Busy Doing Nothing

Whoa, where did that week go?

So we went to Kat and Matt's on Friday night and had a great evening. We ate lovely food, drank lovely drinks and taunted Andrew incessantly. Andrew stayed over theirs on Friday night and came over to ours on Saturday night (via a friend in Swindon, I think!) We ordered a takeaway from a very nice Indian in Horspath and drank yet more wine. It was really nice to spend some time with Andrew, Kat and Matt. I'm honoured at the amount of friends from home that have taken the time to visit us already. I know it will be important for us to maintain those valuable friendships.

I woke up on Sunday morning and my eyes felt a bit swollen - I assumed from the drinking. Paul, Andrew and I went to Cuddesdon Parish Church which turned out to be an eventful morning as the chap who was meant to be Priesting didn't turn up, so another Priest who had just come along to attend the service had to step in. This has shown me a little bit about what it must be like to be a Priest! There were a lot of new students there, and this incident actually lightened the atmosphere.

So back to my face. Over Sunday it became more and more swollen, and when I got up on Monday morning my eyelids, under eyes, cheeks and lips were swollen, red and peeling. I had wondered on Sunday whether it was an eye infection or something, but the dry skin made me realise it was the face wash I had picked up in Asda. I've never reacted to a product before and it was just horrible, itchy and painful but moreover ever so embarrassing! A combination of anti-histamine, ibuprofen, E45 and a lot of concealer have got me through the last few days. The swelling finally completely disappeared on Thursday morning!

This made me approach morning prayer on Monday with even more trepidation, but I think it went OK. Everyone's very friendly and chilled out, so even if I had made a mistake I'm sure no-one would have minded. I consulted Dad on a hymn choice and went for 'Lead me, O my Father lead me.' The bit in the first verse about crossing a tempestuous sea somehow resounded with me.

Monday and Tuesday were largely uneventful days, but Wednesday was Paul's birthday so we decided to do something special. He wanted to go to London again, so we went on the bus. I secretly booked London Eye tickets, because the last time we went which was years ago it was raining and we couldn't see anything. We got on the bus and went for a coffee, and that's when I told Paul about the Eye. We went on it at 10am. It was raining.

Afterwards, we went to the Imperial War Museum. We went to the Holocaust Exhibition, which was extremely well-presented and very moving. It certainly puts something like a slightly swollen face into perspective...

Yesterday evening we went to Kate and Lawrence's for a drink and stumbled home along the dark Cuddesdon country lanes at near midnight. It was really good fun and just being able to kick back and have a laugh and a drink with someone was just what I needed. I hope there will be many instances of stumbling back along the dark Cuddesdon country lanes to come!