Wednesday, October 28, 2009

A Day in Oxford

Jim, Kitty, Steve
Oxford is an architecture student's paradise.




We spent the day in Oxford with our friends Steve and Kitty. We've known them for over thirty years and Steve was in our wedding, so you know how special the friendship is. They've lived all over the world, are full of puns, and have made a huge difference in the world, having lived all over it.
We visited the Eagle and Child pub where the Inklings (C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkein, and Charles Williams) used to hang out and share their stories with each other. We had lunch at a local favorite that one finds only by going through a narrow, nondescript alley, down a passageway and left at the first door. (You have to know how to get there to go there...Keeps out the riffraff.) Both the food and the company were amazing.

Next was a visit to Blackwell's bookstore, which boasts acres of shelving in its many stories. If you can't find your book at Blackwell's, you should give up. Jim bemoaned the fact that we only spent two hours there. I had wanted a Starbucks mug from Oxford to go with my one from Antalya, but they didn't have any. So Steve gave me his Penang one...a new treasured possession. (A Malaysian mug acquired in the U.K. from an American.)

Later had tea and scones with clotted cream back at our friends' home, and I developed a whole new list of great books to read from their recommendations. Quite fun.



















No comments: