Achievement Unlocked: Stiff Upper Lip

So this was my Home for the Holidays trip this week:

Treforest to Cardiff (~11 miles): ~30 minutes
Cardiff to London (~150 miles): 2 hours
time in Longon: 2.5 hours
London to Stansted Airport (~35 miles): 2.5 hours
Stanted Airport to Poznań (~1000 miles): 1.5 hours
Poznań to Wrocław (~125 miles): 3 hours
Wrocław to Lubań (~110 miles): SEVEN AND A HALF HOURS

Apparently our place got out of London just in time, two hours afterwards, there were delays of over an hour on most planes, Heathrow was shut down, and only Luton was having minimal delays. There was a scary amount of fog pretty much all along the train route as soon as we got into England, and the bus trip out to Stansted was like driving through some creepy horror movie setup. The airport was covered in the stuff up until we started boarding, and I guess it didn't really get much better afterwards, although when we were outside to get on the plane, it looked like it might have been lifting.

Once I got to Wrocław, I could have tried for the bus, but I was so tired I could barely keep upright, so I decided to take the train (and I wasn't sure what time the bus was leaving, and my phone was dead so I couldn't check). I could have taken the train half an hour later, the one that goes by the route I normally take, but it was cold in the station and they both arrived at the same time, so I decided to take the first train. I got some food beforehand, so I was full. The train wasn't crowded so I had plenty of room. I got my phone recharged and called my grandparents to let them know I was on my way.

I got to Jelenia Góra where I had to transfer trains fine, I got on the second train fine. There are ten stations between that and Lubań, and we got to the sixth one without a problem. Then it turned out there was another train stuck on the tracks in front of us, with its brakes locked up and thus unmovable. This was half an hour before I should have been home. We sat there for like an hour, then they moved the passengers from the other train onto ours (prompting a not quite nasty incident where a woman started screaming at our conductor and I asked her to please not yell because it's not helping anyone, and she went off on me BECAUSE IT'S FINE FOR YOU TO SIT THERE AND TELL ME TO BE CALM and I was like, bitch, I've been traveling for over 20 hours by this point, so STFU because your day at work is nothing compared to that, and she was all MORE SCREAMING STOP BEING IMPUDENT YOUNG PERSON I HAVE BEEN AT WORK FOR EIGHT HOURS HOW DARE YOU TRY TO TAKE A REASONABLE APPROACH TO THIS INFURIATING SITUATION WHEN SCREAMING ABOUT IT IS HOW *I WANT TO DEAL WITH IT EVEN THOUGH IT WON'T HELP AT ALL AND ONLY MAKE EVERYONE MORE MISERABLE, and at that point, I gave her a smile and put my headphones in and cranked up the Fuck You song, because seriously, shit happens, and there's nothing you can do about it, and yelling at people who aren't responsible just makes you look like a twat, so keep the fuck calm and carry on) and told us they were taking us back to the station we started at, where a bus would pick us up and take us onward. So we backed up to the previous station, and they told us we weren't going all the way back, that the bus would pick us there. And we waited, for about another hour. Finally, the bus got there, and they told us that they weren't taking us all the way to our destinations by bus, only to the station after the one with the stuck train, and another train would pick us up from there. So we got there, we got on the train, the doors closed, and... nothing.

We sat there and sat there and some workmen showed up and started doing something to the outside of the train and it turned out that this train was also broken. So we sat there for like, another hour, and finally got under way. I didn't call my grandparents to let my grandpa know to come and pick me up (I'd been in touch with them throughout the evening) until we were almost there, because I didn't want him to come out for the third time only for me not to be there because we got sucked into a stray dimensional portal or something.

But finally, I got home, despite having been up for something like 36 hours, and in transit for 24 of that. My grandparents hugged the stuffing out of me, fed me supper and gave me hot tea, and then I went up to my room and passed out for something like 10 hours because seriously, sleep make feel good. I'm still a bit wibbly today, but even though it's late, I can't sleep. I'm going to try and make myself sleep in a bit anyway, because tomorrow is market day and I'm supposed to go with my grandpa.

this isn't quite as cheerful a holiday post as I wanted to make

• Just a heads up, the uploads will be delayed or somewhat sketchy for the next three weeks, because while I still have "high" speed internet here, the upload speeds are crap, and since a lot of the shows aren't getting uploaded to the usenet server I use right away, I have nowhere to wget them to the server. So, uh, I'll put up what I can, and the rest will get filled in after New Year's when I'm back in Wales.


• We went and looked at Christmas trees yesterday. I tried to lobby for a fake tree, citing savings and durability, etc., but while Grandpa said that he could probably be convinced, Gran would never go for it. We didn't buy a tree, because it's "too early." This will be my third Christmas in Poland, and putting up the tree like, a day or two before Christmas Eve hasn't stopped being weird and probably never will. Having grown up in Canada, the middle of December is the perfect time to get a tree IMO, but the traditional Polish thing to do is to put it up the day before Christmas Eve, decorate it Christmas Eve morning, and it stays up until February 2nd (Candlemas). *hands* I'm trying really hard to just keep my mouth shut and go with the flow and not question things too much ("That's just the way we do things" is the usual explanation, which is fine and dandy, but why do *I have to give up the things I want and they get everything their way?), but it's hard, you guys.


• My grandmother keeps saying "you haven't had any cake! I left some cake especially for you!" and it's like she's forgotten about the three months of diet before I left. Granted, I didn't really keep the diet in Wales, although Marta and I tried to eat healthy, and we both lost some weight, but come on, stoppit. I'm not going to have a very hard time resisting the cakes, because while I haven't cut out sugar entirely, Gran's recipes have far more sugar than they need to, so after a relatively low-sugar three months, this stuff is making my teeth hurt.


• I'm going to visit Grandma S. and the family on Monday. Gran is sick, and they're not quite sure what's wrong, so it's a doctor's visit after doctor's visit, and my aunt doesn't sound too optimistic about finding out what's wrong. I'm going to try and visit them after Christmas, possibly Boxing Day or the 27th, too. I still have no plans for New Year's Eve, and while last year was fun (a couple of classmates and some cheesy movies), at the moment I'm kinda leaning towards hiding up in my room with a bottle of champagne and watching movies on my own. I have a feeling I'm going to need some hermit time before I have to be social and see people to say goodbye before leaving.


• We're leaving from Poznań again, which means I have to get from Lubań to Wrocław, and then Wrocław to Poznań, and then to the airport. I found there's a direct shuttle bus from the train station in Poznań to the airport, so at least I've got that figured. The trip will involve either spending the night in WRO and catching a train at 4am, or arriving in POZ at 3:30am, so I'll probably try for the 4am train, or figure out if I can maybe arrive late at the airport and just wait there overnight? IDK. Here's hoping I don't run into shenanigans like I had on Wednesday again. *sigh*


• The annual Christmas Carol concert at our school is on Tuesday, so I'm going to try and swing my trip to WRO to make it there. Our institute's director always has a special Christmas lecture, and this year's is "The Natural and Supernatural History of Santa Claus," which I think is the same lecture (or similar) to the one two years ago, but they're always really cool, so I'll probably end up going anyway. And then there's some homework Marta and I have to do some research for, and I'm going to see about visiting my family in Wrocław before I go back to Lubań.


• I was going to try and get in a viewing of The Hobbit before New Year's, but seeing as the movie opens December 28th here, I might end up waiting until we're back in Wales, since IDK if I'll have the time. Enh, I've got plenty of other movies to watch and books to read, so it's not like I'll be bored. Maybe I'll even catch up on my reading a bit!


• I kinda wish I *had taken my camera with me (it got left behind to minimize the luggage weight), because it's so pretty outside and I wanna take some pictures. Have to remind Marta to bring my small camera that I left at her place so I can have something with me.


• I'm going to try and get my grandparents to watch The Sound of Music with me this year. It used to be on TV every Christmas in Canada, and my mom and I used to watch it every year. Plus, it's a musical, and I think they'll enjoy it. I stopped by the movie rental place and the dude there was all "lol, no, we don't have that," but I found a download that might be watchable, so we'll see how it looks on the giant TV downstairs.