to be best friend with her lovely fiance. Which reminds me...special shout out to Kelsey and Andrew who will be happily married in exactly ONE MONTH from TODAY! Can't wait lovely lady! As for me and this weekend? Off to Birmingham in the UK to see the one and only Cadbury Chocolate World. Yes you read that right. A nice bus ride for a two day trip with 10 other girls from the program is exactly what I need after a long and tiring week. Details to come soon!! Until the chocolate filled week is over (we visited M&M World this week too) I will be drowning my body in large amounts of chocolate...don't tell coach! Love you all and miss you like crazy.

The Site-Seeing Softball Player

The Best Bath of My Life

Hold on while I continue to try and pick my jaw up from the ground. Visiting Bath was seriously the BEST THING OF MY LIFE. It was so beautiful that I can't even begin to try and put it into words. Everything there was so great. It was nice to get away from the loud and busy London for a weekend and see something a little different, and Bath was just that. It felt like we were there for much longer than we were, but we arrived on Friday and headed back here on Sunday morning. So what did we do? Where did we stay? What was so beautiful about it? Well folks, you are about to find all of those answers and more!

We started our trip Friday morning where we went and saw Stonehenge. This was something that was simply awesome. The idea of this is great, nobody really knows how the stones got there or how they ended up perfectly the way they are so that the sun can shine through the middle. But I do know one thing, everyone goes here for one reason and one alone...TO TAKE PICTURES! There were tourists (Asians) everywhere and posing left and right. I actually saw a man who had to be 70 years old taking a tradish jumping picture in front of the stones...yes his wife snapped the moment for him. But anyways the stones were cool and it was quite the experience, we only stayed for about an hour because Mark and Jen have seen it many times and said an hour was plenty...they were right. 

 Then we headed to the hostel we would be staying at for the weekend...nice right? It was my first experience with a hostel and it was a great one. Unfortunately for me I do not think that every other hostel I stay at from here on out will be as nice, but a girl can dream. It was very friendly and clean and full of students, so the perfect place to lay our head and dream about Bath some more!

We headed out for lunch where we ran into a nice little bakery/sandwich shop to try a traditional pasty. It was DELICIOUS. A pasty is (in my best description) a croissant roll that is filled with beef, potatoes and sometimes other vegetables. But so good that I went back the next day for another. The best part? They were super cheap and very filling...BONUS.

 After a small break for food we met back up outside of the Bath Abbey and ventured our way into the Roman Baths. The Roman Baths are very old and unique. Basically people used to come here to take a bath and be cured of anything they had wrong with them. It's a huge coincidence because we were told not to touch the water or we could catch something. Ironic right? But they were super pretty and I loved how old it was, you had to be extra careful on the stones as you were walking. We even got to taste a little bit of the Bath water after the tour...it was filtered of course so no worries I will be alright!

And I took a tradish senior pic in front...should have come here my senior year. Dangit.

The next morning we went on a boat tour through Bath. Yes, that picture is real and too good to be true right? It should be on a post card or something, but no I took it and yes I got to ride on that gorgeous scene through the water! It was a dream come true. So pretty and perfect. After the ride we headed to prepare for the Rugby match. One of the guys in our program, Dan, plays Rugby and he (stupidly) bet me a drink that I could not drop kick a Rugby ball...and keep it going the right direction. I even told him that I used to play soccer and am a pitcher...I have a steel leg. But he still bet me and yes I proved him wrong on the second try, but it was okay because we said I had two in the bet. Bath won and the game was intense, those men are pretty strong guys...I mean it is basically football without the pads so yes, strong guys.

Our time in Bath was sadly over and we were headed to Avebury to see the stones there and the Avebury Manor home. This was neat, but I did get a little tired of looking at all these rocks. Also it was freezing outside and our tour guide was not the most interesting man ever, but we made it through. We went inside the house and looked around which was beautiful and very informational. And then we headed back for a three hour ride back on the bus. Overall, Bath was beautiful, fun, crazy, calm and unforgettable. I hope to go back someday and show my loved ones the whole deal. But until then I will remember it by the perfect pictures. As for this week? Internship and class is back on the schedule. Hopefully a little day trip this weekend to see some more sites and maybe eat some famous chocolate! Thanks again for all of the support and following. Love you all so much!

The Site-Seeing Softball Player