Lacey and the Prisoner of Reveling Spaniards?

I finally saw Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban! Hugo and I went to see it on Saturday afternoon. My review of it is probably pretty much the same as most people's, so I won't bore you with it. I did think Buckbeak was cool, though. :)

I went to the library yesterday and today (two different branches) and checked out a couple of travel guides for Costa Rica to browse through in preparation for our visit with Quena. I was looking for Harry Potter y la Piedra Filosofál, but it was checked out. I did, however, find La Caseta Mágica, which I thought was an interesting way to translate The Phantom Tollbooth (literally, "the magic stall/booth," but I suppose it's easier than saying "La ilusoria cabina donde se paga el peaje." :) So that should be fun to read while I'm waiting for Harry Potter to come in.

I'm meeting with Gray Eubank, the stage director of this year's Portland Revels, in half an hour to discuss my part in the Revels and his "vision" for it. Hmmm, could be interesting. :) It looks like I'm actually going to be on stage for most of the show, even though the reason it's me on stage rather than anybody else only takes about three minutes toward the end of the second act. Whatever. It'll be fun. Oh, and I don't think I've mentioned this yet -- Hugo is going to be in the Revels this year as well! He auditioned and got accepted into the chorus, so he'll be onstage for most of the show as well. Hooray!

Yipee, hooray, and Wheeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!

Guess what I just bought ---- plane tickets to Costa Rica!!!!!! Graham and I are going to fly down at the end of August to see our fabulously wonderful amiga Quena! If you can't tell, I'm very excited about this. :) We'll be down there with Quena for just over a week, and I'll be staying a few days longer than Graham and doing some adventuring on my own, hopefully (see sidebar calendar). I figured that since there's nothing I absolutely have to be back for that early, I might as well take the opportunity and have as much fun as I possibly can. After all, who knows when I'll make it to Costa Rica again? And it will be a fine opportunity to practice my Spanish. :)

I was just thinking the other day how well things work out for me sometimes. In particular, I was thinking about the whole plan I had to be in France this summer that I gave up on because I just didn't quite want it enough. I had a feeling when I cancelled that trip that there was some other reason, and a few months afterward, the reason popped up -- the house sold and we had to find another one and move, right around the time I would have been leaving for France. And if I was in France for the summer, I wouldn't be able to go visit Quena in Costa Rica. So it all works out pretty darn well in the end, I think.

I'm a happy Lacey. Quena and Costa Rica, here I come! :)

Miscellaneous catching up

Well, well, where to start? So much has happened since I last blogged. I could spend an hour detailing the horrors and catastrophes of our move, but I don't think I need to rehash that experience quite yet. I'll just say that the "whole thing" (as in, just the getting out of the old house part) took two days rather than seven hours, and that we still can't find our phone (not that we have phone service with which to use a phone...) Things have settled down a bit, we're partially unpacked -- in fact, I think I can safely say that we're more unpacked than we are packed, but I'm not entirely sure -- and, despite the fact that we either can't close or can't open the majority of the windows upstairs and can't close the garage door when it's sunny, we love the new house.

What else? My Spanish class started today. I was really worried about jumping into second year Spanish, since it's been three years since I took first year, but to my surprise (and occasional cringing horror), I think I'm actually better off than a lot of the students in the class. Fortunately (or maybe not), the teacher doesn't really care that we get things right all the time, as long as we can all understand each other. :) He's not a native speaker, but he did both his BA and his MA in Spanish (at PSU) and studied in Spain, so he's pretty fluent. And I've never had a Spanish teacher with a Spanish accent (all my previous teachers have been Mexican), so it'll be interesting.

I discovered last night while perusing the bus schedules for my first day of class that the buses that run close to the house really aren't conducive to my class schedule. I could get to school alright, but would have to wait an hour to come home, which wouldn't really be pleasant. So I decided to ride my bike. I haven't ridden my bike at all for about a year, and we live in twisty, hilly country, so this is no easy feat. My route to school involves a fairly steep and long uphill at the start, and then several miles of exhilaratingly speedy downhill to bring me to downtown. The uphill was longer than I expected, but I survived, and the downhill made me forget all about it. My route home involves taking a bus partway home and then riding uphill for a mile or so to get to the house. I went the only way I knew today, but we just discovered an easier route that I'll try tomorrow, that's exactly a mile. So if I survive the first week of it, I should get into pretty good shape pretty fast!

Anyway, that's life for now, pretty much. Still unpacking, trying to figure out where to put everything, trying to find the phone (we're hoping it didn't get into one of the Goodwill boxes -- or worse, the boxes that got taken to the dump). And now I have studying and homework to add to it. It's going to be a full summer. But we have a lovely new house with a lovely view, and my office is in the basement where it stays (relatively) nice and cool. Hugo and I have been eating dinner out on the deck, and last night we went for a walk after dinner, a habit we're going to try to get ourselves into this summer. The weather has been extremely hot and dry, and the evenings are the best part of the day.

Now it's time to go enjoy some milk and freshly baked cookies before bed. Good night!
:)

Happy Congratulations!

Congratulations to all of my buddies who graduated from Stanford this morning! It's hard to believe that it was "my year" that walked today. Sorry I couldn't make it, but you know I love you anyway. Good luck in all future endeavors in the "real world," everybody, and take care!

And now, back to packing.

Finals are over, now the packing begins

Spring quarter is officially over -- I turned in my last papers and took my archaeology final this afternoon, so I'm done for the quarter! It's funny, it doesn't feel like I've been at PSU for two quarters already, and yet I feel so at home there it feels like I've been there for two years. Which is a good thing, because I still don't know how much longer I'm going to be there! :P

So now it's serious packing time! It's funny, right when we're about to move, we've started buying furniture! We bought a beautiful park bench for our back deck, and today I picked up a lovely headboard and footboard for our bed. All from craigslist, of course, the site I've been spending all my time on for the last week. :P But I figure, as long as we're having a moving van come haul all of our stuff, we might as well add a few more pieces. I love craigslist. :)

Time to get packing! Hooray for not having to worry about studying anymore! (Well, until my Spanish class starts on the 21st....)

Happy Birthday, Graham!

I got so lucky when I got you for a brother. Well, I guess it was more like you getting me for a sister, since you came first, but I'm still lucky! Here's to -- dare I say it? -- a quarter-century of Graham! Just think, with our family's longevity, you've probably got at least another three to go! :) Happy Birthday to the best brother a girl could wish for.

Pictures!

Hooray! I finally posted some of my Folklife pictures and pictures of our new house! The furniture in the pictures is not ours, of course, so it’ll look different once we get moved in, but I thought some of you might like to see some pictures anyway. The house is quite close to Council Crest Park, from the top of which you can see several mountains on one side, and a long way toward the coast on the other side. Very pretty. I’m getting excited about this new house. :)

Cause for celebration

We have a house, and we can move in on the 15th. Hooray for things working out! There was a message on our answering machine when we got home this afternoon saying we'd been approved for the house I mentioned in my last post, and they've confirmed an early move-out for the current tenants that will let us in on the 15th. Whew! I am so glad to have that taken care of. Now all I have to think of is papers, finals, and packing! Of course, this means that I'm pretty much going to have to reschedule my visit to CA, since that'll be right when things get hectic. Darn! I'm sorry, everybody!

By the way, some of you might be tickled by the street name of my soon-to-be-new abode: Twombly Avenue. :)

What's that old saying?

It never rains but it pours. Yeah, I think that's the one. There's so much going on right now I'm having trouble remembering that I still have classes to go to (not to mention papers to write and finals to study for). At this point I'm having to seriously consider postponing my visit to California in order to deal with this whole moving thing. I was really looking forward to coming down, going to graduation, and seeing all of you wonderful family folks, but I think I may have to reschedule. Grrrr.... I don't have anything definite yet in terms of moving dates and whatnot, as negotiations are still happening on all sides, so things might still work out. But even if they do, I'm thinking it might just be better for me to stick around here so I can deal with things as they come, rather than having them pile up in my absence. :}

On a brighter note, I looked at another house this morning (Hugo was in a meeting so couldn't come) that's a strong possibility. It's in a lovely location close to Council Crest, and the back deck has an amazing view. Even though it doesn't seem like it, it's quite close to two bus lines, either of which would get me downtown to school faster than my current driving route, which would make me very happy. The place has some interesting little quirks, but it's got a lot of nice things, too, including a huge basement, a crafts room, a lovely sunny breakfast nook, and a hot tub. :) So I turned in our rental application for the place (first in, that's a good sign), Hugo will look at it tomorrow morning, and if all goes well we'll get approved soon after that. I'm crossing my fingers, because I don't want to have to look anymore!

Sorry for the "dumping"-ness of this particular blog. Sometimes I just need to get these things out. And besides, I figured that most of the people I'm planning on seeing in California will be checking my blog at some point in the next week or so, so this is as good a way to reach you all as any.

By the way, Folklife went really well. We got a lot of nice comments about Renegade Rose's dancing, and it certainly felt a lot better than last year, from both an organizational and an expertise standpoint. So that was good. I took a bunch of pictures, but I'm not even going to try to post them any time soon, so you'll just have to wait. :)