Cambridge

I went to Cambridge today. It's a beautiful town. I loved it. Catie and I took the 8:40 train from Norwich and wandered around the city for a while, completely lost, before we managed to find the tourist information centre. There we found a map and a walking tour of the colleges. Basically, what we did in Cambridge was walk around looking at all the different colleges, including Christ's College, where Milton and Darwin went, and King's College, the famous one. After that, we went to the Fitzwilliam Museum. The Fitzwilliam Museum is an art museum owned by the university. And it's free! We saw a number of fantastic medieval coins and weaponry, along with a collection of fans and other items. They also had busts of Newton, Milton, and Pope, which was really exciting to me. I, being a genius, noticed that Milton, unlike the other busts, had no irises. I don't know if this is the reason or not, but Milton was blind, and so I thought that was why he had no irises. I felt pretty smart.

We went through the churchyard of Little St. Mary's, which had an enormous garden around its tombstones. It was absolutely gorgeous. We were admiring all the flowers (which are still in bloom!) when we turned the corner and saw a homeless man sitting on a bench with his sleeping bag. I don't want to sentimentalize him or blow the event up or anything (because that would be rude and disrespectful), but it's easy to forget that these towns are really towns, that exist in the present, and are not idealized trips into the past. This man made me remember that real people, with real lives and real problems, live here. And then I felt guilty for forgetting in the first place.

Anyway, I will upload pictures to Flickr shortly. In the meantime, more farm animals!

These are cows behind King's College, and Catie with said cows. Yes, they are in there. No, I couldn't get any closer. And the other picture is of Christ's College that I keep talking about. It was actually really hard to find for us, for some reason, because we went on the street that the map said it was on, but there was a giant wall blocking me from worshipping where geniuses had walked. So we kept going along the wall, me cursing it under my breath, until the street opened up and there it was:

Christ's College. Milton went there, people. MILTON. (Yes, I do remember how much I complained when I had to read Paradise Lost. Pretty language does not absolve one of one's misogyny, but rampant misogyny, while tough--nigh on impossible--to take, does not make one's manipulation of language any less brilliant.) Unfortunately, when we got there, we saw this:

College Closed to the Public. Thwarted at the bitter end. You win, Cambridge University. You win.