Yes, at long last our pictures are up. You can view them here, or click the “Photos” button from the main part of our website. Enjoy the pictures, you can post comments on each one, or here, if you prefer.
I had my first ‘real’ postgrad experience yesterday. I read a works-in-progress paper to the STAR (Scotland Transatlantic Research) Postgraduate seminar. As I was lacking in sleep, I was relaxed enough not to be anxious. It was a good exercise, to write something when I wouldn’t normally have written another paper (just for the fun of it…)and to read it and get reaction from other postgrads and professors. After my paper, the rest of the seminar was on finding a research topic for a dissertation and all the issues involved with ‘pretending you’re an academic’–which is what most PhD students feel they are. 
I still haven’t heard about my PhD application, but my references were received just last week, but hopefully all will go well. I received a 70 on one of my papers (which is a good grade here, don’t worry–from 70 and onwards you reach the ‘excellent’ category and many folks don’t give 70s or above as Bryce has found out at his College), so I’m feeling fine about my progress thus far. I’m also applying for PhD funding, which would be immensely helpful; thanks for your prayers for our studies!
We’ve just returned from our two-day getaway to York. My parents left us with some BritRail train passes, and as we didn’t have to pay for the train fares, we figured we’d take a weekend away as our early Valentine’s Day celebration. (Bryce’s present consisted of a home-made card and some chocolate fudgge). It was wonderful just to leave the city and instead of being holed up in our flat, reading hour after hour, we ditched responsibility (a bit anyway) and went to York, in northern England.
We had stopped over in York for one day en route to Edinburgh from London when my parents were here. It’s a darling little city and being that the weather in Scotland can be a bit much at times, we figured we’d head south and be in a city where we could dash inside if the wind/rain picked up. We left Edinburgh early Friday afternoon and did a bit of reading on the train. We made it there safely, hired a taxi to take us to our B&B and settled in. It wasn’t the most amazing accommodation, but it wasn’t expensive, breakfast was included and it was just a short walk to the city centre. So we relaxed and watched a bit of the telly (i.e., television). We then walked into the city and walked around the Shambles area (what remains of the medieval city with houses/shops so old they slant towards one another on the narrow lanes) and found a lovely little French restaurant, Cafe Rouge. We had some yummy wine and good food. We then walked by the 80s bar (Bryce was really keen to go there originally), but after seeing the 20-somethings sliding up against one another, or ensconced in a cloud of smoke, or just standing around totally decked out in 80s attire, we figured it wasn’t quite our thing.
The next day we awoke early so we could make the slot for our full English breakfast. It was pretty good. We then walked into the city amid gusting winds (but I’m sure they were a whole lot stronger in Edinburgh–which should be called the windy city) and to the city walls. The walls are the medieval city walls and you feel like you’re in some medieval times movie as you walk across, looking like you’re patrolling for marauders. Bryce took some great photos of The Minster (a huge Anglican cathedral) while we were walking on the wall. He also got a shot of a tuba in a tree; yes that’s the oddities we come across here in Britain. We then hoofed off to the National Railway Museum, largely because we hadn’t been there the first go around and more importantly, it’s free. It was great; besides the squirming, loud children there, we really enjoyed seeing all the trains, explanations and short videos on them, and the preservation and reconstruction on them–it was really amazing it was free with all the museum entailed.
Then we walked through the Shambles area again and stopped in at all the charity shops, including Oxfam Bookshop, but we weren’t tempted too much to buy more books. We lunched at an Italian Cafe which advertised a 20 percent student discount but then found out the discount doesn’t work on weekends (of course it was written on the bottom of the sign and in shorthand). But oh well, it still was a lovely lunch. As we’d done so much our first visit in York, we just enjoyed walking around and hanging out. We left mid-afternoon and have since been mostly reading. It really was a fabulous outing just to get away and make the weekend feel longer. Trips are quite important, and we had a great (early) Valentine’s Day! (I told Bryce that at least our Valentine’s Day celebration although not on the 14th, wasn’t entirely covered in pink and red hearts popping from every store window!)
…Dross. Practically everyone I talked to today has used the word, kinda weird huh? It’s a good word really, I’m just not that used to hearing it used in everyday conversations. It was mostly used in conversations about finding used books, like, “the Oxfam bookstore has a lot of dross, but occasionally you’ll come across a real gem.”
We’re going to York for Friday night/Saturday. We have free train tickets thanks to Tor and Carolyn coming to visit over Christmas, and they expire at the end of the month…so we decided to make use of them. We thought about going somewhere cool in Scotland, but we decided that bad weather could really ruin the trip, so York was a safer option.
Speaking of bad weather, we got caught in the craziest downpour I’ve ever seen this afternoon. We were walking up the Royal Mile to a bookstore when it started raining unusally hard. We decided to stop in at the nearest store and wait for it to pass, since it rarely rains for more the 10 minutes. As soon as we were inside the sky just opened up. It was a combination of rain and hail, and it was coming down so hard that it seemed like it was being sprayed from a fire hose. The lady at the store kept saying “I’ve never seen anything like this…” for about 15 minutes. The street was covered in hail almost immediately, which made it quite slippery when we went back outside.
Once we finally made it to the bookstore Ashley bought the book she was looking for, but the best purchase of the outing was a book chair! Yes, that’s right, a book chair. It looks like a little lawn chair, and it sits on the desk and holds your book open for you–very handy when we’re reading all the time. I think it may become a source of tension in our marriage, however, since we could only afford one of them :).
Still no pictures, sorry. I’m really working on it. They’ll be up soon, I hope.
As you may have picked up from ealier entries, I was preaching today in chapel at my college. My initial reaction is that it’s a relief to have it behind me…I’ve received nothing but positive feedback so far, I guess we’ll see how long that keeps up. But the two people that were there whose opinions I value and who I think would give it to me straight, were both encouraging.
It’s a strange experience preaching to a bunch of theological students and professors, not at all what I would consider a normal environment. But overall I’m fairly happy with it. The actual sermon was about 10 minutes shorter when I delivered it than when I practiced…I guess I was a bit nervous! If you want to read a copy of my manuscript send me an email or post a comment with your email address and I’ll shoot it over to you.
That’s all for now…I’ll try to post a more thorough entry in the next day or so…
P.S. - I’m working on getting some pictures up…hopefully by this weekend.
You are Poetry.
You are often the most emotional of the arts. You
are introverted, in that you tend to let people
come to you rather than trying to get their
attention. You get along well with Music and
Literature.
What form of art are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
Here’s a two-second quiz for you to take to waste a bit of time. I find it interesting… So, what art form are YOU? Take the short quiz and post your results! Here’s the link.
Busy weekend–We went to a concert at our church on Friday night. Derek Webb (formerly of Caedman’s Call) and his wife, Sandra McCracken, gave a great concert. It was wonderful to hear great music that wasn’t cheesy Christian music, but how Christian music really should be. I recommend you go out and buy Derek’s album (http://www.derekwebb.com/), She Must and Shall Go Free (all about the church), right away. We’re saving up to buy one of Sandra’s soon! We were able to talk to the two of them after the concert and it was really encouraging to us to speak to them and share a bit about what we’re doing here in Edinburgh. When I meet Christians from all over the world, it really gives me a picture of the worldwide Church and it is quite encouraging.
Saturday we got up early and went to the train station to travel up to Banchory. We stayed with the Crocketts for one night so we could be at church for Marcet’s baptism. Kerry’s (Bryce’s sister) friend, Kristen and her daughter Ella, came over from Paris to be there too. That afternoon we took a hike to the top of Scolty (a central hill in Banchory) and did alright until I tried to go down the snowy path and fell at least 10 times. We had a few snowballs to throw at one another and I felt I had my iceskates on with all the slipping I did–it got to be quite funny. It was so great to see Marcet baptised this morning and I’m sure her public confession of faith was a testimony to many there in the congregation (to her friends and to us old folks too!). She looked beautiful and was SO excited to be baptised. It really brought home the verses in Scripture where Christ tells us we must receive the kingdom as a child. After church we had a lovely lunch at the Crocketts’ friends’ home and a nice journey back to Edinburgh. Although we didn’t accomplish too much work (I still have reading for Wednesday and Bryce still needs to work on his sermon for Tuesday), it was great to be witness to the many ways God works and to relax in that knowledge.