Home From Across the Pond and Life Won't Slow Down!

I am home! Glory be! Life has not slowed down enough since coming home to actually post anything so here we are. Let me give a scaled down version of my two weeks abroad. First, this is my third year of doing this. What is this you might ask? This is going with a group of college students on a study abroad trip to London. Our college owns a flat in London and we send students there each semester. I work in the office which handles all of these matters. As we are a small office (which fits because we are a small school) we all take turns going. While there we are in charge of everything from values violations (did I mention the school was a religious affiliated school?) to maitenance on the coin-operated washing machine (I believe that was in my unofficial job duties for the first two years...I have a picture of me attempting to fix it while wearing the same sweater and exactly 365 days apart). So, whereas there is definitely work involved during the two weeks it is not exactly the same work as I do in the office. It is more! I have to keep up with my real day-to-day job while taking care of the matters abroad and on two different time zones. Talk about a hair-brained two weeks! Add to that a family. Yes, I do have one of those too! So, I try to stay on two different time-zones literally. I do not usually go to bed before 2:30 a.m. London time so I can say goodnight to LitlBit via Skype. Skype is a miracle development! I am truly in love with it when I am away like that! So there is the brief version of what I do while gone...now for the fun things!

This year we took the students to Canturbury Cathedral. It was gorgeous! Gorgeous and C..O..L..D! So very bone chilling, mouth does not want to move to talk, cause a major headache cold! We all enjoyed it though. I truly wish we had a bit more time for that and the town though. I loved both. The town is very quaint. Cobblestone streets with local shops all around. Some were simple pottery shops while others were small clothing boutiques. All were worth a look though. Too bad I wasn't able to look at all of them!

Immediately following our return to the house from Canterbury my colleague and I headed out for our own journey, Norway. This was certainly a journey. It started off with us arriving at the Luton airport to see the board say that our flight was boarding...45 minutes early! So, we run, well I run. My friend was held up at security. So, I get to the gate and guess what...they were not boarding! When we arrive we managed to get on the last bus from the airport to the city. Mind you this was a good thing...travel time between the two on the bus was an hour and a half. So, we were glad! When we got to the city we arrived at the bus station...having no clue where our hotel was...at 10:00 p.m. Lovely! We ended up taking a taxi (which was an adventure as the first guy said he did not know where our hotel was but he would still take us) to the hotel. The hotel was in a nice area. We were within walking distance to the President's "house" as the taxi driver said as well as the heart of Oslo. The next day we woke up late and went out in the city. We found out quick that the pound (or the dollar) was not worth anything in Scandinavian states! Taxes ate it up! The city was riidiculously expensive! After going to the Folk Museum and walking through a blizzard on Sunday it was time to return to London. All in all it was a good experience. Although, one I should have prepared my wallet for ahead of time!

Returning home was great! London is a fabulous city. The mass transit is great and all that there is to do is awesome. However, there is nothing like coming home! My daughter screamed across the airport she was so happy that I was back. So, as fabulous as the cities I saw were there is still nothing as fabulous as hearing that voice from across the airport!!!!