Hello everyone,
It's been a long time since I've written on here. It's hard to say all that's happened since it has been so long. It's felt longer than however long it was.
The main event was when my mom came to visit. Well, she didn't come to visit but she was in London for work which is about as close as it gets without being in Ireland. I flew over to see her on a Thursday after my Dissertation Design class, and we went out to a pub in the City before going to a Bavarian style beerhouse for some schnitzel.
The next day we woke early to catch a tour bus to Oxford, Warwick, Stratford-upon-Avon. I've been to London several times and my mom and I decided it would be good to get outside of the city and see what England had to offer. It was great to see the Cotswolds, with the thatched cottages and things. Also, Stratford is the birthplace of William Shakespeare, if you've heard of that guy, so that was pretty neat. I'm not really a fan, but still. We also got to see the room at Oxford that the Harry Potter dinner hall was based off. Once again, I'm not a Potterhead but it was an awesome room and campus. It was another one of those campuses that I don't think I'd enjoy actually going to university at. They're very manicured and feel stuffy. I wouldn't feel comfortable there. Warwick Castle was also good. Definitely the best preserved castle I've ever been to but it has been turned into a bit of a kiddie place with all the live actors and weird tours like "Live like a Princess" and things. A little Ripley's Believe It Or Not feeling.
The next morning we woke even EARLIER to get a train to Paris through the chunnel. I completely blanked and forgot my passport at the hotel so we missed our train but were able to catch a taxi to the hotel and back in time for the next one so we didn't lose too much time. Paris was great even with the cold and the rain. We didn't have very much time there, so we had to rush all over the place and take pictures of the outsides of the main landmarks but didn't have the time to go into any of them except to the top of the Eiffel Tower. That was really cool, although it did mess with my fear of heights a little. We had crepes at a cafe by Notre Dame and walked along the Seine for a little while before grabbing the train back to London. The next day we woke late, had a quick lunch and I came back to my scholarly life in Dublin.
Other than that trip I've mostly been locked up in my room researching and writing papers. I've finally finished them, including my research proposal after over a month of working on them. I couldn't believe the feeling of relief when I handed them in. I've been frustrated with school in the past, but never quite so close to wanting to give up. I spent a lot of nights staring at the computer screen with bloodshot eyes panicking that I was going to get writer's block and fail. I lost trust in my ability this semester. It may have been that I wasn't completely sure what was considered solid work here versus K-State, or just the feeling of extra pressure; thankfully I pulled through and wrote several papers that I'm VERY proud of, and a couple that I'm at least semi-sure are worth a decent grade. I've always been a natural paper-writer and I had to keep telling myself that I've never steered myself wrong before and trust what my fingers were typing.
Papers this semester were: How the Media Affects Foreign Policy Decisions; Failure of Policy in the War on Drugs; Social Unrest and a Lack of Change: The Argentine Economic Crisis; A Realist Perspective on Asymmetric Warfare; The Democratic Peace Theory; and Covert Action and its Place in the Study of Democratic Peace
I'll write another entry that's more about coming home soon, how the semester has gone outside of classes, and a little more heartfelt soon.
Edwords
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