we are both writers...

*we can just sit back and watch it all go up in flames*

a nice travel to manchester this weekend. erin, aj, dylan, dylan, jake, bryce, and myself traveled there on saturday for the night. manchester is quite a large city, with a population of around 450,000. it was quite nice to just get away from york for a while. erin, aj and i got there earlier than the others, and spent the first part of our time wandering manchester, trying to find a place to get a bite to eat. the three of us were sharing a room at the britannia sachas, were the others were staying at the plain ol' britannia. pretty decent room, even though it didn't have a window. that made it quite interesting when waking up. anyways, after quite a lot of searching, we finally found this pub by the manchester metro university campus. it was called "the pub," which, well, was pretty spot on. it was my first guinness experience of the trip. pretty tasty over here. they had something on tap called "guinness red," but i was just a bit to afraid to try it. it was probably pretty tasty, but i'll save that for dublin and the brewery tour.

we then headed over to the manchester museum of art. it has been a while since i have been to an art museum, and it was such a good time. i really enjoy looking at peoples emotions spilled out onto various mediums. i think my favorite parts were the francisco de goya etchings (which were so utterly amazing), yue minjun's contemporary painting (go here to check it out), and ron mueck's sculpture work (go here to check out a sampling). it was a pretty neat time. i look forward to spending much more time in museums during the rest of my travels in europe.

after that we did a little bit of shopping. i wanted to get a few things at american apparel, but their prices in the UK are ridiculous. i did find some sweet things at "topman," which is actually a pretty cool, hip store. you know me and my love for 3/4 baseball t-shirts.

where the night really took a turn was at the mexican restaurant. i think all of us have been craving not only mexican food, but also a really good mean. i know i had been. so, i basically, along with some of the others, ate into a food coma. i haven't had food this good in a long time, and basically that is saying that i was so hungry, british mexican tasted excellent. (now if only they could learn how to make a cheeseburger). aj, erin, and i went back to our hotel room and just crashed. after all of the food i ate, i don't think i could have put any beer or alcohol down there. completely stuffed. we just sat around and watched some british television (which included a christopher walken-michael cain movie that had a person in the corner of the screen signing the movie for deaf viewers). i really don't know why they couldn't have just used closed-caption. so, maybe for our illiterate-deaf viewers. also, we saw the olympic women's curling team beat the british team. we weren't quite sure what exactly was going on, but when they won, we gave a little cheer. the room was desperately hot. and around 2am we got a call from the others telling us they wouldn't let dylan h back up because the security said there was too many people in their room. so we ended up sneaking him in our hotel and he crashed on the floor as well. four people in a window-less, 80 degree room. were quite the sight. good thing i showered the next day, because i was dripping with sweat. i wonder how that room gets airflow?

the next morning, we had an amazing breakfast at this little cafe called the teacup. damn, that was good. it was really neat looking and they had a ton of threadless t-shirts on the wall. very cool. i had poached eggs (which i now love) with ham on a bagel. oh, and some english tea. no milk though, on account of my "condition."

on the ride back, a girl was sitting across from me watching something on her laptop when suddenly she burst into tears. i took my headphones off because i was not quite sure what was going on. turns out she was watching "the notebook." figures. i got to get a bit into the next novel for my class, "riders of the purple sage" by zane grey. i am actually now becoming a fan of the western, with this novel and all of the john wayne movies we have seen. we watched "stagecoach" today, while we have seen "the searchers" and "the big trail." god, john wayne is a hell of a man. i particularly liked "stagecoach." such a great story line and great acting. the ringo kid. kind of like me.

*all i can see, the buildings they burn so bright*

so, tomorrow i turn twenty-five. the so called, "quarter century." it feels weird to not be in minneapolis celebrating with my friends and family. i have had many fantastic birthdays with everyone back home, and i will really miss that this year. last year i was at nye's, surrounded by my friends, drinking a maker's mark-sour. oh the memories. what will tomorrow bring? i think that is a question we all constantly ask ourselves. well, i will be one year older. think i will be any wiser?

*hold me down*