This shall once again become a sort of travel or study abroad blog, as I prepare for my 10 months or so pursuing my Masters degree in Victorian Studies at the University of Leicester, UK. I learned today that Leicester is in the region of England called the East Midlands, or, for you non-Anglophiles, pretty much smack dab in the middle of central England. I've heard it's not far from the Lake District of Coleridge-and-Wordsworthian fame, so at some point I definitely intend to make a stop there.
(In passing, isn't Wordsworth the most exceptionally apt name for a poet?)
In preparation for my English experience, I've been straightening out quite a bit of paperwork and beginning to assemble a packing list. When I went abroad to Belgium and briefly to Scotland before, I quickly learned that, to a native Texan,
all of Europe only has one temperature: cold. It's really only a matter of cold or colder, or perhaps of utterly frigid, as in Bruges in February. I do not, in any other case, lump the entirety of the British Isles and the Continent into one indistinguishable unit, but I am operating on the assumption that the weather in any and all of the above is what I would consider to be winter, year-round. The unfortunate implication of this is that I must pack more sweaters than ever I cared to own, and the unfortunate fact about this is that sweaters take up room. If one wanted to study abroad with optimal luggage space, a tropical destination would certainly be the way to go!
On the whole, of course, I suspect the sweaters will be quite worth the effort, when I start my year delving deep into the lives of the Victorians while based on their own proper turf. The biggest drawback at this point is that I am almost preemptively lonely for my dear friends and family! 10 months will pass so quickly, yet right now there are also ways in which it seems nearly interminable. To my lovely readers and world-wide supporters, your prayers are requested for my sanity in preparation, my safety in travel, and my sentimentality for my loved ones at all times.
