A Busy Day

No pictures today, sadly, but it was a long, good, busy day and I wanted to share. It started with a little bit of running- because the bus that came by was full, we decided to walk to city centre. We were just approaching the next closest bus stop when our bus drove by. It stopped for the people at the stop, so we ran for it and got onto the bus, which I later deduced that was the exact same full bus that had just dropped off a bunch of kids on the school run. Anyway, we made it to city centre with no problem and I walked a good thirty minutes to get to my first interview of the day.

I met with Wendy and Vicky at the Helen and Douglas House. Basically, this organization is a place where children and young adults through age 35 who have developmental disabilites or terminal illnesses can come if they need a break from their families or vice versa. The residents have a one-on-one caretaker, there is a big garden in the back, a music and an arts room, a "bar" area for the older residents and a kitchen area for all their meals. I chatted with the women for about twenty minutes, got a tour of the place and left with a new position. As soon as my CRB goes through (pray that its quick), I will be working in the open kitchen on the lunch shift, helping out with the meals and eating/spending time with the residents. It's a perfect shift time (11:30-2:30) which leaves me a few hours to ether hang out there and do some other volunteer things, like music (they were really excited to hear that I sing, play piano and cello), before heading over to the Community Centre at 4:30 to work at the Homework Club. This leaves my Monday and Wednesdays pretty full but there's always those two hours if I need a break and there's an Oxfam with plenty of books right down the street.

I was on my way back to City Centre to waste some times before my museum shift started when I passed an antiques store which I of course couldn't pass up seeing as that I wish I could own a massive house full of antiques. The most amazing part was he huge stack of old choral music that I found and started flipping through, reveling n the various pieces that I found that I had sung. There were a ton of orchestra and choral full scores as well, ot to mention case after case after case full of jewelry, dishes, trinkets, etc., to ogle over.

After relaxing at a Starbucks, I went in to my first shift at the Museum of Oxford. I met Katie, one of the other paid workers and got a tour of the museum, as well as the "Staff Only" doors that I had never before been able to see behind. I got the low down on all various procedures and then went to "man" the bottom floor, which went through Roman Times through the English Civil War. Some of the time, it was absolutely, dullingly boring but other times, when people were walking through the gallery and asking questions, it was really exciting. I got to explain to a guy from France what the word "ford" (as in Ox-ford) meant and talked to another guy about the change from hand made books to the printing press and also pointed him in the direction of Giles, our authentic skeleton.

I also had a chance to chat for a bit with Colin and Marisal, two of the other volunteers. Colin is a retired man who works doing cataloguing at a bunch of other museums and the epitome of a chatty British historian, which Marisal is an archeologist hoping to get into the museum business and so its volunteering for experience. Both wre incredibly nice and I followed Marisal around the museum at the end of the day learning how to lock up the place and turn off all the lights. I'm really excited about this job and can't wait for things to liven up a little and for me to finally be an official key holder ;)

This evening, I went over to Discuss at St. Andrews. I chatted with Mikaela, a drama and English teacher at one of the local schools, for a bit- she's a really sweet lady and I've enjoyed the time I"ve spent with her thus far- and at the dinner table I met a new person named Matt and talked for a long time with Rob, the other American from Alabama now getting his MDiv who is in my group. Despite there not being a lot of people at Discuss in general, there were a lot of people in our group and it went the best thus far. There was a lot of friendly discussion about Galatians 2 and there was almost constant conversation and debate, which was so nice! Next week is our group social so everyone is coming over to the house for a Mexican meal- I'll be providing the taco meat, tortillas, salsa and guacamole and everyone else is bringing all the trimmings and the trappings to make tacos and burritos. I'm hoping that by inviting the group into my home, I'll get to know them better and they'll get to know me better and I always love being the host and of course haven't had the opportunity to do that since I've been over here.

All in all, it was a great but tiring day and I'm so excited for the things that are happening and what will continue to happen. Tomorrow I'm looking forward to my first evening with the Junior High Group (Pathfinders) but I'm first looking forward to a quiet day at home with possibly a lunch of grilled cheese and tomato soup :) Be jealous.