X Eye *ting!* Gnus ^ 03/02/05

Translation for those of you not hip to the rebuses:

"Exciting News Update"

Just a few quick notes of various levels of excitement:

• Awoke this morning to shocking amounts of snow, which continued to fall throughout the day. Those of you who've spent long periods of time on the icy East Coast will probably roll your eyes at my Southern Californian naivete, but I still get really excited by the prospect of walking through the tumbling wintry confetti, which gives me a certain storybook thrill of adventure. Although I wasn't expecting the supreme difficulty of navigating a snowy,
  downwards-sloping parking lot when I rushed out of the flat this morning only marginally on time for a meeting with my Creative Drama group, which almost resulted in my becoming much more closely acquainted with the slush upon which I was so perilously treading than I was at the moment prepared for.
• Did manage to successfully make it to my group meeting, and devised a structure for our presentation next Monday which might just be worthy of carrying over to our final production. In our quest to explore the process of formation of identity and the concept of the self, we've hit upon the idea of showing the crucial although often insignificant-seeming moments of clash between various ideological systems, and have decided to do so, at least for the moment, by connecting random short scenes with snapshot images appropriate to both the ending of one and the beginning of the next. What we have so far looks really neat.
• Read C. S. Lewis' The Great Divorce, which is simply a fantastic book and worth a periodic re-read.
• Tasted the full golden glory of a peanut butter and honey sandwich on whole grain bread, which has been left for an hour to allow the honey to crystallize. If you have not yet experienced this incredible phenomenon, I advise you to do so at once.
• Saw a production of Shakespeare's As You Like It put on by SUDS (Sussex University Drama Society), an entirely student-run society that puts on some really fabulous work. They put on Little Shop of Horrors a few weeks ago, which was quite good, but tonight's show was simply fantastic. So playful and fun to watch, and done, in the spirit of the original, with significant cross-dressing (Rosalind was played by a man, reintroducing the original additional layer of gender play to the production, as was Audrey, while Silvius was played by a woman. And the girl who played Celia was professional quality, quite truly. They also really used the silly love-ditties scattered throughout the script to good effect. Wonderful!
• Was presented with a book entitled "Free Will: A Very Short Introduction" by Gavin and Sara, a gift I will treasure forever. It's hard to articulate how precious it is when you are given, not just an appreciated object, but an expression of such clear and deep comprehension of one's self.

On a slighlty less XI* note, I appear to be coming down with some kind of illness, which has me sore-throated and losing my voice. But, back on the upside, tomorrow afternoon I head to London, where I'll stay the night after seeing the new Andrew Lloyd Weber musical Woman In White, to depart early the next morning for three days in Wales through the Arcadia University study abroad program! Quite exciting, indeed! So, expect more fun photos and recounting of touristy adventures in a few days' time. Until then, my beloveds, a wonderful weekend to you all, and infinite affection and well-wishes from my corner of the universe (provided your understanding of the geometry of the universe provides for the possibility of corners).