Capslock Springtime and the Great Beroubling

Last weekend was my birthday!

And we ate cake.

And cookies and lemon squares and malva pudding and chocolate mousse cake and hummus and muffins.

And we had a party.

And everyone paid attention to me and gave me lovely presents.

And thus I turned 22 again, which is, so far, oddly like the first time I was 22, but with better hair.

It was also the end of term, which you'd think would mean five weeks of happy-tea-drinking-travelling-baking-picnicking fun times, but actually meant a return to spending my life in the library, or at least the very excellent study space in the adjacent building where you're allowed to eat. I also get to feel like a fancy postgrad with fancy postgrad access to the fancy postgrad study area, but I'm mostly in it for the food.

 

The good news is that I managed to avoid the worst of the exam madness, and by yesterday I'd got through all the work I wanted to do before going away, which meant that I could spend last night with some of my favourite friends, watching Firefly, eating crunchies, and being SASSY. (We filmed it. Expect to be overwhelmed by the awesomeness of our white girl sass any day now.)

And then today was CAPSLOCK GORGEOUS, because it's SPRING and EVERYTHING IS THE BEST and I LOVE EVERYTHING and HEY LOOK DAFFODILS and ALSO I HAD AN ICE LOLLY.

♪ I love the flowers; I love the daffodils. ♪ (Photo by Imke.)

Spring is another thing that makes me go mad, but in a good way. Or at least, a better way than exam time. Spring has never made me cry under the desk in the lab or eat only frozen peas for weeks. It just makes me want to burst into song and skip and have picnics and spend too much money on things I don't really need. (I have not-coincidentally done all of those things in the last three days.) Today I went into town to pick up my travel money, and was just overwhelmed by how perfect York is in this weather. Anyone foolish enough to stand still for too long will have heard me enthuse about how generally wonderful York is, but in the spring it's properly postcard perfect and warm* and delightful. For it to be any nicer, it would have to be Jo'burg spring, and I can't ask too much.

As for the travel money, I am beroubled!

Beroubled.

Assuming everything goes all right when I go to collect my passport and visa in London tomorrow, I'm off to Russia on Wednesday, where I'm led to believe that Emily's gran will feed me to within an inch of my life.

I am fine with this plan.

*English warm. It's 18 degrees.