long time, no update...

finally, the moment you've all been waiting for...my first real update since the end of november. i apologize for keeping you all in suspense for so long and for being relatively out of contact up until now, but things here have been really hectic..being home for christmas was really nice and i was sad to leave but it's also great to be back here. this term i am really enjoying my work, but i have a ton of it. my primary tutorial is studying the letters of Paul in the New Testament, and my secondary tutorial is on postmodern ethics (philosophy), reading nietzsche, kierkegaard, focault, etc. anyways, both are really interesting, but it's about as much of a contrast as possible. both of my tutorials are really eccentric and the classic kinds of people that you would assume to be oxford tutors. my tutor for Paul is named Dr. John Muddiman; he is very english, very aristocratic, very eccentric, and brilliant. he is pretty much the main guy in oxford for pauline theology and i am convinced he knows the entire new testament by memory. he is also really nice, but it's pretty hard to read him. i can never tell what he thinks about my work and my progress in the tutorial...my other tutor is a shy greek woman named Dr. Pelagia Goulimari. she is also really smart and an expert in what i am studying with her, but she is also really hard to read, and she has fairly awkward social skills (true of most professors here)...overall i like both of my tutorials a lot, even though it's a ton of work, and i like both tutors. however, both do feel a lot more formal and impersonal than my tutorials last term; both of mine this term meet in their offices (as opposed to at their homes)...outside of tutorials, things here are going well. as i'm sure you all know, i went to portugal for a few days before term started in january and then dani came out here and visited for almost two weeks on her way to south africa. it was so great to have her here and it was really sad/hard to see her go. i am really glad she finally got to go and i know that God is already working through her down there and speaking to her in the people she's meeting, but it's still hard not being able to be with her. nonetheless, we had a great time while she was here. we actually got to go to paris for about four days when she first got here and it was absolutely amazing. i loved the city- there was so much to do and see- and it was so fun to be there together. the only down side is that when we got back i had to do work all day almost every day she was in oxford, except for the last few nights in which we went to this really cool spanish restaurant called "kazbar," and saw a really shady movie. then on her last night we went to london and stayed with salter, which was fun. we went to a really, really cool mexican restaurant and then we went to the ice bar. the ice bar is new as of sept. 2005, and it is really pretty cool. it is a bar that is completely made out of ice! the stools, the bar, the glasses, everything except the people and what you drink (the only drinks they have are vodka mixed drinks because the bar is called the Absolute Ice Bar, as in absolute the vodka brand). the bar is also kept at 5 degrees celcius, so they have these special capes and gloves that you have to wear when you go inside. the only thing is that the place is kind of a novelty and tourist spot, so it's pretty expensive. it costs 15 pounds to get in and you have to make a reservation ahead of time. this is really expensive, but with the price you do get the cape and gloves to wear and it includes one free drink at the bar (which considering london, would be at least 6 pounds). so, it is still really expensive, but it's something that's fun and cool to do once....anyways, then dani left on saturday night and i took her to the airport, only to have her almost miss her flight. however, she got there alright and is already getting settled in and really enjoying the university and the people...after a sad goodbye, i came back here and just hung out on sunday and then sunday night there was a big party for the super bowl and one pub stayed open all night to show the game. and even thought the game wasn't that great, it was still a pretty good time...since then i've been back to the books and the library. today i finished a paper and i have a tutorial at 10am, but the awesome part is that when it's over, i am coming back here and packing my bags and then leaving for the airport to go to ireland for the weekend! thursday and friday night we're spending in belfast and then saturday and sunday night in dublin. i am uber excited for what should be a really good time! other than that, i don't think much else has been going on here. i just have been so overwhelmed with work that i haven't felt like i've had enough time to sit down and put a real post on here yet. so sorry for the delay, but finally here it is and hopefully there are still some of you checking this who will try to read it all and leave some sweet comments...i hope all is well back home or wherever you find yourself across the world right now. i miss you all very much and hope to see you sooner than i probably will. i love you all and hope to hear from you soon. peace.

p.s. i have pretty much planned out my entire spring break trip with justin and jeff and all i can say is that it's going to be amazing. i am actually leaving during the last week of term and going to south africa to visit dani for almost two weeks! then i am flying back to london for less than a day, repacking my bags, and then leaving bright and early the next morning and flying to bratislava, slovakia where i'll spend the day and then meet up with jeff and justin in vienna that night. then the three of us are spending the next three and half weeks traveling all over- budapest, munich, prague, berling, copenhagen, sweeden and norway (small hiking towns), amsterdam, brussels, and then will will be back on april 15, the day before easter! so it should be pretty amazing and i am so happy that i will get to see all these amazing places in europe, and get to go visit dani in south africa as well...anyways, that's it for now. talk to you soon.

let's (not) go (to the louvre)

hey everyone! sorry its been a while since i've written. i've been very busy with loads of work from my tutorials. it's hard getting a breath of air in between nietzsche and st. paul, let alone a chance to write a blog. dani is here visiting me for 2 weeks on her way to south africa, which is pretty sweet, but unfortunately she leaves this saturday. last weekend was our anniversary and being that we were together, we decided to go where else, but the city of love.. paris. dani got in saturday morning at 7am. i picked her up from the airport, we ran over to salters with what seemed like 500 pounds of luggage... salter was nice enough to let her leave her bags there while on our trip. We had enough time till our train left to spend the afternoon with him. We ate at wagamama's, an awesome asian/noodle bar. it was my first time in the chunnel, so i didn't know what to expect. needless to say, pretty cool, hassle free, and not as scary as I thought (considering you're traveling below an ocean). once in paris we unloaded our stuff at the awesome and very central apartment we stayed in, and walked down the street for the start of what would be a weekend of great, but expensive french food. (we had enough croque monsiers to feed a small village... and i've never seen a country that likes eggs and cheese so much. they seem to put both of them in just about everything they can). over the course of the weekend we did all the big stuff, plus more- we went to the eiffel tower (both during the day and at night), ice skated on/in the eiffel tower- and the best part was that it was free! we had amazing views and it was uber fun. we also went to the top of the arc de triomph (again sweet views), walked down the champs d'elysse, went to versailles (which is massive to say the least), went to church at notre dame, went to the top of the towers there and saw the famous rose windows and gargoyles, saw the famous and not so grandiose moulin rouge (actually in a sketchy part of town), saw the remnants of bastille, went to the latin quarter to this cool place called barrio latino, and we went to the musee d'orssay. everything seems peachy right? Seems like we got everything in? well untill some rather unfortunate events along the way... in my let's go book it says the louvre is open monday nights till 10pm. thinking that instead of wasting the day and nice weather indoors at the louvre, we decided to go monday night. we get there around 6pm, ask someone where we can buy tickets and he tells us it closed at 5:30. closed?! they are only open wed and fri nights. and the worst part is they don't open on tuesdays (the day we left). so no louvre or mona thanks to the writers of lets go... bummer. on another high note- on our way out of the bastille subway stop some subway regulators (about 7 of them) were standing in our way to exit, checking that everyone had vaidated subway tickets that proved they payed for their ride. Now- the twenty something other times (literally) we had already ridden the subway in this city we never needed our validated tickets exiting, so we had just thrown away our old validated ones. for some reason they were checking them at this particular moment (just our luck). now it doesn't really make sense to me because we had bought 10 packs and had the rest of our unvalidated tickets with us proving we werent jipping the system, but the lady wasn't having it and we got fined 25 euros each. lucky we even had unvalidaded tickets on us because if you didnt have any tickets on you the fine could be up to 70 euros each. so that was a pain, but we tried to not let it ruin our trip. we still had an amazing time, and loved paris. its pretty awesome, and the parisians we came across were nothing like the reputation they generally have towards americans... everyone was nice and some even tried teaching us/bettering the little french we tried...on our way back from paris our train was delayed, but we did get a free sandwhich from this really nice guy working in the restaurant cart of the train...all in all it was an amazing trip and dani and i loved paris. i loved being in the city of love with my lover!

lisboa

so portugal is pretty cool...before i came back to oxford for my second term, i went to portugal for three days, and it was a great trip. we spent the entire time in lisbon (lisboa in portugese), the capital, but did take a day trip one day to sintra. lisbon was like other european capitals in many ways, but was also really unique. it is right on a river and the atlantic ocean, which was gorgeous; there was great architecture, reflecting the same moorish influence as in spain; the weather was nice and relatively warm compared to the rest of europe (low 50's and sunny); the hostel was really cool; and it was just overall a good time. seeing as their aren't a ton of really famous sights to see in lisbon, and really all of portugal for that matter, we were able to see a ton of things. the first day we were there, we saw this really cool castle/park over looking the city, and we explore the old part of town, this cool neighborbood with a lot of character, called the alfama. over the next few days, we walked down the river, saw a few cool churches, a sweet monastery, and some cool towers with awesome lookout points/panaromic views (which i am definetely a sucker for). the day trip to sintra was also really awesome. the town itself wasn't that big or impressive, but we did some hiking up this mountain to a palace and old castle ruins overlooking the ocean, which were gorgeous! overall the trip was awesome, a lot of fun, and i got to see another part of the world that i would not have gone to otherwise. the only things that were decent, not bad but decent, were the food and the hospitality. the food was really average and every night we had small, unfilling, and unsatisfying dinners, which resulted in us going to the hard rock for a second dinner...but that's not all bad...then the only other slight disappoint were the people. in general the portugese are known for not being a very accomodating people, especially to americans who don't know the language, and actually we didn't really have any major problems, but the people just weren't that friendly...nonetheless, it was a great trip and i am really happy i ended up going (if i ever sounded like it wasn't that great in talking about it right after, it's just because i was comparing it to switzerland and i have since learned that that's a terrible idea. don't do it.)....anyways, portugal was really cool and unique and a great welcome back to europe....

a colorado christmas

so, as i'm sure all of you already know, i of course got to go home for christimas and it was quite enjoyable. the skiing was awesome (of which i got to do about 8 times!), it was really nice to be home, and it was great to see friends and family. probably the highlight of the whole break was definetely going to vegas with the pops and gramps! it was so fun to be there and spend time with them, and i am pretty much obsessed with gambling and showing my i.d. so, on the whole it was an incredible bday, tons of fun! christmas was really nice and it was great to be with the whole family at grandma and grandpas for christmas eve. after christmas, it was great to go up to breck and spend the week there with grandma and grandpa and dani too! we had a great time sledding, skiing, watching movies, and playing cards...new year's was pretty laid back but nice to finally get to spend it with dani. then the last week of break was pretty busy, trying to see people and get all packed up again, but i able to go golfing with ty and b one day, go to dinner with mom and sarah, and go to a mammoth game with dad, ty, and duff (thanks hiedi and grant!)...all in all, it was a really nice break and i was happy to be home. leaving was bitter sweet, because i already miss everyone so much from home, but also am loving being back in oxford and getting to see sweet places all over the world....