mac genius rob

sorry to leave you all in a state of anticipation. here's an update on the ol' fighter i like to call, mac book.

so after 2 days of fretting, crying, and complaining i made the trek to oxford circus with my soggy friend. i waited for about ten minutes after checking in. rob, my mac genius for the night, called me to the counter, took my computer and disappeared behind some doors.

i felt confident at first....as if this was like any other run-o-the-mill jaunts to the mac store. then, after 10 minutes, 15 minutes, what seemed like four hours, rob emerged. i thought for sure i would be walking out that night with a $1500 debit on my credit card. but, rob had other news for me.

he presented my with my old keyboard and informed me that most of the water damage was contained to that piece and if they had it in stock they could replace it for me right then and there. he also said a little bit of water had gotten on the logic board (mother board) and that they cleaned it up but he had to warn me that it could go out in the next 6 weeks and then i would be screwed (it only costs 400 pounds to replace...thats $800).

i was almost sobbing with relief and definitely started my overly-excited yet nervous chatter. i came to find out that rob was from texas, loved working for apple, had been in london a year-and-a-half, that the regent street store was the largest, does the most sales, has the largest genius bar, steve jobs just visited the week before, and they have random concerts there. can you tell that i was making more than small talk? i dont think i let the guy breathe!

but...chatting got me somewhere for once. when he first gave me the prognosis, he mentioned it would cost 30 pounds for labor and 45 pounds for the part. after about 5 minutes of chatting, he turned to me and said "you know, the old keyboard is already off...i just wont charge you for the labor." to which i almost screamed in excitement.

then a bit later i remarked that it was a good thing i was getting the keyboard replaced because it was already getting a bit dirty. he promptly picked up the old one, inspected it and told me they have been replacing keyboards because of a bad batch of plastic that discolors them. he told me we would pretend this is what happened to mine and proceeded to not charge me a pence for any of it. i just about fell off my stool!

so...they had the part, replaced it, and i walked out a very happy girl!

although, now the thing randomly restarts on me. and i'm not sure what's causing it. sometimes it happens after 10 minutes and sometimes after 4 hours. but, at least its working again!

r.i.p.

well...i have a very long post about norway complete with a lot of pictures. however, its held captive for the moment because of the very sad news i'm about to share with you. earlier this evening, one of my law books fell over and knocked a glass of water on to my brand new amazing computer.

i know...i was crying too. after taking the battery out and praying to God the thing still worked (this was after i turned it over and streams of water came flooding out) i put the battery back in and tried to turn it on. instead it made a very resistant buzzing noise. i promptly called the mac store here...kile was very nice and tried not to tell me that my computer is fried and i will need to buy another one - it really was amazing how much he tried to spare my feelings. i think he realized how distraught i was when he asked for my name and i barely choked the syllables out.

so tomorrow i will head to oxford circus to seek out the mac store, find a genius and hopefully come home with a happy (and dry) computer. if not, i hope i can at least recover all my data. if not, you will be able to find me on some street corner in central london lying in a puddle of my own tears.

how does this relate to my post about norway? well, the pictures are all haphazard throughout the post. unfortunately, i do not know the cut and paste commands for a pc (more specifically a dell...oh yes, i am having to use one of those again). so, until i get my mac back (or when pcs become easier to use....whichever comes first) there will be no posts with pictures.

oktoberfest

dear everyone,

i am out of town until monday afternoon. hopefully i will have several posts about what i've been up to then. just a run down...last weekend i was in norway. we got back around 3am monday morning. i then had class and an interview at kirkland and ellis (which is my new employer...see previous post). wednesday morning we woke up at 4am and caught the eurostar to brussels. we then toured different eu buildings. from brussels we travelled to luxembourg and from there to strausbourg, france. from there a group of nine of us travelled to munich for the weekend to enjoy the wonders of oktoberfest.

after 6 hours of the festival, all i can say is that it is outstanding! i will have more pictures and stories some time next week (though life doesn't seem to be slowing down since i start my new job on tuesday and my family is coming to visit in two weeks).

love,
amanda

new job!

i now work on the 22-26 floors "the gherkin" (aka kirkland and ellis).

i am very excited. hopefully i'll be able to start next tuesday. essentially i'm going to be a paralegal which sucks a bit since i'm training to be a lawyer, but i dont really care since this is going to be excellent experience even if all i'm doing is getting coffee, etc.

plus, the inside of the building is amazing (and the view isnt so bad either)!

norway (in a nutshell)

this past weekend i travelled to the lovely norway with shane, johnny, john and milissa (i'll introduce them to you a bit later). we left thursday night (had to miss con law, which was a bummer because we were discussing roe v. wade) from stansted airport. even though we left three hours before our flight, we still had to run to catch the plane.

airport security was crazy and it took us forever to get through. but we eventually made it on the plane and flew an hour and a half to "oslo." i put that in quotation marks because really we flew in to oslo/torp. ryanair is a great cheap airline but often then keep their costs down by using airports super far away from the actual city. thats what happened here. we flew in to oslo but really we were in torp which was an hour and forty minute bus ride from the actual city.

we came in to oslo pretty late - around midnight. we then checked in to our great hostel (sentrum pensjonat) and some of us went to smack and others went to bed. smack is a restaurant/fast food place that was two blocks from our house. on the way home i noticed that the streets weren't busy with late night partiers...they were busy with hookers. thats when i realized we were in a great part of town. actually, we were super central which was nice, but the area wasnt the greatest.

on friday, we got a late start to the day but we took a ferry to a different part of oslo and visited the cultural center and viking museum.

this is a view of oslo from the ferry. we had gorgeous weather! the ocean and sky were incredibly blue and clear.




the cultural center is a place where cool traditional houses and structures have been shipped in. we then walk around and look at what norway used to be. the houses were cool looking...almost hobit like.







here are johnny and milissa posing in front of one of the hobbit houses. i really like the grass on the roof...i think it adds a nice decorative touch.





for some reason, i thought it would be cool to pretend like i'm running up this ramp towards the house.










we then walked to the viking museum where we saw some very cool boats from the viking age. this boat was a queen's boat. she was buried in it with some of her stuff. now, when i say buried i mean that one day some excavators were digging into a small mountain and noticed a boad. aka, the small mountain was the boat. all three of these boats were buried in the same way.
oh those vikings!











that night we went out to a real norway dinner. unbeknownst to us we went to a ritzy norway dinner. we ended up sitting in the coat room (the coat rack was next to our table and the podium where you ask for a table was on the other side of our table). i think they put us there becuase we were loud and under dressed. but, as it turned out, the owner of the place was our waiter! jorn was great and ended up being our friend by the end of the night. he told us that oj robbed a hotel room...we shared a special affinity with him because we were american and he had spent several years in florida working for disney as a norwegian chef.


after dinner, we were prowling the crazy streets of oslo when milissa decided to ask a group of girls where they were headed. so we followed. we ended up at a sports bar which wasnt that cool but we did make some really cool friends with the norwegian girls that we followed. i have pictures of the girls, but they are on the computer that is dead. i will post more when i get a chance.

the next day (saturday) we woke up super early to catch a 6:30am train to voss in order to see the fjords. this is one of the train conductors scoping out the situation. he thinks the people on the bikes are crazy too!








the train ride there was 5 hours long and we went from beautiful sunny green land to frigid ice lakes.









but the crazy thing is that the snowier it got outside, the more people there were on the train! these crazy norwegians were actually travelling to the snow in order to ride their bikes through the cold wasteland. and they were excited about this as they peeled there multitudes of layers off their bodies. crazy, but we think this is part of the reason why they're so thin - they are very active and eat lots of fish.




we made it to myrdal where we caught the fram railroad that took us back down the mountain.
here we are on the fram. the guy on the left is richard. he became our friend on the long train ride from oslo.



along the way we got off the train and took pictures of a waterfall.
it was kind of a fun ride because there were a lot of asian tourists and whenever we would come around a bend and see something cool they would make loud "oohs" and "aahs" and rush to the side of the train where the wonder existed.



once we got to fram (the city is called fram and the train is called fram...all very confusing!)
by the water's edge, we were supposed to catch a ferry that would take us through the fjords. but we missed our boat so we ended up going on a later one. this ended up being a good thing (even though we were mad at the time because missing the boat meant we wouldnt make it back to the train on time to make it back to oslo that night...this meant we had to make emergency accomodations in voss) because we caught up with some of our school friends that had gone to bergen for the weekend (western part of norway). all ten of us enjoyed the boat and gorgeous scenery!






































it was a wee bit cold on the ferry. none of us were very prepared for the frigid ice rain water. but the hot chocolate definitely helped!

on sunday we traveled back to oslo, checked out of the hostel we weren't able to stay in that night and traversed the city to the nobel peace prize museum. this was a very cool experience. the exhibit showing was about the grameen bank and the guy who started it (they split the prize for 2006). there were a lot of photos, plaques describing what they do, and videos. the videos circulated through many different topics - all touching on people and events that have led to peace and freedom (e.g. martin luther king).

from there we traveled to the airport and then home to london. john and i didnt make it back to the house until 3am! we missed the train from the airport to central london so we had to take a bus. since it was so late we opted for a taxi which meant we made it home about an hour sooner than if we had taken the bus.

i love london...

back home i have never seen a throng of people running to catch the bus, much less a mix of people....suits, older, younger, trendy, and nerdy. the runners come in all shapes and sizes here. all colors and ethnicities.

i like to take the picadilly line home because it seems shorter. i am also becoming a pro at navigating the buses and tubes and my oyster card is becoming my new best friend (its become my badge, declaring to those near me, "yes, i am a londoner.").

this evening i performed my daily ritual of tube and bus interaction. as i exited the northfields tube station i noticed the e3 stopped at the red light. i quickened my pace till i was running across the street with my black suit and stubby heels. but i wasnt the only one - there was a throng. we were all quickly moving, weaving in and out all for the singular purpose of catching the bus.

i almost let out a giggle of excitement. i love public transportation (although, sometimes it is a drag).

old bailey tour

today we took a tour of old bailey. this is a huge criminal court here in london. the building is beautiful and had a great hall in it with really high ceilings and frescos. the walls were lined with marble and there were several statutes surrounding the center of the hall.

we also got to see a court room. there were some noticeable differences between that room and the ones back home. first, they arent allowed to modernize the place too much because they have to keep it looking like it did hundreds of years ago. so my first impression of the court room was "wow, this is quaint."

i was able to sit in one of the judge's chairs and it offered quite a grand looky look of the room. here are the difference: 1) the prosecution and defense sit on the same side as each other - the prosecution sits in the first row (too the left of the judge's bench when looking out into the gallery) and the defense sits in the row behind; 2) the defendant sits in a large box/circle thing in the middle of the courtroom (not next to his/her attorney like in the us); 3) the witness stand has a cover over it (like a roof) because in the olden days, the trial used to take place outside and they didnt want the person presenting the evidence to get wet (you would think the roof would go once they moved the process inside, but again, they dont like change); and 4) the public gallery is upstairs and sort of hangs over the room.

old bailey sees mostly homicides and terrorist trials. there was a terrorist trial going on when we were there and originally we were able to go in and see part of the trial but at the last minute they said we couldnt because too many family members were in the room watching.

right now i am at school waiting for 5:20 to come so that i can have my 6th interview...almost done!

oh...and tomorrow we leave for norway. i cant wait! look for more posts next week.

remembering 9/11

yesterday was big lovin's birthday (for all those who dont know, big lovin is first wife in the house, mr. ben turner....he loves loves loves it when i call him first wife.) we had class all day so we couldnt celebrate until the evening. before the big birthday dinner, corey went to pc world and bought big lovin (blt for short) a camera for his computer so that when blt skypes with his girlfriend, maureen dragon-slayer, they can see each other. john and i bought a couple cards on the way to class and had peole sign them...except our plan backfired because 3 of us from the house of love didnt get a chance to sign them...boo.

at any rate, big lovin decided not to go to class yesterday and instead stayed home watching battlestar galactica and cleaning up. i had an interview last night around 10pm so john and i didnt get back to the house until 11. i thought by then they would have eaten already but just my luck the cannelloni had just come out of the oven! we had a fantastic dinner prepared by my lovely roommates, rachel and vanessa. they made the cannelloni from scratch and it was amazing!

janelle and aaron also came over for dinner and janelle brought home-made cheesecake. all in all i went to bed with a tummy ache because i ate sooooo much.

thank you blt for having a birthday!

london legal walk

the legal system is different here (thank you, captain obvious!). one significant deviation is how they train lawyers. first, there are two types - barristers and solicitors. barristers are the ones who argue before judges. they do not interact with the clients. solicitors are the ones who do everything else. clients will contract with a solicitor and if the case needs to go to court, the solicitor will work with the barrister.

there are four inns of court that train barristers (solicitors can get a law degree from any university and then practice law...but barristers must go to one of these four inns of court in order to become a barrister).

this is a shield with the four crests on it. we thought it looked like something from harry potter. the upper left is gryffindor, the next one is ravensclaw, the bottom left is hufflepuff and the bottom right is slytherin. in reality, i cant remember which inn goes with which crest. so for now, we will say this is hogwarts (not the city law school in london). the inns are only in london and they are all fairly close to one another. we walked to each one.

gray's inn. charles dickens coined the term "red tape" at this inn when he observed clerks bundling up opinions and other legal documents in pink ribbon. he claimed the legal profession was all paperwork and didnt achieve anything good at the end of the day. thus he said "red tape, red tape, thats all this is." (slight paraphrasing on my part).middle temple. (again, another scene from harry potter...i'm told this looks like the dining hall. cant you picture dumbledore and the other teachers at the table?)
inner temple. this church was the stage for the da vinci code movie. this circular church was built way back when by the knights templar. supposedly they became the first bank and were extremely wealthy...i guess thats why people didnt like them.
this is also from inner temple. there are two people on top of the horse, but the people who made the inner temple crest thought it was a horse with wings. thus today the crest is a flying horse instead of a horse with two riders.lincoln's inn. supposedly this is the inn with the most money and thus the most amount of scholarships. i believe its also the inn of many famous english politicians. charles dickens did not like lawyers and wrote about the church at this inn in bleak house.

it pretty much doesnt matter which one a barrister joins, but every barrister must join one of them. they are required to meet at the in and eat a communal meal once a month for a year. i cant remember but i'm pretty sure thats all the contact they need with the inn. after that they can practice (but dont be misled, these inns are very exclusive and it is incredibly difficult to be accepted into one...the meal is the easy part).

here are some other important buildings in the legal world. this is where the barristers and judges buy their wigs. the one on the far left is for barristers when they are in court. the middle one is for judges sitting on the bench. the last one is for...i cant remember. these are very expensive (some go for more than 1000 pounds...but they are all hand made from horse hair).
this is the royal courts of justice where all appeals are heard.patent office....if only i had taken copyright.
this is just a cool building. in the olden days, people had to pay taxes based on how much ground they occupied. so to thwart the system, they would build structures wider at the top than the bottom. in some places, people on the top floor could shake hands through their apartment windows. this was one reason why the london fire way back when was so devastating...the fire leapt from building to building with little effort.
let me tell you...after two hours in heels i was definitely glad to be done with the tour. my blisters are healing into some nice callouses. i am starting to get my "london feet" which means that i can walk for an insane amount of time over rocky terrain (i.e. cobblestone) and still be ok. yes! that means i can eat more ice cream sundaes.

more ice bar pics

i was told i looked good in the parka.this is the full name of the bar. everybody received a voucher for guess what? an absolut vodka drink!
supposedly the ice is from sweden.
me and john.
we thought we looked like secret agents.
here's one of those ice maps.
the group...(left to right). michelle, corey, ben, me, john.
ben, corey and me (the hood pretty much never came off. i took it off at one point and ben said i definitely looked better with it on).
me and ben. john says i look devious.

we had to wait a half hour at the hammersmith bus terminal for the final bus home. i'd say its about 3:15am in this picture.