Our day in Stratford actually started about a mile out of the town at Anne Hathaway's cottage. No, not the Anne Hathaway in "Princess Diaries" and "The Devil Wears Prada" but the wife of Shakespeare. They got married when he was 18 (very young for a man) and she was 26 (rather old for a woman) and they had a child on the way. The fact that it was Anne's cottage really didn't add much to the experience but it was really neat to walk through such an old house and see what things might have been like in the 16th century. The cottage was really small... even I had to duck going through most doorways. I think Bret would have had to slouch just to fit under most of the ceilings! The beds were really short too, but we were told that is because they used to sleep sitting up, propped against their pillows, because they thought the devil came by at night and if he saw you lying down he'd think you were dead and try to take you away. Actually, probably a better explaination for why they did it was to help them breathe better (there were so many illnesses that affected breathing in those days). The cottage had a beautiful garden behind it. I could forgo living in the cottage, charming as it was, but I wouldn't mind having the garden.
Karly and I (it was so cold... I had to use my scarf as a blanket!)
Me and Annie
This is Anne Hathaway's cottage, thatched roof and all.
After Anne Hathaway's cottage, we rode into the heart of Stratford to see the home where Shakespeare grew up. It was quite a bit larger than Anne's, but most things were pretty similar. After the tour we ate our lunches and wandered down the streets of Stratford to the theatre where we saw the Royal Shakespeare Company perform the "Merchant of Venice". They are one of the very best theatre troops in the world and as skeptical as I sometimes feel about Shakespeare, I LOVED it! They made the story come to life, and even though the language was still tricky at times, the story was easy to follow and very funny. I'm really looking forward to seeing King Lear at the Globe in a few weeks after enjoying this performance so much.
We had a little bit of wander time on our way back to the bus. I wasn't ready to eat dinner so I looked in a few shops along the way. There was this fantastic Christmas store. I'm wishing I had been more decisive and gotten an ornament, but I held off thinking I'd eventually find a cheaper one, which is doubtful. Oh well. I'm glad Megan and I started that tradition when we came to Europe a few years ago... it makes me feel justified in buying a souvenier.Ever since I got home its just been dinner, homework, and sitting on my bed pretending that I'm doing homework. I did finally make a long-procrastinated dash to the grocery store to get some bananas and yogurt (I make a PB&J for lunch every day because its the only food they leave out for us at the center and I'm too cheap to buy lunch, so I decided to get something a little healthier to go with it). The girl I went with, Kristen, is Lauren Timmins' 2nd cousin. She's flying home tomorrow for her grandfather's funeral (wouldn't that be so hard to get that news in a foreign country?) and offered to take Lauren's b-day present to her. Unfortunately its rather lame... but I made a pretty schnazzy card to go along with it (another fantastic way I found tonight to procrastinate paper-writing).
Well, as if this entry isn't random enough already, I would like to end on my favorite quote of the day as spoken by my friend Mallory. "Will you watch my stuff? If you're lucky it might to tricks." Sounds kinda silly right now, but I had a good laugh earlier today.
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