Part Two of my adventure.

Yesterday I packed up all my stuff and left Eltham... it was a lot sadder than I thought it would be.

I kept thinking about a month ago when Alex and his dad dropped me off there, and I still had bright and shiny ideas about the next 2 months... and about the night Alex stayed there with me on our 6 month anniversary... and about how many days I then spent crying and feeling completely hopeless in that room... and lastly, about how I finally started having fun with my classmates on that campus when there were only 3 days left.. :/
I knew that would happen. YOU all knew that would happen. I don't think I could have avoided the way things worked out though.. I just have to appreciate the one really good week I had.

I know the entire second half of my trip is about to begin, but I just have this overwhelming and strange feeling right now as I know I'm about to leave this experience behind forever and there wont be quite as many good memories linked with it as I'd hoped.

Yesterday, my last day, was a good day. We met for our last "class" at 10 in the morning, and only were there for about 30 minutes while we sang happy birthday to one of the girls on the trip and talked about last minute things. Then a whole bunch of us went out to Nando's in Lewisham, which was a lot of fun. The group kind of split up after this point, and I went with 5 of my friends out to King's Cross station to show them where Platform 9 3/4 was (this was the third time I have been there, xD) and we took pictures and were dorky and it was a nice way to start my last afternoon in London with Seattle people. It worked out well, because I felt like I bonded a lot with the 5 people I spent that last day with, and they were probably some of my favorite people I met on the trip.

After King's Cross we took a train out to Portobello Market, and walked along the seemingly endless road of booths and stands and fun little shops. We'd decided to go there on a complete whim, not even knowing what it was all about, but ended up having a blast. I bought little presents for my mom and my brother and spent a lot of time admiring the quirky, brightly painted buildings along the street. I have pictures but I am saving my camera battery (still no charger) so I wont be uploading them until I get home.

After a few hours at the market our feet were killing us, so we hopped back on a train to Cannon Street to meet our friend Anthony at the London Stone. This was the creepy gothic pub I mentioned the other day that I couldn't remember the name of. They have amazing drinks there named after the 7 deadly sins, and Anthony and our other friend Craig spoiled us all by buying 5-6 pitchers of the very best ones, like Greedy and Sloth (one was a fruity purple drink (water, sugar, purple!) and the other was a mint chocolatey drink... amazing). We sat around just talking and enjoying ourselves and I felt so content, albeit a little saddened that my entire trip wasn't like this.

I truly hope these people all keep in touch when we get back home to Seattle. These last few days have been so good.

We took the train home, where I speed-packed the rest of my belongings while I waited for Emma to come pick me up. Once she got there we loaded my things in her car, I said goodbye to the few people I could find, turned in my keys, and.. left Eltham. :/

We're staying at Emma's dad's girlfriend's apartment, and it is AMAZING. She lives in Canary Wharf and from the window I can see the Thames, the O2 Dome, the DLR rail, and tons of other buildings I can't actually name. Last night we stood on the balcony for awhile, and aside from being dizzying, being so high up, it was simply breathtaking. All the twinkling lights of the city reflected in the river below - I would love to live somewhere like that, at least for a little while. A beautiful city apartment to supplement my reclusive cabin in the woods where I will go to write. :D


Today is Summer in the City.
I am 2 parts terrified, 1 part nervous, 3 parts excited and 4 parts just ready to meet so many people I have only talked to online, finally.
(Apparently this means I am made up of 10 parts. I suppose that makes sense.)

Probably most excited to meet Johnny, since I already met Dave last week and met a lot of people when I was here in March. But I know that LOADS of my subscribers and blog commenters and CD buyers are British and I am excited to meet all of YOU, too. Making new friends is the best part of gatherings, really. Ask Shannancy.

I really, really hope no one chickens out of coming and talking to me, because I cannot even count the amount of times I have gotten emails later from people saying "I saw you today but I didn't say hi." DON'T DO THAT. I am coming to SITC to meet people, to chat, to hang out, and honestly, the more people I talk to the less time I will spend worrying what Alex is doing. Haha.
I am really excited to hang out with the UK crowd, I know a lot of you blog readers are going, and I am going to be very sad if I don't meet EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU. <3

Okay. I need to do my laundry so badly it's not even funny anymore, so this is the end of my blog post.

Days until I leave: 27
Times I've had Indian food: 9