Hello world, here's a song that we're singing...

Okay, so you know we all know and love that song. Today's a bright, sunny, and cheerful day here in jolly old London! :) So, I know it's been over a week since I've arrived in London and this is the first time I've blogged about it. I know, you can slap my wrists if you'd like, but I'll have you know this is the first time that I've actually had the chance to sit down and work on this thing. Okay, so here's everything that's happened. I'll try to make it short so that it's not 30 pages of reading...haha.

I left for London on September 7th and arrived mid-afternoon on the 8th (12:00pm London-time). The ride over wasn't too horrible (though, the guy in front of me definitely had his chair leaned back to the max...sort of annoying when trying to eat the "meals" they served). I was able to sleep somewhere between 2 and 3 hours, as well as watch 2 movies (My Life in Ruins - super cute | Sunshine Cleaning - um...interesting). Of course when we went through passport control, knowing my usual problems, even with VISA in hand, I was slightly delayed as he had to check every single piece of documentation allowing me into the country and then called someone else over to double check. Now, if you don't know me very well, then you probably have no idea but I ALWAYS have some sort of travel mishap no matter what. I've almost been denied entrance into England before, I've had 2 grown men physically fight 3 rows in front of me, I've been delayed in a plane for 6 hours on the runway, and I've practically slept in an airport trying to catch a 6:00am flight, which turned into a 10:00pm flight. So, this circumstance came as no surprise and I am very happy that's the least of what could have happened. :)

Speeding up...we made it to the hotel and were able to get relatively cheap upgrades on the rooms (score!) and I essentially relaxed for a bit and slept the night away. The following day we (my flatmate, Melissa, and me) viewed over 7 flats and only semi-liked 1 of them. We determined that we only liked the new-build flats and were throwing the Victorian remodels out of the picture. (Side Note: Who the heck thinks it's a good idea to have a split level flat/apartment beginning on the 3rd level of a building?! Yeah, we saw one of those...haha.) Thursday went much smoother and we saw 3 or 4 that we enjoyed, but then when it came down to placing a bid, our favorite flat had gone off the market just 2 hours before and the other 2 apparently had gone earlier in the day. This left us essentially with 1 option (but it also happened to be one of my favorites), so we took it while we still had the chance! :) I am now a proud renter of a flat near the Arsenal Football (Soccer) Stadium in Islington, London, UK! Actually, for those who wish to send me nice things, my address reads:

Flat 10, 71-H Drayton Park
London, UK N5 1DU

Yay for not being homeless! So, we moved in last Saturday and spent the better portion of the day just unpacking, setting up, and running to the local grocery store, a Tesco (convenience of being only 5 or 6 doors down the street...yay). One of the days, we went to a "special exhibit" outside of the Tate Modern. That was pretty neat. Although, the entire exhibit dealt with fire in the gardens and that made me wonder if England had forgotten their city had burned down like twice...did they really think it was a good idea to do something like that? Oh, well...at least all were unharmed, as far as we are aware. :)

Hm...what else has happened? Oh! On Monday we met up with another girl that's going to London Met for her masters degree. She's not in the same program, but she's definitely super cool and super from. She's originally from the OC and we all seem to have the same sense of humor...pretty cool. And then, yesterday we 3 met up with another girl from the school (again, not in our specific program) who is also really cool! I think we're going to have some crazy adventures between us all! We 4 had a girls night out last night and had a really great time revisiting one of mine and Melissa's old hangouts, The Sports Cafe. Oh, wow...now I feel SUPER old going there! We did a survey thing and everyone before us said they were born in 89/90/91...wow...they were young! So, we'll be on a search for something more our age, since I'm 23 and the other girls are older than me.

Let's see...anything else? Oh, the appliances here are strange. We have a dishwasher (which I am DEFINITELY thankful for), but it took several failed attempts to get it working properly. We can't find the lint trap for our washer/dryer combination machine...does it even have one? And, it took us about 30 minutes to figure out that there was a completely separate panel for using the stove than the oven...haha. And, we still don't know how our towel heaters turn on. Hm...I'm using a 2-day Internet trial package right now, so my Internet is still super inconsistent, so I'm not sure when I'll be able to write again. But, I won't be here very often over the next week anyhow. I guess that leads me to the next agenda item...my September travel dates!

My September Schedule | * Signifies tentative dates
17-21 :: Munich, Germany for Oktoberfest
22-24 :: Dublin, Ireland
27-?? :: Enroll for classes and Welcome Week with the school.
27-30 :: *Rachel comes to visit for a few days.