Michelle’s Scotland Saga

[“The English are not happy unless they are miserable, the Irish are not at peace

unless they are at war, and the Scots are not at home unless they are abroad.”]

-George Orwell

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Wednesday, July 16, 2008

My birthday, Edinburgh, Scottish driving…

Me on the Edinburgh train

Ok, so it’s been a fair while since I last updated…again! Sorry about that, but for once this summer, I have the excuse that I’ve been busy. Firstly, I turned 28…aaaah! I was not happy about that development, but what can one do? June 28^th has, over the last several years, become a day that I dread; I do not like getting older, especially as I climb toward that dreaded 3-0! I knew my birthday was going to be especially useless this year, as many of my friends were not in Aberdeen, as they had all buggered off either to their own homes in other lands or were on holiday. Even my own flatmate was going to leave me alone on my day, as she had to work! However, I digress. On the 27^th, Ross took me out, as he was leaving the next day on a holiday. We went out to Banchory, and the plan was to go have lunch at this certain restaurant, but once we got there, it was packed! So, we changed our plan and instead bought some food at Somerfields and decided to have an impromptu picnic in the park. I liked this plan even better, as I got to just sit in the sunshine and talk to Ross, whom I hadn’t seen in over a month. We talked, people watched, and generally just relaxed. When we were done eating, we took a walk, though I had no idea where we were going. We ended up on this bridge overlooking some small waterfalls. It was really pretty. Then we watched as salmon tried to jump up the small cliffs and swim upstream. It was really amusing, although after a while, I began to feel bad for the little fellas, as they were trying so hard and getting nowhere! Lol, ah well, that was nature I suppose. I kept remarking how if I were a fish or some other animal, I wouldn’t go to all that trouble, and then Ross said that if I were anything other than human, my apathy for life would mean that I would have died out long ago! Lol, he was right, but still, that’s not nice to hear. After watching the struggling fish, we walked back to the car and Ross drove me home. Overall, it was a really nice day…I always have the best days out when I’m with Ross!

Well, the next day dawned and I nearly refused to get out of bed. However, plans had been made, so I had to. It had been decided that Charlee’s boyfriend Bobby and I would spend the day together. He kept laughingly referring to it as our ‘date’ (which Charlee completely approved of!). Silliness. Anyway, we decided to go see the preview showing of Kung Fu Panda, as we both wanted to see it, but Charlee adamantly refused to see herself. It ended up being a really cute and funny movie, and I’m glad that we saw it. Afterwards, we were going to either get some lunch at a restaurant or go to a pub for some drinks, but I didn’t really feel like it, so we just walked home. I ended up ordering a pizza and Bobby bought some lunch from Tesco. After that, we battled each other in a racing type game on PS2 for a few hours, whilst I began drinking! Lol. Eventually, Charlee got back from work and we just chilled out for the rest of the night. Bobby did surprise me though…I was lying on the couch with my back to the door talking to Nathan on MSN, when all of a sudden the lights went out! I turned around to see what was going on, and Bobby was walking in with a chocolate muffin with a single candle in it singing ‘Happy Birthday’. That was really nice, and a surprise, seeing as how I had been with him all day and didn’t know when he bought the muffin! So, by the end of the night I had to begrudgingly admit that I had had a good birthday, thanks to Bobby. I still wasn’t happy with my age, however!

For the next several weeks, I didn’t really do much besides read and putter around the flat. However, on Monday, July 7, Theresa came over for a week-long visit. Knowing that we each were very skint, but also that we both hated simply sitting around doing nothing, I actually planned some activities for us. Monday was a chill-out day really, as I wasn’t even sure when she was arriving. So, once she got here, me, Theresa, Charlee and Bobby all went into town to get some Burger King. After that, Bobby headed off to the doctor (it turns out that he had tonsillitis) and the rest of us browsed up and down Union Street. Nathan had been telling me that I should start painting, so I went and bought some supplies to do just that, although because I had never painted before in my life (bar finger painting in kindergarten) I didn’t know what to get, but luckily I had the expertise of Charlee and Theresa to help me. Eventually we all headed back home and ended up ordering pizza for dinner.

The next day, Theresa and I left very early in the morning to catch our train (at around 7am!) to Edinburgh. I thought it would be fun to go there for just a few days. I managed to find tickets for only £9 each way, which is ridiculously cheap! It only took about 2 ½ hours to get down there, and Theresa and I amused ourselves enough on the train that it felt like no time at all. After we got off the train we realized that we still had several hours before we could check into our hostel, so we got some lunch at Subway, picked up some smoothies, and headed towards the park to relax for a bit. The view from the park was amazing, as it was just beneath Edinburgh Castle (see picture to the left)! While we were there, we met this guy Ash and he asked me for my phone number. Oh yeah, I had only been in Edinburgh for about 3 hours and I pulled! Whoo! I usually don’t give out my number, but he was an interesting character, so I did. We then decided to go and try to find our hostel, and Ash came along to try and help us find it (however, as he had only recently moved there from London, he wasn’t that much of a help in the end! Lol). Theresa managed to find it without getting lost at all and I was well impressed. Out hostel was called Castle Rock, and it was right across the street from the Castle and had a fantastic view.

Edinburgh Castle as seen from the park

After checking in, we both got ready to go to the castle. It was warm so Theresa and I changed into the summer dresses that we had both just bought a few hours before. I hadn’t worn a dress in a few years, so it was a different experience. However, I did feel really embarrassed just a few minutes later. Theresa and I were looking for a newsagent so that I could get some headache medicine, when all of a sudden (and completely sober, mind) I fell down with a ‘plop’ on the ground! I wasn’t wearing heels, I wasn’t drunk, and there wasn’t even a huge hole in the ground, I simply just fell down. I got up and was bright red and told Theresa to just walk fast so that I could leave the vicinity of my incident. Ha ha. I was going to go back to the hostel to change because my entire leg was red, scratched and bleeding, but in the end I decided just to head to the castle anyways, regardless of the state of my leg. We headed off towards the castle, and Theresa even bought me an ice cream for my troubles! Aww. The castle was amazing, and huge! The best bit was seeing the Scottish crown jewels…they’re absolutely gorgeous!

After spending about 2 hours at the castle, we went down to our hostel and took a wee nap. After about an hour we got up and got dressed up to go out to dinner and then have some drinks. We ended up at this pub called The Last Drop, which apparently was the sight of the last public hanging in Scotland. The dinner was fantastic and cheap…by showing our hostel cards, we each got our dinner for only £3.50. Then we went out for some drinks. Ash, the guy we’d met earlier suggested a nightclub called Opium, but as I’m getting older, I wasn’t really in the mood to dance the night away…I just wanted to drink! So, we went to this place called the Rush Bar, and by showing our hostel card again, our drinks were only £1 each! We both drank so much and were completely pissed by the time we left, and we ended up singing down the street to our hostel. Theresa taught me the Danish words to the ‘Gummy Bears’ song! Ha ha. Theresa fell right to sleep once we got back, but I ended up texting Ali for the next few hours and didn’t go to bed until nearly 2am!

Me at Rosslyn Chapel

The next day we got up and then had to go back to Edinburgh Castle, as Theresa had lost her cardigan the previous day there. In the end, they didn’t find it anywhere so she just had to write it off as a loss. Then we went to the bus station so that we could put our stuff in a locker there before finding the right bus to take us to Rosslyn Chapel (pictured left). It only took about 30 minutes to get there and I was so happy, as I had always wanted to visit there. I was really mad, however, because they no longer allow cameras in the inside, and the outside of the chapel was covered with scaffolding! So it wasn’t as beautiful as it should have been. The inside was amazing though, with all the different carvings, and the apprentice pillar did not disappoint at all. We didn’t get to look around as long as I would have liked, as we had to hurry and catch the bus back because our train left at 3pm and we couldn’t miss it. We ended up making all of our transportation points on time and got back to Aberdeen by about 6pm. I had the best time there, as Edinburgh is a very beautiful city and I would have no trouble moving down there if the need ever arose (except that it is quite a touristy place)! I definitely plan to go back down there again soon, as there is so much to do and we had so little time.

Ben Nevis (obscured by a cloud)

My first time driving a manual car

The next day, on that Thursday, we rented a car to drive around Scotland. There was an ulterior motive to the rental car as well: teaching me how to drive a manual car! Theresa decided that we should head through the Cairngorms towards the west coast of Scotland and Ben Nevis. We got a bit lost heading out though, and it ended up taking us over 8 hours to reach Ben Nevis (the highest mountain in Britain, at around 4,409 feet), when the directions said that is should only have taken up 4! Lol, I have no idea what happened there. However, I did get to drive (pictured left), which was fantastic, as I had wanted to learn to drive a manual for awhile now, but none of my friends trust me with their cars! It was really scary at first, but Theresa just pulled over on a small ‘B’ road and told me to get behind the wheel. I think that

I picked it up pretty quickly, even if I do say so myself. I do tend to have a bit of trouble with first gear, however…I think because I’m so anxious to get going (like I can do with an automatic) I lift up on the clutch too fast and don’t push down on the accelerator in the correct manner. I only stalled a few times (uh, like maybe six). Ha ha. However, driving on the motor way was fantastic, as I never had to go below third gear. The great thing that I realized, however, is that I am completely comfortable driving on the left side of the road now and don’t even give it a second thought anymore, which is great seeing as how I am itching to take my theory test for my license soon!

Our rental car (“Richmond”)

Theresa and I always end up naming our rental cars (like our “Pink Lady” car in Ireland), and this one was christened “Richmond”. It was a Chevrolet Matiz, and was barely a 1.0 litre engine I think, as it didn’t have much power and only really got over 60 mph when it was going downhill, but it was a good reliable car and we have fond memories of good ‘ol Richmond. So, aside from my new knowledge of manual driving, we got to see Ben Nevis (even though it was a dreary rainy day and the mountain was obscured by a giant cloud on top of it), picture on the right, Inverlochy Castle, Braemar Castle, and the gorgeous views from west and north Scotland. By the time we got home we had been driving for nearly 12 hours and we were exhausted, but it had been a fantastic day…I love driving through the Scottish countryside and hope to go out again very soon. The next day Theresa and I returned our car by 8am and then Theresa left to go do some errands and head up to Peterhead to meet her boyfriend, and I finally got to relax and sleep past 6am for the next few days! Lol.

I still have to write about what I had gotten up to during the last few months…most of it entails going to castles, but I shall recount all that at a later time. Until then…

Friday, June 27, 2008

Back by popular demand…me!

It has been brought to my attention by nearly everyone that I have not updated my web page for quite some time. I am sorry, but last semester was crazy. I moved to a new flat, visited numerous Scottish castles, had to finish school work, and recently I took a trip back to the States. But I digress. I shall start with my most recent endeavors first, as I might find it hard to remember all the things that I’ve been up to! Well, as I said, I recently traveled back to the States. The main reason being that I was going to help my mom move down to Arizona from Minnesota to help my grandmother out. We had to get three cars and a trailer 2000 miles, which proved to be quite the adventure. Well, first things first. I arrived back in Minnesota on May 13. Surprisingly, my three plane rides went pretty smoothly, aside from a 2 hour delay leaving Aberdeen. I went from Aberdeen to Manchester (just so that I could say that I’ve been to England! Lol.), Manchester to Chicago, then Chicago to Minneapolis. It was quite the long day I can tell you! I just hung out on the Tuesday, and then ran a few errands with my mom on the Wednesday. On Thursday, I went to pick my sister up from Eau Claire, Wisconsin. I was happy to do it seeing as how I hadn’t seen her in over two years and also because I was just itching to drive my car again! I can’t believe how much I actually missed driving, but it felt fantastic to be behind the wheel of my car again. Of course, I felt really stupid as I couldn’t remember what side of the street I was meant to be on. Seriously, I had to keep asking my mom which way I had to turn onto the street leaving her flat because I honestly couldn’t remember which way was right, having gotten used to seeing the cars on the other side of the street. She remarked that maybe I shouldn’t be driving after all! But, I soon figured out the ‘right’ way to drive and went to pick up my sister. Eau Claire is about 1 ½ hours from the Twin Cities, which isn’t too bad, but once I collected her, I just turned right around and drove back to Minnesota, and it did start to feel a bit of a long drive by the time we got home. Oh, I do have to mention here that I got to drive on a roundabout in Wisconsin! I was amazed when I came across it, as I didn’t know that Americans had begun building roundabouts yet. I went around it with delight and was actually squealing ‘weeeeeee’ as I went around it! Ha ha, I couldn’t help it, it just felt so strange going counter-clockwise around it, as opposed to the other way. So anyway, my sister and I headed to the Mall of America on the way back from Wisconsin, as it was my mission to go clothes shopping for my friend Nathan. We hit all the big stores: Abercrombie & Fitch, American Eagle, Hollister and others. I left with an armful of bags, which Nathan had better like! By this time I had realized that my left (i.e. ‘driving’) arm was severely burned from hanging out the window on the way to Wisconsin. This was to prove just one of several burns that I would sustain on my holiday. The next day, my sister and I drove up to St. Cloud, because I wanted to visit my old university and see if things had changed. I surprised myself by being able to find my way straight to campus without getting lost once, even though it had been over 5 years since I had last been there. Go me! I bought a SCSU alumni t-shirt and a hoody and a t-shirt for Nathan as well. Then I drove home. That means that I drove 140 miles roundtrip just to buy a t-shirt! This was just the precursor to what I had planned for the next day. Originally, my sister and I meant to drive up to Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada and go party at a bar and stay the night. However, as my sister had no money, and I couldn’t afford the both of us, we decided just to take a day trip. That proved to be one hell of a challenge. We left at about 10am and started driving. To the left is a map of the route we took. The drive is about 339 miles and takes about 6 hours. By the time we got there it was 4pm, but in actuality, it was 5pm because I forgot that Ontario is in a different time zone. Well, things must close very early up there, because there was nothing open and it was raining pretty hard. So, we ended up just going to McDonald’s and Walmart, and then left for home! I had to drop my sister off in Wisconsin, so I knew that I would be in for a really long drive. By the time I got home that night it was around 2-3 in the morning! It turns out that during that day, I had driven about 787 miles, and it had taken about 14 hours…all that just so that I could say that I’ve been to Canada!

The Move

Over the next few days I just puttered about trying to help my mom pack up her flat. She kept saying that it wouldn’t take the long to pack up the trailer, but that didn’t prove to the case. I woke up on Friday, May 23^rd thinking that the trailer would have been all loaded for the day, but nothing had been done. It took most of the day to finish packing and loading the trailer, and we didn’t even set off until about 5pm! We were originally supposed to leave at like 10am that morning. So much for getting an early start. My mom and I set off in our cars, taking 35E and my step dad was in the truck pulling the trailer and decided to take 35W. By the time that we decided to stop for the night, we had only managed to make it to Mason City, Iowa. There was no sign of Bob, but it turns out that when he started his journey, at the first stoplight, the trailer passed him by when he stopped! He had to find help to retrieve the trailer and get it all hooked up (properly this time) again. He didn’t make it to our hotel until quite late that night…I’m just glad that I got my own room and didn’t get woken up by him! Oh yes, and I should also mention that we were carrying my mom’s two cats around as well. Luckily, this hotel allowed animals to stay, but my mom only paid to have one stay, so we had to smuggle the other one in through the side door, and they were not happy kitties! Lol.

We made pretty good time the next day, driving through the remainder of Iowa, Missouri, Kansas and part of Oklahoma. However, once we got to Oklahoma, we experienced our first thunderstorm, and boy was it a doozy! While we were driving, I spotted a weather chasing vehicle for a local news station, and I immediately became alert to my surroundings. I wasn’t trained as a meteorologist for nothing! Lol. All was fine until I happened to turn on the radio and heard that there was a tornado warning in Oklahoma. It said that a tornado had touched down in Perry, and here I am thinking “where the hell is Perry?” Not a minute after I had this thought, we passed a sign that said, wait for it…’Perry – 10 miles’! Well, that answered my question. It was raining quite hard by this point but nothing that I couldn’t handle. So here we were, driving straight toward a tornado…not too smart! Just before we got to the town of Perry, I heard a really loud slamming sound on the roof of my car. I immediately knew what it was and was not happy…it was freakin’ hailing! By the sound of the slams against my car I knew that they were pretty big in size. By this point I couldn’t see in front of me anymore, as the visibility must have been only about 20 feet. So, I did exactly what I had been trained not to do in a severe storm situation…I pulled under a highway overpass! I know, I can just see all my met teachers cringing, but I had to protect my car! I wasn’t the only one either; there had to be at least 50 cars parked under every overpass for several miles. After about 10 minutes it looked as if it were easing up, so I pulled out and my mom followed me. Unfortunately I was premature in my leaving the shelter of the overpass, because not a full minute later I was forced to find another one to pull into as the hail and rain began coming down even harder! We waited there for some time before I decided to pull out again. Finally, as I drove on and away from the Perry area, the rain started to diminish. My mom and I both pulled into a petrol station to fill up and inspect our cars for hail damage, but miraculously, there didn’t appear to be any! I have no idea how we escaped any damage, but luckily we did. Our plan was to then continue driving until we hit Oklahoma City, but after the stress of our severe storm experience, I was exhausted and we pulled over in some random town, whose name now escapes me. We got two rooms yet again and had dinner.

It was on this day that my step dad called my mom and told us about the tornadoes that occurred in Minnesota. Apparently, there was an F1 tornado that struck just blocks away from the apartment complex that we had just moved out of in Coon Rapids! I was so mad…after years of wanting to see an actual tornado in real life, we moved just a day before one happened…and I wouldn’t even have had to chase it as I could have spotted it from the balcony! Dang it. In addition, it was even scarier to learn that a pretty powerful F3 tornado hit Hugo, the city where my Dad lives. As Hugo isn’t a huge city, I had a dreadful feeling that my dad’s house might have been hit. Luckily, I heard from my sister, who had called my dad, and found out that he was alright and that thankfully his house had been spared from damage. I couldn’t believe the amount of tornadoes that had been plaguing the country…it’s like we left a trail of tornadoes behind us, as every place that we just left experienced some sort of severe storm activity!

The next day we had hoped would be our last day driving as we were all getting sick of it. We drove through the rest of Oklahoma, the Texas panhandle and most of New Mexico by the time we started to get really tired again. We pulled over after we passed Albuquerque in some town that I again cannot recall. The next day we made the final push to Clarkdale, Arizona. All I can say is that automatic cars have the most difficult time trying to go up mountain sides! Lol, my car was really pulling for a while. Flagstaff was especially interesting, as you have to descend this really steep mountain side, and the car wants to keep going like 90 mph, but there are cops hidden in all the bushes so you can’t! We finally made it to my grandmother’s house safe and sound and just had to wait for Bob to arrive with the trailer to begin unloading it. So, all in all, it was an interesting trip with lots of little adventures, which is always good. Things didn’t stay good for long though. I won’t go into the details but I will say that my mom was and still is to a certain extent deciding if she is going to move back to Minnesota. Stay tuned for any news on that front.

Arizona

I didn’t really enjoy staying in Arizona for the two weeks after the move. I was bored out of my mind for most of it. I made my mom do the strangest things, like go to visit Meteor Crater, which was a huge crater created by, that’s right you got it, a meteor! It was actually really interesting and I really liked the little attached museum. I think my mom was getting a bit bored though, as it was all very sciencey. On a different day we drove all the way to Phoenix, which is about 2 hours away, just to see a film. We ended up seeing the new Indiana Jones movie, which I really liked (apart from the alien component, that is), and then just drove back. On another occasion, after hounding her for weeks, we decided to drive to Las Vegas for the day. I should point out that Las Vegas is about a 5 hours drive from Clarkdale. We got there, parked at Caesar’s Palace, then looked around and walked down the strip. I ended up winning $80 at the Bellagio playing blackjack, which was very nice. After looking around for about 2-3 hours, we got back into the car and headed home. I was so tired and I hate driving at night, but I was the one who wanted to go, so I had to drive! Lol, we ended up getting home at about 2am, but then we couldn’t find the house! Lol, Clarkdale is pretty isolated so there isn’t a bunch of streetlights or anything, and they are doing road work everywhere (installing 5 new roundabouts in fact!), so my mom and I kept passing the entrance to the road. We must have turned around at least half a dozen times, and by the time we finally found it, we were laughing so hard there were tears running down my cheeks! Lol, I think it was the combination of being so tired and feeling so stupid that we couldn’t find it. We eventually did find the street and made it inside, but I still have to laugh when I think of that.

So that, in a very big nutshell, is my experience of moving to Arizona. I don’t really like it, and the temperatures are unbelievably hot, so I’m not looking forward to going back. I was so very excited to fly back to Scotland on Tuesday, June 10, although I didn’t actually get home until June 11 (that trip is really too long now, as I have to go from Phoenix to Chicago, Chicago to Manchester, and Manchester to Aberdeen, which is roughly 7000 miles!). I spent the entire first week wrapped up in a hoody though, as it’s been sooooo cold (as I had gotten used to temperatures of 115 degrees F in Arizona), but I’ve gotten over the cold shock by now.

So ends my first update in 5 months. I have much more to say but will spare you the pain of trying to read it all at once and will simply post a new update within a few days. Tomorrow is my 28^th (ugh) birthday, so I’ll take the day off and try to have some fun and not think about how close to 30 I now am! Ta ta for now…

Past entries:

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5	6	7	8	9	10	11	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
12	13	14	15	16	17	18	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	11	12	13	14	15	16	17
19	20	21	22	23	24	25	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	21	22	23	24	25	26	27	18	19	20	21	22	23	24
26	27	28	29	30	31		23 30	24	25	26	27	28	29	28	29	30	31				25	26	27	28	29	30
December 2007							January 2008							February 2008							March 2008
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
						1			1	2	3	4	5						1	2							1
2	3	4	5	6	7	8	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
9	10	11	12	13	14	15	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	9	10	11	12	13	14	15
16	17	18	19	20	21	22	20	21	22	23	24	25	26	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	16	17	18	19	20	21	22
23	24	25	26	27	28	29	27	28	29	30	31			24	25	26	27	28	29		23	24	25	26	27	28	29
30	31																				30	31
April 2008							May 2008							June 2008							July 2008
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
		1	2	3	4	5					1	2	3										1	2	3	4	5
6	7	8	9	10	11	12	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
13	14	15	16	17	18	19	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	13	14	15	16	17	18	19
20	21	22	23	24	25	26	18	19	20	21	22	23	24	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	20	21	22	23	24	25	26
27	28	29	30				25	26	27	28	29	30	31	22	23	24	25	26	27	28 My B-Day	27	28	29	30	31
														29	30

(Updated: 7/16/08)

Castle Check List (i.e. castles I’ve been to and who I went with):

Blarney Castle (Theresa)

Braemar Castle (Theresa)

Castle Fraser (Nathan)

Crathes Castle (Nathan)

Drum Castle (Nathan)

Dublin Castle (Theresa)

Dunnotter Castle (Ross)

Edinburgh Castle (Theresa)

Edzell Castle (Ross)

Inverlochy Castle (Theresa)

Ross Castle (Theresa)

Quick Links:

*Curious about my drawing skills? Take a quick peek.

*If you want a fun diversion, take a look at my spoof mock-ups of Meteorlogix employees.

-or-

*Visit Al Klein’s website for even more pictures.