Another Excellent Weekend

We failed the flat inspection, but being the American I went and had a conversation with the lady who inspects and after much pleading she let me clean out the fridge and checked us off (vs. paying 30 pounds per person in the flat). To be fair Cyprian came along to complain and cleaned off the ceiling of the microwave (Crisis Avoided!). I'm pretty sure if any of my flat mates had taken action (with the exception of Mike) they would have just gone and yelled at people and never gotten out of paying for cleaners (yea! for begging skills).
Then Friday night we (at least 12 of us Americans) threw an American party...we really just took over the Australians lobby. The Australians brought some fries and a few of them out drank the Americans. I enjoyed my first game of beer pong which Mike and I lost horribly. Just as most of us were getting loud and obnoxious, Lena (previously mentioned German girl), who always brings at least two beers to every event I've been to yet, came for about twenty minutes, said "American Parties are different" and left shortly afterward. This had a strange stomping effect on my evening. I have since learned that stereotypically Germans can out drink anyone and never get noticeably tipsy...I think I Idolize that. I left a short time later as people got louder and stupider, not really my cup of tea.
Saturday was awesome! Rob (A coworker of my uncle's) took Scott and myself and several of his coworkers who had just arrived from the states to the Rangers vs. Kilmarnock soccer game. Some of the security people were on big draftish sized horses. Kilmarnock scored the first goal which made the game really intense for a few minutes until the rangers rallied and scored 3 goals in about 5 minutes. We had the good fortune of sitting on the Kilmarnock side during the first half (which is when everyone scored) so we got to see some excellent goals. One of which came off of the corner kick pictured here. One cultural facet that I noticed was that instead of serving hot dogs they served meat pies such as this one being enjoyed by the die hard Ranger fans in front of us (note soccer pictures courtesy of Scott...I accidentally left the memory card for my camera in my computer on Saturday).
Rob took us all to the horseshoe pub after the game and bought us each a pint of a very tasty locally brewed ale. Then Scott and I left because the conversation was leaning towards business and we walked back to the University. That night I introduced Mark, Mike, Scott, and Christy to the card game "up and down the lazy river". Christy beat us all , but I think the game is a hit we've already played it once since and everyone is still enjoying it.
Mike and Scott didn't go anywhere the weekend before this one, so Sunday Mike planned an excursion to Inveraray. We (Mike Scott and I) got up early and caught a bus to the small coastal town. We got to see a beautiful very full rainbow on the way there. The town is very small and compact but pretty because of it. It definitely makes money off tourists but because it was Sunday (lots of stuff was closed) we didn't go to the ship museum and we avoided the historical jail, although I did try to break in...actually I just wanted a picture with the flag but the climb proved to much work for just a photo.We ate a fast cheap breakfast in the George inn which turned out to be the best thing we could have done. The place had the perfect atmosphere, it was built in the 1700's so it was mostly stone, they had a real fire going and the food was very good. We left The George and went exploring. We came across a "new" castle built in the 17th century. Apparently some 10th duke of something still lives there. What fascinated me most was a Canon in front of the castle that was salvaged from a wrecked ship that served in the Spanish armada.
We went from the castle up a local hill/mountain that had on top of it a watchtower that served the area back in the day. The hike was not to bad compared to other things we have already done, however we decided to go off the path and strait up the mountain side...probably not a wise decision but it turned out OK. The views from the top were incredible. We stayed up there for a while because it wasn't too cold and was way too pretty to leave.
We did finally packed it up and headed down the mountain and on our way down we came across the ruins of what I deduced to be a farm. There was an ancient silo, house and what was possibly a barn (barnish building pictured with mike taken by me from the top of what might have been the silo). We also went on a very long "nature walk" which didn't turn out as pretty as we had hoped, but we got to see lots of sheep and some highland cattle. We also passed the ruins of a mill. The area was surprisingly similar to areas of the Appalachians I've been in. With the exceptions that everything here is covered in a green moss, there are fewer insects, and it feels older...I think this is mostly the fault of the moss that covers everything, but I'm not entirely sure. When we got back to the town we realized that it was low tide so we took our weary feet out to the lock's shore (most my prompting) and took a look around. I picked up a shell from between the seaweed because I though it looked pretty (kinda a purple shade). As we walked back into town I looked at the bottom of the shell to discover a very small pearl (can you see it? Its the pimple to the right of the guitar pick.) I doubt it is of any value but I haven't removed it from the shell yet...I think it's kinda pretty.
Anyway we ate dinner back in the George Inn and enjoyed the cozy fire from a distance as the place was pretty busy. They had wonderful tartar sauce that went really well with the fish and chips...very abnormally flavorful tartar sauce. We caught our bus and slept on and off as best we could on the ride back (less than a 2 hour ride home the whole round trip was only 12 pounds).
Today (Monday) was again back to the drag of going to class. Some people in my value theories class think companies should account(aka record in financial documents) for every piece of the environment they pollute. I think this is ridiculous unless there is actually a risk from lawsuits. I guess the environmentalism is a "welcome to Europe" the tree huggers at home are weenies compared to people here (thank goodness). Not saying I think companies should free willy pollute everywhere, just that their accountants shouldn't be stuck with the responsibility of dealing with it unless it impacts profit, that is all.
Oh one other side note. I bought "Highland Tea" and have combined it with this strong organic orange stuff (to thick to be juice to thin to be pulp) added a little organic fair trade sugar granules and it has turned out super delicious. I shared it with Christy cause she was sickly, even made some for the guys when we played cards, so far it has been a hit!