Weather

So, I'm being a little slow to learn about British weather. Yesterday it drizzled on and off all day. Whatever, New Jersey is like that a lot. Today? Wow. There was sun in the morning. There was sun when I got out of my first seminar. There was sun all the way up to the point where I sat down on a bench, extracted my sandwich and a book from my bag, and started to eat, and then suddenly, from out of nowhere, there was a downpour. What the hell?

Then it happened again this evening. I said to myself, "It's nice out there. I'll take another walk to the library and poke around some more." I spent a pleasant 10 minutes wandering through all my favorite sections (I made a note to come back for that book on Aging in Ancient Egypt) and then I walked out again straight into a downpour. Of course, I didn't have an umbrella. Why would I have an umbrella? I was only warned to always carry an umbrella about nine million times.

Apparently this is perfectly normal for England. During my second seminar, the woman talking to us said "We've already had sun, clouds and rain today. We even had sun and rain at the same time. We haven't had snow yet, but it's only 2:00 pm, so there's plenty of time." Okay. Never forget the umbrella. I get it already.

Another thing I'm having problems with is walking on the wrong side of the sidewalk. If I'm walking, and someone is walking towards me in the opposite direction, my first instinct is to move over to my right-hand side. Unfortunately, the British move to their left-hand side. It's the same thing with doors - entrance is usually to the left, and the exit is to the right, when my instinct is to go the other way. My dad also warned me a couple of hundred times to look the opposite way when crossing the street - cars come at you first from the right, not the left - and this is a huge problem for me. I have obviously not been run over yet, but I always forget.

I'm working on it. Still no signs of real culture shock, though, just little irritating things like this. I keep waiting to see if it's all going to drop down on my head right when I have to start classes. So far, I've had less trouble than I did adjusting to California. How sad is that?