real sick

so ive been sick.  real sick.  In the words of Alexander Osborne: "peeing through my butthole" sick.  nice image, I know.   Being sick is bad:

a. when you are in a new place, where nobody knows you or cares about you (I mean no mom/wife/girlfriend/dog*)

b. when you are in a foreign country

c. when you are in a foreign country whose toilets dont flush properly

d. whine whine whine, my list of unfortunate circumstances could go on for a while.

As it is, I am somewhat on the mend.  I took two days off from rowing, which might set me back a bit, but there was nothing to be done.  Even biking slowly across campus today my heartrate skyrocketed and I was exhausted.  

Today was the first day of lecture! Woooo college, I mean university!  I am finally an official Cambridge student.  I got to meet the other four members of my program, who are quite diverse.  One is a math major from the UK. The other three all have backgrounds in GIS (Geographic Information Systems, which is what I am studying, and is code for digital spatial data management, which is code for "how you make maps" (sounds boring I know)).  They are from Hong Kong, China, and Mobile Alabama respectively.  I think it is a good group, though we really haven't developed a dynamic yet.  The program director is a very enthusiastic Brit, with a very bouncy manner, which served to make me feel welcome and excited about the program.

I feel  I need to justify the interestingness of my topic a bit more.  On second thought, deal with it.  I think its interesting, and thats good enough for now.

*please nobody be offended by this, its a joke.  You have to admit there are times when you'd rather have a dog to comfort you than your mom.