October 1, 2007

Wow- it's hard to believe that it's October already! Here in Cambridge it's just becoming fall- more and more leaves are just beginning to turn brownish/yellowish, but tons of trees are still green and normal looking. It's been cooler of late, in the mid 60s during the day and down to almost 40 at night. It won't get much colder than 40 all winter. In fact they barely get 1 day of frost per month all winter long. There's been an outbreak of Blue Tongue disease among the cattle here, which came here from northern Europe, and it's carried by midges, which are teeny flying bugs that bite. In fact I half wonder if they don't mean mosquitoes. :) Anyway on the radio they said the only hope to control the outbreak was a cold winter- as in colder than normal temps for at least 60 days. Perhaps Michigan could share some of it's 6 months of winter with Cambridge, since I think a 4 month winter in Michigan would be long enough. :)

Our friends Helen and Robin have been here this weekend visiting family and taking their yearly trip around England. It has been wonderful having US friends visiting here! We really miss everyone a lot, and just having a teeny connection to home has been great. We've had a wonderful time- we got to meet some of their friends here in town, and we also spent yesterday doing a bit of travelling around. We went to Lavenham, which is a famous attraction for it's unusually high number of Tudor style buildings. You know, the ones with the plaster and the wood logs which are often painted black? This village is crazy- most of the buildings lean in some funny direction or other, and there's a cool National Trust place there, the Corpus Christi Guildhall, which was used for wool and cloth from like 1450 or something. Lavenham was one of the wealthiest cities in Britain at that time due to it's cloth production. It's amazing- it really made me think about what Solomon said in his Eccl wisdom book, about how he strove his whole life and at the end of it, what was all that striving for? Everything he had gathered would go to another, and who knows what they'll do with it. It's good to remember that we shouldn't be too proud of our personal status or of our city or country's status, because in the future we will all die, and the status and wealth may become nothing. Anyway I think history is fascinating and I enjoyed the guildhall and the village.

Here's a picture of one half of the guildhall itself- we're used to seeing these buildings with black beams, not grey, but in fact the Victorians painted the wood black because they thought it looked nicer. In reality they were grey because they would put lime on the building to preserve it- the lime soaks into the wood, and then over time flakes off on the outside leaving a grey wood with white plaster in between.



One of the houses in Lavenham had this Chinese Junk model in the window:



The guildhall has a cool little dye garden in back- representing the plants which were used to dye the cloth that was made there in Lavenham.



Who knew that woad, famous for it's use in Scotland for painting faces was also used to dye fabric blue. And this teeny little plant is what makes the blue dye! You have to mash it up and let it sort of ferment I think they said. Or at least let it sit for a few days.



Lavenham was actually a stop on the way to Aldeborough, a quaint sea side town on the North Sea. It's beautiful there- I took a picture of G on the beach. It was definitely cold and windy though.


All along the beach are these black huts where the fisherman bring their catch and sell it to the public each day. They write what they have available on the board, and you can just buy it right there.



Helen and Robin are going to their next stop tomorrow morning, and then things will be as usual here until this weekend when I'm flying over to Germany to visit some friends who are in from Michigan. I'm leaving Saturday evening and coming back Tuesday during the day I think. You know, it's cheaper to fly to Germany from London Stansted than it is to take the train from Cambridge to London! Times really have changed.


Did I mention that I found 3 spiders in the bathtub last night? I yanked the curtain back and there were 3 of them- a biggish one, a medium one, and a baby one. :) G caught the 2 big ones, and the baby ran away. I think maybe they get thirsty- after all, what's a spider supposed to do to get water in a big dry house? Just when I start to think that there are fewer spiders I see more. :) Oh well. The day Helen and Robin arrived my dresser was delivered, so now my clothes are even safer than they were in the trunk. :) Emmaus house had a 50% off sale, which rocked because we'd been holding off on buying some furniture because of the cost. So we were able to get a mattress for the spare room, the dresser, a table for my big photo printer, a rocking chair, and another chair to use in the living room. We have quite the quaint little snug cottage now, and it really feels like home. The garden is still looking good, and I've been able to put a few houseplants inside as well. Well, they're basically more cyclamen, but I just can't get enough of those things and by the time I'm done I think I'll have 2 or 3 in every window! They are so beautiful here with different pinks and white and red, and I've been picking the ones which are fragrant- not all of them are, but I sniff each one before I buy it to be sure that I'll have the added benefit of a good smelling house.

This is going to be a busy month- Helen and Robin leave tomorrow, I'm off to Germany next weekend, the weekend after that we've decided to take a tour of the Peak District while the weather is still decent enough to hike and travel, and then that Tuesday G's mom comes for 2 weeks. Scottish dancing starts up this month, as does the class for internationals that I'm helping with at STAG.

I went to the first women's group meeting last week- we meet on Thursday, and it's like a women's small group basically. I was a little bit uncertain what to expect, but to my surprise the group has 3 older ladies (I think they're all around 80) and when I saw them I felt so relieved- I feel so comfortable with that age group, and I have so many wonderful friends in Ann Arbor who are that age that I just knew I would fit in from the start. :) It ended up being me and these 3 ladies as some of the women are on holiday, and I had such a wonderful time with them. Their wisdom and knowledge of the bbl, and a lifetime of fth, make their insights very interesting. And I felt I had something to add as well, since I have a lot of experience serving Gd overseas, which is something they don't have personal experience with. We all had a great time. I really am thankful to Gd for providing me with a group like this, and for all of our Living Proof friends in A2 who were so accepting of us and love us so well.

Nelly is clamoring for some attention here- with guests in the house she's ready for some one on one time I think. :) Although she took rather well to Helen and Robin and liked them from day 1- sometimes I wonder if she misses other American voices too. :)